Ocarina of Time went through a lot of changes before it became what it is known as. Due to the effort of various The Legend of Zelda enthusiasts, details of the beta stages are becoming revealed to the public. One set of such details relates to the development of the Sages, who at one point were to be quite different from the eventual group.
It is currently concluded that a group of three Sages were to power up the Master Sword during Link's quest, namely the Sage found at Turtle Rock (presumably the Sage of Fire), the Sage found at the Ice Temple and the Sage found at the Wind Temple. Whether these three were part of the group of six or a different group is unknown. Each of these three Sages' functions and context have been altered for the released game, though hints of their development history remain. Turtle Rock is the development predecessor of the Fire Temple, which was altered quite little compared to the other two. The Ice Temple is what the Ice Cavern once had to become, but those plans were tossed out in favour of the Water Temple. Along with it, the Ice Medallion became the Water Medallion.[37] Small hints of this are left in-game in the form of the ice-themed challenge in Ganon's Tower for the water barrier and Zora's Domain perpetual frozen state. The Wind Temple in turn was even further removed from the game by being completely scrapped to make room for the Forest Temple, the only remaining in-game hint at this development being the wind-themed challenge for the forest barrier in Ganon's Tower. Like the Ice Medallion became the Water Medallion, the Wind Medallion became the Forest Medallion. Furthermore, it is currently believed that instead of Saria, the Kokiri girl Fado was to be the Sage of Wind.[38]
Since Ocarina of Time, Nintendo seems to have been trying to bring over unused ideas of one game into later games. In context of the Sages, this sheds an interesting light on the "The Wind Waker" Sages, because they are noticeably similar to the presumed original idea for the "Ocarina of Time" Sages.
The most obvious connection would be the Master Sword-supporting function of both groups. In The Wind Waker, Link has to awaken the new Sages Makar and Medli to return power to the Master Sword, alike to the Sages described two paragraphs above. Additionally, it is known that two dungeons have been cut from The Wind Waker,[39][40] which together with the unusual trial-free way Nayru's Pearl is obtained hints that a Sage was removed from the final game, bringing the number of Sages needed to power up the Master Sword to three. The third link between the groups would be the identity of the Sage of Wind, in both cases a Kokiri named Fado.
Differences are to be found as well. While the development-Ocarina of Time Sages represented the elements of Fire, Ice and Wind, the The Wind Waker Sages represent Earth, Wind and a possible, unknown third element. These differences might be explained by Fire already being taken by a Sage of the group the "Master Sword"-Sages were opted not to belong to, thus meaning Nintendo had to find a new element to assign. If the possible third Sage was to be the Sage of Ice is unknown, as is whether or not that Sage exists in current canon or not.