Fungi Forums

Video Games => Video Game Chat => Topic started by: CrossEyed7 on December 21, 2011, 11:14:59 PM

Title: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: CrossEyed7 on December 21, 2011, 11:14:59 PM
Source (http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2011/12/rumour_official_legend_of_zelda_series_timeline_revealed).

Main Timeline
1. Skyward Sword
2. Minish Cap
3. Four Swords.
4. Ocarina Of Time

Split 1: Link defeats Ganon — childhood branch
a) Majora's Mask
b) Twilight Princess
c) Four Swords Adventures

Split 2: Link defeats Ganon — adult branch
a) Wind Waker
b) Phantom Hourglass
c) Spirit Tracks

Split 3: Link fails in Ocarina Of Time
a) A Link To The Past
b) Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons
c) Link's Awakening
d) The Legend of Zelda
e) Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

(https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F26.media.tumblr.com%2Ftumblr_lwkcemtdvn1qfdqbxo1_500.png&hash=83d7c101073b1cb414a944d3b7a42222)

I haven't thought about it in too much detail yet, but the three-way split actually makes a lot of sense. When LttP talked about the Imprisoning War like it was an actual war, it wasn't talking about OoT as we know it, it was talking about the way the situations in OoT would have played out without one kid going around doing everything.

When exactly is Link's failure in the LttP timeline, though? Did he die in a dungeon, at the final battle, or did Ganon kill him as a baby, or what?

Does this mean that Four Swords is meant to be the origin of Dark Link, including OoT Dark Link?
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: BP on December 21, 2011, 11:45:19 PM
I wouldn't think it matters. Is it canon that he killed all the Skulltulas and got Biggoron's Sword? Not important--you see the same ending(s) when you win. When you die, you see the same "YOU DIED, SUCKER"
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Weegee on December 22, 2011, 03:18:17 AM
I have trouble beliving that Nintendo would make a branch in which Link fails to defeat Ganon.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: CrossEyed7 on December 22, 2011, 10:07:48 AM
I have a feeling it was more like they started out making Ocarina of Time intending it to be the Imprisoning War in the Link to the Past backstory, and then when they finished it, they looked at it and said "Oh, wait, there's not really a war in there, is there?"

Besides, it's not much darker than the opening scroll in Wind Waker.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Turtlekid1 on December 22, 2011, 10:32:25 AM
Besides, it's not much darker than the opening scroll in Wind Waker.
It would be about 20% rather darker in my mind.  When Hyrule was flooded, it was because there was no one to fight for them - Link was just gone, either long dead or somewhere else.  But to actually have him fail would be a lot more decisively "the villain won" as opposed to "the villain had no one to challenge him."  From what I know about OoT (keeping in mind I still haven't played it all the way through), it could very well be called a "war," considering you had every race in Hyrule - only represented by the Sages, sure, but still there - fighting against Ganon.

Also, the timeline that made the most sense to me when I saw it a while back had the original and Adventure of Link take place in the Adult timeline, near the end - if I recall, the guy who posted it argued that they took place in the original Hyrule after the flood waters had receded.

Not that I ever really bothered to think too hard about the timeline for this series.  I'll just go back over to the Metroid fanbase and be all snooty about its having a clear chronology, nyah-nyah.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: BP on December 22, 2011, 04:38:29 PM
Maybe it's a matter of that particular Link's gimmick as the hero of time. Nobody else has any timeline splits except him. It makes sense for Time Link to have at least the two, for the two time periods where he actively stops Ganon in different ways, but nobody else has a what-if-he-did-what-if-he-didn't scenario. In a way, he saved another reality from inexistence simply by theoretically doing nothing!

To ease your pain of "BUT HOW COULD THE BADGUY WIN" you could instead imagine that Rauru forgot to wake Link up after seven years because he is a loopy old man
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: The Chef on December 22, 2011, 07:10:18 PM
Other people have suggested that Ganon might've won during the seven years Link was asleep, or won because Link had to go back in time to get the Lens of Truth and whatnot.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Weegee on December 22, 2011, 07:36:39 PM
I guess this would explain why LttP's Hyrule is in such a [dukar]ty state.

Where do the CD-i games fit in?
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Ultima Shadow on December 22, 2011, 09:04:52 PM
Where do the CD-i games fit in?

The alternate timeline where Link has an acid trip.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: CrossEyed7 on December 23, 2011, 02:44:27 AM
SNES intro text for LttP:
Quote from: SNES
Long ago, in the beautiful kingdom of Hyrule surrounded by mountains and forests... legends told of an omnipotent and omniscient Golden Power that resided in a hidden land.
Many people aggressively sought to enter the hidden Golden Land... But no one ever returned.
One day evil power began to flow from the Golden Land... So the King commanded seven wise men to seal the gate to the Land of the Golden Power.
That seal should have remained for all time...
...But, when these events were obscured by the mists of time and became legend...
A mysterious wizard known as Agahnim came to Hyrule to release the seal. He eliminated the good King of Hyrule...
Through evil magic, he began to make descendants of the seven wise men vanish, one after another.
And the time of destiny for Princess Zelda is drawing near.

Canonical GBA intro:
Quote from: GBA
Long ago, in Hyrule, a beautiful kingdom surrounded by forests and mountains... legends told of an omnipotent and omniscient Golden Power that lay hidden.
It was hidden in a sacred realm beyond the reach of men, but one day... ...a doorway to that realm was suddenly opened...
Hoping to claim the Golden Power as their own, the people began to quarrel and fight... Many sought to enter the hidden Golden Land... But none returned, and instead evil power began to issue forth from the dark portal... So the king commanded seven sages to seal the gate to the land of the Golden Power. Many brave knights were lost in the battle to protect the sages from the tides of evil, but the seal was cast! Evil flowed no more! And the seal would remain for all time...Or so the people hoped...But when these events were obscured by the mists of time, and became legend...
A mysterious wizard known as Agahnim appeared as from nowhere... and with strange magic powers he eliminated the good king of Hyrule...
He cast spells on the soldiers and kidnapped young maidens descended from the sages in order to break the seal...
This destiny fast approaches for the final maiden... the princess, Zelda...
So the door to the Sacred Realm was opened somehow, but no one came out of it with the Triforce (except Ganon[dorf] apparently?). Sounds like Link opened the Door of Time and then died or something? Also there's no mention of the hero, even though this revision was done after Ocarina, and had revisions made that seem to be specifically intended to bolster the ties to Ocarina (e.g., changing "Seven Wise Men" to "Seven Sages" (some say they should've made the maidens have the same races as the OoT Sages if that's what they were going for, but I don't subscribe to virulent anti-miscegnation propaganda like that)). Not mentioning a hero is a big detriment to the (apparently now Jossed anyway) theory that Four Swords Adventures was the Imprisoning War, but as a sequel to the Failure timeline, it fits.

So, Wind Waker is in the Adult timeline, Twilight Princess is in the Child timeline, and Link to the Past is in the Failure timeline. That sounds about right all around, doesn't it?

Where do the CD-i games fit in?
Maybe there's another timeline split before Skyward Sword, where the difference is that everyone is stupid, and that's also where the TV show goes. Maybe Bowser went back in time and kidnapped Star Children there too and that's just the way that stupid TV show alternate universes get created in this multiverse.

And incidentally, I am taking Miyamoto's tolerance of a three-way timeline split in Zelda as definitive proof that my three-way Mario timeline split theory is absolutely correct.

Which reminds me, those purple bouncy Octoroks that are on floating rocks in the sky in Skyward Sword are totally Electrogoombas (http://www.mariowiki.com/Octoomba) (which are now called Octoombas apparently (but the picture down there is of a variant on them that's just called Octopus (http://www.mariowiki.com/Octopus_(Super_Mario_Galaxy)) which I picked because they resemble them even more)).

(https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.zeldawiki.org%2Fimages%2F6%2F6e%2FPurpleOcto.png&hash=2691bcda73693f8de6d4c3e170f7d32e) (https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mariowiki.com%2Fimages%2Fthumb%2F5%2F5c%2FOctoturrets.png%2F200px-Octoturrets.png&hash=e59413d511350b59682306020b49a8c9)

There's also the pink ones that look a lot like Land Octoroks:

(https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.wikia.com%2Fwii%2Fimages%2Fd%2Fd4%2FOctoguy-1-.png&hash=4d235e16a093b7fb3cc854e2cd2e894d) (https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.zeldawiki.org%2Fimages%2Fthumb%2F5%2F52%2FRedOctorokLoZArt.png%2F120px-RedOctorokLoZArt.png&hash=913154875420da905edb306d01b922a0)

Crossbreed the pink ones with the brown ones, and in a few millennia, you've got Sky Octoroks.

Now, Fi says in Skyward Sword that the Grass Octoroks evolved from some kind of ocean-dwelling mollusk-like things, but what does that goddessless scientist know? If Grass Octoroks evolved from Water Octoroks, then why are there still Water Octoroks, huh? You can't explain that. (Everstones)

Besides, those are Deku Scrubs.

(https://themushroomkingdom.net/board/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.zeldawiki.org%2Fimages%2F5%2F54%2FOctorok_SS.png&hash=a06cc9487f8f3d93e4002610fad08c8a)

So how many timelines are there, if Mario and Zelda are in the same 'verse? If both serieses have at least one timeline split, and one series comes before the other, does only one of the first series's branches lead to the world of the other series, or do all of its branches lead to slightly different versions of the other series? Maybe Mario comes first (I've always leaned toward this, honestly), and when Bowser splits the timeline into the one where Mario and Luigi grow up in the Mushroom Kingdom and the one where they grow up in Brooklyn and have really stupid TV show adventures, the Brooklyn timeline leads into the Zelda TV show and the CDi games, while the Mushroom Kingdom timeline eventually leads to Skyward Sword.

I kinda maneuvered that back into being on topic, I guess.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Weegee on December 23, 2011, 03:18:11 AM
If you want to take it in that direction, the frequent Mario references throughout the LoZ series and Link's cameo in SMRPG confirm your hypotheses.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: The Chef on December 23, 2011, 03:46:51 AM
Unless Nintendo releases a book called "Mushroom Kingdom Historia" then there ain't no timeline split for Mario.

Quote
I mean, if Grass Octoroks evolved from Water Octoroks, then why are there still Water Octoroks?

Because evolution doesn't work that way.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: BP on December 23, 2011, 05:10:05 AM
I like how we were all "ooh! Canon timeline! So the debate and speculation will finally end!"

How could I have been so naive
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: bobbysq1337 on December 23, 2011, 08:35:44 AM
I do find it rather funny that the first game is one of the last games to happen in the "FAIL" storyline.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: ShadowBrain on December 23, 2011, 08:38:02 AM
When has canon ever stopped fanon, even if it is deliberately opposed to the official story?
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: bobbysq1337 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. (http://www.equestriadaily.com/2011/12/derpy-officially-named.html?m=0)
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: jmdblazer 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.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Weegee on December 25, 2011, 04:02:41 AM
an attempt to shoehorn

Speaking of which, I wasn't sure where else to post this.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Kojinka 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
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: billy chilly 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/
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: CrossEyed7 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.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: BP 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.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Kojinka 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.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: Turtlekid1 on January 09, 2012, 02:52:16 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtNLMiOZ0T4.
Title: Re: Official Zelda timeline revealed?
Post by: CrossEyed7 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.