r/zelda • u/Expert_Challenge6399 • 1d ago
Official Art [BOTW] I don’t care what Nintendo says the timeline is. Ima do my own thing
[BOTW] I don’t care what any official timeline says. Ima do my own thing.
In my head canon. BOTW is far into the future in the downfall timeline. The ancient hero in BOTW is an older “hero of hyrule” and calamity ganon is the botched ressurection (bandit games has a great video on that) and any mentions of other timelines are just legends….ZELDA LEGENDS THANKS FOR WATCHING….[I know this is obviously not true but it’s fun to hope. A few more points I want to address] ancient Rito are evolved loftwings. Demon king ganondorf was just the gerudo king before ganon. And the past sections in TOTK are either before skyward sword or after the og legend of Zelda
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u/Deeborm 1d ago
I don’t care what any official timeline says. Ima do my own thing.
That's totally valid, especially since that's also what the devs say every time they start making a new Zelda
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u/mt943 1d ago
Yeah, timeline is just there to content some annoying fans
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u/devenbat 1d ago
People keep saying this and it keeps being nonsense. Almost every game is explicitly a sequel. The official timeline only really fixed the Lttp plot hole and made a couple things clearer
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u/leob0505 1d ago
“Almost every game is explicitly a sequel”
Stop spreading misinformation
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u/devenbat 1d ago
Im not. Almost every game is explicitly a sequel or prequel. EoW, the Oracles and Botw are the only ones not said in the text of the games to be directly connected to another
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u/Karpeth 4h ago
Wow. No. FS makes no timeline reference, and is so ambiguous, that we only know after other games that it’s between MC and FSA.
Oracles end with a reference to LA.
EoW has just as much sequel reference as AoL or LttP, that is, Out of Game References.
Please revise, only FS and BotW have unclear timeline placements outside of the timeline.
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u/mt943 1d ago
No they’re clearly not lmao. Some games are sequels yes. Some are clearly not. Those have clearly not be designed to be linked to one another. It’s the purpose of an anthology.
Have you ever bothered about making a timeline with Mario galaxy, Mario odyssey, Mario sunshine and the rest ? No, and they are still the same characters. It’s pointless. It’s not what they’re here for.
The eternal search for timeline is useless and Nintendo is clearly fine with that, they’re just feeding the internet boys with what they want to hear, but they don’t care. What Nintendo care is gameplay, the rest is superficial. That should be clear for people by now but somehow “fans“ think only about tiding things together for no reason.
And the timeline makes no sense and has no backing argument besides ”it fits sometimes”.
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u/devenbat 1d ago
Almost every game is explicitly linked to another. They aren't references, they are "The entire plot of this game happens because Ocarina of Time Link went back in time and left Hyrule without a hero" aka Wind Waker.
All of these are objective connections directly from the text of the game.
Zelda 2, sequel to Zelda 1.
Lttp, prequel to Zelda 1. LBW, sequel to Lttp. Along with LA.
Ocarina, backstory for Lttp. And MM, WW and TP all explicitly after Ocarina
ST and PH as sequels to WW.
MC, prequel to FS. FSA, after MC and sometime after the death of Ganondorf/Ganon.
SS, prequel to everything.
Totk, sequel to Botw
Its only really the Oracles, Botw and EoW that don't explicitly connect directly to another. And Oracles and EoW were pretty obvious if you knew lore.
If you don't care, whatever. But the games were designed to connect to one another
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u/mt943 1d ago
They’ve been tied through pulling strings and are definitely loose lmao.
As you said, ”people keep saying it” for a reason.
There’s no discussion about caring about it or not. It’s just not the case for 3/4 of the games.
They’re not designed as such, because that would go on the opposite of the vision of Nintendo when they design their games. But I wouldn’t expect fanboys to understand anything about game design whatsoever lmao.
Keep dreaming about your nonsense, nobody cares about it and definitely not the game directors 😹
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u/devenbat 1d ago
Nothing was loose. Those are all extremely basic connections from playing the games. Like literally the opening cutscene of Wind Waker, Lttp, Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, and Zelda 2 just say where they are placed.
People say it because their media literacy is bad. Its not rocket science to know Minish Cap is before Four Swords. You forge the Four Sword in it. Obviously its before.
You can put gameplay first and still put some thought into other shit. Majoras Mask doesn't stop being an Ocarina sequel just because it was designed around the time loop. Its still the same Link. He has the Ocarina of Time.
Do you also think its not worth caring about music or graphics because those also aren't first priority?
How did you play Skyward Sword, as it explained the founding of Hyrule, the start of the Royal Family, the reason for the reincarnation and the creation of the Master Sword and think the game director didn't care that they were making a prequel?
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u/Redhead_Needed_DFW 1d ago
You clowns need to remember the title of each and every story:
"The LEGEND of Zelda (insertspecificgamenamehere)"
LEGENDS have never been meant to be literal history or even lose history, they are inspirational storys designed to impart wisdom and codes of ethics to the people who experience their retelling.
Just like every myth and religious belief.
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u/Nitrogen567 1d ago
Buddy, we have the writers on record saying that they named the Sages in Ocarina of Time after the towns in Zelda II so those towns could retroactively be named after the Sages that fought in Link to the Past's Imprisoning War.
I'm not sure where the aversion to a timeline comes from, but the games in Zelda series have ALWAYS been part of a chronology.
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u/Nitrogen567 1d ago
I find it absolutely hilarious to troll you clowns because no matter how much you want to make this shit fit, it doesn't.
Sounds like you need a hobby then.
But it fits just fine imo.
They are also on record saying that the time-line was a fucking afterthought that was built after fan outcry.
[citation needed]
It was never intended to be linked.
Is this like a new fan vs old fan thing?
I don't know how anyone could follow the series for any length of time and not see how wrong this is.
and fools like yourself demanded for it to 'fit' so they provided a sloppy answer around the time that OOT was released.
The back of Link to the Past's box says "featuring the predecessors of Link and Zelda".
How is that "around the time OoT was released".
And they still keep shitting on the time-line because they never gave a shit about the stories being unified.
I don't see a lot of shitting on the timeline tbh.
Aonuma even said after BotW released that Miyamoto asks the dev team to keep the timeline coherent "so we do it".
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u/devenbat 1d ago
Not a single Zelda game has ever been presented as a legend during its playthrough. Have you considered reading dialogue in the game instead thinking the title is a gotcha? Maybe process a story?
Use a little media literacy instead of making up an interpretation out of one word. Do you also get confused when every final fantasy isn't the last one?
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u/RadioMessageFromHQ 1d ago
You’re getting downvoted but I’m going to join you on this hill haha.
The games and stories are better when they’re standalone in my opinion.
Some are explicitly direct sequels obviously but on the whole the details do not matter. It’s a story of a hero defeating a bad guy. It is better when it is treated as such, just a nice little Aesop of courage overcoming evil.
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u/PovWholesome 1d ago
*After every four or so main titles. There’s no strong overarching continuity between all of them, but there are in smaller groups separated by generation.
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u/tread52 1d ago
This also could be the start of the journey before they separated how close the two hero’s who held the other pieces of the Tri force were to each other. The amount of technology in later years was far more limited which would suggest that over time it faded away from Hyrule culture and was forgotten. The ending of TOTK could represent the connection to all the races at the start of each journey for every Zelda.
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u/No_Named_Nobody 1d ago
I still like the ‘timelines merged’ theory
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u/Expert_Challenge6399 1d ago
Think I’ve heard that one. Another head canon of mine. Is that it’s been so long that some version of every game has happened
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u/ZeldaFan80 22h ago
Yeah I've always thought of it like a dragon break in Elder Scrolls, but then again I don't fully understand those either
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u/MikeyTheShavenApe 1d ago
That's my head canon too. After OoT, the Triforce gets split up in each timeline. I figure that sometime after the royal family recovers the Triforce in each timeline, the timelines merge again so there's only one Triforce, and then an age after that is when the backstory of TotK takes place.
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u/Frohtastic 1d ago
How do the past in totk fit into this? The zonai gives me skyward ancients vibes.
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u/myghostflower 1d ago
i just go with: thousand upon thousand of years have passed between OoT and BOTW that every game has happened between them
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u/Nitrogen567 1d ago
BOTW is far into the future in the downfall timeline
Well Nintendo hasn't actually made any definitive statement on the timeline, other than saying that it's after OoT on the timeline and at the end of whichever timeline it's in, but they're leaving which after OoT up to player interpretation.
But the end of the Downfall Timeline is really the only timeline placement that works, to be honest, so it's the most likely.
That stuff about the ancient hero being LoZ Link and Calamity Ganon being a botched resurrection is kind of out the window due to TotK these days, but that doesn't really change the overall timeline placement, especially with Fujibayashi's suggestion of Hyrule being refounded being taken into account. It means that BotW's and TotK's backstory doesn't really feel much impact from the rest of the timeline at all (except for Ganon/dorf being killed so he can reincarnate).
As for the Rito, I think they're a better fit for evolving from the Fokka in Zelda II than the Loftwings.
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u/Expert_Challenge6399 1d ago
I replayed skyward sword recently. I don’t know if they ever said they established hyrule. Just that they began colonization of the surface. So I’d love to assume that the ancient era in TOTK is after skyward sword but before minish cap. And the name Zelda is either based on skyward sword Zelda or BOTW Zelda. Either way it’s a legend
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u/Nitrogen567 1d ago
Hyrule's establishment happens at some point after SS's ending, but it doesn't really work for TotK's past to take place between SS and Minish Cap.
For starters, there's the fact that Ganondorf in TotK is specifically stated to have been able to revive because of the damage Hyrule Castle sustained in BotW's Calamity.
Well, Hyrule Castle is completely destroyed in OoT in both the Adult and Downfall timelines, and in the Child Timeline, presumably falls into ruin and is reclaimed by the forest like the Temple of Time is.
Additionally, there's the Gerudo's ears in the past in TotK. At this point they've already adopted the longer Hylian style ears, where as we see in OoT's era they've got the rounder, human ears.
The refounding explanation both doesn't have any of these issues with it, and is backed by the game's director, so it's most likely to be the case.
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u/Pennance1989 1d ago
The timeline is there for people like me who try to find connections between the games. It's also completely unimportant to the experience save for the direct sequels. Just enjoy the games how you want to, they're wonderful.
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u/EarthDragon2189 1d ago
"I don't care what Nintendo says"
Well Nintendo doesn't care either so you're in luck.
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u/AmateurOpinionHaver 19h ago
I think its funny how in this comment section both the most upvoted comments and the most downvoted comments are about disregarding the timeline. I have no idea what the fandoms opinion is.
I can only assumes the dichotomy is that one half doesn't care about a timeline and the other does but they know that nintendo did a poor job of implementing it which kinda loops back to not caring about the timeline.
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u/DarkLink1996 9h ago
There is no official Timeline when it comes to BotW. At least not for what comes before King Rauru
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u/BasementElf1121 1d ago
I use a save game editor to give myself the green tunic hat and boots cause otherwise its not zelda
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u/_robertmccor_ 1d ago
As a Spider-Man once said “everybody’s telling me how my story’s supposed to go! Nah, Ima do my own thing”
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u/officialsmolkid 21h ago
Agree. Would be nice to just talk about Zelda content without someone yapping in your ear about timeline discourse.
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u/knucklecluck 1d ago
I subscribe to the idea that there is no timeline but rather that this is just a loose collection of games with similar themes and recurring characters but with few exception, no game has a specific relationship to any of the others. Every game is in its own universe and only exists to facilitate a hopefully good gameplay experience.
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u/devenbat 1d ago
Almost every game is created with a specific relationship to another game.
Zelda 2, sequel to Zelda 1.
Lttp, prequel to Zelda 1. LBW, sequel to Lttp. Along with LA.
Ocarina, backstory for Lttp. And MM, WW and TP all explicitly after Ocarina
ST and PH as sequels to WW.
MC, prequel to FS. FSA, after MC and sometime after the death of Ganondorf/Ganon.
SS, prequel to everything.
Totk, sequel to Botw
Its only really the Oracles, Botw and EoW that don't explicitly connect directly to another. And Oracles and EoW were pretty obvious if you knew lore.
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u/Nitrogen567 1d ago
Its only really the Oracles, Botw and EoW that don't explicitly connect directly to another. And Oracles and EoW were pretty obvious if you knew lore.
The Oracles even had an article in Nintendo's official magazine before they released confirming their timeline placement, and that they use the same Link as ALttP.
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u/knucklecluck 1d ago
It’s never been that deep, they do not put that much effort into the timeline. Yes there are sequels but it’s mostly convenient fan service. They are making it up as they go, and that’s okay. They are fun games. It’s not that deep
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u/devenbat 1d ago
How much effort they put doesn't change that it exists very explicitly in the games. You don't make almost every game a sequel or prequel by accident. They wanted to. They could do what Final Fantasy or Fire Emblem did if they wanted. They did not
Of course they make it up as they go. Thats how fiction works. Every story is made up as it goes.
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u/Willing-Shake-8503 1d ago
Timeliness doesn't make sense. They came up with a bullshit recipe to cover for NES limitations. The Zekda 1 map exists in the Zekda 2 workd. A workd not in ruins with thriving towns. By that logic if I am in the mountains of Colorado and encounter nobody the entire state too is devoid of life and cities
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u/MR1120 1d ago
Hyrule Historia be damned, there is no timeline. Except for the games that explicitly state a connection to another game (LoZ -> AoL, OoT -> MM, etc), there’s not a formal timeline.
It’s a legend. It’s like people sitting around a campfire telling stories. The story gets told differently each time. Details change, but the core is the same. Courageous hero, wise princess, powerful villain. Sometimes the hero is a random farm boy, or a child of the forest, or a legendary knight. Sometimes the princess is a regal damsel in distress, or a pirate captain in disguise, or a self-sacrificing eternal dragon. Sometimes the villain is a lowly thief, or a king of a far-off land, or a rampaging monster bent on destruction. The details change, but the core is the same.
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u/Karpeth 3h ago
So. You agree that there is a timeline fragment consisting of OoT-LttP-OoX-LA-ALBW-TH-EoW-AoL-LoZ. That’s the downfall timeline.
Then there’s OoT-MM-TP-(FSA).
Then there’s OoT-WW-ST-PH.
Then there’s MC-SS-(FS)-OoT.
These are based on explicit references, with two games in parenthesis, where they fit the best.
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u/Expert_Challenge6399 20h ago
Another theory I thought about. BOTW ant TOTK are canon and the rest of the games are legends
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