Ravio’s Reminders

Once again, I have broken my hiatus to bring you something which I’m sure that you’ll all find quite tantalizing! But blink and you’ll miss it! A question that always came to mind when I thought about the rental system in A Link Between Worlds was, “How are you supposed to remember which items you’ve rented, and which ones you’ve actually bought?”. Well, Zelda Dungeoners, I believe I have found the answer. When I say ‘blink and you’ll miss it’, I mean it, because, I think the only reason this has gone unnoticed until now is because these shots always happen so quickly in the trailers. But now it is here for all to see! Want to know what I’m blabbering on about? Hit the jump to find out for yourselves!

A while ago, I saw an image of the yet-to-be named propeller item as an icon in Link’s inventory. There was an interesting little feature to it that I always thought was interesting: the purple thing that looked like a mouth at the top. Why does the propeller’s icon have a purple mouth? The actual item doesn’t have it? Why is it there?

A similar question popped into my head when I read an article about a mysterious item appearing in the (at the time) latest trailer for A Link Between Worlds. In a screenshot showing the yellow maiden (as I have come to believe her to be) having been turned into a painting by Yuga, and being in possession of this mysterious item, I noticed, again, the purple ‘mouth’ at the top of the item.

And then earlier today, I was watching some trailers for A Link Between Worlds, and noticed that when Link rents the bow, a pair of purple bunny ears can be seen atop the bow, and I thought, “Aw, look, Ravio left Link a little reminder that the bow is still technically his… wait…”; and that’s when it hit me: on the other items, they’re not purple mouths, they’re purple bunny ears!

I did some more research, and found a screenshot from when Link rents the hammer. Yet again, the purple ears are on top of the item. On top of that, I found a screenshot of Link using the bow in a dungeon (unfortunately, I couldn’t find a bigger version of the image) and if you look closely, you can see that the bunny ears are still there on top. These purple ears will appear on any item that you have rented from Ravio, and as such, they will appear on the item when you rent it, on the icon in your inventory, and on the item itself when you use it.

That was when the thought occurred to me, “What if those purple ears are always on there, just to represent that you got them from Ravio?”. But no, because the purple ears do not appear on the items while they’re still on the shelf. Furthermore, in our world, when you’re renting a house, you can’t make any changes to the physical structure of the house, because it’s not yours. I imagined the same would apply to upgrading items in A Link Between Worlds, and my suspicions appear to have been proven correct by this screenshot of Link getting the upgraded bow. Notice that there are no bunny ears?

This is how you know that an item you have is a rental from Ravio: his trademark purple bunny ears are on top of that particular item. Once you actually buy an item from Ravio, these ears are removed, to symbolise that it no longer belongs to Ravio in any way.

But before I go, I couldn’t help but wonder about the implications of the bunny ears being on the Sand Rod in the painting of the yellow maiden. One thing that’s obvious is that the item is a rental from Ravio at the time of being turned into a painting. But I’m curious as to how it came into the maiden’s possession? Is it because Link rented the item, and then gave it to the maiden upon her request, only to never get it back, because it gets turned into a painting along with her? Or is it that the maiden rented it from Ravio herself for some unknown purpose, and that Ravio asks you to get it back from her when she doesn’t return it? If the latter is true, this could be one item that you don’t get directly from Ravio, or perhaps Ravio will give it to you as a reward for recovering it?

What do you think of Ravio’s reminders? Do you like the subtlety of this system, or do you think it’s going to be an annoying, constant voice in your head, reminding you that it’s not actually yours? Do you think that perhaps the bunny ears serve a different purpose? What are your thoughts on the rented Sand Rod being turned into a painting: did Link give it to the maiden, or will you get it from the maiden after freeing her from her painted prison? Had you already noticed this? Let me know in the comments!