The concept of Breath of the Wild was born. With Nintendo impressed with the results of changing a bit of Zelda’s identity in A Link Between Two Worlds, Aonuma, along with Hidemaro Fujibayashi-the director of Skyward Sword-set their full attention to the untitled Zelda console game that EPD had only flirted with up until this point in time. A Link Between Two Worlds was met with critical acclaim, with both of the new mechanics applauded for fitting seamlessly into the iconic essence of what makes Zelda, well, Zelda. With this mentally equipped and agreed upon by the entire team, EPD would go forth and introduce first-time mechanics/concepts for the Zelda series with some of them including clearing A Link Between Two Worlds dungeons in any order/way they choose and a system that allows the player to “rent” items to clear dungeons. Hiromasa Shitaka, director of A Link Between Worlds, loved the idea of unraveling the franchise and looking at it from a fresh perspective that brought everything about the mechanics, gameplay, narrative, and objectives into question. While hard at work on A Link Between Worlds, EPD decided that they wouldn’t go too far in breaking from the franchise’s conventions but would use the game as means to ease players and themselves into a different kind of Zelda game. As he began to work on 2013’s The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds and the then-untitled Zelda console game, Aonuma felt that these two aforementioned games would be the perfect opportunity to test out new mechanics that could potentially “rethink the conventions of Zelda.” “So we wanted to create a world where you can further that investigation, you can go further and further and continue to search for places where you can’t go.”Īonuma had taken these comments to heart as he and his team Nintendo EPD-an internal division at Nintendo-began to seriously think about the possibility of transforming the Zelda franchise. “I think for people, especially Zelda fans, they have a curiosity to find out what happens in those places where you can’t go, where you’re not supposed to go,” says Aonuma in a 2016 interview with Game Informer. One message in particular that stayed with the producer was a comment from a player saying, “We want to know what happens in the places you can’t go to.” Acclaimed Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma stated that-after fans played, beat, and engaged with Skyward Sword on a critical level-he received an abundance of emails and messages requesting the Zelda team to incorporate more modern mechanics into the franchise. Our story begins immediately after the release of Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. The decision was risky, but ultimately paid off-the game was met with overwhelming critical acclaim.īut how did we get here? Why did Nintendo take such a risk with a franchise so beloved by their fans and run the chances of changing it into something unrecognizable? Was there a need to adapt to the ever-evolving trends of the game industry, especially for an icon? Well, allow for us to answer all these questions and more with another installment of Origin Story! The Conventions of Zelda Implementing an unstructured open-world concept, Nintendo sought to create a nonlinear experience for fans of the iconic franchise, allowing the player to play and beat the game however they liked. Flipping The Legend of Zelda on its head, Nintendo released Breath of the Wild as a launch title for the Nintendo Switch and the Wii U on March 3, 2017. A franchise known for its genre-defining gameplay, narrative, and everyone’s favorite semi-silent hero, Link, The Legend of Zelda has worked to captivate gamers of various generations for thirty-six years with games featured across Nintendo’s home and handheld consoles alike.īut with three decades worth of familiar dungeons and narrative progression, the late 2010s saw Nintendo taking a bit of a risk with their beloved iconic franchise. A true icon moves the zeitgeist forward in ways we once thought were impossible.Īnd, if we were to speak honestly on games that deserve to be categorized and heralded as “iconic,” Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda is a franchise that should always be considered for this title. The mark of a true gaming icon is the ability to exude excellence through its gameplay, immersing its players in a world of possibilities and jaw-dropping creativity. What does it mean to be an iconic game? In a world where the term has been overused in the confines of “internet speak” on a plethora of playable experiences that have come (all too quickly) and gone (all too quickly), the word in question has begun to lose a bit of its mythological weight.
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