Why is the Zelda timeline so screwed up?

[Grimmyv]

No other game franchise has the "timeline debate" that Zelda has.  Mario?  every game since Donky Kong is pretty much in chronilogical order, and if there's a discreprincy, who cares?   Castlevania?  That series has a very tight timeline, puts Zelda to shame.  Metroid?  Same hero in every game, everyone knows the exact order...Final fantasy?  Every game in it's own continuity, absolutely no problems. 

So, why Zelda?  Why is my favorite video game series so screwed up when it comes to such a simple thing as WHAT ORDER THE GAMES GO IN?  I'm sure that Miamoto didn't give a crap about future Mario games and continuity back in 1981, and I'm sure Konami didn't care too much about inter-series continuity but they sure got it together much better than Zelda.  Even games that seem to attempt to repair the timeline (FSA, TP) seem to cause even more problems... maybe the fault lies in us?

well...

ok, I'll still try  to figure it all out, but surely there's no illusion that the creators had everything planned out from the beginning. right?

[Rew]

I like to think that our beloved Zelda series transcends such simplistic trivialities in which we fans try to keep it in a box--the box commonly known as a timeline.

[JakeJustice]

to be honest I don't care. It's fun to debate timelines and ponder the possibilities and such, but sometimes I like to think it's all just a re-telling of the same basic story.

[LexLionHart]

I would rather they give up with this series storyline and start a new one.

[Fairy penguin]

I like debating a timeline. It actaully makes us think. And We wouldn't have so many theories about Zelda, either. We don't need a drastic change like TSA suggested, dividing up the games into seperate timelines.

[Ales]

Basically they originally just made a game and pictured that one with a new Link, Zelda and Ganon and every now and then made a game based of that particular game (like majoras mask)

It was when Eiji stepped in that they actually started thinking of a timeline which we clearly see in Tww (he did make Mm but that was a sequel to Oot and was always planned to be one)

So they've more or less started to create a continuity. what we know for sure is this:
       /Mm-Tp
Oot-
       \Tww-Ph

the rest is just speculation

[Faceless]

Castlevania doesn't have a tight timeline. They're forever retconning games because they don't fit anymore.

As for Nintendo, half the time I don't think they have the older games in mind when they make the newer ones. If you only look at the 3D Zelda games then the timline isn't confusing at all:

OoT > MM > TP
OoT+7 > TWW > PH

Simple.

If they ever make a game that bridges one of the timelines to ALttP then the whole shebang will be just as clear. Aside from some mild debate over TMC and the FS series.

[Grimmyv]

Oh well, at least Castlevania has an official timeline.  The best official word we have for Zelda is, like you said, the Split with TP on one line and TWW on the other.

[Shin Illuminated]

To me, the timeline actually had some structure until TP came out.

[NocturneOfHearts]

Zelda created the "Split Timeline" Theory. In OoT, She stayed an adult, but made Link a child again. So Hyrule "A" Is kid Link and kid Zelda, but Hyrule "B" is adult Zelda, but no Link.

[Korenshei]

I like to think that one day the ultimate Zelda game will come out, maybe a decade from now, and it'll interweave every tale the series has ever had, and bring the most 'legendary' challenges for the series ever.

[Fairy penguin]

What, like make it super long, and tell the order of the Zelda series as the finale? Because that would be AWESOME!!!! Especially if it revisited every world Zelda has ever gone to! Except maybe Koholint, since that was destroyed.

[Grimmyv]

Koholint can come back if the Wind Fish dreams again...right?

[Hyruleansoldier]

Koholint can come back if the Wind Fish dreams again...right?

Um...  You want the pragmatic, theoretical answer to that or the cold hard truth in practice?


... We're not likely to ever see Koholint or its inhabitants again, unless it's a very specific easter egg or something, like OoT's fishing pond owner having a pic of him hang on Hena's wall.

Other than that, it's a theoretical possibility as unlikely as Link ending up in Termina again.  Or Holodrum of Labrynna for that matter.

[Haru to Ashura]

Why is the timeline messed up?  Because we care too much.

It's screwed up because we fans care about it more than the creators do.  They're concerned with giving us individual games that are fun to play, not about creating some sort of fantastical history account.

[Fairy penguin]

Now that Aunoma has started caring about the timeline, it has started to be clearer, but there are still a lot of mysteries. Like why people believe in a fourth Triforce piece, or what the 1st Zelda is.

[Ezlo's Apprentice]

Aonuma's decision to wade in with that non-in-game information to support a split timeline was the first real indication that the developers (or at least the most important man of all, himself, the director) do give a crap about a series chronology. Was good of him to settle that first major timelining woe- to split or not to split. Just the IW to tidy up really.

The TMC vs OoT as first game debates pop up occasionally. I'll still say TMC first for reasons other than the bloody hat, but that'll continue to be argued for a while.

As for the fourth piece, that's one of my old favourites. I've got a thread buried in the depths of the forum somewhere. Gravedigging isn't allowed, but I'm more than happy to start a v2.0 of the thread to put forward the case for it.

[Fairy penguin]

Theres a 4th Triforce thread over at ZL, and it has 25 pages. I gotta see one of those for here. 

[Grimmyv]

I'll say it once:

AoL, the game that established the fact of 3 triforce pieces, states that the triforce shows its FULL power when all three pieces are brought together.  There is no 4th piece.

Unless it's the anti-triforce, which would make sense if it "fits" upside down with the others.  That would make it as powerful as the 3 triforce pieces combined.  And it would be a great item to develop a Zelda game around.  I don't want to imagine the things Ganon (or Vaati!) could do with a so-called Anti-Triforce...perhaps even wipe out the goddesses themselves!

I know this is off topic, but it was my thread to begin with

[LOZ Historian]

So why is the timeline mest up?

1. Popular opinion vs. what was canonically correct (Blame Game FAQ's influence of the Split Timeline)

2. Anouma using non-in-game canon to explain the Split (Which was not necessary to fix the inconsistencies within the series timeline)

3. Are own personal interpreations and feelings vs. what the producers think

Very cold, hard, and simple.

Aonuma's decision to wade in with that non-in-game information to support a split timeline was the first real indication that the developers (or at least the most important man of all, himself, the director) do give a crap about a series chronology. Was good of him to settle that first major timelining woe- to split or not to split.

However Anouma doing this with non-in-game canon is not reasuring to the fans that wish to predict the truth. This shows their lack of consistency to make things evident like this in the games, and that irks not only me but a lot of theorists. But on the optimistic side of things, it does show that he cares. We just need Miyamoto out of the picture in dealing with the series and the timeline will be fine. lol