The battlefield grows dire. Soldiers are collapsing and the enemy is growing in numbers quicker than Link, the Princess, and her knights can defeat them. They don’t stand down but they can only fight for so long. Fortunately, spread across Hyrule, are sacred fountains where magic calls. For those with a kind and courageous heart, a wish could be granted…a plea could be heard. Link reaches the fountain, he makes his wish. The water starts to stir and laughter fills the air. Bounding from the fountain, a Great Fairy emerges, amusement on her lips. A hundred enemies or a thousand, she can take them down with ease, and with a simple kiss she turns the tide of the battle.
Laughing as she bounds from a fountain sprinkling with little fairies, the Great Fairy always knows how to make an entrance. The Great Fairy in Hyrule Warriors is no exception, bounding from her spring with a very similar and nostalgic appearance. Hyrule Warriors saw a remastered look for many characters, enemies, and items and the Great Fairy is no exception. The pink hair, large eyelashes, and forest inspired clothes is reminiscent of the Great Fairies that can be found throughout Ocarina of Time. With HD graphics, she drops the polygon look and embraces her curves (until she discovers her 8-bit form). New look or not, her laugh is still as terrifying as the past with a teasing tone every time her magic sparks. Lucky for Link and the gang, she’s on the light side of battle.
Across the Legend of Zelda series the Great Fairy is known for her large appearance and gifts she grants the players, but in Hyrule Warriors, she acts a little differently. For the most part she is locked behind scripted events and missions to aid the player in various stages of the level. She is seen using various attacks and move sets to aid Link, Zelda, and the others throughout the game. Sometimes she uses enhanced items like a large bomb to destroy many enemies at once, or multiple hookshots to pull Argorok from the sky, or she aids with progression of the story such as summoning clouds to put out a great fire, or fetching a large bowl of lumpy pumpkin soup to get Levias from Skyward Sword to aid the team. Each time the player can only use the fairy fountain once the level prompts them to do so. Forever locked behind cutscenes with the same animation set and no dialogue isn’t usually a character of great interest, that is, until a side mode turns the Great Fairy from a checkpoint to a weapon ready to take on any enemy.
Hidden in H-1 of Adventure Mode is a brand new weapon for Link to use: The Great Fairy herself. Link’s past of bottling up fairies comes back to haunt him as The Great Fairy scoops him up into a giant glass bottle and carries him around the battlefield and toys with him as she conquers her enemies. She uses Link just as Link uses her fairies, but while her fairies heal, Link is forced to play dead man’s volley, destroying any enemies in the sparkling magic’s path. Or sometimes she’ll steal his sword entirely, sending radiant beams toward Link. He dodges them in time, and just as he recovers from getting his sword back, he’s scooped up again, trapped in the fairy’s bottle.
Wielded as a weapon (or player character in disguise), the Great Fairy is capable of pulling down the moon, summoning Levias, and many, many bombs—they just don’t hit as hard as they do in cutscenes. One combo not seen in a cutscene involves summoning a whirlpool of water that shifts into a fountain and sucks up any enemies nearby. Out of all her summons and magical flares, summoning the Moon from Majora’s Mask is a satisfying attack that devastates any enemies below and gets the player out of a tough spot. The Great Fairy may be powerful, but it comes with a cost.
Being a large character, the Great Fairy’s speed is slow. She makes up for it with higher damage output similar to that of a boss. She stomps and swoops around, her sheer size giving her the ability to make an impact with every move she makes. However, just as she can hit a large area of enemies, her size makes it easier for her to be attacked. While she is nostalgic to play, and possibly only playable for a little fun, sometimes she is better off remaining in her magic fountain. But Link better watch out, because every time she gets a chance to play, revenge is always on the back of her mind.
