Rath

Probably just some upgraded wii with minute alteration that no one cares about... the wii is gathering dust on my shelf... not a good sign.

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Sevi

^Mine too.

I honestly wish I had more initiative to use my Wii, but I already passed TP about 6 times and I haven't played Brawl in a while.

So, is there a release date on spirit tracks?

Spiegel

Just a little update on the Hero of Time live action Zelda movie by BMB Finishes. The movie will have its world premire on June 6th in Atlanta, Georgia. Unfortunately its only going to be shown there so its not a "world" premire but they did mention that if you want to see it in your area just go to their website at www.legendofzeldaseries.com to find out how to make that possible. I think you have to do some kind of request and if a good number of people from your town is interested then they will bring film over. Anyway its pretty excited for those who want to see a live-action Zelda flick even though its was done by an independent film company.

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*

Sharingan Lord

GLORIOUS NEWS!
I am soooo excited. Despite the fact that I probably won't have the MotionPlus and whatever the peripheral is. Loooove. :3

Oh. New Spirit Tracks E3 Trailer, but it uses most of the images from the earlier trailer. Check it.

The re-rise of Zeldaaaaa?!
-----------------------------------
I occasionally have my Rock Band parties. And play some Pokemon and Okami sometimes. But not often. : ( My Wii is neglected.

Spiegel

This is exciting news. I wish they could have posted at least the picture of what Miyamoto was talking about. I'll take anything at this point. I've already played Phantom Hourglass and it was kickass, can't wait for Spirit Tracks. Looks like the they are going to carry the same gameplay feel to this game. I hope they make it longer and a little more difficult in this new installment.

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*

Silverblade

http://www.neowin.net/news/gamers/09...-2010-earliest

New Zelda for Wii.

Spiegel

Miyamoto made obvious in the picture that Link doesn't have his trusty Master Sword. I think that the next Zelda installment is going to revolve around that fact or maybe just like the article Silver pointed out and that child in the picture is probably the living incarnation of the sword. Sounds a bit like the zanpakuto used in Bleach how they also have an incarnated version living within the sword. The direction that this game can go has a lot of positive potential.

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*

Sharingan Lord

AHH! That sounds soooo cool!
The little thinger in the front reminds me of the great fairies or something in Wind Waker. But it all seems definitely interesting. Hahaha, a zanpakuto.

chisengan

I'm joining i love legend of zelda and played and beat quite a few of the games
OoT
Majoras mask
Wind Waker
Twilight Princess
OoT Master Quest

my favorite ones are the classic ones so i am not much of a fan of TP sorry to those who like it I just don't see whats so great about it so um ya like i said I'm joining

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I've been spending way to much time on /b/ -_-

Sharingan Lord

Sure you can join. >.O...or invite yourself in. >D Whatev, either one works, haha.

The stories in Zelda are really good, yeah. Especially in the original ones. At first I was pretty sure Twilight Princess was a total rip-off of Ocarina of Time since they had pretty much the exact same music for like the first half until *spoiler* Zant ruined everything again. And then after learning about *spoiler* the Mirror of Twilight things got interesting and different, for a bit, anyway.

I think Wind Waker had a pretty unique story. For the time being, anyway. It was still three dungeons then plot twist then more dungeons then boss, like most Zelda games. :[

chisengan

does any one know any details about the next zelda game or when it's supposed to come out or even the name they're taken a lot of time with this one it better be good

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I've been spending way to much time on /b/ -_-

jimmer45khb

so far it will be fore the wii The Legend of Zelda Wii 2

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Spiegel

Its been a while since this FC has seen activity. Let me start it up again by saying that I got epic news. I've mentioned before that there were a group of people making an independent film based of the Ocarina of Time game called "Hero of Time". Well the movie has been completed and after a couple of screenings in several other cities the announcement has been made. The movie will air on December 14th world wide at Dailymotion.com. Here is a link that takes you to the site for all the info on the movie and you can watch some of the trailers they have out already.

http://www.legendofzeldaseries.com/m...=fanmovie.html

Judging by trailers the movie looks pretty good. Can't wait to see it.

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*

Spiegel

Timeline “enthusiasts” (y’all know who you are!) may be looking at the title of this article with some amount of shock, disbelief, perhaps even disgust. The very thought is probably absurd to nearly all of you, and already you are probably dividing yourselves into two different camps. On one side, some may have already decided that I, in my many months of hiding, have somehow had my head stuck in the sand and haven’t heard about the confirmation of the Split Timeline. (I assure you that you are all dead wrong on that one.) And then, in the other corner of the ring, others would believe me to be some raving lunatic that is either delusional, mad, or simply desperately trying to hold onto the way things were years ago. (Mad? Me? Mad, you say? Hahaha! Hardly! You haven’t seen me get going yet!)

However, no matter what your knee-jerk reactions are to the title of this article, believe me when I tell you all that I am quite serious when I say that, just like bellbottom jeans, plaid pants, and ‘80s TV sitcoms, single timelines are going to be fashionable again before you know it. Sure, they’ve been mocked and critiqued and laughed at recently, but I think it’s only a matter of time before all the cool kids will be doing it.

Allow me to pause while you laugh. Go ahead, get it out. You’ll feel better in the long run.

Back? Good. Let’s keep going.

“How can I say that?” I hear you ask. Be patient, my fellow tenured professors of Ancient Hyrulian History of the Castle Town University Evaluation Board. I’m sure you’ll find my theories enlightening.

A little over three years ago, when I was the webmaster of ZeldaBlog, I began to write a few whimsical articles regarding a few more... controversial ideas regarding the timeline. A lot of the articles that I wrote were inspired by the fact that, when I used to participate in timeline discussions during that era, most of my objections, ideas, and what-ifs were usually dismissed without much thought. This was, for the most part, because they were quite unconventional and challenged the status quo of their beliefs. By and large, there was a consistent and passionate rejection of every idea that ran counter to what they, in their prior debates, had already determined to be goddess-given fact. (This is notwithstanding that there was an obsessive necessity to check everything minute detail of everything against the raw text of a foreign language that they themselves didn’t even understand. But, alas, I digress...) The result of this was that, the moment that you tried to question or show weaknesses in a few fundamental assumptions that were popular enough to have been elevated to law, you were as good as dead to them. Goodbye, sayounara, auf vidersein, au revior.

That sort of dismissal never really set well with me. Granted, it could have just been because their forum culture differed (drastically!) from the Internet corner in which I had been “raised,” but the riotous passion they expressed had practically become borderline religion, and I felt like a heretic amongst them... or at least amongst a few of them. (Some of those timeliners were quite reasonable, but they’re usually not the vocal ones, sadly.) And so, as a result, being the devious Internetian that I was (and still am!), I plotted my revenge.

I began to prove my points in a very different way... this time using their very evaluation techniques against them. What followed was an investigative series on the timeline that showed the weaknesses in their quest for absolute truth in uncovering the mysterious and elusive “one true timeline.” The articles also provided a basic set of principles that would help encourage discussion, new ideas, and... civility in timeline debates. Those who frequented ZeldaBlog in its heyday will remember these articles, but I realize that it’s been quite some time, so I want to present to you all a refresher course in TML’s Laws of Timelinedynamics.

The Zeroth Law of Timelinedynamics declares that, if indeed the canon can find the true timeline, then that timeline is illogical. I analyzed the seeming grandfather paradox found within the Song of Storms from Ocarina of Time and showed that, if one attempts to find the “one true timeline” using only a strict interpretation of canon, one eventually reaches a logical impasse. The Master Sword and the Ocarina of Time, despite how intrinsically intertwined they are within the game’s story, simply cannot work the same way if one hopes to make sense of both the windmill scene and the ending of the game. Therefore, if you hope to create a sensible timeline, you must view the canon as imperfect. Conversely, if you believe in an infallible canon, you must have an illogical timeline.

The First Law is that the canon is overconstrained, or rather, that there are too many conflicting details such that, no matter how you rearrange all the pieces, some small sliver of canon—some glaring fact—cannot possibly be fulfilled. I showed that, in the Four Swords trilogy, no matter how you place The Minish Cap with respect to Four Swords and Four Swords Adventures—certain logistical nightmares will always erupt from the wreckage. The takeaway was that the canon isn’t sacred; to arrive at a perfect timeline, you must subtract facts from the canon.

The Second Law is that the canon is simultaneously underconstrained, or rather, that there aren’t enough details to fully determine the proper placement of all the pieces of the timeline. The Imprisoning War shows this quite nicely in that, given what we know, we simply do not have enough pieces of evidence to know whether or not the Seal War backstory of A Link to the Past is represented by Ocarina of Time or not, partially since a few details between from the manual’s backstory and from the game’s prologue that don’t align perfectly with Ocarina. The realization? The canon isn’t complete; to arrive at a perfect timeline, you must add assumptions to the canon.

The Third Law is that the timeline is canon-indeterminate, or rather, that the timeline cannot be determined beyond a shadow of a doubt through the use of canon details alone. Here I looked at the ending of Ocarina of Time and mused over the then-possibilities between the Single, Split, and Multiple Timeline Theories. I realized that the “problem” with the Split and Multiple Timeline Theories is that each of their respective timelines (e.g., the child and adult timelines) are effectively self-contained; games from one timeline would not be allowed to reference in any way, shape, or form games from another one, therefore making it impossible to know if there were indeed multiple timelines using the canon alone. In short, canon isn’t enough; you need more data in order to find the magical timeline of lore.

While these laws are named after a rather unclever (and remarkably geeky!) reference to the Laws of Thermodynamics (good jokes about serious business are hard to come by, what can I say?), they are actually rather aptly named given their main purpose, which is to say that the timeline is still a dynamic structure, that is, the true nature of the “one true timeline”—a timeline that is without any illogical leaps of faith or any pesky, nuanced contradictions—is forever being evolved and molded and isn’t something that we can possibly ever know absolutely. And if we’re never going to find it, we might as well take over complete ownership of what the Zelda timeline looks like. So be free! Make the timeline look like whatever it is you want it to look like! (But of course, you still need to have a few good reasons for believing whatever it is you want to believe; otherwise, it’ll end up looking like Link from the CD-i games, mai boi.)

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*

Spiegel

However, despite the fact that this practically serves as the ultimate disproof of every timeline ever, there are some that see it for a lot of fancy smoke and mirrors. (In many ways, they are surprisingly correct on this issue!) You see, it’s the fundamental nature of the timeliner to want to uncover the truth. Even I feel this need deep down. There’s something in our DNA that wants to uncover, to analyze, to extract, to connect, and to build. It this regard, we’re all engineers of a sort. Consider that some people like to take apart VCRs, see how they work, and then put them back together (hopefully once again into working order!); we’re just like that... except with the Zelda canon instead of VCRs. And so it’s not surprising that timeliners don’t like the fact that the Laws put a stopper on the goal to find the timeline. It runs counter to our DNA to not reverse engineer it. And so what did they go and do? Well, the clever ones... they went and found a workaround to the Laws.

Yes, I must admit, there has always been one sole saving grace to the Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. (No, it’s not 42. You try telling people that the timeline is “42” and they’ll hang you from the rafters.) The Third Law of Timelinedynamics says that you need something outside the flawed and imperfect Zelda canon to find the timeline, and thankfully for most, there is such a thing. Which is why timeline enthusiasts have decided to fall back upon developer intent to save the timeline. You see, on a rather semi-infrequent basis, Nintendo drags Miyamoto and Aonuma out for some interview with some game reviewing agency that actually gives a care about the whole timeline business (I still can’t figure out how “media” actually cares about such stuff, but, who am I to judge!?), and even more semi-infrequently do they actually reply with some useful tidbit about how everything is pieced together. And they make some rather vague allusions to how some game takes place “100 years” (Have you ever noticed that it’s always “100 years”? I’m getting rather suspicious about this just being a ploy to simply appease us...) after this other game, yadda yadda, stuff, and then Miyamoto and Aonuma hightail it out of there before anyone can think to hold them hostage until they finally divulge details about the next, next Zelda game that everyone is already suspecting to be in the works.

But no one seems to mind that they dodged the big question. We had the chance to have this ever so brief peek at the Golden Land! Quick everybody, to the Zelda Club tree house! (Oh wait, we’re not allowed to talk about Zelda Club!) We must scoff at those disbelievers and readjust our timelines accordingly! Oh glory be, there is science timeline to be done!

Now, I’ve had the privilege of being able to make videogames for the past three years of my life. My opinions about how games are made has changed remarkably from this experience. I’m sure you’ve all had those infuriating questions of “why did so-and-so decide to do this such-and-such stupid idea?” I now have rough ideas as to why. Those times where you ask, “Why don’t the developers communicate with us more?” I’ve felt the frustrations... except from the other side of the fence. And those press releases? Well, let’s just say I can smell PR’s involvement in something from a good 20 miles away. (I mean, anything that requires blowing into the DS’ microphone as controller input... am I right?) And so every time I hear Miyamoto or Aonuma speak about how the games are ordered (and how Nintendo is going to make us smile), thoughts of sugarplums dance in my head. Okay, so I lie; it’s not really that, but I do begin to wonder exactly when in the grand processes that little detail was decided... and more importantly how it was all of that came about.

So while researching this article, I found a hilarious tidbit from Aonuma regarding Four Swords Adventures. In it, he mentioned, before FSA’s release, that “the GBA Four Swords Zelda is what we’re thinking as the oldest tale in the Zelda timeline...[with FSA] being a sequel to that.” However, as it turns out, that plan never really panned out, and after FSA’s release, Aonuma sheepishly admitted that, during FSA’s development, “we changed the story around quite a bit... [changing it] all the way up until the very end.”

If I had heard this three years ago, I might have been surprised; today, I’m laughing to myself because I know how true those words are. The only constant in developing a title is that it constantly changes and evolves in order to account for a significant number of factors. Is this game too similar to another game we’ve made? Too different? Is it going to stand out amongst its competitors? Is it possible to add this feature to the schedule? This isn’t working out; can we cut it? What demographic are we targeting? Is the game too simple? Too complicated? Too unbalanced? Too difficult? Is it fun from start to finish? Is the storyline compelling? Is it believable? On and on the questions go, and here’s a shocking secret about making games: Not every issue gets resolved. There’s always a few “bugs”—whether they be program crashes, spelling mistakes, leaps of faith in storytelling, and simple violations of common sense—that either slip through the cracks or simply aren’t important enough to get taken care of in those last all-important days before the game goes gold. Games are shipped “imperfectly,” and so not only is the game never quite what you initially thought it was going to be, the game never quite ends up to be what you hoped it would become.

This is, in essence, the Developer’s Dilemma. Do you sacrifice gameplay for story? Do you sacrifice story for expanding our audience? Do you sacrifice your audience for gameplay? Sacrifices—in other words, cuts—always have to be made; where do you make them in order to make them as painless as possible? Where do you make them in order to make the game as fun as possible? And as a result of this, I’m going to remove that last pillar of the timeline hierarchy. The standard workaround for the failures of canon is about to be blown away. You ready for this? Because this one’s a doozy.

The Theory of Timeline Relativity: The developers cannot save the timeline.

Please, before you rush down to the comments section, let me tell you what this isn’t saying. I’m not saying that developers cannot possibly establish strong continuities between games. I think it’s quite clear that the Metroid series, despite being passed from developer to developer, has told a very compelling storyline over its entire series (disregarding the deus ex machina of starting over from scratch every time).

However, in the case of the Zelda timeline, we are officially up to 15 Zelda games, and the best Nintendo has been able to clarify the order of everything is to piece a measly six of them into some sort of continuity. The rest of the timeline is so scattered and so disjoint (thereby creating the need for the prior four Laws of Timelinedynamics) that Nintendo is in far too deep in order to ever fully make sense of all the small details now. If they could have saved the timeline, they would have done so already. At any point in this process, they could have already decreed by fiat precisely what the timeline actually is. (Actually, NoA tried to do this once, but that timeline was ironically met with derision and mockery.) However, given either Nintendo’s inability or lack of desire to do so, they have all but admitted that a perfect continuity has been either cut from their grand schedule or has been put on the backburner indefinitely. (This isn’t to say that they don’t have any ideas at all about how it all works, mind, just that they probably haven’t resolved every last plot problem themselves and are just waiting for a new game that just makes those nasty bits work.)

__________________
"Inherited will, the destiny of the age, and the dreams of its people. These are things that will not be stopped. As long as people continue to pursue the meaning of freedom, these things will never cease to be!"
-Gol D. Roger

*Ex-Kakashi87*