n 1999, Shigeru Miyamoto announced "Ura Zelda", an all-in-one revision and sequel to Ocarina of Time, for the upcoming N64DD, a disk drive peripherial to the N64. Unfortunately, the N64DD flopped in Japan, and all of it's games, including Ura Zelda, never got to see the light of day. However, Miyamoto had promised that if they were not able to release Ura Zelda for the DD, it would come back one day as a special bonus for Zelda fans. Three years later, Miyamoto has made good on that promise, as Ura Zelda has been revived. Enter Ocarina of Time: Master Quest.
 
 

Jabu-Jabu gets fed very, very well.

The Story:

Civil war had struck Hyrule. The seven races fought furiously against each other, attempting to gain power. As a result of one battle in particular, wildfires broke out on Hyrule Field, and forced a young Hylian mother too flee into nearby Kokiri Forest. Badly burned, and physically exhausted, she laid at the roots of the Great Deku Tree pleading for it to protect her son. As she took her last breath, the ancient tree sensed something special in the infant, summoned the children of the forest to take them in as one of their own and to never speak of this day again.

Ten years later, a great leader united the people, and was given the throne of Hyrule. Meanwhile, the Hylian infant had grown into a boy named Link. He had befriended the other children, who remained indefinitely young, save one soul, Mido. Link was teased by this local bully insistently because he did not possess a fairy of his own, which troubled Link greatly; however, this soon changed. As the evil King of Thieves grew in power, The Great Deku Tree began to worry. Knowing that his time was near, he summoned Link by means of the fairy Navi. Telling him of his predicament, the young Hylian boy started on an adventure that would forever change the people of Hyrule and their descendants...

The Game:

In 2002 (and then in 2003 for North America and Europe), Shigeru Miyamoto and Eiji Aonuma were eager to release the next installment in the Zelda series, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, for the GameCube. As an added incentive to buy the game, Nintendo offered a bonus GameCube disc for those who preordered TWW. The bonus disc contained trailers for upcoming Nintendo titles, and the disc held a port of the N64 smash hit, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, with a smoother polish and increased frame rate. But the real incentive for getting this bonus disc was the reincarnation of the failed Ura Zelda--Ocarina of Time: Master Quest.

Master Quest was a remake of OoT, but not in the sense of graphics or audio. Granted, both of those were improved when the game had been moved onto the GCN disc, but the biggest and most remarkable, not to mention noticeable, change was the dungeons. Each dungeon from Ocarina of Time, from Inside the Deku Tree to Inside Ganon's Castle, were completed redone. Where there were rooms of hearts and rupees before, now contained enemies that you would normally meet later on in the game. The puzzles were now far more complex and challenging, for both newbies and vets of OoT, and required one to sit in front of their TV, actually thinking of how they could do everything they needed to do without messing something up. Even the Young Link dungeons like Dodongo's Cavern will leave gamers puzzled!

The other most noticeable difference in Master Quest from OoT is something not carried over from Ura Zelda, but a result of this game being on the GCN--the controls! Although it's blatantly obvious that OoT: Master Quest was not made for the GCN, Nintendo did a remarkable job of adapting the N64 controls for a GCN game. The analog stick, A button, B button and R button still serve the same purpose on the GCN controller as they did on the N64 controller, and Nintendo has changed the targeting button from Z to L now. Not so bad right? But here's where it gets tricky.

The X, Y and Z buttons serve the same purpose as the C stick, which in turn serves the same purpose as the C buttons. So on the N64 version, you would use your items via the C buttons. Now, on the GCN controller, you can do that with the X, Y and Z buttons, or with the C analog stick. But because of the C stick's flexibility, and the awkward positioning of the X, Y and Z buttons, using items can be very awkward to do, especially playing an Ocarina song. As you continue along you get used to the controls, but they still act quite clunky when compared to the N64 version of OoT.

In the end, despite some awkward controls, Ocarina of Time: Master Quest suceeded in it's mission to give new players a run for their money, and veterans of the series a refreshing and challenging new look at an old classic.