Castle
Ch!ld0fV!si0n
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2012
- Location
- Crisis? What Crisis?
- Gender
- Pan-decepticon-transdeliberate-selfidentifying-sodiumbased-extraexistential-temporal anomaly
So I've dropped back in from outer space where I've spent the last four years (or has it been five? Time has no meaning in space) contemplating the meaning of life, the universe and everything (still no answer to that, btw) to test a Zelda theory I've been pondering in the meantime. I'm surprised I haven't seen it anywhere before. Perhaps I missed it. It's so hard to find a decent wifi connection in space.
So if you really squint hard at the map of Twilight Princess you can just barely see how it sorta kinda resembles the map of Ocarina of Time. Yes, there are some notable differences - the desert is too close to Lake Hylia, for instance - but the biggest difference, the one that really throws everything off, is the location of Death Mountain having moved from its traditional location in Hyrule's northern highlands to the far east in Twilight Princess.
What's odd is that Death Mountain has always, always been the furthest point north in Hyrule's geography. It was like this in the very first LoZ, ALttP and again in OOT. So why the sudden change in Twilight Princess?
Something that has always struck me about Death Mountain in Twilight Princess is its odd look. I often refer to it as The Giant Flaming Cabbage. It isn't really even a proper mountain in the sense that it has a slope and a peak, it's just that giant flaming crater - a caldera, to use the geological terminology. Calderas are indicative of relatively young, often especially active volcanoes. Volcanoes become mountains after millennia of soot, rock and solidified flow coalesce and build up around the fissure. In the original Loz and ALttP, there is no indication that Death Mountain is even active. In OOT Death Mountain is mildly active but only seems to become really active under Volvagia's influence. But in Twilight Princess the mountain is extremely active from the start. It even has a constant lava flow and the Gorons who are naturally resilient to extreme heat and pressure conditions don't seem to go anywhere near it. Neither does Link, for that matter, whereas in OOT you can survive in the crater for a time or with fire resistant attire.
My conclusion? Twilight Princess's Death Mountain is young. Newly formed. It hasn't been around long enough to become a mountain, and its activity suggests that it is relatively recent. The surrounding Eldin region even shows signs of geological upheaval. The land is dry, arid and rigid with large crevasses, canyons and mesas which are also signs of tectonic activity.
So if Twilight Princess's Death Mountain is new, then what became of its predecessor? You will notice that Snowpeak occupies the same relative position as Death Mountain in previous games, west of Zora's River. My Theory is that Death Mountain went dormant. Suddenly bereft of geothermal heat, the mountain became susceptible to freezing, forcing the Gorons to relocate to the new site of tectonic activity in Hyrule's Eldin province. Another notable difference between OOT and TP is the absence of Goron City. Goron City from Ocarina of Time is a vast complex that would have taken the Gorons years, perhaps even centuries to mine. In TP the Goron Mines appear to be a relatively low-scale excavation that also contain small isolated pockets of living space. My idea is that the Gorons mine primarily for food. As more of their mines are excavated they repurpose areas as living space. In OOT Goron City would have been the Goron's old strip mine, and Dodongo's cavern would have been the location of a more recent excavation. Dodongo's Cavern is even small and not as industrialized as the mines in TP. The Goron's haven't even exterminated the cavern's occupants, and despite being a mine where the Gorons explicitly receive their food from it is still referred to as Dodongo's Cavern instead of Goron Mine.
In Twilight Princess, the largest construct serving as living space for the Gorons is the ramshackle metal fortress at the end of the path. Most Gorons are content to just stand about outside or lounge in the springs. This suggests that the fortress is meant to serve as temporary shelter until Goron Mine is excavated extensively enough to be refurbished as living space. Hence, the Gorons haven't been living on Twilight Princess's death mountain long enough to establish a more thorough presence.
So there ya have it. *flies away!*
So if you really squint hard at the map of Twilight Princess you can just barely see how it sorta kinda resembles the map of Ocarina of Time. Yes, there are some notable differences - the desert is too close to Lake Hylia, for instance - but the biggest difference, the one that really throws everything off, is the location of Death Mountain having moved from its traditional location in Hyrule's northern highlands to the far east in Twilight Princess.
What's odd is that Death Mountain has always, always been the furthest point north in Hyrule's geography. It was like this in the very first LoZ, ALttP and again in OOT. So why the sudden change in Twilight Princess?
Something that has always struck me about Death Mountain in Twilight Princess is its odd look. I often refer to it as The Giant Flaming Cabbage. It isn't really even a proper mountain in the sense that it has a slope and a peak, it's just that giant flaming crater - a caldera, to use the geological terminology. Calderas are indicative of relatively young, often especially active volcanoes. Volcanoes become mountains after millennia of soot, rock and solidified flow coalesce and build up around the fissure. In the original Loz and ALttP, there is no indication that Death Mountain is even active. In OOT Death Mountain is mildly active but only seems to become really active under Volvagia's influence. But in Twilight Princess the mountain is extremely active from the start. It even has a constant lava flow and the Gorons who are naturally resilient to extreme heat and pressure conditions don't seem to go anywhere near it. Neither does Link, for that matter, whereas in OOT you can survive in the crater for a time or with fire resistant attire.
My conclusion? Twilight Princess's Death Mountain is young. Newly formed. It hasn't been around long enough to become a mountain, and its activity suggests that it is relatively recent. The surrounding Eldin region even shows signs of geological upheaval. The land is dry, arid and rigid with large crevasses, canyons and mesas which are also signs of tectonic activity.
So if Twilight Princess's Death Mountain is new, then what became of its predecessor? You will notice that Snowpeak occupies the same relative position as Death Mountain in previous games, west of Zora's River. My Theory is that Death Mountain went dormant. Suddenly bereft of geothermal heat, the mountain became susceptible to freezing, forcing the Gorons to relocate to the new site of tectonic activity in Hyrule's Eldin province. Another notable difference between OOT and TP is the absence of Goron City. Goron City from Ocarina of Time is a vast complex that would have taken the Gorons years, perhaps even centuries to mine. In TP the Goron Mines appear to be a relatively low-scale excavation that also contain small isolated pockets of living space. My idea is that the Gorons mine primarily for food. As more of their mines are excavated they repurpose areas as living space. In OOT Goron City would have been the Goron's old strip mine, and Dodongo's cavern would have been the location of a more recent excavation. Dodongo's Cavern is even small and not as industrialized as the mines in TP. The Goron's haven't even exterminated the cavern's occupants, and despite being a mine where the Gorons explicitly receive their food from it is still referred to as Dodongo's Cavern instead of Goron Mine.
In Twilight Princess, the largest construct serving as living space for the Gorons is the ramshackle metal fortress at the end of the path. Most Gorons are content to just stand about outside or lounge in the springs. This suggests that the fortress is meant to serve as temporary shelter until Goron Mine is excavated extensively enough to be refurbished as living space. Hence, the Gorons haven't been living on Twilight Princess's death mountain long enough to establish a more thorough presence.
So there ya have it. *flies away!*
Last edited:
