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Welcome to the first installment of a new column, where we’ll dive deep into some of the game’s most memorable moments – good and bad. We start strong with a moment that cemented the Zelda series as one of the greatest of all time, to celebrate Link’s 35th birthday or something like that. Happy birthday, Link. You are now old enough to get a mortgage and stop straying from Kokiri.
There is something magical about cathedrals. Maybe that’s the way their arched architecture elicits a silence so deep you can almost hear God. Perhaps it is the knowledge that generations of old bones lie beneath your feet, waiting for you to join them. It’s no surprise that games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne revere and fear them in almost equal measure: they are places of awe-inspiring beauty, in the original sense of the word. Honestly, it’s not hard to make an eldritch horror of the Christian myth, filled with blood, relics, death and rebirth.
The literal legend of Zelda has often centered around these places of worship, Skyward Sword Statue of the goddess at Link to the past Sanctuary. Religion and the awe it inspires are vital parts of Link’s various quests, and having churches and cathedrals in the games is a shortcut for how they make us feel.
From the first moment you step into the Temple of Time, a resounding and unnerving song fills the room. There is a feeling that it is sacred land, although the Temple has no seats, no pulpit, and no tombs, as one would expect from a church.
The most famous of these is the Temple of Time, which often symbolizes Hyrule’s eternal quest to defeat – or at least banish – the ever-returning darkness. In Ocarina of Time, his first appearance, he houses the Master Sword, the tool that will help Link bring back the light once more – but he also becomes his prison.
From the first moment you step into the Temple of Time, a resounding and unnerving song fills the room. It feels like it is sacred land, although the Temple has no seats, no pulpit, and no graves, as one would expect from a church.
It’s reminiscent of London legal offices, where huge reception areas are deliberately left empty, as a sign of wealth and prestige. “Look how much space we can afford to waste,” they say, in a city where one room full of mice and misery will give you a great month’s life. The Temple of Time, on the other hand, is not a demonstration of wealth, but of power. You don’t need to know anything about Hyrule theology to know that something great dwells between things, and that it is a sacred space – a literal sanctuary from outer evil.
Once you place the three Spirit Stones and the Door of Time is opened, the theme of the Sacred Hollow continues: inside the room there is nothing but a pedestal and a sword. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this – Link to the Past’s main sword is encased in the Ethereal Lost Woods – but the same mysticism and importance is conveyed here, that the sword is in a wooded glade or in a strange octagonal stone vault. , lit by a well-placed ray of sunlight.
Of course, everyone knows what happens next: Link draws the sword, accidentally gives Ganondorf the key to the sacred realm, and locks himself in the Temple of Light for seven years, as children cannot be the ones. saviors of the world before less Majora’s Mask.
Turns out seven years is a long time, and Hyrule is no longer Link’s youth pastoral paradise (two minutes ago). The contrast is stark: upon leaving the Temple of Time, day has turned into night, the sky is dominated by Death Mountain’s terrifying halo of storms, and Hyrule Castle Town – previously a place filled with happy villagers – is now overrun with moans and screams. ReDeads, and the only remaining inhabitant is the opportunist Poe Collector, who is so creepy that Ganondorf was probably too scared to kick him out.
The moment to step out of the Temple into a hellish landscape is undeniably effective, even despite the technical limitations of the N64. Sure, nowadays it looks like a big brown spot, but at the time it was a masterpiece of visual storytelling. You don’t need Navi to tell you it’s all gone to hell – although she will anyway – because the sunny, music-filled world of Hyrule has been replaced by a simple, eerie wind track. . This wind was so disturbing that we used to have nightmares about it.
The moment to step out of the Temple into a landscape of hell is undeniably effective, even despite the technical limitations of the N64
Link’s exit from the Temple of Time and the transformation that has taken place within is an eerily excellent representation of growth. Puberty for most of us may not have come with megalomaniacal zombies and evil beastmen, but the feeling of not being able to put metaphorical genius back in the bottle is real. It is only when you are past childhood that you realize that the days of no responsibility were the sunshine before the Ganondorf of hormones unwittingly propelled you into the world of adulthood.
That moment, between entering the Temple as a child or exiting as an adult, carries with it a sense of mystery and reluctance, of Link being forced into something he didn’t even know and to to be the weapon for a bunch of people trapped in time, duty and helplessness. Link has no voice, and he never has, so he is swept away by the currents of honor and fate to continually be the hero, the savior, the chosen one. It’s been said before, but the Legend of Zelda very rarely concerns the Legend of Zelda – it’s always about the story of Link and the inexorable march of his divine destiny.
We started this column by explaining how Zelda relies on religious symbology to elicit certain emotions in its players, and if the Temple of Time is a cathedral, then Link is the perpetually reincarnated sacrificial lamb of Hyrule, the only thing who can hold back the darkness, whether he knows it or not. There are many brilliant moments in Zelda’s history, but the Ocarina of Time may be the first time we’ve enjoyed the series’ holy tragedy.
Did the Temple of Time have a similar impact on you the first time you experienced it, or do you have different feelings? What other key game moments would you like to see covered in this series? Leave a comment to let us know.
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