The Zora are an iconic aquatic people in the The Legend of Zelda series, appearing in almost every game since the series’ inception. Their roles in the games have varied, from helpful friend to hostile foe, over the series’ almost 40-year history. With the latest entry in the series, Echoes of Wisdom, set to release in September of this year, let’s take a look back at the history of the Zora and speculate about what their future might look like.
The Early Years
The Zora’s first appearance was in The Legend of Zelda, released internationally in 1987 on the Nintendo Entertainment System. In their first incarnation of the series, the Zora were enemies, leaping out of the waters of Hyrule to attack Link during his adventure.
This trend continued into most of the other 2D entries into the series. However, A Link to the Past planted the seeds of change for the fish-like race. Link can encounter the Zora’s king, who will sell him Zora’s Flippers allowing him to swim in water. In Link’s Awakening, there is another friendly Zora that Link can meet, who makes their home in one of the many villages on Koholint Island.
A New Direction
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, the first 3D entry in the Zelda series, reinvented a lot of aspects of Hyrule including the Zora. Nintendo took the seed planted in A Link to the Past, re-imagining the amphibious beings as allies to the kingdom of Hyrule. They now lived in a part of Hyrule known as Zora’s Domain, where the kingdom’s drinking water flowed from, and during the course of the game, their princess, Ruto is awoken as the Sage of Water to help Link defeat Ganondorf.
The other 3D entries into the series followed this development. In Majora’s Mask, the direct sequel to Ocarina of Time, one of Link’s tasks is to retrieve the stolen eggs laid by the Zora singer Lulu. Then, in Twilight Princess tasks Link melted the ice in Zora’s Domain with a volcanic pillar and saved their sickly prince, Ralis at the request of the his mother, Rutela’s ghost.
Interestingly, Oracle of Ages features they live in both sea and river as two different variants. The two water dwellers do not get along with each other, opting to live on opposite ends of Labrynna. There are even implications that they will attack one another when they come into contact.
The Future
During last month’s Nintendo Direct, an announcement trailer was released for The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, which shares the art direction of 2019’s Nintendo Switch remake of Link’s Awakening and features Princess Zelda herself as the protagonist tasked with saving Hyrule. The trailer also shows a short scene of what seems to be a river and sea Zora are having a conversation.
Tears of the Kingdom introduced many new characters, one of them being Sidon’s fiancée Yona. Yona is said to have come from another domain, implied to be outside of Hyrule. Is it perhaps possible that Echoes of Wisdom will show a transition from hostility between river and sea Zora to friendship? If so, where might that place the new entry on the overarching Zelda timeline?
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