This is a great dragon who guards the Essence of Nature, and he’s not much more difficult to defeat than he was in Zelda 1. He will shoot three fireballs at a time from his flashing horn and will sometimes charge at you. Naturally, you’ll want to evade these attacks and move into position. His horn is his weak point, so attack it with your sword. If you stand near the blocks in the northeast corner of the room, you may be able to strike him with impunity if you position yourself in a way that his attacks won’t touch you. Another good opportunity for attack is to move in and slash right after he finishes either a fireball or charge attack. Keep this up, and he will fall in no time.

This dinosaur-like enemy has been a classic in several Zelda games, but now he returns in his original fashion, as a wandering triceratops vulnerable to bomb explosions. More than just meandering around the room (which he will do too), he will frequently charge at you, so be ready to move out of the way! In addition, he’ll inhale and then breathe fire out at you. When he inhales, that’s your chance! Throw a Bomb into his mouth before he can emit fire, and he’ll be stunned. Then lift him up with the Power Bracelet and throw him onto the spikes in the center of the room. Do this several more times, and Dodongo will be destroyed.

Breaking the trend of having bosses from the original game, here is a boss making its first appearance since A Link to the Past on Super NES. He’s a bit more tricky to defeat than the first two bosses, however. For one thing, Mothula will summon a number of smaller moth enemies to swarm at you. This can be a blessing in disguise, however, as you can slash away at them and earn valuable Recovery Hearts. It also shoots multiple fireballs at you in a row, and you’ll have to dodge those by jumping between the two center islands with Roc’s Feather. Even more annoying is the kind of fire shield with which it will surround itself and then attempt to crash into you. Be on your guard, as this could knock you into the pit below the boss room. If you ever do get knocked down to the floor below, you’ll have to use the trampoline to jump back up, but you start the fight with Mothula all over again as it will have rejuvenated its life energy every time you fall out of the room. (One way to prevent yourself from falling is to stay off the two islands and on either of the four sides of the room, but you’ll take a lot of damage from Mothula this way.) The best opportunity for attack is when the boss comes to rest on one of the two center islands, at which point you should move in with your sword slashing. Patience and agility will be the key to winning this battle.

A stock boss appearing in most Zelda games, this crab-like arachnid makes one of her toughest appearances in this particular game. For the first phase of this battle, you must concentrate on the large claw. Watch out when Gohma raises her claw because that means she’s getting ready to grab you and then slam you into the ground for huge damage. Instead, stand above and a little to the west of her claw and slash away at it–using Roc’s Feather to jump away from the claw attack if necessary. Once the claw is destroyed, it’s time to move on to phase 2. Now Gohma will summon a bunch of larvae to overwhelm you. They take only one hit to defeat and oftentimes leave valuable recovery items behind, but there are so many of them that it can test your patience. Be vigilant, and also be sure to have your Slingshot equipped. For as soon as Gohma opens her single eye, you must shoot her with a seed in order to inflict damage on her. Be persistent in staving off the larvae and vigilant in watching for the opening eye, and you will be victorious.

Making its first appearance back in the series since the first game, Digdogger could potentially be the hardest boss in Oracle of Seasons. See that spiked ball in the northeast corner of the room? That’s what you’ll be using to attack Digdogger. So pull it off the pillar with your Magnetic Glove, and what you must do is push and pull it with magnetic attraction/repulsion in such a way that you can slam it into the boss. The catch is that if you pull it too much toward yourself, the spiked ball will hit you and do damage to you! Once you hit Digdogger with it, he’ll be stunned for just a brief second, so try to move the ball back and forth over him multiple times. Also, be wary of his bouncing around the room, particularly when he jumps high off the screen. Keep moving when he does this and watch out for his shadow, which shows where he’ll land. After you’ve hit Digdogger enough times with the spiked ball, he’ll split into numerous small Digdoggers. At this point, you can move in and attack them with your sword, but there are too many of them and (unless you have either the Master Sword or Biggoron Sword) they will take way too many hits for this method to be effective. Instead, magnetically move the spiked ball over them, which kills each one with a single hit. This too is difficult because the enemies spread out around the room and move rather quickly. Moreover, you only have a limited time to kill them off because after a while those who remain reform back into the large Digdogger–and depending on how few are left, Digdogger becomes radically faster with his jumping attacks (especially if you left only one small enemy alive). The key to winning this battle is complete mastery of manipulating the spiked ball–and lots of practice.

Here is a boss that also returns from Zelda 1 and is scarcely less difficult to defeat than Digdogger was. Whereas in the original game it was possible to kill this multi-headed plant off with only a single Bomb, now you have a multifaceted enemy that requires several strategies to defeat. Also note that almost the entire floor of this room consists of moving conveyor sand, with only a few tiles of still ground. Try to stay on this still ground if you can! The only real attack Manhandla has, besides trying to collide with you, is shooting fireballs. So naturally in the beginning of the battle, there will be more fireballs to dodge, as each head can shoot them. Use your Magical Boomerang and steer it into a head–but the head is only vulnerable when a mouth is open (which is when it will also shoot at you). After several hits in the mouth, that particular head will be destroyed. Watch out, though, because the more heads you destroy, Manhandla makes up for the lost firepower by speeding up its movement around the room. The best strategy here would be spreading out your Boomerang attacks on all the heads instead of concentrating on destroying one head at a time. Finally, once all four heads are destroyed, the stem itself will start zipping around the room very fast. Keep pelting it with your Magic Boomerang, which will wear it down and eventually expose its weak core. Once the core is exposed, go in and slash away at it with your sword to destroy this vile plant once and for all.

The multi-headed dragon Gleeok was a nightmare in the original Zelda, but he won’t look too bad in this game in comparison to the last two bosses you just fought. In this game, he comes with only two heads (instead of three or four). As expected, he attacks you with fire–a variety of fire attacks, in fact. The simplest attack is four fireballs at once emanating from a single fireball. He can also fire them out six at a time, going in three different directions, which is harder to evade. Then, trickiest of all, is his fire attack wherein the fireball hits either the wall or floor and turns into smaller fireballs that radiate outward from the place of impact. Dodging all the fire as best you can, move into the space between the two heads and charge up your sword, letting a spin attack hit both heads at once! The value in this strategy is that if you end up concentrating on one head, destroying it, but take too long to finish off the other head, the first head will regenerate after a while. The spin attack, however, will take them both out at the same time. After both heads are destroyed, then Gleeok’s skeletal body will jump into the air and slam into the ground, stunning you and allowing the body to hit you for major damage. Instead, use Roc’s Cape to jump into the air just before the skeleton hits the ground. Just hack away at these skeletal remains with your sword in order to put this beast down for good.

Meet the first original boss of the game! Medusa Head (alternatively called Medelock) can be a doozy too. When she shoots her wave of fire balls at you, jump over them with Roc’s Cape–the first jump should get you over the first wave, and the second jump in midair should get you over the second wave. (She always fires them in two waves.) Then she’ll typically move to the top of the screen and go horizontally across the top firing a laser at you, which should be easy for you simply to jump over. After this, she tends to move to the center of the room where she’ll emit these blue orbs in a spiral formation. If they hit you, they’ll turn you to stone temporarily, allowing her to hit you with fire attacks. Instead, do a double-jump with Roc’s Cape straight up into the air (with proper timing) to avoid this nasty attack. It will take many swipes of your sword to bring this unholy beast down. A good strategy, if you have Pegasus Seeds to spare, is to wait until she moves to the center of the room after the laser attack and pelt her with a Pegasus Seed. She’ll be stunned very briefly, allowing you a window of opportunity for attack. After you have subdued her, you will have defeated all of Onox’s minions. Time to take on the general himself!

The golden-armored General of Darkness who has cast the seasons of Holodrum into chaos engages you in battle at last. His main weapon of choice is the huge mace that he’ll use to hurl at you. Sometimes he’ll also fire out small whirlwinds at you rapid-fire, and other times he’ll smash down on the floor causing debris to fall from the ceiling all over the room. For this battle, it is highly recommended that you use Pegasus Seeds on yourself to give yourself a speed boost against the very swift attacks of General Onox. The only way to damage him is to charge up your sword and hit him with a spin attack. You must attack him in this way many times. (Note that if you’re playing a linked game and have the Master Sword, you can damage him with regular sword swipes.) After a while, Onox will bring in the imprisoned Din and use her as a shield against your sword attacks–if you hit her, her crystal prison will electrocute you and cause you damage! Rather, take out your Rod of Seasons to bat Din’s crystal away, giving you an opening to attack Onox. For an easy way out, simply equip the Green Holy Ring, which makes you immune to electricity, and hack away at Onox even with Din’s crystal in the way. Once you’ve defeated Onox, the battle is far from over. You’re only halfway through!

After some brief dialogue, the floor will crumble away beneath you, and Link will fall into the basement below, landing in a side-scrolling screen where now Onox, in the form of a huge, screen-filling, serpentine monster confronts you. This is it! If you’ve ever fought the final bosses of either Mega Man 3 or Mega Man X, you should have a pretty good idea of what to do in this battle. He has a variety of attacks, all of which are highly damaging and hard to avoid. The blue fire that he emits is probably the least difficult to deal with. Since it’ll home in on you, just sidestep it. The red fire is tougher, for it moves first to the center of the screen, then outward, then back to the middle. Use Roc’s Cape and even Pegasus Seeds if need to be to get out of the way. Onox will also swipe you with his huge arm, starting on one side of the screen and moving almost all the way over. You’ll have to immediately (and quickly) run to that side of the screen to avoid the attack in the nick of time. Finally, Onox’s most basic attack is simply to smash you with his claws. This is a good thing, though! Get out of the way of the claws first, then jump onto the hand and ride it up. When you’re close enough, jump using Roc’s Cape and hit the jewel on Onox’s forehead with your sword to do damage. For even greater damage, charge up your sword on the way up, then jump and release for a spin attack!–but this is very difficult to pull off. Unfortunately, it takes many hits indeed to subdue Onox for good. Be sure to have a full stock of Heart Containers, potions, and Fairies for this battle, as well as the highest quality Rings. You’ll need every advantage you can get to outlast Onox. Once you do, though, Din and all of Holodrum will at last be safe… for now!