Official LoZ Chronology confirmed

[DigificWriter]

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned this yet, but the Japanese publication Hyrule Historia contains an officially confirmed chronology for the Legend of Zelda franchise, and a translator affiliated with the website Zelda Universe has translated the relevant pages of that publication and made them available for viewing.

An image of the translated chronology can be found here for anyone who's interested in seeing how things shake themselves out.

The most interesting thing, at least for me, about what this official chronology reveals is that the model that Nintendo is working with in terms of how they are treating the concepts of time and time travel is one that is very similar to the way that the Star Trek franchise deals with the concepts of time and time travel, especially the ways in which said concepts correlate to the concept of parallel and alternate realities.

 

[Kelthaz]

There is no official timeline. Nintendo just throws out Zelda stories randomly without considering their connection to the rest of the series. It's like that Star Trek map floating around the Internet -- it mostly makes sense and is cool to look at, but it's complete bullshit.

 

[DigificWriter]

There is no official timeline. Nintendo just throws out Zelda stories randomly without considering their connection to the rest of the series. It's like that Star Trek map floating around the Internet -- it mostly makes sense and is cool to look at, but it's complete bullshit.

I didn't just make this shit up. Hyrule Historia IS an actual publication that was just released in Japan, and it DOES contain an actual published version of the official chronology for the Legend of Zelda franchise. The image I linked to is a direct translation of the pages from Hyrule Historia which contain said official chronology.

 

[Kelthaz]

I know you're not making this up, but Hyrule Historia is making it up. It's like that Star Trek comic that came out with the movie. Is it official? Sure. Is it complete bullshit? Absolutely.

It's well known that Miyamoto doesn't care about the timeline(s), so there was no conscious thought to put the games in some sort of chronological order during development. This is just a bunch of fan wank (official or not) to connect the games after the fact. It's kinda cool and it probably makes sense, but don't take it too seriously.

 

[DigificWriter]

If it's published in a publication that is officially sanctioned by Nintendo, it's not 'fanwank'.

 

[Kelthaz]

Interview with Miyamoto:

Nintendo Power: Where do all the Zelda games fall into place when arranged chronologically by their stories?

Miyamoto: Ocarina of Time is the first story, then the original Legend of Zelda, then Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, and finally A Link to the Past. It's not very clear where Link's Awakening fits in--it could be anytime after Ocarina of Time.

Link to the Past after Zelda II? Miyamoto, the creator of Zelda, disagrees with the timeline in Hyrule Historia. He may have changed his mind since that interview (1998 I believe), but that just proves the whole timeline is made up after the fact.

 

[DigificWriter]

Interview with Miyamoto:

Nintendo Power: Where do all the Zelda games fall into place when arranged chronologically by their stories?

Miyamoto: Ocarina of Time is the first story, then the original Legend of Zelda, then Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, and finally A Link to the Past. It's not very clear where Link's Awakening fits in--it could be anytime after Ocarina of Time.

Link to the Past after Zelda II? Miyamoto, the creator of Zelda, disagrees with the timeline in Hyrule Historia. He may have changed his mind since that interview (1998 I believe), but that just proves the whole timeline is made up after the fact.

Miyamoto really doesn't care much about the timeline. However, Eiji Aonuma does, and he helped edit Hyrule Historia, so if you reject the timeline published therein, you're rejecting everything Aonuma-san has ever said about the timeline, and everything that the games he's been in charge of overseeing also say about the timeline.

 

[FordSVT]

The man didn't have anything to do with the Zelda series before the N64.

It's fine if Nintendo wants to finally set the time line in concrete, and it's of no importance to anyone but hard core Zelda fans to argue over it. But Nintendo cared about continuity in the first 10-15 years of the series' life about as much as Gene cared about continuity in the first season of TOS.

 

[D Man]

That was neat to look at, but doesn't make a lot of sense. Do we need 3 Zelda timelines? Probably not. The way I see it, Zelda I and II are a loose duology, same with Link to the Past/Link's Awakening and Ocarina/Majora. Everything else is just nostalgia bait, and everything else works really well for that reason (among many others, like being great games. ) Multiple Links and Zeldas and so forth have always seemed silly to me...each game is just a cool new variation on the "chosen hero" trope, and most of them do a great job.

 

[Rincewiend]

The man didn't have anything to do with the Zelda series before the N64.

It's fine if Nintendo wants to finally set the time line in concrete, and it's of no importance to anyone but hard core Zelda fans to argue over it. But Nintendo cared about continuity in the first 10-15 years of the series' life about as much as Gene cared about continuity in the first season of TOS.

Which is, IIRC, when they started with the whole "every couple of generations a hero will rescue Hyrule" thing...

 

[Amasov]

This is where the timeline sits now until the next few Zeldas come out. After we see the next two or three games, we'll be trying to figure it all out again.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

So there's three timelines now?

Since when was Stephen Moffat writing for LoZ?