Audio note: Some of the audio between videos varies in quality/how it sounds as this is multiple videos pieced together. I also have a cold currently so the intro & outro sound a little iffy. Back stronger in full flow with brand new content next week!

My favorite little "secret" is how ToTK recontextualizes the Silent Princess flower. It went from this symbol of Zelda being trapped by her father, "silent" bc she cant speak her mind or be who she wants to be, to being a flower LITERALLY created by the Dragon Tears, specifically a brand new one. Not only does it explain why they are so rare and hard to find, but their name now also has a different meaning... It's a Silent Princess bc Zelda has lost herself, just like how she can't speak in Link's Recall sage moment. It also indicates some time loop shenanigans, as she kinda created her favorite flower. No wonder Zelda feels such a connection to it!

I noticed some foreshadowing early game that I only picked up on after a certain memory. When you meet up with Zelda on your first visit to the temple of time you're taken into the same realm that the other sages talk to you in. However, she completely silent, more in a sleeping state.

The 'Rauru: first king of hyrule" thing doesnt have to throw that much of a wrench into things. So long as you remember that there are like 4 or so different civilizations all built in the same spot as Pompeii, just separated by a couple hundred years. You take Rauru as just the first king of this new Hyrule after some big calamity (possibly something that brought the split timelines together) and everything basically falls into place

One thing I love about Tears of the Kingdom's world is the visual storytelling of Hyrule Castle rising. We're told in Ganondorf's character profile that Rauru's magic weakened when the castle was damaged (however that works is up for interpretation), and we're also told by a tablet in the Royal Hidden Passage that the castle was built above Rauru's seal to prevent anyone from reaching the Imprisoning Chamber and disturbing it. The castle itself essentially acted as a reinforcement to Rauru's seal, and with that seal now broken, it being raised into the sky represents Ganondorf's power breaking through its prison and reaching the surface once again. It's basically like a massive door into the Depths being opened.

Hearing Fi's jingle and the blue glow when Zelda held the Master Sword legit had me tearing up.

bro the tingle hood is inside the 8th heroine statue TINGLE IS THE 8TH HEROINE

I never understood why Gloom and Malice was never separated in videos as an Element VS an intent or curse. When I unlock the gloom armor it became obvious that Gloom is a type of element in the Zelda Universe. If you think of the Sages from every Zelda entry there was never always a standard element light, water or fire, but spirit or shadow was present. My takeaway is that gloom existed long before Ganondorf was even born, I believe it is an Element of darkness that Ganondorf learned to use as a sage or wizard would. The Element of corruption, a dark power. Ganondorf was the only one to tame and control.

2:39 bro is blown away even though the tablet in the last game was literally a Wii U gamepad

I just met Patricia Summersett (the voice of zelda) this weekend at Fandom Expo, and she was so sweet! She even did her zelda voice for me. We talked about her favorite Easter eggs and secrets so this video was well timed! I was so exited to see if some of the things we talked about were on the video

One thing I found interesting: in the opening cutscene, Zelda picks up Rauru's secret stone that was from his arm. I had the realization that, when she goes back in time and meets Rauru, she still has the secret stone from his arm, and he also still has his secret stone. So there are two of the same secret stone in the same time period. I don't know what to do with this information.

In thr Japanese version of totk, in Zelda's diary she actually calls it "our house", very much confirming they live together! I'm not sure why they changed it in the English version

I didn't realise you could deflect/return Ganondorf's magic attacks during the final boss battle. That's neat.

The reimagined music during the "Death Tennis" segment was my cue to briefly relive the end fight of my favorite game of all time, and I was SO hyped. 🙌

The Ganondorf "tennis" isn't just from Ocarina of Time. Agahnim in A Link to the Past does this, Phantom Ganon in Windwaker and Puppet Ganon (Zelda) in Twilight Princess. I remember wondering if he would do this in Tears of the Kingdom and thought it might look a bit cheesey. But I thought they pulled it off perfetly and was something a lot of people might not even notice.

Did anyone else notice that once you finish the dragon tears quest, Zelda won't talk anymore during the blood mood cut scene?

I think the "Fi music" in totk sounds more like the theme that plays in past games when Link opens boss treasure chests or pulls the master sword.

a detail i thought was cool is that the flame emitter looks like dinraal and the frost emitter looks like naydra and the shock emitter looks like farosh

I miss the trauma of Guardians. By that I mean giving the Guardians trauma when they hear their own theme.

I think to further the fact the first three dragons are zonai is their physical features im their face. Their ears are bigger than Zelda's and the shape of their mouths looks like raru's snout somewhat.

rauru is technically the 2nd king of hyrule he just didn't know about the previous inhabitants so he thought they was the first inhabitants until they started discovering hyrulian race evidence buried underground, id say he is BOTH a sage and king not one or the other, he always has a his wife princess who was able to control light and time with the assistance of the tear thingy, but her powers were still weak sauce compared to zelda's natural born talent

I think it would be hilarious if they played the guardian theme when you saw the decommissioned one just to scare the players 😂

this is cool, the audio quality for your voice took a dive tho

slight editing thing: in the chapter "totk secrets one" where you warn against being spoiled, it has an old timestamp in the video that is incorrect. it comes up at 9:06 in the vid but says to skip to 4:58

The design of Rauru's tunic having triangles like the Triforce is intriguing in that it shows many rows triangles, unlike Link's that only has 2 rows completing the classic Triforce look. Also, Rauru's triangles are concentric. I wonder what this could mean? I've also been theorizing that the reason the Zonai are mostly gone by the time of Rauru's Hyrule is because of a civil war between Hylians and Zonai. I think that Rauru and Sonya's marriage may have been a move to bring peace to their two races. Hence why the Hylians of their time wear tribal Zonai clothing. They adopted the customs of the Zonai as a blending of both cultures. Following the deaths of Raura and Sonya, the Hylians defaulted to their own architecture and fashion, perhaps has other Hylians returned to Hyrule (having left previously after the civil war). They also would have been the ones to cover up the Zonai architecture with the rough stony exteriors we see in the Wild era, which are much more crude looking that the smooth, elegant design the Zonai were really known for. This may have helped them to paint the Zonai as savages, justifying the civil war and their erradication. It would also connect to another theory I have that the Stalchildren in Ocarina of Time's Hyrule Field were, in fact, Zonai - hence their tribal attire. Considering Ganondorf uses a bloodmoon to awaken his armies, it would suggest that the moon has restorative properties and that he recognized it. As the moon also revives the Stalfchildren in OoT, I don't think it was an accident that the moon was specifically chosen as in the game/lore explanation for enemies coming back.

Link was cast to live in the ruins outside of Hateno while Zelda purchased his home as an investment

i was playing totk when u played the guardian theme and had a heart attack lmao

The purah pad is the switch just as the sheikah slate is the Wii u gamepad.

Do you think you could cover this place I found behind gut check rock? There are 2 nameless hot springs in super close proximity of each other near gut check that are both shaped like lizards. I haven’t seen anyone even mention these places yet and I feel like that even if you don’t do a theory on them they could make for a good add-on for a video some how Note: the bottom spring is also where you find Sibajitak Shrine Edit: in between the springs is where the side adventure “bring peace to Eldin!” Takes place Edit 2: there is also a cave at the head of one of the lizard springs called “lizards burrow” where you can fight a bubblfrog and is the place (spoilers) where you find the “va rudania divine helm”

one more curious thing in Zelda's house is that Link can sleep in that one bed, and we all know that Link can only sleep in his beds (or in the stables) soo...... one more thing is that in Zelda's secret study, there is the Link's old hairband

I'm curious aa to why the shrines in the sky islands don't have lightroots since the game indicates that they all were apart of the land then raised into the sky. Second thing in curious about is the figure on Bularia's headpiece. I've only found only one other person mention it and they thought it was the moon from Ocarina of Time.

32:00 bro hit the clump so hard he blue screened the video lol

I love all your videos. I spend most nights listening to these, often falling to sleep. Thank tou

true but did Zelda REALLY HAVE TO SELL OUR CHAMPION WEAPONS??? THOSE WERE GIFTS ZELDA!

Link has all the properties of a sage. Appearing in each age to fight evil. He’s just missing the secret stone, yet his character sits well with the other sages. ….Tom

jesus christ man I am listening to this vid as I am trying to focus on my work and then you played that guardian theme couple of times, you're not even letting it finish. you're evil 😭🤣

Could the 8th heroine be the zonai Link on the tapestry?

The symbols on the sage seals are the Kanji with an eye for said sage elements.

Nothing like some Hyrule Gamer on a Sunday!

the sheikah slate itself, much like the purah pad, was modeled to look like the wii u controller

It’s also interesting that the ghost soldiers in the depths that hold weapons also glow like a poe….a wayward soul. ….Tom

I'm a newer subscriber who hadn't seen all these videos, so this was a nice compilation.

Its hilarious (but also mildly annoying) how many people get legitimately mad about Zelda "stealing their house." I've seen people actually complaining about it online. Yall need to go outside and touch some grass.

If you listen to the very last cutscene of the game you can hear the original theme near the end

for the zelink house one, after you pointed this out my only thought was, what is Zelda gonna say when she find out link paid thousands of ruppes for a house in tarrey town?

I am to the understanding that each character with a secret stone, is indeed a sage. Rauru has two jobs it seems. King and sage. …Tom

what if the clumps are demons sealed inside them (ganondorf IS the king of demons) another idea is that they are shards of ganondorf's being, infusing you with a shard of his power an giving you some resistance to it. one more idea is that they are the souls of monsters (or even people that died from the calamity) sacrificed in order to create the spawn (i think the spawn is also made out of stone from the fact that they attach to the ground, i call i gloomstone because it sounds cool, and they could possibly be ganondorf making a gloom army)

Just going to say that I really enjoy the longer form content.

Great job, your videos are the best!

27:39 The "sages' seals" are just stylized kanji characters of the element of the sages. The Goron one says fire, the Gerudo one is 雷 which is lightning, and such.

The eighth heroine is likely supposed to be a past link; perhaps one from the time between the great calamities 10,000 and 100 (now 106 because totk takes place between 5 and 7 years after botw and totk was released 6 years after botw, which lines up too nicely with the chronology to be a coincidence) years ago

Link has another house in totk( not the one where zelda lives,) in tarrey town, but you have to do a certain task to do so.

The bar for secrets is really low.

day 46 of mentioning that on 6/6/2023 hyrule gamer made a video where, at 43.46, he spent 12 seconds simping about the ancient gerudo soldiers

If we base our presumptions only on the in game/universe there isn't as many inconsistency as most get hung up on. I understand the 'player perspective', and how difficult it can be to distinguish between our expansive knowledge versus what is actually made available in the Botw/Totk lore. To start I'll point out the only real inconsistency the devs never should of let slip. That being most not recognizing who link is, or remembering him from Botw. Either no one should recognize him from his actions in Botw ( i.e. overtly making speed run link canon despite avoiding 'canon' ) or more care should of been put into nods to previous side and main quests. Now. With that out of the way. The one point I wish to point out is in regards to how the 'zonai' lore changed so drastically from Botw to Totk. This is explained much easier than I've heard anyone elaborate on. To put it simply, those 'history experts' in game or ancient text are NOT infallible. What we are told in game shouldn't be taken anymore as absolute fact than we do our own real history. Lore channels seem discouraged because there's a sense of 'nothing matters it's all made up' coupled with player perspective issues. Copy paste cutscenes, while annoying are perhaps a bit more realistic than we care for. Each memory being a perspective of the same event, thus each sage would share near the same exact memory. Likewise the 'Feral Zonai Tribe' is easily theorized on as well rather than being upset they didn't do more. Which of course, they could have, though that shouldn't bleed into in game lore issues. No scientific way to accurately 'date' anything in game. So what we are told in game is subjective. Some barbarian tribe could have easily adopted the name 'Zonai' after stumbling on their ruins. Twilight Princess introduced new crazy powerful relics and lore very counter to previous games. Windwaker showed the triforce can be broken further. Skyward sword had silly paradoxes with its time travel components as well. Thank you for continuing with the lore content HG. There's plenty new to speculate and theorize on in Totk, and I can only hope other awesome Zelda content creators work the bitter player perspective taste from their mouth and return with a fresh perspective to give the new lore introduced another chance. The 'barbarian Zonai' were hinted to be connected or ancestors to the hylians living on the coast of Faron. Clearly not actual 'Zonai' as was revealed yet not as much a travesty as some stress on and a mystery worth theorizing on.

for the lols the 8th is master Roshi yes form dragon ball

WHAT!! I did it again. 14 seconds. I guess I’m just supposed to be here. Good thing I love the videos ❤❤ Ima do my laundry to this 😂

the soliders in the depths also kinda look like poes

Around 29:41 you bring up Dead Man's Volley like it was a OOT reference but they had they also had it in Link To The Past and probably Zelda 1 or Zelda 2 (i admit ive never played Zelda 1 or 2 so im not sure on those just assume).... how did you miss that?

Well seeing as link can only sleep in his own bed or inns it is safe to assume that zlink is a thing

I always thought the three dragons were worshipped by the zonai not neccesarily zonai themselves they are referred to as spirits

Love the endcap.

The game title should be called “The Legacy of Link”

Interesting video , do you have a cold the audio is off

Just what I needed!!

The purah pad is supposed to be a nintendo switch in the way that the sheika slate is a Wii U game pad (Since BOTW was a Wii U game)

Could the time zelda went back to take place a few hundred years after Skyward Sword? And a few before OoT?

I just don't understand why they made the Purad pad so compatible with the shape of the Switch, but didn't used it as the skin for the TOTK themed Switch? What a waste

"I'm not far enough into the game to know if the triforce has more importance to the game yet" DID YOU STILL NOT FINISH IT?? O:

This is isn’t related to TotK in any way, but in BotW, have you heard any SOS signals after entering a divine beast?

6:20 well it’s entirely possible because we know OoT Rauru can change shape due to the fact the he is both an owl and hylian and we never see the King of Hyrule in OoT so Rauru ToTK could have taken a different shape in the sacred realm in OoT for some unknown reason

There's one bed but also only one pillow

8:39 I wonder if that is the "Battle-Tested Guardian"?

11:02 adding to the dragon lore, but every time I see one of them enter the depths, the other two enter at the same time. At least the times I've witnessed them enter the depths that's been the case.

Link has been going above and beyond in his (k)nightly duties 😏😏😏

nice vid man, don't think the 3 dragons have to be Zonai though. (neither was Zelda), they were just the last bearers of the secret stones they swallowed. could always be either sages or trustees of the Zonai, related to the region where the dragons are flying or what their element represents. Dinraal could've been a Goron and Naydra a Zora or Rito. only one I do think might be Zonai is Farosh. Remember we still havent really learned anything about a "savage" tribe, either they were retconned, or they were from the era of Zonai before Rauru declared Hyrule a kingdom, when they were still... well savage. also think there were probably more secret stones when the Zonai first arrived than there were by the time Rauru was king. just theorising though💯💪

I love the ending

Did anybody know that korok balloons targets follow you as you move around them.. or am I just late to the party?? 😅

My theory is zelda stole links hous and forces him to sleep outside by the campfire.

I'm very early to this, let's go!! I'm excited for another great video, dude!

Mostly unchanging models as far as ancient junk goes.

4:06 I don't think there is more to this tunic since I got rid of it once I got better equipment. 8:16 I'VE SEEN ENOUGH HENTAI TO KNOW WHERE THIS IS GOING! I like to think that the dragons are the oracles in the Oracle games. Link bought a new house for a reason so maybe he doesn't live with Zelda. You actually pronounced Fi's name properly. Way too many people call her Fee which really bugs me. 27:00 It looks like the Sheikah eye. Daddydorf? You mean Rehydrated Ganondorf?

im still trying figure out the song name used in the intro lmaoo

If you dont think Link and Zelda were sharing that bed, you're just wrong. I will hear no arguements.

I honestly wished that Tears of the Kingdom leaned far more into the Sequel aspect then it actually did. I was disappointed when NPCs that I helped in BOTW didn't recognize me. Also the the rather bizarre fact that no one in Hateno recognizes Link despite him always being by Zelda's side after the Calamity. The Continuity Errors in this game and the sheer number of them is frankly astounding. This game was marketed for years as a Sequel yet they rarely leaned into that. Revali, Daruk and Urbosa as well as their Divine Beasts seem to have been completely erased.

day 75 of mentioning that on 6/6/2023 hyrule gamer made a video where, at 43.46, he spent 12 seconds simping about the ancient gerudo soldiers

13:35 exceot 1

As for how TOTK is connected the pre-BOTW games, the design team has said they don't take the Zelda timeline into account when creating new Zelda games

Oof yeah what happened to the audio in this one oh boy

The gurudo hero was Gannon, he’s oissed because he was shunned for being a man. …Tom

30:53 😂😂😂😂

Not to sound like a hater but the first few just turned me off the video... I didn't know this would just be a buzzfeed-esque "most people miss that obvious thing is obvious!".

Nah man, don’t tell me that I am putting scary hand guts into my food. 🤢

Hello there

Easter eggs?

Still love this game! Though personally I'd loved to see more of the Zonai. But I know I'm not alone. Here'S hopin for the next game. And I LOVE the detail and secrets Nintendo always puts in the games.

You're slightly wrong about the lightroots and the shrines. Most of the lightroots are directly under the surface shrines. However, a few of them are not, but are rather off to side a little. I'm not sure which ones, but I think it was all three surface shrines in to the labyrinths, and one that was literally sitting in a pond. Maybe. But I do remember explicitly that there's a few that don't line up if you zoom the map all the way in.

Yay!

The lore behind the BoTW/TotK dragons is probably my absolute FAVORITE thing about this era of Hyrule. You can see even more similarities between the dragons and the examples of Zonai beings in Mineru and Rauru. The manes of the dragons look almost one to one with Rauru's impressive head of hair, the dragon ears of the original three appear similar-shaped to Zonai ears (Light dragon's ears are differently shaped and textured), even the dragon snouts and mouths look similar to Zonai mouths. My theory is that three ancient Zonai with special talents of ice, fire, and lightning/thunder (relating to Naydra, Dinraal, and Farosh respectively) were in possession of Zonai secret stones, and for a reason now lost to the passage of time were driven to take the desperate measure of draconification, simultaneously creating the trinity of sacred dragon spirits and the forbidding of ever completing the ritual again. It's possible they had to become dragons to protect the ancient land of Hyrule from some great catastrophe, or protect some hidden knowledge, or grant their own people some sort of power/protection/aid... lots of possibilities there and I doubt we'll ever get an explanation. That just makes the mystery even more delicious though! Anyways, that's just a theory. 😉

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