Ocarina of Time: Gorons redux

[torkell]

Hear my name and tremble! I am Link! Hero of the Gorons!
Link, son of Darunia

I don't think I did all that much between the Forest Temple and the Fire Temple, though there was an odd side quest here and there to complete and some bits and pieces of the adult trading sequence. I also got the quiver upgrade from the Shooting Gallery - this is slightly harder for adult Link as the order in which the targets appear is now randomised, though only partly as the targets that come in pairs aren't split up. Gyro aiming makes this quite a bit easier than stick aiming, especially when the stick was on a worn N64 controller - I recall spending ages trying to get the perfect score on it back with the original.

At some point I also went back to the Temple of Time, where Sheik was waiting having somehow heard that I'd completed the first temple. As a reward for this he teaches me the Prelude of Light so I can warp back to the Temple of Time (with an interesting bit of foreshadowing - "The time will come when you will have to return here quickly" - another odd hint that only makes sense with a subsequent playthrough), and then disappears again so I can now return the Master Sword and return to the past. I've posted before about the rather mindbending nature of time travel in Ocarina of Time - the forward direction makes some sense, and the return to the child period at the end is also reasonable, but it's the back-and-forth travel in the middle that I've never really gotten my head round. Take the Song of Storms - you first learn it from Guru-Guru in the future, but he only knows it because you played it in the past.

Anyway, eventually it's time to leave Kakariko Village and head on up the trail to Death Mountain, which is suspiciously empty of Gorons. About the only one left is a tiny Goron rolling round and round who turns round if you get close to him, making stopping him tricky. It turns out that this Goron is also named Link - he was named after you, the legendary Dodongo Buster! Cool! Sadly he's pretty much the only Goron left as all the others have been captured by Ganondorf to be fed to a resurrected dragon, so it's off to the Fire Temple to rescue everyone with your shiny new heatproof Goron Tunic (which it turns out isn't actually required to complete the Fire Temple - speedrunners have found that if you're quick enough and carry enough fairies you can beat the time limit that appears without the tunic).

In the middle of Death Mountain crater is yet another encounter with Sheik, with another riddle and another warp song. Once again he disappears before you can quiz him about what's going on, this time by blocking Link with a wall of fire before vanishing with another Deku Nut. And finally it's time to descend into the Fire Temple!

It is something that grows over time... a true friendship. A feeling in the heart that becomes even stronger over time...
Sheik