Where do you think Nintendo will take Zelda from here?
Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are both fantastic games - and Tears of the Kingdom really does feel (to me) like they just took Breath of the Wild, and added a few more years of dev time to it.
Where do you think Nintendo will take Zelda from here though? Can they keep with the same new formula? Should they? Will a more traditional game feel disappointing after this?
I don't really know what I want myself. I think they should try something different though. At the same time, I can't help but think I'd be disappointed if the next game was more similar to something like Twilight Princess. Have they boxed themselves in?
Maybe a Xenoblade-like jrpg. Maybe a multiplayer mmorpg style game with a singleplsyer campaign.
Or what about a Zelda shooter?
I just wanna see Nintendo go nuts, no matter what the Zelda fanboys say.
Edit: Also lets be honest Nintendo can't keep up with the size of these games. BOTW took an entire console generation and so did TOTK (even though it's based on BOTW)
Assuming we get a third game in the botw run, I would love to see link travel back to early Hyrule like Zelda did. Nintendo could use the blueprint of the depths ruins as the backbone for a thriving Zonai civilization. Aboveground would be a truly wild Hyrule similar to what the depths are now. No sky islands as this would predate their creation. Instead we could have a 'dive' feature that lets us visit an ancient Zora, spread out in the waters in and around Hyrule. All new characters (except maybe Raru and friends), but many characters could be ancestors of current characters so they would be familiar in some ways. I would love to see the ability to tame monsters, more complex Zonai devices, and yes, perhaps real dungeons.
Also I could even see a fourth game in this series that totally turns all of the formula on its head. It would actually star Zelda, and she would travel through time to different eras of Hyrule. We'd get to see areas and dungeons from ocarina of time, twilight princess, skyward sword and even many of the 2d titles, redesigned with botw graphics and controls. The focus of the game would be for Zelda to help Link. She must stay out of sight, navigate dungeons to place keys, compasses, maps and/or key weapons that the link of that era will need to defeat whatever evil he faces. I think this would be super cool.
Instead we could have a ‘dive’ feature that lets us visit an ancient Zora, spread out in the waters in and around Hyrule.
The Legend of Zelda: The Way of Water
In all seriousness though, this sounds amazing. There are so many unanswered questions from the BotW universe. It would be interesting to see another addition to the series.
The two major things I loved about BOTW and TOTK were the flexibility of the puzzle solutions and the story; I think if those aspects can be put into a new world and setting, I would be very happy.
Also in both games if a puzzle is too hard or you’re just not in the mood, you can step away and do something else; I loved this, it lets your mind refresh so to speak. I want the new game to feel this welcoming.
In a later part of Tears of the Kingdom, I was presented with one puzzle. A large object needed to be transported up and to the other side of a large room. There was a big spiraling rail going up to the other side, along with a hook and some Zonai fans. So I thought "Just stick it to the hook and propel it up with fans." Easier said than done, unfortunately, because there were supports along the rail that would stop it from moving further.
But then I remembered I had time powers. So I just grabbed the object, held it up about halfway on the other side for a good 10 seconds, and let it fall. Then I just climbed up the other side, rewound time on the object to lift it back into its midair position, and grabbed it with ultrahand.
Assuming we get a third game in the botw run, I would love to see link travel back to early Hyrule like Zelda did. Nintendo could use the blueprint of the depths ruins as the backbone for a thriving Zonai civilization. Aboveground would be a truly wild Hyrule similar to what the depths are now. No sky islands as this would predate their creation. Instead we could have a 'dive' feature that lets us visit an ancient Zora, spread out in the waters in and around Hyrule. All new characters (except maybe Raru and friends), but many characters could be ancestors of current characters so they would be familiar in some ways. I would love to see the ability to tame monsters, more complex Zonai devices, and yes, perhaps real dungeons.
Also I could even see a fourth game in this series that totally turns all of the formula on its head. It would actually star Zelda, and she would travel through time to different eras of Hyrule. We'd get to see areas and dungeons from ocarina of time, twilight princess, skyward sword and even many of the 2d titles, redesigned with botw graphics and controls. The focus of the game would be for Zelda to help Link. She must stay out of sight, navigate dungeons to place keys, compasses, maps and/or key weapons that the link of that era will need to defeat whatever evil he faces. I think this would be super cool.