Hylian - or graphical inability?

In A Link to the Past, there are no more Hylians. They have died out according to this story:

Originally Posted by Old Lady in Kakariko Village (GBA translation)
Long ago a prosperous people,
known as the Hylians, inhabited
this land...
Legends tell of treasures with
mystical powers that remain
from the Hylian age...
The Master Sword, a mighty
blade forged to thwart those
with evil hearts, is one...
It is said that even now
it rests deep in the forest.
... ... ...
Do you understand the legend?
Yes
Not at all

Hylians, by definition, are

Originally Posted by ZeldaWiki.org
The Hylians are a race of humans from the country of Hyrule. Their appearance differs from that of other humans in that they have pointed ears, like typical fantasy elves.

So, they look just like humans, with the exception of their pointed ears. If the legend above is true, everyone is a human, with the exception of Link, as he is thought to be the last person with Hylian blood.
And yet, almost every sprite that has ears showing also has pointed ears.

So I ask you, are the Hylians really extinct? Or are the ears graphical errors because they could not make a sprite with regular, rounded ears? And to cap it off, what happened to the Hylians anyway? Is there any inkling of an event that would have exterminated the Hylians?

Originally Posted by Fitoleon

So I ask you, are the Hylians really extinct?

Nope.

Hylians are still around. Link is only the last of the knight bloodline. Hylians are few in numbers, but not extinct.

The royal family are hylian(princess zelda, the king),also link, his uncle, sharsharala, the maidens etc... There are some hylians in hyrule.

Ah, I see. But why say something as stupid as

Long ago a prosperous people,
known as the Hylians, inhabited
this land...

if there are still Hylians out there anyway. Apparently, the old lady doesn't get out of her house often and threw me all off.

Originally Posted by Fitoleon

So I ask you, are the Hylians really extinct? Or are the ears graphical errors because they could not make a sprite with regular, rounded ears? And to cap it off, what happened to the Hylians anyway? Is there any inkling of an event that would have exterminated the Hylians?

It's called the great flood. And for those of you that will bring up the Minish "Hylians" maybe the humans just hadn't arrived yet like the Zoras and Gerudo. Later when they came in greater numbers the Hylian blood at last succumbed.

I think she's talking of the Hylian's golden age, just because Spain's golden age is over doesn't mean there arn't any spanish people running around.

Originally Posted by Fitoleon

So I ask you, are the Hylians really extinct? Or are the ears graphical errors because they could not make a sprite with regular, rounded ears? And to cap it off, what happened to the Hylians anyway? Is there any inkling of an event that would have exterminated the Hylians?

In TP, there appear to be a sizeable amount of Normal Humans. Some people could interpret this as "The Beginning of the End of the Hylian Race".

This is something I never understood about Zelda. It seems most people in the games are Hylian. Does anyone know how the English and Japanese versions line up? Maybe there's a slight translation error or something. You would think that if Link were the only person running around with pointed ears, people would make more of it... But I don't know.

Originally Posted by MetaLinkA

In TP, there appear to be an even mix of Hylians and Normal Humans. Some people could interpret this as "The Beginning of the End of the Hylian Race".

ಠ_ಠ
Ok, Really? Ordon Village, excluding Link, and the three people in Kakariko = Amount of Hylians....
Go to Hyrule Castle Town, I bet there are more Hylians then Zora, Humans, and Goron Combined.

Navi: Agreed and something tells me there are even more of them that we don't see(in buildings and such).

The Hylia are extinct. The sprites you shoed are all decended from the royal line of knights/wise men, so your theory is nill.

You would think that if Link were the only person running around with pointed ears, people would make more of it... But I don't know.

maybe it is a genetic trait that they deem insignificant(as usually there are a few other people besides Link that have the pointy ears, it never really was just Link that had those ears), it would be like us saying that one of Washington's defining features were attached earlobes(made that up on the spot, but you get it).

Originally Posted by Navi the Fairy

ಠ_ಠ
Ok, Really? Ordon Village, excluding Link, and the three people in Kakariko = Amount of Hylians....
Go to Hyrule Castle Town, I bet there are more Hylians then Zora, Humans, and Goron Combined.

What I mean is there is a sizeable amount of both.

Meta:Really? Cause unless there's some other human village that we don't know about there are only about a dozen ordonians to one or possibly several hundred Hylians.

There is exactly 15 Humans in Twilight Princess.

Originally Posted by Navi the Fairy

There is exactly 15 Humans in Twilight Princess.

I rest my case.

Originally Posted by Navi the Fairy

There is exactly 15 Humans in Twilight Princess.

Still a reasonable amount.

How? If this were OoT then it would be somewhat reasonable. In Twilight Princess we are shown there there are a lot of people living in Hyrule thus, 15 is not a reasonable amount.

20, actually. 13 Ordonians, 3 Kakariko...ians, Hena, Coro, Iza, and Ashei. But yeah, that's nothing compared to the Hylian population.

Still, it seems to me that in A Link to the Past there's more to being considered a pure-blooded Hylian than having pointed ears. Just about everyone in the first three games has pointed ears. This doesn't mean a lot in the first two, admittedly (the concept of Hylians wasn't even invented yet at the time they were released), but I think it's pretty notable that A Link to the Past introduced this story element, and then went about showing almost every modern human with pointed ears (there's only a handful of exceptions).

Originally Posted by Maiden

They say the Hylian people mastered mysterious powers, as did the seven sages. But the blood of the Hylia has grown thin over time. And we who carry the blood of the sages do not possess our ancestors' powers, either.

Being Hylian seems to be more about magical ability than ear pointiness.