Is not. It's because of franchise roots. What's Legend of Zelda's roots? It's not puzzling elements and anime lore. All Aonuma misdirection, began when he is charged, is turned The Legend of Zelda more puzzled and story-driven and less the original recipe: one mix of arcade and PC games. The first Zelda game is a prototype of the modern open-world: You could do dungeons out of order and explore all world without guidance ( you can forget the sword in fist cavern). All the illusion of freedom was reinserted in the Breath of the Wild, because of the director: Hidemaro Fujibayashi.  Aonuma never finished the first game, but Fujibayashi is a fan of the first game. The prototype for Breath of the Wild resembles the original Zelda. It's a correction and a modernization: take back all keystone of the old Zeldas(the majority of the first Zelda) mixed with the good takes of new PC games( Terraria, Minecraft, for instance). The result of this correction: sales increased sharply. The sales of the series were in decline until Breath of the Wild.

You do realize the previous record holder was Twilight Princess, directed by Aonuma?  And this transition towards more puzzle elements and a less open world design predated his time.  Ocarina of Time was the template for every Zelda that came after.  Changes to the formula made to facilitate the transition to 3D during an era of extremely limited 3D hardware are the foundations of the 3D Zelda formula from OoT to SS.  Not Aonuma's insidious influence.  

Also, you are aware that Zelda as a series was a 4 to 7 mil series more or less from day one.  The decline you speak of was not much of one.  Wind Waker out sold Majora's Mask and near matched Link to the Past, for example.  

Also the whole "going back to its roots thing" is an interesting perspective but there's far, FAR more to it than that, design wise.  And the heavy puzzle element is still there but in a very different way.  

Also, all that aside, even if we go with your "Zelda needed to be fixed!" mantra and give credit nearly entirely to this "return to its roots" explanation, this is still incredibly shocking.  The original Zelda couldn't even outsell Super Mario Bros 2, much less Super Mario Bros 1 or 3.  And no other Zelda came close to matching contemporaneous Mario games either.  For Zelda to beat the best selling 3D Mario game of all time and blow past 15 mil, more than doubling the sales of previous top sellers in the series, is an incredible leap.  The Zelda brand is far stronger than it has ever been, far eclipsing Twilight Princess, Ocarina of Time, or even the original Legend of Zelda.  There's no comparison.

So no, can't agree with much of anything you posted as it is mostly demonstrably inaccurate or oversimplified.

It's declined because you don't count the expanded market and population growth. Worse, count two separate SKUs like one ( Gamecube and Wii). First, Nintendo sells, NES and SNES era, the majority in the US and Japan. All other territories are minority sales. Second, Zelda II has problems in the production of cartridges (NES have major problems in that, in the later life cycle). N64 and Gamecube era Nintendo tries to expand the market, because of that you must count the population grows in the US and other territories. Mario Kart has constant growth, excluded the Gamecube, Wiiu, and 3DS (consoles have design flaws and game direction errors and affected sales), while Nintendo doesn't make errors, have constant growth, SNES, N64, DS, Wii, and Switch (Mario kart on the switch will surpass the Mario Kart Wii). In a market grow, Zelda must sell better, with a Zelda respect the original, it's not the case in Skyward Sword. It's the worst mainline Zelda in sales. Second, TP Zelda benefited from the Wii fever and Wii Sports, even considering the expanded market, it failed to sell much more than the original Zelda. Another problem, the Zelda after OoT was stuck with a formula that not only completely distorted their origins but also impacts the franchise's growth. Speechless that got stuck in this model due to Aonuma's decision, all games are worse versions of OoT, without the brilliance of it (with the exception of the water temple that was made by Aonuma). Sales need context, take out the context makes sales meanings nothing. It's not an oversimplification, but market analysis. 

The new Zelda drives Switch sales and mixes the classic Zelda plus modern Pc games. It's the textbook back to the roots.

Yup. I agree with all of this. Well put.

The decline that some are arguing about was never there to begin with Zelda wasn't a series in decline it maintained the same sales range through out its whole existence it wasn't a franchise in any decline it was a static one in other words a series that just remained with in the same level of appeal. The reason for this isn't anything on any of the directors it's because when you come down to it Zelda as great as they were ultimately were just fancy dungeon crawlers every game hinged on how good the dungeons were to the point the games would end up with clutter in them that literally had no use outside certain dungeons and the world that each game took place was non existent outside of them. Doesn't matter what the formula is this was an issue in the central foundation of the franchise the adventuring parts were merely getting from dungeon a to dungeon b rather than exploring Hyrule.

SS and ALBW began experimenting with ideas that the team wanted to use to break the mold while collecting feed back hence why the former had various notable mechanics and features in it while the latter had a change in structure all of this came together to form the template of what would be BOTW a game that didn't have to be played like a dungeon crawler and made everything outside of them relevant.

To explain what I mean in every Zelda game you have to tackle the dungeons to progress so if you're stuck on one or don't like one in particular it's a case of too bad a common situation was being stuck looking for an obscure switch or chest. BOTW if you're stuck with something it's oh well sod this I'm going to do something else maybe I'll check out that Dragon I saw in the distance or you can still achieve the goal using other ways instead of the intended strategy the rest of the game is not locked to you this means it can now appeal to those who aren't into dungeon crawlers.

This when coupled with BOTW's unique design on interactive sandbox mechanics and physics helped elevate the appeal even more to the point it now even compares with the likes of Mario and is doing the type of numbers R* games tend to do on a single platform. BOTW's sequel needs to be pushed like it's the second coming by Nintendo they should do what R* did with GTA:VC once they found that appeal with the prior game as it can position the franchise now as the first party answer to R* style games.

Original Zelda was already a 30 years old game when BOTW came out, most of people who played BOTW never even played the original to begin with, they rather started with other games such as A Link to The Past, Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, etc, so it's there where their nostalgia lies on

The "return" to their roots means close to nothing in therms of sales increase. Nowadays gamers learned to like open world game thanks to Assassins' Creed, The Witcher, Skyrim, GTA V, etc. These were the games that "opened the world" to make Zelda peak again

Zelda appeal was limited while following Ocarina of Time formula, and market response for Skyward Sword showcase that. It was limited in a HUGE way (like, most games would kill to sell 3 million+ copies in every game), but limited nonetheless. After the changing they could break the limit the seris was stuck into
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Of course, it would be all meaningless if Switch wasn't fairly successful ant the game itself wasn't a masterpiece, I'm just pointing how minimum was the "root" argument compared to others

Some of these comments aged super poorly.

You can demonstrate first your argument? Have any numbers, research? Back to the roots, it's important because The Legend of Zelda sells 6 million basically in Japan and US, Nintendo rebuilds US market, aways this in the mind. Second, NES is one of the most piracy consoles all time. In the world, have more than 370 (http://ultimateconsoledatabase.com/famiclones.htm) diverse Famiclones, the emulation scenario has a great force too. It's so true, classics games sell looks Virtual Console sales, and NES mini sales. Your argument: never ever played it's not true, because of the sales of NES classics games in a virtual console, because of the sales of NES mini, because of o the longevity of all Famiclones and emulators. The direction o Aonuma, make the series lost potential buyers, declined until BoTW take the old approach, and adapt to the modern age.  It's important back to the roots, for the Zelda series, because have all elements of an archaic open world in the first Zelda, only open-world Esque games it's not the only reason, but back the formula: arcade game + Pc games. Great Nes games aged like wine, the thirst for an official NES emulator is real, look os sales of NEs mini. 

Can you prove otherwise? It's a over 30 years old game, and people 80% of people who own Switch in USA are 34 or less years old:

Source: https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/pdf/2017/171031_2e.pdf

It's unfortunate I don't have a newer source, these numbers are now 26 months outdated, But they came out when BOTW was around for 1 year already

Of course each game has it own sales demographics, but I don't see why Zelda buyers would be considerably older than average 

Plus, even if you're taking into account the newer players (people younger than 35 years) that played the original Zelda in some pirate emulator, virtual console whatsoever how can you make sure these people that played the first Zelda find this specific game design any better than the subsequent Zelda games such as ALTTP, Ocarina of Time, Wind Waker, etc and indeed prefer the first Zelda game to any other of Zelda games?

Seems like the argument you want to sustain is the first Zelda game was loved, they changed the direction due to some console limitations and it was successful for a while (Ocarina of Time) and then people get bored of the OoT formula and wanted Zelda to back to their origins. But honestly, this "return of origins helped to increase sales" point doesn't hold any steam.

I think I agree with what you said about Aonuma's formula making Zelda losing potential gamers. It's true, any game have it's own target demographic and not all kinds of games will meet the same public reception. What I disagree is that backing to their origins is what changed that scenario. IMO, what make BOTW stand out was the incorporation of modern game design elements into its gameplay

People who were Zelda fans loved Zelda they knew, and the Zelda they knew is (mostly) the Zelda of Ocarina of Time onwards. OoT was the 4th best N64 seller for a reason, and it rivaled Mario 64 and Mario Kart 64, so it's quite meaningful. Ocarina of Time for 3DS sold over 6 million copies and it was a storming remaster, Majora's Mask for 3DS sold 3 million copies about the same as the original game. The Wind Waker 2.5 million in a flop system

My only conclusion of this is the "potential gamers" who jumped into BOTW aren't Original Zelda fans/players, they are brand new players who discovered some years ago that open world and exploration games are great and then give BOTW a try because of the awesome world of mouth and reviews. Or even better, it was their first open-world game and again they give it a try because of the already mentioned great world of mouth/reviews. 

Agreed. BotW didn't go open world because it wanted to "return to its roots". In fact, even critically, ALttP and Link's Awakening are considered the pinnacle of the series as far as the 2-D games go. Ocarina just took that formula into the 3rd dimension in style  and set standards that still hold up today. The formula began to get a bit stale by the time SS came out because of the rise of western open world games.

While it can be said that Zelda is the, or one of the fathers of the open world genre ( Even Ocarina which was linear, was perhaps the first 3-D game to offer the illusion of a cohesive open world, with a night/day cycle, weather changes, extracurricular activities, etc), BotW's direction was inspired by games like Skyrim (which was an inspiration for BotW by Nintendo's own admission)more so than any attempt to return "to the roots" of the series. BotW's amazing reception from critics aided in the massive sales of both the game and the Switch, and indeed many were just people wanting to play the next great open world experience. Many others were Zelda fans from the N64, GC, and Wii eras, very few of them actually played the original.

I am 35, and I did play the first two NES Zelda games but I was a pup then. I managed to actually finish said titles in the GC's Zelda Collectors disc more than a decade later. I was really turned in to a long life fan by Ocarina of Time, more so than ALttP.  I suspect the core of BotW owners are actually Zelda fans from that era or TP's era, and rest are new kids who bought the game because as you stated "word of mouth" and the amazing critical reception that the game received.