The Legend of Zelda 40th Anniversary Direct Announced

Nintendo is always good for a surprise. For the first time ever, we're getting a dedicated Direct presentation for The Legend of Zelda, for its 40th Anniversary no less. I would have expected this to be part of the general Nintendo Direct, which is scheduled for the day after (on September 9th), because this is how they did it for the 40th Anniversary of Super Mario Bros. a year ago. Both Super Mario and Zelda are the big crowd pleasers that draw in attention, but with a total runtime of 30 minutes they probably wanted to keep this separate and not overshadow the other Nintendo news.

It's also surprising that they are announcing this on a Friday, giving us the weekend to digest the news and speculate as much as we can. Normally, they would have announced this next Monday, leaving you with little time to mentally prepare.

Anyway, with 30 minutes this sure is going to be beefy, where people are wondering what else could there be next to the Ocarina of Time remake. A deep dive into the already announced title will most likely be the start of the Direct, where I'm still hoping for this to be a true re-imagining co-developed by Monolith Soft.

With all certainty, they will give us the exact release date, probably in November or December. Maybe they will also announce some sort of Collector's Edition for the game, or even a series of new amiibo.

Speaking of, people have been speculating that it will release November 12th, mainly because Nintendo is presumably shipping some Kirby Air Riders amiibo on that day. But we also got the Chef Kawasaki just yesterday, with no new Nintendo game to coincide, so this is rather weak evidence. It still could be November 12th, or maybe it's November 19th or later. Unlike the rest of the gaming industry, Nintendo doesn't care about Grand Theft Auto VI. They are doing their own thing, like they always did, and the nostalgia for Ocarina of Time is so strong that it can beat anything.

After said nostalgia trip, Nintendo will have to talk about the 40th Anniversary itself. There already was a leak about some upcoming merchandise, where this could become an expensive Christmas for any Zelda fan. Other than that, we could be looking at more amiibo, a new LEGO set, or other goodies...

But I also see the middle segment as a strong chance for another game announcement. Yes, I'm convinced that this Nintendo Direct will bring more on the release table than just Ocarina of Time and I'm not talking about the next 3D Zelda. That one is likely still a couple of years away, where they might want to wait with an announcement until after the movie hype, so June of next year or later.

Instead, I'm hoping that we will also see GREZZO's next project, which might be yet another remake. Unlike Ocarina of Time, however, this one would be more faithful and for one of the earlier top-down titles. This could either be the Oracles, scheduled for 2027, or maybe even a remake of the original The Legend of Zelda, also in the same Link's Awakening style, which could even come out as early as next week. Alternatively, I could see them do something with the original game in some other form, like some remixed version of it. I've already went over these ideas in more detail in past blog post, so check them out if you're interested to learn more about them:

• Oracle of Ages & Seasons Remake
• The Legend of Zelda Remake
• The Legend of Zelda - Anniversary Edition

But one of these could be a strong possibility for next Tuesday, where I'm personally hoping for the Oracles to come out next year. This would be the most interesting scenario and also the strongest option, as this would give us two Zelda games in one.

Of course, remaking games is not the only way to bring back classic Zelda titles. Twilight Princess will celebrate its 10th anniversary later this year, where this will be the perfect timing to bring it onto the Nintendo Switch 2 via the GameCube Nintendo Switch Online library. Sure, getting the HD remaster onto Switch and Switch 2 would be even better, but this would distract too much from the new Ocarina of Time, so I'm not expecting this at the moment.

Another interesting NSO title could be Four Swords Adventures, especially if we were able to finally play it online. This was a big deal with Four Swords two years ago, where I'm hoping that Four Swords Adventures will get the same spotlight eventually, because this is the oldest Zelda game to never come back in any way or form. They could even try to localize Tetra's Trackers for the first time ever, or at least make it accessible in all regions.

The 40th Anniversary Direct will likely be concluded with a first trailer for the upcoming The Legend of Zelda movie, which technically won't really be part of the 40th Anniversary any longer, because the series will already be 41 years old when the movie launches on April 30th... But Nintendo probably doesn't care and will want to use the anniversary to hype up the movie, because that's the biggest thing for Zelda in the next years – not the Ocarina of Time remake, not the next open world Zelda game, and certainly not some other remakes or goodies. This movie will be the largest investment around the franchise in its entire history and they will want this to be a huge hit, ideally the next Lord of the Rings, maybe even spawning two sequels.

If the recent casting rumors are to be believed, things are already looking quite promising. They will likely announce all of that cast and then leave us with a trailer that will hopefully blow everyone's mind.

Both the movie and the Ocarina of Time remake are in a similar position here. They already have been announced and we have seen very little about them. Both of them have the potential to be really good, but there is also the worry in the air that they might not be. Next week the curtains will fall.

PS: I just came back from a vacation, so I'm a bit overwhelmed by today's announcement and had some catching up to do with this blog. But there are worse reasons to be overwhelmed. 

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe: Switch 2 Update Released

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe joins the list of games that have received a free update for the Nintendo Switch 2, which is quite incredible in a number of ways. Most importantly, it comes with a big new feature: local split screen support for up to eight players, instead of just four.

You want a really big TV for this one, because it will be hard to see where you're going in any case. But I have been in the situation multiple times where we had a group of more than four players. The only way to play together locally would have been to set up a second TV and a second Nintendo Switch... So, this new solution is certainly a lot more convenient, which adds another selling point over Mario Kart World.

It's a simple scenario: you want to play together with five people in the same room. Do you take turns, so you can play Mario Kart World, or do you simply play Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, which also happens to have three times as many courses? The answer seems clear.

And this is what makes this update so remarkable. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is the best selling Nintendo Switch game by a long shot, with 71.5 million copies as of today, and the most extensive Mario Kart game in existence. Upgrading it to 4k resolutions and with a local eight-player-mode may even be a reason to finally buy into a Nintendo Switch 2 for a number of people. However, this is fierce competition for the new game, Mario Kart World.

They've also added the CameraPlay feature from Mario Kart World to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe with this one. Though, I don't know of any people who actually use this... With Nintendo I'm usually okay with sharing some of my data, but being filmed by a camera while playing goes too far with the privacy intrusions. A voice chat is more than enough for online play.

Anyway, Mario Kart Word is also bound to get some more free updates for the upcoming Knockout Tour Rallies. I suspect that these updates will also have some nice surprises in store, just to keep Mario Kart World interesting next to its older and beefier sibling.

Terranigma – Rebirth Announced

Terranigma is one of those classic Action RPGs this blogs has covered in its early days and then never mentioned again... Mainly because this game never has reappeared in any way or form, where I had been hoping for a Virtual Console release ever since the Wii. Well, Clear River Games is set out to change this. They simply went to Square Enix and asked them if they could bring this game back, which is going to happen next year. You can watch their  trailer on Youtube.

Calling this a "remaster" would be an overstatement, however. It's actually more of a port of the SNES game to all modern systems, where they even kept the 4:3 screen format. You get some additional info at the side of the screen and some quality of life updates, but that's really it. Oh, and there is a new artwork by the original game's character designer, Kamui Fujiwara (source: jpgames.de).

To be perfectly honest... I'm not all that excited. While I absolutely loved the game back in the day, there are certain aspects where it hasn't aged all that well. Personally, I would have preferred a full-blown remake with pretty visuals, but this is certainly better than nothing. Still, I probably would have been more excited if Nintendo simply had added this to their NSO library after all those years.

The Legend of Zelda: Anniversary Edition?

In the recent leak about the 40th Anniversary you can see how Nintendo made prominent use of the 8-Bit Link from the classic The Legend of Zelda, featuring the above the sprite art. Considering that Ocarina of Time will likely become their biggest hit for the later year, this is rather curious and has me thinking that they may also want to do something special with the first game.

Back in February, I discussed how a remake in the style of Link's Awakening could look like, but maybe they want something in the game's original 8-bit style. And one of the most interesting things would probably be the "2D Zelda prototype" that was made during the development for Breath of the Wild:

They could realize this as a full game, or remake the original The Legend of Zelda with the same physics systems, where you can burn down entire forests or swim freely across the rivers with a self-made raft. Something like that.

Alternatively, they could take the NES classic and turn it into some kind of multiplayer experience. Nintendo loves doing quirky stuff for their Nintendo Switch Online service, sometimes even time-limited, like Super Mario Bros. 35.

Or we might be looking at a basic "Zelda Maker", which only supports the classic 8-bit style, but let's you freely make entire game worlds with a number of dungeons. You may even be able to recreate the BS-X Zelda maps in this one.

These are just some ideas, but I have the feeling that the 40th Anniversary will have one surprise in the stores for us, which the majority of the audience out there isn't expecting right now. Everyone has their eyes on the Ocarina of Time remake and the Zelda movie, where I have high hopes for both of these, but this leaves room for something unusual in the middle of all the hype.

The Legend of Zelda 40th Anniversary Leak

There have been quite some worries all around the internet whether Nintendo has forgotten / skipped the 40th Anniversary of Zelda, despite the fact that the 30th Anniversary wasn't initiated until September 2016 either. Well, if you have followed this blog, then you will know that there never have been any doubts, especially with the remake of Ocarina of Time coming later this year.

However, just like with this remake, things got leaked in advance, before Nintendo could give us an official announcement. There are photos floating around of upcoming merchandise, which includes a logo for the anniversary on the package. This looks to be 100% legit with several sources confirming this. Apparently, there already have been leaks last month about this topic, which somehow eluded me... But it all lines up. Don't read the rest of the article if you still want to be surprised.

Zelda Movie: Casting Rumors

There have been some rumors from Deadline about the cast of the upcoming The Legend of Zelda movie and they are quite interesting. First of all, Dichen Lachman will indeed play Impa, where we already have seen leaked photos of her next to Bo Bragason, the actress of Zelda, during filming.

Uli Latukefu will apparently play Ganondorf. He is best known for Young Rock, but also starred in Alien: Covenant, or Black Adam.

Then we have Yvonne Strahovski in the role of some queen. Maybe it's the queen of Hyrule, where she has a similar role to Sonia, or possibly she could play the queen of the Zora. In any case, I'm a big fan of her, where I liked her in Chuck, Dexter, and The Handmaid's Tale. These would be exciting news if they were true.

Not as exciting as the biggest star in this list, however. According to the reports, Sam Neill will be in the movie, which would be tremendous in a sorrowful way. Sadly, he has passed away last month, on July 13th, which could make this his final role. He would probably play the king of Hyrule if these rumors were true. Alternatively, he could play an elder sage, like Rauru.

On a site note, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth can currently be seen in the third season of House of the Dragon. And his performance there really sold me on the idea of him playing Link. He is such a good casting choice that this already making me a lot more confident on the movie.

We will probably get a first trailer, where all of these casting rumors could be confirmed or debunked, next month in a September Nintendo Direct. It's likely going to be as with the September Direct from last year, where they have done the same for the Super Mario Galaxy Movie with the 40th Anniversary of Super Mario Bros.

40th Anniversary of Metroid

On August 6th 1986, メトロイド (Metroid) was released for the Famicom Disk System in Japan. Much like Mario and Zelda before it, this game has defined an entire gerne and spawned a major video game franchise, followed by seven more titles (including re-imaginings of the first two), a whole subseries with six games, and a single spin-off (Metroid Prime Pinball).

These numbers already give away, however, that this franchise has been living in the shadows of its slightly older siblings. Tears of the Kingdom alone has sold more than the entire Metroid series combined. It is more of a niche and Nintendo often treats it that way. While both Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda have seen multiple official anniversary celebrations over the last two decades, this has yet to happen for Metroid. But there is a first time for everything...

Given, it may have to share the spotlight with the 40th Anniversary of Zelda, where Nintendo has yet to initiate it, with the upcoming Ocarina of Time remake at the forefront. But Metroid could see some announcements of its own in the near future, whether they are tied to the anniversary or not. First and foremost, there has been a leak of a new Metroid game by MercurySteam, following Metroid Dread, which seems to be very much legit and would be exciting news.

And there also have been rumors that Super Metroid could see a remake in a pixel art style. Well, if Super Metroid ever were to get remade, it certainly would become much more faithful than Zero Mission and Samus Returns, but this sounds a little too faithful. Though, it also sounds like something special that could get released for an anniversary. And depending on how this is done and gets received, this could develop a new trend for remastering 2D games from Nintendo.

Otherwise, it would be nice if Metroid Dread got updated for the Nintendo Switch 2 or if Metroid: Samus Returns got remastered at some point, where such a remaster could be released for both the Nintendo Switch and Switch 2. There are many possibilities to keep MercurySteam busy, though a new game is certainly the preferred choice.

We probably won't hear from Retro Studios during the 40th Anniversary, since Metroid Prime 4: Beyond isn't even one year old, but maybe we will get a remastered version of Metroid Prime 2: Echoes before Prime 5 comes out. Technically, the anniversary will last for one year from now on, so there would be still time to announce and release something in 2027.

 

Happy 40th Anniversary, Metroid!