#but it will be purah instead

[ganondoodle]

What actually is the totk rewrite project? It looks interesting and I love the art

thank you!

the totk rewritten project is something i started working on after the game (zelda, tears of the kingdom) has left me severly disappointed on so many levels it just didnt let me rest, i love the franchise and i love botw, i even have a fully painted, albeit slowly updating, comic for a story taking place before skyward sword in the works too; tho this project has nothing to do with the comic

basically im rewriting, designing (including game design) totk in almost every aspect, im taking the real game as a basis tho, right now im still in the writing and design phase, i cant do two full comics at the same time so the final look of the project will be painted 'fake screenshots' with written text detailing whats happening, sort of like half comic half book, but in the style of as if its a playthrough

big changes are that theres no time travel, zelda is your companion and with you always (she goes everywhere with you, translates stuff, helps you fight, and is generally much more taking the charge in important moments), the focus is not on zonau tech but shiekah, exploring more of their origins and revealing that their tech was based on that of the long gone zonau, link loses his arm fully and has it replaced by a shiekah prosthetic, the memories (accessed way different) are from ganondorf in which it is revealed that rauru + sonia were scheming to seal him in that awful half death way of being to prevent him from destroying the world bc they had found old ancient texts from a forgotten time (old titles) that the king of the gerudo would turn into a monster trying to bring down the world, despite ganondorf not actually doing that that yet- he finds out and counterattacks- bringing the whole plot going and ending with him sealed anyway, but this time his body was then later discovered by the shiekah and his strong spirit used as a power source for their tech- tho no goodie good guy he is angry, traumatized and out for revenge for what was done to him now

that is a very very short summary, im also designing links new abilities (hook shot with his prosthetic for example) and welll .. alot more

if you are interested in reading and seeing what concepts i have as of now, with the tag "ganondoodles rewrites totk" you should be able to find all posts i have made about it on this blog, tho of course it can all still change as im working on it :D

[missingalaxies]

Link: okay, so, about that- *runs away*

[goodness-graceous]

many zel*nk shippers when ANYONE tries to be happy about and enjoy a different ship involving Zelda or Link:

(this is about b*tw/t*tk, but can apply to any of the games if y’all wish 😌)

[science-lings]

You all know how I like to make botw Link a nerd when it comes to potions and botany but I have now decided that it would also be neat if he was also more interested in mechanics and physics than he seems, like even before the calamity. 

I mean, just imagine, this kid who since the age of four has been naturally great at fighting, the latest in a long line of royal knights, his path only being reinforced when he’s discovered to be the reincarnation of the hero, his duty to the crown being reinforced in his head for years and years, and maybe at first he thinks that he and Zelda would get along due to their similar interests. But she immediately hates him for the sword on his back. 

So every time he escorts her to the royal tech lab, he desperately wants to participate and tinker but he’s just a guard, and all he can do is listen. He loves it when she rambles about what she’s doing and he finds it all fascinating but it’s also been fused to his being that he’s just a soldier meant to gladly die for her and his thoughts don’t really matter. 

Then, when he comes back from the dead, in a room full of mysterious ancient tech, the first thing he’s given is the sheikah slate. And the whole theme of the game is curiosity and discovery and exploration and why should that be limited to just the world? He should be so excited to get the runes and learn how to use them and be baffled by how they defy the laws of physics. He takes pictures and figures out puzzles and has a blast working through problems with the tools he’s given. (also the implied building mechanic in totk... you cannot tell me that he’s not super hyped about making his own car) 

He would think that the champions dlc would be totally worth it when he’s given the master cycle zero, he even gives it the new name of Vah Epona. He powers it with his near infinite supply of apples as if it were a living horse and balances zooming around with teleporting to shrines because that’s just as exciting. 

But in the end he’s still supposed to be the hero, so he can’t stay to talk about tech with Robbie and Purah, he’s happy with waiting for those lectures until Zelda is freed, he has a feeling she’d be interested in it too. 

[three-bunnies-in-a-trenchcoat]

I still can't believe they did that to Paya

[thejolteonmastertj]

BOTW Link was always a crossdresser confirmed. 😂

[k-she-rambles]

Anyway, headcanon that the reason Zelda's achieved some fame as a recipe author in totk is that Link actually isn't that creative of a cook. He has half a dozen recipes for every elixir or horse liniment and "horse liniment" you could name, but he doesn’t have the cooking instinct.

He's a good cook when a recipe is involved, but when he doesn't have a recipe he just makes kebabs or greens and mushrooms. Camp food. Satisfying food, but not stellar.

And Zelda knows how much Link enjoys good food.

So she teaches herself how to cook.

And because she's never half-assed a thing in her entire life she gets really good at it.

And because she loves the science of cooking, she starts writing recipes

And so now we have Zelda's recipes as valuable commodities in TOTK, all because Zelda wanted Link to have better food.

[ranger-kellyn]

i think one of my favorite things about age of calamity is how it made breath of the wild even more harrowing for me. when i restarted my botw play through all i could think about while up on the great plateau was all the different areas for the plateau missions in aoc, and just how empty the world as a whole is. the town below the plateau just being completely gone, opposed to the huge town that was there in aoc, full of homes and plazas and just...life.

when i unlocked the central tower it was nostalgic since that's the. main tower for age of calamity, and i just....botw was already a very lonely game. aoc made it feel desolate

[soul-of-rei]

OOH ROTATING MY OWN TOTK ROLESWAP AU

[armenianwriterman]

AYYY, WE GOT OUR NINTENDO SWITCH BACK!

[flaskuwu]

Hmmm…

[pcktknife]

purah is like sheldon if sheldon was doing hot girl shit instead of selling fire arms to children

[nolongerapileofashprobably]

Just like how botw had small details telling us the probable ‘canonical’ route Link took (aka Zora, Rito, Goron, and then Gerudo), totk has something similar. I’m sure all players noticed that the newspapers will feature one region that is meant to direct Link to go aid the people there. First is Rito, next is Goron, third is Zora, and last is Gerudo. BUT! They also added something else.

Zelda’s role in the story. Namely, her interactions with Tulin, Yunobo, King Dorephan, and Riju. Annnnnnddd Link’s reactions to her!

Tulin’s interaction with her is one meant to confuse players: Zelda was in the past, but Tulin saw her? So she’s here in the present and we’re chasing after her. Sounds a lot like Skyward Sword, okay (which was released on the switch last year, so anyone who didn’t play it back in 2012 had another chance to). It confuses Link, but spurs him to become a journalist ? Cool, I’m here for it. I did journalism for 4 years, I’m sure Link can do it too!

Then, for Yunobo, he actively speaks to Zelda, we see her figure, and Link will actively gasp whenever we see her. He has a genuine reaction to her presence, because he’s surprised, but then we see pink gloom glow in the mask that Zelda have Yunobo and it makes him freak out land turn against Link. That’s when we start to put together that maybe Zelda is being controlled? Or she’s NOT Zelda, just as Yunobo begins to theorize but can’t quite wrap his head around it.

Next, we have King Dorephan who is actually attacked by Zelda and is injured to the point that he decides to hide from his people as to not create more chaos in this time. He chooses to give Zelda the benefit of the doubt here— he could have easily had his people turn against Hyrule and all Hylians because of Zelda’s actions. But he doesn’t! Because it simply doesn’t make sense. And by the end of the quest, Sidon comes to the conclusion that the Zelda in the past and the Zelda in the present are NOT the same.

And we see that thought truly stick with Link in a cutscene in Gerudo. After defending Kara Kara Bazaar, Zelda appears and Riju calls out for her. There is no gasp from Link like with Yunobo’s story, instead he watches Zelda with a slightly narrowed gaze and does not stop watching where she was last seen until Riju directly addresses him. They actively show the players that Link is suspicious, but he is still so very dedicated.

And it happens again, in the center of the light triangle. Zelda appears and Link begins to walk toward her, but there is no intake of breath, no shock at seeing her… instead he slowly walks until Riju calls out for him.

After Link finishes each phenomenon, going to Lookout Landing gives the players a clue in how Link is reacting. Specifically, if you speak to Buliara before going to see Purah, she says something along the lines of “Purah is up on the top deck, but don’t miss a wrung in your haste to get up there.”

Link is expected to rush. Because everyone is muttering about a figure that MIGHT be Zelda. At the castle. Right. Then. And. There.

Link GASPS when he first looks into the scope— Purah doesn’t even say it’s Zelda, not before Link sees for himself. It’s seeing her, clear as day, and even if Link KNOWS it’s not her… there’s still that seed of doubt that lives in his mind. And then at the castle, Link does twist and turn whenever he hears Zelda. He rushes after her every. Single. Time. She disappears. Despite that he knows it isn’t her, he can’t give up. He can’t. It’s quite literally not in his DNA. He sees it through; he needs to make sure it isn’t her. And it’s all a trap, one he walks right into, because he just HAS to see that it isn’t her.

And if you want to say “but Ash… this is just a recap of the storyline in the present.. not small details” let us just remember that Link’s driving motivation in this game is to find Zelda and bring her home. So many people just ignore these little moments or miss them completely.

And I’ll be damned if I don’t talk about link’s gasps or his twists and turns or his micro expressions that tell us so much about how he is feeling.

[mylonelydreaming]

All Co-Habitation Evidence *TotK Spoilers*

I'm going to hide all of this behind a read-more if you would like to remain unspoiled on everything like npc interactions, towns, quests, etc. Which I do have to talk about when it comes to this topic. Now, without further ado:

The bed in the house is the exact same as BotW, and unlike other beds in the world, you can freely sleep in it. If we open up both botw and totk, the bed is the exact same one from botw. Meaning that at the absolute minimum, Zelda has been sleeping in Link's bed. However, if you go up to the bed, Link can still sleep in it. There are very few beds that are free in this game, and the only other beds you can sleep in is obviously communal beds, such as those at lookout landing for those who are sick, injured, etc. You cannot normally sleep in another person's bed.

2. Link's hair-tie, Zelda's diary and the Champion's photo.

If you have completed The Champion's Ballad DLC, and correctly transferred your save, then the photo will still be there. But more importantly, the house has a new addition. Behind the house is "Zelda's secret well" that functions as her new study. In that well, you will find one of the volumes of her diary, hot-footed frogs splashing around, and Link's hair-tie in the corner of the room. Link never took that hair-tie off in botw (only when wearing the ancient helm), so it's a bit suspicious that it's down here of all places.

Not only this, but if you read the volumes of her diary, both the one in the well and on the desk near the bed, there are a couple of things that stick out:

Firstly, Zelda had Bolson build the well because she needed somewhere to focus alone. If she was living by herself, this makes no sense (and, in japanese, rather than "my house" it's simply "the house" here).

Secondly, Zelda states that Link is always by her side. To the point his clothes have become worn. So as a gift she made him a new tunic (and she "can't wait to see the look on his face" when he gets it, just saying).

and third, she had to hide said gift in the castle, otherwise he would find it in the house.

3. The School and Symin

During the time-skip, Zelda founded a new school in Hateno, where she became a teacher. Due to this, a child who misses her visits the house at around 12-2pm and calls it "Ms Zelda's house".

However, if you talk to Symin, he has this to say:

So, clearly, this is not Link's first time here (which should be obvious, how exactly did Zelda get to Hateno and the house in the first place after botw's ending? Link brought her there). He even asks Link why he came back to the village alone without Zelda. Additionally, if you go upstairs and read the "School Notes" it says this:

It talks about the opening expedition under the castle happening soon, and reiterates Link being by Zelda's side. Interestingly, in that opening sequence Zelda says she is glad she didn't leave the Purah Pad behind. Meaning she's glad she didn't leave it at home.

But wait, there's more

There is a side-quest at the school where Link becomes a teacher / substitute teacher. When you finish the quest, one of the children says this:

They say they already thought of Link as a teacher figure even before this quest. To add onto this, there is another child who wants to become a hero and is "always on the lookout for baddies".

4. Manny

Manny is an interesting case. At first, like some other npcs, he seems to have been entirely memory-wiped to be approachable for brand-new players who didn't play botw, but then he has the following to say:

So, first of all, he doesn't call the house "Zelda's house" and instead calls it "the house the princess was staying at"

Secondly, he asks Link to "keep the naive, new-in-town act" to a minimum.

Third, Manny has another dialogue, he wants to "check every well" in town to find frogs for Ivee (because, similar to his quest with Prima in botw, he thinks that's what she likes). But after he says this, he seems to realize he should not have said that in front of Link, saying "Uh oh, no coming back from that one" in the smaller text as though he knows Zelda's well is off-limits. Combined with him calling the house "the house the princess was staying at" he seems to know something.

5. Two Place settings, etc

The house has two places set, two towels, etc. And just in general a lot of things for supposedly one person. There is also a bigger kitchen, and let's be honest with ourselves here, who is more about cooking and actually good at it, Zelda or Link?

Under the stairs in totk

VS botw:

Now, for this next section, I have to talk about things regarding another town in the game, a quest and a mechanic many have not unlocked yet. Continue to read at your own peril (I would hide it under another read more if I could)

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The Tarrey Town House

During TotK, after we wake up and leave the sky islands, we can complete a quest to unlock the ability to build a brand-new "Dream Home" in Akkala, close to Tarrey Town.

The quest involves baby-sitting Hudson and Rhondson's child, Mattison, who, if you'll recall, did not exist yet in botw. In totk, she is starting to gain independence and appears to be around 5 or 6 years old:

I doubt Link was sleeping rough for several years (and Zelda would never be okay with that). Anyway, Link babysits her, goes up into a hot-air balloon with the family, and then has to watch a tear-jerking scene between Mattison and her parents as she has come of the age young gerudo girls have to go to Gerudo Town and stay there until they get older and are ready to venture the world.

It is only after completing this quest, a quest completely about parenthood, that you are offered the "Dream Home" by Rhondson.

Additionally, an npc at the nearby stable has this to say:

So, the in-universe implications of the dream home is that it is a family home, something you only buy when you plan to marry someone or start a family.

Adding onto this, the dining table in the dream home has four seats instead of two. But there's also an interesting comparison to make with the Hateno house. The Hateno house had two seats and two places set, this house has four seats, but is clearly only being used by one person:

In other words, Link is living by himself in a house meant for a family. Which is depressing to think about, but in the context of the game makes sense.

But there's something else. In the new house pieces (including a study you cannot use yourself), all the photos on the wall are of Hateno Village:

Why would Link hang photos of Hateno in his new home, if it was not important or nostalgic to him? (and, as a minor detail, the same yellow flower is in both houses, presumably Link's favorite flower)

In conclusion, it's clear from all the evidence that not only were they living together in Hateno, but the brand-new house actually has it's own implications behind it (and further proves that Hateno was and is important to Link).

Oh, and there is also one last thing, in the japanese version of the game, but I can't mention it here because it is an even bigger spoiler than all of this combined. It'll be an addition to this post later

[jxsterr]

hey. what if link was so consumed by grief he was angry. cuz a tired link is brilliant, a riddled-with-illness-and-depressed link is even better, but what about a link that is so sick of all of this happening to both zelda and him that he's just FURIOUS.

like he's angry as fuck at how, despite everything they have done to protect hyrule, they're right back where they started. all that effort they put into sealing the calamity, those a hundred years link spent asleep just to be able to live again and those a hundred years zelda spent tearing herself apart just to hold that beast back, all for it to be for nothing. all that effort to dispel the ganon from their time only for ganondorf to appear from another time. it's borderline comical. link has to laugh or he'll cry. he's so tired of this constant fight but he's only tired for himself, when it comes to thinking about how much zelda has suffered and continues to suffer it conjures anger so vivid he feels it in his chest. he's so angry at how much the world continues to punish someone who has done nothing to deserve it, someone who has given her all for the people of this world and more and yet she cannot even feel the grace of peace for longer than a few years. she of all people deserves a break more than anything and he finds himself wishing he'd fallen instead of her.

link finds it hard to process or even care about the goings on in lookout landing after he finally wakes up (again). purah is babbling in his ear about something to do with increasing monster attacks but it's impossible to remain present when his mind is so torn up over zelda, his zelda. gods. she really is gone, isn't she? he doesn't know where she is, doesn't know if she's still breathing, or if he'll ever see those emerald eyes again. it's so much harder this time because last time he didn't even know her—at least not as much as he knows her now. her face was blurry back then and her voice was something so familiar yet so distant, but now he loves her. he knows her inside out, knows her favourite tea to drink in the early mornings and what books she'll pull from the bookcase based on her mood. the sun died that day and so has a part of him.

the air beside him feels so thick with emptiness that he finds himself getting lost in helping the local folks just to fill it, taking up a few errands and joining in with the monster control forces just for someone by his side. weeks pass since her fall and link finds himself stuck in the anger phase of grief. it feels like a disease, he doesn't like how angry he feels but goddess he can't stop feeling this way. it's just so fucking unfair. more often than not link finds himself venturing out of lookout landing deep in the night just to kill. not defeat, not vanquish, but to draw blood in a feeble attempt to quench the burning rage inside his soul. he tears his pathetic excuse of a sword mercilessly through the flesh of unsuspecting bokoblins, slices through the tendons of gloom hands and unleashes the full extent of his fury onto the phantoms of ganondorf's shrivelled form. he yells as he plummets the tip of his sword through the phantom's chest until it disperses into thin wisps of gloom, but it's still not enough. it's never going to be enough. he repeats the same useless task every night yet it does nothing to change anything. he's still angry.

purah's told him about the phenomenas pestering the four corners of hyrule but he can't bring himself to focus on the world just yet, so he goes to mount lanayru. he's waist deep in frozen water with hands clasped around one another when he begins his plea to the goddess. he asks her why zelda was served a fate as cruel as this, and why he seems forever cursed to walk hyrule alone. she doesn't answer. it irritates link, so he repeats himself louder. she still doesn't answer. he's yelling at her now, using the full extent of vocal cords that have barely moved since he awoke, and driving his fists through the spring water in an act of overwhelming frustration. answer me! tell me why we have to endure this! he cries, but the goddess is evermore silent. he chokes out a sob, and then, in a moment of fury, unleashes words undeserving of anyone to hear, not even ganondorf himself. he needs something that will just sit there and take it and right now he's beginning to understand the frustration zelda felt all those years ago when all her efforts went under appreciated. he decides this act is some sort of revenge for how the goddess has ignored them, even if it really isn't her fault; he just needs to feel like he's done anything of use when he's been rendered so powerless. his bitterness only continues to grow the longer she ignores him, until he's exhausted himself from the outburst and stands in the water until his limbs go numb. pathetically quiet, he curses the goddess.

when link learns of zelda's fate after the final tear, he goes missing for weeks. the only noticeable trace of him in the world is the sudden lack of monsters in some areas of hyrule, namely the lynels. the tears had acted as a sort of comfort to know that at least wherever zelda was, she was able to find some sort of comfort or happiness there. the memory of zelda and sonia made him cry hysterically afterwards, of course she still finds a way to speak of him even when they're separated by a millennia or more—but the final tear makes him feel like the air was knocked out of him. he can't even think about it, he tried to ignore zelda's dragon floating aimlessly about the skies for the first few days but the grief became too much. he finds himself cross legged on her snout, braiding blue nightshades amongst silent princesses in her mane, taking comfort in talking to her about the weight of everything on his shoulders. purah's search party is useless when he spends the first week or so constantly by zelda's side, sleeping in amongst the warmth of her locks and offering her buttered apples whenever she perched. "hey, old girl."

seeing zelda this way, knowing she has destroyed herself just so that he may prevail in the fight against the enemy who caused all this suffering.. link vows to become his worst nightmare.

[critical-birb]

Doing the champion trials dlc really do be giving me a whole new insight into the champions.

Mostly because of the illusion battles - because like, assumably it's replicating what the champions had.

Yeah it's easy to be like lmao the blights were so easy to beat, but the champions had...like three pieces of food, no shields, no purah pad with runes. Mipha had no way of shattering those homing ice blocks without her weapon - of which she had only three, no cryonis for her. None of them had unlimited bombs to throw or stasis to stop the blights. They didnt have tons of food to regain their health, or even half decent armour.

More than anything I am FACINATED to know wtf is the story behind Revali's inventory because why doesn't he have his great eagle bow? All the other Champions have their specific weapons. Instead he has a regular swallow bow, and a duplex bow (the kind you only get from the Yiga???)

Did he lose his bow on the way to vah medoh and have to steal one from a yiga???? What is up with that situation.