I continued my game in the Lanayru Mining Facility, which is the third dungeon. I was stuck in this first room for a while. There were little icons of a face with a circle around one eye, and there was a large face thing in the room. I thought it was a hint that I was supposed to do something with its eye. I tried bombing it, shooting it, and everything else I could think of, but it didn’t open up a path.
Eventually I found out that this one thing was actually a lever I had to pull down. It looked like a thing in earlier levels that you have to use your beetle on to cut a rope, so I didn’t realize it was a lever this time. Oops.
But once I was past that stumbling block, I was making pretty good progress through the dungeon. I found some blue stones that brought some areas back to life.
It’s pretty cool when the sand-filled, deserted areas spring back to life with all sorts of robotics, neon lights, and technology.
I ended up getting a new item called the Gust Bellows. It can blow an endless gust of wind (much like some people I know). All these curious mounds of sand that I’ve been seeing now make sense. I can blow away the sand to reveal things, much like I used the claws earlier in the game to dig at X spots.
I did reach some enemies that gave me some serious trouble. These flying things that shoot missiles and then floating bombs started killing me.
Smurf-Fi told me I could repel the missiles with my shield. The problem was, I didn’t have a shield. One time I got past that enemy, only to have my rear end handed to me by this other laser-shooting enemy at the top of a ladder. After dying a few times, I decided enough was enough and I went back to the sky to buy shields (and potions while I was there). I returned and I eventually made it past those trouble spots.
I finally ended up getting the map of the level. I say finally because it was very far into the dungeon. Usually you get the dungeon map before you’re halfway through; this time, there were only two rooms I hadn’t been in yet.
But finally having found the map, I saved and ended the game for tonight.
While looking for the third one, I found a crack in a wall and bombed it. A path opened up that let to a heart piece.
Searching around for a while, I eventually found the third power node and activated it. Fortunately, this one wasn’t in a mini-dungeon.
I made my way back to the generator. I just needed to solve a simple puzzle.
Once everything was up and running, a large building rose up out of the sand. It’s the Lanayru Mining Facility.
It appears to be the third dungeon. I was about ready to save my game, but decided to go inside and look around. There was a large room, but the door that led further wouldn’t open and I didn’t see any clear way to progress. I decided I would figure it out next time and saved my game.
It now has pincers that be used to pick up and drop items (such as bombs).
I used it to drop some bombs into some basketball-style buckets to proceed. And of course just using the beetle anyway is fun to look around and see things you otherwise couldn’t see. Eventually I met up with my Goron friend at what apparently is the Temple of Time.
He saw Zelda and that mysterious woman go inside, but an explosion made the temple inaccessible. So I have to find another way inside. Another little guy I ran into told me that the Lanayru Mining Facility is connected to the Temple of Time underground. I reached the power generator for the machine that opens the gate for the Mining Facility, but I first have to activate three power nodes. I activated one of them, but then I saved and quit my game. I’ll get the others next time.