6 replies to this topic

[Russ]

Isle of Rebirth by Evan20000

 
 

A difficult-ish quest that takes Link across the island of Remdra in his quest to rescue Princess Zelda. Quest is best played in 2.5.0, but should work in 2.5.1 final. I take no responsibility for version bugs caused by this, however.

Speaking of Isle of Rebirth! This one was huge back in the day and set a lot of standards for quest design. I've wanted to do a retrospective on it and see how well it holds up vs how much it's been left in the past by shifting design standards.

 

There was a time when this was my favorite quest on the database. At its peak, it was THE ZC quest, with more attention than any quest since Hero of Dreams or Lost Isle, even attracting a let's play from Zelda Dungeon. That was some ten years ago. So let's take a look at how it holds up and how design trends have shifted in the meantime.

As this is a large quest, our usual weekend quest club streams may not be enough time to get through it. In addition to Deedee hosting regular weekend streams, I'll try to do some midweek streams if my schedule allows it.
 
As always, a thread for the Quest can be found on the PureZC Discord here.

[Mani Kanina]

Personally I always found IoR a bit too harsh and overbearing in places, even if impressive on a technical level. It's a quest worth taking for a spin, but it's one I think can be quite a bit too much for many.

[bigboylink]

Sweet.  I was hoping IoR would get featured here eventually as I've been itching to replay it.  Been a long time...my previous play through I made it all the way to 

Spoiler

level 11

 

...but then didn't play for a while (I forget why...life happens).  When you're away from a quest this big for a while, it's hard to just jump back in.  So hopefully I'll make it all the way through this time.

[Evan20000]

I've never heard of this quest. I should give it a try.

[Jamian]

This is a classic, and at times a source of inspiration for my own quests.

 

If anyone hasn't heard of this quest, they should give it a try.

[bigboylink]

Sweet.  I was hoping IoR would get featured here eventually as I've been itching to replay it.  Been a long time...my previous play through I made it all the way to 

Spoiler

level 11

 

...but then didn't play for a while (I forget why...life happens).  When you're away from a quest this big for a while, it's hard to just jump back in.  So hopefully I'll make it all the way through this time.

 

Finally getting around to replaying this -- hoo boy it is a joy to play but it is indeed difficult, even on normal mode -- and not the usual Z1 difficulty of "oh I'll be fine if there are 8 blue darknuts because I know how to slay them and know they'll drop hearts" (and I'm now remembering exactly where I stopped playing in my spoiler tag above, lol).

I found what I think is a bug / something that will hard-lock your save-file in level 4 if you're not careful with your keys: you can sequence-break before getting the lens, walk over some spikes you're not supposed to, and if you unlock the door on this screen (lock not shown...I'm already in L5), you've hard-locked your save-file:

https://imgur.com/a/l4-ior-MQRcaQe


Maybe I'm wrong, I haven't tested this extensively or anything, but I'm ~90% sure this results in a hard-lock.

Edited by bigboylink, 19 January 2026 - 06:42 PM.

[bigboylink]

I recall the previous time I played this that the info merchants were much more helpful. Specifically stuff like “the moldorm in level 2 is weak to bombs” or "use the wand on gleeok", maybe not so explicitly, but words to that effect. Now the hints are, well, kinda useless.  Or maybe I'm hallucinating & misremembering <shrug>.

Not a big deal, just thought it was curious.  Level 8 is fun.

 

 

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EDIT #1:
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Made a lot of progress -- going to edit my post instead of making a new one.

Levels 9 & 10 -- I feel like you're intended to tackle these levels similarly: you get the map early and it's important to use the map a lot to help decide "where do I need to go next".  For level 9 this was incredibly fun: "ok first where do I need to go, second which block color needs activating to get there", for level 10 I found myself squinting at the map to follow all the automatic arrow paths, and ehhh that just got to be tedious.  

Think I took ~45 minutes on that level 9 ice block puzzle lol.

Level 11 -- Except for the boss, I found this was surprisingly easier than levels 9 & 10.  Normal mode the whole time.  The boss is, well, I know a lot of posts were written about this boss.  Back in the day I remember not immediately "getting" that she's invincible until you shine the light on her, but that stuck with me 10+ years later, so I only died ~3 times to her.

Level 12 -- even with the gold armor this is a surprising difficulty spike.  Cool puzzles.  Just got the portal sphere.

Found a cute bug -- not game breaking at all -- outside of level 12 a fairy tells you "that puny red tunic will get you destroyed" (or words to that effect).  Then when the door opens she comments on your "improved butter suit" even if you're still wearing the red mail -- to be clear, the "bug" is that the door opening seems to trigger her new dialogue, not you actually getting the gold armor.

Not much left in the main game for me now...this has been a lot of fun (despite being turned off by level 10).  Still think this quest remains a top ~3 quest in the DB (and I probably wouldn't quibble with anyone who thinks it's #1).

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EDIT #2:
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Final boss reached.  Oooof I don't know if I'm motivated to finish him.  Got all the skulls too this time -- never did a proper dig of Level X in my initial playthrough, but I hate to say I am feeling burned out on this quest and not feeling motivated to dig through Level X either.  Still think the quest holds up extremely well, and kudos to the community for choosing to highlight this quest.

Edited by bigboylink, 01 February 2026 - 04:50 PM.