“Hey!”
“Hey!”
“Hey!”
Link has landed on a beach and a fairy has been trying to get his attention. I’m not entirely sure the fairy’s voice is the same as Navi's (she doesn’t say “Listen!”), but if it’s not, they probably could have saved whatever money they spent recording the new clips. The fairy’s name is Ciela. She’s lost her memory, and has been living with a man she calls Grandpa. When she hears about the Ghost Ship and Zelda, she thinks Link should go talk to him. Control is given over to the player for the first time, giving me a chance to get used to controlling Link by poking the screen. It’s different, and I’m not a huge fan of this style of control, but most of it’s become fairly easy to get a handle on.
By time Link gets to Oshus, Ciela’s “Grandpa,” he’s been filled in on what Link intends to do. He tries to talk Link out of his goal, but Link’s not easily dissuaded, and neither is Ciela. So with a grumble about young people, he points Link to the nearby harbor village, where Link can find a sailor named Linebeck, who might be willing to help Link find the Ghost Ship. Ciela mentions that he’d come to visit them, and wants to go with Link to point Linebeck out. Oshus agrees, to Ciela’s great delight. Oshus has one final warning: there are monsters about the island, and Link needs to be careful.
As Link heads to the village, an earthquake strikes the island, and Ciela notes that they’ve been happening a lot recently. The bridge leading from Oshus’ home to the village is knocked out by the earthquake. A woman standing by the wrecked bridge tells Link and Ciela about another way to the village around to the north, but the path is filled with monsters so the only thing to do is wait for the bridge to be fixed. Oshus agrees with this careful plan, but Link and Ciela have to go see the monsters for themselves. In fact, a flag has to be set by Ciela commenting on the monsters – you can’t go to the path, see the ChuChus, realize Link doesn’t have a sword [1], and go back to Oshus to advance the plot without her nudge.
Despite Oshus’ continued insistence that Link and Ciela wait for the bridge to be repaired, Ciela isn’t giving up on dashing to the rescue. She and Link find a cave that Oshus uses to store stuff, including a sword. She remembers his passnumber hint, which gives Link the opportunity to find it and write it on the sign forbidding entry to the back room. With the room now open, Link goes in and finds the sword Ciela mentioned. She says they shouldn’t tell Oshus they’re taking it, but he’s there to greet them as they come out and notices Link has the sword. He agrees to let Link use the sword – after a swordplay tutorial. In-universe, while it makes sense for Oshus to make sure Link can use the sword, Link should be able to quickly show that he’s advanced beyond “the pointy end goes into the other man.” But out-of-universe, since the control scheme is all-new, it’s very welcome. The targeted attack is easy, the side slash is slightly more complicated but not bad, but the spin attack, which requires drawing a circle around Link, I can only manage about half the time.
There’s one more tutorial before Link sets out to the north – a guy had a bunch of rocks fall into his field and he wants Link to clear them. He rewards Link with a single rupee – which actually gets the full item get sequence – and then to make up for it not being very much, tells Link about a tree he might want to crash into off to the northwest, which introduces the idea of using the DS touchscreen to make notes on the map. As Link takes the trail and fights off a few Red ChuChus, there’s a gossip stone that tells how to roll, and suggests rolling into a nearby tree. I'm about as good at rolling as I am spin attacking, but I got the red rupee out. At the end of the trail, Link heads into the cave that leads to the eastern end of the island.
Next: How to run with a sprained ankle.
[1] The Master Sword got left in Ganon in Hyrule, but did Link not keep the sword he got from Orca? I guess it could have been lost when he went overboard, or he had it stowed somewhere on Tetra’s ship and didn’t have time to get it before his ill-fated attempt to jump over and rescue her.
