With a loading screen showing a floating mask announcing that it’s ‘very hungry’, the new Majora’s Mask ROM hack ‘Pumkin Tower’ could well be one of the weirdest Zelda ROM hacks I’ve covered here at Retro Dodo. That’s not a criticism, however; as a man who has the Pale Man from Pan’s Labyrinth tattooed on him, my general ethos is ‘the weirder the better!’.
Pumkin Tower (and it’s definitely ‘pumkin’, there’s not another ‘p’ in there) comes to us from Chadlite. Writing on the official page over on romhacks.org, we discover that players have to move up a tower made up of 5 floors, each floor created using a different terrain with enemies that we know and love from the world of The Legend Of Zelda.
Chadlite has also created some new enemies too as well as many more uses for Link’s transformative abilities picked up from the Masks found along the way in the N64’s seminal Termina adventure. Instead of saving the world from being crushed by a giant moon at the hands of a pesky Skull Kid, however, players have to feed hungry Pumkins. Yeah, it’s completely bat-crazy, and I love it.
This hack only took 2 months to make, which considering this ROM hack has so much built into it and lots of extras that we would have loved to have seen in the original game such as having masks on the D-Pad for quick change as well as all new jokes that Kurko Mods would be proud of, it’s incredibly impressive!
Chadlite also cites creators of other Zelda ROM hacks as helping out with the project, with Zel of The Missing Link helping out with the soundtrack for Pumkin Tower and Col0korn from one of our recent favourites Sealed Palace responsible for the Fishing Hole and the credits.
Pumpkins have been a feature in the Legend of Zelda as of late; grabbing a Fortified Pumpkin from a field or a shop in BotW instantly makes for some defensive capabilities that will save your hearts when going up against bigger enemies. I will say, however, that these Pumkin guys are pretty terrifying when you’re up close to them. It’s the kind of thing that you might think about in the midst of a nightmare! Still, I love how this game feels a little like a fever dream mixed with one of my favourite N64 titles.
Players can either play Pumpkin Tower on Retroarch or put onto a flash cart to play on their actual N64! Check out the official trailer for the game below!
