The Legend Of Zelda - General Thread

@diddyknux: I wanted to hang onto the first Scimitar I got too, but Isha talks about how she made them to be used and how the weapons themselves wouldn't want to be stashed away while Hyrule is in danger, which, yeah, that's a fair argument.

Meanwhile this is me with every food item I make.

TotK Ganondorf's got sort of a greatest hits Ganon backstory with elements of OoT's Ganondorf, Skyward Sword's Demise, and ALttP's Ganon mixed together with the new stuff. Personally, I can dig that.

And WW Ganondorf with the Japanese aesthetic, use of Phantom Ganon AND Puppet Ganon, depowering the master sword, and personal conflict with the King of Hyrule.

Edited by RedHunter543 on Jun 3rd 2023 at 11:16:31 PM

Puppet Ganon?

Calamity Ganon is vaguely alluded as Ganondorf's incarnation of hatred and malice that managed to escape Rauru's seal. So in a way, it's TOK's version of Puppet Ganon.

I suppose that is true. I was thinking that the kingdom being eternally plagued by an incarnation of the Demon King's hatred was one of the things that made Demon King Ganondorf similar to Demise. Some parts of the story really do parallel multiple previous Zelda stories. You could argue that Ganondorf being sealed deep beneath the known world by a forgotten precursor is similar to Wind Waker, but also the Demon King emerging from a fissure in the earth is exactly what happened in the backstory of Skyward Sword, but of course him being trapped there by the sages during the Imprisoning War is straight out of A Link to the Past.

I wonder how this whole thing about "there *HAS* to be a timeline for Zelda" even got such a start that it has so many fans of the series under such a tight grip.

its time travel,ergo there needs to be a timeline

Because there always was a timeline.

Yeah it got retconned a lot but if you asked one of the creators about where a game took place they’d give you a rough estimate

Got all the memories, did some more sidequests, stocked up on food again so I'm gonna go kill Ganon again and see BOTW's true ending!

it really started with Wind Waker and Twilight Princess explicitly being sequels to Ocarina of Time.

then Nintendo started hyping up the official zelda timeline with Skyward Sword and the Hyrule Historia

fast forward a decade, all the kids that fell into the hype of the official zelda timeline are now adults on the internet with a hefty dosage of nostalgia and the ability to be really loud about their opinions

"there was always a timeline" really doesn't hold up under scrutiny, i think. they've retconned the timeline a couple of times already, and its pretty blatant that some of the games are put in places that don't actually make sense

Edited by EpicBleye on Jun 3rd 2023 at 1:51:11 PM

ah, so basically the same reason why there's still a lot of *very* loud yelling about the SNES and its games being the pinnacle of gaming even though a lot of vastly better games have been made since then, got it

Note: I don't have anything against the SNES, I like Altt P, Super Metroid and Mario World, but I'm a firm believer of "these games got surpassed by a bunch of sequels already, and I vastly prefer Wind Waker, Link's Awakening, Metroid Fusion, Metroid Prime, Metroid Dread and Mario Odyssey over them"

Edited by Jaryl on Jun 3rd 2023 at 7:59:37 PM

I want to ban time travel and destroy all the timelines.

While I think it is silly to obsess over the timeline, I also think its silly to obsess about Zelda NOT having a timeline.

So... We're all silly.

Edited by diddyknux on Jun 3rd 2023 at 1:05:59 PM

It's mostly the finger-pointing to Miyamoto that irks me since it reeks of "gamers being deluded, clueless folks" as the usual case. It's what happens when people just look at gospel of youtubers as source rather than actually doing some research.

Edited by Ookamikun on Jun 4th 2023 at 2:28:35 AM

Zelda always having a timeline and that timeline being prone to getting ignored or retconned can both be true statements at the same time. Let's look at the timeline of the timeline.

• Legend of Zelda - First game.
• Adventure of Link - Explicitly a sequel to LoZ.
• A Link to the Past - A bit vague, but even at its release it was generally believed to be a prequel to the first two games, with some material like an official guidebook explicitly saying as much. There was some confusion when Miyamoto stated around OoT's release that ALttP came after LoZ/AoL, but it seems like he was just mistaken on (he also didn't know how LA fit into things) and fans eventually chose to ignore that statement.
• Link's Awakening - Is a Link previously saved Hyrule from Ganon, but is a vague on which Link which caused arguments, though its time of release and some details in the game mostly point to it being ALttP Link.
• Ocarina of Time - Is explicitly a prequel to all the previous games. It was meant to basically be the backstory told at the start of ALttP, though that didn't really shake out in the long run.
• Majora's Mask - Sequel to OoT.
• Oracle of Seasons/Ages - Very unclear as to how it connects to other games other than Ganon being dead and the Triforce being in Hyrule Castle. This was the pair of games that fans argued about the most.
• Four Swords - Doesn't have any connections to other games, could just be its own continuity for all we knew.
• Wind Waker - Explicit sequel to OoT. Aonuma made it clear in an interview around the game's release that the time travel at the end of OoT created two different timelines, and that WW is in one and the other games are in the other timeline. This led to the fan terms adult timeline (WW) and child timeline (MM and ALttP onward)
• Four Swords Adventures - Sequel to FS. Still no good connection to other games to confidently place it other than Ganondorf appearing as a reincarnation of a previous Ganondorf. However around this time Aonuma says in an interview that he's thinking that FS is the earliest game in the timeline.
• Minish Cap - Prequel to FS and FSA, which with Aonuma's statement implies it's now the earliest game in the timeline.
• Twilight Princess - Another sequel to OoT/MM, but in the child timeline. At this point connecting these games to ALttP onward starts to get messy. I think it was around this time that it became the common fan theory that FSA takes place after TP with a reincarnated Ganondorf (since he died in TP) and then Ganon in ALttP onward is the second Ganondorf.
• Phantom Hourglass - Sequel to WW.
• Spirit Tracks - Sequel to PH.
• Skyward Sword - Prequel to OoT and before the founding of Hyrule, so obviously the new first game in the timeline.
• And then at this point Hyrule Historia comes out and gives us a definitive official timeline. MC and FS are confirmed between SS and OoT, the theory that FSA is after TP is confirmed, Oracle is stuck between ALttP and LA confirming the fan theory that it's the same Link and same boat, but the weirdest thing being that ALttP and its sequels are placed in a new timeline that's formed off a what if scenario, presumably because OoT doesn't work anymore as being the backstory talked about in ALttP.
• A Link Between Worlds - Sequel to ALttP, though it has some continuity inconsistencies with earlier games that can't be explained.
• Tri Force Heroes - Nothing really connects to any other game, but an interview around it's release had confirmation that it's set after ALBW with the same Link.
• At this point The Legend of Zelda Encyclopedia comes out with a new official timeline. ALBW and TFH are put in their obvious places between ALttP/LA and LoZ/AoL, but Oracle is now retconned to be between LA and ALBW with a different Link from ALttP/LA. This is the timeline still in use by Nintendo on the official Zelda website.
• Breath of the Wild - Doesn't fit with anything except for having references to OoT and vague allusions to WW, TP, and ALttP. The official word from in interview after release is that it's so far in the future that what timeline it's in doesn't matter and all the timeline's games have become legends for the people in BotW's era.
• Tears of the Kingdom - Sequel to BotW. It has a new Ganondorf and founding of Hyrule, leading to people to argue on what it means.

My approach to the Zelda timeline has been for a while that I treat all the games that are explicitly sequels to each other as being in the same timeline and dont really think to hard how the rest supposedly fits together.

The premise that there were only three timelines was olways pretty shaky since the very premise of the downfall timeline required the Zelda series to have a multiverse and as such an infinite amount of timelines.

My theory is that Calamity Ganon is Ganondorf's version of The Imprisoned with Ganondorf in the Demise role of being the human shaped threat after the monster shaped threat has been stopped.

"Being his sword" is pretty much the one reason you need. He's similar to Fi in that way, only more malevolent.

Ghirahim and Demise, while both serving as main villains, ultimately have slightly different narrative roles. Demise's narrative role is to basically be a big threat. He's the sort of character who's meant to have his presence felt through his minions and the various bad things happening in the world. He's essentially the sort of character who is supposed to cast a shadow over the setting throughout the entire game and only makes an appearance at the very end for the climax.

Ghirahim, on the other hand, is meant to be a more active villain, given he's essentially Demise's proxy in the world. This means that you as a player will have more interactions with him and get to know him better compared to Demise, because Ghirahim's narrative role is to be The Heavy.

That's not to say one can't like Ghirahim more than Demise, but one should keep in mind that the two villains are serving slightly different roles. And as for whether the characters manage to play their narrative roles well, that's up to the individual player to decide.

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Jun 3rd 2023 at 12:43:12 PM

Honestly, the issue with Demise is that he's clearly meant to be Ganondorf without actually retconning Ocarina of Time Ganondorf's debut. His motive is pretty much the same as classic Ganon: Steal the Triforce and Take Over the World. Just without the whole backstory as the leader of the Gerudo, which offers a lot of nuance to Ganondorf's character.

As a result, he doesn't really stand out as a villain on his own. In fact, most of fan's interests in Demise is literally the potential story opportunity of having an Enemy Mine situation between Ganondorf and Link and Zelda, since Ganondorf is a man who wants to be the master of his own fate and the mere implication that he is merely a puppet for an older Demon King would threaten his ego.

Demon King Ganondorf in TOTK is pretty much Demise 2.0 except a more fleshed out backstory and character. I honestly want him to come back as some malevolent spirit trying to possess the next male Gerudo (who for some reason is also named Ganondorf) and thus we can get ourselves both a good Ganondorf and an irredeemable, monstrous Ganon.

Though the original context of that post was to compare and contrast Zant and Ganondorf with Demise and Ghirahim.

The relationship between Zant and Ganondorf is fairly different from the relationship between Ghirahim and Demise. Ghirahim is Demise's personal weapon while Zant's relationship with Ganondorf is not quite as personal despite his fanaticism.

It's not too surprising Ghirahim doesn't turn on Demise. He has no reason to: he's Demise's tool, an extension of the malice Demise intends to inflict upon the world. To serve Demise's will IS his sole purpose.

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Jun 3rd 2023 at 12:39:39 PM

Yeah that’s what I said in the post.

I’m so confused RN.

EDIT: Okay, so post was written in response to someone saying Demise and Ghirahim are totally the same as Ganondorf and Zant.

Edited by RedHunter543 on Jun 4th 2023 at 3:42:46 AM

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't say Ghirahim to Demise is the same as Zant to Ganondorf. It's really only true on a surface level, but like I said before, there's something more personal between Ghirahim and Demise, considering Ghirahim is Demise's sword while Zant is just a useful pawn to Ganondorf.

They're different kinds of master-servant relationships.