The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and quantum mechanics

Popular science publication, Scientific American, took a theoretical look at The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time’s time travel mechanics in a recent guest blog by Kyle Hill.

Hill is a research assistant at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In the post he discusses branching universes, quantum mechanics, time paradoxes and string theory to bring the magical in-game world depicted in Ocarina of Time, where time travel easily exists, to the real world.

"Zelda's decision to send Link back in time splits the universe," Hill wrote. "Link is shot between temporal branches, which is way cooler than any transforming mask or incessant fairy.

"The only way to maintain the idea that separate Zelda games could have followed OoT is the invoking of a theory meant to resolve the loftiest ideas in quantum mechanics."

Ocarina of Time was first released for the Nintendo 64 in Japan on November 21, 1998 and North America on November 23, 1998. The Nintendo 3DS remake was released in 2011 and is available to purchase from the Nintendo eShop.