The heavy atmosphere in Majora’s Mask works because you only have three days to play Majora’s Mask. If you don’t succeed the moon falls and it’s all over. The world ends.
Three in-game days that is. The black countdown screen hits whenever a new day begins. It is ominous and epically inspired. Badum! 72 hours remain, then 48 hours, and last 24 hours. The final timer for the last few hours really makes you anxious.
This is an essay series looking at the Legend of Zelda games, which have inspired me: from learning how to navigate roadblocks in a game, or in life, to discovering speedrunning techniques in Zelda games and how they work for writing too. Let’s take a closer look at Majora’s Mask, the game mechanics, the atmosphere, and the characters.
I want to know: How can Zelda games inspire my art?
The Story of Majora’s Mask
The Legend of Zelda Majora’s Mask was a sequel to the much beloved N64 Ocarina of Time. I adored the first game, replayed and replayed it, but I played Ocarina with a guidebook. Majora’s Mask was the first Zelda I challenged without guides. Instead, I played the game with my sisters’ help.
(Okay, so we had to look up one thing. I sent my sister off to Hastings to read the guidebook on how to get through Snowpeak Temple.)
In Majora’s Mask, you play as the same Link from Ocarina. He’s taking a journey, where you must face an old friend, the Skull Kid, who has fallen under the bad influence of Majora’s Mask. The mask is the embodiment of mischief. The source of all sorts of drama.
The challenge of Majora’s Mask
I remember telling my sisters to follow the character named Anju all day. We were investigating her: What would she do? Where would she go? She works at the only inn in Clocktown. Customers arrive, someone gets a room, and at some point, Anju goes to the kitchen and we can talk to her. We were trying to help her find her fiance Kafei who had disappeared.
Story spoilers from here on out. You’ve been warned.
Later, we find out Kafei was cursed and his wedding mask was stolen! He is hiding at the pawnshop. If you ring the bell near the small frog pond in town you can see him wearing a golden fox mask. The tricky part is getting inside, then you’ll learn why he looks like a little kid. If you agree to help him, you’ll meet in the Canyon and go through a puzzle-filled cave together, until you retrieve his sun mask. (There are plenty of guides now, about the optimal way to do this. Here’s a full rundown of the things you have to do to reunite them.)
However, if you’re helping Anju and Kafei, then you can’t help the Romani sisters, whose ranch is under attack by aliens. You can’t save the Deku Princess, or help Lulu, whose babies were stolen by the pirates. There’s also a deadly blizzard on Snowhead Peak freezing the Gorons. People all over the world of Termina need help, and you are only one person and you only have three days.
The Choices in Majora’s Mask
The game makes you choose.
It guides you along in each compass direction. Go to the swamp first and then the snowy mountain later and eventually the ocean and canyon. You make progress, but at the same time, people in another area are out of luck. It’s a bizarre world and you’re stuck in a Groundhog Day situation.
The mood, music and the countdown create an atmosphere of doom and gloom. Sure the world resets every three days, but the moon is always falling. Everyone is doomed unless you can stop the Skullkid from using the power of Majora’s Mask to destroy everything. Good luck!
A Mastery of Your Time
Similar to Ocarina, time travel lets you influence the world. Playing the game makes you a master of time and routes. You learn where to go and who to talk with to learn key information or collect a key item. (Some items you can take back with you through time, some you can’t.) When you start a new three-day cycle, you often skip areas or parts of a quest that you did previously. You take a new route.
The idea of choices and routes was certainly not new to me, I’d read choose-your-own-adventure books before.
However, by playing hours and hours of Zelda games as a kid: I got to live through adventures and solve puzzles. Majora’s Mask was truly something special. The entire world was a puzzle with quests and people moving around to different places during the day. You have to pay attention to the time and use your time wisely. The game was teaching me life lessons I didn’t know I needed.
The game doesn’t actually feature any choose-your-adventure writing. There aren’t any dialogue trees or branching narratives. There are plenty of games that do this, including providing multiple endings for you to discover. (More about this in an upcoming post!)
Instead, Majora’s Mask gives you a journal to keep track of people you meet and you get a reward if you complete their story. This is a little like writing a novel: You have to keep track of characters and where they fit in the story.
How can Majora’s Mask and Zelda games inspire us?
Here are 4 ways that Zelda games inspire me:
1 Mood and Theme:
There’s a heavy atmosphere in Majora’s Mask. The characters are beaten down. The dancers are frustrated. Lulu can’t sing because her seven children are missing. (Yeah, I’d be distraught too!) There is a moon falling. It grows bigger and the weight of it is impossible to ignore. Everything in this world contributes to the feeling of desperation. You can make a difference by helping these people, by playing the game, but the game never lets you forget. The colors in the game may be bright, but they’re oversaturated too, as if the world is trying too hard, and overcompensating.
When you’re writing, or drawing, do you have a theme? Knowing your theme can help guide your work. Another way is to ask how do you want the reader to feel? These can help you decide what to show, and how to describe a scene. Mood in art guides the color palette. It works in writing too.
2 Characters being characters:
The more alive you make your characters, the more we can relate to them and how they feel. Did you know that Lulu is a fish person? She’s a zora, who can breathe underwater. Does that change her heartbreaking story? No, because we feel Lulu’s pain. Imagine losing your children. Losing her voice is a powerful way to express how she is feeling.
3 Subtle Clues:
Anju and Kafei’s story quest is memorable because you were given tiny clues and how you discover the whole truth is part of the challenge and reward. You want to reunite them, so you investigate and uncover clues. You learn how the world is connected and character’s lives overlap. The game provides hints without just putting a marker on the map. You track the characters by following them, not by looking at a timetable or notes.
Letting your reader discover the world is a classic show-don’t-tell writing tip.
4 Your NEW Writing Strategy:
Zelda games reward you for paying attention. Knowing where you are and where you need to go is a strategy to help. Zelda puzzles can be tricky, but there are clues to help you overcome obstacles.
Writing is a little like puzzling solving, only as an author you’re making the clues and the solution. If you get stuck, reach out to friends. Find a writing community. You can even ask the robot AI for help puzzling out character.
I was talking to a friend about writing and she often found that she’d start to ask the chatbot a question and just by typing out the question she knew the answer.
Always let your Adventures Inspire you
Writing takes time. Storytelling is an art and there are so many different ways. Intuition is important to my writing, but that ability to sense a story comes from studying the craft, (i.e. reading books and playing games) and seeing how master storytellers create a memorable story.
This is why playing games, (and reading books you don’t usually read, or watching movies you don’t usually watch) can teach you about stories and writing. This is also why I play Zelda games because I know they’re fantastic stories and games. Sometimes the stories will inspire you. Sometimes it’s the game mechanics. Because games are interactive, you end up living through the story as you play. This is an excellent way of learning how to be an adventurer.
What story do you want to tell? What are your favorite games to “study”? Let me know in the comments!