I love how, going all the way back to OoT, the Zelda team have consistently made the extra effort to make all these various writing systems actually translatable into modern languages, whether Japanese or English. It reminds me a lot of Tolkien, and the various written and spoken languages he devised over the course of his life. I just find it fascinating.
Tolkien is way more advanced, though. It would be impossible to translate his text if not for him providing notes on how he created his fictional tongues. His sindarin and quenya are pretty much their own languages with syntax and grammar unlike any other - JRRT is a linguist after all. Nintendo is just coming up with more and more alphabets, nothing more.
@@kikosawa honestly instead of a whole new language, just creating alphabets is more fun to decipher and learn instead of discovering a language with its whole grammar and stuff which you won't even use irl
It's been so long since I've watched a Zeltik video. This video popped up on my recommend page, and once I clicked it, I was reminded of the incredible quality of these videos. Just the music during the Zeltik logo gave me chills, it's just so well done. Thank you Zeltik, all the hard work you put into these videos is clear, and the Zelda community greatly appreciates it.
I know right. Proper scripted videos from the GOAT zelda-tuber. Unlike the clowns from other channels farming vids titled WHY NO JANUARY DIRECT IS BAD NEWS FOR TEARS OF THE KINGDOM
I wish my dad would get a chance to play this, BotW was his favorite Zelda game he would have loved the trailer for tears of the kingdom. I'm going to play the hell out of it when it comes out for him.
The characters at 4:31 look like ancient Chinese seal script. They might be based on man’yougana, the Chinese characters used for their sounds instead of their meanings to write Japanese syllabically, which were simplified into modern kana sets. I can’t tell if any of them are close enough to the ancient forms of the kanji used for Japanese before kana to be mapped to them, but it could be interesting to look into that. Excellent video as always, and I simply can’t wait for the game to finally come out!
My first thought seeing them was 'oracle bone script'. They're clearly inspired by them in my opinion. And like you, I can't tell if they're simply inspired or modified versions. But seal script is a much better resemblance than oracle bone.
Are you going to make a part 3 to the classic enemies reimagined series? I'd love to see the Gleeok reimagined by you, or maybe you could do items reimagined, like the hookshot.
I think it'd be cool if he tried to incorporate both versions of the Gleeok as in the ones in Zelda 1 as well as the one in Phantom Hourglass. Like maybe have it where it has three heads each with their own element like one being fire and one ice like in phantom hourglass. Then they could have the heads have something where they detach from the main body like in Zelda 1.
I got really scared at the beginning that I missed news the game got delayed again until remembering "Oh yeah, Zeltik's in Britain, they write dates differently" lol.
@@doubledee8677 in my opinion, the only proper way is to write the name of a month instead of itsnnumber because I genuinely don't even know the order it's supposed to be where I live
I think you're probably right that they might've made deliberately nonsensical text for the trailers but then there are some parts in Zoeysaurusrex's translations that seem so appropriate like on the door that I think it might just be for the cinematic shots like the wall-carving mural at the start of the Name-Reveal trailer. Still, it's nothing short of incredible there have been any even-moderately reasonable translations so far.
I agree. It’s odd to me that there was a “footage not final” caption in the 3 rd teaser when there wasn’t one for the first 2, so it makes me wonder if they changed the text and, like you said, made temporary nonsensical symbols that would warrant a “not final” caption in the cutscene
@@jmw__ I suspect that they did. When the special edition switch box art leaked, I noticed that the runes for those were ever so slightly different than what I captured back when the third trailer released. Despite my effort, I think my solution might not be valid anymore. That said, I’ve been trying to find valid values for the runes on the leaked box art. If we could get one more trailer with the runes, I’m certain I could repeat the process again.
I respect the extremes that people go to for something like this. Really digging using every little screenshot from trailers to try and piece together something. I'm happy to just wait on the game. But will cheer on those going for it.
The Zelda series always amazes me with the attention to detail and world building. There are races with entire languages and histories that we still know so little about... Cannot wait for this! Thanks Zeltik for yet another high quality video!
Personally, I'm loving the fact we barely know anything for TOTK. As it's a sequel, we as players are already familiar with the Wild Era of Hyrule making exploration a little less exciting. By keeping all the massive changes/additions to the gameplay, story and world hidden besides the vague 'skies, underground and beyond' it creates a sense of mystery and intrigue making exploring TOTK that much more appealing. If we do get footage in the next direct, I just hope it's like the 2017 Switch Presentation one as it's so incredibly well made creating massive hype and yet spoiled virtually nothing from the game. Afterwards, I'd greatly appreciate videos of the Zelda team detailing TOTK's development leading up to release.
I remember you started a series of analyzing in detail each dungeon from Ocarina of Time and stopped after the Fire Temple I believe. I hope you can finish it. I would love to see more analysis on the Water, Shadow, and Spirit temples.
As someone who ives in America and reads dates mm/dd/yy, seeing 12/05/2023 scared me, I thought I missed an announcment that the game was delayed until December of this year lol
Just wanted to appreciate the shoutout to the subreddit, we’ve formed a great community and I hope over the next few months we get some more hints for deciphering the runes. Great quality as always!
Trying to 100% botw before tears of the kingdom comes out right now and im really loving it. These videos have really helped me while im doing the tedious stuff haha.
Thank you so much for the credit! I’m a huge fan of your channel. FWIW, I’m still trying out new solutions all the time because I’m so fascinated by the runes. While statistically my solution could work, I want to keep at it in case a better solution shows up!
I’m at the point where I’ve got all but five symbols on the big doors through a process of comparing the low resolution symbols to intentionally distressed versions of the known runes. I’m eager to see if any of my previous work shows anything useful, but it’s hard to say.
I just want to know how we are going to take control of Link in the beginning of the game. Are we going to do anything with Zelda after defeating Ganon from BOTW? It seems to suggest in the credits. Will we just get a cutscene of the caves and then do the intro to the game in the sky? It's like you said, there's a lot of gameplay and lore missing.
This video has such a good atmosphere. Some parts were so mysterious and creepy I kept looking behind me in case there was someone there. Keep going with these amazing videos Zeltik.
In my opinion I think the biggest mystery of the Tears of the kingdom is who's hand is what looks like holding ganondorf down ? Not the swirls floating around or the symbols.
I love linguistics. I initially thought this video would just start out talking about the linguistics behind solving this and then move on but was pleasantly surprised to find it kept going on this fascinating subject!
For me, Zelda games are awesome, yes. But, I never tried to understand the meaning of all the designs and writing on the walls. I'm amazed at how you, and others, put so much effort into analyzing stuff like that. It's great to see your passion about the little details.
#1 - RAD intro. Nicely done. #2 - Personally, I LOVE how much we don't know about the game. I'm sure that'll change in the coming months, but I wish it would stay this way without me having to disconnect from so many social media outlets. The return of Ganondorf was spoiled for me in the comments section of a Game Grumps episode. It was the Twilight Princess episode where Arin was relentlessly trying (and failing) to save the covered wagon from burning down. How could I NOT look at those comments!?
The symbols from the newest trailer was translated in game over Jessie’s Zonai translation videos, you should check them out, he also talks about how they translated them, he worked with Zoey.
Pictograms are, of course, not necessarily logographic. Phoenician language was likely written as an abjad, a type of photographic script that doesn't include vowels, with the letter for a glottal stop being an ox head. Greek language adopted Phoenician script after recovering from the Greek Dark Age, and modern Latin script still uses the same exact ox head, just rotated so the horns point straight down(I.e., the capital letter "A").
Your videos are the absolute best when it comes to Zelda theory and I appreciate the work you put in for each one. Especially your choice of music from Twilight Princess.
When your videos incorporate real world sources, they remind me of the historical documentaries we used to watch in grade school, which, coincidentally, got me interested in Ancient Egyptian history in the first place. Love your work as always.
What if those 7 or 8 symbols ARE somehow the tears of the kingdom? Rabbit, deer, I can see whole story lines around collecting tears of importance related to those concepts
New theory (kinda morbid too) Zelda games always show spirits through little blue flames. Giving Ganon's quote to leave no survivors, are these dots in the pic spirits? And being that they're the same color as what's stored on Link's hip, are they the "tears of the kingdom"? And link has to collect spirits to fuel his power. Furthermore, in the first trailer we see Ganon held down by this power. Was Ganon kept at bay through a spell using the innocent spirits slain by Ganon's creatures and once Link destroyed the calamity, there were no more spirits to fulfill the spell hence awakening Ganon's corpse with unfettered power to create massive destruction to the land with more powerful foes.
I like how the fan community basically said, 'füçƙ you Nintendo, we'll reveal more about the game ourselves, even if we need a degree in ancient languages to do it.'
Waiting to have the intro/title card until after the set-up at the beginning and then having the symbols floating around it was an incredible editing decision, 10/10
I haven't seen the full video yet but i have to come and highlight how COOL the intro looks with the symbols in it, I wouldn't mind if that was how it looked from now on. Plus i think it also has a slightly tweaked sound? If it does it sounds great too, but it might just be me imagining stuff
I'm hyped too, but I'm trying to be cautious about it. Unfortunately hype doesn't equal quality. Sometimes high quality games generate a lot of hype because of their quality, but sometimes marketing teams generate hype without substance so they can sell a lackluster game. BOTW2, as a successor to BOTW, gives us a lot of reasons to be hyped. BOTW was an incredible experience and game. But with all these mysterious trailers trying to build up hype but not showing us anything, it makes me a little hesitant.
A bit off topic. I think people also forget about the very position of ganondorf, for alot of media its when from either spell or curse your tearing something out from the other. The arched back and the hand reaching towards it in the shadow flash shows much, but also when you look closly at ganondorf in the first trailer it looks like the hand is trying to tear something out. This might have been an attempt to remove the very curse of demise from the Ganondorf himself but failed and only caused it to fester and grow into the current calamity. It could also be why the corruption is leaking out of the body it such a way from a partially completed spell or undone seal if it is indeed a seal in the first place.
That may be the case. After all given how the princess of Hyrule is always named Zelda they seem to know something about the situation. However, what might this mean for ganondorf in the future.
Just need enough characterstranslate the the script. Is so insane how people can do that. It's really impressive. The zelda community is so freaking amazing
the farmer symbols look more like guards, and in the second pilar between the first two guards, theres a symbol that looks like a person with a cape or a hood. I think the symbols represent someone important being guarded or scorted throgh nature at night, cause theres theres owls, deers and apples
I remember learning that the Mayans would keep records by carving images, often depicting key moments in the lives of people (births, milestones, deaths, etc.) I wonder if the symbols on the wall, being that many of them resemble characters (The farmer, the deer, the rabbit, etc.) aren't actually spelled out words but instead are a record of events. The two identical columns could be showing parallel events, things that repeated over time or followed the same pattern.
I'm starting to think more and more that the Zonai might actually be the same as the wind tribe from The Minish Cap. There are a few connections, for example the architecture for both tribes seems to be based on Aztec or Mayan architecture, just look at Mazaal. Speaking of mazaal, his color scheme is gold, red, blue and green. The gold might reference the Triforce, and the RGB references the colors tied to the main characters. The Zonai ruins are mainly found in the Faron region, and Farore is the goddess of courage and wind, and is green. There are so many links that can be made but I think it could make for an interesting theory vid.
As usual, a super hardcore CSI-like video out of almost nothing. And I mean it a good way. Your content is amazing. I can't wait to see what you will do once TotK is released.
This just makes me so excited! It's like the old mysteries of archaeologists in days past, and greatly reminds me of those who had to translate scripts like Mayan and Sumerian. Can't wait to find out what these symbols actually mean.
Your videos always make me so happy. They've always been interesting and engaging. You are my favorite Zelda comment creator, and above that you're my favorite creator. Thank you for what you do! Can't wait for the next one.
Many thanks for using City in the Sky as background music. This is one of my favorites from the entire saga and I think it fits very well with the mystery theme. EDIT: oh, and Face Shrine after that, I knew you had great taste but not to that extent. Thanks!
Zeltik could make a ToTK video about the possibility of toilet location and I would watch the heck out of that video. I don't know why, but he has a calming voice to me. It's relaxing.
It's possible we are also missing pieces from the sections of writing that they have shown us. It's not too hard to edit out a few characters that create context.
1 year later and we know what the symbols are... but we still can't read them! I really hope they do mean something. And I love that this niche topic, namely Zonai culture/archeology, which Zeltik made 2 videos about YEARS ago, has become the focus of the entire story. They need recognition for this.
That same dragon symbol was carved all over Farosh's shrine (on the pillars in the big dragon entryway - you can see it in the clips in this video) in BotW, repeated over and over again like the Sheikah letters. There are a couple others of those you can find around some of the other ruins in BotW: the rabbit was carved into the tree near where the Guardian of the Mountain spawns, so we can probably assume it refers to Blupees. The deer can be found near Farosh's bridge (as can the dragon again). The difference being that with the sole example of the dragon glyph on the pillars around the giant dragon sculpture, the others are always found as one-off scratches on stones and trees, vague and weathered (as if done long ago), and not in any kind of pattern, so I think most people just disregarded them as part of the scenery.
One thing about them maybe being placeholder text is that first trailer was made years ago, when the script may not have been finalized. If that cutscene even appears in the game on release, the text could look completely different, not out of secrecy, but just because things change during development. They said about BotW that some art designs (like Zelda’s character design) were being worked on until the last minute possible. I will say though that the most recent trailer likely has finalized script. Zoey’s romaji theory is the best theory so far and I think we have to go forward with that as our best guess until more evidence appears.
My theroy about ganondorf is: the shiekah and zonai worked together, the shiekah build the shrines and figured out how to preserve them as monks, we can assume they are alive as they talking to you and because of monk maz koshia, and the zonai where powerfull mahes and knew how to transfer spirit energy,or life energy,and they either taught it to the monks or put a magic spell on them, as they fade away in greenish energy, i assume the shiekah mommyphyed ganondorf but because he was still alife the zonai put on a seal that sucks his life or spirit energy away to a point where he isnt dead but unable to move or do things, i guess that seal took the life of the zonai, and they life in spirit form in the seal,aka the hand thats why it spirals outward away from ganon, and that the prophet that warned the king was a manifestet zonai, as the spirits of the zonai in rhe hand felt the return of the calamty, he tolde them to look underneath the earth. He meant hyrule, but the king thought he meant the divine beasts. So they kinda stoped ganondorf but the didnt prepare for the fact that ganondorf is powerfull enough to send out his malice indepentedly.
Great video man! Can’t wait for the next trailer and even more for the game to come out. The first trailer came out when I was 14 and in 8th grade, now I am 18 and a senior in high school. Been a long wait for sure so can’t wait to play.(been watching you and NBC for the same amount of time).
When viewed upside down, a couple of the symbols look like water drops, so maybe they represent something to do with the reverse water drop in one of the trailers and they're just hints about Link's journey. Maybe they're meant to be read backwards given the game's major focus on time reversal.
So excited for Tears of the Kingdom! Thanks for uploading an awesome video. I’m making popcorn to eat while watching it. What better way to watch Zeltik, after all?
Super cool video. Amazing job! When the Zelda community comes together, amazing things happen! I can't believe I haven't seen anything on this! Thank you for covering it! I'll have to give that subreddit a look. Maybe it'll be the spark for some new theories!
people think they’re worried about this game because they haven’t been seeing many trailers. this should excite you and not worry you, there will be many dungeons and forgotten temple-like locations that will completely surprise us
I'm still convinced that the green symbols and the armlet Link wears are related to the Twili. The symbols on the armlet are very similar to the green designs on Midna's robes after she regained her true form. And in Twilight Princess, in the final cutscene it was one of Midna's TEARS that smashed the mirror portal and closed the gate between both worlds.
The lack of info is actually making me even more excited. Having spent so long play BOTW and knowing so much about it’s world, character’s, story, etc., I’m really looking forward to going in blind. 😃
I took a few hours doing a linguistic analysis on the newer symbols and here are my findings: The way the symbols appear to be drawn includes many semi-circles drawn one half at a time by extending the tails, but forming a circle with the areas they meet. (as a point of reference, think of the Ichthys symbol, commonly known as the "jesus fish" symbol.) This kinda also fits the two-serpent Ouroboros vibe they've clearly been going for as you literally have to draw one when making these symbols in order to form circles. There's also many vertically symmetrical symbols. Something that IMMEDIATELY jumped out at me is that this has a LOT of similarities in presentation, aesthetic, and narrative to the Indus Valley Civilization and their as-of-yet untranslated scripts. The Indus/Harappan scripts that we've found so far: Don't contain many symbols, don't appear to use any common linguistic structure, feature many semi-circles that meet to form loops/ellipses, and use many symbols that use vertical symmetry or left-right mirroring. They're also one of the oldest civilizations we know of that have a lingual script as we think of it today. I think a lot of this is trying to capture the vibe of "so ancient it's literally lost to time." There's a few bits of lore about the Zonai and references in the trailers that also seem to tie into the archeological finds around the Sumerians and Gobekli Tepe. If I'm trying to understand the artistic direction (which is probably the best way to find clues that might lead us to the bottom of this), then I'm led to the suspicion that older (many still untranslated) scripts and archeological finds were used as inspiration to really drive home the "ancient civilization from deep time" narrative. There's obviously some south/central American motifs thrown in there too, which you've previously addressed. I'm not sure if I have any conclusions yet but I thought I'd share what I've found so far.
3:17 The symbol that appears serpent-like kind of reminds me of Calamity Ganon depicted on the tapestry. The resemblance is by no means a perfect comparison (missing the out-stretched arm), but just something I thought about. :P
Did anyone else see the symbol inside the bottle at 8:58 in the top right of Egyptian. To me it looks very similar to another one of the symbols from the game.
I don't mind that this is done in media (bc it gets the job done, is easy to pull off, and is accessible for more audiences) but making 26 (or fewer) new letters and using them to write in a language the audience already knows, esp using preexisting standardized spelling within those languages, isn't the same thing as creating a new language. So it's more accurate to say that people have decoded or deciphered the writing in past Zelda games instead of saying they "translated" it. It'd be interesting if these new symbols were a fully fleshed out language, but I'm guessing they might not be, just a cipher for English or Japanese like in last games but representing a new culture.
Let’s goooooo, I was just rewatching your “what I want for BOTW’s Sequel” vid. Always love more totk content before release. Hoping we get a direct soon!!
9:06 small correction: Hieratic is just another way to write the same ancient Egyptian language which the hieroglyphs depict. It's a script like hieroglyphs not a language.
I was just talking to a friend how the ancient Shiekah script is legible after a friend made some hand made weapon mods for FFXIV, and his mind was blown. I can’t wait to see this language fully cracked open!
I think it's definitely deliberate that the runes can't be translated as of yet. They were very skeptical of even releasing the title because they didn't want to give too much away about the story; though I don't think it was the NAME of the game that they didn't want to release, imo they didn't want us to see the title art because of the sword
Well we know in WW he was stabbed in the head (and turned to stone). And TP he was stabbed in the chest(which might prove its the same one in this game). Pretty sure Ganondorf from oot has always been the same guy in every game. Ganon the beast is different though I think
It's the ancient language of the Sand Seals. "Seal Ganon"
That would be quite interesting *arf arf*
This comment gets the official Nintendo Seal of Approval.
Well this was fun to read, seal you later!
Can't believe they turned from hog Ganon to seal ganon
I love how, going all the way back to OoT, the Zelda team have consistently made the extra effort to make all these various writing systems actually translatable into modern languages, whether Japanese or English. It reminds me a lot of Tolkien, and the various written and spoken languages he devised over the course of his life. I just find it fascinating.
Tolkien is way more advanced, though. It would be impossible to translate his text if not for him providing notes on how he created his fictional tongues. His sindarin and quenya are pretty much their own languages with syntax and grammar unlike any other - JRRT is a linguist after all. Nintendo is just coming up with more and more alphabets, nothing more.
@@kikosawa honestly instead of a whole new language, just creating alphabets is more fun to decipher and learn instead of discovering a language with its whole grammar and stuff which you won't even use irl
@@shun22222 But a language with its’ own grammar is more impressive.
@@Thesamurai1999 it is
I love how we are using the same things a lot of archaeologists do in real life
Robbing graves?
@@triscuitgonzalez7936 ok not that lol
Yet
@@verycoolperson46 hold up what do you mean yet?
This man is literally a real life hyrule historian.
@@TomastheHorrorfan Isn’t our playable character kinda robbing a grave in the first trailer’s location?
It's been so long since I've watched a Zeltik video. This video popped up on my recommend page, and once I clicked it, I was reminded of the incredible quality of these videos. Just the music during the Zeltik logo gave me chills, it's just so well done. Thank you Zeltik, all the hard work you put into these videos is clear, and the Zelda community greatly appreciates it.
I know right. Proper scripted videos from the GOAT zelda-tuber.
Unlike the clowns from other channels farming vids titled WHY NO JANUARY DIRECT IS BAD NEWS FOR TEARS OF THE KINGDOM
One of the best, definitely. You should go back through some you missed, pretty cool stuff.
@@7milesdavis yea I definitely will
Zeltik videos always spark my fascination with the mystique of Zelda
I too missed him... Zeltik has this voice that is just so soothing that one can't help but listen. Can't wait for his next vid
I wish my dad would get a chance to play this, BotW was his favorite Zelda game he would have loved the trailer for tears of the kingdom. I'm going to play the hell out of it when it comes out for him.
I'm sorry for your loss man I think your dad would be honored if you played totk for him
I’m sorry for your loss.
Damn.
Your Dad was a gamer.
The people who read this RUclips comment of yours are sorry for your loss of someone you know that is a gamer like yourself.
The characters at 4:31 look like ancient Chinese seal script. They might be based on man’yougana, the Chinese characters used for their sounds instead of their meanings to write Japanese syllabically, which were simplified into modern kana sets. I can’t tell if any of them are close enough to the ancient forms of the kanji used for Japanese before kana to be mapped to them, but it could be interesting to look into that. Excellent video as always, and I simply can’t wait for the game to finally come out!
My first thought seeing them was 'oracle bone script'. They're clearly inspired by them in my opinion. And like you, I can't tell if they're simply inspired or modified versions. But seal script is a much better resemblance than oracle bone.
I love this comment section
Are you going to make a part 3 to the classic enemies reimagined series? I'd love to see the Gleeok reimagined by you, or maybe you could do items reimagined, like the hookshot.
Hell yes, honestly such a good little miniseries
I can't agree more!
Those are some of my favorite TOTK videos. Hopefully he does!
I think it'd be cool if he tried to incorporate both versions of the Gleeok as in the ones in Zelda 1 as well as the one in Phantom Hourglass. Like maybe have it where it has three heads each with their own element like one being fire and one ice like in phantom hourglass. Then they could have the heads have something where they detach from the main body like in Zelda 1.
Yes please!
I got really scared at the beginning that I missed news the game got delayed again until remembering "Oh yeah, Zeltik's in Britain, they write dates differently" lol.
*Properly.
@@doubledee8677 in my opinion, the only proper way is to write the name of a month instead of itsnnumber because I genuinely don't even know the order it's supposed to be where I live
@@wolfydawolf1296 Doesn't really work for digital stuff though.
@@wolfydawolf1296 SAME
@@doubledee8677 the REAL way to write times is from year to millisecond in descending order, eg. this is being written on 2023/01/28-05:14:51.005 😤
I think you're probably right that they might've made deliberately nonsensical text for the trailers but then there are some parts in Zoeysaurusrex's translations that seem so appropriate like on the door that I think it might just be for the cinematic shots like the wall-carving mural at the start of the Name-Reveal trailer. Still, it's nothing short of incredible there have been any even-moderately reasonable translations so far.
I agree. It’s odd to me that there was a “footage not final” caption in the 3 rd teaser when there wasn’t one for the first 2, so it makes me wonder if they changed the text and, like you said, made temporary nonsensical symbols that would warrant a “not final” caption in the cutscene
@@jmw__ I suspect that they did. When the special edition switch box art leaked, I noticed that the runes for those were ever so slightly different than what I captured back when the third trailer released. Despite my effort, I think my solution might not be valid anymore. That said, I’ve been trying to find valid values for the runes on the leaked box art. If we could get one more trailer with the runes, I’m certain I could repeat the process again.
Imagine after 10 years someone finally manages to translate it, and starts to read it: Lorem ipsum…
I respect the extremes that people go to for something like this. Really digging using every little screenshot from trailers to try and piece together something. I'm happy to just wait on the game. But will cheer on those going for it.
The Zelda series always amazes me with the attention to detail and world building. There are races with entire languages and histories that we still know so little about... Cannot wait for this! Thanks Zeltik for yet another high quality video!
Personally, I'm loving the fact we barely know anything for TOTK. As it's a sequel, we as players are already familiar with the Wild Era of Hyrule making exploration a little less exciting. By keeping all the massive changes/additions to the gameplay, story and world hidden besides the vague 'skies, underground and beyond' it creates a sense of mystery and intrigue making exploring TOTK that much more appealing.
If we do get footage in the next direct, I just hope it's like the 2017 Switch Presentation one as it's so incredibly well made creating massive hype and yet spoiled virtually nothing from the game. Afterwards, I'd greatly appreciate videos of the Zelda team detailing TOTK's development leading up to release.
I remember you started a series of analyzing in detail each dungeon from Ocarina of Time and stopped after the Fire Temple I believe. I hope you can finish it. I would love to see more analysis on the Water, Shadow, and Spirit temples.
As someone who ives in America and reads dates mm/dd/yy, seeing 12/05/2023 scared me, I thought I missed an announcment that the game was delayed until December of this year lol
Same here, bro I was so confused
Lol, I thought the same thing and almost panicked at first.
I cannot wait for Tears of the Kingdom!!! I've been going back and playing all the Zelda games I can in anticipation for TotK!
Just wanted to appreciate the shoutout to the subreddit, we’ve formed a great community and I hope over the next few months we get some more hints for deciphering the runes. Great quality as always!
Trying to 100% botw before tears of the kingdom comes out right now and im really loving it. These videos have really helped me while im doing the tedious stuff haha.
Love the obviously huge amount of work and detail you’re putting in these videos. Please never stop making them, you’re amazing!
Thank you so much for the credit! I’m a huge fan of your channel. FWIW, I’m still trying out new solutions all the time because I’m so fascinated by the runes. While statistically my solution could work, I want to keep at it in case a better solution shows up!
I’m at the point where I’ve got all but five symbols on the big doors through a process of comparing the low resolution symbols to intentionally distressed versions of the known runes. I’m eager to see if any of my previous work shows anything useful, but it’s hard to say.
@@Magic.Pixie.Dreamgirl you’re the real MVP
I just want to know how we are going to take control of Link in the beginning of the game. Are we going to do anything with Zelda after defeating Ganon from BOTW? It seems to suggest in the credits. Will we just get a cutscene of the caves and then do the intro to the game in the sky? It's like you said, there's a lot of gameplay and lore missing.
MAN the production value of these videos. Sound design and writing and whatnot. Y’all are crushing it
I always love your videos, but I especially loved the opening zeltik logo with the symbols over it, it was really pretty
Something about your videos, the way you talk and the music you put in makes makes topics like this feel much more sinister and eerie.
This video has such a good atmosphere. Some parts were so mysterious and creepy I kept looking behind me in case there was someone there. Keep going with these amazing videos Zeltik.
In my opinion I think the biggest mystery of the Tears of the kingdom is who's hand is what looks like holding ganondorf down ? Not the swirls floating around or the symbols.
I agree.
Me too
Yeah I'm with you on that
Exactly!!
I love linguistics. I initially thought this video would just start out talking about the linguistics behind solving this and then move on but was pleasantly surprised to find it kept going on this fascinating subject!
new intro looks SICK 1:26
For me, Zelda games are awesome, yes. But, I never tried to understand the meaning of all the designs and writing on the walls. I'm amazed at how you, and others, put so much effort into analyzing stuff like that. It's great to see your passion about the little details.
#1 - RAD intro. Nicely done.
#2 - Personally, I LOVE how much we don't know about the game. I'm sure that'll change in the coming months, but I wish it would stay this way without me having to disconnect from so many social media outlets.
The return of Ganondorf was spoiled for me in the comments section of a Game Grumps episode. It was the Twilight Princess episode where Arin was relentlessly trying (and failing) to save the covered wagon from burning down. How could I NOT look at those comments!?
I love that your added a little more to the into
The symbols from the newest trailer was translated in game over Jessie’s Zonai translation videos, you should check them out, he also talks about how they translated them, he worked with Zoey.
Pictograms are, of course, not necessarily logographic. Phoenician language was likely written as an abjad, a type of photographic script that doesn't include vowels, with the letter for a glottal stop being an ox head. Greek language adopted Phoenician script after recovering from the Greek Dark Age, and modern Latin script still uses the same exact ox head, just rotated so the horns point straight down(I.e., the capital letter "A").
Phonographic, not photographic, thank you very much Autocorrect, and thank you RUclips for disabling the edit function.
I was just going through some of your older videos wishing there was a new theory to watch. Great timing 😂
Your videos are the absolute best when it comes to Zelda theory and I appreciate the work you put in for each one. Especially your choice of music from Twilight Princess.
When your videos incorporate real world sources, they remind me of the historical documentaries we used to watch in grade school, which, coincidentally, got me interested in Ancient Egyptian history in the first place. Love your work as always.
You know the video is going to be good when there’s a new title card design (and a really cool one at that). Good work Zeltik, another banger
please never change your intro it's so good ily
What if those 7 or 8 symbols ARE somehow the tears of the kingdom? Rabbit, deer, I can see whole story lines around collecting tears of importance related to those concepts
New theory (kinda morbid too)
Zelda games always show spirits through little blue flames. Giving Ganon's quote to leave no survivors, are these dots in the pic spirits? And being that they're the same color as what's stored on Link's hip, are they the "tears of the kingdom"? And link has to collect spirits to fuel his power.
Furthermore, in the first trailer we see Ganon held down by this power. Was Ganon kept at bay through a spell using the innocent spirits slain by Ganon's creatures and once Link destroyed the calamity, there were no more spirits to fulfill the spell hence awakening Ganon's corpse with unfettered power to create massive destruction to the land with more powerful foes.
Link reaper
I like how the fan community basically said, 'füçƙ you Nintendo, we'll reveal more about the game ourselves, even if we need a degree in ancient languages to do it.'
1:25 omg i love the new logo!
Now that we know it’s from the Zonai from the most recent trailer that should help with the encrypting business
Waiting to have the intro/title card until after the set-up at the beginning and then having the symbols floating around it was an incredible editing decision, 10/10
I haven't seen the full video yet but i have to come and highlight how COOL the intro looks with the symbols in it, I wouldn't mind if that was how it looked from now on. Plus i think it also has a slightly tweaked sound? If it does it sounds great too, but it might just be me imagining stuff
So far this one has the biggest anticipation. Haven't really seen this much hype for a zelda game since ocarina of time. It's going to be awesome.
I'm hyped too, but I'm trying to be cautious about it. Unfortunately hype doesn't equal quality. Sometimes high quality games generate a lot of hype because of their quality, but sometimes marketing teams generate hype without substance so they can sell a lackluster game. BOTW2, as a successor to BOTW, gives us a lot of reasons to be hyped. BOTW was an incredible experience and game. But with all these mysterious trailers trying to build up hype but not showing us anything, it makes me a little hesitant.
Were you sleeping under a rock during BotW's announcement or something...?
A bit off topic.
I think people also forget about the very position of ganondorf, for alot of media its when from either spell or curse your tearing something out from the other.
The arched back and the hand reaching towards it in the shadow flash shows much, but also when you look closly at ganondorf in the first trailer it looks like the hand is trying to tear something out.
This might have been an attempt to remove the very curse of demise from the Ganondorf himself but failed and only caused it to fester and grow into the current calamity.
It could also be why the corruption is leaking out of the body it such a way from a partially completed spell or undone seal if it is indeed a seal in the first place.
That may be the case. After all given how the princess of Hyrule is always named Zelda they seem to know something about the situation. However, what might this mean for ganondorf in the future.
Just need enough characterstranslate the the script. Is so insane how people can do that. It's really impressive. The zelda community is so freaking amazing
the farmer symbols look more like guards, and in the second pilar between the first two guards, theres a symbol that looks like a person with a cape or a hood. I think the symbols represent someone important being guarded or scorted throgh nature at night, cause theres theres owls, deers and apples
That's a good theory. But who is the hooded person? Still only mysteries.
I thought “farmer” looked like a shepherd personally 😅
I remember learning that the Mayans would keep records by carving images, often depicting key moments in the lives of people (births, milestones, deaths, etc.) I wonder if the symbols on the wall, being that many of them resemble characters (The farmer, the deer, the rabbit, etc.) aren't actually spelled out words but instead are a record of events. The two identical columns could be showing parallel events, things that repeated over time or followed the same pattern.
I'm starting to think more and more that the Zonai might actually be the same as the wind tribe from The Minish Cap. There are a few connections, for example the architecture for both tribes seems to be based on Aztec or Mayan architecture, just look at Mazaal. Speaking of mazaal, his color scheme is gold, red, blue and green. The gold might reference the Triforce, and the RGB references the colors tied to the main characters. The Zonai ruins are mainly found in the Faron region, and Farore is the goddess of courage and wind, and is green.
There are so many links that can be made but I think it could make for an interesting theory vid.
Probably true
It says, "Join the Nintendo Fun Club today!"
Mememememememememe
Meme
As usual, a super hardcore CSI-like video out of almost nothing. And I mean it a good way. Your content is amazing. I can't wait to see what you will do once TotK is released.
Okay i use the MM/DD/YYYY format and that date at the start made me think the game was delayed 😭
What places do this? Are you American?
@@thod-thod russia
@@thod-thod Yes, I'm American.
You are American RUclips viewer.
BABE WAKE UP! NEW TEARS OF THE KINGDOM VIDEO FROM ZELTIK!
ok a little unrelated but I think your new intro with the green energy looks brilliant
Can always count on ZELTIK to give me the meatiest deep dive in under 10 minutes! Loved the video! The research is so top notch!!!
I can't wait for TotK! Imagine all the new unique ways speed runners/game breakers will find to send Link flying to the sky islands above.
The new intro for this looks sick
This just makes me so excited! It's like the old mysteries of archaeologists in days past, and greatly reminds me of those who had to translate scripts like Mayan and Sumerian. Can't wait to find out what these symbols actually mean.
Your videos always make me so happy. They've always been interesting and engaging. You are my favorite Zelda comment creator, and above that you're my favorite creator. Thank you for what you do! Can't wait for the next one.
Many thanks for using City in the Sky as background music. This is one of my favorites from the entire saga and I think it fits very well with the mystery theme.
EDIT: oh, and Face Shrine after that, I knew you had great taste but not to that extent. Thanks!
Zeltik could make a ToTK video about the possibility of toilet location and I would watch the heck out of that video. I don't know why, but he has a calming voice to me. It's relaxing.
It's possible we are also missing pieces from the sections of writing that they have shown us. It's not too hard to edit out a few characters that create context.
1 year later and we know what the symbols are... but we still can't read them! I really hope they do mean something. And I love that this niche topic, namely Zonai culture/archeology, which Zeltik made 2 videos about YEARS ago, has become the focus of the entire story. They need recognition for this.
“Luckily, it was only two years until we saw more of the game!”😃
Please Nintendo give us something in the February direct
Great editing on this one!
No new trailers aged well💀
That same dragon symbol was carved all over Farosh's shrine (on the pillars in the big dragon entryway - you can see it in the clips in this video) in BotW, repeated over and over again like the Sheikah letters. There are a couple others of those you can find around some of the other ruins in BotW: the rabbit was carved into the tree near where the Guardian of the Mountain spawns, so we can probably assume it refers to Blupees. The deer can be found near Farosh's bridge (as can the dragon again). The difference being that with the sole example of the dragon glyph on the pillars around the giant dragon sculpture, the others are always found as one-off scratches on stones and trees, vague and weathered (as if done long ago), and not in any kind of pattern, so I think most people just disregarded them as part of the scenery.
One thing about them maybe being placeholder text is that first trailer was made years ago, when the script may not have been finalized.
If that cutscene even appears in the game on release, the text could look completely different, not out of secrecy, but just because things change during development. They said about BotW that some art designs (like Zelda’s character design) were being worked on until the last minute possible.
I will say though that the most recent trailer likely has finalized script. Zoey’s romaji theory is the best theory so far and I think we have to go forward with that as our best guess until more evidence appears.
1:10 The symbols... They haunt me, I haven't slept in weeks
My theroy about ganondorf is: the shiekah and zonai worked together, the shiekah build the shrines and figured out how to preserve them as monks, we can assume they are alive as they talking to you and because of monk maz koshia, and the zonai where powerfull mahes and knew how to transfer spirit energy,or life energy,and they either taught it to the monks or put a magic spell on them, as they fade away in greenish energy, i assume the shiekah mommyphyed ganondorf but because he was still alife the zonai put on a seal that sucks his life or spirit energy away to a point where he isnt dead but unable to move or do things, i guess that seal took the life of the zonai, and they life in spirit form in the seal,aka the hand thats why it spirals outward away from ganon, and that the prophet that warned the king was a manifestet zonai, as the spirits of the zonai in rhe hand felt the return of the calamty, he tolde them to look underneath the earth. He meant hyrule, but the king thought he meant the divine beasts. So they kinda stoped ganondorf but the didnt prepare for the fact that ganondorf is powerfull enough to send out his malice indepentedly.
I love this theory!!! Count me in
@@ij8961 thanks :3
Great video man! Can’t wait for the next trailer and even more for the game to come out. The first trailer came out when I was 14 and in 8th grade, now I am 18 and a senior in high school. Been a long wait for sure so can’t wait to play.(been watching you and NBC for the same amount of time).
When viewed upside down, a couple of the symbols look like water drops, so maybe they represent something to do with the reverse water drop in one of the trailers and they're just hints about Link's journey. Maybe they're meant to be read backwards given the game's major focus on time reversal.
This game comes out in my birthday, and being the huge Zelda fan that I am it being my favorite VG franchise, I couldn't be happier
I watch a LOT of Zelda theory channels, but I don't normally take theories seriously until Zeltik mentions it....
So excited for Tears of the Kingdom! Thanks for uploading an awesome video. I’m making popcorn to eat while watching it. What better way to watch Zeltik, after all?
Super cool video. Amazing job! When the Zelda community comes together, amazing things happen! I can't believe I haven't seen anything on this! Thank you for covering it! I'll have to give that subreddit a look. Maybe it'll be the spark for some new theories!
Did i already mentioned that i love your Intro?
The symbols over the logo was really cool
people think they’re worried about this game because they haven’t been seeing many trailers. this should excite you and not worry you, there will be many dungeons and forgotten temple-like locations that will completely surprise us
Nice guessing but you don't know this.
I'm still convinced that the green symbols and the armlet Link wears are related to the Twili. The symbols on the armlet are very similar to the green designs on Midna's robes after she regained her true form. And in Twilight Princess, in the final cutscene it was one of Midna's TEARS that smashed the mirror portal and closed the gate between both worlds.
Ayooo. I forgot about midnas tear... that is a nice catch.
The lack of info is actually making me even more excited. Having spent so long play BOTW and knowing so much about it’s world, character’s, story, etc., I’m really looking forward to going in blind. 😃
I took a few hours doing a linguistic analysis on the newer symbols and here are my findings:
The way the symbols appear to be drawn includes many semi-circles drawn one half at a time by extending the tails, but forming a circle with the areas they meet. (as a point of reference, think of the Ichthys symbol, commonly known as the "jesus fish" symbol.) This kinda also fits the two-serpent Ouroboros vibe they've clearly been going for as you literally have to draw one when making these symbols in order to form circles. There's also many vertically symmetrical symbols.
Something that IMMEDIATELY jumped out at me is that this has a LOT of similarities in presentation, aesthetic, and narrative to the Indus Valley Civilization and their as-of-yet untranslated scripts. The Indus/Harappan scripts that we've found so far: Don't contain many symbols, don't appear to use any common linguistic structure, feature many semi-circles that meet to form loops/ellipses, and use many symbols that use vertical symmetry or left-right mirroring. They're also one of the oldest civilizations we know of that have a lingual script as we think of it today. I think a lot of this is trying to capture the vibe of "so ancient it's literally lost to time." There's a few bits of lore about the Zonai and references in the trailers that also seem to tie into the archeological finds around the Sumerians and Gobekli Tepe. If I'm trying to understand the artistic direction (which is probably the best way to find clues that might lead us to the bottom of this), then I'm led to the suspicion that older (many still untranslated) scripts and archeological finds were used as inspiration to really drive home the "ancient civilization from deep time" narrative. There's obviously some south/central American motifs thrown in there too, which you've previously addressed.
I'm not sure if I have any conclusions yet but I thought I'd share what I've found so far.
3:17 The symbol that appears serpent-like kind of reminds me of Calamity Ganon depicted on the tapestry. The resemblance is by no means a perfect comparison (missing the out-stretched arm), but just something I thought about. :P
Did anyone else see the symbol inside the bottle at 8:58 in the top right of Egyptian. To me it looks very similar to another one of the symbols from the game.
Zelda TOTK is gonna be downright revolutionary
I don't mind that this is done in media (bc it gets the job done, is easy to pull off, and is accessible for more audiences) but making 26 (or fewer) new letters and using them to write in a language the audience already knows, esp using preexisting standardized spelling within those languages, isn't the same thing as creating a new language. So it's more accurate to say that people have decoded or deciphered the writing in past Zelda games instead of saying they "translated" it. It'd be interesting if these new symbols were a fully fleshed out language, but I'm guessing they might not be, just a cipher for English or Japanese like in last games but representing a new culture.
As someone who has created a language myself i really find this stuff fascinating.
One thing about those symbols that isn't a mystery?
They look great in the intro!
I like how this is basically the Linear A of Zelda. Ancient, we've given the symbols names, and we just don't have enough examples to make sense of it
Once again, no competition of the best zelda tuber
Zeltik videos are so high quality
"Bes sure to drink your ovaltine."...a crummy commercial
Let’s goooooo, I was just rewatching your “what I want for BOTW’s Sequel” vid. Always love more totk content before release. Hoping we get a direct soon!!
I love your intro, man
9:06 small correction: Hieratic is just another way to write the same ancient Egyptian language which the hieroglyphs depict. It's a script like hieroglyphs not a language.
Seeing the 12.5.2023 terrified me for a moment. As an American, I read that as December 5, 2023 and thought it got delayed.
I was just talking to a friend how the ancient Shiekah script is legible after a friend made some hand made weapon mods for FFXIV, and his mind was blown.
I can’t wait to see this language fully cracked open!
I think it's definitely deliberate that the runes can't be translated as of yet. They were very skeptical of even releasing the title because they didn't want to give too much away about the story; though I don't think it was the NAME of the game that they didn't want to release, imo they didn't want us to see the title art because of the sword
To think ganondorf has been alive since ocarina of time until Totk and never completely died
Well we know in WW he was stabbed in the head (and turned to stone). And TP he was stabbed in the chest(which might prove its the same one in this game). Pretty sure Ganondorf from oot has always been the same guy in every game. Ganon the beast is different though I think
@@tumultuousv well ganon is still all demises curse but I think they are different ganons