The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild's story is completely optional, but it's a good one worth seeking out. You will encounter a number of story moments by simply pursuing the dungeons and following the main path, but for the complete picture, you will need to find a number of hidden cutscenes throughout the land of Hyrule. You won't see any of those cutscenes below, but it's not a bad idea for me to include a spoiler warning here, just in case.

Below you will find the reference picture for each of the story moments, a larger map picture, a zoomed in map picture, and a picture of exactly where the moment is.

Sacred Ground Ruins





Lake Kolomo

Ancient Columns





Kara Kara Bazaar

Eldin Canyon



Irch Plain

West Necluda

Hyrule Castle

Spring of Power

Sanadin Park Ruins

Lanayru Road - East Gate

Hyrule Field

Ash Swamp

The final story moment is a little bit different, and demands you recover the first 12 moments before you can go after it.

For more features on Breath of the Wild, check out our review here, four reasons not to miss the game here, and finally some interesting callbacks to previous games here.