Hello everybody, I hope you all have had a good weekend. This week, my brother was on vacation so I haven’t continued our Elden Ring Seamless co op playthrough. Instead, I have started playing the Persona 3 remake. My only prior experience with the series is Persona 5, but with that in mind ive been enjoying it so far. The dungeon design is very archaic, as you can only make RNG generated floors so exciting, but I have enjoyed the cast of characters I’ve met so far. The one thing I havent liked is that all the social links are in the same time slot, which feels incredibly overwhelming at times. Anyway, hope you all have a good week ✌️
Been playing Ocarina of Time, and I’m in the home stretch—this is a (long-winded) gameplay diary of my two sessions from this past week, but I was also hoping that someone could give me some general pointers on tracking down the last 13 Gold Skulltulas, one final Piece of Heart, and a key item I think I’m missing (see bolded text towards the bottom). I know I could just pull up one of a zillion strategy guides and get the answer, but I want to still give myself the chance to find these last things using my own brain, and I also find it much more gratifying to connect with people through this lovely game.
spoilers for late game in Ocarina of Time
…I’ve been a fool.
I was treating Nabooru’s dialogue like it was Skyrim dialogue, and so I never selected the last dialogue option (“Nothing, really”) because I thought it was just an “exit dialogue” option. Well, at least I figured it out in the end lol. This is really a classic me blunder, missing the obvious thing and then going over everything else with a fine-tooth comb.
Before that I ran around doing a bit of cleanup (got a few more Skulltula, grabbed the Piece of Heart from Death Mountain Caldera, got the Big Quiver from getting 1500 points in the horseback archery minigame), but nothing too involved. Once I got into the Spirit Temple as Young Link, I didn’t have too much trouble, although I did end up needing to use a Blue Potion for the first time against the miniboss at the end. Getting the Silver Gauntlets answered my question about how the heck I was supposed to get up to that chest on the Colossus, and I saw poor Nabooru get captured by the two witches, who I’ve been anticipating ever since I saw them in the attract screen.
Once I switched back to Adult Link, I first went and chucked all the rocks near Hyrule Castle (didn’t seem to do anything), then headed for Kakariko Village to chuck the stone that’s up on the windmill ledge, but I was surprised to find the town ablaze! I wondered what the deal was with it always being rainy after finishing the Fire Temple, but I guess it was a portent of this greater evil about to escape its confines. During my cleanup run, I actually noticed that there was a warp point in the graveyard and wondered how I’d get up there, and then Sheik gave me the answer not too long after. Kinda surprised the townspeople don’t comment on their town being temporarily ablaze, but ah well.
Rather than go to the Shadow Temple, though, I continued on my whirlwind rock tour, chucking the lone stone in Hyrule Field where that one lesser Poe hangs out (again, nothing there), but I finally got results with the stone to the left of the Gerudo Valley bridge, although it was pretty underwhelming (an Octorok and about 40 Rupees in a small diving pool).
Finally, I went back to the Gerudo Training Course and got the final Small Key, earning me the Ice Arrows! I did end up getting swallowed by a Like Like for the first time, and I was surprised to learn that it not only takes your shield but also your tunic (!!), which answers my question about why you can buy them if they’re given to you for free, but thankfully I also discovered that it drops them after being defeated. Also, it was pretty cheeky to have the obvious chest be booby trapped with a freeze spell and require you to use the Lens of Truth to find the actual chest with the key!
Next play session, I’ll tackle the Adult Link side of the Spirit Temple. Only 1½ temples to go, then perhaps some indeterminate endgame, and finally…Ganon!
Adult Link Spirit Temple time! On the first floor, after clearing the Silver Rupee section with the boulders and entering the room that just has a chest in it, I immediately went, “…no way it’s that simple.” And sure enough, a Like Like dropped from the ceiling! But since I was ready, it didn’t get me.
Pretty smooth sailing the whole way through, I’d say. The first phase of the final boss took a while, since it was sort of a crapshoot whether the other twin would be in range for me to reflect the attack at them (I’m sure there’s a technique to it), but otherwise it was straightforward. I know that this is more or less a tutorial for the final boss fight (I don’t remember exactly how it goes, but I know there’s some reflecting of light or attacks or something).
One thing I find slightly disappointing is that the townspeople of Goron City and Gerudo Fortress don’t have any different dialogue after you finish their respective temples (save for Darunia’s son, I think), although at least the carpenters had something to say about Nabooru. The poor Zora especially get the shaft, with their city still frozen after their temple’s cleared. Anyhow, after chatting with everyone, there didn’t seem to be much else to do but head for the Shadow Temple!
Same vibes as the well dungeon, I see! I still haven’t quite mastered the best/fastest way to take out that creepy miniboss with the hands coming out of the ground, so that’s probably the biggest snag I’ve hit so far, but I did get him in the end. Also, when Navi mentioned to watch for shadows upon entering the large chamber in B3, I was like, “Pshh, I got this,” …and then promptly got Wall Mastered and sent back to the start of the dungeon. Serves me right!
There was one room in B4 with five Silver Rupees (the one with an invisible platform in one corner) that took an embarrassingly long time for me to find the hidden hookshot point for. Gamers never look up…
One thing that was really odd was the bit with the ship—when I got to the end, I created that makeshift bridge and immediately went across it, but it seems like it’s one way, and I didn’t have the key yet, so I had to jump in the pit and redo the ship part. Only took two minutes, but I thought it was an odd oversight—surely I can’t be the only one who spotted the bombs and immediately shot them. Also, how the heck are you meant to get up on those platforms with hearts on them??
The room with the moving spike walls took me a lot longer than it should have—after trying and failing to find a way to jump over them or destroy them with bombs, I finally noticed the ReDeads. After chucking bombs at them ineffectually (thinking that if I killed them it would stop the walls), I used Din’s Fire to attack them, accidentally discovering how to destroy the walls in the process.
I got my shit pushed in by Bongo Bongo because I kept trying to engage the hands in melee range, but once I realized I should just stand at the edge, shoot them, and then shoot the eye, I got three cycles in quick succession and ended the fight. Ended up having to use a Blue Potion on this one, too.
So…this is the beginning of the end, eh? I’m missing one Piece of Heart (agh!) and, despite all the continuous scouring of Hyrule I’ve been doing, 17 Gold Skulltula Tokens! Actually, even more shocking is that I’m somehow missing Fire Arrows? How is that even possible?! Is there a whole mini-dungeon like the Gerudo Training Course that I’ve completely missed??
…wait, make that 16—I just found the entrance to a secret passage under a rock at Zora’s Fountain. But still, besides the dungeons (which I always made sure to clear out fully), I only have all Gold Skulltula Tokens in Market, Lon Lon Ranch, Hyrule Field, and Gerudo’s Fortress. Haunted Wasteland, Gerudo Valley, Lake Hylia, Death Mountain, Kakariko Village, Lost Woods, Kokiri Forest, and Zora’s Domain are all incomplete.
Some of these are especially baffling, like Lake Hylia…there’s barely anything to that area! I remember getting the one that’s hinted to by the plaque next to the warp point (the one about looking towards the east at the sunrise or whatever), one on the back of the professor’s house, and one on top of the professor’s house, but like…where else could there be a Skulltula? I know I ran around the perimeter at night and even checked the fishing hole, but I came up empty-handed. Haunted Wasteland also seems quite limited—I think there was one in the fort in the actual wasteland bit; at the Colossus, there was one in a tree, and one that I had to reach with the bean platform. Filling the oasis didn’t seem to spawn one, and I can’t think where else to search unless there’s some weird alternate route through the wasteland that could take me to another one.
I’ve searched Kakariko Village and Kokiri Forest top to bottom multiple times over the course of my playthrough (the trickiest ones I can recall were the one on top of the house with the U-shaped roof which I only spotted on the bean platform next to the Kokiri Forest shop and the one in the Lost Woods that also requires a bean platform). One thought I’ve got for Kakariko is Dampe’s Crypt, which seems like a cruel place to hide Gold Skulltulas given the time limit, but that’s about the only idea I’ve got at this point.
Obviously I couldn’t expect anyone to guess which 16 I’m missing, but can you give some general advice about what kinds of search strategies I should use? The Mirror Shield and Hover Boots don’t seem like they’d be useful out in the overworld, and I think I’ve taken care of all the liftable boulders by this point. Maybe I ought to switch back to Young Link to see if there are some time-dependent ones?
…okay, I found two more in Lake Hylia: the one on the tippy-top of the tree (I thought I’d already checked there, but it was with the hookshot, and I think you need the longshot to actually get on top), and the one in the box in the pool in the Lakeside Laboratory. Still missing at least one in Lake Hylia, though, and I’m really stumped. Found another in Kakariko Village reachable via longshot to the large building running along the southern wall…but still missing at least one there, as well. 13 to go!
I can’t help you find what you’re missing but godspeed. I hated trying to find all those damn spiders
Happily, I found everything! And I also found out why most people stop after 50 tokens
Here's a hint for the key item you are missing:
Based off of what you wrote here, you were very close to finding the Fire Arrows on your own. If you want me to narrow it down to a more specific zone:
Spoiler
Take another trip to Lake Hylia.
This time I'll just answer directly:
If you played a song for the scarecrow as a child, then came back and played the song again for it as an adult, he’ll tell you, “My buddy Pierre is wandering around, so play that tune when you want to call him! I’ll tell him to help you if he’s nearby and hears that song, baby!” The platform with the hearts is one of the locations where you can call Pierre, which is why Navi flies up there and turns green when you get near. You can hookshot him to reach the places he appears.
I can't help much with the Skulltulas, but here's some things I didn't think to try when I first played the game:
There's also one devious one that's hidden in a way I don't remember the game ever teaching you about:
You can play Song of Storms in some places to reveal hidden grottos. One of those grottos has a Gold Skulltula in it. Like the Fire Arrows hint above, I can narrow it down to a specific zone if you want:
Spoiler
Search around Hyrule Castle.
Heart platforms
Ahhh, that’s what it was? Thankfully, another Hexbear tipped me off about the Scarecrow’s Song, so I did write it down (eventually memorized) and have used it a handful of times, but for some reason I didn’t think to use it there. And actually, that explains some odd Navi behavior I think I’ve seen elsewhere, so let me try it real quick…
…sure enough, there’s a scarecrow spot at the beginning of the Sacred Forest Meadown maze that would let you bypass the whole darn thing! That part was really annoying for me as Adult Link (and I also think it’s really odd how the Moblins don’t disappear after you clear the Forest Temple…is there a lore reason for that?), so I’ll definitely have to file that one away for when I do a Master Quest run.
General Gold Skulltula hints
…THAT’S what the bugs are for?! I was actually going to ask you, “Hey, so…what are those bugs for besides selling to that one lady?” but I don’t think I’d ever have guessed they’d be related to finding Gold Skultulas (unless you stuck me in a room with this game and wouldn’t let me out until I got all 100 Skulltulas…I’d probably read enough dialogue to figure it out). Now that you mention it, in addition to the House of Skulltula hint about Gold Skulltulas liking soft soil, I think there’s a hint somewhere or other (maybe from the Sheikah Stones via the mask of truth?) that mentions the bugs also liking soft soil, but I didn’t put two and two together. I think I thought it was saying that you could find the bugs there, but in retrospect, that doesn’t make much sense when you find them under rocks and grass. Another reason for the disconnect could be that I played through the initial Young Link section (all the way up through becoming Adult Link for the first time) entirely in Japanese, so I didn’t have as strong a connection for those key words in English.
Well, at any rate, that was a huge one: got me the last one in Kakariko, the last two on Death Mountain, the last one in Lake Hylia, another one in Gerudo Valley, last one in Haunted Wasteland, the last two in Lost Woods, and the last one in Kakariko. Only four more to go!
I did know about the tree thing from having watched someone play through the first few Young Link dungeons (I think I got a few that way just by remembering which trees they’d bonked—one in Lon Lon Ranch, and maybe one either in Kakariko proper or a tree in Hyrule Field near the entrance to Kakariko?), but it looks like I wasn’t as thorough as I ought to have been about checking. I found one in Zora’s Fountain this way, as well as at the entrance to Zora’s River.
I found the last one in Gerudo Valley by just listening closely (I’d missed the one on the back of the arch opposite the tent). That leaves one last one somewhere in Zora’s Domain, which is inconveniently the most sprawling area besides Hyrule Field, encompassing three separate zones…but actually, I found it really quickly! Seems like this was another Adult Link only one, since it was pretty easy to find (it was on one of the walls accessible via the elevated platforms halfway up the river). Yippee! And now, for my reward…
…unlimited Huge Rupees? Well, I understand it thematically, since they’re supposed to be this super rich family, but considering the absolute earliest you could have gotten all 100 Skulltulas is after finishing the last temple, who would need rupees at that point? What’s the Venn diagram intersection of “People who are completionist enough to have collected all (or very nearly all) Skulltulas going into the final temple” and “People who are still missing a lot of key items after the final temple (such that they might need to spend a lot of money)”? I feel like you have enough money to buy whatever you want for like 90-95% of the playthrough. Oh well, at least I unironically got a Sense of Pride and Accomplishment for doing this (mostly) using my own brain. It’s a lot more reasonable than, say, trying to get all the Korok Seeds in Breath of the Wild.
Key item
Will do! Okay, so there’s another scarecrow spot on the little island where I got a Gold Skulltula back as Young Link (presumably to allow you to get there when the lake’s drained?) but I notice that Navi is also activating at the base of the right pillar. Tried bombing, Song of Storms, Zelda’s Lullaby, but none of those worked. Hmm. Or actually—is that Navi telling you that this is a spot where a Gold Skulltula appears during the nighttime?
…wait, don’t tell me…Aha, I got it! Wow, I feel really silly. What happened was, I assumed that the stone tablet next to the warp pad was referring to the aforementioned Gold Skulltula, so once I got it as Young Link I figured I’d done everything I needed related to that island. In retrospect, that does seem like a fairly elaborate setup for a single measly Gold Skulltula, but hey—I got there in the end! Thanks for the nudge.
Devious one
I accidentally spoiled myself early in the playthrough about using the Song of Storms to open some of the hidden grottos (after having used dozens of bombs on a few Stone of Agony spots to no avail). I’ve yet to see any evidence that this is even hinted at anywhere in the game—and believe me, I talked to a lot of Sheikah Stones with the Mask of Truth—so I don’t feel too bad about “cheating”. But surely there must be some oblique, obscure hint somewhere, even if it wasn’t adequate, right? It seems like too frequent a mechanic to be left totally to guesswork (or game magazine fodder). When I’m done with this playthrough, I’m gonna search through the text script of the game and see if I find anything.
With that, I’m nearly fully kitted out! Only two things left to go: the last Piece of Heart, and the second quiver upgrade. For the former, I’ll consult the trusty dusty Nintendo Player’s Guide (courtesy of RetroMags).
Final Piece of Heart
Ah, turns out it was just that I had to finish the Dampé’s Crypt race in under a minute. Well, I don’t feel too bad about that one. Took me a little longer than I expected (15 minutes or so?) but I got it.
For the latter…wait, before I ask for a hint, let me just check the most obvious place.
The most obvious place
Yup, it was the Shooting Gallery lol. I swear I perfected it before, but I’m guessing you get some other reward the first time and I never bothered to try again. (Upon consulting Zelda Dungeon, I think I must have done it before I actually got the bow and arrow! Oopsy daisy).
And with that, I am truly decked out—all key items, all capacity upgrades, all Pieces of Heart + Heart Containers, and full stacks of everything. Thank you so much for your thoughtful hints—they made all the difference!!
I guess that means my next play session will be my last! Funnily enough, while the entire Adult Link section up to this point has been played with close to zero prior knowledge (compared to the opening Young Link act, where I’ve watched multiple people do casual runs up through Dodongo’s Cavern), I do know a bit about the endgame thanks to having watched a handful of Any% speedruns, but it’s been many years since I watched any—and of course, they’re not playing them in the intended fashion. Look forward to taking on Ganon myself!
Yay! Congrats on getting everything! I’m glad my hints were helpful.
spoiler
I’m not sure if they ever give a lore reason for why the Moblins stay after clearing the Forest Temple. My interpretation is that you’ve only stopped the source of Ganondorf’s influence in the area, and that it will take a while for the forest to fully heal. I can’t remember now if they say anything in game that contradicts that though.
Yeah the 100 Gold Skulltula reward is kind of notorious for being useless lol. It does feel good to save the family and see that 100 on your Quest Status screen though.