Literally everything Link does in OoT ultimately turns out to be completely pointless. Think about it.
1a. He saves Hyrule. Navi ditches him immediately. That bitch Zelda in a vain attempt to prevent a time paradox sends Link to the past, which creates a time paradox
(female brain). In that timeline nobody knows what Link had to go through and what he had accomplished, he has no friends, goes on a self imposed exile and meets a sad and lonely end. Even after his death he must still roam the land as a spirit for centuries.
>>7259 the events in MM were probably a fever dream all in his head, something Link's mind came up with recalling the events of his life as he was dying.
1b. Now without the hero Hyrule ends up being biblically destroyed anyway. Good job Zelda. Them conveniently finding a whole new continent later on was such an ass pull. It should have been a permanent water world from that point on.
2. Link fails, Hyrule ends up being destroyed but the wizards reset it all merging it with another realm kind of like saying "evil may have triumphed but we'll get you next time, ganon. bwahaha". That being said, a Zelda game set in a grimy, hopeless world really works for a lot of people myself included.
It's such a clusterfuck no wonder they had to do it all from the ground up with BotW