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News The Legend of Zelda Echoes of Wisdom Announced for Switch, Releases September 26 (Playable Zelda)
- Thread starter N 2 Deep
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Secu
Tektite
After a brief contemplation, I deepened that the obsession with dungeons is a bias of European and American culture.
After weakening the dungeon elements, the Zelda series achieved great success in the East. To be honest, it's hard for me to imagine a game with puzzle solving and dungeons as its theme becoming very popular in the East. There, they are all niche and less popular elements and even sometimes annoying.
I have always believed that how a game triggers people's imagination is the key to determining whether it will achieve great success. The trailer for BOTW also gives people the expectation of a breathing world, rather than solving puzzles and dungeons.
I usually don't say these things. But I really don't like dungeons. I like Zelda's future to provide a living world, rather than a bunch of dungeons and puzzles.
After weakening the dungeon elements, the Zelda series achieved great success in the East. To be honest, it's hard for me to imagine a game with puzzle solving and dungeons as its theme becoming very popular in the East. There, they are all niche and less popular elements and even sometimes annoying.
I have always believed that how a game triggers people's imagination is the key to determining whether it will achieve great success. The trailer for BOTW also gives people the expectation of a breathing world, rather than solving puzzles and dungeons.
I usually don't say these things. But I really don't like dungeons. I like Zelda's future to provide a living world, rather than a bunch of dungeons and puzzles.
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Honestly, i'd be against that.
It's Zelda's first non-spinoff (or non Not-safe-for-life-shit-product like the CDi games) game as the playable character, let it stay like this.
The maximum they could do could be a NG+ where Zelda has a "permanent" Link Echo to order around.
joveroy
Moblin
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This doesn't make any sense, Souls game for example is very popular in the east.
Secu
Tektite
It is known for its excellent boss battles and live streaming, rather than solving puzzles and dungeons, and solving puzzles has always been seen as its weakness.
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I like the gameplay possibilities, not least because you could deprive Link of the echo ability and have him play more conventionally, but I certainly see the point you're making. This is meant to be Zelda's game.
Secu
Tektite
Anyway, this is just a discussion about how a series of games cater to a wider audience and become different from before. It's not much different, I've seen too many similar things before.
I don't want to argue with people about these inconclusive conversations, I just suddenly thought of an interesting narrative.
I don't want to argue with people about these inconclusive conversations, I just suddenly thought of an interesting narrative.
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PixelKnight
Observing the process
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To be fair there’s a shitload of Japanese dungeon crawlers like Etrian Odyssey (that pretty much kicked off renewed interest in the genre), Shiren, etc. Not to mention them being a staple of rpgs in general, no matter where they are made.
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freedomseekr
Brave Phantom
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I think if it takes after ALttP, it's definitely going to lean more on being macrolinear, i.e. there's an overarching structure to be followed, but within that structure there's a degree of freedom in which to tackle things.
Which is honestly the best way to go about things for a game like this.
Which is honestly the best way to go about things for a game like this.
Secu
Tektite
Indeed, but they are niche.
More importantly, what I mentioned was EAST rather than Japan, because the region where Zelda made the greatest progress is called others in Nintendo's sales statistics.
Whether it's Zelda or other games, you can feel creators' preference for this element. I have always believed that this kind of bias towards dungeons is not purely for gaming reasons. I think the cause may be related to the development history and culture of video games.
GenOneCam
Moblin
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I very much doubt it would happen, but I don't think it is entirely outside the realm of possibility. I have said earlier in this thread that I do think you will start out this game playing as Link. I think the intro will be Link leading up to the Ganon fight and the freeing of Zelda from the crystal. In the footage we see Link jump, so I am thinking he has the Roc's Feather. This game is built off of the Link's Awakening remake so maybe he has all the same items from that game even. And if they already have Link playable in the game with his items then it would be kind of cool if the map is designed in such a way that you could play the game with Link using his items as a second quest. It is 100% not going to happen but it was a thought I had after watching the trailer.
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Thinking of it ... if we assume this game has been in dev ever since the LA Remake dropped, or a year after, so roughly ~4 years ...
It must've been draining for Aonuma to get so many questions and requests for playable Zelda, the online discussion.
And he's just there, sitting and fully knowing that those demands / requests will get what they want, they just have to wait a bit longer at that point.
It must've been draining for Aonuma to get so many questions and requests for playable Zelda, the online discussion.
And he's just there, sitting and fully knowing that those demands / requests will get what they want, they just have to wait a bit longer at that point.
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Second Quest with playable Link should start in the prison with him not being able to escape and then the credits roll.
bbymetroid
Piranha Plant
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Why is everyone already fantasizing about playing as Link in Zelda's game.
Let him "hyahhyahh" a bit at the final boss as Zelda summons an army, the end.
Let him "hyahhyahh" a bit at the final boss as Zelda summons an army, the end.
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I pointed this out when I was willing new 2D Zelda into existence, but his last word on playable Zelda was "maybe" in December 2023. And to be fair to him, he's consistently said it would be about a new gameplay style that suits Zelda, and that's what we got, while simultaneously fulfilling his past desire for a "more evolved" style of portable Zelda.
Zelda, outside the prison cell:
What's that? You want the Trirod? More like triharder, Link, amirite?
Literally one person - me - joked about a Second Quest. Let's not overreact.
I've also been demanding playable Zelda for a while, including my pie-in-the-sky wish for a Tears Second Quest starring Zelda in Ancient Hyrule. I just want me some Second Quest shenanigans.
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Turns out, Aonuma doesn't play 5D chess. It's just that his stuff is sometimes delayed! ;D
Also, not targeted at you, but i don't see the issue discussing a potential "second quest" with Link, as long as it's a legit discussion like we've done here in this thread.
It's as fair as discussing / wanting a gameplay part with Zelda in TotK, for example.
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Yeah, they've really done the character of Zelda justice.
Nintendo always puts gameplay first, so I bet there was the question of messing around with new mechanical ideas, arriving at "how do we break the convention of sword-based gameplay?" and deciding that it would suit Zelda as a protagonist.
I am less certain that the team was like "hey, let's make a playable Zelda game", only to come up with whatever fit the occasion. That approach is sometimes resulting in pretty ham-fisted mechanics.
Nintendo always puts gameplay first, so I bet there was the question of messing around with new mechanical ideas, arriving at "how do we break the convention of sword-based gameplay?" and deciding that it would suit Zelda as a protagonist.
I am less certain that the team was like "hey, let's make a playable Zelda game", only to come up with whatever fit the occasion. That approach is sometimes resulting in pretty ham-fisted mechanics.
Kaka
Boo
Isn't it more like 5 years ? LA was September 2019.
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Grezzo made Miitopia immediately after Link's Awakening, while Tears of the Kingdom was already in full production at that point given the public reveal and hiring calls earlier in the year. We also know former leads of the 2D Zelda team had moved to EPD4 and 10 by that point.
We don't really know what the development timeline is, because we don't know what the team distribution is, who the new director for this Zelda is, and so on. It's definitely not as simple as "5 years"; on some level preproduction and concept planning could easily go back to 2016/17, after Triforce Heroes. After all, in early 2017 Aonuma said he'd told the portable team to evolve their style of Zelda, so ideas were being worked on at least.
If I had to guess, I'd say concept planning was going on for a while, 2016 onwards probably with some disruption given staff moved out of EPD3; full production probably only began in 2021 after Miitopia and once Tears was well underway; development might have been boosted in 2022 when Tears was content complete and perhaps more EPD staff were free to join.
bbymetroid
Piranha Plant
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My bad for the hyperbole.
I did see more people talking about it around though, and I understand the idea. Just feels a bit boring to already be talking about having Link back again when we've just had our first glimpse at Zelda's long-requested game and it looks wildly creative.
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Sure, I get that. And obviously I'd much prefer Nintendo's focus for world design and level design was on making the game as strong as possible for Zelda rather than thinking about how a Link Second Quest would factor in and making compromises accordingly.
Certainly I'm looking forward to seeing and hearing more. Fingers crossed for amiibo, collector's edition, and an Ask the Developer feature!
JR436
Probably looks better in a dress.
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That they're using Zelda the character as a conduit to try and break/rethink the 2D Zelda conventions is pretty cool. Feels like they're truly taking things seriously with something that a lot of fans have wanted for a long time.
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Of course, it takes a lot of wisdom to break those conventions, so you better use the most wise character that is there! ;D
Aufhebung RPG
History is tragedy becoming comedy
If they make this "convention-breaking" Zelda as a controllable character in 3d Zelda in the future, maybe we can experience the cycle between convention (using Link) and convention-breaking (using Zelda).
Vaenyr
Rattata
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Haven't read the entire thread, but have we already discussed that the main theme includes Zelda's Lullaby? At the end of the second and fourth measure of the main melody that is first played by a clarinet and then doubled by a piccolo the second time around, the final three notes are the first three notes of Zelda's Lullaby. Not even transposed, they are exactly the same as in OOT's version, namely B D A. Curious to see what other musical easter eggs we'll find.
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The fanart surrounding this game has been incredible, and we're only two days post announcement.
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Right on! I fully agree and think once the game is in our hands this will blow over... just initial reactions.
I agree with what you're saying, but the points you're making do not relate directly to what I said. If the first (proper) game starring Zelda discarded every aspect of her character in favor of just gender swapping Link, IMO it would be a disservice to her character. Your examples of Peach, Daisy, Toadette don't really compare here– that is a Mario game where you can play as them, I'm all for that (and the representation and inclusion it represents!). Meanwhile, Peach in Showtime is her own beast.
Further, we don't know enough to say that Zelda won't be able to swing a sword in this game of course, but I'd obviously have no problem with that. But again, that's not what I said in the first place. If she, an established and unique character, were to be boiled down to be nothing more than just "female link" I would have been disappointed - that's all!
Expanded above
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VintoWin
Bob-omb
It'd be a miracle if Nintendo ever included substantial difficulty options or new game plus at all. It's been forever.
Apopheniac
Monolith Soft action game truther
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The renders being posted by the ZeldaOfficialJP account use a dot and dash pattern as the background, similar to the ones seen in the trailer. The lore deepens ever further...
sounds good, but i think we need some kind of echo pun for the subtitle
Lugia667
Darknut
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modsiW fO seohcE :adleZ fo dnegeL ehT
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Not to be entirely self-centered, but I'd like to gently nudge towards my previous post ITT:
Magic-Man
Perseus Jackson
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I think it should be "The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom |ST| Error 404 - Link Not Found"
HockeyBird
Villager
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Link wears a cloak over his cap. Dude literally wore the cloak just so he could throw it off before his battle with Ganon.
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It's either that, or something like "Oh, how the tables have turned!"
Undeniablybiased
Moblin
Just stack some water blocks.The studded walls here definitely seem like they're intended to require a specific echo or other tool to traverse, though I'm sure enterprising princesses will be able to find alternatives.
ziggyrivers
thunder
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The Spirit of the HeroZelda replicating Link's body is the initial power that explains all the links in History and the whole line of games
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Sooo… Aonuma saying maybe to a Zelda game that was already heavy in development, could it mean that we could interpret in some ways his “no comment” answer to OOT remake?
Apopheniac
Monolith Soft action game truther
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That might work for the ledge on the left, but the wall in the middle looks significantly larger, and it appears to extend horizontally as well as vertically.
Undeniablybiased
Moblin
Stack another set of water blocks when you get on top of the ledge on the left.
I’m being facetious, of course, but as excited as I am for the game I do worry that it’ll play out similarly to totk. Where the simplest solution is overpowered and can trivialize several parts of the game. We’ll see.
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I trust Nintendo to have balanced this system well enough given the context of the game.
Eg. ALBW - it explored a more "open" system, but within the confines of a classic Zelda shell. It had its limitations and failings, but was overall a win.
I'd rather we feel friction like that and have them keep pushing at the idea of what "can" be a Zelda title rather than the alternatives of (a) only doing modern open-world style or (b) having a hard-line between the two series where they can't inspire one another.
Eg. ALBW - it explored a more "open" system, but within the confines of a classic Zelda shell. It had its limitations and failings, but was overall a win.
I'd rather we feel friction like that and have them keep pushing at the idea of what "can" be a Zelda title rather than the alternatives of (a) only doing modern open-world style or (b) having a hard-line between the two series where they can't inspire one another.
Apopheniac
Monolith Soft action game truther
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There's a couple of thing that differentiate this game's mechanics from TotK's.
In TotK, the various Zonai components are consumable items, and stocking up on them requires the player to cash out their Zonai Charges at the appropriate dispensers. Reaching the point where you can trivialize parts of the game is its own challenge, since the player has to explore the map to find the dispensers that have the devices they want, and they also need to be able to consistently mine Zonite and defeat the Zonai enemies to get these charges, as well as upgrade their battery capacity to make their contraptions usable for longer periods. Many areas have machines that prebuilt, or mostly prebuilt, in part to showcase how the contraptions work, and in part so the player doesn't need to constantly expend time and resources constructing them.
The echoes don't seem to have any long-term resource management; once Zelda learns how to echo tables, she can continue echoing tables through the rest of the game without having the refill her table supply. Instead, the restriction is imposed by Tri, who supplies the triangles necessary to create objects. These triangles are largely fixed, and in most of the trailer, Zelda is limited to only being able to echo four objects simultaneously. Trivializing puzzles requires either finding more efficient echoes that enable further travel without using more triangles, such as using the water blocks in place of a stack of tables, or by acquiring more triangles through progression, such that Zelda can stack more tables to reach greater heights. Eventually, the studded wall will be trivialized, but Zelda's path to trivialization is going to look different from Link's because she's playing with different restrictions. Since Zelda doesn't have her whole set of tools available at the start of the game, she'll likely need to use small stacks of tables during the beginning of the game as she explores the map until she learns other echoes.
Undeniablybiased
Moblin
Well I don’t agree with yours points about Totk as you can trivialize most puzzles immediately since all you need is ultrahand, recall, and your glider for a good portion of the game. Then the extra stuff you get throughout the game just makes you even more overpowered.
As for this game, this is a level design challenge, and it’s going to be difficult for them to manage it. Easier than in totk, but still difficult. If you give the player more triangles, now you need to make walls higher and gaps further constantly, or “more beds!” will continue to be the solution to many navigational challenges. That’s tough for a tile-based games as there’s only so much space. And since it will likely be a more open game like link between worlds, it’s going to be even more difficult for them to have that kind of progression. If it is anything like BotW/LBW the challenge progression will be relatively even from start to finish which will just exacerbate the issue. So yeah. We’ll see!
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Your criticisms on ToTK are near mirror inverses of the critiques many had on Skyward Sword.
Different games will have different goals, focuses and intentions. Different doesn't equal outright bad, that's just personal taste + opinion.
