ToTK and how it contradicts the lore of the series along with thinking about how complicated the lore the series already was post WW had me thinking:
Zelda really had some charm that was lost in Ocarina of Time and even more by the time of The Wind Waker. The first four games prioritized gameplay over story, and the story that was there wasn't some over convoluted mess of a lore like it is now. And while there were technically multiple Links in those games, it wasn't apparent at the time. For all we knew, the series was about a single hero and his multiple adventures in Hyrule and surrounding regions.
Part of me wishes that the series stayed simple. None of this convoluted lore, half-baked story over gameplay, ship-bait female characters, etc. Just fun, top-down, action-adventures with RPG and Metroidvania elements, and just have it be about a single hero and his many adventures.
Seriously, just looking at modern Zelda and it's fanbase, it's mostly just shipping and debating about the lore of the series. The latter isn't bad by any means. The former is, however, and even then, it feels like most people don't even care about the gameplay. Like all the praise that OOT gets is just how "emotionally impactful" the story is when it is really just the same "coming of age" story where a character realizes that they are not who they thought they were, and the gameplay is just ALTTP in 3D.
I also feel like there being "lore" is kinda antithetical to the concept, it's the *Legend* of Zelda, I always took that to mean that every game is just the same story being told from a different "narrator" who may embellish details and use artist license (except Majora's Mask, I always interpreted that as a dark fairy tale). That's why sometimes the worlds flooded, sometimes there's shadow people, sometimes it's in the sky, etc.
Anyway, my favorite Zelda game is the one where you're a wolf...
@Indigo
>I also feel like there being "lore" is kinda antithetical to the concept, it's the *Legend* of Zelda, I always took that to mean that every game is just the same story being told from a different "narrator" who may embellish details and use artist license
Not really. As convoluted as the Zelda lore is. It's been explicitly clear that some games take place before and after others (Zelda II taking place after Zelda I, OOT taking place before ALTTP, etc). The "legend" part could explain all the plot holes however.
@Indigo Well the story and lore is hard to just ignore because the newer games prioritize it's half-baked story over gameplay. It's why I feel like some charm was lost after OOT.
That's why Spirit Tracks and Phantom Hourglass being sequels to Wind Waker but not having much to do with anything else still flies, those are part of the Wind Waker "legend" that were added on later.
I know there is technically a "timeline" that splits because of the time travel nonsense in Ocarina, but I always interpreted that as Nintendo throwing a bone out to make fanboys shut up, ironically having the opposite effect.
Granted, I'm the type of person who doesn't tend to care about what's "cannon" when I'm playing video games about fictional fantasy worlds. Same reason I consider all the Dark Souls games to effectively be their own universe; and consider Fallout 1,2, and New Vegas to be one universe and Todd's weird fanfiction a different one.