The Legend of Zelda



For the first game in the series, which shares the name, go here.

Nintendo's video game series that codified the Action Adventure genre and began in 1986 on the NES.

The Legend of Zelda franchise is, in essence, a mythos in the classical sense of the word: An evil wizard/warlock/thief/monster named Ganon (or Ganondorf, but not Gannon) has cast a great evil over the land of Hyrule, and a young boy in a sort of green Peter Pan / Robin Hood costume must save Hyrule by recovering powerful artifacts that rest in places tainted by Ganon. Princess Zelda is his resourceful and sometimes secretive love interest. He either must rescue her or is guided by her, if not both at once. The story is repeated in many of the games, showing many eras, generations and Alternate Timelines for the land of Hyrule, and as many young boys named Link who find themselves forced to become heroes. An official timeline was revealed in the collector's book Hyrule Historia in 2011; how long it will remain canonical, and whether it will ever be acknowledged within the games, remains to be seen.

Games in the Legend of Zelda canon include:


 * The Legend of Zelda (NES, 1986)
 * Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (NES, 1987)
 * The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES, 1991; ported for Game Boy Advance, 2002)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (Game Boy, 1993; Updated Rerelease for Game Boy Color, 1998; completely remade in 3D for the Nintendo Switch, 2020)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (Nintendo 64, 1998; updated as a Preorder Bonus for GameCube, 2002; remade for Nintendo 3DS, 2011)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (Nintendo 64, 2000; remade for Nintendo 3DS, 2015)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons and The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages (Game Boy Color, 2001)
 * The Legend of Zelda Four Swords (the multiplayer mode for the Link to the Past remake; Game Boy Advance, 2002; remade for DSiWare, 2011)
 * The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (GameCube, 2002)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures (GameCube, 2004)
 * The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap (Game Boy Advance, 2004)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (GameCube and Wii, 2006)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (Nintendo DS, 2007)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks (Nintendo DS, 2009)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii, 2011)
 * The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds (Nintendo 3DS, 2013)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes (Nintendo 3DS, 2015)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wii U and Nintendo Switch, 2017)
 * The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Nintendo Switch, 2023)

Around the time Link to the Past was released, three more games came out which... haven't made the canon: Link: The Faces of Evil, Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon and Zelda's Adventure, the latter two of which are the only games in the franchise in which you play as Zelda throughout the game.

In addition to the main canon, there are also the three Satellaview games released only in Japan for the Satellaview add-on for the Super Famicom: BS Zelda no Densetsu (BS Legend of Zelda) and BS Zelda no Densetsu Inishie no Sekiban (BS The Legend of Zelda: Ancient Stone Tablets. BS Stands for Broadcast Satellaview) The former is a remake of the original Legend of Zelda with SNES graphics but the Satellaview mascots (a boy in a baseball cap or a girl with red hair in a ponytail) are playable instead of Link. The latter uses the same characters but is based graphically on Link to the Past. The character chosen appears in Hyrule and defends it while Link is away (during the events of Link's Awakening). The third is a full, normal, downloadable version of A Link to the Past. The three Satellaview games were "broadcasted" during a one hour window on a weekly schedule and were designed to self-destruct after that hour was over (with the exception of the Alttp one). Because of this, you can no longer play them on the actual hardware and they can only be played on an emulator.

Non-canonical licensed media include:


 * Link: The Faces of Evil, Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon and Zelda's Adventure for the Philips CD-i
 * The Legend Of Zelda cartoon
 * The Legend Of Zelda comic book published by Valiant
 * The Legend of Zelda manga


 * 8.8: Indirectly, because of the score Twilight Princess received in a Gamespot review.
 * Americans Hate Tingle
 * Boss Subtitles
 * Dark World: Used in several of the games.
 * Death Mountain
 * Gannon Banned: Well, somebody forgot to spell-check the main opening of the original game.
 * Heart Container
 * Hijacked by Ganon
 * I Fight for the Strongest Side
 * The Lost Woods
 * Spin Attack
 * Urban Legend of Zelda: More for the pun, but the series does have numerous examples.
 * Wall Master
 * Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: Link's catchphrase in the cartoon.

A-C

 * Abnormal Limb Rotation Range: Kaepora Gaebora and the other Owls.
 * Link himself in Skyward Sword, under some extreme Wiimote gestures.
 * Aerith and Bob: Link and Zelda are both normal, if rare, names, but Malon? Midna? Kafei? Laruto? Not to mention, on the "regular" names from Hyrule, the series gleefully mixes Western and Japanese names in a way you probably wouldn't expect from a kingdom trapped in Medieval Stasis. For the most glaring example, the second-ranked Knight of the Cobble Kingdom in Phantom Hourglass is Doylan. The first-ranked is named Max.
 * All the Worlds Are a Stage: In all the 3D titles--Ganon's Tower type in the first three and the fifth, Zant Stage Rush in the fourth. Also the source of the names of those two types.
 * All There in the Manual: Nintendo released a Japan-only guide to the series called Hyrule Historia as part of the 25th Anniversary celebration. Among other things, it contains the series' official timeline.
 * Alternate Timeline: According to Eiji Aonuma, Ocarina of Time split the timeline in two, with one timeline leading into The Wind Waker and the other into Majora's Mask (and Twilight Princess 100 years later). The 25th anniversary Japanese guidebook revealed it actually split the timeline into three. The third branch leads into A Link To The Past followed by the Oracle games, Link's Awakening, and the original NES Zelda games. This branch is the result of Link being defeated by Ganon in Ocarina.
 * Alternate Universe: The various Dark Worlds in A Link to the Past, Twilight Princess and Spirit Tracks.
 * Ambidextrous Sprite: Played straight in the 2D games, although Link is canonically left-handed. The LttP manual attempts to either justify this or hang a lampshade on it (depending on who reads it) by stating that Link always points his shield towards Death Mountain due to superstitious beliefs.
 * Ambiguously Human: Several races, including the Hylian, Twili, Gerudo, and Sheikah.
 * Amusing Alien: Tingle. Oh, so very much.
 * Anachronic Order: The first four games come an indeterminate amount of time after Ocarina of Time (the fifth), while the sixteenth title, Skyward Sword is said to come sometime before.
 * Anachronism Stew: The series absolutely explodes with this trope. While the core of the games is Medieval European Fantasy, you still have ranches and ghost towns stripped straight from the Old West, boomerangs, steamboats, trains, chancellors with 19th-century top hats, cameras, and even telephones. And that's just barely touching how Egregious the anachronisms get in this franchise.
 * "The Group" has a bazooka. Fortunately, that's the most egregious of anything not-magic...except perhaps Goht, the mechanical bull.
 * By Twilight Princess, the Goron people seemed to have not only mastered manipulation of electricity but also understand the principles of electromagnetic attraction. Their mining facility is also remarkably modern-industrial for the Zelda world.
 * The Bombchu Bowling Alley in OoT even features neon lights.
 * In Skyward Sword, the earliest game in the series' internal chronology, Link encounters the remnants of a civilisation of robots, making robots one of, if not the, oldest races in the world. Based on clues in that game, the world may have undergone a Cataclysm Backstory caused by the demon invasion of the surface, and the advanced tools that Link finds in the various games are Lost Technology.
 * Animated Armor
 * Animated Adaptation: The games had a cartoon series back in The Eighties, along with Super Mario Bros.
 * The Archer: Zelda will often serve this function when she fights. Other times, she's a Barrier Warrior.
 * Artificial Gill: various items are required to swim underwater throughout the series.
 * Ax Crazy:  and Ghirahim are possibly the most psychotic characters Link has encountered in his many adventures. The first is an Omnicidal Maniac who wants to obliterate the world with a moon for kicks, the second is a deranged, power hungry man willing to do anything to become king and possibly has an unhealthy obsession with Midna, and the third is a creepy Blood Knight who threatens to torture Link for getting in the way of his plans.
 * Badass: Link in general. Badass Adorable in his "Toon" incarnations from Wind Waker, Phantom Hourglass, Spirit Tracks, The Minish Cap, Four Swords, and Four Swords Adventures.
 * Young Link from Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask is also a Badass Adorable.
 * And then there's Wolf Link from Twilight Princess, which is a Big Badass Wolf.
 * Give credit to the various Ganons: they do manage to always pose a significant threat. It often requires the best and most holy weaponry in the game to defeat a Ganon as he is in control of many dangerous monsters and is quite powerful himself.
 * Badass Beard: Ganondorf started sporting a chin curtain in The Wind Waker.
 * Badass Grandpa: Orca. He wanted to be a great swordsman but suffered a serious injury which put a halt to that, though he is still skilled. He moved on to fishing afterward. You can see his catches along his walls. One set of jaws is larger than Link.
 * Hyrule Historia reveals the Hero's Shade qualifies for this, since he is.
 * Badass Princess: Zelda in the cartoon and later games, and in Twilight Princess.
 * Even as a Damsel in Distress in the first game, Zelda is pretty badass. Sure, Ganon captured her, but not before she broke the Triforce of Wisdom into 8 pieces and hid them all over the land.
 * Bag of Holding: Implied in the games.
 * Beam Me Up, Scotty: Variation. It's not with one quote from the game, but rather the title of one of its most famous music themes. Princess Zelda's Leitmotif is officially titled "Zelda's Theme", but most fans know it as "Zelda's Lullaby". Although that name was used, it only referred to a very specific version of it: the ocarina tune in Ocarina of Time. The "normal" version got the former title, and was used in later OSTs, like The Wind Waker. However, since the latter title appeared on screen every time the player played it in Ocarina of Time (the most popular in the franchise), it's not so strange most people know it by that name.
 * Beware the Nice Ones: Link is an all-around nice kid. People who end up on his bad side wind up with multiple stab wounds to their everything.
 * Princess Zelda as well. Yeah, she gets kidnapped repeatedly but the girl has shown she is a decent archer, knows a bit of magic, has some Sheikah training in Ocarina of Time and is willing to fight with a sword in Twilight Princess. Even in Spirit Tracks, as an Animated Armor, when you attack her too much, she'll go berserk on Link, and even safe zones can't protect him from her wrath!
 * Blade of Fearsome Size: Some examples include the Biggoron's Sword, the Great Fairy's Sword and the blade used by the Fierce Deity.
 * Big Bad: Ganon(dorf) in most cases (8 games), followed at a relatively distant second by Vaati (3 games), with every other villain except Twinrova having one appearance each so far.
 * Bigger Bad: as Skyward Sword reveals.
 * Big Boo's Haunt
 * Bilingual Bonus: It's been possible to translate the various versions of the Hylian language since OoT.
 * Bishounen: Link, in his older incarnations.
 * Black Magic: Many of the main villains possess some knowledge of black magic. Even some evil characters mentioned only once or twice use it, like the Interlopers from Twilight Princess or the tribe which used Majora's Mask.
 * Agahnim could send people to the Dark World and control minds. Being a wizard, he also has various magical attacks. Since Agahnim is Ganon's alter ego, these feats apply to Ganon himself.
 * Ganon can lay death curses, revive ancient terrors from the dead, transform into a beast-like form, create ghostly versions of himself and more.
 * Majora (and Skull Kid using Majora's Mask) was able to steal and transfer souls, summon a moon to destroy the land of Termina and inflict curses on people and places.
 * Twinrova could brainwash people, use fire and ice attacks and twist the environment to an ice or fire setting in the Oracle games.
 * Vaati could curse beings, turn people into stone, corrupt an area and use various magical attacks. He even manages to  in a Nonstandard Game Over during a timed segment before the Final Boss battles.
 * Blackout Basement: The lantern stages.
 * Bold Inflation: Just look at the page quote for one particular example.
 * Bonsai Forest: Like many isometric games, the 2D entries in the series have very short trees. To a lesser extent this also occurs in some of the 3D titles, although specific areas may still have tall trees.
 * Bonus Feature Failure: The Bombchus in the Oracle games, where they are only acquired as a bonus after starting a New Game+, are not particularly useful at any point in the game, and are not normally dropped by defeated enemies, making them difficult to stock up on.
 * However, later games made use of them in interesting ways, mostly as a minigame.
 * Bootstrapped Theme / Bootstrapped Leitmotif: The title screen / overworld theme from the first Zelda game along with many others are used in later games both as the series' Main Theme and as Link's Leitmotif.
 * Bow and Sword in Accord: All the Links make use of a variety of ranged weapons as well as a sword.
 * Bowdlerize: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to The Past was named as such in English because of Nintendo of America's aversion to even the most tenuous of religious themes; what the translated title should have been was Triforce of the Gods.
 * One game later, in Link's Awakening, they changed cross-shaped grave markers into "RIP" rounded-block gravestones. Also the bikini top of the Mermaid became a... pearl amulet.
 * And when the DX version came out, it crept to the European cartridges.
 * The original release of Ocarina of Time had Ganondorf cough up blood after you beat him and mortally wound him. The blood was turned green and then removed in later-produced cartridges. The vocal track in the Fire Temple was excised as it was a Muslim chant, and the Gerudo symbol of the star-and-crescent was replaced with a symbol resembling a stylized face, again for its association with Islam.
 * The 3DS remake of Ocarina of Time gave Princess Ruto an extra layer of scales that end in a small ridge just above her chest, in order to suggest clothing.
 * Broken Bridge: In addition to literally breaking bridges, the Zelda games have also begun teleporting those bridges through time and space or replacing the broken bridge with a broken man cannon. It Makes Sense in Context.
 * But Now I Must Go: Tends to happen to the Exposition Fairies. Even Link does this on from time to time.
 * But Thou Must!
 * Call a Rabbit a Smeerp: Chicken? Cucco. Bats? Keese. Skeletons? Stalfos. Mummy? Gibdo. Zombie? Redead. Dinosaur? Dodongo. Venus Flytrap? Deku Baba or later in the timeline, Boko Baba.
 * Call to Adventure: Has been getting steadily more complex. It used to be a bunch of random (but extremely insistent) strangers ordering poor Link to save the world, but now we have mysterious sidekicks, kidnapped sisters/lovable village scamps/possible love interests, and so on.
 * Camera Centering
 * Camera Lock On
 * Cartography Sidequest
 * Cartoon Bomb
 * Cash Cow Franchise
 * Cast of Snowflakes: Part of the charm of the 3D Zelda games are seeing what crazy character designs the developers came up with for each and every Non-Player Character. They seem to be getting more outlandish with every installment.
 * Cataclysm Backstory: Two notable examples are  and the battle to seal Ganon in the backstory of A Link to the Past.
 * Celtic Mythology: Just a little bit. The default name of Link's horse, in the games where she appears, is Epona - which is the name of the Celtic goddess of horses.
 * Chain of Deals: Typically for something awesome but optional, like the Infinity+1 Sword.
 * Chaos Architecture: The realm of Hyrule itself. Landmarks such as Lake Hylia, Hyrule Castle, Death Mountain, Kakariko Village, and the Lost Woods tend to move around from game to game. Often excused as corruption introduced in each "telling" of the titular "legend," verging on Literary Agent Hypothesis.
 * Chest Monster
 * Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Items and uniforms, especially. Enemies too, in many games; weaker enemies are red and stronger are blue.
 * Dialogue text will often have important words highlighted in a different color than the rest of the words, sometimes using appropriate colors (like "forest" in green, "lake" in blue, etc).
 * Commonplace Rare: Bottles. In every game that they were featured in, Bottles seem to be something that SHOULD be easy to get. But as it so-happens, the Bottles tend to be only possessed by a few (if that many) people in Hyrule. And these people NORMALLY require some quest or mini-game to be completed. Despite obvious glass windows in quite a few places in the series...are storage containers made from this material THAT sought after? I suppose when you have a kid breaking into everyone's houses and smashing their clay pots to steal their hard earned items, an apparently unbreakable jar seems like the best thing ever.
 * Conservation of Competence: The Hylian Royal Guards may very well be one of the worst military forces in this world or any other. When they're not brainwashed and attacking Link (in which case Link slaughters them in droves), they're either standing around, walking back and forth in pointless patrols, or being slaughtered in droves by whichever villain the game features. They have lost every war they have ever fought and never once made a significant contribution to Hyrule's salvation. Their supposed leader, Princess Zelda, by contrast, seems to have gotten more powerful over the course of the series. This eventually leads up to situations like the ones in Spirit Tracks and Twilight Princess, in which Zelda is a potent sorceress and archer while the guards are incompetent morons whose uselessness is repeatedly lampshaded.
 * In Twilight Princess, if you run through Hyrule Castle town in wolf form, the guards will circle around you, but every one of them is shaking and cowering like mad, and if you make a move they all scream and go running like crazy.
 * Continuity Snarl: The timeline, at least until the revelation in the 25th anniversary artbook of the master timeline thus far. As the article puts it, it's like someone pulled random scattered pages out of three mega-Doorstopper Hyrulean history books and then shuffled them. While Professor Nintendo finally saw fit to step in and show us which page goes where and give us a number of chapter titles, the snarl will reemerge whenever a new game is released, as its place in the timeline is viciously fought over.
 * Continuity Creep: While there is an official timeline, evidence of its existence and of connections between the games' histories didn't really emerge until after Ocarina of Time, after which it began to increase. Even then, Continuity Lock Out isn't a much of a problem, as the same factors that made sorting out the snarl without Word of God impossible ensure that even reference-heavy continuity-heavy games also work perfectly well as standalones.
 * Cosmic Keystone: The Triforce. To a lesser extent, the Master Sword.
 * Counter Attack
 * Cool Key: Boss Keys tend to be this.
 * Cool Sword: The Master Sword, the Four Sword, the Great Fairy Sword, the Razor and Gilded Swords, the Lokomo Sword, the Phantom Sword, Biggoron's Sword...basically, any major sword upgrade.
 * Coup De Grace Cutscene: Many of Ganondorf's final boss battles.
 * Crate Expectations
 * Critical Annoyance: The incessant beeping sound that appears when you're down to one heart. It's not as high-pitched in later games, though.
 * Crosshair Aware
 * Culture Chop Suey: Probably more than one example, but Link's use of a boomerang in a relatively (at least in the earlier games) medieval setting stands out the most.
 * Cute Shotaro Boy: Young Link, Kafei, Colin.
 * Cute Shotaro Boy: Young Link, Kafei, Colin.

D-F

 * Darker and Edgier: Pretty much the whole reason Twilight Princess was made, according to Word of God; Nintendo heard all the complaints from America (which is the bigger market for Zelda, mind) about the "toon" look of The Wind Waker, and the art and design team was tasked with creating what would in many ways be the darkest chapter in series history.
 * Other candidates for Darker and Edgier are Majora's Mask, where impending doom is just for starters, and The Adventure of Link, where the impending doom won't stop arriving.
 * Dark Reprise: Series-wide example. A heroic Hyrule Castle theme heard in Link to the Past gets a darker reprise in Minish Cap.
 * Dark-Skinned Redhead: The Gerudo people, including Ganondorf in Ocarina of Time prior to his becoming Ganon, although even at the beginning Ganondorf's skin has a sickly/undead-looking greenish cast, which becomes outright Hulk green or even blue in many of his appearances (not all of which are humanoid, of course) later on in the series's chronology.
 * And Midna takes both dark skinned and redhead to to a new level, being a literally ebony-skinned imp with glowing orange hair.
 * And Skyward Sword gives us.
 * Deadly Rotary Fan: Peahats attack using these in the N64 games.
 * Despotism Justifies the Means: Ganondorf.
 * Determinator: Link's determination is outweighed only by his courage. Curses, giant monsters, long falls, dangerous terrains, being flung across the ocean... the Links go through a lot. Ghirahim comments on this in Skyward Sword: "But instead of scurrying away like any creature with a basic instinct to survive, you just kept coming back. Again...and again...and again."
 * Ganon is a tough son of a gun as well and keeps charging forward despite horrible injuries. Rule #1 with Ganon: he never stays sealed permanently and will find a way out eventually.
 * Die Pot Die: And boxes and grass, too. And chairs and tables and couches and who knows what else. All Links have an innate hatred for anything they can destroy, often in the name of finding pickups: items, hearts, and money.
 * Disc One Final Boss / Dungeon: Agahaim and Hyrule Castle in A Link to the Past, Zant and the Palace of Twilight in Twilight Princess, in Spirit Tracks, and   in Skyward Sword.
 * Doomed by Canon: Skyward Sword is the first game in the chronology, according to the official release of the timeline. There's a lot of Foreshadowing within the game that suggests.
 * Down the Drain: The water dungeons, with the Water Temple as its most well-known (read: notorious) example.
 * Dramatic Thunder: Clashes with Ganondorf sometimes uses lightning as a backdrop just in case fighting a thirty foot man-bear-pig wasn't freaky enough.
 * Dual Boss: Twinrova, Twinmold, Fraaz...
 * Dual World Gameplay: A Link to The Past started with its use of the Dark World and then Ocarina of Time and Oracle of Ages used time travel.
 * Time travel-dual worlding is revisited in Skyward Sword, but only within the radius of "Timeshift stones." This culminates in the Sandship dungeon, where there is a timeshift stone powerful enough to resurrect an entire ship
 * Dungeon Crawling
 * Earth Drift: The first games had crosses sprinkled about, and A Link to The Past has artwork showing Link kneeling before a crucifix. All of this would be phased out in favor of a more original mythos.
 * Eat Dirt Cheap: The gorons eat rocks.
 * Easily-Conquered World
 * Easing Into the Adventure: From Ocarina of Time, though more obvious from The Wind Waker.
 * Eldritch Abomination: Bongo-Bongo qualifies. An ancient, cyclopic spirit of darkness that manifests as a hanging, decapitated corpse with severed hands.
 * Malladus, Bellum, Majora, and Dethl might also count, as they're a demonic, misty skull with a habit of possessing people, a tentacled beast from the deep, an evil, insane Trickster god, and a giant, shadowy manifestation of nightmares, respectively.
 * Electric Jellyfish: The Bari species of jellyfish are electric.
 * Elemental Nation
 * Empty Room Psych
 * End of an Age: The Wind Waker, although its message is surprisingly positive. It's more about letting go of what's gone and moving on to the new than lamenting what has been lost.
 * Ermine Cape Effect: It's an important plot point if Zelda is not wearing her dress.
 * Everything's Better with Princesses: Somehow, Zelda is never referred to as Queen Zelda, even in the games without token cameos by parents.
 * Lava Adds Awesome: Any fire-base dungeon, especially volcano dungeons. Usually, you also have to fight burning bats and huge monsters that set themselves on fire.
 * Evil Tower of Ominousness: Ganon's bachelor pad.
 * Exposition Fairy / Fairy Companion: In order of appearance:
 * The cartoon: Spryte, making the concept of the Fairy Companion a Canon Immigrant with...
 * Ocarina of Time: Navi, the Trope Codifier.
 * Majora's Mask: Tatl.
 * The Wind Waker: The King of Red Lions.
 * Four Swords Adventures: Whichever maiden you've just rescued, who takes the form of an actual fairy.
 * The Minish Cap: Ezlo.
 * Twilight Princess: Midna.
 * Phantom Hourglass: Ciela, Leaf, Neri and Linebeck.
 * Spirit Tracks: Zelda.
 * Skyward Sword: Fi.
 * Eye Scream: There's a recurring element throughout the series of shooting arrows into eyes. Find an eye-shaped thing in a dungeon? Shoot an arrow into it to solve the puzzle. Fighting a boss with one large eye? Shoot an arrow into it to beat it. It's easy to forget how disturbing this is.
 * Fairy Battle
 * Fan Sequel: There is a game editor/creator that is for making your own 2D Zelda game that has gained popularity called Zelda Classic.
 * Fetch Quest: The stock quest for padding in between the real winners -- the dungeons.
 * Fictionary: Hylian, which is just a substitution cypher on Japanese when it appears in-game (except in Twilight Princess, when it's based on English).
 * Fishing Minigame: Most games since and including Link's Awakening have had one. Averted in The Wind Waker, which apparently has few fish in its ocean.
 * Fish People: The Zora.
 * Foreboding Architecture: Can be spotted on the maps many of the games have.
 * For the Evulz: Majora is a massive prick whether it is acting through Skull Kid or not.
 * Four-Element Ensemble: The Earth, Fire, Water and Wind elements from The Minish Cap, Four Swords and Four Swords Adventures.
 * Frickin' Laser Beams: All throughout the series, from laser barriers in The Wind Waker to Beamos in multiple games which shoot lasers. A Link to the Past has the enemy called the Laser Eye, which is an eye that shoots lasers.
 * Attack Its Blatant Glowing Red Spot For Massive Damage
 * Attack Its Blatant Glowing Red Spot For Massive Damage

G-I

 * Generation Xerox: Link and Zelda always, and sometimes notable supporting characters (like Marin/Malon, Tingle, Beedle, and Linebeck)
 * Ghost Butler: There are two cases of this: one where iron bars or some similar obstruction blocks regular doors until a Mini Boss is defeated or a puzzle is solved, and one where the big door to the boss just slams shut and becomes locked for no apparent reason.
 * Ghost Ship: In both The Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass.
 * Giant Eye of Doom: Gohma, the first boss in Ocarina of Time. Wart in the sequel as well.
 * Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: Many examples, particularly Mini Bosses.
 * Giant Spider: Many enemies and bosses, most notably the various versions of Gohma and the Skulltulas. Twilight Princess features the largest and most realistic spider in the series so far, Armogohma.
 * God Is Inept:.
 * Go for the Eye: A perennial favorite.
 * God in Human Form: Skyward Sword reveals that
 * Good Morning, Crono: In every game since A Link to the Past, Link begins the game asleep. Or at least, he is first able to be controlled after he wakes up.
 * Twilight Princess and Four Swords are the exceptions here, where in Four Swords, Link is knocked unconscious after a lengthy cutscene, and in Twilight Princess, we first meet Link while he speaks with Rusl. He goes back to his house and falls asleep, only to be woken up by Fado.
 * Good Colors, Evil Colors: Usually, Link's basic colors are green and blue. Zelda's are pink and white. Ganondorf's, black and red. Neat, huh?
 * Gotta Catch Them All: The Triforce pieces/pendants/whatever.
 * Grappling Hook Pistol: Hookshot is the most common name, though the Switch Hook is used in Oracle of Ages, and the Clawshot in The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess and The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword takes it to extreme levels, as you can use two of them in tandem.
 * Grave Clouds
 * Great Escape: In Ocarina of Time, The Wind Waker, and Twilight Princess.
 * Grim Up North: The northern part of the world map will generally have some sort of foreboding mountain or volcano.
 * Guide Dang It: And how. Typically, the series is full of things you probably wouldn't normally think to do.
 * The Guards Must Be Crazy: Once again, the Hyrulean guards.
 * Hearts Are Health
 * Heel Face Turn: Ingo, Mido, Skull Kid, Linebeck,  and.
 * Hello, Insert Name Here: Although the name Link is used extensively here and on many a fansite, you get to name the lad in almost every game.
 * The Hero: Link is often "The Hero" in a literal sense -- of Hyrule, Time, Winds, or chosen by the Gods. He may start out as an unassuming Farm Boy, but heroism is inevitably his destiny.
 * The Hero Dies: Hyrule Historia states that one of the timelines in the series is created when Link fails to stop Ganon in Ocarina Of Time and creates the Imprisoning War, (aka leads up to A Link Into The Past.)
 * Hero's Journey - In almost every game, with the possible exception of Majora's Mask.
 * Hilarious in Hindsight: It is quite possible that Groose . He matches the physical attributes very well (namely the red hair, yellowish gold eyes and dark skin). Worth mentioning is how Groose and his cronies stole Link's loftwing and hid it away. The Gerudo are well known thieves.
 * Iconic Item: Link's green tunic and hood and, to a lesser extent, the Master Sword. The Triforce also serves as the Iconic Item for the entire series.
 * Iconic Logo: The page image.
 * Immortality: Ganon from The Legend of Zelda is both Type VII External and Type I Perfect (In addition to his obvious Joker Immunity), as he can't be killed as long as he holds the Triforce of Power (though he has shown a few signs of slow aging, before he turned from a human to a Pig Man form). There are also several incarnations of fellow Triforce bearers Link and Princess Zelda, definite cases of Legacy Character and Generation Xerox at least, and a few Epileptic Trees extend this into Type IV Reincarnation Immortality (which would also be Type VII External), but the series has never gone into the details.
 * The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword has dropped some hints.
 * Implied Love Interest: Link and Zelda in many (but not all) of the games. The biggest examples are Spirit Tracks and Skyward Sword.
 * Impossible Item Drop: Most enemies (and random objects like pots or bushes) drop rupees, arrows, bombs, magic potion vials, and hearts at random. Even better, whenever you get a new item (bow, bomb bag, slingshot, etc...) that consumes something, whatever it is suddenly starts appearing everywhere in spite of its not showing up before.
 * Inescapable Ambush
 * Inexplicable Treasure Chests:
 * Infinity+1 Sword: The Magical Sword in the first game, the Level 2 Sword in Links Awakening, Biggoron's Sword in Ocarina of Time, and the Great Fairy's Sword in Majoras Mask.
 * Insurmountable Waist High Fence: Though Link has no problems at all with ladders, steep mountain trails, and vine-covered walls, he is unable to pass man-made fences without the aid of his horse.
 * However, this gets averted in Skyward Sword, where Link is actually able to move around it automatically. And the Fandom Rejoiced, indeed.
 * Interchangeable Antimatter Keys: A staple of the series since Day One. The first two titles even had keys that worked in any dungeon.
 * Interface Spoiler: If there are empty spots in your item and quest menu, rest assured that they will be filled up later on. Notably averted in Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages in which you get several more item spaces than you actually need, and Twilight Princess, where the item menu is a circle where the items are evenly spaced, and the quest menu puts all the Plot Coupons in one space where they float around. Links Awakening actually has more items than inventory spaces-- one has to be traded away for another (and traded back if you need it again, as buying a new one will make the game Unwinnable).
 * Interquel: According to Hyrule Historia, the Oracle games and Link's Awakening are set between A Link to the Past and the original game, while Twilight Princess is this to Majora's Mask and Four Swords Adventures.
 * Interspecies Romance: Gets mentioned (and usually poked fun at) in several games.
 * In Link's Awakening, there's a subquest where you have to deliver a picture from a shy man and his female penpal. Said penpal turns out to be a talking goat in Animal Town (who sends him back a photo of Princess Peach to boot).
 * In Majora's Mask, Treasure Chest Shop Owner (a female Terminan) will flirt with you while you're wearing the Zora Mask.
 * In Oracle of Seasons, Link need to go on a date with a Subrosian (mysterious, subterranean people who wear cloaks, eat metal and bathe in molten lava) in order to proceed and can ask her for further dates as well.
 * Vaati, a Picori who used black magic to assume humanoid form and first introduced in The Minish Cap, is explicitly stated as kidnapping Hylian girls because he's attracted to them.
 * In Ocarina of Time, Link gets an Accidental Marriage to Princess Ruto of the Zoras.
 * In The Wind Waker, there a subquest about a Hylian girl falling in love with a moblin.
 * In Twilight Princess, there's the hinted romantic attraction between Link (Hylian) and Midna (imp/Twili). Not to mention Link spending one-third of the game as a wolf (though Midna treats him more like a pet dog at this stage).
 * In Oracle of Ages, Link gets propositioned by a tree. A tree wearing ganguro-gal makeup.
 * Invincible Villain: Ganon has shades of this. After being pelted with holy arrows, exposed to powerful magics and stabbed lord knows how many times with the ultimate sword of good, Ganon tends to stay alive through it all.
 * To scary limits at the end of Ocarina when he is shown after being sealed away. He showed no signs of being harmed at all despite receiving a stab wound to the face moments earlier.
 * Irony: The game with the best ending is probably in Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, where Ganon is truly defeated for good and Link and Zelda are truly together. The irony is, this is the conclusion of the "Hero Defeated" timeline, the timeline that is created should Ocarina of Time end with Link's failure to defeat Ganon.
 * Item Get: Link reacts to new items and treasures in the most enthusiastic way possible (and the music agrees) in every game. Increasingly Lampshaded as the series goes on.

J-L

 * Jerkass: Skull Kid before he found Majora's Mask (more so afterward). Mido remains a jerkass until he puts his jealousy of Link aside. Groose is arguably the best example in Skyward Sword..
 * Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Tetra, Midna, Linebeck.
 * Just Eat Him: Like-Likes don't seem to be able to keep Link down, and usually opt instead to strip him of his shield or clothes (or rupees for some varieties). No idea why those would be more nutritional than Link. Originally, they only "ate magic", and devoured Link's Magic Shield because it was the only easily-accessible edible item.
 * Killer App: It's pretty much guaranteed that a Zelda release will coincide with a massive spike in Nintendo console sales. It (along with Mario) is basically Nintendo's home console equivalent to Pokémon.
 * Lady of War: Applies to Zelda in later games (Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, etc.)
 * Lampshade Hanging: While other handheld Zelda games have done this, the two Nintendo DS games are most well known for doing this to extreme levels. They also enjoy Leaning on the Fourth Wall a bit.
 * Late Arrival Spoiler: Crosscheck with Super Smash Bros. Melee and Brawl - Sheik is, and
 * Also, literally any game in any connection with The Wind Waker (Super Smash Bros., once again, counting) literally goes out of its way to make sure that everybody knows about.
 * Legacy Character: Due to the sprawling (and branching) timeline of the series, Word of God has it that there are multiple Links and Zeldas. In the case of Zelda, this is simply because all princesses of Hyrule are named Zelda; Link is more of a wild card, and seems to appear by lucky happenstance (or, more likely, divine intervention).
 * Leitmotif: Music is reused throughout the series. The most common examples:
 * The iconic series Main Theme, which eventually became Link's leitmotif too. It's the only leitmotif that can be tracked down to the very first NES game.
 * Zelda's Theme (a.k.a Zelda's Lullaby), for the titular princess. It's first appearance was in A Link to the Past, but became popular in Ocarina of Time (which is the reason why most fans refer to it by it's alternative title).
 * The series' Big Bad has his own: Ganon's Theme. Also, it was created in A Link to the Past.
 * Great Fairy's Fountain is almost always used as the Save File Select Screen theme and the fairy's leitmotif. And yeap, appeared in A Link to the Past first too.
 * Kakariko Village. It has had several arrangements, depending on the setting of the titular village. Guess in which game appeared first.
 * Inside a House. A homely theme that has almost never missed an entry ever since its first appearence in Ocarina of Time.
 * Lethal Lava Land: Starting with Ocarina of Time, this always overlaps with the eponymous Death Mountain trope.
 * Level Map Display: The world map can be viewed at any time via the menu screen. From Ocarina of Time onwards, a mini map display -- complete with arrows marking your point of entry (represented in blue) and your current heading (the yellow one) -- usually occupies the lower left corner of the screen for faster, easier navigation.
 * Limited Sound Effects: There are only three sounds your sword makes when it hits something, but more than three materials.
 * Literary Agent Hypothesis: When you put Legend in the title, it's just begging for Fan Wank.
 * Love Interests: Although it's generally accepted that Link ends up with Zelda at the end of most games, along the way Link often meets other girls with whom he has chemistry with as well. Ocarina of Time has at least three different girls who qualify, and that's only counting the ones roughly his age.

M-O

 * Magic Music: Excluding Phantom Hourglass, some form of this trope has appeared in every Zelda game so far.
 * Magic Wand: Many, including the Rods of Ice and Fire and the Staves of Byrna and Somaria in A Link To the Past, the Rod of Seasons in Oracle of Seasons, the Wind Waker, and the Dominion Rod in Twilight Princess.
 * Malevolent Architecture: The Hylian people don't seem very religious, most likely because all of their "temples" are labyrinthine deathtrap and monster repositories.
 * The Man Behind the Monsters
 * Marathon Level
 * The Maze: The Lost Woods overlap with this, in every incarnation.
 * Medieval Stasis: With occasional Schizo-Tech. Wild mass guessing ensued.
 * Missing Mom: Even in the games where Zelda's father is present, she never ever has a mother.
 * Mistaken for Granite: Mooks called Armos and Darknut.
 * Money for Nothing
 * Money Spider: One could be forgiven for thinking the trope was named for the tektites of the original game. However, here the trope refers to another enemy altogether.
 * Mook Bouncer: The Wall Masters aren't just a type of Wall Master.
 * Mooks Ate My Equipment: Like-Likes
 * Multiple Choice Past: The Master Sword. The manual for A Link to the Past says it was forged by the people of Hyrule. Princess Zelda in Twilight Princess says the Master Sword was forged by the ancient sages. Skyward Sword.
 * Named After Somebody Famous: Word of God says the titular princess is named after F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife.
 * Zelda Williams, daughter of Robin Williams, was named after Princess Zelda and appears in commercials for Ocarina of Time 3D.
 * Natural Spotlight: Wherever the Master Sword is.
 * New Game+
 * Ninja: The Sheikah and the Garo.
 * No Export for You: Tetra's Trackers from the Japanese version of Four Swords Adventures.
 * The Sattelaview games for the Super Fmicom: the first being a remake of Zelda 1 (with different map layouts), and the second being a Timed Mission in the A Link to The Past engine, where your hero (not Link, who's caught in Windfish Island) must collect the 8 stone tablets to seal Ganon again, after his seal weakened.
 * The three Tingle Spin-Off games: the first one, Freshly-Picked: Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland, was released only in Japan and Europe; the US version was cancelled under popular demand from an online NOA poll. It has greed as a game mechanic. The latter two, only released in Japan, are a Ballon Fight clone, and a sequel to the first game but with Dating Sim elements, of all things.
 * No Hero Discount: You can save the world as long as you have enough rupees.
 * No Hugging, No Kissing: In (almost) every game, Link and Zelda never express romance, though there's an undercurrent in several games.
 * Non-Linear Sequel: Half, maybe two-thirds of the time. Part of why the timeline is such a mess.
 * Notice This
 * Oddball in the Series: Zelda II, Majora's Mask, and Four Swords Adventures; to various degrees.
 * Ominous Fog
 * One-Gender Race: Well, almost. The Gerudo (most prominent in Ocarina of Time) are almost all female. One man is born to the race every hundred years, and the only known male Gerudo in the whole series is Ganondorf. It's implied by a Gossip Stone that the Gerudo mate with Hylians.
 * It also appears as though all Gorons are male. Every Goron is referred to as a "brother" by each other and so far, no definitely female Gorons have come forth.
 * One Head Taller: Gender inverted; Zelda is often depicted as being a bit taller than Link.
 * One-Winged Angel: Often Ganondorf.
 * Our Fairies Are Different: In some titles, they're depicted as female winged humanoids, while in others, they're depicted as winged orbs of lights.
 * Our Monsters Are Weird: The four biggest examples are the Like Likes, Pols Voces, Octorocks and Digdogger.
 * Our Orcs Are Different: Moblins.

P-R
"IF ALL ELSE FAILS USE FIRE"
 * Parental Abandonment: Has anyone ever seen Link's parents or Zelda's mother? In A Link to the Past, The Wind Waker and The Minish Cap, Link is raised by other relatives. In Ocarina of Time we find out that both of Link's parents died during a great war. Link's father presumably died in battle (the game never says what happened to him), and his mother was killed while trying to hide Link in the Kokiri Woods. In Twilight Princess Link lives in a small village with several families, but he has his own house and no one claims him as a relative. In Skyward Sword, Link is in the same situation, inhabiting a dorm room in the Skyloft Knights academy, but he's not alone; all of the other students are also missing their parents, except for Pepit's mother and Zelda's father.
 * Personal Space Invader: ReDeads and Like-Likes, quite infamous among the fandom.
 * Pimped-Out Dress: Zelda has had those since at least the second game, and her standard dress since Ocarina.
 * Pint-Sized Powerhouse: The Cuccos.
 * Plot Coupon: The Legend of Zelda eats this trope up. Every game in the franchise uses it.
 * The Legend of Zelda: Eight Pieces of the Triforce.
 * Adventure of Link: The Six Crystals, or rather the six statues to put the crystals in (you have the crystals at the outset).
 * A Link to the Past: Three Pendants first, then the Seven Crystals.
 * Link's Awakening: Eight Siren Instruments.
 * Ocarina of Time: Three Spiritual Stones followed by the Six Medallions. (You get Rauru's medallion free when you draw the Master Sword for the first time.)
 * Majora's Mask: Four Mask Remains.
 * Oracle of Seasons/Ages: Eight Essences of Nature/Time.
 * The Wind Waker: Three Goddess Pearls, then the Two Sages, finally the Eight Pieces of the Triforce.
 * Four Swords Adventures: Six Shrine Maidens, then Zelda.
 * The Minish Cap: Four Elements.
 * Twilight Princess: Three Fused Shadows, then the Four Mirror Fragments.
 * Phantom Hourglass: Three Spirits, next the Three Pure Metals.
 * Spirit Tracks: Four Force Gems (or, more precisely, the energy from them, which reattaches the broken segments of the Tower of Spirits) and the four glyphs to find them, followed by the Bow of Light, and then the Compass of Light.
 * Skyward Sword: Two surface maps (one is given for free), then the three flames (and accompanying harp songs), next the four parts of the Song of the Hero, and finally.
 * Plot Tailored to the Party: Most of the items in the game have to have certain markings or items in the wall to be useful.
 * Plot Tumor: The Master Sword didn't even appear until Link to the Past when you needed it to battle Agahnim, but it was emphasized that even then it only repelled his magic, it couldn't actually harm his body. To defeat Ganon you had to strike him with the Master Sword to stun him, then shoot him with a Silver Arrow. And you could even have blacksmiths temper the sword to power it up. Ever since Ocarina of Time though, the Master Sword is a Cosmic Keystone that is just as important as the Triforce to the cosmology and fate of Hyrule, its usage determining the fate of entire dimensions, races, and the space-time continuum. It's the only weapon that can harm Ganon(dorf), and if you're looking at powering it up it's going to take divine intervention.
 * Power Floats: Many instances throughout the series, from Mooks to bosses. The Triforce itself hovers over its pedestal, turning slowly.
 * Power-Up Magnet: One of the abilities of the hookshot.
 * Powerup Mount: Riding Epona allows the player to jump over fences.
 * Precursors: The series is a fan of this trope. Enemies like the Armos and Beamos (any robotic enemy, really) are leftovers from a more advanced group, one example being the Minish.
 * Prequel: By Hyrule Historia's reckoning, A Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, Four Swords, The Minish Cap and Skyward Sword each go successively further back into the original game's past.
 * Prison Episode: Prison settings are presented in The Wind Waker, Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, and A Link to The Past.
 * Puzzle Pan
 * Puzzle Reset
 * Pyromaniac: Bombs are one of Link's all-time favorite problem-solvers. In the first game, he also started several forest fires.

"Lumpy Pumpkin Owner: Why would you do that! Link: (Picks up Heart Piece from chandelier wreckage) Player: TOTALLY WORTH IT!"
 * Rainbow Speak:
 * Link, go save Zelda from Ganon.
 * Most plot-important items or events are highlighted as well.
 * Recurring Element: The "Link" and "Zelda" characters are, excepting for the direct sequels, different people in each game (they just happen to look exactly alike and wear the same clothes and have the same name).
 * Adventure of Link actually explains the multiple Zeldas as tribute to an ancient Zelda whose brother trapped her with a sleeping spell.
 * Recurring Riff: The main motif of overworld theme of the first Zelda game can be heard in numerous songs throughout the series.
 * Redshirt Army: The entire Hyrulean army. It's a wonder that they still bother.
 * Reincarnation: In Spirit Tracks, the Lokomo Ascend To A Higher Plane at the end of the game and say they will return in a new form without memories of their previous life. In Skyward Sword,
 * The Reveal: Ever since A Link to the Past, almost every game has had at least one of these, ranging from "oh, that's pretty interesting" to "HOLY CRAP, DID THAT JUST HAPPEN?!"
 * A Link to the Past:.
 * Link's Awakening:.
 * Ocarina of Time:.
 * Majora's Mask :
 * Oracle of Ages / Seasons:.
 * The Wind Waker:.
 * Four Swords Adventures:.
 * The Minish Cap:.
 * Twilight Princess:.
 * Phantom Hourglass:.
 * Spirit Tracks:.
 * Skyward Sword:
 * Rewarding Vandalism: Such a perennial favorite that it is a minor shock when someone calls you out for destroying scenery for your own benefit:


 * Also sometimes you get money from people for keeping their secret places that you just discovered for yourself. Subverted in the first game and the Oracle games, where you sometimes have to pay for the door you just destroyed.
 * Reviving Enemy: The Stalfos are usually this (falling apart into a pile of bones and reassembling themselves if their remains aren't dealt with).
 * Rule of Three: Is present everywhere.
 * Link always (with the exception of Skyward Sword) starts out with three Energy Hearts.
 * Bosses usually die after 3 rounds of a battle.
 * There are 3 Golden Goddesses of the Triforce: Din, the Goddess of Power; Nayru, the Goddess of Wisdom; and Farore, the Goddess of Courage.
 * Link occasionally must collect 3 items for the plot. A Link to the Past has the pendants of virtue, Ocarina of Time has the 3 Spiritual Stones, The Wind Waker has the 3 Goddess Pearls, Phantom Hourglass has the 3 pure metals. Twilight Princess has two instances of this with 3 pieces of the Fused Shadow and 3 pieces of the Mirror of Twilight.
 * Running Gag: Since A Link to The Past, bosses in subsequent games tended to have a Weaksauce Weakness of some sort. it happens so often that it can't just be a Good Bad Bug. In short order:
 * Aghanim's energy balls can be reflected with the Bugcatching Net.
 * Phantom Ganon's energy blasts can be reflected with an empty bottle.
 * Dark Link can be easily defeated with the Broken Goron's Sword(due to the fact that his attempts to stand on your sword fail without, y'know, an actual blade.).
 * Ganondorf is easily distracted by the fishing rod, of all things.
 * In what is almost certainly a two-for nod to A Link to The Past and Twilight Princess, Demise suddenly stops to look at your bug-catching net if you pull it out. It can also reflect his lightning strikes.

S-U

 * Save the Princess: It's been getting better as the series has progressed in terms of plot complexity. The games started with the simple "save Zelda from Ganon", but in some games, the Princess doesn't even get kidnapped until later in the plot. This is even completely subverted in Spirit Tracks, where the princess is actually your Exposition Fairy. Nevertheless, in every game in which the Princess appears she is a captive at some point and Link has to save her.
 * Scenery Porn: The console games after the leap to 3D indulge heavily in this. Even the N64 games were considered this before technology marched on.
 * Schizo-Tech:
 * It's like a mish-mash of Medieval, Pirate and Arabian themes, with a few borderline Easter Egg modern inventions (Game Boy Advance, telephones, colour film cameras and locomotives) thrown in for good measure.
 * Majora's Mask had a mechanical bull. Not as an Easter Egg, as a boss. The mind boggles.
 * Taken Up to Eleven in Skyward Sword, where an entire area of the game is based on technology. And keep in mind that the game only has 3 main areas (four if you count Skyloft) that you frequently revisit, so that means one third of the game is technology-based. Ironic, as not only is it chronologically the first Zelda game, but you actually have to travel to the past in order to see the technology.
 * Steampunk: Elements of this have started to appear in the more recent titles. Spirit Tracks had a train, Phantom Hourglass had a steamboat, and Termina in Majora's Mask was borderline Industrial Revolution, especially with the Great Bay temple.
 * Sealed Evil in a Can:
 * While Ganondorf apparently has met his final end a few times, the end of Ocarina of Time and the backstory to A Link to the Past, The Wind Waker and Twilight Princess has him sealed in a Dark World due to his immense power. Of course, his long isolation there gives him plenty of time to gather his strength, allowing him to break the seal and unleash havoc upon Hyrule once more.
 * There's also Vaati, except he's sealed in the Four Sword rather than any alternate dimension.
 * Malladus, Bellum and Ocarina's Bongo Bongo are sealed deep beneath the worlds of their respective games.
 * Sequel Difficulty Spike: Adventure Of Link, full stop. The first game was already a certain level of Nintendo Hard, but the second game took that and added Platform Hell and a hard-to-master combat system. Majoras Mask may count as well, as it can be hard to keep track of everything that resets with each Groundhog Day Loop. (Though an in-game "appointment book" helps.)
 * Shifting Sand Land: Since the beginning, typically termed the Gerudo Desert.
 * Shout-Out: Mostly to Mario.
 * Sigil Spam: The Triforce is only the most prominent example. This series loves its recurring symbols. An incomplete but extensive list can be found here.
 * Silver Bullet: The Silver Arrow plays a crucial part in slaying Ganon in both the original Legend of Zelda and A Link to the Past. Stab him as many times as you want with any sword in those games. Without the Silver Arrow finishing him off, Ganon will keep coming for more.
 * Skeleton Key: The first two Zelda games both had a key item that basically served as infinite keys for the remainder of the game. The sixth palace in Zelda II the Adventure of Link couldn't be beaten without it.
 * Sliding Scale of Realistic Versus Fantastic: Fantastic.
 * Slippy-Slidey Ice World
 * Songs in the Key of Panic: Since the 3D games, minigames and timed switches use this method to tell you to hurry up. Then there's Majoras Mask, which takes the whole concept of limited time and uses it to mess with your head.
 * Sound of No Damage: Used for both Link's shield deflecting projectiles and enemies getting hit in armored areas.
 * Spin-Off: Link's Crossbow Training (of Twilight Princess), Freshly-Picked: Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland (not of a specific game, but starring a recurring character) and an actual board game.
 * Spoiler Title: Link's Awakening and Twilight Princess.
 * Stab the Sky: Almost every time Link gets a sword.
 * Sticks to the Back: Jarring in Ocarina of Time, where Link is often depicted with his sword strapped to his back, but has no such strap in-game. Majora's Mask fixes this, as does the 3DS remake of Ocarina of Time.
 * And yet not one game in the series explains how his shield stays put. In real life, they're usually strapped across the chest. Link apparently Velcros it to his scabbard.
 * Stock Video Game Puzzle: Every single one in the blasted book, what with the series basically being the Trope Maker and Trope Codifier for a large portion of them.
 * Strictly Formula:
 * Enter dungeon. Get item. Beat boss with item. Use item to enter next dungeon. Repeat.
 * And there's the other formula of "visit three dungeons, villain gains upper hand/escapes, visit 3-7 more dungeons, final boss" that has been present since A Link To the Past. Skyward Sword is said to be mixing this up a little, but whether this means an actual new approach will be made or that the first three dungeons will just be on the field can only be speculated on.
 * Suddenly Voiced: Tetra and her crew in Navi Trackers, a puzzle game mode in the Japanese version of Four Swords Adventures. Needless to say, they speak in Japanese.
 * Surprise Creepy: There's a lot of foreboding and horror for a series that's ostensibly rated E.
 * Super Drowning Skills: In the 2D games Link cannot touch water without certain items or he'll drown. Tanken to the logical extreme in Oracle of Ages where you needed two separate items in game for two different depths of water.
 * Sword Beam: In the first game and some of the others, usually only when you are at full health, as well as in the Animated Adaptation.
 * Sword of Plot Advancement: The Master Sword in most games where it appears; the Phantom Sword in Phantom Hourglass.
 * Technicolor Blade: The Master Sword is bluish.
 * Temple of Doom
 * Tennis Boss
 * Themed Cursor: In the Wii and DS games they use these to show off the new controls. Twilight Princess has Navi as the Wiimote pointer. Phantom Hourglass used the Exposition Fairies as indicators of where you touch.
 * Theme Naming
 * Time Travel: Everywhere in the series and has been the central mechanic of two games (Ocarina of Time and Oracle of Ages).
 * Translation Convention: Whenever a character talks we're supposed to think they're speaking Hylian. Jarringly apparent when a voiced character talks.
 * Thriving Ghost Town: To the extent that Hyrule itself could be called a Thriving Ghost Kingdom.
 * Treasure Is Bigger in Fiction: Throughout the series, the size of your average rupees has varied up to the size of Link himself.
 * Tsundere: In order of appearance and type:
 * Type A's: Princess Zelda in the Animated Adaptation, Princess Ruto, Tatl, Tetra, Midna, and Linebeck.
 * Type B's: Ilia, Ciela, and Princess Zelda.
 * Underground Monkey: They're usually not elemental, but different colored enemies indicate different strengths, especially in early games.
 * Underwater Ruins: Pretty much every single water-themed dungeon, most notably in The Wind Waker.
 * Unstoppable Mailman: Aside from Majora's Mask, where he doesn't deliver letters to you, the mailman in the games will always be able to find you to deliver letters.

V-X

 * Variable Mix: The series has been increasingly embracing this to an awesome degree.
 * Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Every game has one.
 * The Legend of Zelda: Death Mountain Labyrinth.
 * The Adventure of Link: Great Palace.
 * A Link to the Past: Ganon's Tower.
 * Link's Awakening: The Wind Fish's Egg.
 * Ocarina of Time: Ganon's Tower.
 * Majora's Mask: The Moon.
 * Oracle of Seasons: Onox's Castle/Room of Rites.
 * Oracle of Ages: The Black Tower/Room of Rites.
 * Four Swords: Vaati's Palace.
 * Wind Waker: Ganon's Tower.
 * Four Swords Adventures: Palace of Winds/Tower of Winds.
 * Minish Cap: Dark Hyrule Castle.
 * Twilight Princess: Hyrule Castle.
 * Phantom Hourglass: Temple of the Ocean King.
 * Spirit Tracks: The Dark Realm.
 * Skyward Sword: Sky Keep.
 * Video Game Cruelty Potential: Keep hitting those Cuccos. See what happens.
 * Video Game Cruelty Punishment:
 * Revenge of the Cuccos!
 * Also possible in Spirit Tracks if you hit Zelda with a boomerang, whip, etc.
 * Lampshaded in Spirit Tracks when
 * Also the pigs in The Wind Waker.
 * Steal from the merchant in Links Awakening? Prepare to be zapped.
 * Steal from the afro-wearing merchant bird in Twilight Princess? Prepare to be continuously pecked any time you enter the "shop" until you pay up.
 * Video Game Tools: Many of the iconic items are these: Boomerang, Bombs, Bow and Arrow.
 * Villain-Beating Artifact: Most of the games requires Link to use the Master Sword to defeat Ganon.
 * Visible Silence
 * Voice Grunting: The games with any "voice acting" use this exclusively, with the exceptions of the Tetra and the pirates in "Navi Trackers", Midna in Twilight Princess, and in Skyward Sword Zelda's singing voice and Fi, the last three speaking (or singing) Simlish.
 * The Walls Have Eyes: All over the damn place. You would be hard-pressed to find a Zelda game where there aren't eyes as switches.
 * What Could Have Been: The Minish Cap made mention of Vaati's swordplay skills. A couple NPC's discuss how skilled he is and how Vaati won the swordsman tournament easily. Unfortunately, Vaati only uses magic on screen and in the battles against him.
 * Wise Tree: The Great Deku Tree serves as the page image.
 * Womb Level
 * When All You Have Is a Hammer: Most bosses follow the "expose the weak point with the dungeon's item, then whack it with your sword" schema.
 * Xenafication: Zelda has progressively become more active in the games as the series went on. Originally just a classic Damsel in Distress, in Ocarina of Time she gained the badass admittedly didn't do much against the actual Big Bad. But in the later games, starting with Wind Waker, it became her schtick to fire Light Arrows at Ganon during the final battle, and in Spirit Tracks she even.

Y-Z

 * You Have to Burn the Web: Ocarina of Time was one of the first video games to do this, showing up in the first dungeon. Later games have used the mechanic as well.
 * You Shouldn't Know This Already: There's the Ocarina Songs from Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask, the Wind Waker's songs, and the sword fighting moves from Minish Cap, Twilight Princess, and Zelda II.
 * Zip Mode: The games feature a variety of ways to speed your trek across the land of Hyrule.

"IT'S A SECRET TO EVERYBODY."