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phoenixcatch7 · 2 years

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Gosh, okay, so it's been a couple days since I finished age of calamity and I've had the chance to peruse a fic or two, which is time enough for my initial questions to start getting answered.

So. What actually happened.

Like what happened behind the scenes? What in universe reasoning is there for such drastic changes in circumstances? We've got new characters, new stories, new designs.

The first thing I can say with certainty is that the time line did not, in fact, branch from when Eggy arrived in the past. Somehow, the little creacher managed to land itself in a timeline that had already been long separated.

Why?

Well the first) main thing is obvious - link doesn't have the master sword. How odd. Given how young he found it, and all the chances he would have had since, why not? What was stopping him?

Would it not be in his enemies favour that he hasn't had the chance to train and prepare for the role since he was a child? Who would even know to ensure it didn't happen?

Gee, if only there was a seer 100y ago in hyrule. A prophet of calamity, say.

Imagine if Ganon got his hands on him?

A seer driven half mad, someone with access to rare sheikah tech and the ability to use it.

It was Astor.

And Ganon played him like a fiddle. With the hindsight of the game, it makes a lot of strange things clear. Like what he was Seeing.

Interestingly enough, the divine beasts have all been found. The same champions have been selected, no matter how sabotaged each were. Astors close allies, we learn later. The monsters for daruk, the one lynel finding the missing Prince when dorephan already worried for his children's safety, kogah impersonating urbosa, the harbinger getting terrako mistaken for it.

Instead of a handful of yiga getting intimidated by a fully realised hero when they attack the princess (in a memory), sooga leads a full army to the heart of the kingdom.

He's there in person to try and take control of korok forest, and is shocked by a new master sword power we've never seen before destroying the shadows.

He attacks akkala earlier than in botw. He gathers monsters and uses them in his schemes rather than flooding hyrule with them all at once with Ganon. He tries akkala again, knowing how important its fall is to his plans. He manages to upgrade the blights from what they were in botw. He manages to infuse monsters and guardians with elements. He can recall and deactivate them at a moments notice. It's Fort hateno, an otherwise unremarkable battlefield, that he goes all out, with dozens of guardians, hundreds of monsters, all the blights at once he throws at link without even a moment of thought to Zelda. He was convinced Link would fall.

Astor saw the Breath of the Wild timeline.

He saw things in links memories, he saw us, the player, defeat Ganon. He saw Link die, saw Zelda hold Ganon at bay, saw link's return and the defeat of Ganon. Unlike botw, the Great plateau has already been blocked off (else Rhoam would have rejoined the fight) - no one knows about the shrine of resurrection. Link would have died there, and no matter what Zelda did, that would have meant ganons success.

Because Zelda had strength enough to battle Ganon for a century, but it was Link, not her, who managed to deal the final blow.

Even with the plateau blocked off, there were soldiers investigating the shrine. They were swarmed with monsters, and it was only purahs upgraded teleportation - courtesy of investigating terrako - that saved the day.

Say what you will about Astor, but that man was extremely clever and and cunning, and used his ability to work with sheikah tech and his visions to their FULLEST extent. He was manipulating events to his own advantage, he was ten steps ahead of hyrule at all times, he had backup plans on top of backup plans and he was ruthless enough to use them (killing the yiga for power when they failed). His fanaticism made him come off as significantly less of a threat than he was.

And he was one.

So how did the heroes survive?

Terrako.

That little egg was just enough of a butterfly effect (remember the butterflies everywhere when it first appeared? Not subtle) to give them the chance we needed.

The ability to give all the champions and allies the powers of the slate was just the beginning. That meant they were better able to fight, better able to defend themselves from heavy damage attacks. They could communicate across the battlefield with ease.

The egg could control deactivated guardians. Zelda used it to attack enemy guardians, blow up blockades. Most notably in the first akkala battle.

The egg contained information on the future. This enabled the sheikah to make their own plans in counter to Astor. I believe this is why they went to Fort hateno, with the same foreknowledge Astor had that it was IMPORTANT.

The egg had some hand in calling the future champions, saving every original champion from certain death and crucially enabling reinforcements to reach them in time.

Most importantly, the egg contained invaluable technology, which purah and Robbie uses repeatedly throughout the game to improve their other tech to unprecedented levels, single handedly saving akkala citadel the final time AND saving the plateau (with the shrine of resurrection) and the King himself, not to mention upgrading the fighters abilities even further. Simply put, without Eggy, Astor would have won, devastatingly and even more completely than in Breath of the Wild, the timeline they both seek to change.

But the final thing we learn about Eggy is who created him.

And that was Zelda, against her father's wishes.

In age of calamity, Astor, vessel of ganons hatred, tried to destroy the kingdom.

And it was Zelda's love of her mother and her hobby of tinkering with technology that saved them all.

Take that, rhoam.

#LONG post #Reason 158 mortals shouldn't interfere with the cycle #If rhoam had let his daughter do her own thing Ganon would have been dead by sundown #She probably would have unlocked her powers in a lab accident or something too knowing her lol #This started as a way for me to make sense of the background stuff happening #Astor turned out to be WAY more dangerous than I'd realised #Even half feral he was whip smart #Like how do you even infuse monsters with elements??? How do you even start #Shout out to link for unknowingly being the Queen on the chessboard between the tug of War between Zelda and the enemy #Like always but hey #You gotta respect the princess bloodlines instincts #Always choosing the exact path they would need to survive #Probably that sweet sweet triforce of wisdom #I'd make my point but that would be listing literally every Zelda #Shout out to oot Zelda and ww Zelda especially though #Seriously everything I learn about loz just tells me more about why you shouldn't try and micromanage the hero and the princess #It just makes things ten times worse!#legend of zelda #loz #breath of the wild #age of calamity #Botw #loz aoc #hyrule warriors aoc #link loz #Zelda #Loz #Reiterating:#Long post #Couple things I forgot to mention:

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lost-in-hyrule-field · 6 years

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Crazed Theory Time

So, I’m really into timeline theory (and have been for ages), and so I’ve got some thoughts on the timeline placement of BOTW, if anyone’s interested in reading.

I know that most dominant theories I’ve read place it somewhere after twilight princess, because of that line that Zelda says, but I’m pretty sure that BOTW takes place in the fallen hero timeline after Zelda 1 and The Adventures of Link.

I’ve got a lot of reasons for thinking this, so hang on to your shields kids.

The first is just the general spirit of the game. I know that sounds vague, but I really feel like this game is the spiritual successor to the first two Zelda games. It contains a lot of elements from those games, which I’ll go into later. But it also captures that sense of adventure and a massive world out there to be explored at your leisure that the first two games tried in particular to capture. There’s that amazing open world with no real exposition of direction to get you started off. There’s that mysterious old man at the beginning. There’s also the fact that they used concept art from Zelda 1 in BOTW.

Duelling Peaks anyone?

The Hyrule of BOTW feels to me like the Hyrule they imagined for the original games but were unable to realise. It’s the Hyrule of Zelda 1 and 2, and so it’s the Hyrule of the decline timeline.

Also, according to Zeldapedia the original Zelda was supposed to have Link travel through time between a medieval world and a futuristic one, and he was supposed to collect microchips. That had to be scrapped because of system limitations, but the time travel idea obviously got reused, and the microchip collection became the triforce shards. I don’t know about you guys, but I can really see the influence of that original idea on the Sheikah technology.

That’s it for the spirit of the games, what about actual in game evidence?

Lets start with the slightly more circumstantial evidence.

For one thing, in Zelda 2, in order to get the triforce from a mysterious old man, Link must fight his own shadow (which is the first appearance of Dark Link). While this connection is slightly oblique, it is highly reminiscent of the system of trials in BOTW.

Furthermore, there’s clear reference to a religion centred around the golden goddesses in the other timelines. There isn’t that in the decline timeline, so it makes sense that they were all worshiping Hylia and that just never came up in the games. Yes, I know there’s vague references to ‘gods’ (ie Triforce of the Gods, the Japanese title for ALttP). I know that this could be chocked up to Nintendo of America’s strict policy back in the day of leaving religious iconography out of their games, but let me have this. “BUT,” I hear you cry, “The oracle games feature Nayru, Din, and Farore as the oracles and they take place in the decline timeline.” Well, it seems to me like they’re not goddesses in those games. I suspect that even a sorceress of Veran’s power would be hard pressed to possess a proper goddess. And I don’t think they’d particularly need Link’s help. So they’re not actual goddesses, but they’re named after them. I can’t speak to Japanese culture, and I know for sure that this isn’t universal, but (at least in many Western cultures) it’s highly atypical to name a kid after a deity that’s being actively worshiped (yes I know Jesus is a typical Spanish name-- I said many). So I don’t think that the three golden goddesses are being actively worshiped in the decline timeline. This is on par with BOTW, where Hylia is the main deity, and though the spirits of Courage, Wisdom, and Power are still revered, they’re not the main deal.

Now onto the (slightly) more concrete evidence.

Lynels and Hinox have only appeared in games in the decline timeline, up till maybe this point.

Also, the decline timeline is the only other time we see someone placed in some sort of extended cryo-sleep, like Link is in BOTW. And that’s the ‘first’ Zelda from Zelda 2. “WAIT A HYLIA DARNED SECOND!” I hear you all shout, “Zelda the first was placed into a deep sleep by a wizard and she could only be awoken by the power of the triforce!” Well my friends, if you told a medieval person about an iPad, I imagine they’d assume it was magic. So what if, just maybe Zelda the first was placed into the shrine of resurrection, and her brother blamed the sheikah technology for the whole thing, and so the tragedy of Zelda 1 was the event that turned the people of Hyrule against the Sheikah and their technology and spawned the Yiga clan. And then as the story was passed down the generations people forgot the advanced technology and so the teleportation iPads and giant stone beasts and eternal slumbers became just-- magic. Also remember, we’re told the story of Zelda 1 by Impa, so she’s maybe not necessarily the most reliable narrator ever, especially if she was potentially trying to protect her Sheikah brethren. Also, the light at the begining of BOTW suggests to me that it’s Zelda’s power (AKA the triforce) that wakes Link up, and it’s likewise the completed triforce that wakes up Zelda 1. Coincidence? Probably. I don’t know.

Speaking of the triforce, the decline timeline is the only timeline after the split that we see the royal family have and use the completed triforce like Zelda does in BOTW. Link doesn’t have the Triforce of courage like he does in a number of the other timelines-- Zelda’s got the whole thing in this one.

Also speaking of Impa, she really only shows up in the decline timeline as well. I know there’s Impaz in TP, but it’s not the same as Impa. Also, she’s only ever been shown to be a crusty old lady in the decline timeline (and SS, I know, but I’m talking post-timeline split, since we know BOTW is post Oot).

Also speaking of the Yiga clan, they’re always out for Link’s blood, and they plan to resurrect Ganon. In Zelda 2, Link is told that Ganon’s minions are out for his blood so they can sprinkle it on Ganon’s ashes to resurrect him. Sound familiar?

Also speaking of the plot to resurrect Ganon, that shows up fairly frequently in the decline timeline -- ALttP, ALbW (sort of), the oracle games, Zelda 2, you can argue that the Ganon in Zelda 1 was resurrected before the game starts. However, stopping the resurrection of Ganon isn’t a major theme in the games in any of the other timeline branches. Furthermore, when Ganon shows up in any other timeline, he starts out as a human and then will sometimes transform into beast Ganon. But in the decline timeline games, he starts out as beast Ganon, getting more bestial as the games progress. Almost as though each time he’s literally resurrected (not reborn or fetched out of an alternate dimension) he looses a little bits of his original humanity, until we end up at pig miasma Ganon in BOTW.

Also, there’s a maze island in the north east of the map in Zelda 2, as there is in BOTW. Even though they’re of drastically different sizes...

Also, those weird trees in the lost wood look like the first dungeon from Zelda 1.

“What about the Rito?” I assume you’re asking. “They only show up in WW, which is in the adult timeline!” Well, I have a whole lot to say about that, but I feel like this post is already too long, so let me know if you want to hear about that, and I’ll make a separate post about my theories on those guys.

#legend of zelda #breath of the wild #zelda theory #timeline theory #botw

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