Zelda Wii U is Open World, Coming 2015

[Daystar Clarion]

Here, try this image:

Spoiler

Eyelashes are much thicker, the character designer's shorthand for "this is a female!"
Plus, she has a thin waist and wider hips. I can't not see a lady.

Grasping at straws a little aren't ya?

That Link is androgynous enough that it could go either way, I'm not convinced it's a girl yet.

 

[Fox12]

I'm really not seeing how/why people are claiming Link's a chick here or whatever. It's pretty clearly a male Link, just like every other Zelda game ever made. He's got a ponytail now, that's the only difference.

Seriously, I thought he actually looked much MORE manly then in the last two games. Not exactly saying much, though...

Nintendo, you had my curiosity, now you have my attention. This is (almost) enough to make me wish I had a Wii U. I can't really justify buying a console for one game, but I won't lie, this is the first exclusive thats really caught my interest. If that actually was Zelda as the main character (it's not), and if they really did do something different, and if they add a larger library of titles, then maybe, Nintendo, you and I could talk.

Seriously though, I would love to play as a female Link/Zelda. Take the story in some different directions. We already know that there's a separate timeline where Link loses, so it's not ridiculous to think that we could play as a separate protagonist who tries to pick up the pieces of Links failure. Or Link gets reincarnated as a female.

 

[Scribblesense]

Here, try this image:

Spoiler

Eyelashes are much thicker, the character designer's shorthand for "this is a female!"
Plus, she has a thin waist and wider hips. I can't not see a lady.

Grasping at straws a little aren't ya?

That Link is androgynous enough that it could go either way, I'm not convinced it's a girl yet.

Link has always been androgynous, sure, but I've never mistaken him for a girl in the past. I instantly noticed this Link was a girl, but I totally get how people don't see it.

Overall, I really like the design, female or not. I'm sure once this Link is revealed as female people will come to appreciate the subtleties in her design - I'm liking that she looks like a young teenage girl can look, without shoving massive T&A in your face (here's looking at you, Metroid: Other M).

Part of me thinks it would be fun if they did a "Fionna and Cake" transformation of Hyrule - Epona is now Epono, Zelda is Zachary, Impa is Himpa, Ganondorf is Womanondorf. Eep!

 

[Dragonbums]

But 11000x less sophisticated than Skyrim that wouldn't...Sorry, would be funny.

How do you know they will be significantly less sophisticated? I'm merely talking about the game being a buggy shovel ware mess. We have literally nothing to go on in the trailer to tell us how sophisticated the game is in terms of mechanics.

An open world game doesn't mean it can compete on a technical level with Bethesda as most "open world" games mean that they are parring with GTA/Spiderman/SR.

Of course Nintendo isn't necessarily competing with Bethesda. However they can certainly 1-Up them in terms of quality control. Something that Bethesda- at least in terms of the Elder Scrolls- sucks ass in. PS3 being the worst offender last gen.

I believe that Nintendo is doing this to respond to those asking for an open world Zelda game ala the first ones.

With the modding available on the PC, you can tell that there's much much more to consider than to what you just see on the screen.

This thread reeks of fandom.

Bethesda relies on the modding community just to make their games even remotely playable on all systems. Including PC. I judge a game based on what the devs-who are paid to make good games (in theory) for a living deliver in the final package.

Not what single to 4 man teams like xxSallycodesxx, and Deathmods3457 do with the game in their free time. They are a nice addition. But not something your game should be entirely reliant on.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

Zelda Scrolls: Hyrule.

Looks seriously pretty, and I love Link's design.

That protagonist is right handed, and wears blue instead of green. Maybe, just maybe, we're playing Zelda in this game? I'd welcome it.

Link was made a righty for the Wii games Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, since like 90% of people are right-hand dominant or ambi-dextrous. He was always a left-handed before that. Its likely that they just kept that change, maybe without even realizing it. That, or they somehow shoe-horned motion controls into this one.

That would be a valid idea, but he's appearing as left handed in Wind Waker HD (the first proper Zelda game on Wii U), the new Smash Bros game, Hyrule Warriors and even in his new Amiibo figurine. So it'd make no sense to have so many materials with him as left handed only to have him be right handed in the next main game. To me at least.

But I'm daring to hope. Moviebob also pointed out in a tweet that the colour palette in the outfit of the protagonist is identical to Tetra's from Wind Waker. So who knows~

 

[Dragonbums]

Link has always been androgynous,

No. There was a time where Link was unmistakably male. From the first Zelda games all the way up to Windwaker you would be hard pressed to mistaken him as anything but a man.

It started to blur around the time Twilight Princess came about.


It's more than likely the eyes and head shape that make people question it. News reporters call him a woman all the time because of his current build.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

Here, try this image:

Spoiler

Eyelashes are much thicker, the character designer's shorthand for "this is a female!"
Plus, she has a thin waist and wider hips. I can't not see a lady.

Grasping at straws a little aren't ya?

That Link is androgynous enough that it could go either way, I'm not convinced it's a girl yet.

Link has always been androgynous, sure, but I've never mistaken him for a girl in the past. I instantly noticed this Link was a girl, but I totally get how people don't see it.

Overall, I really like the design, female or not. I'm sure once this Link is revealed as female people will come to appreciate the subtleties in her design - I'm liking that she looks like a young teenage girl can look, without shoving massive T&A in your face (here's looking at you, Metroid: Other M).

Part of me thinks it would be fun if they did a "Fionna and Cake" transformation of Hyrule - Epona is now Epono, Zelda is Zachary, Impa is Himpa, Ganondorf is Womanondorf. Eep!

Don't get me wrong, I'd love the idea of a female Link, or playing as Zelda or whatever.

I just don't think there's enough evidence to think it's anything like that yet.

 

[RandV80]

Looks amazing. When one says 'open world' people tend to think Bethesda/Elder Scrolls, but I always thought a better fusion would be to take inspiration from Shadow of the Colossus. While Skyrim is fun to explore, the fundamental carrot on the end of the stick is looting and leveling. Bethesda loads the world up completely optional quests and dungeons, and you dive into them in search of all that loot to grow your character. SotC, like Zelda, has none of those conventions so doesn't need them. It's more about adding space between objectives, with more subtle rewards for exploring. And since you start with a trusty horsey companion you can cover a whole lot of ground quickly.

 

[Cecilthedarkknight_234]

well it's time to buy a wii-u.

 

[duct tape guardian]

Okay Nintendo, you've got my attention.

This looks nice, this looks fresh, but more than that this looks different from the plastic toy aesthetic you've been using for years now.

Looks like I'll be picking up a Wii-U once they drop the price to about 200.

Nintendo is currently selling refurbished Deluxe versions for 200 on their site.

https://store.nintendo.com/ng3/us/po/browse/productDetailColorSizePicker.jsp?productId=prod150200

just in case they don't drop the price again soon.

I doubt motion Controls will be the default control scheme, (at least the Wii style motion controls, the gyro aiming will probably be default, but that was toggle-able on Wind Waker HD and OoT3D) since they'll probably want to include game-pad support.

 

[Guffe]

This looks and sounds promising.
Now just to hope that this isn't all talk and acutally facts

 

[Worgen]

Damn, this looks pretty amazing, I doubt the link shown is a female but it would be completely awesome to have a female main character in this game.

 

[nomotog_v1legacy]

Just throwing my decision into the tally, if I had to choose man or woman, I'd say Link is a woman. Its a tough call. That said, this is definitely the most androgynous we've ever seen Link though, and Link is wearing a new outfit without a shield or sword, so I think there's a lot to gather that they're doing a new take on Link, which could include Link's gender. Link, while riding the horse, is also wearing a hooded cloak, which while we've never seen Link wear one before, we've seen Zelda in them before.

Spoiler

There's a lot to imply that Link may be a woman this time around, so I'm definitely not going to rule it out.

4. Are they going to program a bunch of ridiculous stuff in related to the attempts at integrating social networking? If so, that'll DRASTICALLY reduce my interest.

This is Nintendo. It took them until late 2013 to even allow you to send messages to other players, or to have a player ID that spans multiple games. I would think we have another five years or so until Nintendo starts doing this.

I am all about hair brained speculation, but even I think that using the cloak as evidence may be stretching it past the braking point.

 

[Grimh]

It would be cool if it was a female Link (to the past) or (the legend of) Zelda.
But I doubt it, could just be a teen Link (between worlds) who hasn't fully grown into the masculine, testosterone-fueled slab of machismo we're so used to. Let's not get our hopes up too high up in the sky(ward sword).
You can hope a little bit though, I know I am.

 

[GonzoGamer]

Sorry, but I was under the impression that all the Zelda games were "open world."
It would be great to see Nintendo come out with a game that's as detailed and explorable as a Bethesda type experience but I'm not used to seeing them try that hard.