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Spoiler The Legend of Zelda series timeline and lore discussion thread, post-TotK (full series open spoilers)

Jersh said:
The only thing I think is gained by any of that is linking Zelda to Rauru and Sonia by blood, in order to explain both the light and time association. BotW Zelda was already linked to light, so that bit wasn't strictly necessary, but not time. In that sense, Rauru needs to be royal to be an ancestor of Zelda, and with him being the last of an ancient race, perhaps it's easier to have him be the first king. It kinda just throws the oddity of the time power on to Sonia, though, as her significance is completely unexplained. In some ways, that's fine; underexplained ancient stuff leaves a lot of room to the imagination, and is probably better than Zelda just inexplicably having some control over time after not showing a trace of that in BotW. On the other, OoT and SS kinda already linked Zelda to time (indirectly through Hylia in the latter), so while weird strictly in the BotW/TotK continuity, Zelda's association with time would've been fine for longtime fans.
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Not exactly related to the timeline but this brought up an interesting thought, did we ever actually get any confirmation that Sonia and Rauru had kids before she was killed? I didn't finish the 13 tablets quest so maybe it was answered there but the memories themselves don't really make any kind of indication that they had kids.

Would be kinda funny if they went the Futurama route and Zelda wound up becoming her own ancestor which somehow gave her the triforce power.
 
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We know that Sonia comes from a line of priestesses of Hylia, so they can be blood related without Zelda being her direct descendant

There's no text I've found so far that explicitly confirms Rauru and Sonia having a child together
 
Jersh said:
Tears of the Kingdom is a phenomenal game that I enjoyed a ton, I'd like to make that clear before I start. Easily among the best games I've ever played. But I am feeling pretty let down by how it handled its lore.
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It's kind of funny that this mirrors a discussion we had a while back about a Link Between Worlds where I echoed similar feelings. I think the game is brilliant, but treats the series lore as a template at best and an afterthought at worst.
Jimmy Joe said:
We know that Sonia comes from a line of priestesses of Hylia, so they can be blood related without Zelda being her direct descendant

There's no text I've found so far that explicitly confirms Rauru and Sonia having a child together
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Rauru and Sonia (Or maybe it was just Sonia, I'd have to check) mention that they sense Zelda is a blood descendant of them, though it could be like, well, real life Royal families from history, in that, following the death of the King and Queen, with the king having no family other than Mineru who is potentially ineligible anyway due to her duties/physically dying, the line of succession moved to an unknown relation of Sonia's, who carried on the bloodline from there. That way, Zelda retains her blood relationship with Sonia without being a direct descendant. It would also avoid questions about Hylian/Zonai hybrid children (though the Ancient Hero armor seems to imply there were some anyway, or at least other Zonai past Rauru and Mineru).
 
WestEgg said:
It's kind of funny that this mirrors a discussion we had a while back about a Link Between Worlds where I echoed similar feelings. I think the game is brilliant, but treats the series lore as a template at best and an afterthought at worst.

Rauru and Sonia (Or maybe it was just Sonia, I'd have to check) mention that they sense Zelda is a blood descendant of them, though it could be like, well, real life Royal families from history, in that, following the death of the King and Queen, with the king having no family other than Mineru who is potentially ineligible anyway due to her duties/physically dying, the line of succession moved to an unknown relation of Sonia's, who carried on the bloodline from there. That way, Zelda retains her blood relationship with Sonia without being a direct descendant. It would also avoid questions about Hylian/Zonai hybrid children (though the Ancient Hero armor seems to imply there were some anyway, or at least other Zonai past Rauru and Mineru).
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I believe the word Sonia uses is 'blood relation,' and they might assume that Zelda's a descendant? I'm not sure, and I'd have to check, but we definitely don't know if Rauru and Sonia have a kid
 
Here's the priority level I give to what is presented in terms of the lore/timeline.
  1. The events of games published by Nintendo with "The Legend of Zelda" in the title. The scenarios depicted in the games, particularly the cutscenes, show events as they happened. We can make some exceptions for things that are obvious QoL features like Grante being able to recreate the Hylian Shield, The Sheikah Stones in Ocarina of Time 3DS Amiibo bonuses, and, you know, Link dying and the game reloading. In general, I will treat the Japanese text as higher canon than English if there is conflict since that is what Nintendo themselves will follow, and will dismiss gimmicks added in remasters/remakes like Dampe's Dungeon Maker in LA. Obviously non-mainline Zeldas like Cadence of Hyrule, Hyrule Warriors, the Tingle games, or ones not pubished by Nintendo like fangames or the CDI games do not affect the series lore.
  2. Things mentioned in Instruction Booklets, as these are essentially intended to be a component of the game as well. This mostly applies to the older games, and the game takes priority in the event of conflict.
  3. Strongly implied or directly stated Inter-game connections. The biggest examples of this would be Demise's Curse from Skyward Sword, which gives us the base assumption that future instances of Zelda, Link, and Ganon(dorf) respectively carry the blood of the Goddess (are a descendant of SS Zelda/Hylia), have the Spirit of the Hero (are a reincarnation of Link ((though on a meta level I've always believed "the spirit of the hero" refers to the Player themselves))), and are an incarnation of Demise's Hatred. Other examples include Zelda's speech in Breath of the Wild referencing Skyward Sword, Ocarina of Time, and Twilight Princess, The Master Sword very obviously still being Fi, the references to Ruto and Naboruu in BotW, etc. I also personally view the costume pieces and weapons found in the base game of TotK to have similar, deliberate connotations, given their prominence in the setting.
  4. Supplementary Official Material that is tied to the games themselves. Namely, Hyrule Historia, The Encyclopedia, and Creating a Champion, and official Strategy Guides. This DOES NOT include things like official manga, or any other adaptations the games/series may receive. It should be noted that it's been revealed that a lot of the information presented in Hyrule Historia and the Encyclopedia are closer to theories and speculation than a firm series bible the developers adhere to, and given there are some contradictions between them, things can be taken with a grain of salt. Notably, the infamous 3 way timeline split came from here, and strictly speaking this has never been confirmed to be the actual explanation within the games themselves, but in absence of stronger evidence, it is currently the best explanation of the series timeline we have for the time being. I'll also throw direct quotes from Miyamoto/Aonuma in here as well, given they themselves have been pretty wishy-washy on the subject and gone back and forth on ideas a few times.
  5. Fan theories that fill gaps in story explanation that otherwise do no conflict with other more secure lore.
 
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Jimmy Joe said:
I believe the word Sonia uses is 'blood relation,' and they might assume that Zelda's a descendant? I'm not sure, and I'd have to check, but we definitely don't know if Rauru and Sonia have a kid
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Sonia uses the term "blood connection" (and something similar in the JP as well), but she does explicitly say that she feels her own time powers and Rauru's light powers in Zelda, however you decide to interpret that.
 
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I don't believe the spirit of the hero is the actual soul being reincarnated over and over, we've seen a few games with multiple confirmed or implied heroes appearing simultaneously and Demise is amazed at Link because he's the first brave human he's ever met. It's more like a mentality IMO.
 
LegendHero said:
I don't believe the spirit of the hero is the actual soul being reincarnated over and over, we've seen a few games with multiple confirmed or implied heroes appearing simultaneously and Demise is amazed at Link because he's the first brave human he's ever met. It's more like a mentality IMO.
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As far as I know, the only instances with Link interacting with another Link (not counting amiibo Wolf Link) are the Hero's Shade training TP Link, and the implication that the old man who runs the dark link mini-game in A Link Between Worlds might be LttP Link. In the former case, ghosts/shades interacting with future incarnations isn't an uncommon thing in fiction, think Avatar for example. You could even argue that as the Hero Shade only ever appears to or is acknowledged by Link, he's a part of Link's soul that manifests to him at certain times. For the old man, I don't really buy the implication that he's a former Link. I can't think of other instances, but I could be forgetting.
 
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If Sonia had a child, I doubt the game would mention it anyways, both BOTW and TotK seem to enjoy leaving the finer details of their past events up to debate, which is why the 13 tablets you have to find are written by some chamberlain whom is never seen, and is presumably why the Temple of Time is somehow floating in the sky, since the tablets mention Zelda and Mineru did it, but the last memory of Zelda turning into a dragon outright contradicts that, so it had to have happened after Zelda turned into a dragon. Thus if they had a kid it's something that's off-screen.

That said I have to echo the sentiment from Jersh that Rauru being the first King feels utterly pointless and as of it only exists to be contradictory. If this game simply had it's past events take place before the Calamity from 10,000 years ago but after the timeline proper, no one would be that upset by it, but instead they're insistent that it must be the start of Hyrule, and that only needlessly contradicts the lore of the series. Effectively asking us to forget 30 years of speculation and theorizing for a story that is as bare bones as it can get, even by Zelda standards. I also agree that Mineru bringing up the Draconification idea and then immediately shooting it down felt bizzare. It's like they needed to establish that that was a thing, but didn't know how to introduce the concept more naturally.

Also we can't really assume the Ancient Hero means the Zonai age is longer than what's said in game. We don't know what is going on with the ancient hero, and while I would personally like to assume that ugly abomination is simply non-canon, I think the easier assumption is that it's a warped mirror image of current day Link, where instead of just needing his arm replaced it was his whole body. That tends to be the narrative purpose past Links share in Zelda stories to act as a mirror for the current one, so it would make sense to assume thats what is going on here, tho that's just a theory so take it or leave it. Regardless it doesn't make much sense in-universe anyway, as the shrines are said to be made by Rauru and Zonai and thus are from the Imprisoning War Era, so how would the soul of some hero from thousands of years in the future be tied to completing each of those shrines? It inherently doesn't make sense and thus makes me doubt it's canonicity.

Also also, the various past games items only make sense as replicas, the Goddess Sword isn't the Goddess Sword it's just a sword designed to look like it, same with stuff like Mindas Helmet which has Midnas hair attached to it, like that would make zero sense to be the real deal. This overall unfortunately adds more fuel to the "they're all just myths bro" nonsense, so...that's certainly unfortunate.
 
I'm sure it's clear at this point, but my position is firmly that gameplay rewards are just not text. Or at least, their importance as text is very very low on the totem pole. Not the Hylian Shield (in either BotW or TotK), not the Hero of the Wild set which somehow found itself spread across the depths between games, not the 10 Hylian Rice Symin gives you for completing his quest, not the 3 Bomb Flowers Rauru keeps in a treasure chest for when you learn how to throw.

But honestly this is what makes theorycrafting lore in video games interesting to me. In film and books, almost all the text is text. They have to go out of their way to let the reader/viewer know if something is not supposed to be text. But video games, being an interactive medium, have to dance between text, gameplay, and incentive, so it's our job as people who care way too much about teasing out the connections to figure out what's text and what isn't.

Mango said:
That said I have to echo the sentiment from Jersh that Rauru being the first King feels utterly pointless and as of it only exists to be contradictory. If this game simply had it's past events take place before the Calamity from 10,000 years ago but after the timeline proper, no one would be that upset by it, but instead they're insistent that it must be the start of Hyrule, and that only needlessly contradicts the lore of the series. Effectively asking us to forget 30 years of speculation and theorizing for a story that is as bare bones as it can get, even by Zelda standards.
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It's interesting how the references to OoT Rauru have evolved. Rauru is introduced as an ancient sage, old enough to have established the Temple of Time long ago, who is associated with owls and was probably the true identity of Kaepora Gaebora. Then in Skyward Sword, Zelda's father looks like both Rauru and Kaepora Gaebora and is named Gaepora, and he's the sworn guardian of the Goddess Sword's chamber. And now Zelda's possible ancestor is a Zonai named Rauru, and he's treated as a father figure for Zelda more than her own father was.

I think Nintendo's drumming something up here, but I can't say what. One of the first sky labyrinths I did mentioned the Lord of Owls and I was like "oh geez, are they really gonna bring it up?" but then it turned out it was referring to the Boar, Owl, and Dragon symbolism that was already present in the labyrinths in BotW.
 
I've had a lot of fun thinking about chronologies as a fan, but I've also always been perfectly comfortable with the simple idea that each new The Legend of Zelda game, 2D or 3D, is a kind of rewrite and narrative varriation, of a mythological base. And that suits me just fine.

The only thing I don't understand is why make Hyrule Historia when you're Nintendo. It contradicts this approach and doesn't make sense, unless you cobble together a multiverse which, after all, would also make sense.
 
Choosing to count or not count certain parts of the text is the very spirit of making the timeline, to me

There's nothing saying you have to pick TOTK and keep it anywhere on your timeline. Ganondorf remembering Zelda when he wakes up not lining up with the geoglyphs? Who cares! You don't have to count the game!

When it comes to this sort of project you should only ever adhere to explanations that you find personally satisfying. Authorial intent is bupkis, the text is all there is, and the parts of it you read are for you alone
 
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A few reasons why I'm also in favor of Hyrule's past in TotK taking place later in the timeline rather than at Hyrule's original founding.
  • As much as people don't like the idea of multiple iterations of Hyrule, it's literally happened in game before, namely Spirit Tracks. That is a brand new iteration of Hyrule. Further, if we believe that BotW/TotK takes place either in the Adult Timeline, or in a merged timeline, Hyrule had to have later been resettled in its original location (as it would be very unsatisfying to just say there's another Death Mountain, Lake Hylia, among other geographic references, etc.)
  • Hyrule has also been shown to enter periods of decline in game, such as Twilight Princess and the original Legend of Zelda. It's very easy to infer the Kingdom could have collapsed multiple times, even aside from the times we see in game (Flooding in Wind Waker, the Calamity).
  • Again, if we are to take the text of the stone tablet that says Hyrule Castle was placed where it was to keep Ganondorf's body sealed as accurate, we have to assume that that specific Hyrule Castle is the same one seen in every game if TotK's Imprisoning War predates most of the series. Which includes two timelines where it was destroyed.
  • King Rhoam calls out the Great Plateau as the birthplace of the Kingdom of Hyrule, which is consistent with what we see in TotK's past. But the Great Plateau has never been a significant location in any prior Zelda game, and no, the whole games cannot have taken place on the plateau, as several landmarks such as Death Mountain are not present there.
  • If TotK Ganondorf predates OoT Ganondorf, it raises a lot of questions about reincarnation first of all, but it also makes Zelda's plan with the original sages seem silly since an incarnation of Demon King Ganondorf has in fact risen and destroyed Hyrule many times in the intervening years with little concern for that failsafe.
  • The Light Dragon itself would be a pretty significant thing to retcon as always just having kind of been floating around off screen this whole time.
It's just too heavy of an ask for me to say all of this has now been built into the backstory of the majority of the series rather than just this game. The simplest explanation seems the easiest, and as we already know BotW/TotK takes place tens of thousands of years after the prior games, the easiest answer is these events also do not predate and interfere with preestablished games.
 
Having just finished the game after 160 hours of play time (and still a crap ton more I can do), I have just a few theories I’d like to share:

There’s definitely a clear connection between The Depths and the Sky Islands. All the Old Maps you find on Sky Islands leads to treasures in The Depths, all of which are connected to previous Links. We know from Skyward Sword that Demise is from the depths and this game seems to suggest that the Zonai may have originally lived in The Depths. So if that is true, I do wonder if they left for the surface because Demise drove them out? And then Ganondorf however many years later arrived and then drives the Zonai from The Surface into the Skies.

That also begs the question… if any of that is true, could Demise himself perhaps have been a Zonai gone rogue and evil?

I also believe they may have converged the timelines here somewhat and it’s tied a lot toward those aforementioned treasures. I wonder if Sonia, as the Sage of Time, was doing some multiversal time traveling and retrieving the treasures and items that other Link’s wore and used and she creating those Old Maps for Link to find so he can use them to help defeat Ganondorf when the time comes.

The descriptions of the tunics & weapons are pretty clear that they’re the very items that those other Links used. So this is the best explanation I have atm to explain how they could end up here.
 
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I still don't see what's contradictory about Rauru being the first king. We've never been told the name of the first king of Hyrule, who founded the kingdom, or what he looked like. Contradiction would imply any of those things were known before now.
 
LegendHero said:
I still don't see what's contradictory about Rauru being the first king. We've never been told the name of the first king of Hyrule, who founded the kingdom, or what he looked like. Contradiction would imply any of those things were known before now.
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The main contradiction caused by all of this is Ganondorf IMO. OoT implied this was the first appearance of this guy, if TotK is saying he fought the first king of Hyrule then clearly the OoT Ganondorf was not the first.

The fact that TotK Ganondorf was sealed for tens/hundreds of thousands of years also makes the idea of another Ganondorf happening in that time or afterwards kinda odd.

If Rauru was not called the first king of Hyrule then this wouldn't be a problem, we'd just assume this Ganondorf is a reincarnation of OoT Ganondorf far in the future.

So the best way to reconcile this IMO is that this is not the same Hyrule kingdom as in OoT and other games, and Rauru was indeed the first king of this new Hyrule.
 
Skittzo said:
The main contradiction caused by all of this is Ganondorf IMO. OoT implied this was the first appearance of this guy, if TotK is saying he fought the first king of Hyrule then clearly the OoT Ganondorf was not the first.

The fact that TotK Ganondorf was sealed for tens/hundreds of thousands of years also makes the idea of another Ganondorf happening in that time or afterwards kinda odd.

If Rauru was not called the first king of Hyrule then this wouldn't be a problem, we'd just assume this Ganondorf is a reincarnation of OoT Ganondorf far in the future.

So the best way to reconcile this IMO is that this is not the same Hyrule kingdom as in OoT and other games, and Rauru was indeed the first king of this new Hyrule.
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I don't really see that as a contradiction either. Kingdoms often have repeated names for their rulers, Koume and Kotake are young women in the flashbacks to the founding of Hyrule but are 400 years old in Ocarina of Time, and there are many historical examples of warring nations making peace and then falling back in to conflict. While the Koume and Kotake connection could suggest there is a metaphysical connection between the two Ganondorfs, even that is not necessarily true. They may just be similar people, the explicit evidence for population-wide reincarnation in the Zelda universe is almost nonexistent. Hylia becoming the Skyward Sword version of Zelda is the only time we know of that definitely being the case, a lot of the time the similar characters exist because Nintendo wants to keep some of the iconic characters while still letting each story or two take place in a new era. The story of the Zonai is so similar to the story of Hyrule's founding we're told of in Twilight Princess that setting this in a new Hyrule requires two ancient advanced civilizations connected to the sky coming down and founding a Hyrule kingdom. I guess it's debatable, but I don't necessarily see that as more implausible than there being two demon-controlling Gerudo named Ganondorf.
 
The Calamity, to me, seems to be a very highly developed version of Phantom Ganon, and was building itself a body to take on a wholly different form; I think that suggests that other monsters throughout the series could have been the same thing

If the witches Twinrova were to take Ganondorf's Malice and act as surrogate mothers, doesn't it make sense that Ganondorf could be reborn in this very specific way, even as he remains imprisoned?
 
I don't think the backstory is compatible with being before OOT. The timeline states:

Era of Chaos > Temple of Time built by Rauru using the Master Sword to seal the Sacred Realm. He seals himself in the Sacred Realm > Hyrule is founded and the Era of Prosperity is started > many years later OOT Link opens the Sacred Realm by pulling the Master Sword

ToTK states:

Rauru and Sonia are married and found Hyrule > Temple of Time is around probably built after the founding like everything else > Ganondorf attempts to take over the TotK Imprisoning War happens > Zelda and Mineru set in place the plan to help Link in the future including creating the Great Sky Island and raising the Temple of Time > Mineru dies and Zelda transforms > Temple of Time is raised into the sky and stays there.

so we have two stories both involving a Rauru, a Temple of Time, and the founding of Hyrule, one states it must all mostly be before the founding and the Temple of Time must stay on the ground, the other states it's all after the founding and the Temple of Time flies off.
 
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Jimmy Joe said:
The Calamity, to me, seems to be a very highly developed version of Phantom Ganon, and was building itself a body to take on a wholly different form; I think that suggests that other monsters throughout the series could have been the same thing

If the witches Twinrova were to take Ganondorf's Malice and act as surrogate mothers, doesn't it make sense that Ganondorf could be reborn in this very specific way, even as he remains imprisoned?
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Yeah, that's why I mentioned them and a possible metaphysical connection, I do think that's a possibility. But that kind of technical stuff isn't usually elaborated on in a significant way by the Zelda team, so we'll probably never know for certain.
 
Jimmy Joe said:
The Calamity, to me, seems to be a very highly developed version of Phantom Ganon, and was building itself a body to take on a wholly different form; I think that suggests that other monsters throughout the series could have been the same thing

If the witches Twinrova were to take Ganondorf's Malice and act as surrogate mothers, doesn't it make sense that Ganondorf could be reborn in this very specific way, even as he remains imprisoned?
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I agree regarding Calamity Ganon, though if the two simultaneous Ganondorf’s interpretation is the correct one, then I would prefer it if Calamity Ganon was the original Ganondorf because it is clearly what Breath of the Wild was going for, and even Demon King TotK has no association with Boars the way OG Ganondorf does.

Also regarding Koume and Kotake, I don’t see a reason to assume those Gerudo are the same ones as OoT. We already have an instance of a revived or reincarnated Koume and Kotake in the Oracle games, which are in the era of Link to the Past, hundreds of years at least after Ocarina of Time, where they very explicitly died.
 
WestEgg said:
I agree regarding Calamity Ganon, though if the two simultaneous Ganondorf’s interpretation is the correct one, then I would prefer it if Calamity Ganon was the original Ganondorf because it is clearly what Breath of the Wild was going for, and even Demon King TotK has no association with Boars the way OG Ganondorf does.

Also regarding Koume and Kotake, I don’t see a reason to assume those Gerudo are the same ones as OoT. We already have an instance of a revived or reincarnated Koume and Kotake in the Oracle games, which are in the era of Link to the Past, hundreds of years at least after Ocarina of Time, where they very explicitly died.
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In fairness, OOT Ganondorf isn't really associated with boar imagery until he turns into Ganon. But I understand why you'd prefer that; still, in the case where the Calamity is the original, does that mean TOTK Ganondorf is a reincarnation of the Calamity, who is OOT Ganondorf, which means TOTK's backstory takes place during the 10k year gap after the Calamity is sealed?

And I don't mean to suggest that it's necessarily the same characters. I personally think that "Twinrova" probably describes any twin witches who serve as the elder magic-keepers for the Gerudo, especially the ones with dark magic. I'm happy to agree there might be three or four sets of Twinrova across the series
 
Ganondorf really does cause so much trouble for the timeline discussion. I kind of think maybe we just had three Ganondorf’s co-existing? He had been sealed away beneath Hyrule Castle for so long, it actually gave enough time for another evil Ganondorf (the one we see in Tears) to be born and rise to power. It’s actually kind of cool to think about all of this stuff going on in these Zelda games and there has been another Ganondorf just sealed away down there this entire time haha

And speaking of it, it did have me thinking about something I had never really thought about before… a male Gerudo we know is born every 100 years. My assumption here is that, by tradition, the Gerudo likely name all of them Ganondorf but only a very, very, very select few (three that we know of now) actually live long enough to grow old and become some evil, power hungry villain. The others just kind of… idk, die off I guess and are forgotten.
 
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A thought.

We saw the final battle between the Seven Sages and Ganondorf. We know it takes place underneath the present Hyrule Castle while Rauru's actual castle appears to be located on the Great Plateau. We know the present Hyrule Castle was built over that spot to commemorate the sealing of Ganondorf by Rauru. So why were they there in a cave in that area near the center of Hyrule? I can see them fighting on the land or at some important site, but why were they in some underground area unless that place was important?

I don't have any evidence or anything for why, but I am thinking: maybe that was an entrance to the Sacred Realm where the Triforce would have been and Ganondorf thought the Secret Stone wasn't enough. He needed more power and stumbled upon it.
 
Jimmy Joe said:
In fairness, OOT Ganondorf isn't really associated with boar imagery until he turns into Ganon. But I understand why you'd prefer that; still, in the case where the Calamity is the original, does that mean TOTK Ganondorf is a reincarnation of the Calamity, who is OOT Ganondorf, which means TOTK's backstory takes place during the 10k year gap after the Calamity is sealed?

And I don't mean to suggest that it's necessarily the same characters. I personally think that "Twinrova" probably describes any twin witches who serve as the elder magic-keepers for the Gerudo, especially the ones with dark magic. I'm happy to agree there might be three or four sets of Twinrova across the series
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Well, I don’t subscribe to two simultaneous Ganons either way and think OG Ganondorf is just dead (he’s died in all three timelines at this point rather than just be sealed away, having been stabbed, petrified and drowned in Wind Waker, dead on his feet in Twilight Princess, then reincarnating for Four Swords and getting absorbed into the Four Sword (which means this one is the “least dead” of where we left them off) and being exploded into pieces in The Legend of Zelda, with his followers having failed to revive him in Zelda II.) I see TotK as his most recent reincarnation like Four Swords was before. I think Calamity Ganon as TotK Ganondorf’s malice projecting his will/personality is the simplest explanation and therefore the most likely correct one.

BUT FOR THE THOUGHT EXPERIMENT, if there are in fact two simulations Ganons, I could see OG Ganondorf having continued to be revived until he degraded into a broken monsterous Force of Nature form of Calamity Ganon as we had assumed in Breath of the Wild, but then either by coincidence or by malevolent guidance from a mutual connection to Demise, the Calamity broke the seal on TotK’s Imprisoning Chamber, setting the stage for TotK to be revived.
 
I tell you one nice thing about the "TOTK's past is the oldest thing in the timeline so far" idea. I will tell you one thing:

Demise becomes a very advanced Phantom Ganon, which means that Demise's curse is actually Ganondorf's curse, and Demise comes from Ganondorf rather than the other way around

Fixing the worst problem introduced by Skyward Sword (making it reasonable to assume Ganondorf isn't his own person), Hell, that's worth all kinds of timeline changes
 
andipossess said:
A thought.

We saw the final battle between the Seven Sages and Ganondorf. We know it takes place underneath the present Hyrule Castle while Rauru's actual castle appears to be located on the Great Plateau. We know the present Hyrule Castle was built over that spot to commemorate the sealing of Ganondorf by Rauru. So why were they there in a cave in that area near the center of Hyrule? I can see them fighting on the land or at some important site, but why were they in some underground area unless that place was important?

I don't have any evidence or anything for why, but I am thinking: maybe that was an entrance to the Sacred Realm where the Triforce would have been and Ganondorf thought the Secret Stone wasn't enough. He needed more power and stumbled upon it.
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As I mentioned in my own theory post earlier, it is implied that The Depths was once the home of the Zonai. The statues and such down there I believe are erections of previous Zonai heroes or just important Zonai in general. That explains why they were down there in the scenes your speaking of.
 
Rareware said:
As I mentioned in my own theory post earlier, it is implied that The Depths was once the home of the Zonai. The statues and such down there I believe are erections of previous Zonai heroes or just important Zonai in general. That explains why they were down there in the scenes your speaking of.
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I don't really think it explains why they were down there at all. The only Zonai left are Rauru and Mineru, and both of them appear to be living near the Temple of Time on the Great Plateau on the surface. Certainly the Zonai mined things in the Depths, but I don't know that they lived there. At the very least, Rauru and Mineru didn't. Either way, why were they confronting Ganondorf there? Did they lure him there? Was he there already? What drew Ganondorf to that location?

The Depths are particularly mysterious to me though because the Zonai don't seem like they lived underground. They have several surface-world ruins, and the sky islands were probably lifted directly from the surface and not pulled from underground. It's kind of why I'm playing around with the idea of the Depths as a withered Sacred Realm now that the Triforce has not been part of it for ages.
 
Jimmy Joe said:
I tell you one nice thing about the "TOTK's past is the oldest thing in the timeline so far" idea. I will tell you one thing:

Demise becomes a very advanced Phantom Ganon, which means that Demise's curse is actually Ganondorf's curse, and Demise comes from Ganondorf rather than the other way around

Fixing the worst problem introduced by Skyward Sword (making it reasonable to assume Ganondorf isn't his own person), Hell, that's worth all kinds of timeline changes
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Honestly, while I don't like Demise being the source for Ganondorf, this would be worse overall. So much of Demise is built up to be a sorta pure embodiment of evil, a cosmic force of evil to be juxtaposed to the good Hylia. Nothing evil should exist before him imo.

Especially with all the Buddhist symbolism involved in Skyward Sword.
 
Rareware said:
As I mentioned in my own theory post earlier, it is implied that The Depths was once the home of the Zonai. The statues and such down there I believe are erections of previous Zonai heroes or just important Zonai in general. That explains why they were down there in the scenes your speaking of.
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andipossess said:
I don't really think it explains why they were down there at all. The only Zonai left are Rauru and Mineru, and both of them appear to be living near the Temple of Time on the Great Plateau on the surface. Certainly the Zonai mined things in the Depths, but I don't know that they lived there. At the very least, Rauru and Mineru didn't. Either way, why were they confronting Ganondorf there? Did they lure him there? Was he there already? What drew Ganondorf to that location?

The Depths are particularly mysterious to me though because the Zonai don't seem like they lived underground. They have several surface-world ruins, and the sky islands were probably lifted directly from the surface and not pulled from underground. It's kind of why I'm playing around with the idea of the Depths as a withered Sacred Realm now that the Triforce has not been part of it for ages.
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Now one interesting thing about the topography of the Depths is that they're the inverse of the Surface—a mountain on the surface will be a valley in the depths, and vice versa, as if the Surface were lifted out of the Depths, or they mirror each other along a line that runs horizontally through the earth

Mango said:
Honestly, while I don't like Demise being the source for Ganondorf, this would be worse overall. So much of Demise is built up to be a sorta pure embodiment of evil, a cosmic force of evil to be juxtaposed to the good Hylia. Nothing evil should exist before him imo.

Especially with all the Buddhist symbolism involved in Skyward Sword.
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Fi describes Demise this way in Skyward Sword:

This eternal being has conquered time
itself. It is the source of all monsters.


According to tales passed down through
generations, it appears differently in
each epoch and to each person who
lays eyes on it.
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Demise, notably, has not conquered time itself, but Fi also isn't necessarily talking about Demise here: Demise didn't always appear in this shape, or always have this name, which suggests that there were forms of that primordial evil that long predated Demise trying to take the Triforce from Hylia

Demise is predated by older evils in the text of Skyward Sword, so I think it's OK principally to have specific evils be older than him
 
Just for fun, you could say that Ganondorf conquered time by taking Sonia's secret stone and making it his own. (Not that I seriously believe that's what Fi's referring to.)
 
Jimmy Joe said:
Fi describes Demise this way in Skyward Sword:



Demise, notably, has not conquered time itself, but Fi also isn't necessarily talking about Demise here: Demise didn't always appear in this shape, or always have this name, which suggests that there were forms of that primordial evil that long predated Demise trying to take the Triforce from Hylia

Demise is predated by older evils in the text of Skyward Sword, so I think it's OK principally to have specific evils be older than him
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While Fi does say it appears differently, she consistently in that description refers to it as a singular being. Which is consistent with what I said, it's the embodiment of all evil, or, as it is referred to in Japanese, it's "The Bringer of Demise."

Ganondorf is not the same entity, how he directly is related to Demise is unclear, but it's more likely he's influenced towards evil by Demise's hatred or he's somehow reincarnated from his hatred, regardless they're two separate beings.
 
Mango said:
While Fi does say it appears differently, she consistently in that description refers to it as a singular being. Which is consistent with what I said, it's the embodiment of all evil, or, as it is referred to in Japanese, it's "The Bringer of Demise."

Ganondorf is not the same entity, how he directly is related to Demise is unclear, but it's more likely he's influenced towards evil by Demise's hatred or he's somehow reincarnated from his hatred, regardless they're two separate beings.
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What I'm getting at is that this incarnation of the Demon King isn't the first. Which is interesting, because it implies that there were wars with the Demon King—Imprisoning Wars, since pretty much every war with a demon king that doesn't kill them ends up being a kind of imprisoning war—before Demise's first appearance. In fact, at some point in the past, it's heavily implied that Demise was sealed beneath the earth, which is why he emerged from there in the backstory of Skyward Sword

The way Fi talks about Demise is pretty much exactly the same way Impa talks about past incarnations of Ganondorf's hatred in the form of the Calamity, according to @Starphanluke , and I don't think that repetition in the writing is by accident

Edit: I went back and checked, and one of the contradictions you were talking about isn't as bad as it sounds at first

When the chamberlain describes the Temple of Time rising into the sky, she reflects on what Zelda had told her in the past and what Mineru had done to achieve this feat, but she doesn't refer to them being there, indicating that she's referring to events that happened after the draconification/death of everyone involved. Her account lines up with the story told by the steward on top of the Temple of Time
 
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So I just finished all Shrines after 175 hours and got the special costume set. This answers a REALLY big question I’ve had since Breath of the Wild: why is the Hero from 10,000 years ago presented as someone with long, red hair? Well… now the answer is very clear. It was a Zonai wielding the Master Sword that defeated the Calamity Ganon.

I spoke to Impa there and she had this to say:

“The Calamity was the Demon King of ancient times, brought back to existence in the form of hatred manifest. Shown here are the royal princess with the power to seal away evil… and a warrior chosen by the legendary sword. This image depicts how, using our four relics called Divine Beasts built by our ancestors, they drove off the Calamity.”

So it’s interesting to see that 10,000 years ago, the Zonai were still living alongside the Sheikah. And Impa saying he was brought back through “hatred manifest” is clear as day referring to Demise, who says exactly that at the end of Skyward Sword.

Now trying to wrap my head around how all of this fits into the timeline.
 
Do anyone have any clue why Hateno kids grew up but Narah and Nebb(botw The Weapon Connoisseur boy) siblings didn't?
They seem to be younger than Hudson daughter that wasn't even born in the first game. At first I thought some accident happened at the lab but now after seeing that the game have a lot of inconsistencies (somehow you met hudson but not bolson, nobody at hateno recognizes Link) I fear it was a overlook.

Not an overlook in the sense they forgot about it as those have new dialogues and routines. Just that let's get back to it if we have some time and they never did.
 
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balgajo said:
Sorry. I meant he doesn't recognize you. Though in BOTW you meet he and Hudson at the same time.
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i mean canonically link is just some guy he did a job for like 5 years ago, makes sense why he wouldn't remember
on the other hand you literally organized hudsons wedding so he would def remember
 
I think a lot of people just forget that to many Hylians, Link is just "some guy" who helps with small favours. No one is linking Link to the guy who saved Hyrule because he's not exactly advertising it.

Also on the "if he's with Zelda, surely someone would know him" train, do you remember the names or the faces of the royal guard in real life? Most people are focused on the princess, not the random dork in the blue shirt.

Though the real lore mystery is how Zelda isn't considered Queen.
 
xaszatm said:
I think a lot of people just forget that to many Hylians, Link is just "some guy" who helps with small favours. No one is linking Link to the guy who saved Hyrule because he's not exactly advertising it.

Also on the "if he's with Zelda, surely someone would know him" train, do you remember the names or the faces of the royal guard in real life? Most people are focused on the princess, not the random dork in the blue shirt.

Though the real lore mystery is how Zelda isn't considered Queen.
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I’d say because Hyrule is only starting to get back on its feet after the Calamity, and so she has been working to prove herself with personal acts of service to the people of the kingdom (which many quests indicate to be the case) before feeling she can formally try to reestablish the monarchy and crown herself queen.
 
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My take is that, as we learned in Twilight Princess, the actual monarch of Hyrule, when she comes of age, is still Princess. She'll be queen if she ever takes a husband and makes him king, I think
 
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Food for thought: zonai and Ganondorf clearly didn't know the very existence of the Master Sword, but it exist from a long time.
This point reinforce my idea that all the Totk backstory (and the botw backstory too) take place thousand of years after the last game of the old timelines
 
Onilink said:
Food for thought: zonai and Ganondorf clearly didn't know the very existence of the Master Sword, but it exist from a long time.
This point reinforce my idea that all the Totk backstory (and the botw backstory too) take place thousand of years after the last game of the old timelines
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same for the triforce tbh
 
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even if the zonai did refound the kingdom, no way they didn't know what the triforce is

Sonia has a tattoo of it, and they continued to use the royal crest with it included
 
Another point towards a later timeline placement for TotK’s past.

Rito should not have been present at the time of Hyrule’s original founding. Even assuming Wind Waker Rito and BotW Rito are separate species (which I do), Wind Waker still shares a past with the rest of the series, namely pre-Ocarina. It would be weird for Rito to evolve from Zora when they apparently have been around since Hyrule’s founding anyway. Unlike Hylia, there’s little reason to think they’ve been present but offscreen in earlier games, everything points to them having only appeared much later on.
 
Onilink said:
Food for thought: zonai and Ganondorf clearly didn't know the very existence of the Master Sword, but it exist from a long time.
This point reinforce my idea that all the Totk backstory (and the botw backstory too) take place thousand of years after the last game of the old timelines
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That no hero appeared to fight Ganondorf suggests, to me, that the Master Sword and the spirit of the Hero had yet to be established
 
Jimmy Joe said:
That no hero appeared to fight Ganondorf suggests, to me, that the Master Sword and the spirit of the Hero had yet to be established
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But, supposing the old games are in the same dimension, the spirit of the Hero and the Master Sword are the first things estabilished against Demise
 
Onilink said:
But, supposing the old games are in the same dimension, the spirit of the Hero and the Master Sword are the first things estabilished against Demise
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Well, not the first things. It was only established in the modern era of Skyward Sword, thousands of years after the Demise war

But, yes, those two things were established very early on
 
Pretty much any evidence you could claim suggests Hyrule was re-founded after the events of the original timeline and the entirety of BotW/TotK takes place then can also be used as further evidence pointing towards BotW/TotK simply taking place on an alternate timeline, but without the whole issue of why Hyrule was re-founded (and not clearly stated to be a new Hyrule, as was the case in Spirit Tracks) and the question of which of the timelines it takes place on, among other things. Really, BotW/TotK being a different timeline from the original timeline splits we know is the simplest (and in my opinion, most obvious) option all around.
 
Jimmy Joe said:
Well, not the first things. It was only established in the modern era of Skyward Sword, thousands of years after the Demise war

But, yes, those two things were established very early on
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Yep, but Demise curse happened after the MS creation
 
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