NintendoNintendo has surprised us all by announcing yet another surprise Zelda game for 2019. But while Link’s Awakening is a “classic” Zelda title, this new effort is something a little bit different.
To be clear, when I say a “bit different” I mean massively different, since I don’t think anything like this has ever been done before. Nintendo has lent one of its most sacred IPs to indie studio Brace Yourself Games for a Zelda-themed sequel to its incredible rhythm-based rougelike Crypt of the Necrodancer.
It’s called Cadence of Hyrule, and it looks bloody brilliant. Check out the trailer below.
The plot of the game seems to revolve around Cadence – the hero of the first game – finding herself in Hyrule for some unknown reason. She’ll be teaming up with Link and Zelda to explore a world that looks inspired by SNES classic A Link To The Past.
Going from the trailer, it seems we’ll be treated to plenty of familiar Zelda locations and enemies, as well as some groovy remixed tracks from the franchise’s history, which I am especially excited to get in my ears.
A press release provided more details:
As Link or Princess Zelda, players explore randomly generated overworld and dungeons on a quest to save Hyrule, and every beat of the 25 remixed Legend of Zelda tunes is a chance to move, attack, defend and more. From modern-looking Lynels to the Hyrulean Soldiers of old, players must master the instinctive movements of each pixel-art enemy and strategically outstep them in rhythmic combat using an arsenal of iconic items from The Legend of Zelda, as well as the spells and weapons from Crypt of the NecroDancer.
NintendoThe fact that Nintendo has given an indie studio arguably its most respected franchise to play with is genuinely huge, and hopefully a sign of things to come. I’d really love to see smaller studios get the chance to come up with their own takes on often neglected IPs like Star Fox and Metroid.
Cadence of Hyrule: Crypt Of The Necrodancer feat The Legend of Zelda (yes that is its full name) is coming to Nintendo Switch this Spring.
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Ewan Moore is a journalist at UNILAD Gaming who still quite hasn’t gotten out of his mid 00’s emo phase. After graduating from the University of Portsmouth in 2015 with a BA in Journalism & Media Studies (thanks for asking), he went on to do some freelance words for various places, including Kotaku, Den of Geek, and TheSixthAxis, before landing a full time gig at UNILAD in 2016.