Official Zelda Timeline Revealed?

Google+ Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr +

official zelda timeline
As we reported a few days ago, the Hyrule Historia Book being released in Japan was rumored to contain the official Legend of Zelda Timeline. Since then several pages of the book has been leaked and after some translations the official Zelda Timeline may have been revealed.

To see the timeline click through!Now this timeline may still be subject to change. Maybe Nintendo will mix things up with a game down the road that just alters everything. Or maybe it was a mistranslation or spoof. However, as of now this is appearing to be the official Zelda Timeline. I will admit that it is nowhere close to how I had the games placed.

Main Timeline

1. Skyward Sword
2. Minish Cap
3. Four Swords
4. Ocarina Of Time

Split 1: Link defeats Ganon – childhood branch

a) Majora’s Mask
b) Twilight Princess
c) Four Swords Adventures

Split 2: Link defeats Ganon – adult branch
a) Wind Waker
b) Phantom Hourglass
c) Spirit Tracks

Split 3: Link fails in Ocarina Of Time
a) A Link To The Past
b) Oracles
c) Link’s Awakening
d) The Legend Of Zelda
e) The Legend Of Zelda II

What do you think of this timeline? Is it what you thought? See any problems? Let us know in the comments.

Share.

About Author

Noah Glaser is a graduate of the University of Cincinnati where he majored in Information Technology with a minor in awesome. Noah has worked in web marketing for over 5 years and has built a reputation that has followed him both professionally and independently. He is the founder and lead content contributor for The Hidden Triforce.In the 5th grade he bought Link’s Awakening for his brother as a Christmas gift. Since stealing it back, he has been hooked to the Zelda series and has never looked back. In his spare time you can find Noah frolicking with his Porygon and Kiwi Birds. He dislikes chocolate, cheese, and bacon.

  • noahglaser

    I do not think this can be real. Some the ordering makes no sense at parts. The Oracles to me always had to have gone after tLoZ or AoL. It is all about Ganon being revived and he was not killed until tLoZ supposedly.

    • Triforce Deity

      Uh… He DID die. Link kills him in the Dark World during ALTTP and claims the Triforce. In Oracles, at the beginning, Link somehow has the Triforce since he has the mark on his hand, and the three pieces are found in a castle in Hyrule, where Link is sent to save the other lands by the Triforce itself. The linked games are all about reviving Ganon, so it does make sense. At the end, Link departs Holodrum/Labrynna by sea, which is how Link's Awakening starts.

      • frank

        yes… but than Zelda 1 comes rolling around the corner. AND GUESS WHAT?! Ganon is Alive and well and messing around in Hyrule! How the F*CK are they suppose to explain that?

        • klz92

          Well, in Zelda I and II, Ganon is refered to as "The Prince of Evil" or dark prince, but the original Ganon of Ocarina is known as "The Gerudo King of Thieves" and later on, other games called him King of Darkness, so IM JUST GUESSING HERE that the ganon we fight in the last 2 zelda tiles (The Legend of Zelda and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link) could be the son of ganon rather than the original Ganon?

  • frank

    see here we go again: A single time line (Splits or not) Just doesn't make any sense anymore!
    Too many games that are too different from one another.
    I think I will stick with y "Five separated timeliness" theories. Perhaps i will share it with you one day, but I'm lazy to write it all down.

  • VanitasXII

    This timeline disappoints me. But at the same time, I think we have enough confirmation that the events of SS correspond to "the Hero of Men" legend of TMC…if this timeline is legit, anyway.

    • frank

      that would mean that the four sword is the Master Sword; and that this blade Mysteriously obtained the "four sword" ability somewhere between Skyward Sword and Minish cap , Lost it just as mysterious during OOT and it's sequals. And as the icing on the cake obtained it yet again at four swords adventures!

      Sure! makes perfect sense!

      besides how will you explain the minish who provided men with the four sword?

      • somecrazyguy

        i think i can explain this. i actually only came up with this theory today. you remember that old ghost dude that teaches link in TP? we all thought it was a previous incarnation of link, but we didnt know which one… well i think now that that is WRONG!!! here me out. its hinted alot that link and zelda in SS have more then just a friendship, or atleast, will. my guess is they get married and all that jazz.. in later years, thousands of monsters invade the surface, preparing to take revenge against the hylians that have settled there. but a dorrway to the sacred realm is opened, and the minish come out with the picori sword, and the golden light. they give it to a decendant of link and zelda. this decendant is not link. he is the hero of men. he drives the monsters away, and the people make him their king. he has two decendants, one who goes to live as a commoner, and the other becomes king in his place. more years pass, and eventually from this hero of men comes a new zelda and link. since the legend in SS is well known to the royal family, they right aways get link and zelda together, which explains their relationship already present in MC (in other games though, either this is forgotten, or they hanvt met becuase link is hidden, like in OoT) anyways, MC happens, OoT happens, and then TP. in TP we have this ghost guy, a previous hero. my guess is this hero is actually the hero of men mentioned in MC.

  • Ash_AP

    The "Link failing to defeat Ganon" isn't mentioned anywhere in the revealed timeline, I believe; I'm pretty sure that this is just your speculation. The third split is more of a "don't trouble your minds with strict rules" kind of split — proving how bold and unlimited the creative freedom for the series is. It's basically the classical "Miyamoto Timeline".

    I'm very happy with this timeline! I'm glad Nintendo is not nuts with those matters. Providing an absolute, concrete, scientific timeline would be out of the series' scope. Zelda's mythos greatly involves the acceptance of concepts that are not necessarily regulated in similar ways to those of conventional fictional universe.

    This timeline basically tells you to be open-minded in contrast to troubled about such matters. There is a sequence, there is some logic — but the end result is a mixture to many more unconventional variables than those two.

    • Ash_AP

      Oh, it is apparently mentioned as to how the timeline occured, at least in the source of the translation. Pretty strange, I daresay… :P

  • richard

    when does link fail in oot maybe they mistaked it with failing in mm because its the same link and u can fail in mm

  • KeyroTono

    Ummm, If Link fails and Ganon gets to rule freely… then why is A Link to the Past in the fail branch? Ganon was sealed away by the 7 Sages and thats why the wizard, Agahnim, tries to free him…

    • that guy

      maybe OoT link managed to awaken the sages, but fails to defeat Ganon in the final battle leaving the sages to seal him their selves leading to the imprisoning war spoken of in ALTTP and the events after that

      • somecrazyguy

        apparently its actually due to zelda sending link too far back into the childtimeline, which causes a paradox in the adult timeline, cuz link has pulled out the master sword, but at the same time he hasnt.

  • Eximius

    A link to the past has to be last as their blood runs thin. Also split 2 and 3 are the same because link failed as a kid, but returned 7 years to defeat ganon. The time splits when he is returned to prevent ganon.

  • Eximius

    We'll I meant Link's awakening should be last, as it was an obvious follow up to a link to the past. Correcting my self.

  • klz92

    Precisely, if "link fails" in ocarina of time (not sure how that would work though) Ganondorf enters the sacred realm and becomes Ganon, and gets trapped by the 7 sages… and time later occurs ALTTP with Aghamin getting him out.

    • KeyroTono

      So for split 2, Link defeats Ganon and seals him away with the Master Sword, but for split 3, Link fails so the sages seal Ganon away without the Master Sword or Link's help?

    • kkn,h

      in OoT, link fails as a child to defeat ganon but comes back as a adult and claims victory.

  • Hohoho

    I don't think that this new ALttP timeline has to include the fact that Link fails. What I did learn by playing Zelda is that Link NEVER fails ! Also I think that when Link go seven years in the future for the first time he leaves a first dimension in which the king and the sages have to deal with Ganon alone and as a result of this situation, ALttP's imprisonning war happen. In the second dimension Link defeat Ganon and go back in the past in a third dimension in which Ganon he warned Zelda about Ganon's evil plot. (please excuse my lousy english)

  • ABAZELDAFAN

    DONT THINK ABOUT TIMELINES JUST ENJOY THE ZELDA SERIES!

  • DjinnFighter

    Fail is a bad choice of word I think. You can view that in another way. At the end of OoT, the Hero of Time returns to the past and then the famous split becomes. But, in OoT, the Hero of Time did not returned to the past only at the end of the game. He returned some other times before (to find the Lens of Truth for example). These time travels created multiple split timelines too, but they are all similar.

    In these split timelines, Link returned to the past before he saved Hyrule. So, there is no more Link to seal Ganon in the Sacred Realm, so Link "failed" in these alternate timelines. With no Hero of Time, the Imprisoning War began and blablabla… ALttP backstory.

    This timeline is pretty solid.

    • somecrazyguy

      actually it isnt. becuase the sages are awakened by the hero of time. if they arent awakened, they dont become sages. how does ganon get sealed then? my guess is that alttp actually happens after fsa. we see a link to the past like backstory that could be slightly changed due to many years to make it similar to what the backstory in alttp is. ganon is sealed, there are sages, and no master sword is used, just like alttp says. also, its where ganon gets his trident of evil thing, which he has in a link to the past aswell.

      • There could be another yet to be released game between ocarina and lttp that explains this. Probably another Link. You have to understand that we don't have the complete story yet. There are planned future Zelda games.

  • DjinnFighter

    I don't know who made the picture above… but there is no Adult Link in Majora's Mask…

    • noahglaser

      i never noticed that in the pic. but it was from a nintendo magazine i believe

  • Ent

    I have no problem with the timeline. In a way, having an extra branch for the "fail" timeline where you go back in time to get the Lens of Truth and the Mirror Shield actually makes sense. The only question that I would have would be Four Swords Adventure since it has a new beginning for Ganon, but if that Ganon is the son of the original Ganondorf, then it would make a lot more sense. And I get the impression that that may well be the case.

    • that guy

      Maybe it wasn't the son of Ganondorf. Maybe he was reincarnated over and over again because of Demise's curse where link's and zelda's descendants would be followed by an "incarnation of his hatred"

  • cucco

    since you get to choose your name in most of the games, I think their all different heroes, or new ones from the same bloodline. in windwaker it mentions that the girl pirate is from the hyru bloodline, and link wasnt. she even apologizes to him for getting him involved in all this. in hyru underwater in windwaker it show a twighlight princess like link raising his sword, which means that probally took place in the past. In a link to the past link puts the sword back, for the next hero, or his future self. I think the only connected games are twighlight princess, ocarina of time, and windwaker. A link to the past and all the handheld titles probally took place in the past.

  • Chris

    I dont get how minish cap happens after skyward sword. The master sword exists in SS but in TMC there is the four sword. Wheres the master sword. Why dont they use that to seal vaati why make another sword. Also, if they both exists wheres the four sword in the other gams that feature the master sword. Why not duel wield them.. Lastly, why does four sword adventures happen so apart from the other four sword games if the four sword link is said to be the FSA link. Someone please explain.

    • Luvodicus

      The new third timeline is what happens should Link, the Hero of Time, lose against Ganondorf/Ganon during Ocarina of Time. Unlike the "Child Timeline", which was created when Link was sent back in time and changed the course of history, this newly announced third timeline is not created by any events in Ocarina of Time, and appears to be an alternate scenario of what would have happened had Link died during the course of the game.

  • Ganonator

    Firstly I beleive the word "FAIL" maybe a strange translation from a Jappanese word used in a diffrent context.

    Secondly I think this timeline gels. The reason for the two FS games are seperate is because releasing Vaati twice in a row seems pretty stupid on the part of Zelda and Link but as time passes lessons are forgotten and blunders are made. I also the Flute Boy in ALTTP is a desendent of "Failure" Link.

    P.S. Perhaps Ganon obtained the Ocarina of Time in the future and traveled back in time to sabotoge link like the Termonator. (I call this the "Ganonator" theory.

  • worldofblackheroes

    This is interesting…..never cared much for the timeline theory but this is food for thought! :)

  • garret

    How come in skyward sword Link's an adult but in Ocarina of Time he's a child?

    • poop

      That's not exactly accurate, In OoT he's a child growing up in the forest because supposedly, he goes back in time 1000 years in the sealed grounds turns into a child, and is raised by trees in OoT. So really OoT is in the future. SS is in the past.

    • Zeldafan101

      First:It is because OoT's link is the Reincarnation of the SS's link.
      Second:In SS you get the godess sword and then gather the Great Flames Which creates the MASTER SWORD 8D……and also proves that Skyward sword comes first OoT is the far future and Majora's Mask is the end of Link because it is right after OoT.

      • Zeldafan101

        Oh wait Oot and MM are in the middle because Wink waker Speaks of "The Hero of Time"=Adult Link from OoT.8D

        • Zeldafan101

          And Sheik+OoT's Instument to teach the warp songs is Melonie's Instrument in wind waker= more proof.
          I think it is an easter egg

          • Zeldafan101

            P.S. Demise is OoT Ganondorf's Father i think

          • Zeldafan101

            Plus all of the Ganons and or Ganondorfs are the same people because link repeatedly sends ganon/ganondorf to the sacred realm….8D

  • TheRocker502

    WOW O_O

  • wolf

    um thats cool i remember all of them ive played every single one and have beaten them all but i still can tell the difference between them and im glad the legacy continues
    after skyword sword came out i called gamestop and they said that zelda was through and that there was no more zeldas and although skyword sword was ok i thout,"really NITENDO your really gonna make that your last game???"and i was upset for several months but now that i know theres another one im happier than ever

  • Link3453

    This timeline is awesome. Anyone who thinks differently needs to brush up on their history. Yeah, at parts it can be confusing and you can tell the creators just sort of added some random stuff in, but if you read into it, it fits perfectly.

  • jace kinnings

    i have a question.
    if the made a legend of zelda with a female link would zelda be a lesbian, or would they gender swap her too. honestly i think that a female link saving a female zelda would be a great Yuri story and would be hot ,but what are other peoples opinions on this subject.