Incomplete Majora's Mask ending

[Hyruleansoldier]

Okay, so I just beat Majora's Mask again, this time without obtaining any optional masks (which most of them are) or helping anyone from the Bomber's Notebook.

I had heard some speculation about little additions to the ending depending on certain masks you obtain during the game, but specific data were nowhere to be found.  So I just beat the game with only the Gibdo Mask, Garo's Mask, Captain's Hat and Giant Mask (the only non-character masks you need to beat the game), and to my surprise there are 9 mask-related mini segments of the ending (that you either get to see or don't depending on whether you obtained the mask or not).

During the staff credits it will then just shows a black background with the mask in question rotating in the bottom right corner - urging you to return to those sidequests to actually watch all those extra scenes.

I list for you all masks which affect the ending (in order of appearance, of course), and what part of the ending you miss out on if you don't have the mask in question:

1) Postman's Hat : The postman runs across Termina Field back to town

2) Kamaro's Mask : The Rosa sisters perform the dance at the Carnival (in the Milk Bar)

3) Great Fairy Mask : You see the 5 Great Fairies hover in line and cast their colorful magic things

4) Romani's Mask : You see Romani shooting 3 ghost-shaped balloons in a row with her bow

5) Blast Mask : You see the bomb shop owner and his mom side to side in front of the shop

6) Bunny Hood : You see Grog in the Cucco shack surrounded by all of his (grown-up) cuccos

7) Circus Leader's Mask : You see Gorman being his drunk self in the Milk Bar, looking around at the other people

8] Bremen Mask : You see the guy with his (Song of Storms themed) music box in the Milk Bar (a lot of characters are also in this sequence)

After this you see the scene where Pamela runs towards her father and he picks her up (close to their house).  This scene you will get no matter what, although if there WAS a way to beat the game without the Gibdo Mask, I’m pretty sure this would be optional too (since then her dad would still be a half-Gibdo).  At any rate, you get this scene before the Anju & Kafei’s Wedding (or just see the Couple’s Mask if you didn’t complete the sidequest).

9) Couple's Mask : You see Anju's wedding in Termina Field, with all her friends and relatives present

I should also point out that all these scenes occur right after each other, some flowing over into others, so for example with regard to the sequence in the Milk Bar you will of course see several more characters than just the ones immediately pertaining to certain masks, but if you don't have one of these masks the entire sequence is not shown.  Makes getting everything all the more rewarding!

So yeah, I was oddly pleased about finding all of this out.  I'm a perfectionist so usually by the time I beat the final boss I'll have obtained almost everything in the game, so I would never have ended up seeing this "minimal" ending.  Interesting stuff!

[DarkLink]

Wow, I don't pay attention to those kind of details...nice find HS!

[Mana_Master_Genis]

I always seem to bring this up but...I've almost never played this game.

And your point here really makes me want to see this happening with my own eyes.  Nice job HS.

[DarkLink]

How long did you take to gather all this info?!?! must have been a while

[Hyruleansoldier]

How long did you take to gather all this info?!?! must have been a while

Ehh not that long, since I just had to beat the game without all the optional masks, so when I beat the game I saw all the masks that influenced the ending sequence and I put them in this thread.  I also beat my other file with all 24 masks to see exactly what scenes where involved.

[Ales]

I've never gotten the incomplete ending myself since I simply love doing all the sidequests in MM (usually in games it feels more like a chore sometimes but not here) but I have seen it before on youtube which actually brings a nice sense of "what you did actually mattered" kind of feeling.

Kinda like when one plays Tww after having played Oot (although in Tww's case I literally got chills due to the massive ammount of nostalgia). Still it's usually something that goes unnoticed so it's a good find

[Be_yourself]

i got some of the incomplete ending in MM, but it was reletively recently, coz i too enjoy doing those sidequests...

[chibimoon]

Interesting stuff, HS. I wouldn't mind playing through MM doing the absolute minimum but like Be_yourself said, the sidequests are far too enjoyable.

[Minish Majora]

Interesting, I always presumed there was a sequence for every mask collected but obviously not.
It must have been dull with nine sequences missing. I used to think it was incomplete with four missing.

Good work HS, nice topic to return too 

[NinJa]

Awesome stuff, for reals.
I always, always watch the credits after I beat a Zelda game, but I never thought about this.

[Hyruleansoldier]

Interesting stuff, HS. I wouldn't mind playing through MM doing the absolute minimum but like Be_yourself said, the sidequests are far too enjoyable.

I know!  The idea is to save some sidequests till after you beat it the first time.  Just go back to day 1 after beating it and get all the other masks - you have to do this a few times anyway to get everything ^^

Good work HS, nice topic to return too 

ZOMG wb MM!

[chibimoon]

I know!  The idea is to save some sidequests till after you beat it the first time.  Just go back to day 1 after beating it and get all the other masks - you have to do this a few times anyway to get everything ^^

I'm ashamed to say I've only played through MM twice - the first time was to get as much as possible without really knowing what to expect (being the first play through), the second time was to obtain all 24 masks. Now that I've recently completed my umpteenth playthrough of OoT, I really should crack open MM again.

When you say "beat it the first time", do you mean beating the entire essential storyline for the first time, or the first time the 3 day cycle ends? I think you'd mean the former...

[Python]

Cool, hadn't noticed before.

Every time I play through MM I'm sure to collect every mask before entering the final battle. Except for my very first time with MM when I was too young to know about these kind of things. Nor did I even care for them.

Now that I've recently completed my umpteenth playthrough of OoT, I really should crack open MM again.

Yes, you absolutely should.

[Hyruleansoldier]

I'm ashamed to say I've only played through MM twice - the first time was to get as much as possible without really knowing what to expect (being the first play through), the second time was to obtain all 24 masks. Now that I've recently completed my umpteenth playthrough of OoT, I really should crack open MM again.

You really should.  Everyone should, really.  It's still an underappreciated game, because you won't get all the joy out of it it has to offer from the first couple of playthroughs.  I STILL keep finding new little things, comments by NPC's/reactions to masks, or different scenarios depending on what you did or didn't do --- and I've beaten the game more than a dozen times.  Go for it !

When you say "beat it the first time", do you mean beating the entire essential storyline for the first time, or the first time the 3 day cycle ends? I think you'd mean the former...

Yeah, the first time you do the essentials to get to the moon and challenge Majora.

When beating Majora you will see the incomplete ending, then you can go and get all the other masks and go for a complete collection/sidequest completion and do the minigames on the moon so you get the Fierce Deity's Mask and can complete the game like that.

On that note it's not as easy beating Majora's forms without the FD mask.  And it's a good idea to make careful use of your arrows too.  And shield.

[chibimoon]

You really should.  Everyone should, really.  It's still an underappreciated game, because you won't get all the joy out of it it has to offer from the first couple of playthroughs.  I STILL keep finding new little things, comments by NPC's/reactions to masks, or different scenarios depending on what you did or didn't do --- and I've beaten the game more than a dozen times.  Go for it !

I plan to. Just as soon as I finish my current games (and there are far too many of them).

On that note it's not as easy beating Majora's forms without the FD mask.  And it's a good idea to make careful use of your arrows too.  And shield.

I beat MM the first time without the FD mask and it is a much better experience. When I beat it the second time with the FD mask, the battle was over within minutes. No challenge. Maybe the makers thought they'd reward players who spent time to collect all the masks and go through all the sidequests with an easy final battle but I'd rather the battle difficulty was upped, so to speak, even with the FD mask obtained.

Although FD Link looks awesome. Incredibly awesome.

[Be_yourself]

i remember my first time beating Majoras mask without fierce deity...i was out of bombs so i ran up to the final form with the bomb mask and blew myself up repeatedly...it was the only satisfying boss fight i have had until the golem in Metoroird corruption

[mikecamper]

I know!  This is off-topic.   But......

I just replayed Majora's Mask over the weekend.  I've played it several times but I noticed for just the first time that the taunting sort of sound made by Majora's Incarnation is actually her singing the Level 9 dungeon theme from the original Zelda game. 

That's awesome!   Any one else caught on to that?

[Hyruleansoldier]

ZOMG you're right!  I never realized.....


Lol @ fighting Majora with bombs.  I prefer arrows until you can get close enough to jumpslash.

[Uber_Challenger]

Don't know if anybody else has brought this up yet here, but during the scene where the Indigo-gos (the Zora band) are playing, in Mikau's place is what looks to be Link in his Zora form, even though Link left to go back to Hyrule right before the carnival started. Anybody know what this is about? Is it intended to be an extra or is it an unintentional plot hole or something?

[Hyruleansoldier]

Yeah, I'd noticed that before.  I'm guessing plot hole.  Mikau is dead, and since everyone assumed Link to be the real Mikau, they couldn't have found a replacement (clone ) so soon.  I don't think he actually stayed just to be the Indigo-go's Zora Guitarist...