Majora’s Mask is one of the most unique Zelda games of all time with a ton of rad ideas, surrounded by several annoying mechanics that can leave parts of the game feeling frustrating and tedious.
Similar to Ocarina, I have some very specific memories of playing Majora’s Mask as a kid but not a lot of overall memory of the game itself. My strongest memories are how cool it was that Link could transform into a Deku, Goron, and Zora and that the Couples quest was an absolute pain in the ass. I genuinely have such fond memories of Link being able to transform at will by just throwing on a mask. Even revisiting it now, it’s such an awesome mechanic.
The very concept of making Zelda a time loop game is a cool idea, but I found that that premise ended up causing a few annoyances (like having to have the same conversations with NPCs every single loop). The rules around what resets when you go back in time feels pretty arbitrary. Your ammo resets, but your health and magic do not. Why do I lose my arrows and bombs, but keep my bow and bomb bag? Why do I keep all of my masks? If every element in the world resets, why don’t pieces of heart respawn? Once you start thinking about it all, none of it really makes sense. Which is what leads me to my biggest complaint - dungeon regions completely resetting. One of the most satisfying things in the game is lifting the curses of the different areas in Termina after you beat the dungeon boss and get their mask. So nothing sucks more than restarting the loop and realizing that the poison you cleared from the swamp or the frost you cleared from the mountains is back and the dungeon boss is alive again, even though you still have their mask. What’s worse is that several puzzles require these regions to be in their “healed” states, which means you may need to go back and defeat a boss again. When you defeat a boss, claim its mask, and heal a region, the region should remain in that cleansed state. If not, how are any of the giants actually free? Better yet (even though this would’ve sucked), make the player go through and defeat all 4 bosses in the final time loop before continuing on to the final boss. Either fully commit to the time loop mechanic, or fully commit to your ability to master time.
As I played more of the game,I realized I never actually beat it as a kid or finished getting the masks, so I’m glad I remedied that. Not only did I beat the game, but I finally did the childhood goal I never achieved - I got the Fierce Deity mask, and holy crap was it cool. The little kid inside me was screaming as I wrecked the final boss as Fierce Deity Link. It only took revisiting the game 23 years later, but I finally conquered Majora’s Mask, even if the journey was occasionally annoying.
+ Link transforming into races that all play different is cool as heck
+ Time loop Zelda is an interesting idea
+ Gameplay holds up surprisingly well
+ Soundtrack rips
+ The mask collection aspect of the game is a cool, functional collectible
- Time loop logic feels arbitrary and inconsistent
- Zones resetting every loop is a bummer
- Losing all your ammo every loop sucks
- Having the same NPC conversations over and over is annoying
Similar to Ocarina, I have some very specific memories of playing Majora’s Mask as a kid but not a lot of overall memory of the game itself. My strongest memories are how cool it was that Link could transform into a Deku, Goron, and Zora and that the Couples quest was an absolute pain in the ass. I genuinely have such fond memories of Link being able to transform at will by just throwing on a mask. Even revisiting it now, it’s such an awesome mechanic.
The very concept of making Zelda a time loop game is a cool idea, but I found that that premise ended up causing a few annoyances (like having to have the same conversations with NPCs every single loop). The rules around what resets when you go back in time feels pretty arbitrary. Your ammo resets, but your health and magic do not. Why do I lose my arrows and bombs, but keep my bow and bomb bag? Why do I keep all of my masks? If every element in the world resets, why don’t pieces of heart respawn? Once you start thinking about it all, none of it really makes sense. Which is what leads me to my biggest complaint - dungeon regions completely resetting. One of the most satisfying things in the game is lifting the curses of the different areas in Termina after you beat the dungeon boss and get their mask. So nothing sucks more than restarting the loop and realizing that the poison you cleared from the swamp or the frost you cleared from the mountains is back and the dungeon boss is alive again, even though you still have their mask. What’s worse is that several puzzles require these regions to be in their “healed” states, which means you may need to go back and defeat a boss again. When you defeat a boss, claim its mask, and heal a region, the region should remain in that cleansed state. If not, how are any of the giants actually free? Better yet (even though this would’ve sucked), make the player go through and defeat all 4 bosses in the final time loop before continuing on to the final boss. Either fully commit to the time loop mechanic, or fully commit to your ability to master time.
As I played more of the game,I realized I never actually beat it as a kid or finished getting the masks, so I’m glad I remedied that. Not only did I beat the game, but I finally did the childhood goal I never achieved - I got the Fierce Deity mask, and holy crap was it cool. The little kid inside me was screaming as I wrecked the final boss as Fierce Deity Link. It only took revisiting the game 23 years later, but I finally conquered Majora’s Mask, even if the journey was occasionally annoying.
+ Link transforming into races that all play different is cool as heck
+ Time loop Zelda is an interesting idea
+ Gameplay holds up surprisingly well
+ Soundtrack rips
+ The mask collection aspect of the game is a cool, functional collectible
- Time loop logic feels arbitrary and inconsistent
- Zones resetting every loop is a bummer
- Losing all your ammo every loop sucks
- Having the same NPC conversations over and over is annoying