The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Master Quest
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| The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time Master Quest | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Nintendo EAD / NST |
| Publisher(s) | Nintendo |
| Designer(s) | Shigeru Miyamoto |
| Release date(s) | February 18, 2003 |
| Genre(s) | Action Adventure |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: E (Everyone) OFLC: G8+ |
| Platform(s) | GameCube |
| Media | 1 × Nintendo GameCube Game Disc |
a version with both The Wind Waker and the bonus disc packaged together that was only available in a Nintendo GameCube bundle. In Europe and Australia, the disc came in the same case as the initial pressings of The Wind Waker.
Contents |
[edit] Gameplay
The Master Quest contains the same storyline as the original, but includes altered dungeon layouts and more powerful enemies; the parts outside the dungeons remain the same. There are no new enemies. However, the player has to deal with stronger enemies earlier in the game. All end-of-dungeon boss battles remain the same, and the bosses retain the same number of hit points. The alterations concerning the dungeon maps contain the addition of other/stronger enemies in several rooms and slightly different room layouts (items are placed on different locations, and puzzles have to be solved in another manner). Some examples include new switches or group of enemies to defeat in order to unlock a door. However, key puzzle elements that are part of a dungeon's structure cannot be changed – this includes the dead Dodongo's eyes, the ship in Shadow Temple, and pounding the pillar in Fire Temple. In many cases, knowledge of the original game can be a hindrance rather than a help, and trying to solve puzzles the way they are done in the original leads only to a trap or useless treasure chest (containing one rupee, freezing ice or something similar).
[edit] History of Master Quest
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was originally developed for the Nintendo 64 Disk Drive (64DD), which would have afforded the developers 64MB of space. However, when the 64DD was repeatedly delayed, the game was then modified to fit on a 32MB cart. The cartridge shipped with 64DD "hooks" so that later additional content could be patched in using a 64DD disk.
[edit] Ura Zelda
Ura Zelda (which roughly translates as "Another Zelda") was announced as a Nintendo 64DD expansion disk for use in conjunction with Ocarina of Time. It was designed so that the original Ocarina of Time cartridge would be plugged into the main Nintendo 64 console while the Ura Zelda expansion disk would be plugged into the 64DD that sat underneath the console. Upon the insertion of the Ura Zelda expansion disk the 64DD disk would act as a patch to Ocarina of Time. The title screen would change slightly, adding a Triforce icon and "Ura Zelda" on the bottom of the logo indicating that Ura Zelda was now loaded. The size of this patch was supposedly about 32-64 megabytes, and due to the smaller maximum size of Nintendo 64 cartridges, the game could not otherwise be released on a cartridge.
Eventually, due to repeated delays in production and development, Ura Zelda's release as a 64DD add-on was scrapped, even as the game was finishing production. As a result, there is no 64DD version of this game available to the general public. Due to public demand for the completed game however, Ura Zelda was eventually released on the Nintendo GameCube as the Master Quest. However, the Master Quest released for the GameCube was most likely not the original release, as the 64DD version was supposed to do more than just change the dungeons; the Ura Zelda was also supposed to make the game longer, add dungeons, add items, add attacks and magic spells, and altogether expand the game.
[edit] Emulation bugs
There were a few setbacks in the Nintendo GameCube version. Since the game was not truly ported in the technical sense, (as in being altered and optimized for the console in question) but merely running under emulation, there were some minor inaccuracies in the presentation of both Ocarina of Time and Master Quest due to flaws in Nintendo's emulator.[citation needed] For example, the controls are not as tight or responsive as they were in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Also, certain sound effects were altered.[citation needed]
Additionally, due to the nature of the programming, it was discovered that the ROM image of the game could be extracted from the disc, which could then be used in any Nintendo 64 emulator or game-copying device.[citation needed]
