ゼルダの伝説：神々のトライフォース
The Legend of Zelda: Triforce of the Gods

There are strong geographical similarities between the Light and Dark Worlds, but the details are drastically different. The Dark World is crawling with twisted monsters the likes of which Link has never before seen. The ground, air, and water are all befouled, the rocks look more like skulls, and, thanks to the absence of several bridges (both natural and man-made) and the presence of additional obstacles, it's considerably more difficult to get around. Meanwhile, there are now more and tougher guards and monsters in the Light World, possibly an effect of the power seeping from the Dark World.

Link is currently restricted to a relatively small section in the eastern part of the world (plus the part of the mountain he could reach earlier, from the warp tile there). All other areas are inaccessible due either to missing bridges or to strange purple pegs that are unaffected by anything in Link's arsenal.

Not counting the Death Mountain and Misery Mire areas, the Dark World is effectively split into three regions by barriers that aren't crossable with current items and equipment.

In a Randomizer run, each of the other two sections are reachable as soon as you have the Moon Pearl and Power Gloves and either the Hammer or the second pair of Gloves. Aside from beating Agahnim, you can reach this eastern zone from the northwest by swimming across the river with the Flippers, from the southwest by swimming across the lake with the Flippers or using the Hammer to cross the bridge, or from the Light World by using a warp tile south of the Eastern Temple accessible with the Hammer and Power Gloves.

As mentioned before, beating Agahnim is usually optional in a Randomizer run, though sometimes he's your only Dark World access. It's also possible to require him for reaching the eastern section without needing him to reach the rest of the Dark World, but for that you'd have to find both Gloves for access to the other areas without finding either the Hammer or Flippers, and even that can be circumvented by sequence breaking with the Fake Flippers glitch.

Also, there's a whirlpool shortcut for those who can swim, connecting the eastern lake with the river in the northeast. These are in locations corresponding to the Light World whirlpools in eastern Lake Hylia and near the witch's hut. No other whirlpool warps exist in the Dark World.

Near the base of the pyramid is a crack in what looks like a sealed doorway, but even Bombs have no effect.

After exploring for a while, Link finds a sign by the lake at the river's source, one of the limited areas accessible in the Dark World.

Toss something into the interesting circle of stones in the pond (I recommend the sign for bonus irony points). A large catfish surfaces with a rumble...

The catfish tosses at Link a large golden coin with a wavy pattern engraved on it.

Using Shake eats up Link's magic meter (32 magic, or 1/4 of a full bar, for one use), but can be worth it. When he uses it, Link spins around three times, then leaps into the air and plunges his sword into the ground. Shockwaves radiate out, shaking everything and affecting most non-flying enemies. Some die outright, some are left immobile for a fairly long time, and many, oddly, are transformed into mindless frail monsters that look like moving vegetables with faces.

Japanese folklore includes catfish that cause earthquakes, so that explains that.

Link heads toward where the Eastern Temple would be in the Light World.

Along the way, you can hop in the river and use the Mirror to conveniently grab the Bottle from the guy under the bridge if you haven't already, and continue into the lake and Mirror from a suspicious shallow area to land on the previously unreachable island in Lake Hylia to collect a piece of heart.

Instead of a series of cliffs, the area outside the Temple of Darkness has what amounts to a hedge maze. Nearby is small building with a plant-man inside.

As Link navigates through the hedge maze, a monkey starts following him.

It's unclear whether the kiki is supposed to be a name as such, or just a monkey screeching noise it makes.

Yeah, whatever. It could come in handy, and 10 rupees is practically nothing.

Before long, they reach the temple. The entrance is sealed, and there are several large monkey statues around. Hmm...

It looks like there's no choice. Fortunately, money isn't too difficult to come by, and 100 won't break the bank.

The monkey hops around, hitting a few hidden and unreachable switches, and the entrance opens...

Here in the Dark World, the temples are larger, the music and decorations are creepier, the monsters are tougher, the layouts are more confusing, and the quirks are quirkier. This particular one has numerous dark rooms and seemingly invulnerable headless turtles, and introduces as ordinary fixtures tiles that warp Link between different rooms (these were in previous dungeons only in optional secret rooms), collapsing floors, odd... braziers?... that shoot fireballs at Link at regular intervals, strange moving whack-a-mole-like barriers sticking out of the floor, and jellyfish that periodically electrify themselves, shocking Link if he tries to hit them with melee attacks. It also has a unique puzzle that requires Link to shoot an arrow into the eye of an oddly-colored cyclops statue.

Not far into the area, Link finds a telepathic tile:

The Temple of Darkness continues the trend of dungeons with healing rooms. Bomb through the east wall from the map chest to find three faeries.

The big key is harder to get to than ever before, and involves bombing the floor of a bridge and jumping in. The big chest, on the other hand, also involves bombing through a wall, but is otherwise relatively straightforward other than the maze-like dark room on the way there, and contains...

Yes, the original really is that silly...

A precise Bomb Jump, dubbed the Hammeryump, can let you sequence break to the chest from the collapsing bridge that passes by it. This can be particularly helpful in Randomizer runs, especially if keys are shuffled beyond their usual dungeons, since it gives access to the big chest without having to navigate the dark room or spend a key to unlock it. On that note, the Randomizer's usual restriction against keys locking themselves in with other things prevents either the dark room or the big chest from having small keys for this dungeon, even though the original game has a small key in the dark room.

The Magical Hammer (as it's called in the menu screen; let's forget the awkward joke) can pound down the whack-a-mole barriers in the temple (and some other indoor areas), the purple pegs outside in the Dark World, and the wooden stakes in the Light World, allowing Link to pass them. It also works as a weapon, causing twice the damage (usually) of the Master Sword, but is too slow and short-ranged for effective use on most enemies. In this dungeon, it also flips over nearby turtle monsters, making them vulnerable to attack until they manage to flip back over. As a fun and useful side application, the Hammer shatters frozen enemies in a single hit, which usually makes them drop magic jars.

After fighting off hordes of turtles in a series of dark rooms, Link finally reaches the boss's lair. It looks like a demonic scorpion with a protective mask on its face. Hitting the mask with the Hammer or with Bomb explosions damages it, until it breaks off completely, revealing a large, vulnerable-looking, green gem-like obvious weak point in the beast's forehead... it's clobbering time! The boss moves faster without its mask, but it can't take much more of a beating, so Link finishes it off quickly. It does the usual explode-and-drop-a-heart-container thing, and then a Crystal falls into the middle of the room. Link picks up the Crystal and finds that one of the seven maidens is trapped inside.

The style of the last line feels a bit different from the rest of the conversation, so between that and the fact that every one of the maidens says exactly the same line, it's probably supposed to be a traditional prayer or blessing.

As always, Link is fully healed and does his little victory spin. His map now also shows where the other six maidens are...

For Randomizer purposes, the Temple of Darkness—which the community often calls "PoD" (pronounced as a word), short for "Palace of Darkness"—is unusually item-rich, containing a map, a compass, six small keys, and a big key (if these aren't shuffled beyond their usual dungeons), and five other items. That's a whopping 14 locations, counting what the boss drops. Logical access gets complicated, and I'll be using the ALttP Randomizer's spoiler log names here for convenience.

Only the Shooter Room chest (down the lefthand stairs near the entrance) never has any requirements beyond entering the dungeon. Map Chest and The Arena - Ledge (reached by going down the righthand stairs near the entrance) always logically require the Bow (unless enemies are randomized) due to a kill room along the way containing a red Mimic (which can also be bypassed by using the Potion Camera Unlock or Mimic Clipping glitches).

Here's where things start getting more complicated. If the Shooter Room chest doesn't contain a key, you have no logical access to the rest of the dungeon without a Bow. If it does contain a key, or if you have a Bow, then you also have access to The Arena - Bridge (cross the righthand bridge in the room past the entryway) and Stalfos Basement (jump down a hole in the room past the entryway and step on the button under the skull). Spending a key from this point gives access to Big Key Chest (Bomb through the lefthand bridge and go up the stairs). An unrelated locked door leads to Compass Chest (head north from The Arena and cross the collapsing bridge, then go east). From the Compass Chest, using another key leads to Harmless Hellway (the corridor with moving spike traps).

From this point on, everything else logically requires a light source, though racers will often go through in the dark if they don't have one. Dark Basement (down the stairs from Compass Chest) contains two chests; since this room has lightable torches next to the stairs, either the Fire Rod or the Lantern gives logical access. Spending a key in the collapsing bridge room leads into Dark Maze, which contains two chests and leads to the Big Chest, but has no torches and so logically requires the Lantern for all three chests (as noted above, Hammeryump can bypass this for the Big Chest, even without fumbling around in the dark).

Reaching the boss itself requires the big key, requires the Hammer unless enemies are shuffled (due to turtles in a kill room), logically requires the Lantern (because of torchless dark rooms), and requires the Bow even if enemies are shuffled (to shoot the statue).