Inside the 'exercise in suffering' that inspired Zelda's biggest open-world game

Inside the 'exercise in suffering' that inspired Zelda's biggest open-world game

Since the 1980s, the Legend of Zelda series has always been an experimental testing ground for Nintendo. Ocarina of Time for the Nintendo 64 introduced lock-on aiming in melee combat, which became a genre-spanning staple of modern gaming. Twilight Princess on Wii introduced motion controls that added a new level of immersion to the role-playing experience. It wasn't until Breath of the Wild in 2017 that Zelda's sales would finally catch up to it…

As Zelda devs experimented with contraptions that made Tears of the Kingdom great, director realized Breath of the Wild had unused potential: "That's why I thought a sequel would be a good idea"

Nintendo hoped to make the 2017 gem "even better"