While the first previews of tears of the Kingdom are likely to appear shortly, Nintendo is preparing the release of a potential game of the year. We take stock of the essential information.
The Nintendo Switch turns six, a venerable age for any console, whether handheld or home. Present in no less than 122 million homes around the world, it is one of the best-selling game consoles in history, ranking third behind the Nintendo DS and the unbeatable PS2. And one of the reasons for its success is the Zelda franchise, and its latest original release Breath of the Wild. By adapting Shigeru Miyamoto’s games to the open-world format, Nintendo has secured a best-seller for the next few years, and intends to take advantage of it. Six years after the release of this little bomb, here we are facing its second chapter: Tears of the Kingdom.
For the promotion of this major release, Nintendo has not been shy in its communication campaign, providing players with unpublished images of Tears of the Kingdom. What arouse some excitement around the world.
Link is back for a new adventure in the land of Hyrule. Tears of the Kingdom intends to pick up where Breath of the Wild left off, with a land still under threat from the terrible Ganon. Our adventurer will once again have to face the threats that darken the land of Princess Zelda, in a plot that is still quite mysterious, distilled to the drop by the Nintendo teams. In any case, Tears of the Kingdom will be a heck of a competitor to Hogwarts Legacy in terms of sales and overall success in 2023.
But these few images already allow us to understand some essential aspects of Tears of the Kingdom. In terms of history, we already know that the game will pick up Link’s story where the first game left off. The knight’s mission will be to defeat the scourge “Ganon” once again, and to find his friend Zelda from whom he seems once again separated. On the gameplay side, we could see in the trailer several things that tipped us off.
First, at the level of the world in which the game will be located. The plains and the Hyrule no longer seem to be the only universe to explore. Indeed the kingdoms of heaven will once again be accessible, which reminds us of the universe of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. Link will be able to vertically traverse flying platforms, and explore Hyrule using various modes of transportation, including through the skies and in a glider. The Cinetis power is back, except that it will no longer be a question of freezing objects in time, but of sending them back to the past. We can also note the appearance of a flamethrower, and other small novelties like Fuse. Fuse is the unique system that allows you to build weapons, items and equipment with the resources around you. Enough to add a lot of depth to your exploration of Hyrule. One could almost say that Tears of the Kingdom is offered a little bit of Minecraft in its gameplay with this extremely original concept.
We can also note the importance given to verticality in the different gameplay sequences that we have been able to distill back and forth and across since the announcement of the game’s release more than three years ago. There are many passages where you can see Link climbing walls, roots, then throwing himself into the void and returning to the terra firma of Hyrule. Because the kingdom of heaven, we can never repeat it enough, are the great novelties of this long-awaited sequel, and just like in Skyward Sword, this involves new means of transport like the famous glider.
Fans can rejoice because The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom finally has a release date. The game is scheduled for May 12, 2023 and promises to be a great success as it was expected by fans since its announcement more than 3 years ago. A release directly and exclusively on Nintendo Switch, of course, and the promise of a huge flag bearer for the Nintendo console which had been in a slight lack of attractive exclusives for a few months.