Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment Announced

Let's finally talk about what's one of the biggest surprises from the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct last Wednesday, even though it probably doesn't qualify as news at this point any longer... But I wanted to save the most important topic on this blog for last – the upcoming Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment.

As you may know, I've always been enjoying the Hyrule Warriors games, where it's already been over a decade since the first title on the Wii U. And while playing Tears of the Kingdom it became apparent very quickly that what they had done with Breath of the Wild and Age of Calamity could be easily repeated here. Again, you have a major conflict that unfolds in the distant past, where you only catch glimpses of it via memories. And this conflict is none other than the Imprisoning War, though it's technically not the Imprisoning War we know from A Link to the Past, but something very reminiscent in the rich history of the latest Hyrule. Still, it is a very important historic battle, taking place long before the events of the first Calamity from 10,000 years ago.

There's the one memory, called "The Demon King's Army", which plays in the late game and shows Ganondorf on a fierce horse, leading hundreds and thousands of his monsters into battle. And this was effectively just a commercial for the next Hyrule Warriors – they already knew when they were making this particular cutscene what it would convey. That this is something that the fans want to experience for themselves. So, it made all the sense to follow up on Tears of the Kingdom with this and here we are:

In my predictions about the Future of Zelda from early 2024 this was big on my list, where I expected this around 2026, which may even become true. Though, I honestly did not anticipate this to be revealed already, as one of the first exclusive games to come to the Nintendo Switch 2 within its first year.

But Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity was the game that made me finally buy a Nintendo Switch back in 2020 (after years of waiting for a Zelda edition of the console), so it's only poetic that its successor will likely get me to buy the Nintendo Switch 2. At least this will be happening much sooner this time, because I honestly regret having waited that long with the Switch.

That being said... it looks like the game is running like garbage again. The only aspect of the gameplay in the trailer that tells me that this is in fact a Nintendo Switch 2 game is the sheer amount of enemies. This goes far beyond anything what Age of Calamity was able to pull off and it's very impressive how they were able to translate the tremendous mass of monsters we saw in the Demon's King Army memory into a Warriors game. But I probably would have prioritized performance, because the biggest point of criticism about Age of Calamity was its poor frame rate, where Age of Imprisonment doesn't seem to run any better.

To be fair, the footage was in 4k and there will probably be a performance mode to target a higher frame rate. Maybe things will even get somewhat optimized in the next months, before the game is released. And hopefully they will also update Age of Calamity while they are it, so you can finally enjoy playing it with stable 60FPS.

There is another valid concern and that is how the story will unfold, which is the other problem many people had with Age of Calamity. In its early marketing it looked like we were going to experience a bold new Warriors game that dared to explore one of Hyrule's darkest chapters, the Great Calamity, where the kingdom will ultimately fall to ruin. But that was not what we were getting, instead the game used time travel to unfold an alternate turn of events.

And while it was disappointing, it was also understandable to a degree. They probably didn't want to make a game where all your efforts are in vain, where you lose your fighters and everything ends in a disaster. And naturally they also wanted to make the descendants of the Champions playable – especially Sidon and Riju were big fan favorites that you couldn't just leave out in a Warriors game all about Breath of the Wild. And to be fair, the roster of 21 playable characters (technically even 25) left very little to desire at the end. You have to give them that.

Now, with Age of Imprisonment they are dealing with a backstory that actually ends on a win. The Imprisoning War ends with Rauru and his Sages successfully sealing Ganondorf. And this leads into the events of Tears of the Kingdom. From a story perspective there is really no need to alter the events with even more time traveling...

However, this would cut the roster quite short. We have seen three playable characters so far with Zelda, Rauru and Mineru. The other sages will certainly become playable as well, so that's seven in total, only a third of what Age of Calamity had to offer. Sonia is sadly out of question if they respect the canonical events. Maybe Ganondorf and some of his minions (like Twinrova) will become playable this time in a villain campaign. Maybe they will bring back both the Great Fairies and Hestu, because they have been around for eternities. That would add some more, but it still couldn't compete with the previous title.

But like with Age of Calamity they won't dismiss the descendants. Sidon, Riju, Yunobo and Tulin will most likely become playable as well. They are even getting new amiibo this year, so there is no way that they are going to leave them out of this game. And Link, of course. As much as everyone enjoys the recent spotlight on Princess Zelda, where this will be another big chance for her to shine, Link has to join the fun eventually. The question is how they will pull it off, while respecting the events of the Imprisoning War...

One idea would be to pick up from the epilogue of Tears of the Kingdom, where Princess Zelda asks Link, Purah and the sage descendants to stand with her in order to keep the peace in Hyrule for all time. Well, she probably didn't mean it so literally, but maybe they will find a way to use her time powers to go back into the past and support Rauru in his battle. Well, this would create yet another alternate timeline, but who's counting at this point? (It's three. Three timelines, just like the classic Hyrule.)

So, the game would start with Zelda arriving in the past. Then you would play the events of the Imprisoning War as you know them from Tears of the Kingdom. But after the finale the game's second half unfolds, where Zelda and her team return to the past and alter the timeline, which unlocks many more characters to play as (potentially even Sonia).

I think that this would be the best approach. And overall there is a lot of potential with the ancient Hyrule, because there is so much we have yet to see there, where this will be very exciting. But let's talk more about that in upcoming posts...