Zora's Fountain Beta Cutscenes!

[Zeth Ryder]

For those of you from ZSO and beta questers of the old Zelda N64 game, you might remember the Jabu Jabu cutscene that freezes for reasons that were unknown back then. It was during this time that the Ocarina Pedestal was found in Zora's fountain, I took sometime to examine things and fix them correctly as they are suppose to be, these cutscenes are representation of old beta unused and unfinished cutscenes that never made it to the final game. While also going through the object sets, I also found unused groups that you never normally see in Zora's fountain.

 

00A4 = Golden Torch stand

0012 = Shabom

0061 = Normal Warp Pad

0013 = Cucco

 

Taken from my own personal guesses, these object sets are older then the map itself, which explains why Jabu Jabu was moved extremely far from his alter, probably due to the map was originally a lot smaller, Another thing I find interesting is that the normal warp pad's object set is there as well as the Ocarina pedestal. Perhaps you had to play the Ocarina infront of Lord Jabu Jabu at one point, then again, why does the spiritual stone float up and over the pedestal? I do know that the normal warp pads were not in their locations they are now in the final game, this has been proven by examining old objects sets, so its probably a good possible guess that the normal warp pad that's in Lake Hylia used to be in Zora's Fountain. The Golden Torch was probably decoration of some sort and Shabom is just anybody's guess what it was used for, however a cucco? That is a little beyond me....

 

Anyways here's the video, enjoy!

 

 

Also just to jog memories on how it used to be, we couldn't even be a certain height without it freezing:

[Secant]

The Shabom object could've been something a lot older at one time, representing something else until it was discarded entirely and its object number was filled in with something else. The warp pad could've been for the Ice Temple, perhaps... but it's anyone's guess as to whether the Ice Temple would've been where the Ice Cavern is now. I'm with you on the golden torch stand. As for the cucco, I'm willing to bet it was placed somewhere in the high platform which you can get to by uncovering the Silver Gauntlet block and going through the tunnel with invisible Skulltullas. That seems especially viable because in the canon game (to the best of my knowledge) there's nothing there at all, which leaves one wondering why Nintendo would bother with that feature at all. I'm thinking there was most likely a Piece of Heart on top of the giant rock wall to your right when on Jabu-Jabu's platform, and you'd use the cucco to fly to it. I'm willing to bet it was removed in QA testing because you could fly off the map from that height (maybe in the valley made in the mountains where you can see some trees in the background) and Nintendo was too lazy to modify the collision at that point.

 

Just telling some academic lies--some refer to those as "theories."

 

EDIT: Actually watched the video just now, and I think I know what the deal is with that object set for that map. This was probably a scrapped cutscene bit for the end credits which showed Zora's Domain/Fountain had finally thawed out, and the Zora's Sapphire flying over the pedestal might've been a bit of humor on Nintendo's part, showing Jabu-Jabu swallowing the gem once again. Seems to make sense to me, anyway, thoughts?

[Zeth Ryder]

I do remember there being a bunch of invisible spiders in that hole, can't remember if there was something else up there, I think a gold skulltula, maybe? Anyways, its rather interesting to find these old object sets, even more interesting that shabom is actually located for the object set, makes me wonder what purpose it played? Decoration like in MM's giant's santurary or enemy like inside of Lord Jabu Jabu?

 

Edit: Also perhaps Ruto is suppose to be standing there and you get to see the Zora's saphire and Ruto swallowed by Lord Jabu Jabu?

[Vincent Swiftstrike]

Well, if Princess Ruto was supposed to be in that cutscene, perhaps there are some missing animations for her somewhere? I know in Majora's Mask, the Fairy Fountain cutscenes you showed, Zeth, those animations that Link used in them can be accessed via action replay codes.

 

 

I feel the length of the cutscene seems too long for Princess Ruto to simply be sucked in. If she was being sucked in... well, she would have enough time to crawl out of the way if the cutscene is nearly a minute of just that. Of course anything could happen; maybe that's why it may have been scrapped in the first place.

 

 

I feel like the original planned cutscene would be that she was there with the spiritual stone (perhaps Link met up with her, asking for the stone, and she initially refuses) then Jabu-Jabu opens his mouth, sucks the stone out of her hands, or where it may have been resting perhaps, and she chases in after it, which Link would then follow after her as well.

 

 

With the length of the cutscene, it seems more plausible, but I'm doing nothing but theory crafting.

 

 

 

 

Finally, it's possible there may be no extra animations to Ruto as well. For all we know she could use the same animation when you find the spiritual stone inside Jabu-Jabu right before you fight the giant Octorok.

[ASAP Sam Worldwide]

I think there should of kept some cutscenes from beta.

[MedicalNerd]

I support the thought of Ruto having the stone and then the stone got sucked in. I just got through the Jabu Jabu-part of the 3DS game and she says Jabu Jabu ate the stone and she went in to search for it. It seems likely that this was the case with the cutscene since it clearly shows the stone being sucked in Jabu Jabu's mouth.

 

Also, the thing with the pedestal, I also belive it once was the warp pad when teleporting to the Ice Temple. Maybe once all warp pads looked like this and when the developers decided not to include the Ice Temple but instead the Ice Cavern they maybe never changed the ocarina pedestal into the warp pads we see in the final game. I've seen some screenshots when google-ing ocarina pedestal where the forest warp pad is instead the ocarina pedestal. This might support my hypothesis?

[Danicus]

I wonder if the Ocarina Pedestals were origionally like the Owl Statues in Majora's Mask. Play one song, and you could warp to many different locations on the map. I find it odd to think that they were the initial warp pads for the temples. It just seems to simple looking to me.

[Forecast]

I wonder if the Ocarina Pedestals were origionally like the Owl Statues in Majora's Mask. Play one song, and you could warp to many different locations on the map. I find it odd to think that they were the initial warp pads for the temples. It just seems to simple looking to me.

That's what early versions of things tend to look. Just look at the enemy designs shown at the old Zelda64 screenshots.

[Vincent Swiftstrike]

I wonder if the Ocarina Pedestals were origionally like the Owl Statues in Majora's Mask. Play one song, and you could warp to many different locations on the map. I find it odd to think that they were the initial warp pads for the temples. It just seems to simple looking to me.

 

 

Maybe, but a problem with that is that once you learned that song, you could warp anywhere in the game with those pads. By the time you learn the song, you could either sequence break the game too easily, doing temples far earlier then you are supposed to or getting key items like how we get the Zora's Mask ridiculously early in a Majora's Mask speed run. Or in the case that you get this song too far into the game, when by the time you learned the song, there would be little to no need for it except for it other then simply back tracking, that would only be good for side quests and traveling between point A to Point B; which as we know for some Side quests this is void due to the warping taking up in game time. I'd find it hard to get such song in the middle of these two scenario's, because it probably couldn't be too hard to sequence break the game to get that song earlier then intended, which will forever lean it closer to the former scenario, where it's used to sequence break the rest of the game.

 

Once again, I'm doing nothing but theory crafting here. But it seems logical to me. In Majora's Mask it was much better due to the 3 day time limit, the game offered countless check points so that way you didn't have to redo so much of something again for players of all paces, as well as the fact Majora's Mask already had the song list full, they could only reduce it down to one song. I also find it nice you don't have to memorize 6 different songs to warp to 6 different locations. In Majora's Mask the Owl check points were numerous enough that there had to be one song as well.

[Arcaith]

There are quite a few possibilities; the owl statues can only be warped to once you have struck them with a sword. The pads could be similar in that you could only warp to them when you had sighted or stood on them at least once. That or they were all useable at once and the game breaking was only noticed later. *shrug*

[Zeth Ryder]

Problem that comes with these theories is that the Ocarina Pedestal and Warp Pad object sets are both loaded in the beta cutscene however only the Ocarina pedestal is present in the actor list(which kind of suggests that the warp pad was at one point there as well with the Ocarina pedestal). Thing is, Jabu Jabu is the ONLY place I've ever seen the pedestal being loaded up via old object sets in the map normally.

[Vincent Swiftstrike]

There are quite a few possibilities; the owl statues can only be warped to once you have struck them with a sword. The pads could be similar in that you could only warp to them when you had sighted or stood on them at least once. That or they were all useable at once and the game breaking was only noticed later. *shrug*

 

I don't see any possible way to activate them though. The only way I could think of "activating" them is to learn separate songs as we do now. Perhaps they still functioned the same way in beta as they do now; they just all had the same graphic. In beta that scenario isn't too far-fetched either.

 

 

Problem that comes with these theories is that the Ocarina Pedestal and Warp Pad object sets are both loaded in the beta cutscene however only the Ocarina pedestal is present in the actor list(which kind of suggests that the warp pad was at one point there as well with the Ocarina pedestal). Thing is, Jabu Jabu is the ONLY place I've ever seen the pedestal being loaded up via old object sets in the map normally.

 

So no other map has the pedestal act in this way? Or have all maps not been tested yet?

Since Majora's Mask has the same build, or the near same build as Ocarina of Time, would it also be possible to perhaps scavenge Majora's Mask for evidence, perhaps in similar scenario's of this kind? More information may be able to be gained if there is some sort of pattern.

 

This may be slightly off topic, but I've been reminded of something. I remember a video on Youtube. I won't go too far into detail unless someone pressed for more (or asks for the video itself), but basically entering a sealed off debug map in Ganondorf's castle had a legit Arwing in the map. However, by normal means, entering the map via debug mode does not seem to spawn the Arwing. I've always been curious as to why, or if the guy happened to somehow milk the contents to seem something more then it is.

 

This is going to be a stretch that I'm probably going to whack myself later for even considering, but as of now it's 5:50 A.M. for me and it seems like a small shred of a possibility.

Perhaps in the beginning, the Zora's home could have possibly been in Lake Hylia, for Lake Hylia is certainly more then big enough to fit Lord Jabu-Jabu and be able to populate all the Zora's, and Zora's domain was originally just the Ice caverns, which may have been an ice temple at the time.

 

I take back about whacking myself later, because I feel like whacking myself now because it seems too far of a stretch, but it doesn't hurt to leave it up I guess. All theories should be considered; I just feel this theory has no evidence to really go on.

 

Also, I forget, was Jabu-Jabu's size different in the beta compared to the original (I think his sizes are different even in the beta quests but it's been ages since I've anything physically with Ocarina of Time)?