I'm back! With the Next Zelda in Line for the Chopping Block: Majora's Mask.
If you didn't know, I used to play Ocarina of Time every Sunday and write what happened inaccurately. Since I finished that, this feature's been on a little bit of a hiatus, because I wasn't sure how to continue with it. I didn't just want to continue straight into the next Zelda game, because I didn't want this to be the "Zelda-Feature".
But, time passed, and here we are. After playing Outer Wilds, and knowing the rough premise of this game, Majora's Mask very much looks like the Outer Wilds of Zelda games (that's a sentence). Sooo, I decided, fuck it.
Let's learn what a Majora is and why it has a mask!
We open up on a cinematic with the titular (I assume) mask spinning around, but then we are greeted with a sinister view:
Knew that guy was up to no good! Told you from the moment we saw him in Ocarina of Time.
...Hold on. Did they really make an entire game about the guy doing a side-pyramid scheme in their previous game? Okay. Huh. Not the direction I would have imagined.
Then the cinematic dives into showing a peaceful town
and we catch some glimpes of a very Link-looking boy sitting around as if there are no princesses to vaguely impress, and also Postman Goro
who's my new favourite character already.
But then it gets dark and night, and the camera shows a little boy(?) with the mask on, watching, uh, this
FACE MOON
That's probably fine and safe. TITLECARD
All right, time to delve into the actual game. What are we doing here?
First, we get some text
oh no, not more Hyrulian legends. I know how those end. (With bongo drums)
wait... who's this boy?
secret!?
Woah, okay, so we're really continuing straight after Ocarina, are we?
YUP! That's the Link we know and love! On some four-legged creature. I don't know where he got that. That's strange.
The forest is ominous and spooky and then these two fairies suddenly dive down and push Link off his horse.
Which I think is the first instance of fairies actually enacting a physical change upon the world? Like, actually pushing things? Huh. Also, these fairies seem mean. Which is also a new idea, you know, fairies having personality.
A lot of stuff is going on here.
But then this boy shows up:
"oh hello. Uh. Hi. I'm. Link. I... uh, Saved The World. You may have heard of me."
Mask Kid doesn't give a damn, but apparently the two fairies are working with him, so he walks over and inspects Link's hapless corpse, and finds
An ocarina. In case you had any lingering doubts this was directly after the last game. Interesting. (This also means its the same Link. Which is GREAT).
After Mask Boy has played around with it for a bit, Link realizes he better wake up and stare menacingly at the boy, to which he jumps up and steals that strange looking goat(?) Link had and rides off. Link grabs the leg and is carried along the ground for a while until he's dumped in a meadow and we get
The tense music from the chase is still going and an obvious door is at the end, but.
but
there are bushes.
So first, we spend 30 seconds, while the Mask Boy is riding off with the literally Most Powerful Object in the Universe and a four-legged oversized chicken--excuse me, cuccoo.
But no, we gotta get 40 rupees.
Then, and only then, are we ready to chase the house down.
oh that's a hole, oh we fell down it
it's a hole of... symbols? I dunno, man.
But then, the ground is revealed and the Mask Boy is floating in the air, pretty menacingly, with theatre spotlights on him
so we know he's a big deal.
He says some mean words and Link is thrust into a nightmare sequence, and when he wakes up, he's...
Got face-surgery?
I mean, we can kinda agree. It's not the worst. We've seen the worst. This is demonstrably better. Also, jumping ahead here, but when he walks now he's got this really cute dapper-dapper-dapper, that's just adorable.
Mask Boy laughs and leaves, but not before one of the fairies from before (right, don't forget the fairies), is trapped with Link.
Also
The Mask Boy's name is Skull Kid.
Which is definitely an edgy name he gave himself and forced others to call him, so I'm sticking to Mask Boy. Navi 2.0 gets all antsy about being trapped in here with Wood Link, and even pulls a Ruto on him
Yeah. Alright. Let's count that, that was about 10 minutes into the game. All right. Off to the races.
So, we get control of Link again, and walk up to the closed door, and
open it.
Just like that. The fairy, who could PUSH ME off a riding horse (what?) cannot open this door. All right.
And then, immediately after we've shown our truest door-opening prowesses, in the most obvious-and-bad twist imaginable, the fairy is immediately all like, no-don't-leave-me-behind-i-have-nothing-now-uhm-please-i'll-follow-you.
Right. Yes. Of course. I'm riveted by this possibility.
Now with a fairy around us, the game let's us have a little more gameplay (because these games apparently can't function without a fairy), so we do a few light puzzles with our new-found body.
Because it turns out that NUTTY LINK can
FLY
For a very limited time, and it's more like a gentle float and it requires a flower pad to jump out from but ignore the technicalities and just hype with me about that for a minute! HE CAN
FLY
And then at the end of that the game just casually throws one of Ocarina's best tricks in there
as if to say "no don't go, we can still do cool things, please! You won't be a wooden deku boy forever! Maybe! Who knows!"
But then. Well. Uhm. It seems we have forgotten something. Or. someone, rather.
OH CRUD.
HI. Uhm, no I'm not interested in what you're selling, please, how did you get this number, aaah
oh you're right here. I see. Uhm, how did you get in here? Where are we?
Surprising no one, this guy wants to offer a deal.
Pyramidschemer here can turn link back to his former self! That's good...
...he wants Link to get back the Ocarina from Mask Boy, and also, he wants the Mask that Mask Boy has back, because apparently, it his. Supposedly. Assumedly. Allegedly.
And also we got a 3 day deadline. Because this guy has to leave town in 3 days!
No reason! No real reason, just, don't try to find out what's happening three days, or if there's an important trial or judgement or something. no, just don't, just get it in 3 days okay? Capiche? Comprende? coolio.
So that all seems completely unsafe and not trustworthy, so naturally Link does the ONLY thing he has ever done in his life: He accepts it.
All right, we got a game! Sick. I'm actually excited about that.
The next door takes us into the town we saw in the opening cinematic! It's called "Clock Town." Okay, we got a setting. Neat.
New Navi then tells us that we should find the Great Fairy, because she'll know what to do about Mask Boy, and she's WAY stronger than him. Clearly. She's in the north part of town, so boogie.
I walk 3 steps into town before I face my first enemy
Yes, actually. It straight up attacked me when I got close. Then it launched into second strike and I dodge out of the way with my elegant wooden body and the poor creature launches haplessly into the pool beside
I do a little town exploration to try to find out where the north part of town is, and find 3 things.
1. A weird balloon guy who wants a "Moon's Tear" for his "wife", and then he'll give me his "flower".
That's not a euphemism. Honest. That's what he said.
2. There's gonna be a carnival soon? Maybe? Something about a carnival.
3. This boy:
Who... uhm... is a 40-something year old man, who believes he's a forest fairy! And he sells me maps!
I bought a map of the town for 5 rupees! I told you those 30 seconds grinding while my horse was dying paid off!
With the map, we easily find the Great Fairy's fountain (it was right next to him), and learn the horrible truth:
Right. Of course. Mask Boy is apparently more powerful than the Great Fairy. New Navi was wrong. Ok. Tatl. Sorry. You were still wrong.
And that's where we'll end it today!
Got a full town to explore next time around, in search of a missing Fairy-piece, which is sure to be eventful, so I'll leave that for the next episode.
To recap, we got a not-so-honourable quest to return ourselves to our vain childish looks, and to do that we'll steal a mask from a boy to help a pyramid-scheming salesman do God-knows-what!
We're right on track.
The Jury's still out on what a Majora is.
Read the next part here.