The first stop in the Ocean Realm is Papuchia Village, but there’s nothing of interest here (yet). The Spirit Train continues onward, and as it passes over water, instead of railside rocks, there are floating barrels. On the last island before the tracks currently run out, Link and Zelda find the Ocean Sanctuary. Link has to fight his way through Lobarriers, crab enemies with a giant stone claw they use as a shield, and solve a puzzle of identifying the way the statues on the island are facing and drawing that symbol (a double diamond, or squared infinity symbol) on a red door to Carben’s home. Only, Carben’s not home, but he’s left a note saying he’s visiting his “sky friends” at Papuchia Village.
Zelda spent a summer at Papuchia Village and invites Link to go swimming, but being a ghost is apparently not great for it, and… this version of Link, as in Phantom Hourglass, can’t swim, if his behavior when he jumps in water is indicative. Zelda spots Carben riding in a harness carried by the local birds, but can’t get his attention, so she suggests going to the village leader, a fortune teller known as the Wise One. The Wise One starts with some questions of her own, and it’s the player who has to answer, but it doesn’t have voice recognition, just detection, so you can say whatever you want, or just blow on the microphone. She points Link to a tree near the birds, and the Song of Discovery unearths a Song Stone that teaches Link the Song of Birds.
Playing the Song of Birds brings the bird carrying Carben down. He’s annoyed at having his flight disrupted, but agrees to help if Link takes him to the Ocean Sanctuary. On the trip, the train is attacked by Miniblin pirates. They board the train, and Link has to fight them off to protect Carben. After enough are defeated, the pirates’ leader, a Big Blin [1], boards the train. This guy takes a lot of hits to put down, and a few Miniblins board during the fight. The Big Blin’s indiscriminate who it hits with its club, so it’ll knock out the little guys, but if he hits Link, Link gets up dizzy. Once the pirates are dealt with and the train pulls safely into the station, Carben’s gratitude to Link for protecting him produces a Force Gem, which opens up another section of Spirit Tracks.
At the sanctuary, Link and Carben play the next Lokomo song, which requires passing over a note. This was tricky for me to pick up, but I got it, and that restored a large section of tracks in the Ocean Realm. The temple itself is underwater, so Link needs to open the way, and Carben gives Link the directions. There are three spots marked on the map, and Link finds Ferrus, who tells him to blow the train whistle to activate orbs. Once all three orbs are activated, the tunnel to the ocean floor opens. There are six rabbits Link can catch along the way. The Force Gem Carben gave Link gives him access to a warp gate between the Forest Realm near the Trading Post and the Snow Realm near the Bridge Worker’s Home.
Underwater, Link is occasionally pestered by Octoroks, but they’re hardly the worst danger. As Link approaches the temple, an Armored Train appears. Unlike the Dark Trains, which make random decisions at junctions, Armored Trains will actively chase Link, even changing a preset course to do so. Fortunately, Link starts out ahead and is able to outrun the train to the Ocean Temple.
The Ocean Temple is designed to constantly frustrate Link’s progress until he fights the miniboss, Snapper, who uses a whip to restrain Link, but opens himself up to being hit in retaliation. After Snapper is defeated, Link gets a whip of his own, which he can use to bypass obstacles. The whip can be used as a grappling hook (both to retrieve items and swing from branches) and can remove thorns from vine gates so he can get by. And, of course, a whip is a weapon, which can be used against enemies like Snapper or yellow ChuChus. And there a lot of wall-mounted fish heads. Some have tongues Link can grab; sometimes pulling the tongue is the solution to the puzzle, sometimes he pulls a sword that has to go in another nearby fish head.
Key Masters return in this dungeon, and this time Link can’t avoid them, so he has to fight them off. The boss fight takes place outside the temple (and apparently the temple extends to the surface); Link has to first use the whip climb the tower, knocking a few vines out of the way by throwing barbs into their eyes, while the boss rains goo on him. The boss is Phytops, Barbed Menace, and it looks like Medusa wearing a pink hairnet taking a bath. Two bubbles of goo cover its eye, so Link needs to first hit them with the barbs, then the eye to make Phytops land on one side of the pool where he can hit the eye with his sword. Doing that a few times and dodging the vines when they slap at Link is all there really is to the fight, and another section of the Tower comes down while the tracks connect it to the Ocean Realm.
Next: Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match…
[1] Sadly, not Maxiblin.
