Day & Night Cycle

Description

The Ghost Ship only appears at night, so manipulating the Day/Night cycle is crucial in a speedrun in order to skip having to obtain the Song of Passing or needing to wait for the Ghost Ship to appear. The Ghost Ship also appears at different islands depending on the moon phase, and manipulating its location is also important. The time is measured in-game in terms of hours and minutes. 0:00 is defined as midnight, 6:00 is when it turns day, and 18:00 is when it turns night. The in-game date also advances by 1 whenever the time passes midnight.

Internally, the game keeps track of the time with a float between 0 and 360, but for ease of reading, we will be doing the conversion into the 24-hour system.

How Time Passes

Time will never pass before you obtain the Wind Waker. After obtaining the Wind Waker, time passes differently depending on the current time. Between the times of 6:00 until 11:00 and 18:00 until 23:00, time passes everywhere normally on every island, including inside dungeons, buildings, and hidden caves. However, at any other times, time will not pass on certain islands. These islands include Windfall, Dragon Roost, Forest Haven, Outset, Gale, Headstone, Forsaken Fortress and Greatfish. Time will also not pass inside any building, dungeon, or hidden cave. Because of this, it is crucial to wait until it just turns day or night if you want time to pass at certain places, or arrive at a certain place before it turns day or night in order to have time freeze.

The time passes at a rate of 1 in-game minute every 12.5 frames, or 1 in-game hour every 25 seconds, or 1 in-game day every 10 minutes. Time does not pass at all until the wind waker is obtained. Events that reset the time to a specific value (see below) do still work though.

Events That Reset the Current Time

Occasionally, certain in-game events will reset the current time to a certain value. They are the following

  • The Outset portion of the Intro Cutscene sets the current time to 11:00 on day 0.
  • Saving Tetra in the Forest of Fairies during the prologue sets the current time to 12:00. This time change happens at the load at the end of the cutscene.
  • Both the Tetra text after Spoils Bag and entering Forsaken Fortress 1 set the current time to 20:00. These time resets will add one day if you were already past this time when they occur.
  • Beating FF1 and the cutscene of meeting KoRL resets the current time to 15:00 of the current day. This will however never add a day, so technically you will be going "back in time" here.
  • Arriving at Greatfish will immediately reset the current time to 0:00 (midnight), and endless night also freezes time. If you enter the cutscene past midnight, the game will add a day to the day counter.
  • Visiting Hyrule field will reset the current time, but to 12:00 (noon). Just like beating FF1, this will never add a day.
  • If you enter Forsaken Fortress 2 between 21:00 and 4:00, the time will not change. Otherwise, it will quickly fast forward the current time until it reaches 21:00.
  • Completing the Ghost Ship resets the current time to 08:00. This will also never add a day.

Playing the Song of Passing will make it 12:00 if it were night, and 0:00 if it were day. The Song of Passing will always add a day if necessary.

Interestingly, time of day actually moves on the file selection screen, and it carries over into the intro cutscene. This doesn't matter since it gets reset when the transition to Outset occurs afterwards.

Endless Day

Discovered by TrogWW

There is also a trick that allows you to go back to the previous day using the Greatfish cutscene. To perform it, superswim with double storage to Greatfish and pull out the wind waker to cancel camera lock exactly when the cutscene starts. This skips KoRL talking and the fadeout to endless night. The wind waker pull is frame perfect, making this TAS-only.

Week Days Cycle

The Ghost Ship changes location depending on the day number/moon cycle. This is also the case with the Legendary Pictographs, which one is sold by Lenzo depends on this cycle also. Below are shown the correspondances.

Week Days Cycle
Day Moon Cycle Ghost Ship Location Legendary Pictographs
0 Waning Gibbous Greatfish Isle King of Hyrule
1 Full Moon Crescent Moon Island Ganondorf
2 Waxing Gibbous Diamond Steppe Great Fairy
3 First Quarter Bomb Island Jabun
4 Waxing Crescent Spectacle Island Queen of Fairies
5 Waning Crescent Five Star Isles Fado
6 Third Quarter Star Belt Archipelago Laruto
Ghost Ship Chart

TWW Ghost Ship Chart

Each Legendary Pictographs will only be sold if the corresponding character has been met by the player before.

  • The King of Hyrule picture requires watching the Tetra to Zelda Transformation cutscene.
  • The Ganondorf picture requires watching the FF2 Ganondorf cutscene.
  • The Great Fairy picture requires obtaining any of the seven great fairy rewards.
  • The Jabun's picture requires watching the Nayru's Pearl cutscene.
  • The Queen of Fairies requires watching the Fire & Ice Arrows cutscene.
  • The Fado picture requires watching the cutscene of learning WGA.
  • The Laruto picture requires watching the cutscene of learning EGL.

Mail

The mail system also sometimes use the time system. In order to receive mail at all, Din's Pearl is required. Then to trigger mail, you generally need to meet a condition and sometimes also wait for the day to change. This is however not the case with all letters. Below are the requirements to obtain all the letters:

  • The Letter from the Rito Chief requires obtaining Farore's Pearl.
  • The Letter from Orca requires triggering Endless Night at Greatfish Island.
  • The Letter advertising Rock Spire's Shop Ship requires obtaining a wallet upgrade.
  • The Letter from Beedle requires obtaining Bombs.
  • The Letter from Grandma requires curing Grandma with a fairy + a day change.
  • The Letter from Aryll requires loading TotG after Hyrule 2 (this is the same flag as triggering the Fire & Ice arrows cutscene and changing FF2 to FF3) + a day change.
  • The Letter from Tingle requires saving Tingle from jail, loading TotG after Hyrule 2 + a day change.
  • The Letter from Baito's Mom requires mailing the Note to Mom + a day change.
  • The Letter from Baito requires mailing the Note to Mom and defeating Jalhalla.
  • The Letter from Hoskit's Girlfriend requires giving 20 golden feathers to Hoskit inside Dragon Roost Island + a day change.
  • The Letters from Beedle for both the Silver and Gold Memberships require respectively 30 and 60 membership points + a day change.

Other

There are other interactions that check if the day has changed. For the most part, it is NPC dialogue that reset (Pompie & Vera for example). The Masked Beedle on Rock Spire checks how many days has passed since the first time you've talked to him, and he will do a "Grand Reopening" after 7 days. This is however purely flavor text.

There are however still some interactions that are useful to know:

  • Carlov can only create one figurine per day. This interaction actually checks for the day changing. Thus you can make one figurine at 23:59 then another one at 0:00.
  • You can only perform a maximum of 3 goron trades per day. This limit is reset on day change.
  • After becoming Lenzo's assistant by delivering the Anton and Linda picture to him, you must wait a day before you're able to get the correct dialogue from Anton in order to get the couple's heart piece in the Cafe.
Last updated 08/18/2026 – azer67