Zelda Complaints With Bandit Games and Monster Maze | Yggdrasil Podcast 36

0:00 Intro
2:40 Pretentious (but accurate) Zelda musings
8:36 Attack on Titan
12:14 The Last Airbender
16:07 Zelda Movie
21:48 Metroid
40:51 Totk complaining begins
50:51 Timeline
56:38 Ganondorf
1:16:22 Story
1:32:08 BotW
1:43:19 Content reduction
1:47:11 Zonai
1:56:55 Future
2:02:44 Rewards
2:05:55 Was it always like this?
2:24:55 Misc

[@ratatoskr6324]

My voice sounds weird because I've been sick.

[@lukedavies3654]

Get well soon!

[@davinsosa1438]

No proglem, brotha 🤙

[@Caliban743]

You sound fine

[@highdefinition450]

the coughing gave it away lol it's okay

[@Banuune]

Don't worry about that. You sound fine ^^ Also get well soon

[@rwcappellano]

The Crestfallen Zelda-tuber timeline.

[@highdefinition450]

punished rat arc

[@cato3277]

Hyrule has fallen, billions must find new interests to fill the void

[@javiervasquez625]

The "Golden Age" of Zelda content is over. Behold the dawn of the Dark Ages.

[@TheXeroLink]

So sad too, Breath had me hopeful, Tears left me in….Tears lol

[@Veo87]

The fact that so many characters don't remember Link is one of the biggest things that brought me out of the story and made the continuity between BotW and TotK feel like a mess. It's ridiculous that the Hateno village residents don't know Link despite the fact that he was there during BotW and is Zelda's personal body guard, so he would have been with her a lot while she was at Hateno (whether he lived with her or not). It's ridiculous that most of the residents of Tarrey Town don't remember Link despite the fact that he was the one who recruited them to live there, was involved in the building of the town, and attended their leader's wedding with them all. This is especially true of Kapson, the Zora resident of Tarrey Town. BotW proved that Zora not only have long lives, but long memories. When you go to Zora's Domain the first time in BotW, Zora recognize Link even though he's been supposedly dead for the past 100 years. The fact that Kapson, after only a few years between BotW and TotK, treats Link like he doesn't know him, has no good writing excuse. It's crazy that Bolson doesn't remember Link despite refining Link's house, talking to him a bunch, and attending Hudson's wedding together. I can accept that SOME characters wouldn't remember Link, but it doesn't make sense that so many don't remember him and treat him like a stranger. The fact that Link himself doesn't correct any of the characters on this front either means he doesn't remember them either or he's either an idiot or a jerk for not bringing it up with those people that they met before. I get that Nintendo probably didn't want new players to feel alienated, but they probably could have done that without making the continuity inconsistent with itself and affecting the writing, but they chose not to do it that way. Writing inconsistency breaks immersion for a lot of people and affects their ability to enjoy things. Characters knowing Link already would have been fine anyway. All of the past 3D Zelda games have Link being an established resident at some village and everyone knows him. That wasn't "unfriendly" to new players. Heck, there are still quite a few NPC's that DO remember Link in TotK and that's not considered "unfriendly" to new players. They could have had more characters in TotK remember Link without being unfriendly to new players.

[@javiervasquez625]

If the whole "new player alienation" was such a big deal for Nintendo they could have added a _narrative_ reason for the apparent collective amnesia which plagues the kingdom during the events of the game by simply having Ganondorf's Gloom have an effect on people's memories making most NPCs who didn't personally know Link forget about him to avoid dealing with the plotpoint of Link having spent the last _6 years_ knowing all the people in the kingdom. Maybe with such a contrived plotline like Ganondorf causing massive amnesia the fandom wouldn't be as annoyed with Nintendo's carelessness but alas it's very clear that to them the gameplay was top priority compared to the narrative _inmersion_ as per this been a direct sequel to a previous game.

[@azzyiseternal4745]

what they definitely shouldve done was have it detect if youve played botw on that save file or not when it comes to the dialogue. if you don't have a botw save, then they likely don't remember you but if you do? then they'll recognize you. that way it still lets new players not feel alienated and lets old players feel like their accomplishments actually meant a damn

[@Veo87]

@@azzyiseternal4745 They could have done that, but I'm not sure they would have even needed to. In BotW, it made sense for people except for a rare few to not know Link because he's been dead to the world for a century and his loss of memory means he wouldn't know people either. In TotK, he's an established resident of Hyrule who not only saved it from the Calamity several years before, doing great deeds for people along the way, he's been the personal knight of the beloved princess for the past several years, who has been working tirelessly to rebuild Hyrule (Though Hyrule doesn't look to have made much progress in TotK, but that's a different conversation). Because of this, more people really SHOULD recognize him because he has likely still been working with the princess to restore Hyrule. Sure, Link is probably a quiet, humble guy who doesn't boast or speak much about himself, but he's going to get some people's notice still, especially the people in Hateno village, since that's where Zelda resided for a while. So, even if they ignored BotW when they wrote TotK and treated BotW like it's largely not cannon, you'd still expect more people to know who Link is. The fact that so many don't know who he is makes it look like Link hasn't been doing anything effective the past several years, which I doubt Nintendo was wanting to get across.

[@jaydenc367]

They do remember Link though and the continuity between them doesn't feel like a mess. But they do remember him. Except again they do remember him they are just acting casual. Not really. But he doesn't treat Link like that. He does remember that too. But they do remember him...they just don't constantly reference past events. They don't need to be corrected though and he does remember them and he isn't a idiot or a jerk....but like...what was there to correct? I mean it wasn't inconsistent with itself or affected the writing, no they did chose to do it that way. But this isn't inconsistent. Exactly...a lot really do know him, but a lot aren't close to him. I dunno what we got was pretty good.

[@connorkoops8965]

It's reasons like this that I've only ever recomended TOTK to people who skipped BOTW. They get the intended new player experience while also getting to explore the map for the first time. Exploring TOTK's map after beating BOTW multiple times just felt like completing a checklist.

[@dangerousalone5070]

The craziest part to me is in the trailer for totk they set it all up perfectly. Ganondorf had the Twilight princess scar, he was under Hyrule Castle having his energy funnelled to power the shiekah tech.. boom there's your motivation. It could've been so easy.

[@javiervasquez625]

That would have made perfect sense had Aonuma not made the mistake of releasing the official timeline on the Hyrule Historia and revealing Four Sword Adventures as a direct _sequel_ of Twilight Princess. Having a Ganondorf reincarnate in Four Sword Adventures practically destroyed any chance for the original Ganondorf from Ocarina of Time to revive in later titles in the timeline.

[@Raven_Frame]

​@javiervasquez625 This is the issue with having an established timeline. Four Swords is great, but I think it would be fine with most everyone if it was a spin off with its own continuity. Not everything has to connect.

[@javiervasquez625]

@@Raven_Frame Agreed especially since you can look at the "Four Sword Trilogy" as a self-contained narrative of it's own which can easily be seen as an "alternate dimension" (not timeline mind you) to the main series canon which happens to exist independently from any curse of the Demon Tribe and the Lore established in Skyward Sword.

[@isdel9474]

I figured Ganondorf desired Ultrahand or access to Zonai technology so that he could conquer Hyrule. But instead, he was just sitting down in Hyrule Castle's Depths for practically no reason - completely free and able to leave, but not doing anything himself.

[@BioAlpha5]

did you know there was older unofficial "official" timelines before more than 5 games was out? look up the history of zelda timelines on google @@javiervasquez625 and by unoficial "official" i mean they talk about the chronology of the games, in interviews way back when. So i could so see Four sword being its own trilogy. and we already got ALternate dimensions. Look up lorule or Termina. Look up Parallel Reality Timeline Theory too while your at it as that could be true too as even Fujibayashi even mentioned in an interview "" I think there is room for fans to think about various possibilities. If I am speaking only as a possibility "" so if there are various possibilities, why not that? We already know multiple exist, and the timeline has changed, MULTPLE times, (Even from Hyrule Historia (Green BooK) to the Encyclopedia (Blue Book). In fact fans theorized there was a two way split for years, then Hyrule Historia showed 3 instead of two and even Skyward Sword, love it or hate its time travel plot, has theories about a possible split as well. So its anyones guess, except Nintendo cuz they made it.

[@highdefinition450]

sheikah technology should have been found underground. they rose from there in the first place, it would have been cool to find a decaying divine beast while exploring the depths. something to do there lmao. also the sight of this giant inactive beast in the dark? so cool

[@willian1917]

imagine to find each divine best in the depths below the area they used to stay in the surface, like in the mines below the 4 cities. divine beats destroyed by the gloom.

[@javiervasquez625]

And yet we still have a derelict Sheikah Guardian on top of Purah's Lab making one wonder what stopped that one Guardian from not vanishing like all the other technology...? (staring expectantly at Fujibayashi's pale expression).

[@Galgus2000]

​@willian1917 that would have answered a big question and look great.

[@wunder4402]

It would have been insanely cool to find other divine beasts down there in ruins, not the ones we saw in botw

[@netweed09]

I mean, nah - that's your opinion but I was soo done with the D!vine Blands barely after my 2nd one. They just totally turned me off from the 1st game with their monotony and crudeness. To the point of giving me 'gaming PTSD' I had to suffer for 6 years with, lol! The sheer cheek to replace the tried & tested Temples with insipid and hollow Robots! Tears unceremoniously disbanding them was to my total joy - Tears was 100 times the game Botw was for me.

[@stormcutter59]

I really hope as time goes on more and more fans understand. Our criticism of Tears isnt to be a hater or to just shit all over the game for the sake of it being "different." We criticize it out of a place of love and appreciation for the series and the issue here is the games have undeniably LOST a part of the charm these games were known for. We just dont want to lose that charm

[@96Jambones]

Exx-fucking-xactly. We want good stuff, we don’t want this shit. Can’t get that if we just say “I love it, thank you.”

[@justarandomguyontheinterne681]

Well said! Love this series, and i agree. We are critical of it cuz we love it so much.

[@Terrerfeu17]

Here here!

[@lexdysia9119]

If the “fans” think for half a second they would know this

[@stormcutter59]

@@lexdysia9119 I totally agree.

[@payton9665]

I completely disagree with people saying that Ocarina of Time is outdated because I recently played it for the first time on the Switch Expansion pack and I absolutely loved it. It's such a great Zelda game, one of the best for sure and I can see how much it influenced and had an impact on future Zelda games. Just because it has old graphics it doesn't mean it's bad at all.

[@inscription8099]

I love the overworld in ocarina and every section of the game you feel like your doing something important. Plus all of the little rewards for the various side activities hidden and scattered around the world. Always something worthwhile to explore or investigate. Not only that, ocarina has the most important story in all of the lore. WW, MM, TP, even the fallen timeline to an extent are better understood knowing the events of ocarina. Even the creation myth was explained in that game.

[@mortiat]

I could honestly listen to you guys complain about TotK for many more hours

[@Rattlehead20XX]

Yes we need standalone weekly series with you guys.

[@zachmongoe]

Agreed a bi-weekly podcast would be nice about all of Nintendos games. The mini metroid tangent and just in general. Very enjoyable listen. Mostly cause I feel like I resonate so much with it.

[@javiervasquez625]

They should become fellow members/costars of ZeldaMaster and Zeltik's new podcast channel as they all hang out discussing and playing Zelda to the community's enjoyment as the Zelda drought continues.

[@FullyOnVolks]

@@javiervasquez625for real

[@FullyOnVolks]

This can be the new zeldatube topic that would engage the audience again. Totk was so bad that none of us want to theorise about it anymore, but we do want to voice our complaints

[@highdefinition450]

i don't like when people say we had like 19 years of ocarina of time-likes because in reality, there were only 4 games between it and botw in that same style lol. pretty much all the other ones were like, 2D lol that's like saying we've had 7 years of botw-likes, it makes the number lf games released seem much higher than it really is lol

[@jfm5864]

It's frustrating because I would be fine if Zelda wants to continue in this new direction but I feel we never reached the full potential of the "OoT formula" and probably never will now, at least not in the Zelda franchise.

[@greenoffields]

Did you ever as a kid damage a jigsaw puzzle because you refused to believe this piece didn’t go there? That’s kinda how TotK felt to me: all the right pieces forced into barely the wrong spots. Gameplay, story, lore; it’s all there but often feels like it doesn’t fit together right. Even the gravity thing: imagine if gravity was normal everywhere on the surface, low everywhere in the sky, and heavy everywhere in the Depths (like you couldn’t jump or climb down there, you’re too heavy). Not only is it logical-gravity does fluctuate in real life with elevation (and other factors)-but it would make the Skies and Depths feel so alien and ortherly all by itself. It almost feels like Nintendo didn’t want to commit to anything with this game: they wanted it connected to the classic games but also not, they wanted a huge open world but made it into a bunch of disconnected playgrounds. It just kinda felt awkward.

[@javiervasquez625]

It's like a sandbox openworld but without "meat" to tie everything together feeling disjointed and unfocused in it's execution giving players 2 choices: either wander about the gameworld confused as to what they're supposed to do or just forget about there been a narrative basis to what they're doing altogether and simple scout around doing "stuff" until they happen to reach the game's credits. Both games in the Wild duology come off as sandbox entertainment by lacking any substance based narrative for players to invest in all the exploration making the games just a massive "collectacthon" where the only goal is to collect stuff with no intetest in any narrative whatsoever.

[@jameso2290]

The gravity idea you mention is genius, and it wouldn't even be hard to implement. All the code for it is already in the game, it would just need a clear design vision to have been implemented. Dang, what a missed opportunity. Think of the cool implications of higher gravity in the depths too: arrows wouldn't fly as far, and zonai contraptions might behave differently too. But also if you can't jump like on the surface, you can't do dodges or flurry rushes either - which would force you to engage in combat in the depths in a completely unique way.

[@blackchickiedee7]

Well said👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

[@hoesmad8207]

I don't wanna break It to you, but that's not logical at all. I get that It"s a fantasy World but Gravity doesn't work like that. Maybe a more logical feature would have been a damage or nausea effect because of the different pressures, but honestly that mechanic would ve probably been useless

[@greenoffields]

@hoesmad8207 That’s fair. I was mostly frustrated at how little the skies/depths had to do with the plot. 2 temples each notwithstanding, they’re mostly there just to be there. Most of my ToTK complaints have actually melted away since I posted that comment, though I still find the game somewhat underwhelming given the long development cycle. It’s not at all a bad game, but the flavor isn’t all there despite cooking for 6 years if you follow me.

[@robertgamer3112]

"I have big issues with the gameplay and the level design as well... the depths were boring, the sky was boring... they did a lot of cool stuff with the mechanics, but mechanics cannot carry an entire game." This sums up my biggest problem with the game. I mostly like Zelda for the level design and story and from a level design standpoint the game is very bland, the sky, the depths and the caves are boring, the shrines mostly have good ideas but are too short to develop those ideas into something compelling. Big quantity over quality problem. I think the dungeons are decent, but do not make up for the rest of the game. Thank you guys so much for sharing your opinions.

[@glitchy000]

Mechanics not being able to carry an entire game is such a refreshing concept to hear. I view games as a complete synergy of storytelling/writing, visuals, audio, and interactivity. Mechanics are just the means of interacting with everything else. Dropping one in favor of another misses the point. You need them ALL to make a truly great game.

[@stormcutter59]

​@@glitchy000Exactly and yet so many people will ACT like you have to choose one. It's this strangely addicting idea of duality people have, where asking for both things to be good is somehow not possible in their heads. I don't think I ever understood it

[@phillystevesteak6982]

You sort of just described the issue with massive open-world game design in general. By its very nature, it is a sacrifice of quality for quantity. But where that quality will be sacrificed depends on the game. Elden ring will never compete with the intricately weaved level design of dark souls, for instance. That would be an outrageous undertaking in an open world game

[@linkkicksu]

I never did any of the amiibo crap for BotW so when I found the Biggoron's Sword after a tricky fight in the depths it felt so good And then I learned that all the treasure is just recycled amiibo DLC and it lost the charm.

[@frostbite_1244]

What...

[@ramontavaresdacruz2256]

Yup. They kinda fucked up when it comes to making us feel rewarded. Specially about the Depths. The Depths are such a good part the less you know about it.

[@azzyiseternal4745]

it felt rewarding for someone like me, given i never had like 90% of the zelda amiibos when botw came out. so it was nice to be able to get these items without amiibos

[@ramontavaresdacruz2256]

@@azzyiseternal4745 I never had the amiibos either. The problem is, I never wanted the items they gave, but not only that, they recycled content as reward, content that they charged during BOTW through amiibos, and then laziness set in and they used assets they have made solely to sell amiibos as rewards in TOTK

[@jchud13]

@@ramontavaresdacruz2256both of these games are like that

[@biggums5]

Ganondorf being the same guy was one of the best parts about him. Totally agree, wind water Ganondorf is best Ganondorf. And no one saw the fallen time-line even coming until nintendo revealed it.

[@highdefinition450]

ever since we saw that shot of the castle rising from the ground in one of the totk trailer, i thought how cool it would be if the continent itself that we explored in botw was also raised and separated into chunks for the different regions, all at different elevations with pieces broken off and whatever. would make traversing the old map a new experience while not changing the actual contents all that much. such a missed opportunity imo, the sky should have been the focus like the trailers and tutorial implied lol. also loftwings to replace horses would have been great lmao

[@stanstanstan2597]

The depths were more interesting as a concept to me, because they aligned more with the aesthetic of the very first trailer. Sky Islands had their chance in 2011, I think they should have put all that effort into making the depths actually compelling to explore

[@rewskiem5700]

I think its bizarre that the castle floating has nothing to do with the sky islands. It should be the most obvious connection ever, but apparently there's no relation at all.

[@mishoniwanniman8321]

@@rewskiem5700 originally I thought the castle would be shot all the way into the sky and become its own low gravity sky dungeon, then eventually it'd be recalled back down to the surface or something.

[@hotgirledits2000]

1:04:09 okay legit, does anyone else remember when these games had, like... themes? in response to criticism directed at totk's story, i've seen a lot of fans claim that the zelda franchise has never had good writing, that the stories have always been bad and we're just huffing the paint fumes of nostalgia a little too hard. but i feel like this is a goofy claim to make because, like, no, these games have never had particularly complex stories, but that doesn't make them bad. i feel like the simplicity of these stories and their clarity of theme is actually what makes them so effective and memorable-- wind waker is a great example. ganondorf (the antagonist) and link & company (our protagonists) represent two conflicting sides of a thematic argument around which the whole plot turns. i've been chewing on totk's plot for months now and i'm still, like... what does rauru represent? what do our heroes believe in, and what does ganondorf believe in? i know it sounds like i'm scrutinizing this fun wacky video game too hard but these shouldn't be difficult questions to answer.

[@mrInhinyero]

as a Zelda neophyte whose first Zelda game is BOTW, this is disheartening to hear but can't help but agree. The lore hunting outside of the game made me excited to play the older games and follow a lot of Lore Hunters on YT. They made it fertile ground for connecting lores and then came up short on TOTK, which is now basically definitive evidence that they don't care as deeply about it as the Zelda community. They made the breadcrumbs so delicious and then end up showing us a stale bread :(

[@zleeven]

The reality is that zeldas lore has always been that, crumbs left for people to connect if they care. Zelda lore has never had any connectivity or consistency between games. The only time you can follow point a to point b have been from oot to mm, og to AOL, ww to ph and botw to totk. And only botw to totk have been directly connected to botw.

[@zleeven]

@user-pw2ro7gt4r yep, lore in zelda is disconnected from one game to another. none of the games follow a consitant set of rules that the lore of the first game set. to me zelda has been more of a final fantasy style. and antology series that has some connective breadcrumbs between insallments and once in a while we get a direct sequel, but never directly connected in lore or narrative. for example you can play mm then tp, go to og, then botw and finish with oot and not be lost in any of those games narratives. a cohearent zelda lore and timeline does not really exist. its what you make of it. also i think alot of people dont understand the purpose of link. link is not supose to be a real character, but your link to the world. he is the connetive tissue to the world of zelda. that is why he is name link, as in your link to the world. to me none of the youtubers shitting on totk never understood zelda in the first place, or them making zelda lore content for years kind of mess with their perseption of what zelda is.

[@mrInhinyero]

@@zleeven I'm saying even the connection between BOTW and TOTK has been very shallow to the point that you can play TOTK, totally ignore BOTW and lose almost nothing. People from BOTW not recognizing link in TOTK, the Hateno house not belonging to Link, its almost as if BOTW never happened. Thats coming from a direct sequel connection, which is what I'm talking about them not caring as much as the community does.

[@sethfeldpausch4337]

@@zleeven This is true for the most part, but the problem with TOTK is that the "crumbs" they gave us were from another type of bread entirely! They gave us a direct sequel while disregarding many of its most fundamental parts, just because they wanted to introduce new concepts. We had beautiful sour dough crumbs, and they swept them away, giving us brioche. Both taste great, but we wanted to follow the proper crumbs to the proper bread, so to speak. BOTW set up some AMAZING concepts, and TOTK just disregarded them entirely, only to replace them with something entirely different, which means neither game can build off from one another! I don't mind that the games are "crumbs" but they have to be consistent crumbs that lead into one another and resemble a piece of bread when you gather all the pieces and try to assemble a whole! Some holes in the bread here and there are fine, but completely changing the recipe in the same "bake" (timeline) just doesn't work! TOTK will always be a phenomenal game, with a baffling lack of consistent world building and a disappointing story!

[@zleeven]

but consistacy in zelda is no existing, lets take a look at oot and mm. after oot we are left with link with zelda at the castle. only to follow the next game into link looking for navi into a fever dream of a game that makes does not expand in any of the hyrule lore, zelda lore, makes the song of time alot more powerful that in the original, with things are are beyond the power of the tri-force, what is suppose to be the strongest thing in zelda base on oot. why arent all this people shitting on mm for being incosistant with the lore, or are they just picky with what they go after. lore from game to game has always been incositant for the betterment of the gameplay or narrative they are trying to tell with the game. how about i throw another example, moblins in the og where creatures created by ganon as creatures made after his image, so them existing since skyward sword makes no lore sense because ganon did not exist back them. or how about one build into the historia, the fallen timeline. why does that timeline exist, it should not exist at all as it makes not logical since. the reason why their is a split timeline is because oot created it when zelda send link to the past erasing his existance from the 7 years in the future part of oot. but that explanation does not fit in the fallen timeline as that timeline the existance of branch realities, which would make everytime you go back in mm a new branch timeline or every time you travel or die a new reality in zelda. which would mean that zelda has all timelines one person can think of. or how about we talk about all the little connective tissues in botw. botw has tissues that connects the game to all of the timelines. heck koroks exist, rito exist next to zora. giving the game a connection to all branches. or how about another inconsistant to mm. why was it not mention anywhere about mm in oot. the happy mask sell man was there. did he die in hyrule and never went to termina. if that was the case why did ganondorf not use the mask. and if evertyhing played out the same as it did in oot, but link was trap then did mm and ganondorf fought. you cant have mm existing and not be mention in oot as that was a world destroying even unless mm if not real and nothing in the game matters. or the better explanation is nintendo does not put much thought into the cohesive timeline or the expanding franchise lore but cares about the narrative and lore they tell in each game. @@sethfeldpausch4337

[@JeffreydeKogel]

People who were 12 when Ocarina of Time came out and played the original Super Mario Bros. on NES as their first videogame, represent. 🤘 It often seems like 99% of KZbin content creators I come across are at least a decade younger than me, so it's kind of refreshing to hear Monster Maze grew up in the same time period and has played a lot of the same games growing up as me. Thanks for the podcast guys!

[@Syngrafer]

It's really nice to see, yeah. I was only around 7 when I first played OOT, but it's still nice to see older people around.

[@glitchy000]

I was 12 when I played OoT in 2001. I grew up with my parent's old consoles so I played games older than I was so when my peers were playing SM64, I was just getting my hands on SMB3.

[@phillystevesteak6982]

Das me! First gane duck hunt/mario. First game to blow my mind: oot

[@thomasbruce4990]

If Nintendo is actually listening to us, let's make a big deal about being tired of it not making sense. We play these games because we love the characters and the story. My biggest gripe about tears is how they purposely muddled everything.

[@enternamehere142]

They ain’t listening

[@quintonhoffert6526]

Nintendo is almost certainly not listening to us. Japanese (game) companies in general tend not to listen to their Western fanbases. Some do, of course, but Nintendo is among the more conservative Japanese game developers and it's very likely they look for feedback only from their Japanese audience. Now, I don't know the Japanese Zelda fanbase at all. Maybe they're also screaming their heads off about lore stuff and it will be fixed next game. I don't know. However, I think it's extremely unlikely that anything will change unless the Japanese community is up in arms. Like, by all means, if you want to make a big deal of your hatred of BotW/TotK then go ahead. I'm just some guy on the internet, I can't stop you. But don't think that your gripes here will make it to Nintendo of Japan. The people who responsible for the upper end decisions for these games either speak very little English, or no English at all, so unless the Japanese Zelda community is similarly upset they won't see your perspective. There's always hope though.

[@lk_3099]

Nintendo sadly don't care for story, it usually takes one creative forcing themselves into them to even feature more meaty story. And it doesn't usually pan out. They're gameplay first, story later. Most of their best stories are made by outside developers.

[@SENATORPAIN1]

Seriously what story? What ever thin veiled story Zelda does have they have been telling for over 30 yrs.

[@lk_3099]

@@SENATORPAIN1 Alright, I wouldn't go that far. What does thin veiled mean in this case? If it's the general idea of a hero saving a loved one from a dark villain, a lot of stories follow this format. Way more than you'd think.

[@UltimateTobi]

Yes, in Skyward Sword, when you looked up, you had a regular sky (some clouds, some free areas/blue sky). So it was, as MM says, a "one-way mirror"; obscured from above, see-through/regular from below. And of course you can see down below from up-top in TotK, because by then the barrier is dispelled. Everything's visible from below and above. If that is intended or not, we don't know. But coincidentally, at least, it fits the lore Skyward Sword established. Bolson not knowing Link is also weird, while Hudson recognizes you. You *have* to have met and worked with Bolson for Hudson knowing you making sense.

[@javiervasquez625]

My one guess as to Bolson's amnesia is that unlike Hudson who owed Link a lot after founding Tarry Town and matchmaking him with Rhondson Bolson never had such a close relation to justify him getting to know Link personally that he would remember his name. I see Bolson as someone who only ever saw Link as a potential costumer for that one house he was tearing appart 6 years ago hence why he has no idea who Link is.

[@smileyjojo4913]

A samurai jack style metroid movie sounds like the hardest thing imaginable actually. But i think thats the kinda project youll only see created by fans and not officially licensed.

[@javiervasquez625]

Only way to make a Metroid movie is by copying Other M and we all know that's going to suck if Samus is portrayed as an emotionless PTSD ridden Mary Sue protagonist who monologue the entire money while blowing away monsters.

[@Veo87]

I'll leave a second comment about what bothered me in TotK's story. In BotW, you can unlock the story cutscenes in any order you want. This was alright in that game because the story or context those cutscenes give didn't need to be seen in a particular order and seeing those cutscenes doesn't change anything about what Link is doing or ought to do. TotK doesn't do this as well though. Like Ratatoskr said in another video of his, it's like they wanted to tell a story that requires seeing it chronologically to make complete sense, but still wanted to give players the freedom to unlock it in any order, but that causes issues. The problem is that seeing things in a particular order creates a dissonance between how we'd EXPECT Link to act given what he now knows and how he does, in fact, act in game. For example, Link and many NPC's are putting in a lot of time and effort in the story to find Zelda. People are heavily invested in knowing what happened to her so they can find her. If you finish all of the Geoglyph tear memories BEFORE you finish all of the Regional Phenomena/Sage quests, then Link knows EXACTLY what happened to Zelda and where she is now. Given this, you'd EXPECT Link to tell someone what he now knows. However, he doesn't. He doesn't tell anyone until after you finish getting Mineru, the 5th sage, so Link just goes around like he's along for the ride and has no effect on anything, letting everyone chase dead-ends. "Oh, is that Zelda over there?! Oh no, she shouldn't go that way! We need to go there and stop her!" Link should say "Nope, not Zelda." But he just seemingly shrugs his shoulders and lets things happen without his input. I know we don't hear Link, but he does speak, so it's frustrating that he doesn't say anything. To be fair, after you get the Master sword, you can find Impa back at those ruins with the map of the geoglyphs on the ground and Link will tell her what happened to Zelda if you speak to her. But Link should have also at least told Purah, Sidon, and some others what he knows. The fact that he doesn't makes him either look like he's stupid, or an asshole, or completely ineffectual. As far as I can tell, this dissonance is avoided if you do all of the sage quests BEFORE you do the Geoglyph memories. However, the freedom the game gives the player means a lot of people won't do things in that order. As an extra thought, this is one reason why I don't like the idea of Link being a "self-insert character." This may have worked in the older, simpler 2D games, but in the 3D games where Link has a bit more of his own character, motivations, and backstory, I don't understand how I'm supposed to "insert myself" into Link (don't take that out of context). The things I ranted about above are a good example. If I knew where Zelda was, I'd TELL people. The fact that Link doesn't do what I want makes it impossible for me to treat him completely like an avatar that represents my actions in the world. I'll also make it clear that there are one or two cutscenes in TotK that I thought were the best and most emotional story scenes in any Zelda game I've played. I also think that Zelda is a certified badass in the BotW/TotK story, so there are things that I like about the story in TotK. It just has these major flaws that are hard to ignore.

[@theoaremevano3227]

"The things I ranted about above are a good example. If I knew where Zelda was, I'd TELL people. The fact that Link doesn't do what I want makes it impossible for me to treat him completely like an avatar that represents my actions in the world." ^This exactly. People might say that if Link had explicit character in some scenes, it would contradict their interpretation and ruin the connection, but I find that in some cases, him NOT reacting poses the same problem. Unfortunately, when presented in full 3D, there's just no way to avoid it, so I'd prefer Link to just show his character than not.

[@aidanvanstraaten8251]

I’m glad someone finally said it feels like a dlc, and I’m not saying this to say that it’s a small or bad game. Traditionally, dlcs are additive experiences (new map, new enemies, new weapons/abilities, maybe even new mechanics but core mechanics left unchanged), whereas sequels are iterative experiences (core mechanics changed). TotK almost never iterates, and only adds, just like a dlc. The only thing that was actually changed rather than just added on top are the champion abilities, and it’s not like those are core to the experience.

[@blackchickiedee7]

And I think that's my biggest problem or gripe with TotK. Nintendo shouldn't charge $70 for DLC, slap a new title on the game and say "hey, here's a sequel/Entirely new game" I've noticed they been doing that for years and it needs to stop. It's not fair and I can understand now why some people who are gamers don't mess with Nintendo

[@marielcarey4288]

I actually loved the stealth sequence in Eldin Volcano when you lose all your gear. It shakes up the gameplay and actually one of the few times youre glad to be back with Fi

[@jacobkirk1846]

I remember as a kid feeling so hurt as a kid walking into ruined Castle Town for the first time in OoT as adult Link that I ended up resetting my save to try and undo the damage.

[@viljamtheninja]

Ocarina of Time fucked me up when I first finished it as a kid because it was not a perfectly simple happy ending. It ends with Link going back in time, and that made me start thinking about things I otherwise wouldn't about time, causality, feelings and accomplishments and probably a whole lot else. Kid me started thinking wait, going back in time at the end, that means Zelda and no one else knows what happened in the future? And so on. It broke me in a similar way to the legendary and hugely underrated game Illusion of Gaia (aka Illusion of Time).

[@LevantineR1]

Illusion of Gaia was on a whole other level.

[@viljamtheninja]

@@LevantineR1 YES! So sad that no one ever talks about it, one of the greatest games I've ever played.

[@ShallBePurified]

All the pre BotW 3D Zelda games had some kind of loss. Link didn't get a perfect ending. He always ended up losing something. But with BotW and TotK, nothing was lost. There was no message to take away from the story. If Zelda stayed a dragon, or if Link no longer had his right arm after Rauru exhausted his Deus Ex Machina powers to recall Zelda back into a human, then at least that would've been something. But no, Link gets his arm back and Zelda comes back with no memories of her being a dragon or facing the consequences of turning into one.

[@licota11]

​@@ShallBePurifiedI have to disagree on your BotW take, the entire game, from my perspective, is about recovering from and "getting over" loss. 100 years lost, countless lives lost, relationships shattered, it's why the cutscene of the champions bringing Ganon to half HP felt so cathartic to me.

[@glitchy000]

@@licota11 But, from my perspective and as a player, I never lost anything with Link. All that happened before the game started. I got to know Midna before she left forever. Same with Tatl or Navi. BotW didn't have the same sting since it began long after it was over and we don't have any opportunity to interact with Zelda or any meaningful characters at all.

[@Doodoovessel]

About the point of Zelda totk being glorified DLC and just being born from too many ideas. Mario Galaxy 2 was born in a similar fashion, they literally had so many ideas for an expansion for the first game they just made it into a whole sequel. The thing about Mario,m is that he is not shackled by story or expectations. Mario is just Mario, Zelda in the other hand is just different. This game definitely fealt like an expansion of the first game, and the lack of content in the sky island and depth just rubs me the wrong way. It feels like They literally created the ultra hand and recall and were like welp now we have to make a whole game just for these powers.

[@dante19890]

Yeah, Totk is just way too similar without its own identity like the other 3d zelda games. Totk is just an improved botw 6 years later that replaces it rather than standing on its own like Majoras mask did to Ocarina of time.

[@felipe970421]

I was actually somewhat disappointed by Galaxy 2 replacing Rosalina and the Comet Planetarium with that Patrick Star looking guy and a planetoid in the shape of Mario's face. Rosalina added a lot of mystique to the experience and she had an unexpectedly powerful story hidden away where Miyamoto wouldn't find it.

[@FullyOnVolks]

The difference between galaxy and new Zelda is that galaxy is essentially a platformer. It’s not an open world game. All they have to do is make NEW platform areas and it works, and it did, galaxy 2 is known as better than galaxy 1 and nobody calls it dlc. Totk on the other hand puts you in the exact same world with not much change. They’re not credible comparisons, hence why people already don’t like TotK a few months after release

[@theoaremevano3227]

@@felipe970421 : That's the thing, even though Mario generally doesn't put much on story, people still found MG2's scenario of "So Mario Galaxy kinda pseudo-happens again, but with a lot of things/characters gone this time" disappointing, so there was very little reason to think a Zelda would not be affected by this.

[@glitchy000]

@@felipe970421 Agreed. Galaxy 2 may have had better levels, but I still play SMG1 specifically because of Rosalina and her story (as well as that music!).

[@joshvolk5832]

Big thank you to you three. Its been isolating to see most of the community just pretend like nothing is wrong with the franchise. Hearing you guys address this has been cathartic

[@wunder4402]

The fact that they dont even mention malice in totk can be used to generally sum up most issues with totk's internal continuity

[@robinita46853]

Great conversations guys, so cool to hear. It sounds like for the question “was it always like this?” Bandit says that botw was a lore rich intentional game and MM says that in hindsight botw was pretty empty easter eggs. I’m definitely in the MM camp. I hope I see these guys on the other side of a new trailer. Legacy theories are the best imo and im so over the botw/totk era that I just feel relief and hope for something super different next time!

[@TaliesinMyrddin]

I definitely think BotW was just empty easter eggs. They said it was up to players to determine the timeline placement - they washed their hands of it. In making BotW they didn't care about a timeline, they just needed a ton of names to reuse for some semblance of a Hyrule that might be vaguely familiar.

[@joshuatealeaves]

I was in the finishing hours of my Witcher 3 platinum grind. This podcast got me over the finish line. Thanks boys 👍🏻

[@bagelenjoyer3437]

Tw3 is amazing

[@Nova-gh5yr]

All Im hearing is we need to let Koizumi cook again. I wouldnt say Fujibayashi is bad but he tends to be spotty. Botw is possibly the best thing he made, it is the most solid game. SS is good, I love it, but there are some baffling flaws. I dont think I need to talk about totk as the whole video sums up it's problems and even then there are some you guys haven't touched on. He did direct the capcom games and they are good. Nothing mind-blowing but theyre good. Koizumi though, he added whatever story was in ALTTP. MM and LA are excellent in their themes and are games thay really make you feel and think. And you can tell how much he cares about story since in other series like Mario, for Mario Galaxy he was the one to add story to the game much to Miyamoto's dismay. I feel like anytime he's allowed to create, it turns out great.

[@jordangonzalez4658]

Skyward sword story is amazing imo. But please make more of these I can listen to you guys talk Zelda forever.

[@javiervasquez625]

They should join ZeldaMaster and Zeltik's new podcast channel.

[@Obeliiix]

Skyward Sword's story: "Thank you Link (sort of, not even, quite the opposite actually...), but your princess is in another temple!". : |

[@rakshithanand8262]

@@Obeliiix I actually quite liked that twist, since it isn't that Zelda is held captive elsewhere or that the enemy moved her, but rather that she's got her own journey to go on separate from yours. Impa more or less tells you "Git gud, scrub. Once you're toughened up, THEN you get to meet Zelda". I actually thought we'd be getting playable Zelda for a while because of that.

[@navpun1989]

I think the entirety of TotK should have taken place in the sky. Link spends the whole game in the sky regaining strength to finally pierce the cloud barrier to go fight Ganondorf. Would leave the slightly altered overworld as a complete bonus to the game rather than requiring the player to retread old ground to complete it. If you really want to keep the depths in there, make the shrines in the sky lead to areas underground via teleportation. Would have been miles better.

[@javiervasquez625]

It would have made sense had Ganondorf actually _conquered_ Hyrule at the start of the game tasking Link with spending time on the sky islands powering up so that THEN he would return to the surface in order to reclaim all the lands bellow from Ganondorf's control by exploring dungeons integral to his hold over said regions which also connect to the many areas within the Depths. Had the story been about reclaiming Hyrule from Ganondorf's control while he's busy powering up elsewhere the story would have been far more engaging than what we got.

[@FullyOnVolks]

@@javiervasquez625exactly. There’s no sense threat at all in totk. Nothing has even gone wrong in the world apart from the castle being raised up by gassy kool aid

[@Deletetarek]

@@FullyOnVolksthat’s just objectively untrue. Idk if hate bandwagoning has clouded your memory but the regional phenomena and the gloom to a lesser extent are explicit threats to the world in TotK, more so than any other threats in prior Zeldas with the exception of the moon in MM.

[@ogelpeace4610]

Agreed. I wanted to go to space to fight ganon 😂

[@javiervasquez625]

@@ogelpeace4610 Next game should be called "Super Zelda Galaxy" with Hylia acting as Link's Rosalina as Ganondorf kidnaps Zelda in his path to conquer the entire universe.

[@skywrd_]

these sort of videos are so healing lmao

[@lmnt66]

Thank you guys for the badly-needed catharsis! I‘ve been hoping for this kind of episode for a while now. I like the core idea of openness but it should not come at the cost of the series' established staples, i.e. complex and varied puzzles, a more involved soundtrack and storytelling. So while I‘m not getting my hopes up after being burned twice now, I am curious to see if/how Nintendo will improve on these lacking core aspects.

[@MagillanicaLouM]

Yeah. I was excited for botw but pretty much on release day watching others play for a good while I realized something was off. Wasn't excited for Tears but willing to lend an ear towards any positive news that it would do better at marrying this freedom open world concept with the shit that makes a Zelda game a Zelda game, but it seems like it's mostly just surface level half assed efforts they did to make fans like us bite the line for a bit before realizing that it's just surface level half assed efforts. What I love about Zelda is in the past and hopefully at least any new 2d releases. Not gonna bother with the new 3d direction though. Other folks can have their fun but this isn't the same series I vibe with anymore

[@livchamps9573]

so nice to listen to three chill guys with chill voices.

[@javiervasquez625]

ASMR Zelda collab.

[@highdefinition450]

a town in the depths and in the sky would havr added so much imo lol. like a zonai town and a monster town with actual people and shops or something lmao

[@janeenschultz8502]

A monster town would give more reason for getting the monster masks.

[@javiervasquez625]

Add an Oocca Town in the sky and Mogma Town in the Depths and you got yourself a marked comment by the channel owner.

[@viktorthevictor6240]

@@janeenschultz8502 Dude, that's a great idea. We got that with the Yiga hideout, but a monster town would be amazing

[@richardhambel648]

It's all worse when put into perspective: Nintendo had: -6 years to make the game -Started from an already finished and polished game -Virtually infinite resources -Over 1000 people working on the game -Some of the best talent and long-time veterans in the industry -Experience with making about 20 previous Zelda games under their belt When I take all that into consideration, there is no excuse for the laziness put into TOTK. Nothing is "too hard" for a development team in their position. Too hard to write a story that connects with the previous games? Too hard to add underwater exploration? Too hard to make 7 or 8 dungeons as complex and dynamic as traditional dungeons? Too hard to create an entirely new overworld map with a completely different topography? "Too hard" does not make sense here and is only an excuse for indie devs, new small studios, or if there's just a year to make the game. Honestly I feel like there was some kind of development hell going on behind the curtains that will be revealed or leaked to us in the future.

[@FullyOnVolks]

Miyamoto was absent for a large part of development due to working on the Mario movie and came back late in the game’s cycle. Seems to matchup time wise with when the game got delayed in 2022. He was probably appalled at what he saw and forced them to redo & add many things. With Aonuma at the leader position of this series, I honestly am not against the idea that Zelda as a whole is a dead franchise walking. This game was so lazy and created with so little love under these developers that if they remain there, it’s not going to improve whatsoever. I won’t be surprised to hear that the next game is in the same Hyrule again, I would almost bet on it.

[@natearts]

Hey, I just want to say in regards to the comments at 2:19:31, regarding TOTK not having the same word-of-mouth legs as BOTW, that rings true of my experience. I'm a pretty casual gamer, more of a TV and movies kind of a guy. My best friend BEGGED me to play BOTW, for years. I've never had anyone beg me to play a videogame before. And it wasn't just an isolated incident-- so many of my friends were just all in agreement that one **had** to play this game. And BOTW was incredible for all the reasons you've outlined. I came for the open world, I stayed for the lore. And I don't hear anyone saying the same thing about TOTK. And honestly, TOTK just feels like a chore, and it's because nothing I do in the game matters. It's just... a sandbox of mechanics. Love your content, thanks again.

[@1996Stein]

I about lost my mind when Ganon addressed Link and Zelda by name at the beginning of the game Then I i found the sealing cut scene and was like.... Oh.... Nvm i guess lol

[@boo-rian2717]

Random comment: For your section talking about Ganondorf and why he was cool, I think the ultimate validation of that thinking is actually in the Subspace Emissary of Super Smash Bros. Brawl. You've got Ganondorf in that being the one giving the orders to Bowser as Master Hand's chosen villain, cementing him as a cross-Nintendo big bad. Then he betrays Bowser because of course he does, realizes that Master Hand has been beaten and is getting puppeted by Tabuu, and then had the GUMPTION to go heck with this and challenge Tabuu all by himself. And while it didn't work, he managed to do enough damage to temporarily knock Master Hand free. That is a Ganondorf who clearly commanded the respect of the team behind Smash Bros at that time. This new incarnation of Ganondorf I don't think would command that level of respect.

[@jfm5864]

Sakurai is a huge OoT fanboy. If you look at just how much OoT stuff made into Melee plus the fact that he brought back Ganondorf's OoT design in Ultimate for seemingly no reason beyond him liking it better shows how much of an impact that game had on him.

[@BioAlpha5]

OH ONE MORE THING! In Skyward Sword the regular sky is blue with some clouds here and there. So the Cloud Barrier is invisible. But if you go high up enough like in Twilight Princess you can reach it as theres an entire dungeon up there. with what looks like a cloud barrier. Monster Maze is right when he said its a oneway mirror. obscured from above, invisible to the naked eye from below. And thanks to the Upheaval in TotK, the barrier is dispelled and everything is visible from below and above to everyone! it fits the established lore in 4 games, Skyward Sword, Twilight Princess, Tears of the Kingdom and even Breath of the Wild due to the Dragons going into what looks like a portal in the sky when you shoot them with an arrow. They are going past the barrier, just like Zelda does in the memory cutscene.

[@coocola6076]

So many things are so weird. Just now I went to Muzu and he said "King Dorephan is resting. Regardless, you cannot be trusted...." Like what did I do? Didn't I save Zora's Domain in BotW? It's like the two games aren't even connected. It rubs me the wrong way fr fr.

[@prettyoriginalnameprettyor7506]

Muzu literally apologises in botw and its like he hasn't even changed

[@javiervasquez625]

My guess would be he just doesn't Link regardless of what he does for the Domain and kingdom at large hence the lack of courtesy and kindness towards the most proactive individual in the whole franchise.

[@infinitecurlie]

53:01 I can't believe people actually say that. 😂 If it didn't matter then...Why does Majoras Mask opens with a small recap of Ocarina Of Time? It's becauee it's a direct sequel. Then at the end of Majoras Mask the skull kid says Link smells like the boy from the forest that he knew. They didn't have to put that there. But they did because it's a connection. Wind Waker opens with a recap of OOT and what happened when the hero left (for MM) and how that led to Hyrule being drowned. There are references like when the king of red lions is talking to Jabun about how WW Link is just a dude and he's not connected to the legendary hero. (Im pretty sure but I'm digging through 10 year old memories lol) Which then WW goes into Phantom Hourglass which then goes to Spirit Tracks. I just couldn't. I would seriously ban someone from the channel for saying something like that. Nintendo is the one who made the timeline, they made the games connect, nobody forced them to do it. And now suddenly in TOTK they want to go oh it doesn't matter? No way man. That was just lazy storytelling.

[@Mechadeuce]

I wonder how many Zelda games the people who constantly regurgitate this nonsense have actually played.

[@quintonhoffert6526]

Maybe other people are making that argument, in which case I'd agree it's a bad argument, but I'm on the side opposite Rata and co and I think my argument is being misconstrued. I do think that Zelda lore is both not that important to the Zelda team now, and that it's never been that important to them, but I don't think that means that they didn't create the timelines. Of course they did. They've flat-out said that certain games are direct sequels to other games (the chain of Wind Waker, Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks comes to mind). Obviously some of the games have continuity with other ones, and obviously the Zelda team created those games with the express intention of them having continuity. That fact isn't in contention. The thing I think Rata and co are wrong about is the idea that said continuity was intended to go somewhere. For sure each game had themes, and many of those themes work retroactively, but I honestly don't believe that Nintendo created the Zelda franchise with the express intention of having a vast, interconnected lore for lifelong fans to piece together like a giant Dark Souls puzzle. A lot of themes stay consistent but enough narrative details get lost or changed game to game that I think that you could level the same kind of complaint being leveled here at TotK at most of the other games and have it still feel just as valid. Let's take OoT to Wind Waker as an example of what I mean. OoT establishes that the six temples (Light, Forest, Fire, Water, Shadow and Spirit) were the domains of the six sages, with Zelda being the secret seventh sage. Nowhere in that list is an Earth or a Wind temple mentioned, nor does it fit anywhere obvious into the geography of OoT Hyrule. It's not necessarily out of the question that the people of Hyrule would also revere the Earth and the Winds, but it's definitely weird that two temples major enough that Ganondorf would spend the effort to corrupt them and fill them with monsters to ward them from the Hero's quest wouldn't be major places featured in OoT even if they weren't explorable. It also begs the question of why the Mirror Shield and the Hookshot would be found within them, when the Mirror Shield was the sacred treasure of the Gerudo held within the Spirit Temple and the Hookshot wasn't even a dungeon item at all. Furthermore, at the end of Wind Waker Ganondorf has an entire giant castle filled with monsters and traps, only a few minutes walk from Hyrule Castle. Even if we agree that the distance is abridged and that in true geometry they're much further apart, Ganondorf never had that kind of giant castle in OoT. Rather, Hyrule Castle WAS Ganondorf's castle full of monsters and traps, and that castle should have gone away when Zelda sent Link back in time and thus retconned the future. Yet Ganondorf's Castle is clearly a different location in Wind Waker since Hyrule Castle is a separate location and is sealed away from time by the Triforce's power. Another good example is Skyward Sword to Link to the Past. This one is a bit weird because SS came out so far in the future after LttP, but I think it fits my narrative even better because of it. As Rata is fond of pointing out, LttP's lore states that the Master Sword was created by the Seven Sages of LttP specifically to defend against Ganondorf, the thief who had broken into the Sacred Realm, stolen the Triforce, and turned himself into Ganon, the King of Evil. Clearly, however, SS retcons this since we create the Master Sword through SS Link's trials within the second set of dungeons. The Master Sword is no longer a sacred weapon created to slay Ganon, it's instead a symbolic representation of the Hero himself, as Link creates it by imbuing both the blade and himself with the essence of Courage, Wisdom and Power. As you can see, the Zelda team wasn't interested in upholding obscure pieces of lore: they wanted to create an origin story for the series, so they had it be the origin story for the Master Sword as well, and to hell with LttP's explanation. Yet another example is the state of the Shiekah in OoT versus the other games. While the Shiekah have always been guardians and protectors of the Hylian Royal Family, and by extension the Goddess Hylia, OoT portrayed them as a very dark Hylian Secret Service that surreptitiously carried out torture and assassinations for the King of Hyrule. The Shadow Temple is, in fact, their secret lair where they carried out such brutal and inhumane acts, and the monsters that filled it as a dungeon were the restless spirits of those who died in its depths, put to use by Ganondorf. This is extremely dark lore and is otherwise completely out of place for the Shiekah, who have now featured in a number of Zelda games and always as generically good servants of the realm. Even in BotW, where there IS a brutal, surreptitious Shiekah group that carries out torture and assassinations, it's made clear that it's an evil offshoot called the Yiga that branched off from the noble and honorable Shiekah who peacefully complied with the will of the kingdom. At least one lore KZbinr (I think it was Monster Maze but I know Zeltik also made a video on it) made a long-form lore analysis of the lore of the Shadow Temple and the OoT Shiekah, yet nothing has come of that lore and it's almost certain that nothing will. Much like the Master Sword lore, it was clearly retconned by the other games, since if Nintendo cared about the lore of the Shiekah being ruthless torturers and assassins they would have at least left hints in another game about the group's dark side. This is what I (and, I expect, people like me) mean when they say "the players created the lore, not Nintendo." Obviously Nintendo literally wrote the lore and created the Hyrule Historia timeline, but the fanbase imbued it with significance that Nintendo never intended. Yes, the games are meant to fit together in an order, but there was never intended to be a Dark Souls-esque greater picture that fans could piece together to create a full, coherent vision for the whole Zelda universe. Each game is, first and foremost, intended to be a game, not a new lore entry, and Nintendo as a whole are gameplay-first developers, not story-first developers. Again, this doesn't mean they didn't focus at all on the stories, or on how they connected together, but it does mean that there isn't a "godbook" sitting in Aonuma's office painstakingly connecting every random bit of lore from every Zelda game like there is in Miyazaki's office for the Dark Souls universe. A lot of references in the Zelda games in general are just references, and Nintendo isn't afraid to retcon stuff without explicitly saying "X is being retconned, the new lore is Y." The references are nice nods to players who have been with the series for the long haul and will recognize things from previous games, but they're just references. Nintendo isn't combing through a giant lore document to make sure all the background lore they add to their games fits the lore that came before: Zelda KZbinrs are the ones doing that. I'm definitely not saying they shouldn't; I myself love fanfiction and read more of it than regular fiction, and I don't think lore KZbinrs should stop making theories if doing so makes them happy (and, more cynically, if it makes them money). But I really don't think that Nintendo has ever put much thought into the background lore of the Zelda series beyond the obvious ways in which the games fit together. Fan theories about the greater Zelda lore can be very fun but I think it's dangerous (to your enjoyment of the franchise) to convince yourself that obscure background lore and references are anything more than world-building and fun references for long-time players to recognize and enjoy. Nintendo didn't create the lore for that purpose, the fans did.

[@Mechadeuce]

@@quintonhoffert6526 I don't believe anyone out there actually thinks they have some grand George Lucas style plan for a timeline, nor do I think people believe Nintendo has some kind of lore keeper at their offices in Kyoto. I think we're just upset that they _don't_ at this stage. Like, what's the point of them constantly rewriting things, if they're just going to ignore or even throw it out two games down the line. And as a bit of a counter against what you said regarding Wind Waker, I think your point about stuff like the new temples/sages or even the overall geography being largely ignored by the community, is actually exactly why I don't think them trying to stick to the timeline would really affect the gameplay aspect of development much at all. Because the Zelda community as a whole is pretty understanding about changes being made specifically to make for a better gameplay experience. Geography being the biggest example, 'cause whether it be Hyrule Castle, The Temple of Time, Lake Hylia, Death Mountain or Spectacle Rock, the devs will put them wherever the hell they need them to be, and we'll just sit there, smile, point at the reference and say "cool". And you know what? That's A-Okay in my book. (And you gotta admit, the new lore do be kinda ass. The Zonai were poorly executed. The new Ganondorf was the flattest villain in the series, and the Secret Stones are easily the worst magical McGuffin they've ever made.)

[@pockyboxes5902]

​​@@quintonhoffert6526 I think you hit the nail on the head regarding Nintendo's nonchalance connecting Zelda games, even ones that are told to be in the "same" kingdom like OoT and TP/WW. I think the term "spiritual sequel" is a better description, because clearly these worlds are a little bit different, a little bit nostalgic/familiar, but there's a plausible, kind of playful throughline in all of them. None of that applies to TotK though, because it's _exactly_ the same Hyrule as BotW, with the same princess and hero and the same world we've explored 100 times over since 2017. We know that Hyrule and it's inhabitants front to back. But rather than making the full-blown sequel you'd expect from _returning_ to that same Hyrule, TotK instead tries to fit it into that "spiritual sequel" mode. But it doesn't work because again, a lot of us know this version of Hyrule better than our own backyards, and we can tell that things are wonky for what is supposed to be _the same place_ , just a scant 3-5 years removed from BotW.

[@LittleBeanGreen]

You know, I have similar feelings about this game and I've been listening to others air their grievances. It seems like the consensus is that TotK is hollow. There is so much to do but there are no stakes, none of it REALLY matters, that it all seems meaningless. Where is the hero? I hope we find him soon.

[@Aktedya1-jt7vw]

It's like Minecraft, except it's *trying* to have the story and quests of a traditional game.

[@LittleBeanGreen]

@@Aktedya1-jt7vw Nintendo should let Minecraft be Minecraft and Zelda be Zelda

[@pancito8292]

Fujibayashi is the problem. All of the games he directed tends to disregard any connection to the old lore of the series. Even worse, three of the games he directed were the first one in the timeline for a time (Minish Cap, Skyward Sword and now TotK). They need an actual writter or to bring Koizumi back.

[@FullyOnVolks]

Yep. Koizumi must come back. Dude made super Mario galaxy all on his own and never directed again, he also had a big hand in majoras mask and its dark elements. He needs to come back asap

[@SoulsOfWisdom]

You guys talking about your first Zelda game. Now I am just suddenly realizing my first Zelda experience was the cartoon. 😂

[@viktorthevictor6240]

Mine was hyrule warriors on wii u xD

[@HezakHQ]

i literally just got finished watching Bandit's video. this was perfect timing. xD

[@marielcarey4288]

Similar lol, I watched his video, went to bed, woke up a bit ago and this video was at the top of my recommended.

[@Night_Quest]

same, was looking forward to this

[@timh6647]

Same

[@annaghost]

I’m sooo glad you guys talked about the inconsistency with the sky islands. It’s so frustrating. In the game they say they raised the temple of time up to protect link (also um how??? With whose power??) BUT whenever you do those diving through rings quests the robot tells the player that it’s an ancient competition that the zonai did- and we know the zonai came from the sky!!! So the sky islands had to be up there before they raised the temple!! I just don’t get what Nintendo was thinking

[@javiervasquez625]

Maybe some of the islands were from the ancient Zonai civilization Era while the Temple of Time and Great Sky Island were purposely lifted by Mineru to assist Link when the time was right. I'm still confused as to wether the Zonai literally came "from the sky" by living in floating islands or if they actually came from Outer Space aliens style so it's very much a mystery wether all the sky islands were lifted from the ground or if some always existed in the first place.

[@quintonhoffert6526]

@@javiervasquez625 I think it's unlikely that the Zonai came from outer space. After all, the Rito quest heavily suggested that the ancient Rito helped a Zonai lord return to his/her home, and that the Stormwind Ark was a gift to the Rito for their aid. The Rito have to breathe like everyone else in Hyrule, and the flying ships surrounding the Ark don't have any obvious insulation to keep in air in a vacuum, so it's really unlikely that they would have been able to carry the Zonai of legend outside of the atmosphere even if we accept that their ships could travel that high. I could be wrong, since it's been a while since I played TotK, but I believe Rauru and Mineru also said they had family who remained in the sky while they decided to descend. Combined with the numerous remains of houses we find on various sky islands, this would further suggest that the Zonai lived in the sky. Of course, Zelda also just tells us that it's the case during the opening. I think it's most likely that the Zonai civilization originally did live in the sky and they died out over time. We know that there were Zonai around in Hyrule as late as the last sealing of Calamity Ganon since the Ancient Hero's Aspect armor shows the Ancient Hero to have been a Zonai. Considering that the Zonai lore in BotW suggested them to be a brutal and barbaric race, I think there's a good chance that their civilization declined at some nebulous point in time and they lost access to their homes in the sky and their advanced technology. The same sort of thing happened to the Beastmen of Farum Azula in Elden Ring, another ancient, advanced bestial race who lived in the sky whose culture eventually declined, in this case to the point of losing most of their heritage and mentally reverting to a more animalistic level of culture. In this case, they likely retained some degree of technological prowess but were unable to return to the sky. After all, if they already had homes in the sky and could return at any point, why build stuff on the ground level?

[@javiervasquez625]

@@quintonhoffert6526 Beautifully said and well thought out. This all becomes even more headscratching when you remember the _other_ sky faring races of the Zelda world: the Minish from The Minish Cap and Oocca (or Skypeople in Japan) from Twilight Princess. With so many god-like races seemingly hailing from the heavens above one wonders how crowded all those sky islands must have been with so many civilizations living in the same place before conveniently descending into the surface world at specific intervals so that neither the Minish, Oocca or Zonai would bump into eachother on their way to become the next mysterious race to replace the one before. I'm starting to wonder if Nintendo even cares about addressing this issue regarding the many races originating from the sky or if they simply don't care as they continue to rehash the same concept over and over and over again. Anyway haha thank you for this comment.

[@quintonhoffert6526]

@@javiervasquez625 I doubt Nintendo particular cares, but in this case it's a moot point anyway. BotW and TotK take place so long after the other games in the series that even the 10,000 years in the past that the Zonai stuff and first iteration of Calamity Ganon take place in is still tens of thousands of years after the other games in the series. Those games all take place in the "Era of Legends," a time when the histories of what happened have, fittingly, lost so much context that all that's left is vague legends about the Heroes and their most famous acts. In the BotW/TotK era, the Minish and the Oocca are almost certainly long gone, much in the same way that any human civilization that existed more than 10,000 years ago IRL are certainly long gone. I'm also going to guess that neither will ever return to Zelda canon regardless, even if the next game takes place in the Era of Legends again. The Minish were created by Capcom, since Minish Cap was a Capcom game rather than a Zelda team game. They did a great job creating a Zelda game but Nintendo might choose not to bring back the Minish since they're technically a third-party creation. They also might be legally barred from doing so: I have no idea what the IP contracts are like in regards to Minish Cap vs the rest of the Zelda games, but it's possible that Nintendo doesn't actually own the rights to the Minish. The Oocca are much simpler: they just aren't popular. People didn't like them in TP, they were weird and broke the tone of the setting a bit, and there's no real lore for them other than that they somehow had a city in the sky even if the proportions of that city were obviously built for humanoids rather than weird foot-tall chicken people. I bet you that a good chunk of the Zelda fanbase doesn't even remember that the Oocca existed. Popular characters get brought back (even when they really shouldn't be); unpopular characters stay buried in the past and the best they can hope for is a passing reference to their existence.

[@UndyingNephalim]

Pretty amazing hearing these sentiments. You guys are spot on about almost everything you bring up here. There is one contention I have though, and it's all of your claims about Skyward Sword. Skyward Sword is absolutely a massive retcon and completely changed the established origin of the Master Sword and even weirdly random and specific things like where the name Hylian came from. That game was also headed by Fujibayashi.

[@caravaneerkhed]

I have young childhood memories of just living in ocarina of times world, I played it for years, not able to get very far, so I would restart a lot and run around kokiri forest, take a shower in the waterfall, and run around and play on the fences by the tutorial area, and just kinda exist in the village without actually progressing. I specifically remember I didn’t like the way the shield looked on links back, so I always avoided progressing through the dungeon because of that, and also the deku trees mouth freaked me out. And then I was too scared to fight gohma

[@ZeldasMask]

I’m SO glad these conversations are taking place. I love Zelda to death but honestly it deserves to be critiqued like all other games otherwise the games will get worse

[@glitchy000]

Isn't it weird that the Wild Era is a trilogy of sorts (BotW, AoC, and TotK) and none of them are canon to each other?

[@Nova-gh5yr]

I was thinking about that. It's kinda sad tbh how the prequel and sequel to botw both seem to disregard the game they are based on.

[@wiremesh2]

Re: “Lynchian” storytelling: I’ve recently been watching the Dark Souls “Making of” videos by DondonRV and learned that even though Miyazaki has a “lore bible” of sorts, he refuses to share it because he enjoys letting people theorize and piece things together. Apparently he will even limit the artists/designers on the team to differing bits and pieces, giving them some freedom of interpretation.

[@javiervasquez625]

Lol it only Aonuma and Fujibayashi could be THAT commited to their craft to keep such a coherent Lore bible for them Zelda games.

[@Middleman_93]

The exclusion of the Triforce is particularly weird when you consider that it would have been a much more satisfying solution for how to change Zelda back from an "irreversible" change. All-powerful wish-granting relic left over from the golden goddesses, well-established in series lore? Nah, let's just have Link and a couple ghosts stretch out their hands and want it reeeeeeal hard!

[@javiervasquez625]

Actually some fans (me included) believe it was the _Triforce_ which reversed Zelda's draconification after Rauru's _Power,_ Sonia's _Wisdom_ and Link's _Courage_ combined together to activate the Triforce laying dormant within the draconified Zelda so that it's omnipotent power would undoe her draconification. The evidence as provided by her "Sealing Power" and the scene where she reforges the Master Sword with Light coming from her right hand make a strong case for this interpretation of the game's ending to be factual.

[@Alex_Barbosa]

​@@javiervasquez625I could see it if they showed or referenced the triforce at any time, but they don't. I'm not one to put things into the narrative that aren't already stated to exist.

[@javiervasquez625]

@@Alex_Barbosa Sorry to come back unannounced after 5 days but i just remembered that a fellow Zeldatuber named Moxie Watts has recently _edited out_ the Light coming from Zelda's right hand during the scene where she's reforging the Master Sword and to her (and the entire community's) surprise she found the *symbol of the Triforce* hidden within the light emanating from it. I would argue that's evidence enough to reach the conclusion she carries the full Triforce within her very own body.

[@Alex_Barbosa]

@javiervasquez625 Thats not quite enough for me. Still too many assumptions for my taste. A good theory though. I remember seeing the triforce in the light when Zelda uses her sealing power in BOTW. But it's never brought up in lore or anything. It's really weird. It's super underpowered in this game if that's the case though.

[@javiervasquez625]

@@Alex_Barbosa Yet it fits the Lore as established in Ocarina of Time, The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and A Link between Worlds that when a person possesses either the entire Triforce or a single piece the symbol would _specifically_ appear on said person's right hand as a sign of them carrying the golden power within their grasp. The Lore has been consistently explicit enough across the timeline for Nintendo to be throwing a red herring at us so i simply can't see any other conclusion as to the "Sealing Power's" nature courtesy of the aforementioned Lore. If it's so hard to figure it out all i can tell you is that you're in dire need of replaying the 5 games listed above.

[@Multipurpose_Bagel]

I think Matthewmatosis' video on BotW sums up the issue of random references inserted without thought or care. He effectively said he found it to be a problem when the little title cards would pop-up at the Temple of Time, or the ranch, other locations, because they weren't actually those places. Without the title appearing/the name on the map, you'd likely not think of them as such. "Of course it's the Temple of Time! It says so right there on screen!" is the response.

[@Syngrafer]

Honestly, I don't even care that much about Zelda lore but I didn't like TOTK either. I didn't even finish all the first 4 temples, despite buying the expensive collector's edition and expecting to nerd out about this game for years to come. The ultrahand mechanics are fun, but besides that, most of the new additions just doesn't interest me much.

[@BioAlpha5]

TLDR this is about the Timeline, The Fortune Teller in BotW/TotK (not Hyrule Warriors), The Ancient Hero Aspect and his quest to make the shiekah tech and train before the calamity awakens and Ganondorf/Demise and the Evil Tree down below So about the Timeline split, and where BotW and TotK are. Bandit mentioned how the Downfall Timeline is a alternate reality. So is Lorule, or at least a Parallel Alternate Reality. So what if there is a split somewhere in Skyward Sword or later, but before Ocarina of Time N64, and makes 1 massive long remixed Alternate Parallel Reality Timeline? 58:27 and pretty much thats my theory, its a new timeline continuity! Parallel to the OG 3 way split timeline. I definitely think BotW and TotK is in its own parallel Reality Timeline. Basically the events in the OG timeline still occur in this new timeline however since its not the same, but a ALTERNATE PARALLEL REALITY TIMELINE it results in branching parallel realities where the same events occur differently, or not at all. Which we kind of see this in TotK, as the events of Ocarina play out but somewhat different. In the old Timeline we see a few alternate realities or parallel worlds like Termina and Lorule. we know parallel worlds exist. we know alternate ones exist. we also know the timeline can split and have 3 of em as a result. So if there's Timelines that we can see, what about the ones we don't see? And remember they said : "As is our custom, where does "Tears of the Kingdom" fit in the timeline of "The Legend of Zelda"? The "Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword" depicted the originator and "Breath of the Wild" depicted the end, but "Tears of the Kingdom" is a sequel to "Breath of the Wild" but also tells the story of the founding of Hyrule, so I wonder if it could be the originator... .......... Fujibayashi: It is definitely a story after "Breath of the Wild". And basically, the "Legend of Zelda" series is designed to have a story and world that doesn't break down. That is all I can say at this point. With the assumption that the story will not break down, there is room for the fans to think, "So that means there are other possibilities? I think there is room for fans to think about various possibilities. If I am speaking only as a possibility, there is the possibility that the story of the founding of Hyrule may have a history of destruction before the founding of the Kingdom of Hyrule. I don't make things in a random way, like "wouldn't it be interesting if we did this here? So I hope you will enjoy it by imagining the parts of the story that have not yet been told." did you know there was older unofficial "official" timelines before more than 5 games was out? look up the history of zelda timelines on google and by unoficial "official" i mean they talk about the chronology of the games, in interviews way back when. The timeline has changed, MULTPLE times, (Even from Hyrule Historia (Green BooK) to the Encyclopedia (Blue Book). In fact fans theorized there was a two way split for years, then Hyrule Historia showed 3 instead of two and even Skyward Sword, love it or hate its time travel plot, has theories about a possible split as well, which is also where BotW and TotK fall in. In fact i made a theory video about this exact thing lol. But my point is All the other games are still canon. Is Windwaker still canon even though Twilight Princess is Canon as well yet each game are in 2 separate Timelines? " I think there is room for fans to think about various possibilities. If I am speaking only as a possibility " He even mentions there are various possibilities that could have happened? So why not it all be in 1 big merged timeline split off from somewhere during or somwhere directly after Skyward Swords Events happen. Where Ocarina of Times Events are altered, like Instead of the course of 7 years, its over many hundreds and thousands of years. Instead of Link traveling through time its Zelda. Theres a lot of evidence pointing to this. Even looking at Fi, she seems to be only present in a few games, Skyward Sword, BotW and TotK. Its even possible Hyrule flooded before thanks to 2 reasons, the rock salt and TotK has fossilized petrified Tree Roots in the depths which can happen in the presence of water and rock. What are those tree roots? idk, possibly has something to do with that Evil looking tree with red eyes and a mouth you enter (like Deku tree in OoT), which is both connected to an ancient God/Demon named Demise and his incarnation Ganondorf (which Japan Shinto has Shinboku, sacred trees, and Ki no Kami among other deity trees which TotK has heavy Shinto influence, including Ganondorf mirroring Susano no mikoto right down to traveling to the depths of hell which in susano;'s story is an underground area like TotK Depths) Also we can use what we learned from the old games to learn Ganondorfs motives for TotKs Events. WW Ganondorf we see he wants to save his people. Gerudo Desert is a harsh enviroment to live in, so he wanted to take over hyrule for his people. When he acquires the Secret Stone tho it taps into Demise and his whole "Hate Humanity" so he turns against even his own people. Basically this TotK Ganondorf is similiar to how the adult and child timeline both have the "Same" Ganondorf. Also i know who the Fortune Teller is. Its Zelda. She traveled back in time. With a piece of Sheikah Tech even. Probably tells Rauru and Mineru and Sonia about the events of BotW, the calamity, etc. So the Anicent Hero Aspect probably has the quest of building the shiekah shrines and divine beasts to help seal ganon, then bury it to hide it from ganon to re use it in BotW. and she had a ancient hylian chambermaid. Im sure she told a lot of what happened, from the sheikah tech, calamity ganon, the ancient story from 10,000 years ago, the fact ganon took over the mechs. Wouldnt be surprised if thats why the tech vanished. If i recall no one mentions when the fortune teller told them. it could been a thing passed down through the ages, sure but the reason why (if thats the case, being passed down) all started with Zelda. Hell she showed Mineru the Purah Pad. which is Sheikah Tech. And that leads to the Adventure that The Ancient Hero Aspect goes on in his time "10,000 years ago". They knew to build the shiekah tech to help them from a "prophecy of the past (Zelda in the Past ToTK)" and built them. But there was a warning to it as well, and thats why the King of old forbid the tech from being used ever again. So they buried them, But the Shiekah also built in a failsafe to dissolve the tech after Link of BotW wakes up and defeats the calamity. Cant have the tech take over if Zelda told Mineru (Who is still alive as a spirit in the purah pad) all that happened before she traveled through time to mineru. So Mineru likely helped the Ancient Hero Aspect on a journey simililar to the one Link takes on in TotK but different. The Heroes Aspect traveled to all 4 regions (and more) and helped build not just the shrines to train in, but also helped build the divine beasts in each Main Capital for each race. And also built the Shiekah Slate, and Sheikah Towers while protecting them from the calamities monsters before the final battle which is when the mountain in Hebra got a hole in it. The Zonai Shrines were repurposed into Zonai Tech being powered by the wisdom of the Shiekah Monks (as mineru even said she could get the teleport feature to work in TotK, its cuz its based on Zonai tech). Why does the Sheikah tech dissapear? Probably the same reason why the Zonai shrines and such appear. The Sheikah tech dissolved away, and back into the Zonai tech. All according to Mineru's design. She was a Zonai Engineer afterall (she built the construct robot her spirit inhabits and we know that from one of 13 stone tablets above kakariko). How specifically? Well either triggered by the upheaval due to what Zelda told her, and even possibly due to Zelda telling her, could have realized she used Recall as she knew she was a blood descendent of her brother Rauru and sonia. So it probably was triggered due to Recall when the Secret Stone Sent Zelda back. Of course before they transformed back to Zonai stuff, some stuff was repurposed by Robbie and Purah thanks to the Sheikah tech stop working due what i mentioned earlier (even Zelda mentions in BotW the divine beast stopped functioning and was gonna go check it out, so she told mineru bout that too probably. She told them probably everything in order to try to get home. She was probably desperate to get home when she first got there.) And honestly with all that i said (and more that i havent but gotta figure how to condense it into a bite sized youtube video which holy crap thats tough to do) it does feel like a loop, a repeating ouroboros. like the logo on TotK, and even the timeline has looping moments, be it vaati, or maledues, theres always a great evil that the hero and Zelda must fight. So yeah workin on a few videos myself bout Ganondorfs whole deal (and what that evil tree is) and how Zelda is the Fortune Teller/HowShiekahtech was used and even lol So glad that freecam came out for the game lol

[@GarfieldLasgnaMaster77]

Ya know, i was sure that Nintendo didnt even think of the previous games when they made this games plot. Now im thinking that isnt true. This makes a ton of sense.

[@GaryJuuce]

holy crap i think you solved it.... o.O this makes so much sense. I think imma check your channel out for when this video comes out.

[@CakesWarden]

A message for the people who say “imagine playing Zelda for the story/lore”: What if in the next game… Link wears nothing but a diaper the entire game. He carries a golf club instead of a sword. Zelda has 50 twin sisters who all rule the kingdom together. The horses all have Wii remotes instead of hooves. Ganondorf is back once again. He kills Link’s entire family at the beginning as the inciting incident. Link responds by asking Ganondorf to marry him. Ganondorf says yes. There are 5 dungeons, and after every dungeon we see Link and Ganondorf divorce and remarry again. Also every dungeon in the game is made out of cardboard and duct tape, but can’t be damaged by any of Link’s weapons. Is that something you would consider bad, or at the very least disappointing? Bad enough for you to rant with the rest of the community about wtf the devs were thinking? Even if the gameplay mechanics were solid. If your answer is yes, do you know what I would say to you? “Imagine playing Zelda for the story/lore”

[@lRedBaronl]

I expected so much more from the sky islands. They could’ve put a new Rito village up there at least. The depths felt like it was going to be amazing but there it turned out to be a boring emptiness that got old really fast.

[@biggums5]

The issue is breath of the wild created a version of hyrule with a ton of mystery and unknowns, and tears of the kingdom took all the mystery out of that world.

[@stonaraptor8196]

no post game, not even the ability to talk to Zelda post Ganonondorf fight. After over 2 decades Nintendo still cannot give us any form of post game. I hated that in Ocarina of Time as a kid, hate it in TotK now.

[@justarandomguyontheinterne681]

sometimes it feels like even Nintendo's game design is stuck in the past, not just their tech.

[@edortsoclumsy]

Ye I felt the same with BOTW. Like after the credits rolled and I went back to my save and I was disappointed . I didnt even want anything fancy. Just some dialogue changes and maybe being able to explore the uncorrupted castle.

[@scrappy2082]

i have a weird issue with the idea of playing Totk first over Botw even though they share many of the same problems, the overworld is MUCH richer in experience in Botw, the lack of zonai stuff & sky islands means your forced to traverse the world by foot and in that sense get immersed into hyrule much more. not only that but the side quests feel more polished and connected, i love the whole sneaking mission with thr Yiga in the gerudo valley & grabbing the electric arrows early on while avoiding the lynel in the zora domain. idk i think this is why I kinda prefer botw world over totk also the lack of guardians makes the world so much more dull, i miss those guys so much 😅

[@LealFireball]

Since zelda development teams are so big nowadays, there's no doubt in my mind that there's a lot of disagreement inside of it and this whole "zelda games are connected vs zelda games are standalone" is likely reflected in the teams as well. But, while I like zelda lore and find it cool and interesting, I also think that the devs as an unified group, do not care about it. Individual lore-lenient devs may be able to sneak in references and connections to the games they like more to maybe lead the team into that direction, but that's it. I think that particularly the chain of games between zelda 1 to wind waker are fairly well connected. But I think that from Twilight Princess forward, the people who had power to connect the lore either had increasingly less power or they were moved to work in other nintendo franchises. Ultimately they see the story and lore as just background to think about, I don't doubt that anything above the very basic "unlikely hero fights a demon king and zelda is the princess" was fought for very hard for the games that had it. Koizumi himself, as he was cited in the video, had to fight to put in his story ideas in the zelda games he worked with and not doubt was forced to scale back. Koizumi is responsible for much that we find interesting about Link's Awakening and Majora's Mask (like their whole story and scenario), but do not be mistaken, he is responsible for much of which we found interesting about Zelda at all. His first development-related job at Nintendo was to write the whole lore of A Link to the Past, which ended up serving as background for every zelda game after, like the creation of the world and the origins of the triforce.

[@alfreddypennypacker8362]

Yea this sums up my thoughts on Tears, the biggest take away I got was that Nintendo literally did not care at all. Maybe because they thought it was guaranteed sales thanks to the new BotW audience they had but it's very disappointing for them to just not try at all. I think this is the first time or maybe the biggest time where their gameplay before story ethos actually hurt the final product. I noticed that some people in the comments are saying "who cares", and fair enough it is just a game it's not really of great importance in the greater scheme of things, but for Nintendo's premier narrative driven franchise it's a big issue and it should be addressed. The whole Zonai element is also the perfect definition of "flanderization", they were very clearly basing the whole Zonai exploration team on Zeldatuber's obsession with the mystery tribe but it just came off as if they were mocking fans lol.

[@kidren50]

Zelda right now is in the same position as Castlevania when they made Lords of Shadows. They tried a soft reboot, first game is good, some interesting lore connections, some other stuff that makes you question the continuity, and a second game that cut all ties to everything that came before.

[@thierrys85]

So interesting how some zeldatubers have suddenly, unanimously, agreed TotK is now canonically crap.

[@jordanstiltner9439]

My thing with it is that cleary from a gameplay standpoint it’s great. It’s just I have no reason to care for the gameplay when the story and lore is nonexistent or bad. I mean I can only hear “demon king!? Secret stone?!“ so many times

[@janeenschultz8502]

@@jordanstiltner9439 I'm of the same mindset. Gameplay: 8/10. A few things could be better, like interacting with the sage powers. Lore: probably 3/10. As a stand-alone game, it's fine. Being a direct sequel to BotW, it brings many questions. Linked to the whole series, it makes little to no sense for no discernible reason.

[@LaserFace23]

My guess is that a lot of them have been biting their tongue since about a month after the game released, but the fans were still a bit too, uh, excited at the time, and they didn't want to get eaten alive by backlash. So they waited until there was basically zero online conversation about the game, then a few tepidly poked their heads back out and said "hey, uh... the story and gameplay didn't really blend together, you know?" and other mild takes like that. When there was no meaningful backlash, they realized it was probably okay to actually criticize the game as harshly as they wanted to.

[@joemoe650]

​@@LaserFace23its importsnt to note that for game like totk, eldenring, halo, cod ect. Most peoplr are cadual fans who hold some aspect of the gamr above others. For zelda it seems most people care about the mechanics and world with lore and story being secondary. So it makes sense to hold back on trying to introduce criticism of the game into the conversarion dominated by people who simply wouldnt get it or dont care.

[@bam_693]

they are just creativly bankrupt

[@mitchellbutler2307]

Funny that they mention A Link Between Worlds because that's another game that introduced CRAZY new ideas (an alternate Hyrule with its own triforce? Bizarro versions of Link, Zelda, and Ganon?) and then immediately dumped them in the trash. They keep coming up with these really cool concepts just to repackage old ideas - Lorule is an excuse to do the Dark World from ALttP again, the Zonai exist to have a new ancient civilization with a different design aesthetic, etc.

[@thespookylocker]

I appreciate the skyward sword love, it's my favorite zelda game. And desperately deserves more love. XD

[@Obeliiix]

Absolufinetly not.

[@ashiraecho2039]

Ganon should have had the triforce. And they needed the secret stones and the sages to stop him.

[@kanyaebruh]

watched this with zelda and chill on in the background

[@darknesswave100]

I'll admit I'm one of the people Bandit was talking about. I played breath of the wild and it didn't really click with me. I don't know why but it just didn't. Believe me I tried. So when TotK was about to come out I watched a crap ton of lore videos and stuff like that to get caught up which oddly enough didn't involve the side content for the most part. So when I ran into the stuff where people didn't recognize link it didn't really bother me until I found out that you actually interact with those same people in BotW. So honestly I think it is better to go into TotK without knowing about BotW. Cause I loved the game

[@RadishAcceptable]

I really liked the story in TotK, but I still enjoyed hearing you all complain about it. I liked the vagueness of it. I was happy and disappointed when they decided to give us a happy ending, no actual sacrifice from Zelda, but I was okay with it (I guess I felt that they had set it up for a good sacrifice, so reversing it felt cheap to me.) But all around, I was eager for more of it as it was going on. I just figure that the "wild" series is doing its own thing, like a soft reboot if you want.

[@justarandomguyontheinterne681]

its a rebooted timeline where the old games are just reordered and remixed to make something new yet vaguely familiar. Kinda reminds me of A link between worlds Lorule a bit ngl. Look up the Parallel Reality Timeline Theory. Great video

[@stuffz1757]

The timeline feels pointless when we start taking Fujibayashi at his word and have a refounding that leads into a kingdom that clearly isn't refounded.

[@javiervasquez625]

Carl Johansson would like to know your location.

[@stuffz1757]

@@javiervasquez625 I'd like you in particular to get off my dick, you're not my groupie, so stop following me around.

[@Sarah_H]

re: cloud barrier not being visible from the sky islands By the time we get up there the cloud/sky/ barrier/cloak has been destroyed by the Upheaval, giving us a nearly clear view of the surface, except for when we're in the tutorial section where you can only catch glimpses of the surface through the clouds, but it's stated in THREE places that the sky islands appeared at the same time the chasms opened and Hyrule Castle went up, so is there just...a single solitary piece of the sky barrier under the GSI? How was it unaffected by the Upheaval? If the barrier was broken by the Upheaval and then remade when Link was taken to the GSI, who remade it? re: Ganondorf's eagle eyes HOW DID GANONDORF KNOW ABOUT DRACONIFICATION?? THIS IS A LEGITIMATE QUESTION. In The Gerudo Assault this is presumably the *first time* he's seeing a Zonai Secret Stone (why didn't they just call them Sacred Stones, "sacred" gets thrown around for everything else but these stones they wear in plain sight all the time are "secret"), and since A Show of Fealty takes place immediately after The Gerudo Assault, there hasn't been a lot of time between Ganondorf finding out about the Stones and him going to see Rauru. Mineru probably has texts about ancient Zonai culture in her library, but is just anyone allowed in there? Especially the guy Rauru knows has evil ambitions? Since it's a forbidden act, is draconification even mentioned in those texts, or is it omitted so there isn't the risk of anyone finding out about it? Mineru would not have told Ganondorf that he could turn into an all-powerful immortal dragon by swallowing a Stone, and if she HAD, why was that not the FIRST THING he did when he got it? The scene where he turns into a dragon emphasizes that he KNEW what happens to people who swallow a Secret Stone ("my body...my mind...everything! I'll sacrifice it all to destroy you"), but WHERE did he learn about it??? Nintendo be like "We want to make a sequel to Breath of the Wild that does not tie in at all with Breath of the Wild's continuity, explains none of its own lore, and in fact raises more questions than it answers" "You sonuvvabitch, I'm IN"

[@UltimateTobi]

RE: Cloud barrier: since Dragon-Zelda broke it, when Link was ready, I assume she created it temporarily for the duration of the tutorial. RE: Ganondorf's Eagle Eyes: it was assumed the stones transfer information/knowledge/wisdom. Perhaps he did that way. But it isn't explicitly made clear. He also was stuck for severel tens of millenia with the stone. So who knows how he acquired information and knowledge. Perhaps draconification was among that.

[@Sarah_H]

​@UltimateTobi where was it implied the Stones transfer knowledge? TBH I'd thought that he could have gathered information via a Phantom Ganon, but he apparently only became capable of producing Phantoms after obtaining the Secret Stones (like the Sage avatars), but then...would he have been able to project a full Phantom Ganon while he was sealed? I'm inclined to think he wouldn't be because all the Phantoms we see in the game were created after the seal was broken. Well what about Calamity Ganon, which is an emanation of the Demon King's hatred but is still capable of thought and planning? But by the point Ganondorf has been sealed and the Calamity forms, all knowledge of the Zonai civilization would have been lost from living memory. So that brings us back to: WHERE did Ganondorf learn of draconification?

[@UltimateTobi]

@@Sarah_H IIRC it was a comment Ganondorf made; along the lines of that there are limits to the knowledge the stones impart. I am not too sure though. What I am sure of is that that line fell somewhere, by someone about the stones. Fairly sure it was a GDorf line, but not 100%. Edit: after you beat Phantom Ganon in Hyrule Caste.

[@javiervasquez625]

It could also be possible that he learned about the irreversible nature of draconification by seeing Rauru's _memories_ after he used his own secret stone and Light powers to seal both himself and Ganondorf together creating a spiritual "link" between eachother allowing Ganondorf to know everything Rauru knows and viceversa. A baseless theory i admit but still worth considering if only for the sake of especulation.

[@TheRealNintendoKid]

I loved this game. And I loved Breath of the Wild. But both games shared the same exact problems in every single way. Tears of the Kingdom improved a few things, but not enough. We didn't really learn anything new about the Zonai, which the game was supposed to be all about. And it kinda was. Their ruins were everywhere, but the lore was almost non-existent. And the depths would have been the perfect place to have TONS of it, along with some OG labyrinth-type dungeons full of tough new enemies and some kinda lore to find, but we never got that. The story and dungeon presentation was ripped straight from Breath.

[@BioAlpha5]

2:37 but thats a part of the plot. The king of red lions literally tells jabu jabu that he has NO CONNECTION to the Legendary one lol

[@memedumpster3684]

What a great podcast, I hope y'all get together again! The combination of the 3 of you works really well

[@markclifford5712]

I think that Tears of the Kingdom was designed with a philosophy of unrestrained creativity; the abilities and combat feel uniquely unrestrained by concerns about curating a players experience; it's sort of the opposite of a metroidvania. the lore being a complete afterthought at best is a direct symptom of this unrestrained design philosophy in my opinion.

[@highdefinition450]

i disagree, you can have both with a little effort. they just didn't care enough lol

[@ThatGuy-ky2yf]

​@user-pw2ro7gt4rIt also didn't help that the stories simply weren't on par with previous console entries. For all the flak SS got it did have a better story than the recent two games.

[@Ianmar1]

Creativity comes from constraints and how they are used and even incorporated. No one thinks that a rant is more creative than a poem even while the rant is unconstrained by meter and rhyme. No one thinks that incoherent babbling is is more creative than a rant, even while incoherent babbling is unconstraibed by semantics and syntax.

[@felipe970421]

It's nonsense to pretend ToTK has more story than other games when it actually has less story cutscene time than any other 3D zelda game including Ocarina.

[@javiervasquez625]

​@user-pw2ro7gt4r This sounds more like salty rambling than an actual attempt to justify Nintendo's mishandling of the narrative element in the 2 most recent titles in the series. As stated by many these 2 games feel empty in Lore as it all surround either the Zonai or Sheikah with very little substance aside from random and disjointed events which ultimately lead into the formulaic climax against a reincarnated/resurrected Ganondorf. Any and all attempts to add "meat" into the storyline in the Wild duology is diluted by Nintendo's insistence in emphasizing openworld gameplay over anything else within the game's world giving us this empty space for us to basically endure a hundred long hour collectacthon with little depth in regards to consice and cohesive narrative. Needless to say i'm sure you won't bother to listen so i'm just doing some rambling of my own. Moving on.

[@thedinosaurman2506]

Dude hearing you talk about Samurai Jack I just gotta say, you would fucking love Primal. It's by the same guy (Genndy Tartakovsky) and they just let him go nuts. It's awesome. You gotta watch it, if you haven't already.

[@infinitecurlie]

Ooooo I loved Samurai Jack I'll have to check this out too lololol.

[@Makkaru112]

Would have been WAY cooler if ROTK had been like Gravity Rush 2 with all the sky stuff. It was VAST. It had its own depths too and wasn’t always the same when explored deeply enough even as standalone dungeons. I took so many awesome pictures everywhere for months.

[@pietroalessandrini]

I also hate how they threw away the idea that calamity ganon was ganondorf that gave up reincarnation.

[@halosaft]

That was never an idea, that was a mistranslation.

[@seanelsenbroek7530]

NintendoBlackCrisis’ theories on the zonai were unironically better than nintendos final product of them 🤦‍♂️

[@DDryTaste]

1:09:10 I understand maze's perspective but you guys shouldn't forget that the game was delayed, who knows what items on the drawing board got scrapped just because of the timeline (pandemic, high stakes) and after the delay. The gem on ganon's head changed appearance and we'll never know what else they scrapped. Idk if you guys are familiar with the story of EA's Spore and how the dev build had so many more features than the finished product. It was horrendous. That being said, I'd rather have they just are open about such things and delay further. But the stakeholders and executives don't care about that, they want return on investment right now. The product we received was fun but also lacklustre at best.

[@victorthevictorian]

2h 40 minutes, what a treat!! Thanks! I'm only like an hour in rn and I just agree so much with everything you guys say.

[@NutronicAtomic]

In slight defense of the secret stones, they do have a much deeper connection to Japanese culture and context than their English translation would imply. It feels like Nintendo was trying to appeal more to Japanese audiences (much in the same way BotW did) by using and invoking more of their culture and heritage into the narrative. The issue I feel is much the same as having link's shield have a cross on it like in early Zelda. It relies on out of universe context that even still raises more questions when thought about all for the sake of a "cool factor". It could have worked, but it would have require recontextualization of the idea itself which at that point you might as well make something new.

[@cookiedoodle5582]

Japanese culture? Could you elaborate?

[@NutronicAtomic]

@@cookiedoodle5582 I saw a video about it a while ago but can't find it now. But the Wikipedia page is just as helpful. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magatama

[@cookiedoodle5582]

@@NutronicAtomic Ah, I see now. Thanks for the answer!

[@Level_Eleven]

Thanks for the Thanksgiving upload

[@theoaremevano3227]

I feel like this goes to show how much story elements play into the experience of a game in ways that people often take for granted. A lot of people seem to think of a game's 'story' as ONLY its cutscenes, dialogue and other text the player can find in the game, but ignore how much it plays into the presentation of gameplay elements. I think Don is dead right that you can't build a game like this out of mechanics only. I've been playing a game that really hurts for story content, and I see other players complain about this need without having the faintest clue what's actually missing. They say it needs 'meaningful content' or blame it on the need for random features and side activities, thinking those will bring about the kind of vitality that's missing, but it would just make the game feel more like BotW's Hyrule (which was probably the aim of the company that made this game, at least at the time they started it). However, what it's really missing is that sense of there being a scenario behind the action in the game; the setting and mission structure that turn a 'room' full of enemies into a real, significant story event. That said, I can appreciate people feeling uncomfortable with the shift in tone around TotK. I personally feel like anything I like; sometimes anything I touch, people seem to find reasons to throw it into the gutter. If I don't like a game, or don't have much investment in it, then it's the opposite. Certified GOAT and all that. So I know what it feels like. I'm not even inclined toward hating Starfield. I share all the same concerns about Tears of the Kingdom, and by and large prefer the Zelda games prior to Breath of the WIld too, but I actually preferred Tears over Breath of the Wild quite a bit, so I'll still give it that. I'm only frustrated with Nintendo seemingly not appreciating stories much lately, just to satiate newer players supposedly not wanting to be left out, which I'm willing to be isn't an issue like they think it is. I see the 'Legend' in Legend of Zelda as the idea of hearing about that old continuity, having it lay some backdrop to each new Zelda game, and then, during the adventure, being able to reach out and touch that legend, whether it's drawing the Master Sword, or finding an old location, race, or villain. The one thread that IS solidified by the plot establishes the reason for all those other floating references to be fruit for potential lore theories.

[@ninalily]

Really in depth. Loved listening to this😃💛

[@xorphinindi]

Hold up. The spiritual stones did not just open a door. They were a metaphor for each of the things that Link needed to gain / understand before being worthy of the power of the Master Sword. Hero's journey type stuff. Don't dis the stones.

[@zleeven]

hold up, did the lore guys miss that point. holy fuck, how, how can they miss such obvious symbolism. heck each of the challenges to enter/complete the daungeon are set up one of the parts of the tri-force. the first in having the courage to leave your innocent kid live behind you. that why the first challege in not one the requieres any streaght of smartness, its a challenge of courage and all it takes in you having the courage to embark on the call for adventure. the second one is of power, and what is actual power. not the power one possess by themselves, but the power of having connection and people that you care for and care for you. that is why you need both the zeldas lluluby and sarias song to get throught darunias. and for the last one windom, you need to listen to everyone around you to gain the knowledge to enter jabbu jabbu, then the patiance to deal with princess ruto, both elements of winsdom. this is such a easy to undertand media analysis that it makes me question these guys ability to analyze media, if i can do it better than them, a guy with a regualar job that does not pay much attention to story/narrative in game, compared to lore guys of a series they make videos of and being doing so for years.

[@HylianSwamp123]

​@user-pw2ro7gt4rthey're talking about OoT not TotK

[@javiervasquez625]

Speaking out loud you're right: Kokiri Emerald = giant scary spider boss and been imparted with the Quest to save the world = Courage Goron Ruby = large powerful dragon and the might necessary to withstand the perils within Dodongo's Cavern = Power Zora Saphire = learning how to make Jabu-Jabu open it's mouth and solve many puzzles with Ruto's help = Wisdom All 3 concepts are earned by the Hero on his journey to become the Hero of Time each time he acquires one of the 3 spiritual stones until he's finally worthy of removing the Master Sword and opening the door leading to the Sacred Realm where the divine Triforce lies dormant.

[@javiervasquez625]

@user-pw2ro7gt4r You know if your comments could be as straightforward and simple as this one you would have far more support and backing from the community than with an essay level ramble like the ones on @Venturific 's thread.

[@HylianSwamp123]

@user-pw2ro7gt4r Ohhhhh gotcha gotcha. Reading your comment again I can see that very easily, for some reason when I read (sarcasm) the first time I thought you were being sarcastic about... well I don't even really remember now lol I do generally also disagree, I think TotK still has some interesting lore, like I think the legend of the stormwind ark is really cool and the secret stones are interesting. I do think that they couldve added in more details to flesh out certain things, like the ancient sages, Ganondorf, who the rest of the Zonai were, etc. But I don't necessarily think that means all of the lore is uninteresting like what they said

[@ess1405]

Didnt know Bandit Games and Monster Maze and hot damn, it's been a long while since i've enjoyed listening to a podcast this much. Loved listening to you guys talking about different stuff during the first hour and even though i'm not a zelda lore fan and i didn't even play totk i still listened to the rest of the podcast and had a great time. Hope you consider inviting them again just to talk about games, anime, adaptations and that kind of stuff.

[@Makkaru112]

The triforce was shown by a certain channel showing exactly when the Triforce showed up when rauru shot that beam decimating that force of sandworm things. It also appeared on the back of Zelda’s hand when she hasn’t had the whole Triforce before.

[@handsoaphandsoap]

I don’t get the argument of “would you rather they make a good game or respect the story?” Why not both? There’s nothing stopping them from making a good game and also making the story be good and consistent with the rest of the franchise’s lore, or at the very least not actively contradicting it. I’d argue that a game with a bad story makes the gameplay weaker and vice versa. Story and gameplay should inform one another to help strengthen each aspect of a game. That’s how you make a great game. Also I have to disagree with your gripes about the cloud barrier, I found that to be like the only thing in TotK’s story that made sense and was consistent with the pre-established lore. It does seem like the cloud barrier is something they deliberately wanted to be a part of the world, otherwise they wouldn’t have the dragons disappear into the portals in BotW or include that cutscene with the Light Dragon piercing the cloud barrier to give Link entry. In any case, there’s bigger fish to fry when it comes to the problems in this game imo.

[@SLAMTUCKER]

Hey just want to say that people in fact got hopping mad about timeline stuff well before the Hyrule Historia. I remember being on Gamefaqs Twilight Princess board and people would lose their minds saying there is no timeline, and especially no split timeline.

[@JaidynReiman]

And then there were also debates about which timeline theory was correct, etc. And a third timeline was never in anyone's minds until Hyrule Historia.

[@zleeven]

yep, i still remeber the war between the linearist and the splitist, many great soliders die on that battlefield. then nintendo came to prevent uneeded bloodshed and save many lives with the hyrule historia.

[@chrischl8003]

​@@zleevenAs someone who wasn't there during these brutal times, it's really interesting to hear how it was back then.

[@thewindisblowing7520]

After I heard Ratatoskr say he has a general distaste for Avatar related things beyond the og show and that he "can't watch that shit" when he brought up Korra, I knew we would be good friends if we met lol

[@emperortgp2424]

based as fuck

[@MagillanicaLouM]

Word for word my opinions on the, i guess franchise now lol. Original show forever one of the greatest things crafted by the hands of man, but everything else I just... Let's just ignore that. Not excited for even those animated films coming up with how the track record has been since the og show ended

[@thewindisblowing7520]

@@MagillanicaLouM I like to keep an open mind & stay positive, but I won't get my hopes too high or anything. ATLA is one of a kind & they likely won't top it

[@anotheryoutubeaccount5259]

​@@MagillanicaLouM Ok, sure

[@glitchy000]

How do I find friends who will talk story to this level in intelligible ways with voice and not text? I study story for a living and am a writer, yet I often find myself surrounded by mechanics gamers and it feels so isolating.

[@jakeyandhisbass]

I’ve been SAYING totk is glorified botw dlc since I beat it after the first month or so and been getting crucified online for it. Nice to get some big zeldatuber vindication. Take any new feature in isolation, and it’s botw dlc. Take 20-30 of those new features, and you get totk. This is not the crafting of a sequel but crafting of super dlc and calling it a sequel. The biggest disappointment of all is the fact that they spent 6 YEARS and pumped up the price to $70 for this dlc. Just bonkers. I love LoZ too much to give up on it for good, but if this is the production quality we can expect moving forward, LoZ is lost.

[@soulkibble1466]

I remember when I questioned why Nintendo was using Ganondorf again and fans were trying to argue that "He hasn't shown up in Zelda games in roughly 15 years" not realizing that In both Windwaker and Twilight Princess he was killed. And I had the feeling they weren't gonna do anything to connect this Ganondorf with the others or with the timeline whatsoever, but I was just shrugged off because "Muscle Daddy Ganondorf"

[@enzoeclipsed]

It’s a thanksgiving miracle

[@ericwilford2156]

I have never felt more validated by a video. Rata, consider me no longer alienated. Can’t wait to be alienated again in your next video! I loved breathe of the Wild, but I regret playing it because it made playing TotK a slog. I was not even able to finish because I lost interest at the third *temple. Hearing that Gannon only appears at the end ruined the game for me