Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Hyrule Warriors: Expansion Ideas

Following my previous post for new characters I already put some thoughts into potential updates for Hyrule Warriors, what I would like to see and such... of course these update ideas can be split into smaller packs or may be content for a sequel. The character ideas I already explained in previous posts, so I will focus on things like stages and troops in the explanations.

Extreme Legends

  • New characters: Cia (Staff), Volga (Lance), Wizzro (Ring), Linkle (Crossbow), Nabooru (Axe), Twinrova (Brooms), Groose (Cannon), Batreaux (Scythes), Yeto (Fish)
  • New weapon types: Copy Rod (Midna), Net (Agitha), Whip or Fishing Rod (Linkle)
  • New weapon skins: Skull Hammer (Darunia)
  • New stages: Gerudo Fortress, Sand Sea, Snowpeak Ruins, Outset Province
  • New troops: Zora, Gerudo, LD-301
  • New captains: Gerudo Warrior, Zora Warrior, Iron Knuckle, Scervo, Skipper

This is basically an expansion of what we already have, meaning new characters, weapons, stages and troops from the Hyrule Warriors universe and the three games Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword.

I think they should start simple with making the original villain trio playable and maybe adding Groose and Linkle. Since having some female Link wouldn't make much sense in the storyline, they should introduce Linkle as Link's sister and maybe even call her Aryll. I thought, it would be interesting to have Link's home as a battlefield, which I called "Outset Province". Could be some kind of village map.

In total I aimed at three heroes and one villain for each era. So, Skyward Sword gets two more heroes, Groose and Batreaux, Ocarina of Time gets Nabooru and Twinrova, while Twilight Princess only gets Yeto - but it is currently the game with the most characters anyway.

There's also one new stage per era... but I realize that we would have one too many desert stages with my ideas. We already got Lanayru Valley and the Gerudo Desert, so adding the Gerudo Fortress (+ Desert Colossus) and the Sand Sea might be overdoing it. However, that's where the interesting characters and awesome new troops come from. The game really needs more variety in the troops, right now you keep fighting Bokblins, Stalchilds, Bulblins, Hyrule Soldiers and Gorons all over again.

As for how the troops work, I realized that the Skipper will most likely just be a robot captain similar to King Bulblin and not a playable character. The robot troops would be led by Fi. With the Zora it would be awesome to have the Zora Warriors from the Nintendo DS games as their captains, which resembled the classic hostile River Zora from the older 2D games.

Concerning Twilight Princess, the only interesting thing left would be Snowpeak as an ice stage, maybe with Yeto as a character. I guess, you could even have ice troops made out of Chillfos, Freezards and Darkhammers...


Termina Warriors

  • New characters: Fierce Deity Link (Helix Sword), Skull Kid (Mask), Deku Princess (Pipes), Mikau (Guitar)
  • New weapon types: Bongos (Darunia)
  • New stages: Clocktown, Woodfall, Pirate Fortress
  • New troops: Deku, Garo
  • New captains: Deku Warrior, Garo Master, Gomess
  • New bosses: Odolwa

Majora's Mask should be the first game to expand to, since it provides the necessary visuals and lots of good potential. Again, it's a total of three heroes, one villain and three stages for this era.

Next to the funny Dekus, I thought it would be interesting to have Garos as troops. They match the established troop designs very well and could have Garo Masters and Gomess as their captains. Of course overall Stalchilds could just work for the Clocktown setting.

While Mikau might provide a different enough character from Ruto, who also fits the entire style of the game very well, being a rockstar and such, I can't say the same for Darmani. It might be more interesting to give Darunia a second moveset based on the character. Overall I didn't have all too many ideas for secondary weapon types and we really have a lot of one weapon characters...

I don't know, if they would add any bosses. Right now we have one boss for each item and the Imprisoned, who's designed around using special attacks. But the way each boss works is that you knock them down for their weak point phase. Not many bosses qualify here for something that fits in the established mechanics. But Odolwa might be worth a shot for something different, where you can bring him down with any attack, but he's very quick on the battlefield.


Lorule Warriors

  • New characters: Ravio (Bracelet), Hilda (Scepter), Yuga (Brush)
  • New stages: Lorule Field

Ravio would use all the items from his shop for different combo attacks and specials, which get pooled by the Bracelet as a quite special weapon type. It's basically a weapon that lets you use many different items at once. In a way that's similar to Ghirahim's Demon Blade, only a little crazier. And Yuga naturally would fight with painting attacks, maybe even with paintings coming to life. I don't really have any great ideas for Hilda except for using dark tentacles with her scepter, but that's a start... Ravio and Hilda would both math the designs of Link and Zelda in the game.

With Lorule Field I could actually see them using the Hyrule Field stage from the beginning of the game and just redesign it in the visuals of Lorule. So, instead of a river, you get a huge dark gorge dividing the battlefield, etc.

This would actually be a nice and small pack, so maybe...


Other games

Well, as I pointed out in an earlier post, the characters from Oracle games were already used as a source of inspiration for Lana, Cia, Volga and Wizzro. And with the whole Capcom suing Koei thing recently, I doubt that we will see anything from the Capcom Zeldas in Hyrule Warriors. We also already know that Capcom has the rights to the music (they couldn't play songs from their Zelda games at the Symphony of the Goddesses), so that's already a problem.

I honestly don't think that we will see any characters or environments from any of the Toon Zelda games, because they just don't fit visually and reworking them might destroy their original charme. Overall I expect to see more references like the Wind Waker or the Deku Leaf, but nothing from the actual Hero of Wind era. But never say never. Byrne for example could make an interesting fighter... but actually touching the railway Hyrule might be too early at this point, especially if we have more fitting games left to chose from.

1 comment:

Lankelink said...

Now it's speculation time again! They have just announced 4 new packs, which will add 3 new characters (1 from TP and 2 from MM). Also, the villains will be playable (and free!)