Death Mountain
Death Mountain is hardly as dangerous to traverse as it has been in other games. There are a few tektites hanging around the lower path, and that’s about it for enemies. Further up is tended by gorons, friendly dwarvish rock-eating creatures whose disappearance from later games in the series makes me wonder. The Kokiri at least have that hidden elf village vibe that gives a little bit of hope that later Links may just not find them, although them being wiped out after the Deku Tree’s death seems a distinct possibility, too. The gorons on the other hand just seem to be gone and Death Mountain has not fared well in their absence.
Not that things are peachy for the Gorons now, either: Their main quarry was overrun by dodongos and then Ganon magicked a boulder in front of it, sealing it off. With their main and favorite source of food cut off, the gorons are hungry and dispirited, and one of them even says they’re facing extinction, although his talk about how the gorons aren’t interested in eating rocks not from Dodongo’s Cavern suggests that may be a little melodramatic and/or premature. Sure, they may not be as good, but if it reaches the point of starvation if they don’t eat other rocks… those other rocks might start looking a lot tastier.
Goron City
Goron City is a maze of rings and caves going into the mountain. Big Brother Darunia, the leader of the gorons, has taken the spiritual stone and shut himself in his room, waiting for a messenger from the royal family. So, Link stands in front of his room and plays “Zelda’s Lullaby” to
gain access, and Darunia feels insulted that the messenger is a kid, on top of his other problems, and says his people’s problems are just that and they don’t need any help from strangers. He kicks Link out.
Up a level, there’s a cave where “Saria’s Song”/the Lost Woods theme can be heard coming from deeper within. If Link takes a Deku stick and ignites the bomb flowers in the cave, it opens a passage to the Lost Woods. The goron in the cave asks Link about the music coming from the passage, saying the gorons all like it. And so, Link goes back to Darunia and plays “Saria’s Song” for him, which, well…
The song snaps Darunia out of his funk. He properly introduces himself to Link and Link finally gets the chance to ask for the Spiritual Stone. He hints that someone else was after it, and won’t just give it to Link, but offers a trade: If Link can open up and clear out Dodongo’s Cavern, he can have anything he wants, including the Stone. He gives Link a Goron’s Bracelet which gives him the strength to lift the bombs from the bomb flowers, so there’s one last thing to do in Goron City before leaving. On the bottom level are a bunch of unlit torches. When they’re all lit, a giant vase starts moving around the bottom level. If Link can toss a bomb from the flowers into the vase [1], he gets a piece of heart, which means a second full heart container before the dungeon.
Now Link leaves Goron City to head back to the entrance to Dodongo’s Cavern. It remains as stubbornly sealed up as before, so we’re going to have to get creative to get him in there. There’s a bomb flower a bit up the mountain; a bit too far for Link to run it all the way back down to the entrance and blow the boulder, but it’s conveniently positioned directly above the boulder and entrance. Link drops the bomb over the edge and it blows the boulder up and clears the way to enter. And… seriously? That’s all it took? None of the gorons have thought of doing this before now?
Inside, the way is blocked by another bombable wall, but the flowers are much nearer and so it’s easy enough to blow the wall and enter the dungeon proper.
Next: Dodongo’s Cavern.
[1] Much easier said than done. I’m still struggling with the controls a bit here, and lost track of the number of times Link set the bomb down rather than throw it, or ran over the edge holding a bomb, or threw the bomb off in the wrong direction. It was almost to the point where the next post in this series was going to be “Why Link Went Into Adventuring Instead of Basketball, Part 1 of TBD.”
