*proceeds to write a two-page long essay on master kogha because i'm bored* (spoilers for the story of aoc) Master Kogha made his debut as a sort of mini-boss villain in BotW, and he was a bit more of a joke than an actual threat. He provided a laugh, a fun little boss fight, but nothing too much. TotK brought a lot more for this villain, having him appear more often with multiple boss fights, and a bigger role in the story. But I don’t think that game expanded on him as much as AoC did. In the spin-off game for breath of the wild, the Yiga Clan have a lot more of a prominent role when it comes to the story. They’re pretty much the main antagonists up until the calamity awakens, and this game introduces a whole new character in the form of Sooga. Sooga is the right-hand man to Master Kogha, basically acting as his personal bodyguard the entire time. And the two of them make an iconic duo that is really fun to see. One of the big plot points in the second half of the story is when, after all of the Blight Ganons are defeated, Astor betrays the Yiga clan and steals a whole bunch of their soldiers’ life forces to revive the blights. Master Kogha and Sooga realize that this whole time Astor has only been using them in order to help with the revival of the calamity, and once they were no longer useful, Astor and Harbinger Ganon were going to ditch them (a lot like what happens to astor later on). Sooga fights off the Blight Ganons and the Hollows in order to protect Master Kogha, but once they realize they can’t win, they decide to flee. Now, the base game of AoC doesn’t really show us much more than this. Master Kogha and the Yiga Clan don’t show up again until after the Fort Hateno level, so it doesn’t really give the players much thought. Heck, I didn’t even realize what really happened until like two years after having completed the game! But in one wave of the DLC, the Guardian of Remembrance, it allows us to go a little deeper into the Yiga’s side of the story. After playing a level as Master Kogha while fleeing from the Blight Ganons, we get this cutscene with Master Kogha and Sooga. And I kid you not, this is single handedly THE SADDEST CUTSCENE IN THIS ENTIRE GAME! Forget King Rhoam’s “death” scene, forget Zelda’s flashbacks of Terrako, no, THIS is the most emotional scene in Age of Calamity. It shows Sooga injured, and he keeps telling Master Kogha to go on without him, but Master Kogha refuses. Then Sooga has a flashback to when he first joined the Yiga Clan. We see from his pov, him as just a starving little boy who stumbles into a Yiga camp begging for food, and the Yiga soldiers don’t really treat him kindly. But then Master Kogha comes along, and at first Sooga is afraid that he is going to do something to him, but when he looks up, Master Kogha offers him a banana. (this sounds like a fanfiction but i swear it's real, go look it up). This scene actually shows that Master Kogha does have a kind side to him, despite being the leader of what is basically a terrorist group. After giving up some of his bananas (which are highly prized among the Yiga, mind you) he says, “You know, you’ll have to pay me back for that someday.” Even so, the scene is just so sweet and heartwarming, and shows you that there really is a good side to Master Kogha. Then the cutscene flashes back to the present, and the Blights finally catch up to the duo. Sooga, using what is left of his strength, holds them back, begging Master Kogha to save himself. Master Kogha finally panics, running away, and Sooga is left to face the Blight Ganons alone. He draws his swords, the screen goes black, and you can hear him say: “Have I paid you back now…Master Kogha?” (AAHHH SOMEONE GET ME A TISSUE BOX ITS TOO SAD) Alright, now to get back on topic (i say, wiping my tears). The game doesn’t show us this, but this would leave Master Kogha with the realization that he had just left his best friend (or something more, if you wish to think so) behind, and there’s no chance that he could survive taking on all the blights on his own. This would be one of the darkest moments for not only Master Kogha, but the rest of the remaining Yiga Clan as well. They lose a good number of their own to Astor and the Ganons, and to have their strongest warrior be killed as well would be devastating. So, in this dark moment, when all hope seems lost, what does Master Kogha decide to do? He decides to go to Princess Zelda, and form an alliance. Now, what we get is a simple cutscene where Master Kogha appears to Zelda, Impa, and Link, and bows to them. It seems pretty basic, but when you really think about it, this would be a lot more complicated than it seems. Asking for help is one of the hardest things for a person to do sometimes, and it definitely wouldn’t be easy for the proud, arrogant leader of the Yiga Clan. Not to mention that the Yiga’s entire purpose is to conspire AGAINST the royal family. (continued in credits)
click the green flag for some mmusic Song is Master Kogha Boss Fight theme from BotW (couldn't find the TotK version sadly) (continued down here) They formed their own clan because of the wrongdoings that the royal family had been doing to the Sheikah for centuries. The Yiga and the Royal Family have been at each other’s throats for a full 10,000 years! And it's not just the past that factors into this. Master Kogha has literally plotted to kill Princess Zelda multiple times! Why would she ever pity him? For all she knows, this could be a plot to place spies within their ranks. Zelda and everyone else has no reason to forgive Master Kogha, let alone believe him! So Master Kogha has to set aside 10,000 years worth of conflict and ask for help from his worst enemy, coupled with the fact that they would have no good reason to hear him out, yet he still goes ahead and does it. It had to have taken a remarkable amount of courage to do this. More than Master Kogha has ever used, considering how cowardly he is. That just adds more weight to this whole decision, the fact that he is so cowardly yet doing something that someone would have to be very brave to do. All of this really plays a whole lot in Master Kogha’s redemption arc. It’s not just, “oh well the bad side betrayed us, time to join the good side!” This is Master Kogha, losing not only his only allies but also his best lackey/friend, being cast into a pit of pure hopelessness, and in his darkest moment, having to stand up with more courage than he’s ever used before, and go to his worst enemies to ask for help, all because he knows that it’s the only hope that the Yiga has left. They can’t fight against Calamity Ganon on their own. Their loss against the Blight Ganons showed them as much. And after all, “the enemy of your enemy is your friend.” This all allows Master Kogha to tap into his good nature (which Sooga’s flashback shows he has!) and redeem himself, joining the good side and fighting for Hyrule. Really, this whole thing could have made for a great villain redemption arc for him. The only thing that brings it down is that the game doesn’t actually show a lot of the emotional weight that would go into these scenes. The most emotional scene, Sooga’s death (sniff) is only shown in the DLC, which only some of the players will have (and like i said, i didn’t even realize he was dead until long after finishing the game). It doesn't go that far to explore the emotion depth that this side of the story holds, and for that reason, I think Groose’s redemption arc beats it out (I’m semi-serious on that front, Groose really does have a decent character arc) good job reading all that, you get da korok seed (yahaha) forget five paragraph essays, this one has eleven
