Okay, this is going to take a bit.

In the beginning, there was The Legend of Zelda. Even if you've never played it, as a child of the eighties (kind of, sort of) you'll be familiar with it to a certain extent; "It's dangerous to go alone!" and "Well excuuuuuse me, Princess." (Although that's not the game, that's the cartoon.) Like many NES games, the story doesn't make a lick of a sense without the instruction manual.

Then there was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. This is a direct sequel to the first one; you're playing the same guy, the same Link.

Then you had The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. (Still referred to as Zelda III by some; it was marketed that way for a bit.) This was the first and only Zelda on the SNES, and also the first one where you were, definitively, playing a different Link than in the first two games. It had a lot more lore than the previous two, and contains a lot of bedrock series concepts that are now baked into the franchises DNA. The Sword of Evil's Bane, the Master Sword? Comes from this game. Kakariko Village? This game. Zoras, the Hookshot, the ocarina, the Dark World, Zelda's default princess dress and color scheme (this is the first game she's actually IN in a meaningful way) the nature of the Triforce as a sort of combination of monkey's paw and apotheosis engine... all of that bedrock was laid down here.

This is in the way of initial context.

After that was the Game Boy release Link's Awakening (another different Link!) and then, on the N64, Ocarina of Time.

Ocarina is the Big Dog of the Zelda series; it is the one most often cited as the best of the series, and is competitive in the ranks of "best console games of all time." It also introduces the concept of the Hero of Time, sort of the ur-Link legend that all other Links are part of. It was followed by a sequel, Majora's Mask, which is sort of the "high-concept" entry in the Zelda franchise; it's a Groundhog Day scenario. The same Link is in both Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask.

This was followed by a couple more Game Boy releases, Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages, then The Wind Waker on the Gamecube (if you've seen cel-shaded, cartoony Link? That's probably Wind Waker) and Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, both on the Wii.

All of these Links? Completely different Links from each other.

The history lesson has a point. Bear with me.

By this point, it had become abundantly clear that Nintendo wasn't really operating in any kind of properly constructed shared continuity, barring the games that were direct sequels to each other with the same people in them. However, a sort of... ad hoc mythology had grown around the games, developed by the fanbase and was made explicit eventually:

In the land of Hyrule, "Link" and "Zelda" are traditional names among the populace and in the royal family. Most Link's are just Links, and most Zelda's are just Zeldas. Sometimes, tho, one of the Links is the legendary hero, the bearer of the Master Sword and (sometimes) the Triforce of Courage, the Hero of Time. Conversely, there's only the one Ganon, who must be defeated on the regular.

The game designers also couldn't help but periodically throw little nods and implications in. Wind Waker was famous for this; "oh, no, this isn't actually future of the Hyrule you saw in Ocarina of Time. Wink wink. Nudge nudge. this is totally the future of the hyrule you saw in ocarina of time" That sort of thing. But for the most part everything was sort of separate from each other except for vaguely stated and implied connections. Think more "the Mad Max movies" and less "the Marvel Cinematic Universe."

Then they kinda fucked up. They tried to tie it all together.

In 2011, to comemorate the franchise's 25th anniversary, the Hyrule Historia was published. I have it. I believe Phil does as well. Gorgeous book. Full of all kinds of production trivia, art, and information.

It also tries to tie every single Zelda game released internationally in a single, cohesive continuity, and OH BOY, it is RIDICULOUS. They have to write in a temporal fuckup in Ocarina that splits the timeline into three separate and distinct pieces... and it still doesn't really work! It's like watching someone try and reconcile comic books from the 60s and comic books from the aughts into a single unified continuity; sure, it can be done. But you end up with Frankenstein's monster and everyone just has to kind of agree to pretend they don't notice the stitches and bolts.

So basically, the answer to your question:

>Questions like: do these games all happen in a shared continuity, or
>alternate versions of the same setting?

Is "both." It's a shared continuity AND alternate versions of the same setting! At the same time! Except for when it's only one of those things because you're comparing two games in the same timeline.

There's a bunch more lore I'm leaving out here, about the Triforce and the Goddesses Nayru, Din, and Farore. (I think you might have managed to accidentally reference one of them in one of the Hyerull stories without any input from Marty, an impressive feat.) But you didn't ask about that, so.

>(Also, why is Zelda not the main character if she's in the title?)

I dunno, Ben. Why is Undocumented Features still called that when you left the weird computer programming conceit underpinning the series cosmology behind like two decades ago? :)

More seriously, Zelda is actually long overdue to headline. Even Princess Peach has headlined a game! But Zelda, no dice.

-Merc
Keep Rat