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Author Topic: Official Zelda timeline revealed?  (Read 10029 times)

« Reply #15 on: December 23, 2011, 10:11:12 AM »
When has canon ever stopped fanon, even if it is deliberately opposed to the official story?
Sometimes it replaces it.

« Reply #16 on: December 23, 2011, 11:55:58 PM »
It seems like the "fail" split in the timeline is an attempt to shoehorn the games prior to OoT into a coherent timeline, since Nintendo wasn't concerned with an overarching timeline until that game.
Gently push a piece of the tube containing the intersection along the fourth dimension, out of the original three dimensional space.
- WIkipedia page on the Klein bottle

« Reply #17 on: December 25, 2011, 04:02:41 AM »
an attempt to shoehorn

Speaking of which, I wasn't sure where else to post this.
YYur  waYur n beYur you Yur plusYur instYur an Yur Yur whaYur

Kojinka

  • Bruised
« Reply #18 on: December 25, 2011, 10:52:15 PM »
Yeah, I just see the third branch in the timeline split an attempt to shoehorn the first four games into a sensible timeline out of a cluster[****] of prequels and sequels.  While it does accomplish that, I don't know if I can accept the possibility of Link being defeated. But it's possible to die in all of the games, so why does this Link get a whole timeline branch out of that what-if scenario? Because he's the 'Hero of Time'?  I guess I could also accept the LTTP branch as a scenario where if Link were to die as an infant with his mother at the foot of the Great Deku Tree.  Yes, it's morbid, but it would make the some sense, considering no hero is mentioned at the beginning of either version of LttP.  If he had died during his journey, wouldn't there be some mention in the legend of a boy that was overwhelmed despite his valiant efforts?  Now, If he had died before even starting his journey, there would be no hero to mention. 

The timeline also ignores one important detail established by FSA that it takes place not long after the first FS.

But I decided to stop working my brains over the timeline after finishing TP.  It's just not worth it.  I'd rather just enjoy the games.

I think the rules say I'm supposed to edit curse words. Sorry for the minor niggle. - The Chef
« Last Edit: December 26, 2011, 12:43:08 AM by The Chef »
Regards, Uncle Dolan

« Reply #19 on: December 29, 2011, 10:06:29 PM »
Normally I don't care at all about continuity in Zelda games, but I think the "Link Fails" branch of the timeline is totally fascinating, and a really ballsy story-telling move on Nintendo's/Aonuma's part.  http://shigeruslist.com/2011/12/29/official-zelda-timeline/
Haters gonna hate

CrossEyed7

  • i can make this whatever i want; you're not my dad
« Reply #20 on: December 30, 2011, 10:54:41 PM »
Where exactly was it established that FSA was shortly after FS? I keep hearing that, but I can't remember what the reference for it was.

It's been a while since I played FSA, but I don't remember anything in game explicitly saying it was shortly after, and if it was a marketing thing, LA was alternately implied to be right after LttP or right after the Oracles, depending on when it was released.

I think the rules say I'm supposed to edit curse words. Sorry for the minor niggle. - The Chef
Racist.

Quote from: Shigeru's List
In the “Link screwed the pooch” timeline we have Link to the Past, the two Oracle games, and then finally the two original NES games. Following the games in that order, we see Hyrule go from a beautiful kingdom with towns and villagers to a ruined, desolate place overrun with monsters, where friendly faces are few and far between (though things seem to be on the upswing in Adventure of Link).
I hadn't really thought about it that way before, but yeah, that makes sense.

It also makes sense, considering Aonuma has gone on record as hating the pre-OOT games, that he would put them in the "Failure" timeline.

I used to hold to the "oral tradition" theory (that each game was a different retelling of the same legend, like a loose mythological type thing), but it's getting to the point where the stories and settings are so different, and with so much connection between them, that it just doesn't make sense anymore. Although, really, it was always like that a little. AOL is obviously meant to be a direct sequel to LOZ; OOT made some relatively clear references to being the backstory to LTTP and AOL (towns "named after" sages); MM was explicitly a direct sequel to OOT; WW and TP had very clear, if not always clear, ties to OOT; PH and ST continue right on from WW; TMC, FS, and FSA have a story arc thread running through them... There was never really a time in history when it made sense to believe that every single Zelda game was a retelling of the same legend and none of them were meant to be continuations of the others in any way, it's more that there was a time in my personal history where, with the knowledge I had at the time, it made more sense to me.
"Oh man, I wish being a part of a Mario fan community was the most embarrassing thing about my life." - Super-Jesse

BP

  • Beside Pacific
« Reply #21 on: December 31, 2011, 12:19:11 PM »
I think the "literal legend" theory still makes sense except for one thing, and that is the fact that one game will make direct reference to another as a set of events that had previously occurred. Other than that, it's not hard to picture two Hylian grandpas in rocking chairs trying to tell the story of the hero in green to some small children.

"He weren't called the Hero of Winds, ye ding-dong, he was the Hero of Time! And he wasn't a little boy, neither, he was a man."

"Who told ya that? And how did he ride a silly HORSE around, the land was covered in a ocean, it was a BOAT."

And then a third one comes in,

"You're both wrong you geezers, he flew around in the SKY on a BIRD."

And all any of them can agree on is that Link looted dungeons for magic artifacts and that he fought evil. And that he wore green.
All your dreeeeeeams begiiin to shatterrrrrr~
It's YOUR problem!

Kojinka

  • Bruised
« Reply #22 on: January 01, 2012, 10:26:52 PM »
So I assume the forum's censor software doesn't recognize curse words when they're combined with things like "cluster"?  I apologize. I seriously thought it would censor that word for the users who have the option activated.
I think the "literal legend" theory still makes sense except for one thing, and that is the fact that one game will make direct reference to another as a set of events that had previously occurred. Other than that, it's not hard to picture two Hylian grandpas in rocking chairs trying to tell the story of the hero in green to some small children.

"He weren't called the Hero of Winds, ye ding-dong, he was the Hero of Time! And he wasn't a little boy, neither, he was a man."

"Who told ya that? And how did he ride a silly HORSE around, the land was covered in a ocean, it was a BOAT."

And then a third one comes in,

"You're both wrong you geezers, he flew around in the SKY on a BIRD."

And all any of them can agree on is that Link looted dungeons for magic artifacts and that he fought evil. And that he wore green.
I am suddenly visualizing this scene play out in a flash cartoon or something.
Regards, Uncle Dolan

Turtlekid1

  • Tortuga
« Reply #23 on: January 09, 2012, 02:52:16 PM »
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtNLMiOZ0T4" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtNLMiOZ0T4</a>.
"It'll say life is sacred and so is death
but death is life and so we move on"

CrossEyed7

  • i can make this whatever i want; you're not my dad
« Reply #24 on: January 09, 2012, 06:38:38 PM »
Someone on Neogaf came up with a good theory on where the Fail timeline comes from. In the regular, non-Master Quest version of OoT, you can beat the game only going back in time once, to do the Bottom of the Well and the thing in the Shadow Temple (I still haven't beaten OoT, so I don't know). So let's say that canonically, Link only went back in time that one time, and that created a Back to the Future-style branch. So it's not just a "what-if" hypothetical thing that you could have after any game, it's an actual timeline split (True, you can make Link go back in time as many times as you want, but you can also make him constantly attack Cuccos, or stand and stare at Sheik's crotch for hours, or keep telling the Deku Tree "no" so many times that the disease should have spread and killed him already, or whatever).

So in the normal, unaltered timeline, Link opens the Door of Time and falls asleep, Ganon takes over, then Link wakes up seven years later and makes some progress, but ultimately comes across an insurmountable obstacle in the Shadow Temple, and from that day on, he is never seen again. The Royal Knights of Hyrule then step in and fight the Imprisoning War, sealing Ganon away the hard way.

This also means there is only one Hero of Time. There's not the one that's successful and then the hypothetical one that dies in some random dungeon. Just one, in the Child timeline, who doesn't die until after MM (and actually, at some point after getting out of Termina, he apparently became a Stalfos as a result of going into the Lost Woods (as good an idea as any for why the Hero's Shade in TP looks the way he does)).

I don't know if this is specifically what Nintendo was intending, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense. I mean, really, how else do LttP and OoT make sense together? Besides, a three-way split timeline is a nice thematic touch. The timeline is gonna have to be a little kludgy considering that they weren't planning on any of it until maybe LttP at the very earliest, but I think they did a good job of working everything in.



The guy in the video kinda makes a good point asking how the Fail timeline and the Adult timeline end up different when neither of them has a hero, but presumably there was some difference in the kind of seal that the Knights made and the seal that Link made (maybe the Seven Wise Men actually aren't the same as the Seven Sages?), or maybe the Knights were just better trained and disciplined after the Imprisoning War, and while the Link from LttP may have still been born in the Adult timeline, he wouldn't have come from a line of Knights because the Knights didn't really exist -- with no Imprisoning War, and just Link running around and doing everything, they never needed to gear up to fight Ganon, and then they figured they didn't need to because Ganon got sealed away by the goddesses and the Triforce and the destined hero and whatever and now they've got their happy fairy tale ending with pretty much no one dying, whereas in the Fail timeline, they sealed Ganon away themselves, in a gritty struggle involving lots of casualties, and probably wouldn't trust the sealing as much as if it had been done by the goddesses' chosen ones, so they'd've been more vigilant.

Holy crap, that was all one sentence. Let me try again.

The guy in the video does make a good point in asking why there's a difference between the Fail timeline and the Adult timeline, when both end up with a world where Ganon is sealed, and then is unsealed with no hero around to stop him. I think, though, that he fails to take into account the differences between the timelines. In the Fail timeline, Ganon was sealed by the Knights of Hyrule following the Imprisoning War, a much more protracted, gritty struggle than the Adult timeline, where some kid goes around and does it all with magic and no one dies. The Fail timeline would have a more regimented and more vigilant order of Knights, as they knew firsthand that the fate of the kingdom rested directly on their shoulders, and many of them probably doubted the strength of the seal they were able to kludge together. The Adult timeline, on the other hand, would have more complacent Knights, believing that the goddesses's seal would hold fast for all time, and that if it didn't, fate was on their side -- the struggle against evil would come down to a showdown between Ganon and the goddesses's chosen hero (who they never saw again, but didn't know was irretrievably gone, which would, over time, raise him to the status of immortal legendary messiah figure), not a war between Ganon's troops and King Daphnes's troops.

While the Link from LttP may still have been born in this timeline, he at least would not have come from a line of Knights, as the Knights would not have lasted that long after OoT without an Imprisoning War. Even with the Imprisoning War in their past, the Knights had all but died out by the time of LttP, so coming instead from a timeline where their services had not been needed since the Civil War was settled, they definitely would not have been around. Further, we do not know the origins of LttP Link's parents -- it is likely that somewhere along the line, his ancestry relied on something in the Fail timeline that was not in the Adult timeline (for example, one of his ancestors might be a woman from a far-off country who married a Knight, while in the Adult timeline, either the Knights were not around at that time (so that guy had no reason to go to that country), or that country did not exist (maybe it was formed by refugees who left Hyrule during the Imprisoning War), or something like that).

That's more like it.


I still kinda wish Link didn't have a hat in SS. I'm okay with the alternate origin for the rest of the clothes, though -- The Kikwis probably evolved into the Kokiri (or they evolved into Koroks and were given the Kokiri form by the Deku Tree and/or the fairies), so once they started wearing clothes, they apparently decided to wear clothes reminiscent of the legendary hero from the sky who found them a place to live centuries ago.
« Last Edit: January 09, 2012, 06:43:37 PM by CrossEyed7 »
"Oh man, I wish being a part of a Mario fan community was the most embarrassing thing about my life." - Super-Jesse

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