How Nintendo ruined the Zelda series

The Legend of Zelda is one of the best game franchise on the Nintendo platforms. And in my opinion, the only reason to still play your Wii (the poor 480p resolution is horrible to look at on an HDTV). However, Nintendo has ruined the Zelda series for me by butchering the story in Skyward Sword.

For starters in the book Hyrule Historia it is mentioned that Skyward Sword is the first Zelda game in the timeline (see a translation of the timeline here). We also know that after chaos ended, the kingdom of Hyrule started. Yet after winning enough battles in the challenge Lanayru gives you, he'll reward you with the Hylian Shield. However, at this point the land is just the nameless surface! If there is no Hyrule at this point, then why is the shield called "Hylian?" Now I guess you could say "Well the Goddess is named Hylia" – however then why not call it Hylia's Shield? Besides, there already is a shield named the Goddess Shield in the name. No, it is obvious the shield is named after the at-this-point-non-existent kingdom Hyrule.

Another problem with this being the first game are the fairies. In Ocarina of Time a fairy in a bottle will give you full health when you fall. In later games, you only get a few (6-8) hearts when revived by a fairy. The same is true for Skyward Sword. Are we really to believe that the once limited fairies became strong enough to grant full hearts, only to be limited once again years later? It would be more believable if you could get full hearts in Skyward Sword then the argument could be made that over time the fairies became weak, and that is believable. Growing weak or strong over time is more believable, than growing strong for a brief period and then getting weak again.

One of the biggest problems are the moblins in the game. Moblins are created in Ganon's image. Yet in Skyward Sword there is no Ganon, he hasn't been born yet. So how can you have moblins if there is no Ganon?

Nintendo took a once great series and ruined it. I have played every console Zelda game (on their original consoles) and a handful of the handheld Zelda games. It's bad enough that Nintendo makes sub-par handheld games, don't ruin a perfectly good console series!