Spring forward? Fall back? Let's Play The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons/Ages!

With their game finished, the faeries, true to their word, fix the forest again and offer us another game when we've got the spare time. But enough of that - it's dungeon time!



Oh come on, I'm sure it'll be fine. I mean, it's still standing, right?



Let's just pull this rock out here...



...and we'll just no no NO! Why did it have to fall apart now, of all times?



Don't rub it in, Maku.



Nayru's place? ...Sure, I guess I'll check it out. Not like I can do anything else at the moment...



This is the place, right? Looks pretty cozy.



Hmm...

Figures that there'd be a secret passage in this place, especially with that statue sticking out like a sore thumb. But why would there be one, I wonder?



Ahh, I get it now. Clever girl.



So there we have it! Instead of hiding it in a temple like Din, I guess Nayru decided to keep her trademark item close at home so no one would know where it was. Not bad, not bad at all.



And she even left us a recorded message too. I'm guessing that foresight is something that comes naturally with being the Oracle of Ages, but it's nice to have an important NPC who leaves us stuff ahead of time before they wind up vanishing.

Nayru tends to ramble on a bit here, which lead to... quite a few screenshots being taken, so I'll spare you the trouble of it and summarize instead. Essentially, Nayru foresaw things going down the way they did, so she left her item here with a message so that the chosen hero (Link) would have something to travel through time with. Along with the Harp, she also included a record of the song needed to open up those portals we've been going through...



Namely the Echo Tune. Out of the melodies we'll get for the instrument, the Echo Tune is probably the weakest, but right now we just need something for us to pass through time with and so it'll have to make do for now.



After we leave Nayru's house, the Maku Tree pages us again and gives us a hint as to how we'll get inside the next dungeon. Even though it's crumbled in the present, it might still be intact in the past and so we'll make use of our newest item to travel back to take advantage of this.



But since we're still in the past, we might as well take some time for some minigames, right?



Introducing the sharpshooting minigame, which, despite its name, revolves more around a hyrulean version of baseball than shooting a firearm.

The game is pretty simple, overall. Ten blocks will form an upside-down U shape around Link at the top of the screen and the mechanism in the center will fire a ball downward. In order to score points, you'll have to hit the ball with the sword and try and aim for it to hit any of the blocks shown. Each block has a different amount of points awarded however, with blue blocks and faeries adding to the score while red blocks and imps subtract from it, so you'll have to time your swing and position correctly in order to score big-time.



The minigame gets a little annoying after a while, but the prizes for winning are very, very worth it. A score between 251-350 points nets us Gasha Seeds at a significant discount (10 rupees instead of 150) and anything above 350 points gets us some rings. As such, you'll want to spend at least some time with it at some point in order to take advantage of what it has to offer.



Anyway, once we've finished milking the game for what it's worth, we drop by the neighbourhood post office to see what's up.



It seems like the Postman's been having trouble making deliveries without a clock to tell him the time. We pass on the Poe Clock to him and in return we get some stationery as a result.



Oh hey, a Gasha Tree. I must've forgotten that I planted it back in the first installment. Since I'm already loaded with Gasha Seeds from the ball minigame, I cut down the seed and plant another one in its place.



You know, all of this adventuring has made me tired. Might as well take a break at the outhouse-



-Gah!

Oh wait, it's just that... guy... hand... thing? Whatever, he's from Majora's Mask, and I'm guessing he's been travelling to explore the world's toilets, I guess? Man, I don't even know anymore.

Whatever it is, it still needs some paper to wipe himself with. Seeing as we've got some stationery on-hand from the Postman* I guess we might as well give it to him...

*And seeing as the very same worked in Majora's Mask, but shh.



...



...



Uh...



Oh gross. Gross. That's just nasty!



Take that, you weirdo.



Well, now that most of the pre-dungeon stuff has been dealt with, might as well get all of those rings we've got appraised.



Out of these five rings, only two of the bunch are ones that we don't have already. The first one is the Blue Holy Ring, which negates damage from fireballs shot by Zola's, which is situational to the point of near-uselessness since they pop up rarely and are easy to dodge. The other ring, however, is much more interesting - the Light Ring (L-2) allows Link to shoot sword beams when he's got at least three hearts less than his max instead of requiring a full meter like it usually does. This mostly means that you can use the sword beam with much greater frequency once you upgrade the sword, though there's one more ring out there that does this job even better...

Anyway, so! Now that we're back in time and got all of our ducks in a row, it's time we move onto the real dungeon.



However, we're not along in the western woods here - it seems that Queen Ambi has sent out her guards and advisors to look for Mystery Seeds by request of Nayru/Veran, and, in reward, she's promised a bomb bag to however finds it.



And hey! It seems we'll need bombs in order to get into the dungeon in the first place. Putting two and two together, I guess we've got ourselves some seeds to find.



Further down the line, we come across a bush and burn it, as per standard protocol. We come out lucky this time, as burning it up reveals a path leading to our fourth Piece of Heart.



Anyway, we reach the Mystery Seed tree in little time, but it's blocked off for now. Looks like we'll have to find another path.



Which doesn't take too much longer, as the next few screens over leads us to another underground path. Along the way we even pick up some cash too. Anyway, our job's done now so let's get the hell out of here now.

Good thing that a guard captain's been following us, as he saves us the trip back. Nice guy, that captain.



Ohh man, we're going to see the queen.



It seems she's happy to see that we brought her the Mystery Seeds Veran's looking for.



And with that, we get our first set of Bombs! Why we couldn't just by them from the Town Shop (especially since they'll now become available after this point) is beyond me, but we've done our duty and are ready to roll. Let's go, then.



Aw geez, we were suckered again. Screw you, Veran.

Now that Veran's got her Mystery Seeds (which she finds unpleasant - an important hint that will come into play much, much later), she moves into phase two of her plan. She tells Ambi at this point that she'll now stop time with the help of the seeds in order to try and force the Black Tower to be built faster (I guess before she was just slowing it down?) and tricks Ambi into agreeing by promising that she'll be remembered as a great Queen.

But there's not a damn thing that we can do about it for now, so I guess we'll just have to get back to work collecting those essences.



At this point, I decide to take a trip back to the first dungeon with Bombs in tow in order to revisit that room we had to pass up. We bump into Maple along the way (though she doesn't drop anything of any interest)...



...and we're there. I try the bombs, but they don't work?



At that point I realize that I was being silly and forgot that you had to use Ember Seeds to break through. Whoops! Oh well, at least the ring there was a duplicate of one we've already got, so no harm, no foul.



Anyway, without further ado, we pick up a few more Mystery Seeds and bomb our way into the second dungeon, Wing Dungeon.



Right off the bat, the game throws a few Spiked Beetles our way to tip over. We're off to a good start, I'd say!

A little bit afterwards, we come across another color block puzzle. However, this time it's a little bit trickier, as pushing it straight onto the switch gives us a blue flame instead of the red flame we want. In order to get the right color, you have to shuffle the block around a bit at the start so that the red side will land on the switch.



It wouldn't be an Oracle game without a track puzzle at some point, now would it?



A few moblins later, and we snatch our first key from the dungeon in mid-fall. I blame A Link to the Past for this quirk, honestly.



Head back further into the dungeon brings us to another cracked wall, and you know what that means: bombs! Bringing down the wall leads us to another chest, giving us the Dungeon Map.



Anyway, with a key in hand, it's time we push open the locked door we passed by earlier and head into the next half of the dungeon.



Oh my, Ropes too? Note that we have to take them out here - the block in the top-right corner is a trick block, and won't open up until we've taken out everything else in the room. We grab the compass lying there for now...



...but otherwise we'll be heading south to explore that end of the dungeon first.

Jumping puzzles, thwomps... I wonder what item we'll get in this dungeon, hmm?



More ropes, another key... so far, it's pretty standard stuff in here. I'm honestly strugglign to find things to say for this dungeon.



We take a ride on a cart further into the dungeon...



...and here's the mini-boss, Swoop.



Swoop's one of the hardest minibosses in the game, all-told. It's hard to predict his movement when you first fight him, as you don't quite expect him to home in on your position when he swoops down on you when he already is while he's flying, so you're bound to take a hit or two when you first fight him learning about this quirk. In addition to that, he also knocks out a few tiles in the floor when he swoops to the ground, so you have to avoid the holes he makes so that you don't fall through the floor and start the whole fight over.

My best advice is to just keep moving and relegate your attacks to (what else?) Spin Attacks. As long as you're on the run from him when he attacks, usually you'll be moving fast enough that he'll miss you when he hits the ground. Once he connects, you can just switch direction and nail him with a Spin Attack and wait for the next pass, and five hits is about enough to take him out.



Like any other miniboss, Swoop leaves a shortcut back to the entrance, though sometimes a misplaced hole can pop up like this. Though I wonder what would happen if you stepped on it anyway... hmm...



Anyway, once he's been put down, we head through to the north door and head down the stairs. You know, since the block is locked and the other staircase leads to a dungeon full of stalfos and broken bones.



Jumping puzzles? Steps leading downwards? Looks like we might be reaching the end of how much of this dungeon we can explore...

...at least until we stumble across a Roc's Feather lying around! Hooray! You have no idea how long I've been waiting to pick this baby up again (though the lack of a L-2 makes me sadface ).



Jumping on the Thwomp brings us to a small cache of rupees hiding away up near the time. Hooray again!



Now that we can use the Roc's Feather, we can solve this jumping puzzle here (which is solved by leaping over the tile until it matches the block's colour, but I'm going to backtrack a little further first just in case. Spoilers: I end up going the wrong way. Whoops!



Near the staircase upwards we come across another jumping puzzle. Matching the tiles with the blocks nets us another small key, which we can use to unlock that locked block we saw earlier.



Like so.



Another day, another cart puzzle. We have to jump through this section here first and change the tile's colour to blue to open up the path first, but that's just a hop, skip and jump away from the start.



We can head north through this section here, but we might as well pick up the Gasha Seed before we head on first. Really, it's like they wanted to make that Heart Piece easier to find in this game...

This puzzle stumped me for the longest time, and it's all because I completely forgot that you could push the pots at this point. Even though I played Seasons first and the puzzle in Poison Moth's Lair should have tipped me off onto this. And the fact that there's a clear path to the switch in question.

Yeah.

...



Well whatever, that's all in the past now. Instead, let's get to work on this puzzle here.



The trick here is that, in order to move the statues into position here, you have to get the tile at the top to match their colour first. Ideally, the pattern should be yellow-blue-red for ease of solving, though you can switch blue and red around since only the yellow statue needs to be moved in first. Once we finish this up, we grab the key and move on.



Further in, we come into this room here full of chameleon Gels which can only be harmed when the colour of the tiles don't match themselves. This is a little annoying, since you've got to keep switching the colour around while trying to take them out, but thankfully there's enough margin for error to prevent it from becoming truly frustrating.



Once they're down, we take the Boss Key for ourselves. Is it can be boss time now please?



No. Not quite yet, at least. Remember that point downstairs that we passed up earlier to backtrack? Yeah, whoops.



Heading further past the part we passed by earlier brings us to yet another set of tracks to navigate. We just have to hit the switch here in order to get the cart to stop in that room, thankfully, so no annoying criss-crossing today.



Bombing the wall to the east nets us the last key we'll need for now.

Once we're back in the other room, we just push the coloured block onto the switch in order to open the route back up and we'll just ride the cart right back to the staircase earlier.



You'll have to excuse me now as I take the time to dig up a few hearts outside, as I have no intention of having to do this entire section over again when I'm so close to finishing up.



Once we're filled up, we just open the Boss Door up, climb the stairs...



...and take on the boss, Head Thwomp. *Groooaaann*



The battle against Head Thwomp is fairly unorthodox, at least as far as bosses go in the Zelda series. Instead of charging up to him and attacking like we did in Seasons, or even just doing the weakspot-attack-repeat pattern like later on in the series, Head Thwomp's gimmick is that it all relies on timing and a good number of bombs.

He's got four faces on him with different effects with each, and knowing the order is key to winning. In order to attack him, you have to toss a bomb into the top of him and he'll start to spin around like a roulette wheel, before coming to a stop on any of his faces. The green, blue and purple faces all attack in a variety of ways - by spitting up podoboos, shooting fireballs around the room, and slamming into the ground and causing a cave-in in that order - while the red face actually hurts him when he lands on it, so you have to time it so that the bomb lands in him just as he turns onto that shocked face of his in order to win.



Even though I tend to prefer the boss fights in Seasons over Ages, the battles this game has going for itself are still pretty cool in their right. Despite being the very kind of puzzle fights that I've ragged on earlier in this LP, there's still some element of skill to attacking them that helps keep them from getting boring. Head Thwomp here, for example, tests you on your precision and timing, so even though you have to repeat the gimmick in order to win it's never like the fight's handed to you once you've figured it out. Nintendo should really take notes on how Capcom does these kinds of fights.

It also helps that the fight itself is an homage to the spinning Goron pot from Ocarina of Time, what with the varying faces thing and all. Honestly, as far as fights go in these games, they really pulled this one off well.



On an unrelated note, I wish animated avatars were allowed on the forum so I could get to use this guy here. Ah well, them's the breaks.

Anyway, once we've tossed in a bomb, the Head Thwomp hits the ground with one final thud and gives up his Heart Container.



And with him out of the way, there's nothing left for us here but to pick up our second Essence of Time, the Ancient Wood!



Man, Turnip's going to have a field day with this one, I know it.



Well, we're done with this place now, so I guess we'll be heading off for Crescent Island for a nice tropical getaway.

But that will have to wait for next time.



Next time: The Moonlit Grotto and the Echoing Howl!

The Hand in the Hole is the worst Zelda character.

Because he gives you a bag full of poo.

hold up! that's mighty presumptuous!
I firmly believe it is merely a bag full of stink, as advertised.

also, I hate the battle with Head Thwomp. it's clever and all, but split-second timing and platforming are not what this game engine was made for

Same here. I don't even find the concept very novel, and in execution, it's the worst Zelda boss ever.

I'm also in the hating Head Thwomp camp. The timing on the last hit is beyond frustrating.

igi, what am I supposed to say about a car air freshener? I mean, they're kinda dumb looking, but?

I... don't remember? I think it had something to do with the [Seed of Life] when I typed it, but eh. I was tired that day, so sue me.

BTW, Updates should resume by tonight, once I get everything cobbled together.

Bah. Anyway, last time we were tricked into delivering Mystery Seeds to further Veran's plan, travelled back in time to loot a dungeon before we were born, and finally picked up one of the few worthwhile items in the game, the Roc's Feather! Oh, and I also left the thread hanging for a week for no damn good reason, but that's all in the past now. Er, figuratively speaking, of course.



Now that we've got a means to leap over these damnable holes, it's time we explore the countryside a bit and try and unravel a few secrets. So far, nothing really shows up...



...at least until Maple flies by for the time-honoured tradition of colliding with Link. How she managed to get back to this era is still up to debate (time portal? magic? Lavos?), but who cares? Let the scramble begin!



Fifteen seconds later, and we come out of the raid victorious. Oh Maple, if only you didn't forget to bring your vacuum with you when you came to Labrynna, this wouldn't have happened.



Oh hey, a Gasha Patch. Might as well plant something while we're here...



And we pick up a Piece of Heart along the way, too! Not bad. Might as well head back to Lynna City and restock a bit.



But what's this, I wonder?



Oh my, it seems I've stumbled across the GBA shop. As you can imagine, it can only be unlocked if we're playing the game on the GameBoy Advance, however it's mostly stocked with novelty items (or rather, rings) so it's mostly an easter egg for anyone playing on a GBA. But what are the items, you ask?

Let's find out!



The GBA Time Ring is mostly just a souvenir from the shop, and doesn't have a special ability to warrant it being carried along. The Whimsical Ring is a little more unique, however - it lowers the strength of Link's sword when he attacks, but occasionally it'll deal a critical hit as well. Personally, I don't bother with it because of the luck factor, but hey, go with whatever works best for you.



Anyway, emulating the game on the GBA is washing out the colours a bit so let's switch back to the regular mode for now.



Let's just switch this off like so...



...and we're back to normal.



Now that we've got the Roc's Feather, we can cross over this stream here to the south of Lynna City and meet a rather scholarly fellow named Cheval.



He's, uh, a pretty morbid fellow, that Cheval. However, his goal to create water-proof rope and Flippers may very well prove to be of use for us. But how?

I know, let's ask Ralph! So tell us: what's the skinny on this Cheval guy?



Geez, I take it that death's going to be a common theme for this episode, huh? Anyway, graveyard: check. Guess we'll be heading back there for our next lead, then. Thanks Ralph.



Second screen into the graveyard, and we run into Moosh getting mugged by a bunch of Ghinis. Maybe if we walk away very quietly...



Damn, guess we'll have to fight then.



Charge!



Fifteen seconds later, the ghosts are down and Moosh is showering us with praise. Yep, all in a day's work.



And with that, he helps us fly over the hole-ridden plot to the north to reach - surprise, surprise - Cheval's grave. Down we go into the... watery... depths? Why is there so much water here?

Well, anyway. Looks like we won't have to bother with any time-travel twinkery this time - Cheval completed his inventions ahead of time and saved us the trouble! First up are the Flippers, which finally let us swim through deep water and save us from a lot of cheap falls. Hooray!



And with that, we can swim to Cheval's other invention, his water-proof rope!



Well, time to head back. Since we've got ourself some waterproof rope and a pair of flippers, I guess we're ready to head for Crescent Island?



Nope, we'll still need a raft first, and Rafton (heh) here will be the guy to help us.



At least, after we've found ourselves a sea chart to get there. Honestly, isn't this getting a little silly at this point? Couldn't Link, in theory, just fumble his way to the island himself instead of doing tedious legwork that amounts to collecting a set of MacGuffins that won't come into play at all once this part of the game reachs its conclusion?

Yeah, yeah, anyway...



Oh goodie, it looks like Ralph's been tailing us again, this time calling us out on our lolly-gagging. He mentions some weird guy having secret charts, but that information's hardly of any use. Screw you, Ralph!



Oh, hey. It's Ricky too? What's with all of the sidekick cameos today?

You lose them every day, Ricky. At this rate, you'll have lost your gloves more often than you'll have used them.



Right, guess I'll go find them, then. They can't have gone too far - just leave it to Link and me as we put our extraordinary sleuthing skills to work. We'll track down those gloves in no time.



...Seriously?



Ricky, they were buried under some dirt. Hell, I found them on my first try. Did you really have trouble finding them, or were you just being a dick?



Well, if he's offering a ride, it wouldn't make sense to not take it. Up, up, and away!



No offense Tingle, but I've already wasted enough time gathering doodads to cross the ocean to the south and I don't want to spend any more listening to you rehash your lines from Majora's Mask in yet another half-assed cameo. So please, just hand me the chart already and let's move on with our lives, all right?



Thank you.



Figures. We step out for a second, and Rafton completes the raft in record time.

Ooh, almost forgot to plant this Gasha Seed here. All right, now let's go.



Even though Rafton's raft lets us cross the water with little effort, the whirlpools and jellyfish floating around on the waters limits our options for exploration somewhat. So, with that in mind, there's little we can do but head further east where the waters are cleaner.



Which, of course, leads us into a thunder (monkey?) storm that gets us shipwrecked. Today... is not a good day.

LATER...



Hmm? You guys saved Link? Huh, thanks. But why are you giving me that shifty look?



Wait a sec... you don't mean... oh you bastards.



I'll be blunt - this part of the game is irritating as all hell. Fetch quests in and of themselves are annoying enough, but having your equipment stripped from you just magnifies to infuriating levels. There's nothing quite as frustrating as being bombared by levers while you're missing a sword.



Thankfully, it looks like we've got some muscle on our side helping us get our stuff back. But who...?



Hey, it's Rosa! It seems like she's gone on a trip across the country while we were off gallavanting across Labrynna, and she's dropped by here at the perfect time.

With that, we pick up the first of our stolen goods. That's one down, but how many more to go?



Rosa's enjoying her independence as she travels around, so sadly we'll have to wait until later for another date. Oh well.



With the shovel, we can dig our way to this guy here.



Hmm... you know, maybe these guys aren't as bad as I thought. I'm still pissed about the stolen goods thing, but it's seeming more and more like they're just kleptomaniacal than outright malicious. Oh well, that's two down now.



And, more importantly, we can defend ourselves now. Take that, levers! And your little octoroks, too!



Our shield, sadly, has gone AWOL, so we'll have to settle for buying another one from the Deku Scrub here. Damn you, monkey storms!

Finally, there's the rest of our items. The thieving bastard is asking for an outrageous price of 20 Scent Seeds and Mystery Seeds for the both of them, but settles for our shovel for now. Really, Link should just gut the jerk, take his stuff back and be done with it, but for now we'll just have to play it his way.



Heading around to the side hear and lifting our way past brings us to our bombs next. And finally too, since we've got some asploding to do.



Like so. On an unrelated note, is anyone else perturbed by the sheer ease these Gasha Seeds are being found?



With our bombs now back in our possession, we lay another one and bomb our way into another cave on the island, though we'll need to pick up the Roc's Feather before we can explore it.



After that there's just one more wall to bring down, and this one brings us to...



The Wild Tokay, yet another minigame to play before we proceed.



Namely for the Scent Seedling here, which we'll need to plant, grow, and harvest from in order to get back one of our items from the shady trader to the north. Well, since we're locked into participating we might as well try...

The game itself is simple in execution, and starts out pretty easy at first. The gist of the game here is that we'll have to toss large chunks of meat to the Tokay wandering by, and we'll have to make sure that each and every single one gets one before they leave. If we miss one, it's game over, but that shouldn't happen with how slow-moving these Tokay are... right?



Wrong. After you win the first round and grab the Scent Seedling, the Tokay become noticably faster afterwards, roughly at the same pace as Link. This, in itself, wouldn't be bad, if not for the fact that they'll also start appearing in pairs like in the screenshot above, which require pixel-perfect timing and reflexes in order to make sure you don't fail the round outright. Either by themselves wouldn't be too bad, but both of them together make this easily the most frustrating minigame in the entire game.



At least we get some good prizes from it though. But otherwise, fuck the Wild Tokay.



Once we've got the Scent Seedling, we drop the Bracelet off for the Feather and head back to the cave we passed by earlier.



And hey-o, we've got our Flippers back now.



Now that we've got our Flippers back, we can trade our Feather back for our Bracelet again (sigh) and head into a sunken passage blocked off by rocks.



And with that, we grab our Seed Satchel again. Now that we've got some Mystery Seeds, we can grab our Feather back fair-and-square, leaving our Shovel and Harp of Ages to pick up.

Yep.



And with that, we pick up our Harp of Ages as well. Looks like all we have left now is the shovel...



But before we warp forward in time, we'll just take the time to plant our Scent Seedling in the Tokay hatchery so we'll have some nice Scent Seeds waiting for us in the Future. That Link, he's always thinking ahead.



And with that, let's do the time warp again!



Huh, that was quick.



And there we go. God, that was irritating, not to mention a complete waste of time. Worst. Sidequest. Ever.

Thankfully, it's not too long later that an opportunity presents itself...



...an opportunity for revenge.



Hah! That'll show you for stealing my stuff and forcing me to jump through hoops getting them back! Never mess with the Link.



Wait, that wasn't supposed to happen...



Damn it.



Well, whatever. We're all but done here now. With all of our stuff back in our possession (except for our Shield - where the heck did it go, anyway?) it's time we got back to the real reason we came here in the first place.



Yep. It's time we moved onto the Moonlit Grotto and picked up another Essence of Time.