Lost Woods

The Lost Woods (迷いの森, Forest of Bewilderment) is an area of confusing forest located in The Legend of Zelda, A Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, Oracle of Seasons, and Four Swords Adventures.

Its layout is usually designed to make anyone who enters to become irreversibly lost. If anyone gets lost, they turn into a Skull Kid, Stalfos, or a Deku Scrub.

The Legend of Zelda
Its first appearance, in The Legend of Zelda, is as a simple looking cross-section of dead trees. However once he enters it, Link finds that exiting the forest in any direction will cause him to simply appear back at the same spot. The only way to clear the forest is to follow a specific pattern through it. This special pattern is revealed when Link pays an old woman for information. She tells him that the proper directions to escape the forest are north, then west, then south, then west again. . A similar puzzle also appeared in the Lost Hills of Death Mountain.

A Link to the Past
In A Link to the Past, the Lost Woods became greener than in The Legend of Zelda and was more like a maze than a puzzle. Many notable things can be found here. Most importantly, it is the location of the legendary Master Sword. Several fake Master Swords can also be found, resulting in a humorous line if Link picks one up. The Thieves Hideout can be found here, with a Piece of Heart located under a secret entrance under a bush. Other thieves run amok in the forest, bumping into Link, and attempting to steal the items he drops. The Magic Mushroom can also be found here, in multiple places. If picked up and given to Syrup the witch, Link would receive the Magic Powder.

The A Link to the Past Lost Woods theme music was planned to be used in the Sacred Grove of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, but a version of Saria's Song appears instead in the final game.

Ocarina of Time
In Ocarina of Time, the Lost Woods were more like they were in The Legend of Zelda than in A Link to the Past. The noticeable difference is that instead of having one screen that is repeated until Link successfully exits, it is laid out more like a map, with each screen having something unique about it. Also, the goal in these Lost Woods is to stay inside, rather then to escape; if Link took the wrong doorway, he would be warped back to the Kokiri Forest. By following the sweet music of Saria's Song, Link could navigate through the hollow trees and get to the Sacred Forest Meadow. Alternative methods could also be used to determine if a path led to another part of the lost woods or back to the Kokiri Forest. The main method was to simply to analyze the hole in the trunks. If there was gradually increasing light center of the tree trunk (as if it were a tunnel out), it would lead back to the Kokiri Forest, but if it was a flat wall of blackness, it would continue through the woods. The “Lost Woods” is home to the only Moblins in Ocarina of Time, as well as many Business Scrubs, Mad Scrubs, and the only collection of average Deku Scrubs in the game, the Deku Community.

It is said that those who become lost in the woods will become Stalfos. The Skull Kids that inhabit the forest are implied to be children who were lost as well.

Oracle of Seasons
In Oracle of Seasons, the Lost Woods are in northeastern Holodrum, connecting to the Tarm Ruins. Near the Lost Woods, there is a Deku Scrub in a cave. If Link has obtained Guru-Guru's Phonograph, the Deku Scrub will say that he likes the song and tell him to go in some specific directions in the Lost Woods. If he does this he will find the Noble Sword in a pedestal. This is the final part of the Oracle of Seasons trading sequence.

Four Swords Adventures
The Lost Woods in Four Swords Adventures operates similarly to that of A Link to the Past in that it follows a concrete map and does not operate as a navigational puzzle. The Woods is populated primarily by Deku Scrubs although other visitors and enemies have congregated in the wood whether by accident or by Ganon's orders.

Statements by the resident Deku Scrubs establish some interesting aspects of the Lost Woods in this game. First, it seems all Deku Scrubs are 'born' in the Lost Woods and any person who lingers there too long becomes a Deku Scrub as well. This may lead one to the conclusion that Deku Scrubs are not a race that reproduces naturally but is entirely composed of those enchanted people who have wandered too long in the Lost Woods. This attribute is similar to how the Lost Woods in could turn the lost into Stalfos. Those who enter the Lost Woods are to remain there by order of Ganon, presumably in order to increase his army of Deku Scrub minions.

The Deku Scrubs also state that Ganon's darkness will cause the Lost Woods to spread all over Hyrule. This statement may suggest that the 'Lost Woods' is not the name of one location in particular, but any forest which is enchanted in such a way to grant it the qualities of a 'Lost Wood', such as its ability to cause those who enter to become lost as well as causing those people who are lost for long enough to transform; in this case, into a Deku Scrub. Second, it demonstrates the freedom possessed by those who have been transformed to traverse the Lost Woods without becoming lost.

Link’s Awakening
In Link's Awakening, a forest is located just north of Mabe Village. It is called the Mysterious Woods and is similar to A Link to the Past’s Lost Woods. Not much can be found here, but it serves an important role in the beginning of the game.

In the Mysterious Woods, Link must find a Mushroom to create Magic Powder at the Witch's house, much like in A Link to The Past. The powder is then used to be sprinkled on a raccoon in the Woods who was preventing you from accessing the next screen where the Tail Key for the first dungeon, Tail Cave, was kept. If Link tried to progress to the next screen without sprinkling the powder on the raccoon, he would be warped to a different part of the Woods.

Oracle Of Ages
See Fairies' Woods.

Majora's Mask
The story begins in the Lost Woods of Hyrule. The pursuit of Skullkid and Epona leads to Termina.

In Majora's Mask, while the Lost Woods are not featured directly, its Terminan counterpart, the Woods of Mystery, can be found. It can be located off of the Southern Swamp and acts in an identical way to the Lost Woods of Ocarina of Time. However, it is now home to Monkeys and Giant Turtles, rather than the Deku. A Monkey will guide Link through the woods, showing him the correct path. Koume can be found here, injured from her encounter with The Skull Kid.

The Wind Waker
In The Wind Waker, the Lost Woods do not directly make an appearance. Instead, the Kokiri Forest appears to have been overrun by monsters and became the Forbidden Woods, a reference to the “Lost Woods“. It serves as the second dungeon of the game, the home of the Boomerang, and Ganondorf's minion, Kalle Demos. After defeating Kalle Demos and rescuing the Korok, Makar, The Great Deku Tree's Ceremony is played out, and Link receives Farore's Pearl.

Twilight Princess
In Twilight Princess, the Sacred Grove appears to have replaced the Lost Woods, featuring Saria's Song as the theme, and a Skull Kid as Link's guide (first as a wolf, to find the Master Sword and again as a human and a wolf to reach the Temple of Time). The Sacred Grove is the location of the Master Sword, a reference to A Link to the Past, and the Temple of Time which serves a new role as a dungeon as opposed to Ocarina of Time where it was simply the holding place of the Master Sword.