Sunday Morning Game Ocarina of Time Part 38

Aah, crap.

Well, shoot.

I have neither the power of silver nor a pure heart, so I'm boned. And the reason why I need to be a child? 

Link can't crawl through this hole.
They made one of the two openings in the temple a tiny hole, and the other blocked by a giant boulder I can't move. Smart design? How does anyone use this temple, then? Is it just full of children? And very strong people? Or very strong children?

Well, I need to be a child, so I think I'm smart and just song-warp back to the Temple of Time. Emphasis on think. Because this game doesn't want you to be too smart. You'll see what I mean.

I warp back, realize I've never been to Gerudo as a child so I begin running across Hyrule to the west, meanwhile stumbling upon this guy

Ey, it's the wandering running man!

He's too busy to stop and talk. He's very determined. And.. running. Just look at that face. Just look at it. Perfection in mankind. Pure Killer Instinct. A true hero.

Anyways, Gerudo Time. Cue the so--

Uhm. Right. I've never been here as a child. Well I got a pass, this'll go fine I bet.

That's it. That's all she says. Because I'm a baby. And

she's right.

There's no way Link should be let in there, he's just going to fuck it all up. So, well, we've got no other choice than tooooooo

FLY CHICKEN FLY

There was a chicken.
It was... conspicuously placed, let's say.
So I went for it. I flew across the chasm, elegantly floating mid-air, suspending all my limbs in a dance with the wind, as the bird flaps desperately, fighting for its very life

And we fall together

And fal-- wait, is that a cow?

What.

Oh, there's a person too. Much better.

I land, and gently (ahem, not so gently) toss the chicken to the side and am greeted by the most joyous expressions I've ever seen.

And what does she say?

"What are you doing all the way down here?"

Essentially. That's all she says. She doesn't acknowledge the fact that there's a cow next to her or that there's no escape from this tiny island next to the river. They're just here the same way I got here, I guess. Trusted a chicken too much. Look at that cow, that's the expression of someone who trusts chickens. I know from experience.

There's also a soft mound of soil, you know the kind I placed a magic bean into and it becomes a plant in adult-Link-land, so I think that maybe I need to plant a bean here and then come back as an adult--wait no that doesn't work. I need to be in the Temple as a Child. Sooo---

ooh that's a ladder behind the waterfall!

I crawl up like a snake-eater and find a piece-of-heart. Which, the best part of that is it refills my hearts. Which is nice. It's a fairy.

Ok, I'm stuck. I can float down the river and then i end up in Lake Hylia, which brings me no closer to The Spirit Temple. 

Soooo, I consult The Six Wise Ones find out...

oh my god.

I was very pissed when I read this. Here's the line from zeldadungeon.net, right after you enter the Spirit Temple and read the plaques:

 "Go back outside."  

Right? You think I did that, right? I went to the Timeplace and became a child. Like you do. Right?

No. Turns out, you just need to walk out of the temple.

Let me put this in another way:

The game, after telling you, very clearly that you need to be a child in order to progress, expects you to walk back to the temple of time, when you have a perfectly working fast-travel-ocarina-song-melody that does it for you.

*sigh*

So. Back to the Temple of Time, become an adult, go back to Gerudo, through the Fortress, through the Desert, and enter the Temple, to exit it again.

And look, there's 

Sheik.

Oh, now you want to teach me? All right. Give it.

That's not helpful.

I just did this to get the eye of truth. For the previous dungeon. Without which I could not be here. So I know this. You know I know this.

More boat metaphors! Maybe I should revisit that theory? Maybe it's the entire Temple that ferries souls to the netherealm. And like, every time I travel to become an adult, I actually die and end up in the death-version of Hyrule? Would make sense with all the zombies!

The plaque just told me this, game. You really are not tutorializing the right things this late in the game. I have notes--NOTES--on all the things you did not tutorialize properly. 

Owl boy! Haven't seen you in a while. What you been up to? Just... creepily observing me as I play the ocarina? (...is that a euphemism now?)

Yep. Oookkkk. Nice. Goood to know.

All right, now we know the song, Time to do the double-teleport-time-swap maneuvre, or as I like to call it: The Ocarina Twist.

And final thing about this: This interaction made me realize that Sheik is incapable of entering Temples. She literally physically cannot do so. Which is why you have to go out again to see her. All the other encounters with her have been just in front of temples, never inside. 
WHICH, if the game is doing that on purposes, actually explains a whole lot! I hope that's brought back in some meaningful way.

But who am I kidding.

Time to crawl in a hole! And die!

Oh, hi lady. 

Guess what the right thing to say here is. (By right I mean the thing that progresses the story. Not right as in the thing you should say as a sensible person).

If you guessed "Looking for the Sages" you'd be wrong because we both know that's not why Link is here. Instead, if you say the truth: "Nothing, really" You'd be correct! Apparently! Because then she's all like--oh well if you're doing nothing then you might as well help me! Because someone doing nothing is not suspicious.

Then she asks me if I'm one of Ganondorf's followers, to which you can say "What if I am?" or "I hate Ganondorf!"

Which is a strong emotional reaction from Link, I must say. That's showing more character than he's had the entire game. So that can't be right, can it?

...It is.

Ohh, huh. Ok. This is, if you don't remember, the current leader of the Gerudo Thieves in the Realm of the Future Dead. Then she says these things

Which is opposite to what the thieves sad before. They revered Ganondorf. AND Nabooru. Which means... intrigue! Drama! Excitement!

Eehh.. pffpfmmmaaahgg I'm not gonna comment on this. It's... yeah. you know. Sigh.

This is in respond to her asking my name. It's the only appropriate answer I've seen this whole game.

And then she immediately presumes to use me: She wants me to go through the hole behind her (which is another instance of this game having a character ask you to do the thing you already want to do), because there's treasure inside! What treasure?

How convenient! To leave that with which you can push the big heavy boulder inside a hole that only a child can climb through.

Actually, if that was a security measure, it's kinda clever. But, the problem is that, supposedly, there are people inside this temple (she says so (I guess they could have kids with them, hmm)). Which makes this whole thing fall apart a bit. Buut who cares, I'm getting silver gauntlets soo--

Ooh, snap. I guess I'm not!

Because there's no way Link is smart or shrewd enough to just take the gloves and run away with them. With a teleport spell or something. No, he's literally incapable of that.

She makes way for me and I can finally begin the dungeoneering that I've been waiting for this whole time!

Aaargghh fuck these boys are touch as a kid huh?

I do some more bits and pieces of puzzles but nothing super interesting as of yet, so I'll call it here. This was a longer episode than I expected considering I literally made an inch of progress (Like, I moved one room).

Buut that's for next time then! The Silver Gauntlets will be .... hers!

See ya!