Here we go.
Thus Nintendo’s classic ARPG is considered holy by many, and you don’t mess with sacred artefacts.
Note how Edge refers to Link to the Past as an ARPG or Action-Role-Playing-Game. This is exactly how Zelda was perceived and consumed in the past. When Zelda was introduced to the world with the Nintendo Funclub Newsletter, Nintendo defined Zelda as a combination of action from the arcades and role playing games from the PC as a type of ‘best of both worlds’, i.e. the Action RPG.
I’m delighted Edge refers to Link to the Past as an ARPG. Nintendo completely denies this definition today and insists Zelda has always been about story and puzzles. Just playing the early Zelda games contradict this entirely as the gameplay is entirely and purely ARPG.
Zelda was also much more popular and extremely well respected when it was a ARPG instead of Aonuma’s Puzzle Story!
During January’s Nintendo Direct, you said that you intend to “rethink the conventions of Zelda”, and then a few months later you announced the sequel to a game from 1991. Isn’t that a contradiction?
[Laughs] Right. But although it looks like we’re repeating ourselves, the new game will play very differently to the original. I think the new additions will make players see the game in a different way. And, of course, we’ll introduce even more unexpected elements in the Zelda game that we’re making for Wii U.
Why make a ‘sequel’ if you are doing something different?
It is about re-defining Link to the Past because Link to the Past, being more modern than the NES Zeldas, has been constantly contradicting the Aonuma Version of Zelda.
In a 2D Zelda game, you can zip through the stage at a faster pace, which brings the action to the fore. I wanted players to revisit that style.
As readers know, I see the early Zelda games remaining popular and being the blockbusters they were because they were ARPGs. Nintendo, however, is being obstinate in refusing to consider this. Instead, it is “accessibility”.
We know Nintendo (at least Miyamoto) has been upset that 2d Mario keeps being seen as the definition of Mario instead of 3d Mario. He’s constantly been trying to make the 3d Mario games more ‘accessible’ and none of it works. If accessibility is the only reason why 2d games were more popular, why is 3d Mario now using NSMB’s graphical style?
It is because accessibility isn’t the issue here. The issue is the gameplay skeleton itself. Zelda became another game once Aonuma got put in charge.
Nintendo doesn’t see Aonuma Zeldas as failing. They just see that there is an ‘accessibility problem’ because everything takes too long. “Those 2d Zelda games did things very fast. We should do another one like that.” This is what Aonuma is saying.
This is a big IN YOUR FACE move by Nintendo. It is to place the Aonuma Gameplay in ‘more accessible’ 2d to prove that Aonuma Gameplay is not the problem. It is remarkable how massive these guys’ egos are.
The challenge is to pinpoint what it was about the original that people loved and to respect that, and so long as we do that I think we can make something those fans will like.
Aonuma doesn’t respect anything classic Zelda fans like. What he is referring to is the Link to the Past “story” meaning the NPCs and shit like that. He is not talking about gameplay. This game will not be an ARPG. Therefore, it will not be a sequel to Link to the Past. It will be more of a spin-off.
We’ve been thinking about how to make the new one in a way that will excite the fans without alienating people who haven’t played the original.
Unless the game is an ARPG, fans WILL be alienated. I guarantee.
If I really get it that wrong, then I’ll consider myself talentless
Aonuma utters out a rare truth.
At this point, I would pay Aonuma to NOT MAKE Zelda games. The entire Zelda franchise needs a reboot and needs to return to an ARPG. People get excited about ARPG but not puzzle games with terrible stories.
We started out with the new play mechanics, such as Link being able to become a painting and walk along the walls, and then figured out from there how to build a story around them. Rather than forcing elements of the original story into this one, we’ve instead focused on bringing back the characters, so you can see what happened to them after the events of the first game.
I told you so. When Aonuma was talking about not disappointing fans of the original, he is referring to “story” and to the NPCs.
WE DON’T CARE ABOUT THE GOD-DAMNED NPCS. WE CARE ABOUT THE ARPG GAMEPLAY STYLE!
Aonuma Zelda games keep failing not because it is in ‘inaccessible 3d’. Ocarina of Time was in 3d, and it performed very well (except for the dungeon designs that everyone complained about which were designed by Aonuma. Yikes at the Water Temple).
Part of what made A Link To The Past interesting was the way you could move between the Light World and the Dark World and solve puzzles
What puzzles!? Where the fuck were these puzzles?
Does Aonuma not know the difference between ‘maze gameplay’ and ‘puzzle gameplay’? Figuring out how to get from point A to point B is maze gameplay which was very popular in the 80s. The original Zelda was heavily based on mazes.
Aside from a few pieces of heart, there are no puzzles from going back and forth from the Light World to Dark World.
I have asked them for advice, but the problem is that they don’t remember anything!
Then why don’t you ask the original consumers for advice? I am right here.
Yet, Nintendo doesn’t want our feedback because it contradicts their ‘creative visions’. Then their game is a market bust and hardware sales suffer. Then they do the same exact thing again. And again. And again.
In the Western World, someone with Aonuma’s track record would have been fired three times by now. It’s like Nintendo is in a Bizarro Universe where Zelda is anything and can be anything BUT an ARPG. Don’t you dare mention ‘ARPG’! And that original Legend of Zelda? It was really about puzzles. Really! And as for Zelda 2? Well, that game never existed. Nintendo would rather acknowledge the cd-i Zelda games before Zelda 2. The cd-i Zelda games are, hilariously, closer to Aonuma’s ‘creative visions’ and gameplay style (seriously! they are).
The 3DS software lineup is strong at the moment – it recalls the SNES era in a way.
No, hahahahahaha. Can someone tell me exactly what is good with the 3DS software? The 3DS software is as terrible as the Gamecube’s lineup and remarkably looks like the Gamecube’s lineup.
A good software lineup was the DS. The DS fucking owned. The DS was seen as the reincarnation of the SNES especially since it had the same control scheme. 3DS lineup is fairly sad and uninspired. There is barely much of a 3DS third party presence unless you love Japanese games.
But while I was making Twilight Princess, I was listening to the theme music on an iPod while walking hand in hand with my child, and I suddenly burst into tears.
Burst into tears????
So Aonuma was listening to this…
…and he bursts into tears!?
There are no words, reader. There are no words.
One thing is clear is that Aonuma has never had a real job in his life. I don’t think he has ever grown up. The guy is like a man child.
And after I finished making the game’s final battle with Ganondorf and the ending, I cried.
What the hell? Does this guy just cry all the time?
I realised from that letter the power of games to move people, and the importance of never making a game halfheartedly.
But did Aonuma cry???? That is what I want to know.
I don’t want to get to the end of my career and only have worked on Zelda.
Even Aonuma doesn’t want to work on Zelda! So why is he still here? GET RID OF HIM.
When I was younger, I would never have dreamed of making a sequel to a game by Shigeru Miyamoto. But now that I’m older, I’m like, “Whatever!”
That is my reaction too to Miyamoto’s games. In the 80s and early 90s, they were amazing. Today, the market and I are like, “Whatever!”
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