Over the holidays we’re reposting some select features from the past 12 months. A mix of talking points, interviews, opinions and more from NL staff and contributors, you’ll find our usual mix of thoughtfulness, expertise, frivolity, retro nostalgia and – of course – enthusiasm for all things Nintendo. Happy Holidays!
We finally learned the title of Breath of the Wild 2 (which means we can stop calling it Breath of the Wild 2) with a brand new trailer in the latest Nintendo Direct — and it’s called Tears of the Kingdom, which has already sparked a ton of theories.
You know what that means, Zelda fans – it’s time to put on our guessing caps once again and start dissecting this trailer for every little nugget of Zelda lore we can find.
We’re not going to lie here — the trailer didn’t many go to. This is going to be awkward. However, we will persevere! There’s got to be something juicy about that shot, right?
Also, be sure to check out your early pre-order options for the game and check out our guide that collects all the TOTK information we have so far:
Tears of the Kingdom: Trailer Preview
Owl Lad
It’s pretty safe to say at this point that birds and flight are two of the themes of Kingdom Tears. The first shot of the trailer is what looks like an owl. We now know that owls are very important in Zelda’s lore — Kaepora Gaebora being the most important, and his owl-like Skyward Sword ancestor, Headmaster Gaebora, who was Zelda’s father in the times before Zelda was even a princess.
Can we say something about this birder from the trailer? Oh yeah. Oh yes, we can. More on that later. But for now, let’s just say that whoever they are, they seem very important – dressed in plenty of fancy regalia, perhaps royalty, god, or some other important role.
And… they seem to have Sheikah markings on their faces. Honestly, who knows what that means at this point. We’re not even sure Nintendo fully knows what the Sheikah are anymore… but in Breath of the Wild, the Sheikah are an ancient mystical race whose technology is buried beneath Hyrule, ready to awaken for a chosen hero (that’s you). So this owl (if it’s a Sheikah and doesn’t just have cool eyelashes) is from the past. I understand
(Some people say Owl Lad is a woman. Honestly, it’s hard to tell either way.)
Moblins, Bokoblins and malice (oh my!)
Our next shot is what looks like a pitched war between your standard Zelda foes — Bokoblins and Moblins — accompanied by an expanding vortex of Malice, the hot pink evil slime from BOTW that represents Ganon’s increasing power over the region. There’s not much to say about this one, except that they all carry weapons — the Bokoblins have clubs, and the Moblins seem to have some kind of double scythe.
Rito war?
On the other side of this war are what look like Rito soldiers — the bird people from BOTW — which isn’t surprising, given that this game seems to be focused on the sky, with a ton of bird imagery. What’s interesting to note is that they all hold shields that look a lot like the Hylian Crest (albeit quite simplified), minus the Triforce.
But wait! That coat of arms actually has its own name – it is Coat of arms of the goddess, which first appeared in Skyward Sword and later in BOTW on Spirit Orbs. The goddess Crest represents the goddess Hylia, and the Loftwings around which the Skyloftians fly. This could place Tears of the Kingdom in the Skyward Sword era, since the Hylian Crest (with the Triforce) does not appear in timeline until Okara’s time (after Minish Cap and Four Swords).
And let’s not forget that Zelda is Hylia reborn. Maybe these Ritos are her soldiers?
Which one died?
In the center of this war picture is a single fallen soldier, Rito. They don’t have a shield or a sword, but that could be for simplicity. Who are they? Were they the first to fall? Does it matter? We just don’t know.
There is actually another even further to the right, which does indeed have a shield (but not a sword).
Yourself! Er… Amber Relics!
Around that Owl Lad from earlier are seven small spirals, reminiscent of Magatama from Ace Attorney (i Japanese historyof course) — a shape that often appears in jewelry and relics, and which may represent some kind of spiritual, religious, or ceremonial purpose.
But we’ve also seen this before in Zelda. Known as Amber Relic and Dusk Relic, these notch-shaped materials are used to upgrade Link’s equipment in Skyward Sword. The former can be found everywhere, and the latter is only found in the Silent Realm, an area designed to test Link, which can only be accessed by the Hero.
“You have Amber relic! It is a piece of amber colored gemstone. No one knows why it is shaped like that.”
“You have a Twilight Relic! This item is similar in appearance to the amber relic, but is very different. It can only be found in certain places.”
It is also interesting that there are seven of them around the owl. We’ve already seen the number seven in the Zelda games — most notably the Seven Sages, but also the Seven Maidens in BOTW, the heroines who were the divine protectors of the Gerudo race, represented by seven giant statues — and the secret eighth statue, also representing a heroine who was “erased from history”, although no one knows why. These girls are also said to be descendants of the seven sages, including Princess Zeldabut this story only appears in A Link to the Past and Four Swords Adventures.
Okay, the story of the seven heroines is cool… but probably not relevant here. Sages, on the other hand, probably are relevant. We’ve had owl themes before, so it wouldn’t be a surprise to learn that these seven holy relics around the owl represent sages, especially since Rauru AKA Kaepora Gaebora is one of the sages in Ocarina of Time.
And maybe… those are the titular “tears” of the kingdom. Hmmmm.
We won’t guess what that means yet. For that you will have to enter the… SPECULATION ZONE (on the third page).
Zelda is wrong
Oh my God. Oh no. Zelda is completely horizontal.
“But wait – how do you know it’s Zelda?”
Have you ever seen any other women represented in the historical artwork of these games? No, Tetra, Hylia, Din, Farore and Nayru don’t count. They are all more or less the same person.
“Fair enough.”
Thank you. To continue: Oh no! Zelda’ horizontally. That seems less than ideal. We don’t know why it’s horizontal, of course, but there’s probably something wrong — you can see some threads of Malice crawling under it.
The big door
Everyone loved the moment when you come out of the cave in BOTW and then the sun is really bright and it’s really cool. Good! It’s time for another one of those moments, except for the big door.
What is noteworthy here are the markings on the door – are they snakes? It looks like two chickens with really long necks. Might as well be dragons, although BOTW was three dragons, representing the three goddesses of the Triforce. This circular snake theme also returns later in the logo. It’s probably important.
Color palette
Breath of the Wild was very blue and green—like the sky and grass—with touches of blue and orange to represent the Sheikah technology. But TOTK is very yellow, with touches of blue-green and pink (perhaps representing good and evil).
(Hey, fun fact: blue -> teal and orange -> pink is basically just a few rotations on the color wheel. What does that mean? Well, if we want to be really stupid about this, we could say that it represents the evolution of technology or the world to some mode, or even a repeating time loop. But honestly, it’s just colors. They probably just wanted new colors.)
The yellow color palette makes the world feel a bit strange, like it’s dying somehow — and honestly, since it feels like these sky islands were forcibly plucked from Hyrule, we’re not surprised. All that grass is probably dead.
Link’s Yucky Hand
It’s still there. It’s still miserable. You can read more about our hand theories here.
We’re not even close to done! Head over to page two for more stuff from the trailer, then page three for the Guess Zone…
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