Water Temple

Here it is folks.  My entry for the most hated temple in all of Zelda-lore.  No other dungeon, in any other Zelda game, commands more ownership of hatred, fear and other assorted negative emotions.  It is filled with dangerous enemies, one hell of a mini-boss fight, one hell of a boss fight, and puzzles that make you walk on egg-shells...complete them in the wrong order and you'll get stuck, and it's back to the start so you can restart the entire temple (which is NOT fun, trust me).  Here you meet Ruto, the Water Sage, who seems more than eager to help you, but at least she has her priority straight...she's doing it to help her people, not to help herself to you (she's not the only one, several other females in the game throw themselves at you, namely the Ghost Shop owner and Nabooru).

Either way, this temple is universally recognized as the most hated dungeon of all time, and you know what?  I totally agree.  I despise it.  You have to really take your time, think about what you're doing, and the enemies here are mostly fought underwater, which means Hookshot only (which as a weapon sucks).  Other games will allow you to use your sword underwater, but not here so we have to make with what we have.  This temple is filled with interested puzzles and mazes, leading up to an epic mini-boss fight with...YOURSELF!

In the water temple, you are forced to duel yourself.  Dark Link matches every sword stroke, every move you make, equally.  He's more annoying than he was in Zelda II, and he was pretty annoying then (as the final boss of that game, too).  However, there's a simple trick to beating him: see, Dark Link copies every move we make.  But he can't copy anything we do with the Megaton Hammer since for some reason, he was programmed without one.  Evidentally our shadow only thinks sword and shield are necessary...his loss, because this makes the fight devestatingly easy, and the shadow falls into the mysterious pond below you, and you get this dungeon's prize...the Longshot.  How original, an item that we've already gotten, just with superior range.  How nice.

The key to navigating this dungeon are three switches, which control the water level.  It's a hassle trying to navigate between these, especially if you don't know what you're doing, as in order to do what you need to do the water level needs to be appropriate, and you can't really know what's next in your progression unless the water level is appropriate.  A good challenge, indeed.  I definitely liked this aspect to the temple, added something unique and challenging.

The final room of the Water Temple holds Morpha, an odd amaeboa that is arguably the toughest boss of this game (and by that I mean, I would argue for that).  This boss deals a great amount of damage per hit, is difficult to lure out of hiding (it lives in the water and you need to get it OUT of the water to hurt it...with the Longshot this is possible, but the Longshot is such a pissy weapon when it comes to launching consistently) and your opportunity to attack once you've dragged Morpha out of the pool is extremely limited.  But that's why we got the Biggorn Sword before coming here...it knocks out half of the amount of sword swipes we need.

Master Quest: So what exactly happened to the Water Temple's ominous presence?  This Water Temple's puzzle value is actually a little easier than the original's, and the action is extremely limited (they took the shell blades completely out of the picture, and while they added a few enemies here and there, there are hardly any to speak of.)  Ah well, what can you do, right?  I suppose that this would be a tough dungeon to improve upon...the original Water Temple was a great time sink.