I kinda hope that Nintendo either clears up the time travel rules, or makes it completely,
deliberately incomprehensible. If it isn't going to make sense, make it clear to the players that it isn't supposed to make sense.
I realize that I'm bringing up an older discussion that I was too lazy to continue earlier, but it's abruptly relevant again.
Like, the official explanation for the Downfall timeline is impossible and can't result in the Imprisoning War.
Yes it does. In Hyrule Historia's made-up scenario, the book says Ganon still gets sealed anyway even after Link loses, on Page 92:
"Ganondorf the thief obtained the Triforce of Power and managed to get his hands on Princess Zelda. The Hero of Time, Link, challenged him in a battle that would determine Hyrule’s very existence, and lost. At last, Ganondorf found himself in the possession of the Triforce of Wisdom that dwelt within Princess Zelda, and the Triforce of Courage that dwelt in Link. His true power achieved, he transformed into the Demon King. The Seven Sages of Hyrule, led by Princess Zelda, sealed Ganon and the Triforce in the Sacred Realm as a final resort."
Incidentally, setting aside the notion of Link losing, the text also says that Ganondorf only first became the Demon King upon acquring all three pieces of the Triforce after taking them from Link and Zelda following Link's defeat, when in the game itself, Ganondorf was already the Demon King upon first acquiring just the Triforce of Power.
Leaving aside the timing of Ganon's transformation (I guess the idea is that Link loses in the first phase?), there's plenty of problems. First, Zelda somehow escapes
after Ganon takes her piece of the triforce. Leaving aside the question of whether she'd survive that, how? She needed Link to escape, and apparently the distraction of killing Link wasn't enough for her to get away. Next, the Sages aren't powerful enough to beat Ganon when he
didn't have the full triforce. He needed to be stabbed by the Master Sword before they could seal him.
So. No. The Sages could not beat Ganon without someone using the Master Sword to stand against the triforce. That is not a scenario that can be reached from a point as late as the final battle of the game. The point of divergence has to have been earlier.
My own personal theory is the Imprisoning War happens in a timeline without
any time travel, where the situation is far different.
Mind you, there's plenty of weirdness beyond
neither ending lining up with the backstory of the main timeline.
Hate it all you want, the timeline with Ganon as a blue pig man is the one with the most games. Twilight Princess is totally the problem for the timeline, though. The child ending could have been used to set up the Imprisoning War if someone didn't decide to shoehorn Ganon into the game.
A... Less contentious name for the Blue Pig Man timeline would probably be the Imprisoning War timeline. The other timelines don't have one.
Like, on a conceptual level, the time travel is just weird. It's mental time travel, but that's not the weird part. For some reason, the child's mind is traveling through time instead of the teenager's mind, which raises some issues, but Link just doesn't seem to exist between the two eras, which raises even more issues. How did his body grow up? Where did his clothes come from? How did he exercise?
An easy explanation would be that Link spent those seven years training in the Sacred Realm, which avoids most issues. A more interesting story would be that Link actually survived the intervening time and sent his mind back seven years, showing a montage to cover the time skip.
Why is the Master Sword time traveling? Back when it was only the sword's second appearance, it didn't stick out that badly, but as we've seen more of the sword, it makes less and less sense. The Master Sword just doesn't work that way. It repels evil and curses and the power of the Triforce, it doesn't provide random powers.
The plot device in the title is usually what powers that plot. Why isn't the Ocarina of
Time handling the time travel? As is, the Ocarina doesn't do a whole lot.
I'm not expecting Nintendo to rewrite the story much, if at all, but having the future part of the gap
start with Link finding the Ocarina of Time and using it to jump back would avoid a lot of the issues the time travel raised.
I'll admit that even the prospect of major changes to the game don't really make me that excited, and I don't think Nintendo is going to do much to change things.
I'd have been more interesting in the first and second games getting the
Metroid: Zero Mission treatment.