The Legend of Zelda : Zelda Timeline and Analysis

By Zach Potts

An ordering of the Zelda games as their events occur within the fictional universe. This official chronology was revealed in detail INTRODUCTION I just completed all 16 Legend of Zelda games, which were created over a span of 25 years, in about a month. I took notes during my play through of all of these games, noting important lines of dialogue, plot points, characters, locations, etc. The goal of this was to create an overall timeline of all the major events and games in the series. Interestingly enough, shortly after embarking on this quest, Nintendo released an official artbook, the Hyrule Historia (Japanese only). In this book, they actually reveal the secreted timeline. So, my work was basically done. However, I plan to go much more in depth than the book did, but sway my analysis towards the timeline they provide (which does indeed seem legit). Before I start my timeline/analysis, I think I should point out two important ideas. The first is that these are Japanese games. That is, these games were developed in Japan first, and then translated/localized for the US and other territories. This means that there is the possibility of certain things being lost in translation, of character or town names to change, major dialogue changes, etc, which may impact the exactness of my analysis. The second issue is with the concept of retroactive continuity(retcon), meaning that after facts have been established, designers can retroactively change the truth and alter the series' universe. After playing all the games, this has easily occurred many times, so you may see me point out some of these seemingly contradictory facts, although I'll try to meld them together taking this concept into consideration. Obviously, not everything was planned from the beginning, and over the course of 25 years, 16 games, and many different designers, developers, and writers, not everything will mesh together perfectly as the story and universe evolved and expanded. With that being said, I will now attempt to layout the overall timeline of the Zelda universe, chronologically, as easily as I can, with as much detail as possible and as little conjecture as needed. I will be basing my information primarily from the games' story and manuals only, with a little bit thrown in from developer commentary, Hyrule Historia, and other similar official sources for support. I will annotate all of my facts, listing where they come from, and any speculation and theorizing from my part will be clearly evident and not stated as fact. I should also note that I'm focusing this essay on Hyrule and its history, so I won't delve deeply into the lore of other areas, such as Termina, Holodrum, etc, but I will of course discuss the games in which those settings are involved and how they affect the timeline. And of course, SPOILER ALERT. I will be spoiling EVERY Zelda game ever made and it might come at times you don't expect it. Sorry. If Your Looking For zelda, the legend of zeldazelda breath of the wildZelda dungeonZelda amiiboZelda art and artifactsYou Came To The Right eBook Go Ahead And Purchase This EBook

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1520333803
• ISBN13: 9781520333809
• Release Date: January 2017
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 56 Pages
• Weight: 0.44 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.0" x 0.1" x 8.5"