#usually i prefer lore discussions to be much more civil than this. with any emotions to a minimum. but whatever i'll give myself a pass once

[crowroboros]

kinda tired of always seeing the "waaah Zelda lore and the timeline is so confusing/messy!!"

not really!! you're just inattentive !!

A lot of the connections are either directly stated in the games (Like LoZ 1 and 2. OoT, MM, TP, and WW. WW, PH, and ST, etc) or through meta connections (like how to avoid religious references, Triforce of the Gods was renamed to A Link to the Past because it was written to take place before the events of Zelda 1 and 2 and then A Link Between Worlds getting the name Triforce of the Gods 2 in Japan cause it is a distant sequel to ALttP). Like come on y'all, just pay attention. A full timeline could be formed without looking at the official one ONLY using information in the games and chances are you'd be mostly right.

"Oooah!! but Ganon??!! how does he keep coming back??" Literally always gets explained in games. OoT was his first appearance, Adult timeline: he is sealed away in OoT. breakes free of said seal using the Triforce of Power between OoT and WW (literally stated in the prologue of WW). He is then killed in WW. Child Timeline: OoT is prevented by Link being sent back in time (which we see at the fucking end of OoT) sealed in the Twilight Realm, killed in Twilight Princess. Downfall Timeline, sealed in the Sacred Realm during the sealing war, breaks free of seal in ALttP, killed in ALttP, resurrected in the Oracle games, terrorizes Hyrule in ALBW and LoZ1 and is killed in LoZ 1 like FUCK it is literally shown in the events of the damn games. pay attention!!

Half the shit I see that you all are confused about is due to your own misunderstandings, either cause you didn't understand what was being said or because you just missed it and came up with some interpretation so off base that of course it would confuse you when trying to fit it into the series at large. And half of these misunderstandings wouldn't even be a thing if yall were open to being wrong and changing your interpretation. but alas that's not what we see, instead you blame the games.

No, most of the Ganon appearances aren't different Ganons. they're all OoT Ganon(dorf) EXCEPT FSA and TotK Ganondorf cause OoT Ganondorf is killed in and isn't resurrected but rather reincarnated (as FSA Ganondorf). FSA and its manual even states how Shadow Link is created from the Dark Mirror giving form to FSA Ganon's hatred of a Link who killed him in a past life. Of course it has to be after one of the times OoT Ganondorf is killed for good like how are you all stumbling over this??

No, Zelda doesn't get reincarnated unlike Link. All Zelda's are descendants from each other, but they're not the same person or soul.

NO not all Zelda's are incarnations of Hylia, ONLY SKYWARD SWORD ZELDA IS! They share a blood connection to her through SS Zelda, but they themselves are not Hylia.

No, Twilight Princess isn't a Wind Waker retcon idk how anyone is even coming to that conclusion?? Zelda in OoT makes it VERY clear that Link being sent back seven years and closing the door of time will separate the past and future of OoT, meaning that whatever he does in the past (the child era) won't affect the future already created (the adult era). like this is dialogue said in OoT, read what is being said I'm BEGGING you.

While we're talking about the timeline split...

The Downfall Timeline makes complete sense. Do I think it was what they intended when writing OoT? No. Definitely not. I don't even think they conceptualized it until 2002 or so. But its clear that once they wrote Wind Waker that they realized that the story of the Sealing War matches OoT better (which if you remember, OoT is meant to tell the story leading up to the Sealing War.) in a timeline where Link fails to stop Ganondorf. Otherwise Wind Waker and Twilight Princess wouldn't have been written to explicitly follow the adult and child endings of OoT. As the prologue of ALttP states, Ganondorf entered the Sacred Realm, raged war against Hyrule, becomes the Demon King Ganon using the complete Triforce and was sealed away in the Sacred Realm by the Seven Sages. That doesn't line up with either of the endings we explicitly see in OoT but it sure as hell lines up with what Ganondorf said he'd do if you lose the fight at the top of Ganon's Tower. Yall act like the downfall timeline is some massive horrible failure of writing when its really just the most logical conclusion of what is presented in the games. Never in OoT does Ganondorf obtain the full Triforce. his whole goal in the second half is to kill Link and take the Triforce from him and Zelda. The Seven Sages are there to seal him away, the Sacred Realm is open and has been corrupted by Ganondorf's influence. Hyrule was been ravaged by war. Ganondorf hasn't transformed into the Demon King Ganon yet. Almost everything lines up for the Sealing War, Link just needs to die for it to 100% work because Ganondorf doesn't have the complete Triforce. And he won't get the full Triforce if you win against him. How are you gonna argue that it makes more sense and matches ALttP better if Link wins?

And I've seen way too many people calling TotK a BotW retcon cause of Ganondorf's existence?? Even saw one guy on twitter somehow under the impression that TotK was a prequel? as of the entire game hasn't been advertised as taking place 5+ years after BotW? As if the Castle and Castle Town isn't in ruin? All because Ganondorf is there in human form? Guys, Calamity Ganon is nothing more than Ganondorf's power and hatred leaking from his body as he and Rauru rot underground. Calamity Ganon is essentially the physical embodiment of TotK Ganondorf's goals enacting his will while he remains imprisoned. This is made so clear in his in-game character profile, which also makes it clear that he only broke free of Rauru's seal on him due to the extreme earthquakes and damage that the Calamity caused. It was also fucking obvious ever since the 2019 trailer. This was spoonfed to us and some of yall still missed it? Seriously?

The ONLY extreme oddity in the overarching lore is how BotW and TotK fit in beyond "it's at the end", but even that has a few solid possibilities and isn't anywhere near as egregious as people want to make it out to be. You all want to talk about how you love theorizing and shit but are completely incapable of having a theory deeper than "botw/totk Link and Zelda are romantically involved!!!!"

(^not a dig at zelink at all, I'm just saying that a lot of you so called theorists only try your hand at "theories" that are so strongly implied that they're practically canon rather than trying to solve actual mysteries and questions. you don't want to do any research into the lore and try to piece shit together. something will be even the smallest bit ambiguous and you all tap out)

There's more but fuck I'm not looking to scour the internet to disprove every damn misconception and mistake.

Do I think they planned everything since the beginning? of fucking course not. this is a series with 20 canon games at this point and more on the way. there is absolutely no chance all of this was conceptualized 37 years ago. All im saying is that the overarching lore and connections that have been weaved over the course of nearly four decades isn't the clusterfuck that a lot of you try to paint it as.