How Tears of the Kingdom HACKS the Zelda Timeline

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thinking At Max Volume’s original video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/i5ScknmYa6uJqac

[@eddog6666]

THE SPIRAL IS MUCH BIGGER THEN YOU KNOW! The SPIRAL CONFIRMS THE TIMELINE IS NOT SPLIT AT ALL!

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@eddog6666 tell me more 👀

[@eddog6666]

@@wizcatcheslightning as soon as i figure it out i'll tell you.

[@eddog6666]

@@wizcatcheslightning I just realized the truth. The tears of the kingdom's past takes place after Skyward Sword. And due to this, the timeline split is render impossible. because the light dragon is mention in age of season, Twilight Princess and Windwaker. there is a character that mentions it in each of the game, but it is only available at a certain time it is a hidden cutscene. the remakes also have it too. the only logical explanation is that it isn't a split but a double spiral starting with ocarina of time and ended with both Spirt trans and fourswords adventure

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@eddog6666 if you can find and share these quotes, I would greatly appreciate it!

[@Pirikala_]

I've always thought that there were multiple Hyrule kingdoms throughout the series, and that the one Rauru and Sonia created was just one of them

[@merentori]

I mean, there's definitely at least 2, and if hyrule was flooded and the rediscovered, someone might "found" it again, that idea makes sense to me

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Yeah it’s on some Dark Souls biz

[@mewmew192]

I started to believe that because I saw the sidons' fiance character profile says she comes from another zoras domain, so there must be other hyrules or something similar

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@mewmew192 There technically is another Hyrule in the Land of Spirits and Good from Spirit Tracks 👀

[@dizzynarutofan100]

There is no way that it isn't multiple kingdoms. For all we know, all the non-sequals could be apart by millions of years, each one the Hyrule, born again in a new universe.

[@loley975]

The fact, that no other gerudo male was born after the rise of the Demon King and his sealing also kind of makes sense. After all, the current gerudo male is still alive, just sealed below in the dephts.

[@Pysnpai]

The floating Temple of Time really should have been called the Temple of Light. It would have differentiated the two, and made the Sky islands more like the literal sacred realm that they were going for.

[@stoptheohiomemes]

The ancient tablets on the flower islands explain why

[@tjstarzz9231]

Then that would beg the question, what about the Sacred Realm? In most of the past games, we seek the Triforce or access to the Light REalm/Sacred Realm to find it and/or stop Ganon as he turns it into the Dark World. It's almost unwritten that Zelda is reincarnated Hylia, the Goddess who gifted humanity with the Triforce, bearer of Light, right? There's multiple iterations of Links, Zelda, Ganons, Raurus, Impas...It wouldnt surprise me if they renamed one or used the same name as other locations.

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

I am not convinced that the Sky Islands were meant to be the equivalent of the Sacred Realm. In the game, it is explicitly stated that the Sky Islands were brought to the sky so that Link could have a place to recover in after the Upheaval, away from the influence of Gloom. Zelda knew how badly injured Link would be, so she ordered the sages to lift the Garden of Time, along with other locations, into the sky. The fact that these islands all contain puzzles and shrines was intentional: it would all serve the purpose of making Link stronger again.

[@monhi64]

Frankly it seems a little cheap to just randomly move the temple of time to the sky islands. It would’ve made more sense to make it any other type of temple. So now the implication there’s a bunch of temples of time and they’re not particularly important. Idk story wise they didn’t think some stuff through very well. It would be one thing if this was just a generic game but it’s not, they act like the story is very important and dramatic in game but also aren’t tying up all the loose ends well

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

@@monhi64 How is that cheap? There have been multiple iterations of Hyrule itself, and of many other things throughout the series, like the Master Sword and such.

[@miniwing]

I feel like there's a group of Zelda devs that just watch these timeline deepdive videos furiously taking notes, like yes yes we definitely need to say we meant to do that. That makes so much more sense than our white board.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

🤣 the way the last two games were made, it really does kind of seem like that

[@Yarblocosifilitico]

@@wizcatcheslightning Fr. I've heard the Hyrule Historia basically took the most popular theory at the time (the split timelines) and added a bunch of stuff to it.

[@mastermage23]

It is not too wild to think hat Zelda is acting as "anthropomorphic Sacred Realm" because...Skyward Sword did that already! When Link entered the Spirit Realm for the trials you can see the Triforce reflected in the waters when going into first-person mode...meaning that it had always been within Link. He had to awaken each part within him in a Spiritual Journey and, in the end, is the first to assemble the complete Triforce. In his soul, he harboured the Triforce since the start of the game, possibly his life...but had yet to prove his will and all 3 virtues of Wisdom, Courage and Power to "awaken" it. Zelda being now the bearer of the Triforce is to me the same thing, as the roles of the Knight and Maiden solidified over time. Her failure to use the sealing power in BotW mirror how she hadn't fully aligned herself with all 3 virtues. She had Power and Wisdom, but lacked Courage until the moment she wished to defend Link. Now, in Tears of the Kingdom, she still has that power, but it is utilized in a different way as Light Dragon.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Oh yeah I linked the Monster Maze vid in my description. All of the trivia is really neat 🥲

[@acgearsandarms1343]

Interesting you mention the Silent Realm because those constructs look uncannily similar to Zonai architecture. Food for thought.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@acgearsandarms1343 yeah kind of like robot Zonai. The pointy ears. The Mantles. The whole 9 yards 👀

[@Teikro]

But no the triforce is held in the goddess statue, you literally collect the prices the physical pieces, the marks of the triforce you get when upgrading the goddess sword is stated to be the mark of it but not the actual thing.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@Teikro but as Monster Maze practically proved the theory (video linked in description) that the Triforce from Skyward Sword was always inside of Link. He has to go to the Silent Realm (which is inside of him and it’s a realm that only he can enter) to gather the pieces. When Link is inside of the Silent Realm, any time you look into the water, it doesn’t reflect Link’s image. It reflects the Triforce!

[@josephharter8641]

If the three timelines suddenly converged into one and took everything with it then the flood waters from the adult timeline would have destroyed everything and everyone from the other two timelines. Then after the water went into the ground creating the underground cavern system the zonai who were safe in the sky rediscovered Hyrule and the hylians migrated back.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I like that explanation! Thanks for sharing 🤗

[@jonathanadkins1853]

I had an idea similar to this, not into detail with the flooding, but more on the end of some apocalyptic type of event happened when the timelines have merged.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@jonathanadkins1853 I’m curious to hear more from you!

[@jonathanadkins1853]

@wizcatcheslightning That idea mainly came from me still thinking that the memories take place after the timeline that leads to BotW. Where the idea was after this apocalyptic event Rauru and Mineru took it upon themselves to help the people on the surface. Maybe they themselves are also a result of the timelines merging as well, that some Zonai were alive. Reaching sure, but that's what I love about filling in the blanks with Zelda stuff.

[@lloydgush]

Could be, it would explain why they are remaking hyrule.

[@Drazelleverse]

17:07 - Continuing from this point here, another supporting fact is that Tears of the Kingdom had NO FOREST SAGE! Not even a Korok one! The Sage of the Forest has shown up in more than one game, and yet there IS no Sage of the Forest in modern day, nor in any of the flashbacks. So, it can stand to reason that TotK's flashbacks had to take place not only after the Kokiri became the Koroks, but also after people stopped being able to see them.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Excellent point here! I read somewhere that Saria was meant to be the Wind Sage in OOT (if you look at her sage medallion, this makes sense), but the idea was scrapped for forest instead. That is a HUGE distinction to make, however, and I appreciate you sharing that!

[@ethacon]

@@wizcatcheslightning My little headcannon I've been toying with is that there are 13 secret stones, and that in the DLC Hestu, Kohga, and Link will each get one and becomes the Sages of Forest, Shadow, and "The Wild" respectively 🤣 This leaves the final 3 stones to have been swallowed by the three dragons. If we get a third game in this Hyrule, I'd like to see Purah as the next Sage of Spirit, and them to reuse the scrapped Piccori concept and have one be the new Sage of Light, after finding Sonia/Ganondorf's stone still in-tact (The stones are able to change their size, so while the big one was largely destroyed, it's not impossible that the stone itself still survived as a small shard while the rest of the large stone was just a form of physical light that dissipated once Link destroyed it).

[@riggidynail7228]

@@ethacon that is the best dlc idea ever. I need kohga with secret stone!

[@deejayv6046]

@@ethacon I like the idea of Link being a Sage but instead of adding a new title I think he should awaken as the Sage of Spirit, now that Mineru is gone. I have a headcanon that, whenever a new group of Sages is awakened, they “serve” in their positions for awhile afterwards. Sometimes in their physical forms for the duration of their natural life span, and/or as a spirit (sometimes right after awakening, which was the impression I got from the OoT sages). One Sage spirit continues on solo after the others have faded away to help guide a future hero and future awakened Sages. Now that Mineru is gone, Link could awaken to take her place.

[@Villetownkid]

Where does the series go from here? Most of the outlets I’ve seen have been adamant that this is the end of the story with this Link/Zelda/Hyrule, but I can’t help but think of this as the 2nd leg of a “Triforce Trilogy”, even through the Triforce hasn’t been mentioned a single time between BOTW and TOTK, and the devs haven’t mentioned these connection at all. BOTW - Courage. You literally run out into the unknown and have to have down a monster that has brought the world to its knees. TOTK - Wisdom. This game was so much more about creativity and problem solving. You gain the wisdom of the Zonai over the course of the game and use it to help understand what must be done. That leaves a third game to be focused on Power. I think the Zelda we’ve known these past two games will be seeking a Power to stop the Demise/Hylia/Hero cycle for good. That Power would be the Triforce itself. We know that this Zelda is a historian through and through. It’s not a stretch to think that she’d eventually find out about her connection to Demise through her studies. There has also never been a Zelda incarnation with a more intimate connection to the Master Sword and by extension Fi than this current one. Fi knows about Demise and his curse, she was there when the curse was first spoken. Fi knows about the Triforce she helped Skyward Sword Link obtain it. And Fi just spent several hundred years jammed in Zelda’s head. In the true ending Zelda states that she will dedicate herself to the goal of keeping Hyrule peaceful “for all time”, and she says it like she has a plan to do it. She isn’t ready to settle, she seems ready for action even though she’s earned quiet peace more than any Zelda we’ve met. Think about what she has been through. She was a mostly normal kingdom princess up until the calamity and then she spent 100 years fighting/containing Calamity Ganon in Hyrule Castle until Link could heal, then spent 8ish years putting the pieces of her life and kingdom back together before traveling back in time hundreds of years, living out a chunk of life in Ra-rule, then living out the hundreds of years back to the “present” as an elemental dragon. She claims she “can’t really remember much” from her dragon years but if there was any form of communication from Fi and those memories come back to her she could unlock the truth of the series history all the way back to the start, meaning she may be able to find a way to end it in the third game of the trilogy.

[@iAdriann]

I think that the last scene where Rauru, Sonia and Link channel the sacred power to bring Zelda back to herself is an actual depiction of the triforce. Sonia cannonically being the wisdom aspect, Link depicting the courage of a Hero and then we have Rauru, a being with a sheer amount of power capable of sealing the root of darkness itself on his own. It would make sense that the combination of them three granted the wish of bringing Zelda back to her Hylian form. Idk, maybe I should remove my tin foil hat😂

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I don’t hate the sound of that!

[@StevenElseyArt]

My wild theory is that the hero from the tapestry could be the seemingly hidden child of Rauru and Sonia. When wearing the Ancient Hero Aspect, I think it looks like a halfway point between Zonai and Hylian.

[@damnumonkeyballs]

But the red hair kind of makes me think he's a Zonai/Gerudo mix. Might just be a version of Link that has that heritage mix. I mean Rauru and Sonia's hidden child could have had descendants too and that just ended up being the Hero of that era. Would be kinda cool. That's just my head canon tho.

[@BaldorfBreakdowns]

@@damnumonkeyballs Mineru x Ganondorf

[@acgearsandarms1343]

@@damnumonkeyballs Perhaps, but red hair isn’t purely a Gerudo trait. It’s not that distinctive Gerudo red. It’s a more brownish red. It is an interesting mystery though.

[@MoxieWatts]

damn thats good shit.

[@pancakes8670]

@@damnumonkeyballs I'm glad I wasn't the only one who noticed how similar to Ganondorf the Ancient Hero Espect is

[@noahb3370]

I've always thought of Totk's story as almost a re-telling of Ocarina of Times events, almost like a whole event is repeating itself thousands and thousands of years after Ocarina of time. Both games had sages, time travel, an awakening of sages and Ganondorf showing false servitude to a Hyrule King. Also you mentioned that the sage that seals Ganondorf in Totk could be named Nabooru because of re-incarnation, but I think her name was Naboris. That goes for all the sages. Their names could be Rudania, Medoh, and Ruta. The Divine Beasts designs were based on those ancient sages and their helmets so it's not out of the picture that the sages names were the same as those Divine Beasts.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

So my best guess is that “Naboris” is Latin. It quite literally means “of/from Nabooru”. But yeah, I’ve been thinking those were those sages’ names as well, and we see a lot of parallels with OOT because Hyrule’s history is rhyming. But it’s not just OOT. There are bits and pieces from just about every Zelda game

[@M33f3r]

@@wizcatcheslightning One of the things I like about Zelda is it's handling of catastrophe cycles. We have had many of them on earth as well.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@M33f3r I like this as well. It’s supposed to be a callback to Shinto, from what I’ve gathered. Link is tasked with restoring nature (it’s a lot deeper than this but still really neat).

[@godly_potatoe69xd19]

@@wizcatcheslightningthe studio ghibli vibes are strong here….

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@godly_potatoe69xd19 🎊🐼 🦝 🦌 🦊🎊

[@gabrielabatista6016]

About the 3 dragons, I do agree with your idea about them being zonai before and I want to point out some evidence. 1 - They all have manes of white hair that stays in "clumps" (can't think of a better word here), much like Rauru's hair. Zelda's dragon form has a blonde mane that looks much softer and looser, and the demon dragon's mane is a brilliant red, that doesn't look quite the same either. 2- They have short but articulated muzzles that remind me of Rauru's and Mineru's face. The Light Dragon has a long face, almost looking like a beak, while the demon dragon has a short bearded and again beak like face. Neither of them have the soft articulated muzzle the other dragons have. 3 - Eyelashes. The 3 dragons have spiky eyelashes, LD has eyelashes that look like water droplets on a strand of hair, and I can't really discern any eyelashes on the demon dragon. 4 - Scale colour. LD has white scales on top, DD has black scales, but all the other dragons have the same shade of light gray, with some undertones corresponding to their elements. It really does set them apart; and they're probably much older, seeing as how the Zonai emiter devices are inspired by them, and these seem to have been created waaay before Rauru's time.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Excellent attention to detail here!

[@jonservo]

I kind of like that the exact history of Hyrule is steeped in mystery. The blending of history and legend kind of lends itself perfectly to the title of the series. At this point I think it's safe to assume that there are some cannon events in the timeline but also a lot of things that have been lost or changed through time. I think it keeps the series from getting chained to a certain series of events and having to adhere strictly to it. I will say though that even if it's not canon I wish I had found a reference to Terrako in tears of the Kingdom. Age of calamity is actually one of my favorite games for its story. The idea of coming from the future to change the past knowing you would return to a future where your timeline would remain unchanged was a great emotional conclusion. Besides the cell saga in dragon Ball z it's not something I see used often in stories with time travel

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Man I loved the Cell Saga 🥲

[@skyesilverwing8922]

My thoughts on the idea of the time loop maybe not being a closed loop: When we first see Rauru's Arm, it slumps off of Ganondorf, tired. and the Secret stone rolls over by Zelda's foot. Zelda bends to pick it up. In that moment, it becomes certain that she will be sent back in time, and all of the events in the past solidify, breaking the Dragon break in the past. In that moment, Ganondorf becomes aware of who Link and Zelda are, and Rauru's arm is able to get a second wind, saving Link from falling to his death. Also in that moment, the sky Islands descend and the geoglyphs appear. We have seen this sort of instantaneous alteration of a timeline before, when, in Skyward Sword, after Link and the others return from defeating Demise, suddenly all of the other people of Skyloft are able to fly their loftwings down to the surface, as if their culture had not been established as being unsure if the Surface was even real.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Neat thought here!

[@JBoehmGames]

I 100% believe there was some "Infinite Crisis" level event that caused the timelines to collide and forcibly merge back into one after all the other Zelda games, and after it all, there was no Hyrule left, but there were memories of the past before it, hence where names of locations and characters like Rauru and Nabooru come from, just fleeting scraps of the timelines beforehand left adrift in the collective unconscious of the survivors. It also explains why Hylia seems to be the only Goddess that's worshipped, and the Dragons are loosely named after the other three Goddesses by the Hylians, because they strongly remember Hylia somehow, but can barely recall the other three, like names stuck at the tips of their tongue, they just remember the names and elements the three were commonly associated with, Din to Fire, Nayru to Ice and Water, and Farore to Lightning and Life, and named the dragon "spirits" they'd see in the sky after what they could recall. It's also quite possible that Oshus, the Wind Fish, and Levias were casualties of this event as well, as the three leviathan fossils around the map bear resemblance to each of them. I don't think Zelda's time travel had anything to do with the convergence though, unless it was some sort of Flashpoint "Time boom," but that doesn't really hold water since no previous forays into time travel in past Zelda games have had that consequence. I know it's technically a non-canon spin-off, but maybe, just maybe, the events that lead to Hyrule Warriors, a climactic battle where the Hero split Ganondorf's soul into pieces and scattered them across time, was that convergence? It would explain how Hyrule Warriors also seems to pull from all of the timelines, and all of the characters have some cursory knowledge of those other timelines, such as Impa recalling the Hero of Time, yet there was no Hero of Time in the Child Timeline, but Hyrule Warriors takes from that game as well. Hell, maybe Lana/Cia were appointed as the Guardian of Time to prevent another timeline split, or at the very least prevent another collision of timelines like that.

[@Thebrotherhoodofgaming]

i mean theoretically Hyrule Warriors.. the first one. does kinda fit that mold. it does converge.

[@dragonboyjgh]

Interesting thing about the missing triforce and the dragons. Since they used to be the 3 divine goddesses incarnate oracles, it's possible that when they draconified that the associated physical piece of the triforce lost that goddess'es power.

[@TheCBoysDotCom]

There’s a vid out here about dragonofication that claims they’re male, like their SS counterparts. I really prefer them as the Golden Goddesses though, especially since the Oracle games (which made pretty direct references to their existence via Oracles with their names) featured kingdoms outside Hyrule, and TotK mentions there’s other regions beyond those old borders

[@matheuspimentel5828]

Also how to unlock the shrines in the springs of courage, wisdom and strength in botw you need their parts aka a fragment of their powers

[@ryanpfarr6153]

DLC prediction (hope) and SPOILER here: I hope we find out Zelda wasn't actually alone the entire time she spent as a dragon and actually had Fi speaking and spending that time with her which would explain why she starts referring to the master sword as her. I'd like to think we'll see another master sword trial that involves a direct interaction with Fi or "unlocking" her to raise the sword to it's full potential. Obviously it'll probably be another combat based trial run, but I would love to see this fleshed out. Fantastic video, you answered a ton of very specific questions I've had that I haven't heard elsewhere. Well done.

[@ryanpfarr6153]

I wrote this before the video finished, so the Zelda being a dragon thing is obviously mentioned and I'm not spoiling anything. On that note I am still somewhat unclear as to how Zelda is born and exists in botw but also already exists as a dragon but I suppose that's the "always will be and always was" bit you explained.

[@That-girliscrazy]

She was sleeping?

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@ryanpfarr6153 exactly. It’s a mind boggling time paradox, just like the Song of Storms/cycle that happened in Skyward Sword

[@sebchess3555]

At the end of the game Zelda says it was like she was asleep. But maybe she discussed with Fay even if she doesn't remember. I mean the sword was sticked in her brain

[@clocked0]

@@ryanpfarr6153 TLDR, it's explained in game by the quote "To become an immortal dragon is to lose oneself". Back to the future Zelda did not exist at the same time as the BOTW Zelda. Functionally what happened is BOTW Zelda grew up at points A B and C. At D she got sent back to the past. She lost herself in the past meaning it was no longer Zelda, glided past A B C and D. And ended up at point E where she became herself once more. There is no conflict there. What is most cool about this is that it gives us an interesting glimpse into the mechanics of the dragons themselves in the Zelda world. I wonder if we'll see them turn out to be Zonai since the shape of their ears didn't match Zelda's more Hylian ears in her dragon form. Or maybe they're the goddesses.

[@liamdalemon1525]

In the words of mid Calamity Daruk: "None of this makes any sense" I think no matter how you go about the timeline, there are a hell of a lot of issues you inevitably run into. Like straight up, the timeline uses ALL THEORIES OF TIME TRAVEL!!! I think it's best if we just look at a couple of self contained stories from the series rather than attempt to unravel the bigger picture. (I do like your theory on the golden goddesses being interpretations of the dragons though, I found that to be quite an interesting take)

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I’ll take that 😎

[@Teikro]

I agree, especially with how it seems that ToTK had no research into the past stories, I like to think BoTW and ToTK are not part of the main timeline because it's full of retcons and or misconceptions about the already established lore. It's a good game but a bad sequel for BoTW.

[@Meichrob7]

In the two temples of time section, it’s mentioned how the Hylian shield having the crest of the royal family implies that there was a royal family, and therefore a kingdom of Hyrule that said royal family ruled, before skyward sword. Isn’t it entirely possible that the Hylian shield’s symbol is the origin of the Royal family’s crest design? As in the Hylian shield always did and always would have had that design and that was just the design of the Hylian shield, and then when designing a royal crest for the Hylian kingdom, that same design was used. The symbol of the triforce is seen in a lot of places in breath of the wild and tears of the kingdom. That’s because the actual triforce used to be incredibly important so it’s design was incorporated into other things, it doesn’t mean that Totk/Botw came before the triforce existed and designed its pattern. The Hylian shield can, and arguably should work off the same logic.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Some other people mentioned this, and I can’t disagree. Excellent point

[@MellyMellouange]

Koume and Kotake being Ancient Ganondorf's retainers would explain a lot! They are such fanatics of Ganondorf, that they totally would dedicate their lives to creating a new, separate vessel for their Demon King, and arrange everything for his success. That separate vessel would have the same soul but not the same memories. Monsters created by the power of the ancient Ganondorf would still acknowledge the newer Ganondorf as their king. The Ganondorf wielding the sacred stone was obliterated by the end of the game, but that still leaves the one wielding the Triforce of Power, his body out there somewhere.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

It pans out until you notice that Koume and Kotake in TOTK have pointed ears, whereas they have round ears in OOT 😓 I really wanted the history of TOTK to be before OOT, but that was a big nail in the coffin for me.

[@JNPG-ld3gl]

​@@wizcatcheslightning If Ganondorf can grow pointed ear in less than a decade, why koume and kotake wouldn't be able to loose theirs in the span of 4 centuries or less?

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@JNPG-ld3gl Ganondorf’s pointed ears happened because of Triforce magic. Koume and Kotake from TOTK’s history would have acquired their pointed ears from generations of intermingling with Hylians specifically

[@JNPG-ld3gl]

​@@wizcatcheslightningwasn't the pointed ears linked with them being under Hylia's blessing, and that the gerudo are always born as a full gerudo no matter the father? It could still be possible. I'm a fan of the theory that Groose was the forefather of the gerudo, which would make them already hylian, but got is lineage cursed to only have a male every 100 years or so

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@JNPG-ld3gl there are two conflicting legends about the origin. My video gives you the biology trivia to help explain all of that 😂

[@quillsftw]

I want to add that some zelda games make a distinction between ocean and river zora. So it’s possible for the river zora to have become rito and for the ocean zora to have become fresh or brackish zora, hence the deep sea fish design of the BotW/TotK zora

[@quillsftw]

@@plows2940 aye fair point. OoT/MM didn’t make the distinction between the two kinds of Zora directly. MM reused models and designs to save on time, so maybe MM zora are supposed to be ocean zora and OoT are river zora? In other games with both, the only difference is color changes

[@LoganWeg]

I think that the past of TOTK was the 3rd founding of hyrule, hundreds of years after the end of the 3 time splits. I makes some sense I guess and probably the only way you could explain things like how zora and rito exist in the same time as sages

[@InvincibleSummer7]

Excellent video! It would make sense that the Hylian Royal Family in the age of BOTW/TOTK would keep knowledge of the triforce hidden by referring to it as the "Sealing Power" as it has been the object of countless bloody wars. And all the timelines being converged in the current era makes perfect sense as there are references to all 3 and all Zeldas (Aka the living Incarnations of Hylia) have control over time. And even back in Ocarina of Time both Hylia and The Goddess of Time/Light are referenced, so pre timeline split rhymes with post timeline split bringing the time loop to a close. So by the end of Tears of The Kingdom, all 3 timelines are fixed, Zelda is restored to her Hylian form, Link has succeeded as this ages current hero and new sages pledge fealty to Hyrule thus the old time loop ends and a new age begins!

[@nightwolf89]

I will say that I'm surprised Calamity Ganon wasn't brought up as much as I believe it is very important to the timeline of TOTK. This is because it is suggested that the Calamity Ganon is actually a collection of Ganondorfs malice and power that has leaked from Rauru's seal over time, even confirming that it was the events of BOTW and the Calamity that had weakened Rauru's seal. This knowledge essentially gives us an idea of how long the timeline of TOTK is. According to BOTW, the Calamity Ganon reemerges from Hyrule Castle every 10,000 years, and we can theorize that the Calamity has awakened a bare minimum of 3 times throughout Hyrule's History, maybe more. It would have awakened at least one time after Ganondorf's sealing to establish its existence, a second time when the Sheikah tribe prepared for its arrival with the guardians and the divine beast, and the third time being the events of BOTW. Based on this information we can estimate that the events of TOTK takes place over a bare minimum of 30,000 years.

[@modstin]

My theory is that there was some event before TOTK's ancient history that merged the timelines. This kind of event was so apocalyptic, that the Zonai (who were the denizens of the Sky Realm, at some point the Oocca) had to involve themselves. This event was so big that Hylia herself was involved, and it caused a major flux of timelines and converged them all. This tells us why they're almost extinct and why they would know about Hylia when none of the games between Skyward Sword and BOTW even mention her. I believe they were beyond the timelines beforehand, able to witness every strand much like we the players are, hence why they were able to craft replicas of the ancient heroes garb of many different timelines and seal them away in their mines as ancient artifacts.

[@kristopher3623]

Hyrule warriors. The events that took place during hyrule warriors, not age of calamity, but the og hyrule warriors, it was such a catastrophic mess of time that it ended up merging the timelines as an aftermath of the event.

[@acgearsandarms1343]

@@kristopher3623 And we got an overseer of Time, Cia. Do we blame her for not doing her job? Also is she a Sage of Time?

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

@@kristopher3623Hyrule Warriors isn't canonical. It's not a Legend of Zelda game, and the events of the game are inconsistent with all of the games in the Legend of Zelda franchise. That game, good as it was, it's the equivalent of a very strange fanfiction.

[@rigistroni]

You can't ruin a timeline that never made sense to begin with

[@wizcatcheslightning]

To each there own on the timeline. For me, the series would be more boring without a timeline and environmental storytelling

[@rigistroni]

@@wizcatcheslightning I'm not necessarily complaining about the existence of the timeline and I'm DEFINITELY not complaining about the environmental storytelling because I think that's great. But it's pretty clear the timeline was strung together to connect games with standalone stories so I'll call a spade a spade lmao

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@rigistroni touché to that! 😂

[@samiamtheman7379]

At this point, I just like to think of the games as different retellings of the same legend. Long, long ago in ancient times, a hero named Link and a princess named Zelda work to fight off a great evil named Ganon to save the kingdom of Hyrule. The legend changes depending on who's telling it. Link is most depicted as wearing green, but not every artistic interpretation agrees. Some think Ganon was always a monster while others think he was once a man. Some retellings even include events prior to and long past that conflict, but the core elements remain the same. That's honestly the way to read it that I feel makes the most sense.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I think this whole “what’s really happening” will be a conflict as old as time and neither camp will be able to convince the other camp of their interpretation 😅 For me, to reduce it to legends that didn’t exist misses the mark for why I loved the series in the first place. Call it head canon, but I don’t want the games I grew up with to be just bedtime stories. I want them to be bedtime stories about actual events that happened during the in game universe.

[@lordgiblets7585]

7:12 Spectacle Rock appeared in the original game, and saved as the entrance to Death Mountain, which was another name for Level 9, the final dungeon of the game. It also appears several times in the series, in different locations around Hyrule.

[@cheergiver]

I’m as old as the Franchise, and I spent my teen years on forums debating timeline stuff back in the 90s. I theorized for some time that BoTW is a convergence of the 3 timelines, but when I played through ToTK it was really bothering me that I couldn’t sort out some of this stuff you explained. I definitely figured that it was rhyming, but a lot of things felt like a retcon. Thanks for sharing your thoughts; I think this is the best explanation I’ve come across so far.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thanks for the appreciation! The problem of explaining how it all fit into the timeline lived in my head rent free for at least a month 😅

[@Twilord_]

To me it's very simple where it fits. Even the Ancient part happens thousands of years after Wind Waker. The Depths are old Hyrule. Zora are back because when Hyrule unfroze they fled to the surface, and there was no God Shield that rapidly evolved away their ability to fly. Possibly they even saved some Hylians, Sheikah and Gerudo - preserving cultural history. This is not the New Hyrule of Spirit Tracks but the much more distant one after that The Deku Tree sent out the Koroks (in that one Wind Waker side quest) to create new land. Ganondorf is dead so he can reincarnate anew. Someone else (The King) wished on The Triforce so it's no longer tied to the big three characters. ---------- But it might not be the version of Wind Waker we played. In fact over the course of eternal recursion that outcome might have happened at the end of one of the other two timelines.

[@SarafYT]

In OOT, when Link travels back at the end of the game, he has the crest of the Triforce of Courage, and HH states that this is how Ganondorf got the Triforce of Power. This would mean that the Triforce likely cannot be duplicated through time travel. It's possible that dragon Zelda lost possession of the Triforce because she became a god, returning it to the Sacred Realm.

[@filipeoliveiraladislau4533]

this

[@wizcatcheslightning]

There are three Triforces in three separate timelines. A wish is made in Wind Waker. A wish is made in A Link to the Past. The three pieces of the Triforce glow up on Zelda, Ganondorf, and Link’s hands during the events of Twilight Princess. These separate events don’t happen if there aren’t three realities with three Triforces. My “The Divine Pranks that resolved Wind Waker” video explains this better 🤗

[@clocked0]

@@wizcatcheslightning There are still 3 separate timelines, they're just functionally identical because of Murphy's law. Breath of the wild was so far into the future that every event from every game had already occurred in every timeline at least once, with slight differences and not at the same time that it would have occurred in another timeline.

[@SarafYT]

@@wizcatcheslightning Those are separate timelines, though. I'm talking about duplication within a single timeline. Picture the Triforce as something that transcends space and time. If Link travels to the past with the TOC, he's not removing it from its time but rather changing its state/position in the past. kzbin.info/www/bejne/jpvWmKKOq9OGqrs Basically, if time can be represented as the 4th dimension, then perceiving an object's history would be to see it as a long tube of itself. Link goes back in time at the end of OOT, and "runs his hand along the TOC's path" in essence (which would be his "possession" of it). In this way, he is in possession of the TOC in the past without duplicating it, and this causes the disturbance in the Sacred Realm described in Hyrule Historia. This is also why WW has a TOC.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

In an effort to save me time and thumb pain (lots of responding these past 48 hrs) I would ask you to watch my divine pranks video and then comment a response and see if my view may align with your view

[@TheJH1015]

The concept of Tamashii is also theorized to be present in A Link Between Worlds. It is speculated that the character 'Gramps' present in Kakariko Village in that game, is actually the Hero from ALttP, the Oracle games and Link's Awakening. Gramps has an uncanny amount of references to the old Hero. If this is true, it means the Spirit of the Hero can also exist in multiple persons at the same time, or jump between people when necessary. That aside, personally I think ToTK's past event happen after Skyward Sword, because it can actually sort of explain the Four Swords Trilogy and the events that happen before Minish Cap with the Hero of Men. I would also like to add that, since the Rito already existed when Zelda arrived in the past, the timelines must have had converged beforehand? So Zelda travelling back is, to me, not the catalyst for the converging/dragonbreak. I do think everything else you explained fits very well if not perfectly. Just these tidbits I disagree with.

[@funnylion995]

My memory is bad, how would it explain the Four Swords trilogy and the Minish Cap?

[@TheJH1015]

@funnylion995 the Picori Blade's design is eerily similar to the Master Sword. My hypothesis is that Mineru made notes on the Master Sword before Zelda turned into the Dragon. Later the Picori found Mineru's notes of the events and the Master Sword, and during the prehistory of Minish Cap, they created the Picori Blade in the image of the Master Sword and gave it to the Hero of Men. They learned of the Power of Light from Rauru as well, and taught the Princess Zelda from that era how to use it, calling it the (Light) Force. Additionally, if the Picori are an evolved form of the Zonai formed by a split-off group that left the main population of Zonai long before the past events of ToTK, it could explain why Vaati has eyeball-themes in his monster forms: it's a leftover of the third eyes the Zonai used to have.

[@syeo501]

Fantastic video! What buffles me is the fact that Zonai or especially Rauru's third eye are the inspiration for why Sheikah even have that symbol. I've seen a theory about Demise and Ganondorf act similar to Morgoth and Sauron. Morgoth/Demise being the ultimate evil in existence while Sauron/Ganondorf personify that evil and will of their masters. In that theory, Zonai came down and settled down alongside Hylians. Ganondorf is born, raised by Kotake and Koume and also being connected to Demise who (like Ganondorf did to Zant in Twilight Princess) gave Ganondorf a piece of his powers. Later on, Rauru and Sonia created the kingdom of Hyrule. Ganondorf steals the secret stone and his and Demise's powers are amplified, becoming a Demon King in the process. Ganondorf is sealed by Rauru and Zelda becomes the Light Dragon. Years later, Demise cracks up the surface and starts to attack the people, Hylia also steps in and saves the Hyruleans. The Zonai probably are the source for all the technology and magic we see in Zelda games. Zonai technology and magic is adopted by Sheikah/Yiga. Sheikah probably created those robots in Skyward Sword, too. Yiga maybe teamed up with Gerudo, becoming Dark Interlopers, creating the Fused Shadow and Majora's Mask, getting sealed and becoming the Twili. These Twili forms and symbols resemble Zonai technology. Rauru doesn't seem to know the Master Sword, too, maybe it wasn't created at this point as Rauru died before Hylia created the Goddess Sword.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Definitely check out my “god tribe” (referring to the thumbnail here) video for more details about the Zonai! I’ll eventually make a follow up video for that 🤗

[@TheMentorOfMomos]

Watching this video and then reading comments for over 30 minutes have reminded me of something... It's very established in our western cultured that time is a line, with past, present and future. But humans haven't had that notion of time until very recently, ancient Greeks would mostly think time is a circle (years are composed of 4 seasons, repeating over and over). Knowing this and how different concepts Japanese culture has compared to western's, it wouldn't be too far-fetched that in the developers minds, we're just witnessing the begging of a new cycle, all Zelda games belonging to the previous cycle, but still influencing the new, just how in a year things happen similar but different, while still having knowledge of the previous years.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Love your insight here!

[@Daxyl]

A thing to remember is that the games themselves can be thought of as the telling of a legend, hence the "legend" of Zelda, so even established lore within the games can be taken with a grain of salt. This can also be used to explain why moblins, bokoblins, lizalfos and such can have such widely varying appearances throughout the games.

[@angelmendez-rivera351]

That's right. This entire video is one large moot point, considering that the existence of one unified chronology is a highly questionable idea to begin with, one which the games definitely don't support at all. Hyrule Historia was Nintendo's attempt at giving us a unified chronology, but the way this works is that if Hyrule Historia is in direct contradiction with the games themselves, then we have to discard Hyrule Historia, at least the parts contradicting the games. Well, if this is true for small lore details, then it also is true for the chronology itself. As such, there's no reason to take the chronology as canonical. Sure, it is helpful on trying to determine what the "real" chronology is, at least when it comes to the 2D games, but it'll never look anything like one single chronology.

[@krysis7271]

I just want to know what happened to our little fairy friend that followed us everywhere and gave us direction and assistance. And. Ya know. The triforce. You know. The thing that hasn’t been mentioned hardly at all in the last two games.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

The theory I provided is about the best I have right now 😅

[@telerobotic]

Fun video. In my opinion, the dragon break convergence happened when Zelda breaks the sky barrier after the master sword is sent back in time. This is because the throne room in TotK (Past) is devoid of the Triforce crest and has some obscure Zonai loftwing like symbol instead. If convergence happened in the past, then when did the royal family start commemorating the Triforce with the Royal Crest with the associated golden goddess symbols? In contrast, convergence happening during the mastersword hand off explains why the sheika towers and shrines are missing, why no one seems surprised one has been replaced with the other. How Purah “invents” the Purah Pad despite Zelda happily using the Sheika Slate, etc etc. Otherwise, I really like this theory a lot.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

The Royal Crest of Rauru looks like 7 secret stones to me

[@ThanatosZero]

In regards to zora, there are the ocean dwelling Sea Zora in Oracle of Ages. To be precise in the land of Labrynna. They exist alongside the River Zora, which are more beastlike and extremely territorial to attack any bypassers. Also Sidon's fianceé and later queen comes from a different Zora village.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

This is true, but it doesn’t change the history of the Adult Timeline because that always remained the constant between timelines. Regardless, love your input here!

[@Marixchatt]

Sidon’s fiancé looks like Muzo so maybe explains his racism towards Hylians? Maybe their domain doesn’t have any Hylians near it.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@Marixchatt or maybe…another kingdom we might see in some dlc 😏

[@acgearsandarms1343]

Is the other Zora village that Yona is from in Hyrule or out of Hyrule? Because there’s really no other evidence I can find of it existing outside of Zora’s Domain. We don’t get to go beyond the borders of the kingdom so I’m inclined to think she was from another land.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@acgearsandarms1343 Same here! Sidon’s dialogue says he’s known her his whole life too. From what I hear, that’s what people have been speculating!

[@BrendaAmerind]

Something I haven't seen talked about yet is the history of the Zonai themselves, especially since they aren't mentioned at all during the timeline before BOTW. My idea is that they as old, if not older than, Hylians themselves, meaning they would have existed during the time of the war between Demise and Hylia. It's been established that other gods exist besides those that created Hyrule and the Triforce (Poe statue; the statue that exchanges rupees for life/stamina), so I believe it's possible that the Zonai had their own gods as well. These gods might have taken Hylia's cue and lifted the Zonai into the skies for safety, but instead of returning to land like the Hylians did, they just stayed up there until shortly before the events shown in TOTK. So why did they come down at all? Well, Ganondorf remarks that Rauru and Minaru are the only Zonai left. I think the Zonai descended from the sky because their population was dwindling, and the creation of Hyrule was a marrying of their two kingdoms in order to keep their bloodline alive. This would mean that the hero that fought in the Calamity depicted in BOTW would have been a descendent of either Rauru and Sonia's children or of another Zonai that descended from the sky, but passed away before Rauru and Sonia were killed. The armor set that makes Link look like the ancient hero even has a combination of Hylian and Zonai traits, he might have even been one of the last Hylians to still show Zonai traits, which is why 10,000 years after the Calamity there are none left that resemble the Zonai. By that time, their culture and people have faded into legend, with only a few ruins left to show they even existed. (Side note: The three dragons could have been part of the Zonai that descended as well, and chose draconification over dying out with their species.) This is the explanation I like to go with because otherwise the timeline would have to expand millions of years to allow for the Zonai to evolve by the time of TOTK's history. I think this makes them fit better into the overall timeline while explaining why there's no evidence of them before BOTW.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I would encourage you to check out (referencing the thumbnails here) my god tribe and Zelda pantheon videos. They go into deeper characterization of just who the god tribe actually is. Replace “god tribe” with “zonai” when you watch those videos

[@BrendaAmerind]

@@wizcatcheslightning I will, thank you! ^^

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Right back at ya! 😎

[@nickcampbell6387]

I had already theorized that the three dragon were the original three goddesses and that the gifted "triforce" was the power they saturated hyrule with creating diverse life, a literal triforce, hence why all three in both games positions from eachother is roughly a triangle with lush hyrule in the middle but the thought that zelda being hylia as the light dragon makes that theory even better, its almost like the last two are more of an amalgam of the previous zelda games rather than a time convergence.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Right on. Appreciate the trivia about the dragons here! 🤗

[@Lotus-sp6cu]

I've heard this theory before, and while I really like it, the only thing that I am unsure about is Wind Waker. Doesn't the initial flood happen because the three goddesses specifically interfered? If they were dragons, they wouldn't be "conscious" to cause the floods. I guess they could have turned themselves into dragons after WW takes place, but I don't know why they would

[@lumenascent]

This is my theory exactly. I think we're being told the real story of those games, since all we've known are the "legends" if you will. Rewatch the rise of Ganon cutscene and look at how big the blood moon is and how prominent the face is on it. Then think about that from maybe the perspective of a children's story of a faraway realm, not unlikenhyrule, where the moon seemed to be crashing down from an immense power. I thought "well what about the four giants?" But there are four sages in the corners of the world....

[@nickcampbell6387]

@Lumenascent right, I mean alot the events in the past with zelda are kinda vague reflections of what happens in ocarina of time, Ganondorf leads a rebellion, the rebellion is quelled, Ganondorf swears fealty, zelda doesn't trust him, Ganondorf obtained a powerful relic and ultimately took over only to be sealed in the end with the help of the sages, chief of them is named Rauru, who's to say that the "ancient hero" wasn't in the background helping zelda lead some kind of resistance, gathering the sages for support using some feeble method of time travel zelda created using what would become the master sword in an attempt to get back to the future. I mean they gave you the ancient hero aspect for some reason I imagine.

[@nickcampbell6387]

@Lotus like I said I think that the events before and during botw and totk are not necessarily a reboot/retcon (though i guess retcon would be kinda accurate) or some convergence of time lines as if to they all happened and we're moving forward but rather an amalgam of all those games as if to say they did happen just not in the way or even order we saw them in before, they're supposed to be legends, who's to say the dragons didn't cause a massive flood, In WW it wasn't stated that the people asked for the flood, that was just the goddesses answer, maybe the flood was some kind of reaction to one of the calamity events, its kinda like Greek and norse mythology, there are alot of inconsistent stories that contradict eachother.

[@colossalweeb]

Im sure the three elemental dragons are almost certainly zonai. The fact that zonai were the ones who weild the sacred stones and also are the ones who know about draconification. But if you compare the elemental dragons to the light dragon You see that the three of them have giant ears not unlike the zonai do.

[@theenchilada5290]

When Zelda becomes the Light Dragon, she mends the three separate parallel realities into the one where she exists, since she can't go to any one particular one since that history is not one where she is conceived in. Zelda creates the reality where she is born.

[@manspaghetti6351]

24:30 Not sure if someone has already mentioned this, but the 3 BOTW dragons are almost certainly zonai IMO. Dragonification keeps some of the characteristics of those who go through it, right? Like, the light dragon has golden hair, green eyes, etc, just like her human form. But look specifically to the ears. The light dragon has pointed, Hylian ears. But what ears do the three BOTW dragons have? Large and floppy zonai ears. Meaning they must have formed from zonai.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Completely agreed 😎

[@Mecceldorf]

One key aspect of Ganondorf's existence in the past of Tears for his first time is the common assumption that every Ganondorf was the same man. This has been *mostly* true barring a lone exception, and in Four Swords Adventures of all places. In that timeline, Ganondorf prime *was* successfully killed, and he was reborn in the same fashion as Link and Zelda. If this unified timeline does blend the elements of each timeline, like the multiple collapses of Hyrule, the existence of Rito, and the use of sages, while every historical figure still existed at some point, it makes sense that this Ganondorf did reincarnate after his previous forms, in a future far disconnected from the rest of the timeline, when monsters were defeated and the new Hyrule only knew peace. Japanese Ganondorf has different dialogue from English, rather than simply being subservient to darkness he despised the complacency brought about by weaklings raised in times of peace. This really is a mirror of the hatred that stirred in Demise long ago, who had contempt for the weak who only lived sheparded under Hylia's mercy. The original demon king who would have snuffed out humanity if not for one hero's courage. That Ganondorf would stop at nothing to see this event through indicates an inherent attribute of his nature, serving the propagation of greater power, a world defined only by the strongest combatant, and the grudges of an ancient evil.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Well said here! 😎

[@espinoth9913]

Also the Zonai backstory happening before OoT would mean that at one point, Zelda's tamashi would have been in THREE bodies. Dragon Zelda, the Zelda of Hyrule Fantasy, and Queen Zelda I

[@DarkPrincessAly]

My theory is that, since the zelda team themselves have stated that the timeline is subject to change, there's a bit of an alter here. I don't think minish cap and four swords come before ocarina. I think they take place between majora and twilight. I think ocarina Is the founding era of hyrule. I think the rauru in ocarina and totk are the same person, I think the allegiance scene is the same as in ocarina, and I think we have a case of one zelda FIXING another zelda's blunder. when link meets back with zelda at the end of ocarina, it is before their first meeting. so that Link can warn them that the plan fails, ganondorf is gonna become all powerful, and he will destroy hyrule and spread chaos. the cutscene with totk zelda is directly after that (baby zelda is probably grounded for fracturing the timeline without mommy sonia's permission, and that rauru is getting a lil tired of girls named zelda constantly trying to tell him how to rule). In the first run of the child timeline, you have it played out as originally presented, with the minish cap/four swords alteration and without the presence of totk zelda. The calamity is the converging point, because zelda going back in totk to help seal ganon beneath the castle and live through the child timeline as a dragon is what directly puts him there to be the centerpoint of it. It directly alters the events of twilight princess and fsa, because ganondorf no longer gets sent to the twilight realm at the arbiter's grounds, ganondorf never dies, and so cannot be resurrected in fsa. the events still happen, but differently. The break in the timeline Has to happen, because it is one of totk zelda's primary objectives to go back in time and fix the timeline. She closes the dragonbreak, and the events prior to the calamity have blended together into ancient legend that in-universe historians probably argue about. A Zelda has fixed what another Zelda started.

[@selorkiith4461]

I am still baffled that so many people have issues grasping that time is so much more than a single straight line from A to B and that there are myriad of videos and texts explaining temporal mechanics... nice Video, good work.

[@nicolasadams2204]

In the cut scenes in the past, the temple of time that was on the great plateau WAS the white sky island temple. And it was in the same place as the one from BOTW. We can assume that after it was put into the sky, the new temple was built as a replacement for, the one they put skyward

[@wizcatcheslightning]

There’s too much that needs to be reconciled when you approach it that way. But I’m happy to agree to disagree

[@Gilliebeany]

It's been thousands of years between totk ganondorf and the botw gerudo, it is such a good detail for his ears to be rounded and theirs too be pointed

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thank you! A lot of people who don’t want to entertain the theory say it was “a creative choice” for the Gerudo. But it’s like “we see Ganondorf with round ears the entire time! There’s no way that wasn’t intentional 😂”

[@royakenfalias811]

As far as the rito go, it's important to note that nowhere in Windwaker, or even the Hyrule Historia, does it state that the Rito ONLY ever appeared 1st in the Wind Waker timeline, simply that the Zora (in this case specifically, the Zora from the Adult timeline of OOT) were forced to evolve into the Rito. But answer me this: How did the Zora know they could evolve into flying birds and in such a short time? How and why did Valoo's scales effect the Zora to turn into birds of all things? It can be easily suggested that, just because we only see the Rito for the 1st time in Wind Waker, this is not the 1st and only time they were around. They could've been around elsewhere and just of screen. A group of Zora from a long time ago could've split from the Zora and evolved into the Rito and for all we know, left Hyrule. OR were just in a completely different part of Hyrule since we clearly can't go everywhere in every game like we can in botw and totk. So the Zora knowing they can evolve in WW and being able to do so would easily make sense if they existed elsewhere. There are plenty of examples of species "existing" throughout other games despite them not being seen until much later because they weren't thought of UNTIL then. So I don't think the Rito being around are a good enough reason to place this after the "convergence" and not during the founding of Hyrule. Just food for thought :) EDIT: On another note, we can't take the pointed ears as "proof" that it happens after the convergence either as it is a massive inconsistency. Firstly, the fact that Ganondorf has pointed ears in OOT after acquiring the triforce of power, but also in WW and TP. Now yeah, we can be all like "oh but the triforce of power did that!", but look at the reasoning for the pointed ears in BOTW and TOTK. The Gerudo in Breath of the Wild have two legends explaining the change in their ears from round to pointed: One is that their intermarriages with Hylian men have slowly pointed their ears, while another more mystical take says that their shame over giving birth to Ganondorf who became Calamity Ganon opened them up to hearing the voices of the goddesses. So wait... If we pay attention to the 2nd part above, then why did the Gerudo in TOTK history have pointed ears despite them having a Ganondorf with them who is supposedly the one that BECAME the calamity? It doesn't make sense. The reasoning doesn't make sense. I personally think that the pointed ears thing is JUST a retcon. Because if they "only got pointed ears to distance themselves from the ganondorf that became the calaimty" then why do the ones in the past memories of TOTK with that same ganondorf have pointed ears? In my personal opinion, Nintendo just decided to change them to pointed ears OR completely forgot to change the ears design of the Gerudo in the TOTK memories. Anything else is contradictory and doesn't makesense. WHICH MEANS that the Koume and Kotake in the TOTK memories can STILL be the ones from OOT and it can take place between SS and OOT (as far as the memories go). Let's not use pointed ears as "proof" for either instance because it just doesn't line up xD

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Agreed to that!

[@royakenfalias811]

@@wizcatcheslightning oh hi! sorry if that came off as condescending in any way, just wanted to point it out xD. Also, if you're still a fan of it being between SS and OOT and anyone ever debates the whole "2 Ganondorfs at once" thing again, consider this. If the Koume and Kotake in TOTK are the same ones from OOT, the Ganondorf in OOT could honestly be their attempt to revive/resurrect/recreate the Demon King they served all those years ago. As stated in OOT and in the lore books, Koume and Kotake are Ganondorf's SURROGATE mothers (OOT), not his birth mothers. And they are powerful witches. So Ganondorf in OOT could be their attempt to raise their former master. Which can also help explain is more chilled attitude in WW when he was unsure of his motivations that led him to go after Hyrule. Because he does mention the cool breeze that came in from Hyrule to his peoples land and he says "I... coveted that wind, I suppose" in a very calm way. Anyway, that does help explain the possible reason for 2 of them as well.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@royakenfalias811 I know you may disagree, but I personally can’t reconcile the Koume and Kotake having pointed ears and then reverting to round ears in OOT as much as I want the history of TOTK to take place before OOT. Unless we chalk it up to a lazy error from the dev team. But I’m interpreting that this was deliberate. With the two legends, we could then chalk those up as legends of the Gerudo up until 100 years before the events of BOTW having two legends as to the origin of their changed appearance being conflicting, as with most oral traditions in the Zelda series. In Skyward Sword, Fi even chortles at this, and I’m paraphrasing here, but she says something like “Ah. You passed on your legend using oral tradition, the least reliable method for passing accurate information”. TLDR: Nintendo wants to confuse its fanbase as much as the NPCs who all have decent stories of their history, but not the full truth. They all do, however, have pieces of the true story. And the Devs want us to piece that together. It’s a lore puzzle. That’s fun to me 😂

[@royakenfalias811]

@@wizcatcheslightning I de enjoy a friendly debate. seriously, that's not sarcasm xD. So answer me this then. Why does Ganondorf in TOTK have rounded ears then? Isn't it just as likely that Nintendo goofed as they have done before? Besides, even you point out in your video (although not putting too much focus on it) that there are zonai symbols and references in older Zelda games that came before BOTW and TOTK and before the convergence. If this is the case, but we're assuming the Zonai only descended AFTER the convergence, how does that work? I agree it's a lore puzzle and I enjoy that a bunch as well! But Nintendo has retconned things in the past. They do so when they come up with new ideas that they want to include that were never part of the lore before. like when you look back at Alttp. The history in that game doesn't perfectly line up with events in OOT either, but it ALSO says at the end of the game "The Master Sword sleeps again... FOREVER!" and that clearly isn't true xD. I'm just saying I don't think the pointed ears really works as proof because it can be explained away as forgetfulness, retcon, or any number of other things. And Ganondorf having those rounded ears in TOTK but none of the other ones having rounded ears just doesn't make sense. But this being the 1st ever Ganondorf can certainly explain all the others and their drive for Hyrule, etc. Again, just my take. Pleasure discussing with you! PS. I know I saw a video somewhere on similar symbols in WW, TP and SS that match Zonai from BOTW and TOTK, super cool. and that helps to back this up as well that they have been around for a good amount of time. I know THAT's not up for debate or anything, just thought it worth mentioning. EDIT: Nice Fi reference btw. love that

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@royakenfalias811 well, the Zonai existed BEFORE Skyward Sword (and had some involvement in other games, like the flooding of Hyrule in WW. Or the summoning of the Light Spirits in TP). I have two videos on this topic 🤗 And with Ganondorf, I mentioned in the video that we can chalk it up to a sex-linked recessive trait (because this exists in real life), but symbolically, he would be a reincarnation of the Ganondorf before him. So we can explain why he has round ears both biologically and symbolically 😎

[@ytcollin]

If we accept that history can rhyme, timelines don't necessarily break but can instead loop due to time travel, and cataclysmic events can plausibly erase enough history for people to be unaware of some important elements of the past, I don't understand why there necessarily needs to be a split timeline in the first place. You could have, for instance, Creation > TMC > FS > FSA > Imprisoning War 1 > ALttP > LA > OoA/OoS > ALBW > TFH > TLoZ > TAoL > Hyrulean Civil War (which is a cataclysm) > OoT (Child) > MM > OoT (Adult) > TP > Ganondorf Resurrected > Flood (which is a cataclysm) > TWW > PH > ST > Demise's War on the Surface and Hylia (which is a cataclysm) > SS > Another Founding of Hyrule > TotK (Past) > thousands of years > BotW > TotK (Present). Some problems I anticipate people having here are that monsters from the early part of the timeline don't show up again until BotW and TotK, but if they are of demonic origin, we can't really say they are bound to the same evolutionary stuff going on with other species in the games. What about the Rito and the Zora? It's possible that, though the Zora in Hyrule became the Rito during the Flood, the Zora outside of Hyrule may have been preserved by other means and then moved into the land later. Demise's curse in Skyward Sword taking place that late? I vaguely remember hearing somewhere that his curse could be less of a curse and more of a statement of fact that there is a cycle of struggle between the Spirit of the Hero, the bloodline of the Goddess (which could include those before Hylia joined the bloodline as a mortal), and the incarnation of Demise's hatred; the Demon King could be a spirit that has taken multiple forms throughout history and tends to like the form of Ganondorf/Ganon but isn't opposed to being Demise, Malladus, Vaati, etc. just as the Spirit of the Hero could also belong to non-Hylian non-Link heroes but tends to prefer a Hylian named Link. What about the intro to Wind Waker not referencing Twilight Princess? If you have a legend about a hero that showed up out of the past and then vanished, and you call him the Hero of Time, and then a cataclysmic event happens with no hero showing up, which hero are you going to hope shows up? One whose death is likely known or the hero that can travel through time and is only known to have vanished? The focus is likely going to be on the Hero of Time in TWW's intro regardless of how many heroes were between OoT and TWW. Some additional support for the position is that the presence of Hylia only in SS, BotW, and TotK makes more sense if they don't have all of the other games between them. The story of the history in TMC seems to make more sense without SS being before it. The Master Sword having multiple origin stories makes more sense if there are just multiple Master Swords throughout Hyrule's history. Fi's presence in SS, BotW, and TotK but no others makes sense if that is only one iteration of the Master Sword. The names of regions involving Eldin, Lanayru, and Faron in TP, SS, BotW, and TotK if those don't have other games between them that take place on the surface of Hyrule without those names. Yeah, this linear timeline model with no splits has some speculation involved, but what are Zelda theorists doing if not speculating about things given the evidence in the games? I think it makes more sense than having inconsistent rules for when timelines split and when they loop and when they converge and how time travel even works. Maybe I'm missing something huge, but this rough idea has been in my head since I realized what was going on in TotK, and it might be something worth refining.

[@bathing_master]

You forgot a very important point, nintendo would just be to lazy to deal with the timeline and just stick it before botw.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

🤣 true

[@theendofthestart8179]

The devs when adding stuff to totk: “wont this break the timeline if we add it?” Another dev: “you’re fired get the fuck out”

[@wizcatcheslightning]

🤣 “Don’t pass go. Don’t collect $200. You’re out of here, jerkoff.”

[@garathrahl9640]

I absolutely love the Dragonbreak Theorem, the only caveat I hate about it is that, despite Rauru's fallability, he has no idea what the Mastersword is, it's not something known in his time. Or at least it's not something the Hylians chose to share with him. Unless it's stuck in Dorfs head under the still oceanic sea, it must be hidden somewhere the Depths-Explorable Zonai never found.

[@garathrahl9640]

Adding to this, ofc not every conversation between Zelda and Rauru exists in the game, Zelda does live in their world for an extended period of time but the idea that she never once asked Rauru, or there wasn't even a cutscene about it "why don't we go get the master sword" or "hey why don't we go ask the great Deku Tree about some method to fight this new evil. This new Demon King" it seems odd there's just no mention by Zelda of an existing Evil Banishing Blade in their time period. Maybe she's operating under the pretense of "Pre-Sword creation," she's equally fallible and has no complete knowledge of the world.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I never mentioned this in the video, but I’ve alluded to it in my past videos: the Zonai are the god tribe. And they’ve been around canonically since before SS and chronologically since ALTTP. If the Zonai descended haphazardly throughout Hyrule’s timeline, they would have only known the Master Sword to be the Goddess White Sword

[@KittysCat-j7x]

I can see merit to the theory that secret stones are Triforce shards. Maybe Farosh, Dindraal, and Naydra were Zonai who sacrificed themselves to re-seal away the Triforce, but this time in a different way from the Door of Time. This time the goal would be to prevent anyone from obtaining any piece of the Triforce. Each of these Zonai would consume a shard of one piece of the Triforce. This created three permanent, independent holds on each Triforce piece. So long as no one devours the other shards and combines with another immortal dragon, then they are effectively sealed forever. That would be the real reason why draconification is forbidden: to prevent the unification of the Triforce. The given reason has to be false in order to protect the secret of the trifroce’s whereabouts

[@KittysCat-j7x]

This theory also explains the name “secret stones”. They would be the keys to a very big secret indeed. It should go without saying, but Triforce shards are very well established in the lore of this universe. Triforces can be broken apart and recombined, just as the complete Triforce can be (a type of relationship known as recursion in math)

[@christianmcbuttcheekz3979]

Great video as always, goat. Too much of this goes over my head (and frankly still does), but I love your perspective and deep analysis of things I would never notice. The twinrova detail you mentioned is super interesting, I hope we get a lore book or official entry from Nintendo about concept art/ details that are easily overlooked just to have a deeper dive. Excited for the inevitable dlc and how it only deepens the rabbit hole.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thanks Grump!!

[@Dtctr010]

One thing that no one ever brings up is the fact that King Hyrule in wind waker uses the triforce to wish hyrule away completely, leaving no trace of it behind. How are people gonna ignore an act divine power on that scale and say it converges when the master sword is also buried under the sea. The master sword is the link (pun intended) that aids in the timeline split yet no one brings that up. if the master sword wasnt left behind i would believe it, but that vital key left underwater shows how that timeline built New Hyrule without the baggage of the past. That was the whole point of the king's wish Im pretty sure the answer is that the devs wanted to make a game without following the timeline to limit themselves, and this ends up being its own thing, which is good. It becomes its own continuity uninhibited by previous timeline placements

[@Pissmaster420]

The place you located the dragon memory is on a spiral peninsula too

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Excellent comment here! That’s 200% on point

[@darksilva1026]

This is the same conclusion I came to after planning TOTK. That the timeline had to merge into one or this game completely ignores the official timeline. Loves the video!

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Right on. Glad you enjoyed it!

[@OskarZylen]

I know that it was established that there’s a part of the timeline in which two master swords exist, but that’s also when I remembered that you can obtain the white sword of the sky (Aka the goddess sword) which is the precursor to the full fledged master sword in skyward sword before forging it with the ancient flames. I’m curious what the implications are of this potential 3rd master sword/not-quite-fully-baked master sword.

[@Elite02k]

the one thing that disproves the "before oot-after SS" existence is the fact OOT's ganondorf exists, which he couldnt as long as there was a slumbering demon king ganondorf under hyrule castle per the gerudo's male birth genetical policy. i'd like to think that totk's founding era was probably somewhere shortly after an event leading after spirit tracks/four swords/adventures of link where hyrule's great sea finally lowered.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

There is a loophole with the tamashii (hopefully I explained that decently in the video, ha ha), but yeah it sounds like a lot of people think it’s taking place in the Adult Timeline.

[@Jumbocombo]

I just figured that botw and totk exist so far in the future we are looking at a new hyrule. So Zelda went back to the founding of this kingdom but not to the beginning of the timeline

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Agreed

[@nicodalusong149]

I've seen that dragonbreak video and I sort of agree with it but at the same time, I'm also of the mind that the past segments of the story happen post-Skyward Sword. Some things to consider: 1) The Zonai have three tribes that corelate to the three goddesses and therefore the triforce; 2) a mining construct mentions that zoanite was originally from below (the sky islands but I don't think it was specified any further than that; 3) if I remember correctly, Skyward Sword's prologue mentions that Hylia raised Skyloft which is only an island's worth of people and not every existing person from the surface; 4) there is no record or knowledge of the name Zelda anywhere at the time of Rauru's rule until Zelda arrives from the future. So, here's what I'm thinking: The Zonai originally lived on the ground. At a certain point in time, they discovered zonaite and their technology rapidly evolved until they finally found a way to create their sky islands and permanently live up in the clouds. After the events of Skyward Sword, the Zonai are sent down (presumably) by the Golden Goddesses with the dragon tears to help the Hylians and make contact with a different group of Hylians from the Skyloftian Hylians. Queen Sonia is from this first group of Hylians. After the events of the imprisoning war, Rauru's Kingdom of Hyrule makes contact with either the Skyloftians or their descendants. Because of the names Zelda and Link and the Skyloftians' posessing the Master Sword, the Skyloftians manage to ally with the the Kingdom and political marriage happens between Skyloftian Zelda's descendant and Rauru's and Sonia's descendants (assuming that Raura and Sonia managed to have a child any time before Sonia died or probably even before Zelda arrived of course). It's this marriage that creates the new but still genetically related royal family of Hyrule. I think this theory still has a lot of holes, but it satisfies a lot of the lore requirements without messing with anything from Ocarina of Time to anything before Tears of the Kingdom. Also, Zelda's sacrifice is far more weighty (and the master sword gets more powerful) if she stays a dragon for a much longer period of time.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I think Thinking At Max Volume and I are going to do a collaboration to put the pre MC theory to rest so be on the look out!

[@KodaThePsyduck]

I have a interesting theory. What if the Zelda section and the first seal of ganondorf takes place in the gap of 10,000 years and distant past. As we see in Creating A Champion, all of the other games are in "the Distant Past", my theory is that the totk zelda portion is in the gap of distant past and 10,000 years ago I think it would make sense as in one of the memories, zelda looks at the world and judging from the map in forgotten temple it mostly looks like botws one This is important as Hyrule's geography is super inconsistent each game

[@chickenelafsworld7105]

Another thing about the past in TotK being before OoT is that while we haven’t technically been told, it’s heavily implied only on incarnation of Ganon can exist at any given time. All the Ganons after OoT are resurrected or freed versions of OoT Ganondorf, with the exception of Four Swords Adventures, which explicitly has a reincarnation of Ganondorf, and LA which has him as a fake dream. The fact that the only time an explicitly new Ganon is born is in a timeline where we know he’s fully died already implies only one exists at a time in each timeline. Even the Ganon in BotW is implied to be an attempt of Ganondorf escaping, a mindless incarnation of Malice and not a new being. This “rule” is one they could technically change, since it isn’t explicit lore, but it feels weirdly arbitrary if there’s only ever two Ganondorfs allowed to exist at a time. One I can get behind, but if there’s already two, why stop there? Especially since Ganon doesn’t have to be the only incarnation of Demise’s curse, there are other antagonists before and after Ganondorf that seemingly still fill that role.

[@BananaReidy]

On a side note there is a theory that the vvish that was made 0n the triforce to undo ganons evil deeds from lttop was what lead to the creation of the adult timeline respectively the child timeline. Sounds about right if not then the fallen hero of oot in the downfall timeline would also been resurrected.

[@thinkingatmaxvolume1992]

Thanks for mentioning me! Great video 😎

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I FINALLY saw this. I’m that deep in comments. Thank YOU! Looking forward to chatting with you in the future, friend 🤗

[@davidpacheco2851]

Cool theory! I think totk ganon can actually predate the one from oot, as the later is the one that became calamity ganon, I think he's using the demon king's malice to ressurect himself as we see in botw, and impa referencing them as different in the game kind of supports this.

[@arcticfluffyfoxy]

when you realise ganondorf is the same exact dude every time

[@Apotheosis0]

@@arcticfluffyfoxyOnly one gerudo male has been born since the time of TOTK ganondorf’s rule, this means it’s impossible for him to predate any ganondorf.

[@TheIceCrypt]

@@Apotheosis0 Maybe (OoT)Ganondorf wasn't born. Maybe he's a vessel for (TotK)Ganondorf spirit, conjured using the same magic that summons Bokos, Moblins, Hinox, & all his other demons. It would explain why he becomes the pig-like Ganon when he powers up, as opposed to resembling Demise like the Ganondorf in TotK does.

[@TheIceCrypt]

​@@Apotheosis0 No. You might want to check your wording. "Only one Gerudo male HAS BEEN BORN SINCE the time of (TotK)Ganondorf’s rule" means (TotK)Ganondorf predates only 1 other.

[@Apotheosis0]

@@TheIceCrypt It never mentioned TOTK ganondorf

[@TheWeeklySlopYT]

"The answer is simple... yes!" Had me rolling

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Happy to balance out my ranting with some comedic breaks 🤗

[@ethacon]

Love the video as always. Great job! As for the Hyrulean Crest you mentioned, I like to think that it's been used as the crest for the Goddess' followers (Hylians) since before the Era of the Sky, and was just used for the kingdom later.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I could accept that 🤗

[@zhoupact8567]

I think another thing that plays into how things can be how they are. Is that we are dealing with far more than just a few timelines. We are also dealing with mirror worlds and layers of reality. Pocket spaces and so on. I believe entire pieces of geography can be warped and replaced with that from another timeline/mirror world/dimension/layer of reality/pocket. This may happen both to land, but probably also people. And because most stuff is almost the exact same as always people may not even notice they have ended up in a different world than the one they grew up. In some pocket dimensions time may move normal. Others may preserve stuff keeping a being alive for millions of years if needed. It may be why we find traces of places that should by all right not be preserved at all in Tears of the Kingdom or Breath of the Wild. Its possible that timelines merge, but they may every well also not merge truly merge. Imagine the tree timelines splitting again as they are attempted to be merged. Each one continue on like normal in the end, but a split version of themselves unite into a singular timeline. Potentially more split lines of time may even have been created. One may not have been influenced at all by the attempted merger. But another may go on almost like before, but have "damage" or remnants of the merger. I also wonder. We tend to play in the times when Ganon lost and we as Link kinda win. But surely there are times where things do not work out. Where the hero is defeated. I do wonder how many fun stuffs should be made there. Perhaps some lines are more loved than others. So perhaps a stronger Link is taken from one world and put into another to save the day where its original the weaker Link lost.

[@DJDRWHNTR]

This was so beautifully written it was scary 🥺 amazing job

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thanks! Appreciate the view and the comment as well 😎

[@ShadowWizard224]

I have an idea for a new title…. Legend of Zelda: The Beacon of Hope The game would have a dark western cowboy theme like twilight princess but have the vast open layout like breath of the wild and Tears of the Kingdom. The land will be scattered with different ranches, animals, characters, etc… Basically, instead of scattered shrines you will have huge ranches, farms, and villages scattered throughout the land that will be apart of the main story but also used for side quests and item fetching for certain goods that you will need throughout the game. Link is considered an average worker until the story and game progresses and by the end of the game he becomes a real cowboy that saves the land from outside intruders. Dungeons will take place outside of the mainland and into certain areas like forests, mountains, swamps, lakes, caves, etc… Lastly, it will have a dark western theme. Like a combo of Zelda and Red Dead put together!!!! First M rated Zelda game that uses pistols, shotguns, blood, gore, fist fights, profanity, nudity, etc… and new enemies would include alligators and snakes in the deep swamps and giant polar bears in the high snowy mountains. Opening cutscene of the game will be Link getting his ass beat in a fist fight by the toughest rancher and having to go back to work the next day with a black eye and busted lip. He will revisit the same rancher for a rematch in the middle of the game which overthrows his position as head rancher. I know this might sound kinda stupid but these were just some thoughts I had LOL but let me know what y’all think??? ⚔️ 🤠

[@phoenix042x7]

I've considered this a fourth timeline that split off immediately before OoT due to link not appearing from the start for unknown reasons. This would create a (post-Skyward Sword) beginning and a far end point for it while creating a long, mostly undefined period in between for Nintendo to put in new content which might merge aspects of all other timelines' events in ways that were similar, but not the same as before -- but consistent with this game's past and future. From a purely marketing standpoint and putting yourself in Nintendo's shoes, this would likely be smart because it would allow them to make "rhyming" pseudo-remake/modern takes of all the old games in the process and continue this IP's potential for several more decades -- all while keeping it in one consistent new timeline. IDK, I mean, the take presented in this video is probably the best/most educated one I've heard outside of this yet. I could see this being legit too, though where do we (and Nintendo) go from here with TLoZ as a franchise if that is the case?

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Well thank you! My buddy @GameSmiths believes it gives Nintendo license to remake the games we grew up with as well, and I totally jive with that idea. I personally would love to see Zelda take on the Interloper War!

[@critterwyatt]

This is utterly perfect. Only thing I still would have happened, is Groose was the beginning of Gurudo, and basically the original Ganon. That makes sense because, he just wants Zelda, and will do anything for it, and he was there at the end when Link and Zelda became linked. It would make sense that the 3rd link would be Groose under the power aspect.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Glad you liked it! And I do like the idea of Groose being the Gerudo patriarch.

[@ab-qf1iv]

Age of Calamity is canon, so in that branch there are still 2 triforces and Master Swords. Would be intriguing to see a game set in that timeline to explore the implications of thjs

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Not officially, according to Nintendo, but I still love this idea!

[@TheDevastator619]

I hate that it’s not considered “canon” by Nintendo because it’s (game) story it’s leaps and bounds better that BotW and TotK imo. Almost feels like Nintendo is discrediting themselves for now real reason.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

@@TheDevastator619 I’m sure we’ll have a lore document from Nintendo in the next 5 years to either clear this all up or confuse us further 😅

[@Axecon1]

The two leading theories now are this (TOTK and BOTW converge the timeline) and that TOTK is a re-telling of Ocarina of Time (TOTK & BOTW replace every game after Skyward Sword on a completely new timeline).

[@incomments2864]

Botw and totk are soooo far ahead of the timeline that the establishment of the kingdom of hyrule happened twice.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Now we just need to convince about 95% of the fanbase who took Rauru’s “we founded Hyrule, last time I checked” literally 😅

[@NintenDobs]

I like this explanation of the timeline, in my head-canon only a few things you mentioned play out a bit diffetently. The two Temples of Time for example: it seems more likely to me that sometime after the events of the first temple of time being raised into the sky that those who remained and survived on the surface would later become known as Hylians and they would have built their own Temple of Time based on the history and legends they would be familiar with, hence why although both are large impressive structures, the surface world Temple of Time has fallen into ruin in a much shorter timeframe than the original Temple of Time. The original would have been built using zonaite and magic, while the second Temple of Time seems to be built out of the same stone as Hyrule Castle, a durable stone I'm sure, but likely not as durable as zonaite. Also this has nothing to do with the video but is anyone else confused as to how how Ganondorf knew to swallow the Secret Stone? Zelda learns of the forbidden ritual through Mineru, who at the time was technically unaware of whether it would work or not, although her dialogue suggests she does seem to believe it's more likely possible than not. Regardless, how would Ganondorf have learned of the ritual without Mineru or say some Zonai historical textbooks? Edit: Now that I'm thinking about it, how can Zelda be the ancestor of Sonia and Rauru if Sonia dies before they have children?

[@wizcatcheslightning]

That’s a great question! He probably had some form of insight. Maybe he found a book or ancient text. He’s a clever schemer. Always ways. He even knew about the Zonai “seeming like gods” to the Hyruleans.

[@TrovaoSmasher]

As for the edit, well, we don't actually know if they had children or not. It's very possible they did

[@ismaelerecca1861]

He definitely knew what the Zonai Secret stones were when he saw them from far away, so he probably also knew more details about them, such as how they turn you into a dragon if swallowed

[@NintenDobs]

@@TrovaoSmasher Yeah that's certainly a possibility, but if that's the case it just feels like a missed opportunity having not shown their children/Zeldas great, great, great so on and so forth grandparent(s). Nintendo mainly just implies the races can reproduce together but tends to stay away from showing the result of those unions. It would have been cool seeing their Zonai/Hylian features put together.

[@NintenDobs]

@@ismaelerecca1861 That's a good point as well. Rauru says his plan is to keep him close to keep an eye on him, but Ganondorf may very well have had the same idea before he ever showed up there. If so that would seem to imply prior knowledge and intent

[@Sirbearsy]

I have finished watching this and now I have started to question everything I know about Zelda. the Theory makes so much sense but my brain is having a really hard time comprehending it

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Take all the time you need. Writing this was not easy 😂

[@Lemon_Planter]

I think no matter how you slice it, theres some funky shenanigans going on timeline-wise. I would, however, find it SO funny if they revealed "yeah, idk some guy wished on the triforce and suddenly we all remember 6 different histories. I guess its just weird now"

[@wizcatcheslightning]

That would be a good middle finger to the fandom 😂

[@RealmsCrossMyths]

"Spectacle Rock calls back to A Link to the Past." And the *The Legend of Zelda* for NES, and A Link Between Worlds, and The Windwaker, and… Spectacle Rock is a recurring location, which appears in many games in the series.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

That’s right, but I wasn’t going to say all of that in the video 😂

[@RealmsCrossMyths]

@@wizcatcheslightning Then just say "is a recurring reference"; instead of listing one game - since the other references are specific to one game or timeline; but Spectacle Rock has been around since the original NES game; and since a lot of BotW was inspired by the original NES - like the guardians being designed after the NES octoroks, who looked massive due to the NES' limitations - they would be referencing that game, and not ALttP, if they were only referencing a single game.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Hindsight is definitely 20/20. There was a lot of attention to detail when making and recording the script for this video

[@niwozawa]

Zelda timeline theories are very interesting but damn do they break my brain on a side note one interesting thing I found while exploring the depths was a couple of very long skeletons, with the heads taking the same shape as the dragon's heads. Were there multiple dragons? Were these skeletons just a result of the timelines converging? I find myself extremely interested in the story of these skeletons

[@wizcatcheslightning]

You and me both! The only reason I didn’t talk about the Depths is because they’re beyond mysterious and I felt as if they needed their own separate video, even if it just points out what is in them and how this relates to everything. The dark skeletons are definitely a huge part of that, both literally and metaphorically!

[@TheREALSimagination]

What a head-scratcher. As much as Zelda irked me in BOTW, mostly because of her attitude, Nintendo are good at making me have a soft spot for her and make me care overall. I hated that she turned into a dragon at first, no matter how cool the revelation (because I had only seen the Light Dragon only once before and not recognized it) that even though I had seen her disappear and was now actively looking to bring her back, turns out she had been there all along. Safe to say, I was glad when they managed to change her back, and the final sequence of the game was incredible, and felt like a "full circle" kind of thing for me, as I had learned to dive only a few hours earlier in the same sitting. I also wondered where the direction would have gone if Zelda stayed as a dragon. Unless they started a new cycle, I honestly don't know if I would've liked a Zelda game with no Zelda.

[@doommustard8818]

It's a sort of kinda reboot. Since botw was released they have been saying that the previous games take place in "the era of legends". while most Zelda theorists seem to have interpreted this as them being coy and saying "you figure it out" evidence in the games suggested they are being literal. The events of the previous games are stories that are referenced in the new games, but the details of them are off and not quite accurate. They talked about this as though it is a brilliant solution to a problem in that interview, so the obvious question is what problem. Well there is actually two problems: 1) the Zelda timeline is too messy to work with and we should probably just reboot the series so that we can tell the story we want 2) if we reboot the series that will make the long time Zelda fans upset. Their solution is to say that these previous games are stories that represent history but are not accurate to the actual history of this hyrule. This allows them to retcon what they need to so they can tell the story they want to tell, without invalidating the experiences of the long time fans who've played the older games. It's not complicated it's not rocket science. And they have said all this pretty explicitly. Personally I like the idea that we can reboot the series to tell a brand new multi-game spanning story without completely invalidating the whole timeline.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I never go into detail about this in the video, but my theory aligns with what you say. This theory both reboots the series and acknowledges the history of all previous games before BOTW. It’s a nice lil compromise 😉

[@いいえせんせいあかいぬ]

I honestly thought that this was made by a big name KZbinr and was pleasantly surprised when I found a smaller KZbin creator made this

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thanks so much for that comment! 🤗

[@GentleJoh]

I think the timeline is now more a circle that just a line... Making sense with the uroboros dragon seen everywhere in TotK for the "endless cycle". The TotK ganondorf who died in a massive explosion could (imo) reincarnate into SS Demise. You know, rised from the underground, black scaled evil. A sort of powerful monster borned from the remaining Ganondorf's gloom.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

While my theory doesn’t take it there, I do like and appreciate that input you’ve provided 🤗

[@greenstarlover1]

don't forget that age of calamity essentially made another timeline split. so instead of 3 timelines, they recombined and again split into 2.

[@nathanieltose7653]

My idea is that some sort of event caused all three timelines to converge that completely destroyed Hyrule and just changed so much of the landscape, somehow the Golden goddesses were basically forgotten, and hylia became the only goddess, hylia somehow merged herself with the triforce and the zonai created a new Hyrule that we see now

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I like the sound of that!

[@nathanieltose7653]

@@wizcatcheslightning I like to call it the convergence war, maybe some entity or even hylia herself caused the timelines to merge into one, similar to the events of Hyrule warriors 1, and maybe the Golden goddesses gave up they're divine powers to hylia so she could fix it, and the golden goddesses became the three dragons we see

[@gaymeronabudget]

One of the points that doesn't connect in your theory is that OoT's Ganondorf is the source of the calamity, whereas he is the same Ganondorf from Wind Waker, is he not? And the one from TP is the one from Child Link's timeline. Therefore they are the one and the same Ganondorf, with slightly different motif. Think of Thanos from Infinity War, who sacrificed Gamora and understood about loss; then think about Thanos from Endgame, the one who only knew he had succeeded, and did not have to sacrifice any loved one to achieve what he wanted. They are the same Thanos, but their motivations and goals are a lot different, so different that one could argue that even though they are the same men, they are different beings. But I love how when Zelda is knighting Link, she mentions the time, twilight and sky, and they all give nods to previous games (especially Urbossa to Nabooru). But Urbossa mentions that the calamity started with the Gerudo, and we all thought she was talking about Ganondorf from OoT, but no. She was apparently talking about this Totk Ganondorf.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I’ve read and reread several excerpts from Creating a Champion and someone had to have messed up along the way because the way they write about the Calamity Ganon is contradictory.

[@jabrikolo]

I just love your in depth videos about the zelda timeline after botw and totk. I always found it puzzling how all this might fit together in a meaningful way and I feel like you got it mostly figured out. Thank you so much for the your great work!

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Sure thing! Thanks for watching and commenting. And I’m glad you enjoyed it 🤗

[@historictruecrime5119]

Hey now, spectacle rock has been around since OG Zelda

[@wizcatcheslightning]

That it has, I probably could have said that better because I didn’t mean “it’s just in ALTTP” 😅

[@lenorrismiller563]

I think that the fact that they mention The Imprisoning War is an important factor. Imagine if instead the mural depicted The great flood, or The invasion of the twili. While there have been many battles to seal ganon/demise or whoever, only one is Officially named The imprisoning war. It is a set point on the timeline. And it gives the developers an opportunity to officially be done with ganondorf for good. As he is now truly dead in all three timelines.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

I like this idea a lot! 🤗

[@lenorrismiller563]

@@wizcatcheslightning Also ganons return in windwaker is kind of depicted similarly to the calamity ganon. But In the game he is clearly just a man. We could use this as evidence that the calamity ganon in just his manifesting a body to help himself escape. This could also support the reemergence of ganon throughout the timeline. As he is continuously prevented by the hero from fully escaping Raru's seal.

[@genderenigma8276]

Thanks to the Elder Scrolls, we have a name for the phenomenon. Hail Akatosh or Auri-El, if you're a mer.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

🐉 🫡 🤣

[@felixrivera895]

Skyward Sword doesn't even really end with the founding of Hyrule. It just ends with the Hylians decending from the heavens to live on the ground.

[@Sapphairis]

I was fiddling with the theory that the three elemental dragons were the three golden goddesses draconified and I’m glad someone else said it

[@DartzTheGamer]

I left a comment on a video you did with TMV saying how i believe that the convergence of the timelines may have been caused by a wish on the triforce on either the child or downfall timelines where everyone forgot about it. After seeing this video I think I can add more to my line of thinking. If the triforce was forgotten about it would be across time, causing a reset in a way, but not really. In forgetting the triforce events in time happen similarly to how they did wjen everyone knew about it, but with changes, i.e. the cycle mentioned in this video. My line of thinking is that after this wish was made, the timeline converges at that point, then a similar cycle plays out, but in a linear fashion without the splits. Since history can't be overwritten, instead of retconning the entire timeline, it would just start again from the point the wish was made. Thus having the ancient legends still happen and be referenced in this new era. Similar to a dragon break, all of the past events still happened, but because everyone forgot about the triforce its no longer mentioned.

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Good stuff here 😎

[@elsiebartlett6808]

23:23 rauru even straight up says he doesn’t know what the secret stone in the Great Sky Island is or how it got there, so definitely not all knowing

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Now we just need to convince 99.9% of the Zelda fandom of this 🤣

[@youhaveayds8975]

Man young Koume and Kotake give some clues but it could very well be a different interation of them

[@captainspear6527]

i consistantly remind myself of what king of red lions, or king of hyrule said in wind waker. "this is the kingdom of hyrule, and i am the one who **founded it.**"

[@wizcatcheslightning]

Thank you for saying this! Sincerely! Lots of people are like “but Rauru said he and Sonia were the founders!” Yeah? So did every other royal individual in Zelda 🤣 I’m exaggerating but you catch my drift