Forest Temple (Disambiguation)

Enter the Forest Temple to see some once-beautiful ruins falling to decay. The vines to your right are overrun by Skullwalltula's, so climbing isn't an option there. Go around the tree on the right and climb the vines behind it. At the top, drop to the tree, kill the Skulltula and jump across. Hit the switch and jump back for the key. In the hallway, fight your way past the Skulltulas (watch out for shadows) and, just before the door, hookshot the Golden Skulltula on the wall above the door. Continue through the door to see a scene with four ghosts stealing the fires.

Run straight forward, through the door, and play the song of time to remove the time block. In the next room, defeat the two Wolfos to claim a small key. Back to the main room, take the only open door, the left room (from the perspective of just entering the temple) and deal with the Stalfos that ambushes you.

Through the new door, immediately turn left and collect the Golden Skulltula. Climb the ladders to the push me-pull me puzzle. Pull the blue block straight back until it's out of the path. Run through, to the right, and push the other blue block down until it clicks into place. Climb up and push the brown block here until it clicks into place. Ignore the other brown block in this area for now. Hitting the switch will raise a hookshot target so you can take a shortcut back up here later. Take the right and deal with the...

New Enemy: Blue Bubble

Guard against its blue flame with your shield.

These skulls can't be harmed until their flames are extinguished. You can do so by either running into them with your shield or stunning them with Deku Nuts or the Hookshot. Then it's simply the ol' one-two slice, or a jump slice to finish them off.

Deal with the two Bubbles here, then use your key and go through the door. Take the hallway and enter the next room. Navi will warn you to watch for shadows. Jump down (make sure not to fall in the hole) to claim your Boss Key! You may get ambushed here by...

New Enemy: Wallmaster

Watch out for its shadow on the floor. Destroy it before it goes back up to the ceiling.
One of the most annoying enemies in the entire series, these giant, evil hands will fall from the ceiling and snatch you away, taking you all the way back to the beginning of the dungeon! You can tell when they're in the room by the sound they make and the shadow that appears below you.

To kill them, wait until the shadow is pretty large, then run away. When you hear them thump on the ground, turn back around and slash away at them twice to kill them before they jump back to the ceiling.

Drop through the floor to find...

New Enemy: Floormaster

When it splits up, destroy all the pieces before they reunite!

These spider-like hands will scurry along the floor searching for prey. When they spot you, they'll turn green and rush towards you. While they're green, they're invulnerable. Wait until they're caught off guard and attack quickly. When "defeated" they'll split into three smaller hands that try to latch onto your face and suck the life out of you and potentially reunite to become a full strength Floormaster again! Deku Nuts, Din's Fire or a Spin Attack are all effective ways to kill the little ones. As long as there are any left, they can and will combine (one combines with itself, too), and will break up again into three, so take them out quick.

Deal with this annoying guy, and through the door you go. Stay on top, and take the first door on your right. Here, you can play the sun song to make it easier, but a single redead isn't too bad. A single jump-attack will deal with him, and claim the key he guarded. Back outside, take the next door on your right and hit the switch. This mixes things up and twists the platform. Use the hookshot targets and the newly-relocated blocks to climb up quickly, and make it through the door and hallway again.

The corridor is now twisted, and leads towards a ghost-picture stairway. Head down the stairs, and through the door to the bottom room. Defeat the Stalfos, making sure not to fall into the pit. A platform lowers, filling the hole, and two more come out. Defeat these two quickly, as one will revive eventually if the other two still lives. After a grueling victory, the chest contains...

New Item: Fairy Bow
Unsurprisingly, this new item allows you to shoot stuff. It comes with the smallest Quiver, allowing you to carry up to 30 Arrows.

Break the pots for hearts if need be. Head back through the door you came from (it has a red rug, not the blue) and shoot the ghost pictures until you get the ghost fight.

New Enemy: Joelle (red); Beth (blue); Amy (green) - one of the Poe Sisters
Aim for her when she appears.

This is a fairly simple fight, with the enemy using a very predictable attack pattern. The Joelle is so easy it's ridiculous. Hold your shield up. She'll do a spinning attack, bounce off your shield. If you have her between you and a corner, she'll immediately go to the corner. You can hold her there. After she does this twice, she'll reappear in which time you can quickly attack her. Repeat a few times and she's on ice. The torch lights up, and a treasure chest with your Dungeon Map appears.

Now, we're faced with a choice, we can go kill Beth (the blue ghost) and get our Compass. This will make directions easier, but will require some extra backtracking. Or, we can continue on and get Beth later. This guide will assume you've gotten Beth now (overall, I believe the help of a Compass early on makes this temple quicker), but you can do it either way.

Back to the Stalfos room and through the other side. Solve the same puzzle and fight the same enemy. This time it's Beth and blue, but everything else is practically the same. Claim your Compass from the chest. Heading upstairs leads to nothing but a locked (small key) door, so head back through the Stalfos room, the Joelle room, past the wallmasters and the twisted corridor; all the way to the main room. Shoot the eye over the northwest and northeast corridors to unbar the gates. Through to the west courtyard, climb the vines over the well to claim a Golden Skulltula. There is a large spiderweb on the eastern wall here, but it's just a shortcut to the eastern, but doesn't really save any time because of the long climb.

Jump in the well, equip your Iron Boots (and blue tunic, if you need it), and kill the Golden Skulltula here. Now run remove the boots and swim to the eastern side and climb out here. (If you haven't gotten the Iron Boots yet, simple go inside and take the corridor to the eastern courtyard. After you drain the well, get the Golden Skulltula. It takes a little longer this way.) Whip out your bow and shoot the eye just under the water to drain it. Jump down and open the chest for your first Small Key. Climb back out.

Deal with the Big Deku Baba's and get the Golden Skulltula above the door. Hookshot up, and utilize the Song of Time to move some blocks around. On the last block, shoot the Skullwalltula and jump to the vines to climb up and get another Small Key. If you like, you can Hookshot to the other balcony, go through, and use Din's Fire to open an (unnecessary) shortcut between the courtyards. Head all the way back to Beth's room (if you haven't dealt with her yet, she'd just a bluer version of Joelle), and climb the stairs to use your key. Jump across to the right, through the corridor, and find...

New Enemy: Green Bubble

Use your sword when its green fire vanishes!

The Green Bubble is just the same as the Blue Bubble, who's fire acts different. Turning on and off periodically instead of through direct actions. Simply wait for it to go off and kill it. Or, since these ones are also fixed to a set path, you can always simply go around them.

However you deal with the Green Bubbles, use your second key at the end of this corridor. You find yourself in a room with rotating platforms and spikes, a torch and a blue switch, and a frozen eye on the wall. Simply jump over to the platform just under the eye, grab the box and take it over to set it on the switch. On a rotating platform, shoot through the fire to the eye to twist the corridor that had the Green Bubbles. Remove the box from the switch and exit this room.

The stairs will take you back to Beth's room. Instead, drop through the hole in the floor. The two switches in this room will make a chest (with arrows) drop, and unbar the door near where you dropped in. Step forward just far enough so the ceiling will fall and take a step back. When it drops, quickly shoot the Skulltula's, watching where they are. When the floor drops, you need to be standing in one of the "safe spots" (most are/were occupied by Skulltula's) or you'll be crushed and have to start over. Hit the left switch (the chest is optional, after all) and work your way back to the side corridor. Outside, kill the Deku Baba and claim the Small Key. Use the Song of Time to climb back up, fight through the falling ceiling again, and open the door.

In this room, make sure you are not standing on a shadow and look at the picture on the wall. Shoot it, and you are given a simple puzzle to solve in one minute. The blue block just gets in your way, and your object is to make the picture on the wall. All pieces are oriented correctly (meaning no turning) so just worry about pushing and pulling them to make the picture. If you fail, the whole thing resets and you are given a little more time, until you succeed or leave the room. Success means the picture burns up, and you are faced with fighting Amy, who's battle is exactly the same as Joelle and Beth's fight.

When she goes and opens the door, continue through, through the corridor, back to the main room. If you look down, you'll see the final, purple ghost sitting in the middle of the room. Jump down to face...

New Enemy: Mini-Boss: Meg - one of the Poe sisters
If she splits into multiple images, you need to figure out which one is the real one. Is it this one?

This fight starts out with Meg splitting into four images of herself, and they float around you, confusing you. If you move, they'll move with you so you can't get them with your sword. You can target them and shoot them with your Fairy Bow, or you can manually aim and shoot them with your Hookshot. When you've hit the correct one, they will all disappear, reappearing surrounding you again.

If you hit all three fake ones, the real one will attack you before summoning the fake ones again to confuse you. If you do nothing for a while, the real one will reveal herself by attacking you, before resetting the charade.

You can defeat her using process of elimination. Eenee... meenee... minee... MO! Shoot them until you hit the right one enough times. The easier method is to ignore targeting. Stand still and let the camera pan out. When they appear, the real one will do an extra little flourishy spin, and if you can see the whole battlefield, you'll never miss.

Either way, hit her enough times, and she'll go down, lighting the final torch and raising the elevator. Take it down and arrive in a room with a carnival-tent like floor, with stripes of red, white, and blue all around. There are two slabs of stone jutting out on opposite sides, and two tunnels cut out on opposite sides between the slabs. Grab one of the slabs and turn it clockwise. Through one door, you can defeat two Skulltula's for some pots with hearts in them. Turn it again, hit the crystal switch to open the gate, and hit the button switch to open a different gate. Clockwise again and the chest contains arrows. Once more, through the south blue, shoot the eye, and head north to the bosses room.

Upstairs, you enter an octagon with eight of the same painting on either side. Try to leave, and the gate bars you in. You turn around to behold... Ganondorf, on his Black Steed! But then his face changes, and it is really

Temple Boss: Evil Spirit from Beyond, Phantom Ganon

Phanton Ganon

Attack him when he comes out of one of the pictures! Watch out for the fake one!

He'll immediately jump into a swirling purple vortex, and run off into one of the pictures. After he reaches the castle, two different pictures will have him coming towards you. One of them will create the swirling purple vortex, and jump out towards you. The other one is a decoy, and will simply turn around. Quickly figure out which is real, and shoot him as soon as he emerges to send him back to where he came.

After the third hit, he'll jump off his horse as it runs back, and float around. Now, he'll use his staff of power to send sparking balls of energy at you. Defending with your shield will dissipate the energy. (Oddly enough, if you have the Megaton Hammer, you can smash the energy to dissipate it also.) He can also start releasing spiriling rainbow trails of energy and charge at you if you get too close. Dodge out of the way or take damage, since you can't defend from this attack.

He deflects arrows with his staff. (Even if you have a fire arrow, it can't hit him). Bombs have no effect. Neither does Din's Fire. Deku Nuts will only get in your way as the flashes of light

The way to deal damage to him is to deflect the energy back at him. In fact, talking to Navi at this point will yield advice: "It's an evil ghost of the Forest Temple! He comes out of one of the pictures. Answer his magic attacks with an attack of your own!"

When he sends the energy at you, deflect it by swinging your sword. (Or, if you like a challenge, try defeating him by swinging an empty bottle.) Successful timing will mean it's sent back him. Failure and you're electrocuted. If you send it at him, he may rebound it again. If he does so, keep sending it back until it hits him. The longer the energy stays in the air the more powerful it is, so avoid getting hit.

After you finally hit him, he'll drop to the ground, tired and shocked. Quickly run up to him and slice away before he gets back up. (The longer the energy was in the air, the longer he'll be on the ground.) When he gets up he follows the same pattern as before, so continue the process until he is finally defeated.

He'll rise up in a blue burning husk, and a portal will appear in the center of the room to suck it away. After some words echoed by your real nemisis, warning you that fighting the REAL Ganon will be tougher, he breaks away, and the portal of darkness becomes a portal of light. Collect the Heart Container, and step into it. Have a chat with your old pal Saria and earn yourself the Forest Medallion.