After six, count 'em, six runs through the Ice Palace I finally ended up with this video. And I still used more re-records than I would've liked. There's just so many little things that can go wrong and waste time in there. Not even things that will get me hit, because I know the dungeon so damn well by now—right down to the timing of the jellyfishs' electrification—that I rarely take damage, but stupid little things like sliding back and forth on the ice in front of a doorway for two seconds before finally managing to get through. I called it from the start and the Ice Palace was indeed a huge pain to make a good walkthrough for.
I really was not expecting to be able to do the Ice Palace in one section, though. And my first recorded run was actually over YouTube's 10:59 time limit. But then I remembered two big route improvements that cut out a ton of backtracking and cut the time down by two whole minutes. In the end, I actually managed to beat it a little faster than the Dark Palace, which seems crazy to me.
This makes me wonder if I'll be able to do Ganon's Tower in one section too. That is, show all of it in one section. I'm sure I could do it in one if I skipped a bunch of the huge first floor and just went straight to the Big Key and Red Mail but I'd like to show all or at least most of the dungeon. There's a lot of secrets and interesting bits in Ganon's Tower.
Kholdstare is a really fun boss. It's similar to Blind in that there's a lot of crap to dodge, but not quite as much so that you get to balance defense with offense. And there's just something incredibly satisfying about burning things with the Fire Rod.
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Zelda A Link to the Past - Lv5 Ice Palace
My complete Level 5: Ice Palace walkthrough for The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Played in real time on Snes9x v1.43+ with re-records used to optimize video length.
Equipment checklist: 16 Hearts, Tempered Sword, 1/2 Magic, Bombos
- To get the Tempered Sword, go to the southern section of the Village of Outcasts, where the library is in the Light World, and find the lost smith. Bring him back to his partner in the Light World and they'll temper your sword to make it stronger.
- The 1/2 Magic upgrade can be obtained by jumping down the well next to the smithy's shop in Kakariko Village and sprinkling some magic powder on the statue within.
- You can get Bombos by traveling west from the Swamp Palace and warping back to the Light World in the area marked off by posts, then using the Book of Mudora to read the text on the monolith up on the hill in the desert.
[00:28] Pengators
These duck-billed mammals (no, really) are dangerous in groups when they can surround you on the ice. I recommend burning them all at once with Bombos.
[01:58] Through the Fire and Flames
You can't be hurt while using the Hookshot so use it to pull yourself through the fireball chain.
[02:24] Dashing on ice
Dashing provides some much needed control while walking on ice, by letting you instantly stop moving and change directions.
[02:56] Don't panic
The biggest thing you can do to keep yourself from falling off the edge in this room is to simply not rush. Take it slow and then use dashing to run straight once you're lined up.
[03:38] Giant spike traps
Walk straight down from the doorway and the first two spike traps will always miss, then curve back up and left to avoid the third.
[05:51] SNES-only shortcut
This trick doesn't work in the GBA version because the layout of this room was changed but, if you beat Level 6: Misery Mire and get the Cane of Somaria first, you can use a magic block to hold down the switch under the pot and go straight to the boss from here.
[08:00] Boss: Kholdstare
First, use Bombos (or the Fire Rod if you don't have Bombos) to break the ice encasing Kholdstare. Then, after that's out of the way, what looked like one giant puffball will be revealed as three and they'll all start chasing you around the room as chunks of ice fall from above. Keep your distance, using your sword to knock Kholdstare away and make sure it doesn't corner you, and burn the frozen puffballs from afar with the Fire Rod.
I also have another no damage video, that uses only the sword, here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dpk90nNblxg
