Being a Zelda Loremaster

This post is going to be similar to my write up on the review of the storyline and the consistency post. It’s basically an, “if I could remake the Zelda series in my own image,” type of post. I have a list of about 10 things that I would go back in time and change, if I could. Most of it isn’t personal - things like telling Archimedes to use the radius instead of the diameter when calculating π or telling Benjamin Franklin that it’s the negative charges that move in an electrical circuit, not the positive charges. As it pertains to Zelda, I wouldn’t want to change too much about it - I would want the games to be mostly as they already are with only slight tweaks and changes to the in-game text and manuals (other changes to reduce tedium would be nice, but we’re focusing on just story and lore for now).


It would be nice to have the Lore of Zelda be as deep as Tolkien’s, where it’s easy to tell that they had some of the history worked out beforehand instead of just making it up as they go, and when a new group of writers comes in they don’t throw out what was written before (something that happens in comic books far too often). Along with that would come some geographical consistency, and landmarks that wouldn’t be constantly moving around.

I would love the idea of having all of this pre-planned out years in advance, and having each game serve as revealing one small chapter of the entire over-arching tale of Hyrule, kinda like how the game show Classic Concentration revealed an entire picture once all of the cards were removed. And as part of that, it might not seem like each game is connected entirely or seems to have wildly different geography until a future game explains exactly what happened that serves as a bridge between games, and at some point the entire story would suddenly come into focus, making Miyamoto/Aonuma seem like geniuses (I suppose Breath of the Wild or its sequel would be a perfect story to do so).


So, if I could magically transport myself back to 1980’s Kyoto, Japan (speaking perfect Japanese, of course) and serve as a special advisor to Shigeru Miyamoto and whatever team was working on the Zelda games, here’s what I would do.

The first thing is to inform Mr. Miyamoto that while it might not seem like it now, the lore of the series is going to be scrutinized so it would behoove him to get some of the facts straight before writing up the backstory in the first game’s manual. Realizing that he cares far more about the world he’s creating than the reason behind why someone would want to play there, I would offer to serve as Loremaster of the series, and mostly work with advanced knowledge of the games to make small adjustments to what they (the designers) create. This advanced knowledge would come in handy for things like coming up with explanations about small inconsistencies such as the sudden disappearance of Gorons in the downfall timeline (I could write that the destruction forced them all to Labrynna/Holodrum), or why there were no towns/castles in the first game’s map (the actual answer being technical limitations but it’s easy enough to have a story-based reason as well).

As it stands now, the symbology throughout the games is frustrating when there could be some really great lore that shows the evolution of the symbols with their associated peoples/groups. For example, the 3 symbols for the 3 time songs from Oracle of Ages somehow became associated with the Triforces in Wind Waker and it has been that way ever since. The fact that they were used in Skyward Sword (first in chronology, mind you) means that it’s all kinds of screwed up for when/how the symbols are used. The Hylian shield showing up in Link’s Awakening HD and the Master Sword in the Oracle games is kinda the same thing - instead of the items retaining special meaning/value, it is just the “Zelda version of ‘best’ shield/sword”. The way the goddess symbol combines with the bird and Triforce can be kinda cool if they did it consistently/correctly. Symbology done correctly would be really interesting and meaningful.


I like the idea of a cyclical tale - even the Matrix did it (poorly, admittedly), and that each incarnation is a bit of a different tale. What I would really like is if they planned out a major release with a new incarnation of Link/Zelda who saves Hyrule, then that particular Link does 2 or 3 gaiden games that slightly reference the first one - sorta like how they retroactively made the GBC games all sequels to Link to the Past. In fact, between the handhelds and the consoles, that could work out pretty well. Release a 3D console game (like Ocarina of Time or Wind Waker) that deal with Hyrule/Ganon/Triforce and then have two or three 2D handheld games (like Minish Cap or Phantom Hourglass) that have the followup side-story of that particular incarnation of Link/Zelda that doesn’t involve Ganon or the Triforce. I realize that consoles and handhelds don’t line up as well as they need to be for this to happen, but it’s a nice thought.


The music is somewhat consistent - like how Zora’s domain and Goron City have always had similar music, and Zelda’s theme is always on point. The main Hyrule overworld theme has been used haphazardly - how it was absent in Ocarina of Time but present in Majora’s Mask, etc. If it was the overworld theme only when the adventure was in Hyrule it would be more consistent. As with the various symbols, name places, etc., there should be thought into why these musical choices were made and not just shameless fanservice callbacks.

While I appreciated the BotW map showing “regions” that were named after past Zelda places/people, it doesn’t really make sense in the timeline, unless it’s intended for the merging of the three timelines to happen (TBD). Otherwise it’s just fanservicey callbacks.


Basically, all it would have taken is a little forethought - which is the difference between how the MCU succeeded (at least through Endgame) and Star Wars shat the bed recently. Like even Lucas had a plan when he “wedgied out” the capital ships in episodes 2 and 3 of Star Wars to seem like a progression from those to the Star Destroyers of the OT. Precursors of TIE fighters and X-Wings were present and their evolution is easy to deduce, whereas the Disney sequels are just a mess with no internal logic or consistency. Meanwhile, the MCU treated each movie almost like it’s one episode of a series, and despite having different directors/producers on each movie, they all remain consistent with each other to a high degree. We could think of individual games as chapters in the history of Hyrule and weave a grand tapestry of lore.