25th February 2003, 1:02 PM
Two weird changes I just noticed:
Okay, I played N64 OOT just to look around and see what's different (besides everything looking fuzzy now :D). It turns out there is ONE place where the music is actually different. That's inside the Fire Temple. In the N64 version, there are these people chanting some weird cultish stuff. In the GCN version, that seems to have been replaced with some groaning type sounds, like the earth itself is in pain.
The other thing is the design on the mirror shield. In the N64 version, the top part has a large crecent moon with a small star within the crecent. However, the GCN version has what I can say looks most like the design on the mask of truth on the shield instead.
Anyway, I don't see why they made these changes, but I guess they just kinda felt like doing something a little more than level editing. Oh well, both shields and both fire temple songs sound cool.
I will say this. Some of those adult temples really had some puzzles that made me puzzle and puzzle until my puzzler was sore. However, usually it all ended with me looking up and noticing some switch or something I missed before. I find that even the small dungeons (ice dungeon, gerudo training grounds) were changed.
Here's my review of the changes. They didn't change the map layout of any of the dungeons, only the puzzles. They did do a good job of changing the puzzles and making new kinds of puzzles to solve (mooo). My opinion is that, for a freebie, this is a very nice thing they gave us. However, when stacked against the "master quest" of Zelda 1 (which you can get to by either beating the normal quest, or by cheating :D and just naming your character ZELDA), it isn't nearly as major an edit. I knew not to expect any overworld changes, but I had expected the map layout to be different, and even the order you get the items in from those dungeons to be different (that would have a major impact on how you solve puzzles, don't ya think?). That's exactly what Zelda 1 did, and wow did that feel like a new game. In fact, Zelda 1 actually did edit the overworld, though only by like 15% I'd say. You had to look for dungeons in new places, you had to learn a whole new map layout for those dungeons, and you had to deal with getting items in a totally different order (it took until the 3rd dungeon I believe for you to get the bow in Z1 MQ) to solve the new puzzles. At least one dungeon had no apparent link between any of the rooms, and wow that one was tough, since in MQ of Z1 you get the book BEFORE you get the magic wand. There was even a new enemy, the red bubble, which would apply a curse to you that didn't wear off with time. You needed a potion or a fairy to dispell it and use your sword again.
Then again, I say all this realizing I got OOT MQ for free, and didn't have to pay for it (well, then again MQ of Z1 came with Zelda 1 to start with...), and that they weren't making money off this game in either territory. With all that in mind, this WAS a very fun modification of OOT to play. It's still very lovely so long as you don't make the mistake of putting it against Z1's Master Quest (I think I'll officially call the second quest of Zelda 1 Master Quest from now on :D), since that was and still is the GREATEST prize for beating a game I've ever seen (SMB's little modifications to the existing levels was nice, and came first, but that was like 2 or 3 changes total, hardly something majorly revising all the levels). OOT MQ is indeed certainly worth $15. It's also way ahead of the little bonus for beating Zelda 2 (you got to keep all your spells).
I just hope one day a new Zelda will have such an MQ as Zelda 1 built right in from the start... Then again, I'm sure that at this point such a thing would be a bit harder to do than during the days of Zelda 1 :D.
Okay, I played N64 OOT just to look around and see what's different (besides everything looking fuzzy now :D). It turns out there is ONE place where the music is actually different. That's inside the Fire Temple. In the N64 version, there are these people chanting some weird cultish stuff. In the GCN version, that seems to have been replaced with some groaning type sounds, like the earth itself is in pain.
The other thing is the design on the mirror shield. In the N64 version, the top part has a large crecent moon with a small star within the crecent. However, the GCN version has what I can say looks most like the design on the mask of truth on the shield instead.
Anyway, I don't see why they made these changes, but I guess they just kinda felt like doing something a little more than level editing. Oh well, both shields and both fire temple songs sound cool.
I will say this. Some of those adult temples really had some puzzles that made me puzzle and puzzle until my puzzler was sore. However, usually it all ended with me looking up and noticing some switch or something I missed before. I find that even the small dungeons (ice dungeon, gerudo training grounds) were changed.
Here's my review of the changes. They didn't change the map layout of any of the dungeons, only the puzzles. They did do a good job of changing the puzzles and making new kinds of puzzles to solve (mooo). My opinion is that, for a freebie, this is a very nice thing they gave us. However, when stacked against the "master quest" of Zelda 1 (which you can get to by either beating the normal quest, or by cheating :D and just naming your character ZELDA), it isn't nearly as major an edit. I knew not to expect any overworld changes, but I had expected the map layout to be different, and even the order you get the items in from those dungeons to be different (that would have a major impact on how you solve puzzles, don't ya think?). That's exactly what Zelda 1 did, and wow did that feel like a new game. In fact, Zelda 1 actually did edit the overworld, though only by like 15% I'd say. You had to look for dungeons in new places, you had to learn a whole new map layout for those dungeons, and you had to deal with getting items in a totally different order (it took until the 3rd dungeon I believe for you to get the bow in Z1 MQ) to solve the new puzzles. At least one dungeon had no apparent link between any of the rooms, and wow that one was tough, since in MQ of Z1 you get the book BEFORE you get the magic wand. There was even a new enemy, the red bubble, which would apply a curse to you that didn't wear off with time. You needed a potion or a fairy to dispell it and use your sword again.
Then again, I say all this realizing I got OOT MQ for free, and didn't have to pay for it (well, then again MQ of Z1 came with Zelda 1 to start with...), and that they weren't making money off this game in either territory. With all that in mind, this WAS a very fun modification of OOT to play. It's still very lovely so long as you don't make the mistake of putting it against Z1's Master Quest (I think I'll officially call the second quest of Zelda 1 Master Quest from now on :D), since that was and still is the GREATEST prize for beating a game I've ever seen (SMB's little modifications to the existing levels was nice, and came first, but that was like 2 or 3 changes total, hardly something majorly revising all the levels). OOT MQ is indeed certainly worth $15. It's also way ahead of the little bonus for beating Zelda 2 (you got to keep all your spells).
I just hope one day a new Zelda will have such an MQ as Zelda 1 built right in from the start... Then again, I'm sure that at this point such a thing would be a bit harder to do than during the days of Zelda 1 :D.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)