My original thought had been to have the player try and stop Ganon's cycle of reincarnation by combining the powers of the Whole Triforce, the Light/Silver Arrow, and the Master Sword. And as cool as that sounded on paper, the truth is it probably would have just ended up being a massive fetch quest even more annoying than the one in Windwaker. So from a gameplay perspective the idea was shot, as well as plotwise since Link can't even use the Master Sword now.
For a time I considered veering into yet another split in the Zelda Timeline where the Master Sword DIDN'T in fact rest forever, but that just seemed like something way too appaulingly lazy! I wanted a game that could fit neatly into the already established timeline (as of 2012), with the exception of the fact that it drew heavily from the non-canon cartoon. And when my imagination gets running, it can't be stopped.
When the Hero of Time fell, Zelda and the Sages Fled to Kakariko, the last free hylean settlement in the kingdom. But Ganondorf, now newly reborn as the Demon Lord Ganon, was hot on their trail. With the Hero of Time dead, and both the Triforces of Power and Courage in his posession, the dark one was confident that now there was nothing that could stand against him. With this belief he amassed a massive army of his monsterous servants, and marched upon the mountain where in what seemed much closer to an extermination than a battle, the small village of Kakariko was raised in flames, and most of it's inhabitants were brutally murdered as the cowardly Hylian guard fled up the mountain slopes to the percieved safety of the Goron caverns. They were however flanked by a romp of moblins, who proceeded to massacre the fleeing troops. Only a few brave men had dared to stay in the village, fighting with their captain to buy the remaining survivors time to escape the slaughter, before pulling back themselves to regroup with the Gorons.
Link awakens from a haze to find himself in the place of Melroe Madas, Captain of the Hylian guard during this, the Battle of Death Mountain. Magically transported into a memory of the past, Link must live out that memory, searching it for clues as to how to defeat Ganon, and learning from the mastery of the warrior he is playing (skills which will hopefully compensate somewhat for him not having the Master Sword).
Featuring Things Like...
*An all new subplot that ties into the rest of the quest's already established plot. (Help the Sages trap Ganon during the final battle of the Imprisoning War.)
*A realistic (by fantasy standpoints) way of immidately learning new skills without having to train or study. (Rip those skills from the mind of a dead guy.)
*A bunch more video game and fantasy cliches to potentially lampshade.
*More pointless tasks the player has to labor through to achieve final victory.
Overall I kind of realise in hindsight that it's just a combination of the ANIMUS from "Assasin's Creed", and the Battle of the Five Armies from "The Battle of the Five Armies", but I kind of think that at this point in the game there's not really any such thing as completely new ideas, and that the only way to make something good anymore is to try and put new spins on old ones. The Battle of Death Mountain was something I was always going to infer in the game somehow, although earlier on it was just going to be in the form of a lengthy and unskippable monologue that recounted the battle.
Of course I only talked about the setup for this scene here, and the direction it goes and way it plays out are still frequently changing. I've got more to think about with the Master Sword, and a few more ideas bouncing around to balance out this one, but the overall concept of this battle has remained unchanged for so long, I think it's safe enough to say this WILL be in the final version of the quest!
