Quote Originally Posted by Forum Explorer View Post
I thought that was because he was removed from the timeline or something? Whatever Zelda did at the end of OoT anyways.
There's three separate timelines that spawn from OoT.

The first one is the one we remember playing through. Link becomes an adult, defeats Ganon in an epic showdown, saves the day.

The second one is what you described. Zelda pulls shenanigans to send Link back in time, in this timeline Link beats Ganon before he ever becomes a big deal.

The last one is the one that occurs whenever you get a game over screen in game. The Hero has failed, Ganon wins, and the world turns to Darkness. Usually this would be played off as Gameplay, and Link is just the kind of badass who never dies, but we're already dealing with time travel and a split timeline, and apparently that causes the possibility that Link can lose/die to cause a third timeline spiraling out from that.