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How ‘Spirit Tracks’ Disrespects ‘The Wind Waker’s Story

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“Ah, but child… That land will not be Hyrule.”

At its core, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker’s story is about moving on from, and letting go of, the past. Every narrative beat in The Wind Waker serves to lead up to the moment where Tetra claims she’ll found a new Hyrule only for King Daphnes to effectively tell her to let go of the idea of a “New Hyrule.” There can never be another Hyrule nor should there be. Hyrule’s legacy deserves to be washed away as Hyrule is ultimately not the grand takeaway from The Legend of Zelda as a franchise. The series can exist independent of Hyrule, which is ultimately the lesson The Wind Waker is imparts.

It can be argued that later entries in the series immediately rejected the notion that Hyrule does not necessarily need to be a series staple as Four Swords Adventures, The Minish Cap, and Twilight Princess all set themselves in the familiar kingdom, but no game directly contradicts The Wind Waker’s message. At the very least, there is some justification in why each title is set in Hyrule unlike in The Wind Waker’s distant sequel, Spirit Tracks.

Four Swords Adventures models itself heavily as A Link to the Past; The Minish Cap is a distant prequel to the Four Swords duology along with the series proper, necessitating it take place in Hyrule; and Twilight Princess deliberately contrasts The Wind Waker along with paying tribute to Ocarina of Time. Spirit Tracks, on the other hand, does not take place in Hyrule as the audience knows it, but in a new land called “Hyrule.” Conceptually, it’s different enough in both lore and geography to give it an identity of its own, but the mere fact that the kingdom is named “Hyrule” is in itself a major issue.

Spirit Tracks train

At the end of The Wind Waker, Link and Tetra set out past the Great Sea to find a new kingdom of their own, one that can serve as a jumping off point for a post-Hyrule world. Phantom Hourglass, which stars the same Link as The Wind Waker along with featuring Tetra, takes place at some point during their quest before they can find a new kingdom. Come Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass’ follow up, and it’s revealed that Link and Tetra eventually found their own kingdom, naming it “Hyrule” in the process.

The problem with Spirit Tracks, unlike with Four Swords Adventures, The Minish Cap, or Twilight Princess, is that its version of Hyrule directly opposes The Wind Waker’s ending and main theme. Daphnes’ death in The Wind Waker is intrinsically tied to the idea that Hyrule as a concept is unnecessary. Choosing to drown with Hyrule is a symbolic gesture, one meant to push the narrative of moving on from the past. He even specifically counters Tetra’s desire for a new Hyrule by telling her that no kingdom other than Hyrule can be Hyrule.

For Tetra and Link to christen their new kingdom “Hyrule” after Daphnes specifically told them, with his last words, that no kingdom could or should replace Hyrule, is Nintendo spitting on The Wind Waker’s message. It shows a complete lack of understanding of both The Wind Waker’s narrative and themes. What is particularly frustrating about the Spirit Tracks taking place on a pseudo-Hyrule is that it is Hyrule in name only, meaning that naming it such was ultimately completely unnecessary.

Spirit Tracks Link and Tetra

New Hyrule’s landscape centers itself around the Lokomo, a rather alien concept for the series that focuses on steam trains. Aesthetically and narratively, Spirit Tracks very much has an identity of its own. The game even has a unique backstory completely disconnected from both The Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass. There is no logical reason as to why Spirit Tracks needs to take place in a kingdom named “Hyrule.” In fact, while its setting is far more original than other post-TWW Zelda games, it comes off far worse than the titles that preceded it.

Twilight Princess in particular is seen as having a mostly derivative world, relying quite heavily on Ocarina of Time. At the same time, it mirrors itself after OoT on a very deliberate level. It understands that it is paying tribute to Ocarina far more than it perhaps needs to and revels in that fact. There is a clarity on Nintendo’s part when it comes to why Twilight Princess, as a video game, is the way it is. The same praise, or understanding, cannot be extended towards Spirit Tracks.

Spirit Tracks wants it both ways. It wants to be a sequel to The Wind Waker that moves past Hyrule while also being a sequel to The Wind Waker intent on reminding the audience that Hyrule’s legacy will never, ever die. This isn’t to say that The Legend of Zelda needs to abandon Hyrule altogether simply because The Wind Waker’s story urged players to move on from the past and any direct sequel to The Wind Waker must respect that fact.

Spirit Tracks

While not ideal, it isn’t all that big a deal for The Minish Cap and Twilight Princess to take place in Hyrule. Their stories do not impact or reference The Wind Waker in any capacity whereas Spirit Track’s entire existence hinges on the events of a post-Wind Waker world. Spirit Tracks actively disrespects both The Wind Waker and Daphnes’ death by taking place on a new continent named after the sunken kingdom.

A major theme of The Wind Waker was the acceptance that Hyrule’s legacy was largely irrelevant. The Hero of Winds was not the Hero of Time, but he still stopped Ganondorf; Tetra was not the typical Zelda, but she was the first incarnation of the princess to fight alongside Link in the finale; and the Great Sea was not Hyrule, but it still offered a gameplay experience that was very much in line with the rest of the franchise.

It would be wrong to say that “Nintendo doesn’t understand that Hyrule isn’t integral to the Zelda experience” as The Wind Waker contradicts such a claim. Nintendo knows Hyrule isn’t necessary; that’s the whole crux of The Wind Waker’s plot. Rather, they chose to ignore that idea in favor of blatant pandering. Spirit Track’s “New Hyrule” has no meaning. It has no legitimate content. Anything worthwhile that could be potentially gleaned from this new land is obscured by little more than fan service. Where The Wind Waker was bold enough to separate itself from the series’ past, Spirit Tracks is too cowardly to live up to its predecessor’s promises in earnest.

A man with simultaneously too much spare time on his hands and no time at all, Renan loves nothing more than writing about video games. He's always thinking about what re(n)trospective he's going to write next, looking for new series to celebrate.

4 Comments

4 Comments

  1. Onilink303

    October 2, 2018 at 6:55 pm

    So I have a counterargument here. The thesis primarily concerns the integrity behind the continuity of The Wind Waker’s epilogue as something that Spirit Tracks doesn’t uphold to. I think that’s only partially true. Your basis behind this is the inherented namedrop of the word Hyrule without so much as assessing the meaning behind its historical relevance to whatever time period/era where the name Hyrule is applied to.

    For starters the term “Hyrule” (according to A Link to the Past) is etymologically derived from the Hylians, who in turn were named as such due to their roots being linked to Hylia according to the Hyrule Historia. Yet in much of a similar fashion as to how Spirit Track’s namedrop of Hyrule has no historical pertinence to the Hyrule up to Ocarina of Time (no mention of the Hero of Time, etc), neither does Ocarina of Time’s Hyrule or any post Skyward Sword Zelda title’s Hyrule, barring Breath of the Wild, have anything to do with Hylia’s influence on the kingdom’s foundation because it’s either irrelevant, distorted, or forgotten history in the context of modern Hyrule.

    The namesake of the land in whichever era is simply as A Link to the Past says is tied to the lineage of the Hylian race that initially occuppied it rather than the historical influence of the Goddess Hylia who initially governed it. The Wind Waker’s Zelda, Link and the other settlers are Hylian descendants that went on to discover a new continent and aptly named it Hyrule because of there lineage as Hylians rather than naming it as such to carry on the memory of old Hyrule, which is likely what Nintendo was aiming to convey.

  2. Tyrone Jones

    August 29, 2020 at 7:50 am

    Gotta disagree here. Daphenas’s ideology was the fact that they should forget Old Hyrule specifically. It didn’t mean they couldn’t create a New Hyrule. Forgetting the past meant not getting rid of the ocean to uncover the original hyrule but to drown it completely and create a new one. You notice how no one who lives in New Hyrule even has a history book of the events of Old Hyrule despite Link and Zelda knowing about but instead they’re building a new future within a New Hyrule. In fact naming it New Hyrule is respecting Daphenas.

    • Renan Fontes

      August 29, 2020 at 8:56 am

      Daphnes’ ideology is one inherently tied to the idea of letting go of tradition and moving on from the past. Sinking Hyrule only to name another country “Hyrule” cheapens The Wind Waker’s message.

      I do notice no one in New Hyrule referencing Old Hyrule– which in itself is a problem. The “Hyrule” connection exists only to enforce what had become expected for The Legend of Zelda. There’s nothing bold or thematically appropriate about Spirit Tracks setting itself in yet another land called Hyrule. What’s one of the most culturally unique settings in the series is overshadowed by an inane need to call itself Hyrule.

      I don’t want New Hyrule’s name to be respectful of a character who wanted nothing more than to wash away Hylian culture, I want it to be respectful of The Wind Waker’s story.

  3. Ral

    October 26, 2022 at 3:29 pm

    So I definitely agree that this is a strong critique of Spirit Track’s setting and how it, at least from a surface level, disregards Daphnes’ wish for Hyrule to be left behind. Sure, the triforce is absent, as is Ganon and other elements of its history, but the kingdom is still named Hyrule, right?

    My issue is this: Is the kingdom actually named Hyrule in Spirit Tracks explicitly, anywhere? You’d think so, but the closest we have is the location just being called “the kindom.” Hyrule is the name of the *castle* and thus the name of the kingdom’s capital, for sure, absolutely, but in the same way Buckingham Palace is not the capital of the kingdom of Buckingham, we can’t assume that Hyrule Castle is the capital of Hyrule in this context. Especially when the kingdom’s name is never explicitly stated.

    It would make sense for the name to be Hyrule, so the argument seems pedantic. But considering Daphnes’ wish, it seems strange that this is one of the few settings of a kingdom in Zelda that *isn’t* specifically named aside from it’s capital.

    Perhaps this name of “Hyrule” (or, “New Hyrule”) is simply something the fans collectively invented? I could be entirely wrong, but from what I recall, I’m not confident the word “Hyrule” or “New Hyrule” is ever specifically uttered in relation to the name of the kingdom proper.

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