Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

[Arcadenik]

I loved The Wind Waker and I wish both Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks were on the Gamecube and the Wii, respectively. They would have looked so amazing on my TV, especially with the superior graphics from The Wind Waker.

Anyway, did Niko say anything about Tetra, the pirates, and the previous Link in this game? Is Alfonzo really the son or grandson of Gonzo (they look so much alike!). Who is Malladus, really? He is a train so is he fueled with coal made of Ganondorf's body-turned-stone? Was he a man originally and turned into a train?

[Da Robot]

BUMP!

Iwata Asks: Zelda handheld history.

Includes the development of Link's Awakening and even talk about the appearances/cameos of other Nintendo characters in that game (that we already know about but it's interesting to see Nintendo employees talk about it).

[The Qu]

Interesting. It seems Bowser and Ganon are both based on the Demon Bull King from the Journey to the West. That's really quite odd that both share the same genesis- quite awesome too!

[Shrikeswind]

So, basically, they just kinda made LA just for fun. I see.

[Koopaul]

They say they couldn't get away with some of the things they did then now. Man, it must be hard for new creative ideas to get out there with all these restrictions. Back then it must've been easier...

[Shrikeswind]

They probably couldn't get away with it then. The way they're talking, LA was pretty much just a developer's playground. It sounds like Joy Mech Fight with Link, and everyone loved the in-jokes or didn't catch them, so release could happen. It's possible they did talk with a HAL rep, but were all "Dude, this game we're making's hilarious. Check that ball out. That's an en-oh crap he ate me." "Oh man, is that Kirby? Dude, that's awesome. If you release this, that stays."

[Johans Nidorino]

Link's Awakening certainly introduced many things that may be overlooked, like the Bomb Arrows, the fishing game, the ability to choose from more than one tune to play with an instrument, and the jokes with the beehives.

I know that the Oracle games were stated in the past to have been first planned as remakes of classic Zelda, but this is the first time I directly read it. I see evidence in those rooms where you obtain items in dungeons, the return of the Magical Boomerang (which later evolved with the DS interface), and the presence of the Old Men.

[Koopaul]

No I mean actually being able to make "playground games" A game with no restrictions.

I doubt Nintendo employees could make a playground game today.

[Boo Destroyer]

Those are mainly referred to as "sandbox games". But that term works too, as it's pretty much the same idea.

I'd love to see what Nintendo can do with those types of games, with which series. I recall Flip thought of it once with Mach Rider.

[Dances in Undergarments]

I don't think that is what Koopaul is referring to at all.

[Koopaul]

Yeah I mean something different. They described it in the interview as an "after school" game. Something they were developing for fun and without certain expectations. They had all the freedom... Now I see them doing something like that as impossible.

[Boo Destroyer]

Ah, right!



Now I see what you mean. My mistake. I thought you meant "no gameplay restrictions", but you actually mean "no development restrictions". Okay, there we go!

Well, I don't quite see why they wouldn't have that much freedom even now. It still seems they've got just about anything happening in most recent releases (eh, as far as I know anyway). Do you know of a few examples of where they're limited in what they've been doing lately?

[Dances in Undergarments]

I would imagine it would be pretty hard to do these days because most of the time you'd have a decent size team working on a game, whereas back then you might just have a couple of people (or even one). Its obviously going to be easier for one person to go about doing what they want than a whole team that has been put together with a specific purpose in mind.

That being said, I'd imagine a team like, say, Blizzard, could probably do whatever they want and the publishers would let them get away with it. So I'd imagine its both true and not true, so to speak.

[Boo Destroyer]

Well, you've got it right on the money there. When it's left up to one or a few people, it could very well go the way they planned it and thus, allowing them to smoothly and solidly go with what they like. Very large teams, however, would require a lot of people to agree or disagree on every plan and idea for their games first before bringing them about. All this certainly is something to think about.

One example of the former instance would be Sakurai and Brawl. Granted, that game had quite its development team, but the way the game was laid out with its content and all (pretty much everything about the game) was left entirely in his hands. At least I'm sure that's how it went.