Nintendo shared a ton of info on their new open world Zelda game during their E3 event. It’s called The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and looks like it’s gonna be pretty huge.
How huge? Well, Nintendo asked E3 attendees to put aside around 90 minutes for the demo, which a rep confirmed was about 1% the size of the final game – it was also confirmed that the game’s map is about 12 times the size of the map in Twilight Princess.
As you’d expect, there’s plenty of gameplay footage to pore over, but if you don’t have the time for that, why not start with this trailer?
Clearly this is Zelda, but not as we know it. For a start, Link’s iconic green hat and tunic are absent – in its place we’ll be picking up gear and weapons as we go, more in the style of RPGs like Witcher 3 and Skyrim.
Don’t expect to be able to slash through grass to pick up hearts and rupees anymore either, Breath of the Wild has gone all survival. Link will have to pick up ingredients and cook by a fire to restore health – although weather like rain and snow will stop him from lighting fires, so you’ll need to find shelter in such conditions.
Other new features include way more voice acting than we’ve ever seen in a Zelda game before, as well as the ability to hunt and climb. There’s even a jump button, which is entirely new to a 3D Zelda game.
With such a massive world, series producer Eiji Aonuma has said on numerous occasions that it all comes as part of the plan to rethink what makes a Zelda game.
In Breath of the Wild, there are around 100 dungeons (minor and major) that we can explore in pretty much any order. As with Skyrim, The Witcher, Fallout, or even the NES Zelda, a massive world comes with the chance that you’ll run into enemies you just aren’t ready for.
Check out around 20 minutes of footage from the E3 demo below. It basically just shows off Link exploring, finding treasure, and sneaking around enemy camps.
In essence, the Zelda team have said they’re aiming to get back to the openness of the first game, and it shows.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will come to the Wii U and launch with the Nintendo NX in March 2017.
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.