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Note: I have played this hack from beginning to end.

On the positive side, this hack will make you rethink the game mechanics and force you to learn a couple interesting oddities. It is unpredictable as you can't depend on your well-ingrained knowledge of where everything is. It certainly makes for a refreshing experience.

On the other hand, there are more than a few faults. Some dialogue has been removed or altered, but not consistently. I understand that this was done to align with the randomizer and speedrunner communities, but it just comes off as a cheap gag more than anything. Certain sidequests now contain required items instead of those items being in their vanilla locations. I hope you really like hunting Big Poes. To the credit of the hack's developer, there are Gossip Stones that point you in the right direction. The biggest, single issue, however, is the mandatory double-dipping in almost every dungeon. Even the Deku Tree requires two trips to complete. This is sometimes expected in randomizers, but this was a planned sequence. This doesn't add to the difficulty so much as it amplifies the tedium of Ocarina's worst points.

I appreciate the originality and the care put into this hack, and some areas and puzzles have been completely reworked and make for an interesting experience. For example, the added ice in the frozen Zora's Domain is a nice touch. But, some parts are definitely misguided attempts to increase the difficulty and originality.

I'm glad it's over. And that's a sad thing to say.

Some spoilers ahead:

First easter egg I'd like to mention is the pink hair, can tell its a call back to the texture from A Link To The Past and the shield designs are a nice and new touch to the game I did like, but for the tunic colors they were a terrible choice to choose considering all the other colors he could have picked (Yellow was probably the worst since Masked Quest)

I say exploration is the best part of this game, I did enjoy how heart pieces were scattered though out the Hyrule land in different places and same for some of the upgrades you get as child Link, and seeing how many Gold Skulltula's there were made the game somewhat tedious but not to the point where I didn't want to collect all of them. Yes, I managed to collect all of them.

Patience. Early on the game, I can understand why some people gave up after Deku Tree, unless you've seen or have played randomizers yourself you could see why something like Blue Fire is needed for, not going say what for, it is a silly trick, and don't think your regular OOT player is going to know what and how it's used for

Child Link area's in the game were easy and somewhat fun until Adult Link play came into the picture and this is were the game actually annoyed me. I have to say the worst part of this rom was the constant backtracking back to Temples. For example (Needed one item from 1 Temple, to go to another temple/side quest to beat said 1st temple) And was like that the whole Adult Link Temple form, to the point where it got a little to confusing, but patience as I said was the reason why I beat this game and went for 100%

When it comes to any Legend of Zelda game I like to go to the distance of 100% the game because you get the exploration out of the game which is why I love The Legend of Zelda series and the roms, This game was a little to much with the Gold Skulltula's, but that's why it's Called "Gold Quest"

Some text is cheesy/cringe, and somewhat twitch emotes found though the game, but didn't bother or annoy me (some made me laugh) But as for speedrunners I can see why some didn't like this because the game literally blocked off the little tricks to glitch the game, but for an average player they could enjoy this, perfect example of this game is a "Harder" Master Quest version of the dungeons/temples

6/10

To be direct: the is a clever rom-hack that is very enjoyable with its share of flaws.

The Pros: The game does a good job making you think. Know first of all that movement glitches and the like that you would see in speed running are not necessary to beat this game. With that knowledge, it makes everything more a puzzle of "what do I need to do now" or "what in this room can be used to get that chest?". It's refreshing that the game wants you to see the spider web or the bombable wall and say "now how do I get past that?". It does feel like a Master Quest Plus game.

I have seen some reviews complaining that they couldn't find the sword or had no idea what to do next/how to find items. I don't understand the sword complaint: if you try to get every chest and exhaust all efforts, the sword is pretty straight forward. Same with bombs. As for not knowing where to go, this is a fair complaint, and I will simply say that if you are used to randomizers, you get used to checking every possible check in an area. That would be my advice: check everything you can feasibly.

I also want to say that the blue fire trick, while not telegraphed in anyway, I figured out by putting logic to it: blue fire is available and I can't find the item I need to proceed...try blue fire? It worked, its weird, but it feels like old 90's games that did not always give you an obvious answer and rewarded you for trying new things.

The Cons: By far the biggest problem is lack of hints or "signposting". A clever way to solve this would simply reward the player when they talk with everyone. The hint can be vague or otherwise innocuous, but it does need to be there in some capacity. Besides that, Poe locations are annoying but understandable: when you first play OOT vanilla, you have no idea where all 10 Poes are.

I recommend this game. It could use a few more polishes and details, but I think this concept can continue to be improved and that as it is, it is a very fun play through for someone that wants something different and likes collect-athons.

I hate to sound contrarian but I enjoyed this. That's not to say it's at all flawless as it's not - this hack is chock full of flaws but if you can put them aside I think you'll enjoy playing this if you like OoT and know it inside and out like I do.

What drew me to this hack was that it was essentially what I wanted the official Master Quest to do - modify the overworld as well. This is accomplished for better or for worse, this is a very fresh take on the game which for someone who regularly plays randomizers and wants more OoT is very much appreciated. There's a lot of BS going on though, important NPC locations, backtracking between dungeons, sometimes unintuitive puzzles too. I think it helps knowing some speedrunning tactics like Bomb Jumping, super sliding and sycg. It's not required but for the less intuitive things you can sorta get around them a bit easier. As it is, I wouldn't in the slightest recommend this to newcomers. This hack is very much aimed at veteran players.

There are some very clever designs too, there are two dungeons where you essentially do them in reverse which I thought was great. Taking alternate dungeon designs to that level is something always enjoyable to me.

There's not much custom beyond designs, the author did in a few cases very cleverly reused stock objects from the vanilla game to completely redesign areas which too I enjoyed. There's also a custom upgrade that you'll get later on.

Overall, while frustrating I really do think if you're an OoT veteran who wants more you're going to enjoy this one. Give it a try!

I'll start off by giving the tl;dr, this hack has plenty of potential. Very challenging puzzles and ways of getting around, not just inside dungeons, but it has a severe lack of guidance and signposting since it changes things up considerably from the base game. I wouldn't recommend playing this in its current state unless you have plenty of experience with randomizers and speedrunning.

It's very easy to miss some key items to progress like the Kokiri Sword, Hookshot, and Princess Ruto's letter (all of which are in the game btw). And because you can leave Kokiri Forest before even completing the first dungeon, it's entirely possible to, for instance, screw yourself over one of the Deku Seed bags by completing the shooting gallery minigame before obtaining the slingshot, or generally wander around completely at a loss. And understandably, there isn't any content out there for the hack to reference if you're lost or stuck, except for ZFG's playthrough of it; which helps a lot, but there aren't any timestamps for it or anything obviously, so it's easy to get spoiled on other puzzles and solutions you didn't intend to look for while you skip and search the videos for the one specific thing you're looking for.

The game does a great job at speeding up the dialogue too. Only a few instances where you have to mash A to get through lengthy cutscenes and dialogue; particularly at the end of the game, from Ganondorf's first fight onward (which could probably be updated to match the level of speed and humor). Speaking of which, the story doesn't follow the base game's story at all, and main quest dialogue is either removed completely or altered to a more humorous tone. It isn't intended as a new story or anything of the sort, the game wants you to focus on the gameplay and not the story of a 20+ year old game. Personally, I'm fine with that and I enjoyed it, but I can understand how some of the humor might come off as cringy to some. I also appreciate the nod to ALttP's pink haired Link, as well as the changes to the tunic colors to make it feel like you're playing a whole different game. While it doesn't matter much for the main game, the hack does allow you to use tunics as young Link, which is a nice touch as well.

Unlike Master Quest, both the dungeons and the overworld have changed in this hack. You do not need to be a speedrunner or have any experience with glitches and exploits whatsoever to complete the "main" game (with the exception of off-label Blue Fire applications), but from seeing ZFG's playthrough of it compared to mine, it could certainly help. Additionally, the Big Poe locations in Hyrule Field have changed, and one or 2 of them are very hard to find. The hack does lock an important item to progress behind it, so you do have to go Big Poe hunting at some point. And the thresholds for the Gold Skultulla rewards have changed, but there doesn't seem to be a consistent pattern to obtaining them; I believe I got my rewards at 40 tokens, then 70, then 120, then 150, or something along those lines, which didn't really make sense compared to the base games rewards every 10 tokens.

While some of the puzzles and a few of the fights are incredibly frustrating to deal with, they are doable, if you have plenty of experience with the genre. Overall, the game could use some improvement when it comes to player guidance and where the next important item might be. Things like the Navi and Saria dialogue could probably be adjusted to help the player out for this since, while funny at first, it doesn't really provide any sort of help (and much like the original Navi, it gets old real fast). If the hack manages to include these or other improvements, I could see myself recommending it to the casual Zelda player, but not in its current state.

I'm always excited to see news of a new OOT hack, because it shows how far Rom Hacking has come, and I really like the Idea of getting more content for such a great game. But the new content isn't always so great. Case in point, this hack.

I will detail my personal experiance playing this hack in the flowing review, with my apparent gimic for this site of leaving excessively long, verbose reviews.

In terms of gameplay, the hack has been made excruciatingly frustrating. Made even more so by the claim that it's for people who like to beat the base game 100%. Reading that, I thought this would be a great hack for me, but clearly the creator of the hack and I have differing opinions on what makes doing so remotely fun in the first place.

Notable changes include, but are not limited to:

• Targeting is set to Hold instead of Switch by default (Gross)

• The shop in the starting town being arbitrarily blocked off, despite being revealed later to have no real items of value, other than a piece of heart.

• The change of starting Hearts from 3 to 2, despite at least one enemy that I know of having increased damage output.

• The items sold in all shops have been changed to be arbitrarily inconvenient, with 0 of the shops I visited selling Deku Sticks, Nuts, or Seeds.

• The requirement for rewards from the Gold Skulltula Sidequest has been raised from 10 to 20, putting treasures further out of reach in a hack where the player is bound to be desperate for them.

• The location of important items being changed to arbitrary places, or said items apparently being removed entirely.

In the Dodongo's Cavern dungeon, I found that the Bomb Bag Item, normally needed for completing the dungeon, had not only been moved elswhere, but made entirely optional for the dungeon. But the bomb bag itself is still mandatory for later dungeons and field exploration, so why it was made otherwise optional for the dungeon it's in is beyond me.

The Bomb Bag was in a room guarded by a Stalfos miniboss. However, 2 dungeons in I still had no sword, and thus Deku Sticks, which the player can only hold a limited amount of, are required to beat it. Because the door locks behind the player in this room, the player can run out of Deku Sticks and the fight can be made unwinnable as a result, which, on my playthrough, is exactly what happened, and it was actually the second time it did.

The first time was in the first dungeon, in which the same thing can happen during the boss fight with Ghoma. I was forced both times to save the game, quit out, and grind for Deku Sticks. However, with no sword, and no shops selling them, the only way to do so was to repeatedly climb to a high point in Kokiri Forest, grab the 1 freestanding Deku Stick in the area, then enter a house, leave it, and repeat the process for upwards of several minutes.

The Hookshot was moved from Dampe's Grave to being held by the Man On The Roof in Kakariko, given to the player as a reward for reaching him. But a changed dialogue box, from Dampe, implies that the player should "Look in the other graves" for it. This was either a mistake, or a lie to waste the player's time for no reason.

Upon arriving at Zora's Domain, I was given no signposting whatsoever as to the new location of the Letter In A Bottle, required to enter the third dungeon. At which point I started grasping at straws.

I went to the fishing minigame to try and win its treasure, but I had forgotten about a glitch in the game. Among the many, many problems that come with being this stingy with giving the player a basic weapon, if you don't have a sword equipped when you start fishing, the game refuses to acknowledge that you actually have the fishing rod. You can still pay for it, but you can't actually fish, so it's just a waste of 20 Rupees.

The very last thing I did in the hack before quitting it for good, was enter the Temple Of Time. Where I found that the text on the plaque had been changed, answering the question that had been burdening me from the start: "Where's my bloody sword?" - Turns out it had been put indefinitely out of my reach because "Something Something Speedrunners."

I shouldn't have to explain why a speedrunner's ability to cheat past the Door Of Time does not justify the removal of a basic attack command.

And IF the Kokiri Sword is still in the game somewhere: I. Don't. Care. - It makes 0 difference whether the sword has been removed from the game entirely, or simply put of reach until the Door Of Time is open, the result is the same: I have to go through 3 dungeons while my only available Melee Weapon has Ammo.

In terms of Changed Dialogue Boxes:

The game is explicitly advertised as being "Like Master Quest" So, same story, different maps. But the story isn't the same, as, for some reason, plot-crucial cutscenes have been bombarded with a series of incredibly awful jokes; the Deku Tree's dying words replaced with no less than 10 dialogue boxes repeating the same "You killed me you fool" joke over and over.

The, for lack of a better word, lame sense of humor bleeds over into optional dialogue as well, with Navi being rebranded as an aloof jerk, which we've already seen twice in both Tatl (Majora's Mask) and Midna (Twilight Princess) and the entire point was that they stopped being aloof jerks as their arc progressed. Not that I know that doesn't happen in this hack, considering I have no reason or desire to continue playing after the halfway point I didn't even bother reaching.

But there's also the "Potion" Shop in Castle Town Market, which now only sells milk for the sole purpose of making a Lactose Intolerance joke. Which also bleeds back into the gameplay as the bloody potion shop now exclusively sells milk, and not anything useful like Deku Nuts, Seeds, or Sticks.

Make no mistake; this hack is Bad with a capital B.

Been playing this romhack for a few hours, and though I am a OoT veteran for countless years, I am impressed with the level of attention the new layout offers. Here is a list of personal pros and cons:

Pros: A unique variation that grants players a new challenge, especially seasoned OoT players. Glitches that most took for granted have been patched or areas altered to make the adventure more 'streamlined' (which may be a pro or con depending on your POV). Cutscenes are shortened, which helps shave off runtime, and no map layouts have been altered, which allows for a strict, though brisk and challenging, puzzle update.

Cons: Most cosmetic changes (especially to Link) look a little silly, especially the pink hair and emblems, such as the 'Pac-man' gerudo symbol. Some humorous dialogue aside, most story elements did not need to be updated, and at worst are cringy (especially Navi dialogue). As I had previously mentioned the word streamlined in pros, it was not without caveat: item progression starting with the Forest temple is not linear, and dungeons need to be completed in a roundabout way that merely pads the playthrough and offers no additional challenge besides running around aimlessly. I had to resort to some glitches/exploits to complete certain areas (or the situation seemed to encourage their use).

Some other comments that are not necessarily pro or con, collectathons are the name of the game, and while personally I am the type of gamer who enjoys 100% playthroughs, I understand that some don't. There are over 100 gold skulltulas (I have yet to determine how many there are) and some other quests that used to be optional are necessary for major items.

Overall, the work done is to be admired and full credit where credit is due. Kudos to the developer and I look forward to see what the future holds in the world of OoT romhacking!

I love the idea of a more extreme master quest and this mostly does a good job of setting itself apart. But it avoids giving the player any kind of information, even subtle hints, and some of the changes like the new location to bomb the rolling Goron just feel obtuse for the sake of it.

I gave up trying to find the bomb bag because there's seemingly nothing pointing you in the right direction at all. I'd love to keep playing and see what else has been done with the game but as it is there's a lot of wandering around until you stumble on whatever happens to be the way forward.