Breath of the Wild: Great Plateau's BIG Secret? (Zelda Theory) 

Sheikahs built an iPad that freezes time and teleports you, I think they could move a city easily.

I love that five years ago we basically stumbled upon the tears of the kingdom promise. The great plateau in the Korok forest absolutely got switched because they got put into the sky at some point.

I've had this theory in my head the whole time, but I am loving the evidence you are presenting. Great video.

BOtW 2 castle rising proves this far as I'm concerned

The thing that I think is worth remembering is that when it comes to Zelda, worldbuilding has ALWAYS been secondary to gameplay. Given that, I don't think that smaller details, such as the 90 degree change in placement of the Castle Town gate or the apparent shift in location of Castle Town, affect the validity of this theory. Environments from past games that we revisit in newer titles nearly always look different from their original counterpart, so these variations could be thought more as minor tweaks in game design, especially given that OoT was made all the way back in '98. The major details -- the existence of the fountain, the ruins, the Temple of Time clearly being modeled after OoT's version -- are what really count here. Nintendo included them precisely so we could come to the obvious conclusion: That the Great Plateau is, almost irrefutably, the ruins of Castle Town from Ocarina of Time. The simplest solution in this situation really is the best one.

The Legend of Zelda: The Link Between these maps

As an alternative to Castle Town being physically moved, I would suggest the possibility that you're just looking at the map from the wrong relative angle. In the Lord of the Rings series, Dwarves are known to draw their maps so that the top is East rather than North. Since this map is given to you by the Shiekah Slate, it is possible that they just use a different point of reference on their maps than Hylians. Then any other inconsistency could be cleared up by continental drift or some such thing.

it hits hard seeing those ruins

inb4 "Ockareener of Time"

Do you guys think the Great Plateau is what remains of Castle Town?

hylians: let's take castle town, and push it somewhere else!!

Every time I see footage of Tears of the Kingdom, I remember this theory (exactly when Hyrule castle is being raised and all the islands floating in the sky). It makes a lot of sense that somehow the big plateau was moved intentionally to that location and also with the forgotten temple (placed in the middle of nowhere). I am so hyped to see something about this!

I've been thinking about this. As we all know at the end of OoT Hyrule Castle was destroyed in the final battle (Downfall and Adult) or in the ware that followed (Child), so this theory makes perfect since that a new castle would be built. But that leaves the question of the Guardians. If the castle was already in ruins, why were they attacking it? Where they looking for something, if so, what?

Things makes so much sense now! This could explain why the OoT castle town was in such a weird place in TP, while everywhere else hardly ever really moved. Great video once again dude! I love how you explain things! You truly are like one of the smartest Zelda fans on this site! You are so awesome! :)

Nice script as always, bro ;) Great Plateau is a much larger repositioning of the land than Skyloft was, hm? Those are definitely ruins of Ockareener's landmarks.

Zeltik, I wouldnt be surprised if you were to one day wake up with the first Copy of the Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild. You are Legit one of the best, if not THE BEST Zelda channel to date. (My Opinion, many would agree im Asuming) And if you were to get a copy, you need to do a livestream man, definitel.

Ok damn, this game keeps surprising me by the giant amount of detail.

Okay, I read a bit of the comments, but no one said anything about tectonic plates. This game is supposedly WAAAAAYYY after all the Zelda games. If we take that into consideration, it would make sense with tectonic plates. Everything is relatively close to Death Mountain, so earthquakes and plate movement is highly likely. I believe that plate movement, is likely, and if it takes place as far in the future as I think it does, there is little to no flaws in this theory. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The Goat Zonai where totally a retcon and this video proves it and this idea of the ruins of Castle Town (OoT) was even in the game a year before TotK was even out according to another video Zeltik made

This video gave me shivers. I kind of got history channel vibes from it, like when those excavators go to ancient ruins and discover things about the past based on the bones and left over buildings they find. Very good video.

This was exactly what I thought when I saw the e3 reveal the temple of time being there, the lay out, the ruins. also its description as "The birth place of hyrule"

"The link between these maps" *I see what you did there.*

I like this theory! Thanks for stitching all the shots together to really show the similarities! Super hyped for this game! (And discovering all the secrets)

This is the best Breath of the Wild theory yet - love your videos! Great evidence and explanations, pretty air tight stuff!

I love the theory here. I like to think this is a prequel to the Twilight Princess, after the events of Majoras Mask. Where Link has had time to grow up and adventure more, went back to Hyrule and for some reason, the Shieka felt like they needed to seal him away in case Ganondorf were to ever revive (like he always does), or if some other force were to threaten Hyrule. The new Hyrule Castle feels very Twilight princess-y, especially with the dark ganon magic engulfing it.

"A link between these maps" 😂😂 3:07-3:08

I think the secret people are missing here is that it seems a whole crap load of locations from past Zelda games are getting squeezed into this one giant landscape or something, maybe even all of them (including Skyloft). If that's the case, this really could be something rather special.

Gotta say that I only subbed after stumbling across your videos, this E3, but your videos are really excellent. The videos are all high quality and I genuinely look forward to seeing them appear in my Sub. Keep up the good work (y)

The Great Plateau is totally floating!!

The Life in the Ruins trailer seems to explain the placement of Castle Town. There is a second Castle Town from Twilight Princess located where a second northern castle is. And that castle is the same as Twilight Princess as well. This seems to be implying that this is Twilight Princess' map recreated. Twilight Princess' map was heavily inspired by Ocarina but everything was moved further north due to the entire civilization moving.

Awesome vid as always, man! Keep them coming, they're some of the only things that placate me while I wait for this game to come out

Great video Zeltic, love all the work you've been doing recently. You mentioned the "sharp dip" at the edge of the eastern abby, which you speculated was the remanins of the castle moat. I've been wondering if this is actually the legacy of the giant hole left after Ganon destroyed the original Hyrule castle in OOT. If that's the case it would account for the castle now being set at a different angle (about a 45 degree difference) than it used to be, presuming that this is an entirely new castle built on the ruins of Ganon's keep. It also makes a bit more sense than the moat idea, given that the remaining archways stand well below what would have been the water level. If this is accurate, i think it would place this game pretty firmly outside the child timeline, but could still be anywhere else.

I believe the theory that the Great Plateau is the same location as OoT Castle town is correct but you make a huge stretch by saying it's in a different position so that means it was moved. Let's not forget this is a game and if they have to mimick or follow older games exactly as they were that would be a HUGE limitation, so Castle town is in a different position because it suits this game and that's it, all subtle differences between Zelda games can be explained by that, nobody would want any new Zelda to be limited to what old Zeldas did. Think of the new gods(?)/guardians(?) that Twilight Princess introduced, they where never mentioned in other Zeldas further in the Timeline, the goddess Hylia is also a good example for this, Hylia as a goddess was NEVER mentioned in any other game in the timeline which is ridiculous to even consider since she is the highest God in the Legend of Zelda phanteon.

If this takes place before Twilight Princess, it would make sense that the ruins of castle town and Hyrule castle aren't yet forested. But that does raise even more questions about who built the 'new' Hyrule castle.

I'm 5 years late, but don't forget that in the Adult Timeline, the castle was obliterated by Ganon during Ocarina of Time. The abbey may have been built in place of the castle as a sort of tribute or religious homage, while the royal family's residence itself would have been rebuilt elsewhere... Still, it doesn't explain why Korok/Kokiri Forest is north of the castle now, and why Castle Town is where the south of the fields, north of lake Hylia!

Zeltic, I have a very strong feeling that in Breath of the Wild, Link will somehow be able to travel back through time to where we are able to see and probably prevent what exactly went down outside the Tmple of Time and we will see what it used to looked like. Imagine going back and it's a replica of OOT like you say!! 😍

Oh man! Watching your videos makes me want to play this game so bad! Excelent theory and I really think and hope you are right about this! It's kinda sad to see the Hyrule I hold so close to my heart destroyed and forgotten like this. But its really encouraging to find out what happened to this world, why was link put to sleep for so many year and what the hell happened to Zelda and How did Ganon became that...that montrous dark aura. I'm so hyped!!

I see that you reversed that cutscene from skyward sword haha

I know some people have said in the past that landmarks moving around is weird but at the same time it makes sense with Gannon showing up in these places getting destroyed that they would be relocated to a nearby area

Nice! I noticed the archway while watching a demo, and immediately thought of the one in the pathway to Hyrule Castle in OoT, and thought it could be used to support Teekay's Market ruins theory after reading it. Glad to see I'm not the only one who caught that.

this is just a hundred years after Ocarina of Time

Does the sun rise and set in the same location for both games?

Glad to see your growing so quickly. Love you and your videos.

Good points, ever since I saw the Temple of Time in BotW, I never have stopped at how the ruins resemble a town. Very good video Zeltik.

but isn't calamity ganon trapped in hyrule castle. and the castle is not in ruins. did the gods move castle town but not the castle itself

11 comments? Holy shit I'm early. What's up Zeltik?

I like the idea, and you presented it nicely. The idea that the Great Plateau doesn't naturally belong there seems genuinely interesting for the sake of the narrative.

Fantastic new video I really enjoyed the video and this is a interesting theory and keep up the fantastic and brilliant videos as you always do

Things that exist in this game that only exist in the Fallen Timeline and nowhere else: Link's Yellow Stripe Cap, Lynels, Spectacle Rock. This is the fallen timeline, not the adult, not the child, the fallen. This is a response to those in the comments talking about this game and Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. They're not in the same timeline as BoTW.

plot twist. old man is ganondorf

It might be worth noting that in Twilight Princess, the ruins of Hyrule Market from Ocarina of Time also appear in the southwest corner of the map, in the form of the Sacred Grove. Perhaps the huge map in Breath of the Wild is supposed to line up more with that of Twilight Princess...? I mean, the TP map does also look a lot like OoT's at first glance, but when you look deeper it clearly isn't. Maybe the case is the same here. And that would mean that Breath of the Wild is actually exploring the region north of OoT/Zelda 1's Death Mountain range--the mid-to-northwestern area featured in The Adventure of Link. ALTERNATIVELY: the goddesses' intervention in the events of The Wind Waker's backstory may have had something to do with your suggested relocation of the castle. Do you remember how The Wind Waker showed Hyrule Castle perched upon a plateau jutting out of a large body of water? Well, your image in this video, lining up the BotW map with that of OoT, shows that the location of the Great Plateau is right next to the location of OoT's Lake Hylia. Can both of these things be coincidences? Maybe one, but both?

Awesome theory man, just discovered this channel! Cheers!

If BotW's main story developed more around this, it would have been so awesome

In this 4k screenshot i.imgur.com/0Tx1M4x.jpg to me it looks like the spot where child Link and Zelda meet, possibly the Majora's mask Link. Here is the screenshot from OoT tinyurl.com/jofhgcc . Here's another from the 3DS remaster, tinyurl.com/j5s8zen which looks even more like it. Edit: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-2vOvHs_C5Aw.htmlm52s check out the ending of 3DS OoT! The camera angle pans from the ground, but on the opposite side as the Breath of the wild Screenshot! OoT & 3DS OoT in the same picture so you can see the changes. www.n1ntendo.nl/file/game/2112/zelda_comp-13.png This child Link may be the Link in Breath of the Wild, and the events in Majora's Mask may have all just been a dream during this hundred years sleep. Considering all the characters in Termina were the same as those from ocarina of time, and it is known that when dreaming we only use faces we've seen before, it would explain why so many characters are re-used from Ocarina of TIme in Majora's Mask. OoT Adult link defeated Ganondorf, got sent back in time by Zelda, became OoT Child link with retained memories of OoT, told on Ganondorf/Zelda told on Ganon to the King of Hyrule, and Hyrule had the sages attempt to execute Ganondorf for treason. They were not able to execute Ganondorf, and the sages were forced to send him to the twilight realm, that leads to the events of Twilight Princess. OoT Link may have went to sleep at this time, understanding that Ganondorf would one day break free from the Twilight Realm, since his execution failed, to be ready for his inevitable revival, since he had killed Ganondorf in OoT, and went back to childhood, he retained the knowledge of Ganon's full power, and wants to defeat him again when he revives. This could explain why Link doesn't remember anything, because he lived another life, or possibly life times, while dreaming for 100 years, and may have forgotten reality. This would combine Twilight Princess and Child OoT Link's timelines, considering Twilight Link was taught by a spirit/dead form of Link. Twilight Link may have been born while OoT Link was sleeping for 100 years, and it may have been a different Link teaching Twilight Link new moves, or OoT Child Link teaching Twilight Link in spirit form, after dreaming the events of Majora's Mask, and possibly more.

Wow, I thought of the same thing! When I was watching the E3 stream, I saw the fountain and thought could this be a connection to any other Zelda. Then I immediately thought of the fountain from OoT. Then everything started to just fit in. You just completed my thought, for I did not see that gate in the gameplay(I didn't watch the whole thing)! Great video!!

So going by this. Where Hyrule castle was standing isn't a big gaipin hole where gannon's castle was in the future time line. This further solidifies child time line. This vid was absolutely brilliant.

If this is true then why is Hyrule castle in the distance with Ganon trapped in it? Is this a new Hyrule castle?

Are you sure it is not the place sent to the sky in the era of goddes hlyia

At first i was skeptical, but you convinced me thoroughly.

keep it up with them theories and news! you're the best :)

*climbs on soapbox* "Castle town" is such an annoying and childish name. As the prime settlement of the nation it should be called capital city, Hyrule City, or City of Hyrule.

Please stop saying "ocarener" it's ocarina!

more theories more, love the work bud, keep it up. You're right on point.

Something I've noticed about this video now that we have more information. Where hyrule castle and town should be, north of the field and west of death mountain, is now where the Great deku tree is, as of the switch reveal the other week. You can see pink leaves in the canopy above him. Then later, in several panning shots of Hyrule, as well as the custcene that takes place on top of the plateau tower, you can see those same pink leaves in that geographic area. So it looks like the Great deku tree has taken over the former region of Hyrule castle.

what a waste of time watching that was. OMG BRICKS. THE BRICKS LINE UP! IT MUST BE THE SAME ALLEY WAY FROM OCARINA OF TIME! BECAUSE BRICKS. zelda games include references to older games, but they never perfectly align. there is always some changes, because the priority is making a new game, not making sure the new one matches the old ones locations. i don't expect the new game to be any different. although i was quite surprised how close the temple of time is to the ocarina of time temple of time so i will be interested to see how close other references are in this game.

You almost 100% convinced me, some of the similarities are uncanny. I CAN'T WAIT FOR THIS GAME!!!!!

This is SCARILY accurate and my jaw dropped when I saw the similarities in the two locations. You just earned a subscriber!

The Great Plateau is clearly Ocarina of Time's Castle Town, but in the latest trailer we also know that Calamity Ganon is in Twilight Princess' Castle Town.

This is awesome. I believe your theory about it being the OoT castle town and path to the castle!

Love your videos, I'm waiting for the next one 😁

The landmarks are pretty striking, but I think to be honest the location of the Castle Town is simply "Hyrule has expanded a lot, and OOT Hyrule was left mostly to decay". If you look at the image of the ruins, there is a mountain exactly where Death Mountain in OOT was. While Death Mountain is in a different place in BotW it's possible that one was named after it, and this mountain became dormant. The castle is also in a different place now, with the OOT one in ruins, which also supports this.

very nice channel and with some original video ideas you just got a new sub:D

I love your Breath of the Wild theories!

If the Great Plateau isn't a landmass that was moved by something, whether Sheikah or Triforce, I'm gonna be so bummed. The clouds always made me curious and this explanation strengthened my NEED for that fact.

Possible timeline placements for this game: 1. A new branch of the timeline, mainly because this is a resurrected Link who appears to wake up in the future, which could indicate that it is the Link from OoT (whose soul was sealed in the Sacred Realm), but woke up too late. 2. After TWW, because Hyrule is in ruins, there are Koroks and in an item description the "Ancient Sea" is mentioned. 3. After TP, because Aonuma said there are going to be connections with that game. I highly doubt this however, because in BotW the Temple of Time is in a far more complete state than it is in TP.

Oh wow, I didn't think it would line up with Ocarina's map so precisely! To be honest, I'm always a little surprised when major Zelda landmarks don't move around the map. Compare LttP to Ocarina to Twilight Princess and try to make sense of anything. The way this map mirrors Ocarina's is pretty incredible. I wouldn't think anything of Castle Town being in the wrong location if not for the fact that other major locations seem to line up.

Definitely makes alot of sense, Great video and theory... this theory actually lines up with everything I thought when I first played BotW when it first came out

Another important thing to point out is the location of the Lost Woods relative to the location of the Great Plateau.

yesss bro I was thinking about like all of this since I started playing I'm so glad I just saw this video!!

Just in case you didn't know, Bill Trinen said in one of the E3 Treehouse presentations that the Great Plateau is only above the sky in the demo so you can't leave. You can leave it immediately by just climbing down in the full game.

Hey Zeltik, did you notice, when the amibo funktion of the slate is activated, that Link always is pointing a circle on the ground. When the WolfLinkAmibo is used, he is appering in that circle. So every other amibo should bring a companion of the size of that circle into the game. My guess for the guardian-amibo is, that Link gets help from a miniguardian, which you regular fight in the shrines. My english is not very good, but I hope you can understand, what I am trying to say

In Skyward Sword there were two Temples Of Time, one in the desert and one in the forest area where you first drop, my thinking was that the one we see in BOTW was the Ocarina one, and the one from Ocarina of Time was the one that was formerly in the desert with all the time stones. My thinking was that since it was surround/suspended up on a sandy plateau in klyward with many gorges that were eroded by ancient rivers and ocean/lakes, that maybe over years of geological and natural processes like plate shifting; that the former Hyrule castle/dessert time temple rose up. That and the BOTW temple is directly next to the Gerudo desert and there are similar Grand Canyon gorges eroded by what looks like it could have been formerly rivers

I'm sold.. great research man thanks!

Another theory for what The Great Plateua supposedly "moved" fits in really nicely with another theory which states that the Great Plateau switched placed with the Lost Woods. The fog, the shape, the shrines and even where the shrines intersect all support this

Love this! Also want to point out that Lon Lon Ranch is perfectly positioned in botw. If you turn the map around it all makes sense. Then in OOT if you stand in front of the Temple of Time, you can see a mountain behind it. Thats Mount Hylia. It's perfect!

dude, your vids keep popping up on my channel as recommended everyday. I'm just gonna subscribe now XD

Zeltik keep up the quality vids:D

The theory definitely holds up. Cataclysmic events are known to change the face of the earth in fiction from time to time, and sometimes even quite massively so (Wheel of Time begins with the birth of a mountain and the splitting of a river around a newly formed island, and that is only the first change the world sees in the Time of Madness; which is repeated throughout the Ages). And the fact that only Castle Town seems to be so dislocated from where it should be supports the thought of an intervention of sorts. The only detriment is that we would have two Castles, one in ruins and one with the Calamity Ganon swirling around. But that is worthy of a theory on its own.

I feel like since the old man said that Hyrule drowned many years ago, the Koroks are back, and the fact that you can find old sea salt, this is probs after windwaker.

I think the gods may have moved castle town not 100 years ago but 10 000 years ago when the first calamity hit because maybe it was in the way of a divine beast laser or something.

Fascinating idea. Now that the game has been out for some time does this theory still seem to be feasible? If this is indeed the old Castle Town, it would be nice to see this topic revisited to look into whether this was simply a massive Easter-egg or if it should be seen as relevant to the greater Zelda timeline. An exploration of the various ruined structures on the Great Plateau would also be pretty interesting.

You missed a huge point concerning the frozen lake area that looks exactly like zora's fountain in terms of the river leading out, the little platform where JabuJabu would be, and the waterfall off to the side. :P

keep up the wonderful work bro

If the Temple of Time, Castle Town, and Hyrule Castle were built on a piece of land that was Skyloft, then it stands to reason that the entire chunk could be lifted and moved again. My guess is that over the millennia another larger, more fortified castle was constructed (the Hyrule Castle we see in BotW), and that the old castle became the "Eastern Abbey", likely serving as housing for the religious function associated with the Temple of Time and the worship of Hylia. Heck, it's even probable that the entire landmass was moved during a time of peace using advanced Sheikah technology, as a sort of preservation effort. That would also explain how the Shrine of Resurrection came to be there, as well as the huge walls surrounding the Great Plateau.

Try lining up the sacred grounds, in front of Hyrule castle, with the temple of time on the great plateau, both from the breath of the wild map. You'll find that the plateau butts up against Mount Gustav, and it's neighbor, as well as several raised land-forms on the other side of Hyrule field. I suppose that his was once the resting place of the great plateau, connecting these land forms across the upper half of Hyrule field. Most of the variance can be attributed to a century of erosion, but the important part is how the sacred grounds, which was once under the temple of time, is not only right where it should be, but uncovered once again. Though, my theory is that the plateau wasn't moved when Gannon returned, but a long time prior. As the new castle town in front of Hyrule castle would be on the plateau otherwise, instead of in ruins and crawling with guardians.

considering that the names link zelda and impa are more like titles i wouldn't be surprised if everytime they move something they call it the same thing, there's also the fact that it's been noted that some of the kings of hyrule actually used the triforce to conquer nearby lands and the hyrule in botw is the biggest one yet, forests can also slowly crawl across the land and the only thing that can't normally move is features like mountains and lakes... but hyrule seems to have a bedrock made of butter and the most active volcano ever so i guess those aren't static either lol.

Reinforcement of this compared to the size disparity between OoT and BotW is the loading between areas in OoT. In that we see like run off while to fade unsure of actual distances. The shrine of resurection might also line up close-ish with the great fairy fountain near the castle as well.

This is how i see this. In the legend of zelda franchise, nintendo has put a lot of easter eggs in order to reference other games. Structures that are not supossed to be there, paints about other game in the series, the majora's mask in link's house in ''a link between worlds'', and all that stuff... But, there is something that is not easily manipulated, and that's the races and the living creatures of hyrule. The cronology shows an incredible coherence in that point, so, it's so obvious to me, that this zelda takes place in the ''line of the future'' or ''line of the great sea'' if you prefer. This is so clear because the korog exist in this Hyrule, and theese creatures evolved from the kokiri in order to adapt themselves to the sea world. I truly think that is the most important think to know wich place this game takes in the cronology. But who knows. I can be wrong. Good theory anyway and good work. Note: I'm sorry if I made some mistake in my writing. I'm from Spain.

As a game dev student I have a bit of a different take on why castle town appears to have moved. In games where the player has full control of the camera, its incredibly difficult to show the player what you want them to see. This is especially true in an open world. The shrine of resurrection is the only time in the game where the player is technically forced to see what nintendo wants them see because they have to exit the shrine of resurrection. The exit of the shrine is a framing device used to show off 2 major points of interest; Hyrule Castle and Death Mountain. Nintendo clearly deemed it nessecary that the shrine of resurrection had to be near the temple of time, which in turn means the only way to get that establishing shot is to change where the original castle town was situated geographically. It's just a simple design decision mean to ensure the game opens up with a bit of wow factor.

Hey Zeltik, what editing software do you use? Your editing is amazing!