Zelda Wii U Delayed, Won't be Shown During E3

By Jorge Ba-oh 27.03.2015 19

Zelda Wii U Delayed, Won

Eiji Aonuma, producer for The Legend of Zelda, has announced a delay for the upcoming Wii U adventure.

With the team uncovering more and more possibilities for the game, new ideas have "sprung forth," teased Aonuma in a video message. The team are no longer making a 2015 release the priority, and instead will aim to make the game the "most complete and ultimate Zelda game."

As I have watched our development progress, I have come to think that rather than work with meeting a specific schedule as our main objective and releasing a game that reflects only what we can create within that scheduled time, I feel strongly that our focus should be to bring all these ideas to life in a way that will make Zelda on Wii U the best game it can possibly be.

Nintendo also confirmed that because of this, the game will not be shown during E3 2015.


 

What are you hoping to see in the next Legend of Zelda game? Are you disappointed in the delay?

Box art for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Developer

Nintendo

Publisher

Nintendo

Genre

Action Adventure

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1

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European release date Out now   North America release date Out now   Japan release date Out now   Australian release date Out now    Also on Also on Nintendo eShop

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I wonder if they mean it won't be playable, or it won't be shown at all?

I can't think of a great reason for not showing anything unless something drastic has happened, like a major change in the visual style we've seen so far.

NNID: crackedthesky
My blog, mostly about writing: http://www.davidjlovato.com

God I hope not, that visual style is fantastic.
(besides, its not like they care much about showing a visual style and changing it later).


Anyway, I am happy enough. Zelda games should take a good long while, and anything trying to pull of Xenoblade sized scope but with Zeldas style progression is sure to take a lot more thinking about then normal.
(I love Xenoblade, but Zelda has vastly more diverse gameplay types that are harder to code and map out.)

I really hope they have some "surprise" big creatures on the map, or even "boss fights" across a vast landscape. SoC like, but with Zelda style puzzles to doing them. 
Even old cliches like "make them run into a wall to stun themselves" become fun when its "make the giant run into a mountain"

http://www.fanficmaker.com <-- Tells some truly terrible tales.
Last update; Mice,Plumbers,Animatronics and Airbenders. We also have the socials; Facebook & G+

It's possibly a good thing for the game, but the Wii U desperately needs a killer game this Christmas to stop the console dying. 

Hmmm so will Starfox be the big push this year then? Perhaps even delay Mario Maker and have that as the killer game. They might as well delay Zelda U until the NX anyway, they should really launch that console with a killer app!

Cheesing It Up said:
It's possibly a good thing for the game, but the Wii U desperately needs a killer game this Christmas to stop the console dying. 

I'm not sure there's really anything to be done regarding the Wii U at this point. Third parties will either hop on board or they won't; they claim low sales yet still push their games for Xbox One, which is hovering around the same number and performs about the same week-to-week as the Wii U. Sure, devs can point out how the Wii U came out a year sooner, but with the latter being barely a year old, all that means is they were extremely quick to give up on Wii U yet extremely willing to keep trying for Xbox One.

The simple fact is that the vast majority of developers who gave up on the Wii U did so as soon as it launched. Extra effort to develop for combined with the fact that it didn't fly off the shelves like the Wii did meant it just wasn't worth their time when that effort could be put into porting their games to PS3 and 360, which were sitting on 80 million units each.

Nintendo has a long history of unnecessary censorship, being overbearing/controlling, putting out weaker hardware, and being slow to catch on to important trends (like unified accounts, for example). They're changing, but slowly. The Wii U was dead on arrival when it had last-gen hardware and no other meaningful changes to the industry. It was just more convenient to abandon it. It's only gotten easier; EA abandoned the Wii U when Nintendo decided not to go with Origin support, and now there's Unreal Engine 4, which a good chunk of future games will be made with, and it doesn't have Wii U support at all.

That said, the other simple fact is that Nintendo can afford to not care. Besides the fact that most industry analysts predict the Wii U still ending up better than the GameCube and Xbox, the company has a long history of staying in business because they're in such a unique position. They have a dedicated enough core to keep them going; no game publisher has published as many games as Nintendo, no game developer has developed as many games as Nintendo, nobody in the industry has as much current IP. Even when their console does terrible, it's passable.

I think very few people, developers or consumers, are still on the fence about the Wii U. Either they've decided they don't want one and probably won't change their mind (but still could), or they're waiting for a particular game to come out, be it Splatoon, Xenoblade, Mario, or Zelda. Those ones are probably going to keep waiting even if that game gets delayed; I saw countless people claim they wouldn't buy Watch_Dogs when it got delayed because they "stopped caring" yet it still sold 4 million copies in its first week. When people want a game, they'll get that game and that system if they actually want it, regardless of when it comes out.

As for the Wii U in 2015, I wouldn't write it off. Nintendo is about to launch a big new IP (Splatoon), they're launching the second entry in another (Xenoblade), Star Fox is likely to still come out, we just got a new Kirby, there's a new Yoshi in the pipeline, Mario Party just launched, we're looking at Devil's Third and a possible localisation of Fatal Frame, most major indie games seem to be headed to the Wii U now, and who knows what surprises we'll get at E3? Should still be getting SMT x Fire Emblem this year, Project Giant Robot, Project Guard, a possible third new IP from Miyamoto, whatever Retro is working on, that mysterious Bandai Namco job posting for a 2015 Smash Bros... March is too soon to call a system "dead" due to one game delay.

What I'd really like to know: Where is Hidemaro Fujibayashi? What is he working on? He hasn't done anything since Skyward Sword, except a few interviews that hinted he was working on Zelda, yet Aonuma appears to be in charge of Zelda U. I wonder if they've moved Fujibayashi back to handheld Zeldas? It's not impossible to get another surprise handheld entry in the series.

NNID: crackedthesky
My blog, mostly about writing: http://www.davidjlovato.com

They'll probably have more things to announce at E3 to cover it, I mean Mario Maker's probably coming out with almost perfect timing for the Super Mario Bros. 30th anniversary. 

Aonuma probably saw Xenoblade X's and thought, "we could do better than that" or something, so they've added more and probably have an unstable build of the game now that will need a lot of fixing after they've added the stuff.

So we'll definitely get Mario Maker and Star Fox in the later half of the year, and I'm guessing Xenoblade X and probably one other game announced at E3 or something. 

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Nintendo definitely need some killer Wii U titles for the end of the year - methinks:

- Another Mario 3D game, the solo Galaxy successor - I reckon, though, that because of interests of time they'll release Galaxy HD, instead.
- A Pokémon Stadium-type game to claw in the Pokémon fans.
- They may release a Zelda-filler, unlikely, but you never know - an HD version of Skyward Sword or TP springs to mind.
- Possibly release Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate on Wii U once the 3DS version has had time to breathe.
- Star Fox won't cut it - it'll be heavily gimmicky and "experimental".
- Nintendo need to up the number of Wii titles being released on the eShop, and definitely bring out HD GameCube remakes to fill the gaps - HD F-Zero, Mario Sunshine etc.

Am hoping for a little trailer, but am curious why it's being completely pulled from the public - maybe a visual style change is what's happening?

I guess Nintendo saw the scope and world of Xenoblade Chronicles X and shat themselves.

Cubed3 Admin/Founder & Designer

Xenoblade-X I think forfills killer game requirements quite nicely.
You dont always need a big IP if you can make a splash.

Nintendo has a long history of unnecessary censorship, being overbearing/controlling, putting out weaker hardware

Their last two consoles isnt a long history.
Priour to the Wii, everything Nintendo did was cutting edge in graphics.

The Gamecube was not remotely underspeced compared to the competition, Xbox had better draw distances, GC had better shaders. Both beat the PS2 hugely when it came to fillrates and polycounts.
Likewise the N64 was more powerful then the PS1 by quite a way.

SNES and Megadrive is interesting, as there was pro's and con's to each. But Mode7 clearly gave the SNES some unique games at the time. 

Untill the Wii the idea Nintendo had inferiour hardware was always a marketing lie. Sony putting out very missleading stats on their systems didnt help (raw polycounts....no one makes pure wireframe games!). 

As for censorship, that does have some long history....but not a recent one.
In the last decade Nintendos been no worse then anyone else, and in some case's better. 
(Like the time Sony was drunk and declared no 2D games on their system for a bit)

Blood/Violence/Gore havnt been a problem on Nintendos system for a VERY long time anyway.

( Edited 28.03.2015 10:11 by Darkflame )

http://www.fanficmaker.com <-- Tells some truly terrible tales.
Last update; Mice,Plumbers,Animatronics and Airbenders. We also have the socials; Facebook & G+

Good! Delays are really a good thing. Hopefully the extra time means that the game is perfect!

It will be nice if they show off something in a Nintendo direct as soon as they have something though.

( Edited 28.03.2015 11:08 by Sandy Wilson )

I own all the consoles, ask me anything

Sounds good to me. The franchise needs some real invasion at this point. A link between worlds was in the right direction but awfully short and still in that Zelda comfort zone. I still haven't totally got the bad taste out my mouth from skyward sword, so anything to develop in a different direct to that is fine by me. Frankly, I've been Zeldaed out for awhile now and would much much rather them take their time on something breathtaking that getting another predictable linear do as you are told story book.

crackedthesky said:
Cheesing It Up said:
It's possibly a good thing for the game, but the Wii U desperately needs a killer game this Christmas to stop the console dying. 

I think very few people, developers or consumers, are still on the fence about the Wii U. Either they've decided they don't want one and probably won't change their mind (but still could), or they're waiting for a particular game to come out, be it Splatoon, Xenoblade, Mario, or Zelda. Those ones are probably going to keep waiting even if that game gets delayed; I saw countless people claim they wouldn't buy Watch_Dogs when it got delayed because they "stopped caring" yet it still sold 4 million copies in its first week. When people want a game, they'll get that game and that system if they actually want it, regardless of when it comes out.


I disagree with this.
The Wii U sells more in the final quarter than the other quarters combined, simply because of Christmas. It's a friendly family console after all. If the big game isn't there many people will simply buy another console to put under the tree and that'll be the end of it. 
Of course timing is important. One of the main reasons Skyward Sword did so poorly (for a Zelda game) is that by the time it was released many people had already given up on the Wii. If it's not out this year I think the same will be true for this title.

( Edited 28.03.2015 12:01 by Cheesing It Up )

Ugh, I can't believe they're doing this AGAIN. By now they should know they always need more time than anticipated. They should have aimed for a spring 2015 release, then it could have been safely delayed to late 2015.

And why don't they get the Mario team to help out? And didn't Monolith work on Skyward Sword? They're done with XCX, so they can help out with this game. Anything to get it done in time!

And this video is either some stupid PR crap (hyping the game by delaying it? riiight), or they actually had very little ambition when they started on this game.

I want to find a Japanese version of that announcement video, without subtitles. I will then make my own fake subs.

Canyarion said:
 And why don't they get the Mario team to help out? And didn't Monolith work on Skyward Sword? They're done with XCX, so they can help out with this game. Anything to get it done in time!

Anyone who helped out with Skyward Sword should be kindly asked not to help. It was not a good game also too many people working on something makes it worse, too many cooks and all that...

However a game delay isn't a bad thing, imagine if they released Zelda on time and it was a mess like Assassins Creed Unity was at launch? They delayed TLoZ:TP and it was amazing hopefully this is them going "damn it guys we can't afford to have another Skyward Sword", because Aonuma pays lots of attention to fan feedback. 

I own all the consoles, ask me anything

Darkflame said:
Xenoblade-X I think forfills killer game requirements quite nicely.
You dont always need a big IP if you can make a splash.

Xenoblade isn't on Zelda's level, though. It's a big game for sure, and JRPGs are getting more popular over here, but there's a reason NOA didn't want to localize it. It's not as big a seller as the Marios and Zeldas or even Kirbys and Donkey Kongs. Who knows though, maybe Xeno 3D and X will start to change that.


Their last two consoles isnt a long history.
Priour to the Wii, everything Nintendo did was cutting edge in graphics.

The weaker hardware part was only in reference to the Wii; what I meant to say is they have a long history of alienating third parties. They've done it different ways over time, weaker hardware is just the latest. I'd also argue it happened before; the N64 had "weaker" hardware in the sense that cartridges were far more limiting than discs when it came to space and ease of development, which (coupled with the other things I mentioned) is what led to Square moving Final Fantasy over to the Playstation.

As for censorship, that does have some long history....but not a recent one.
In the last decade Nintendos been no worse then anyone else, and in some case's better. 
(Like the time Sony was drunk and declared no 2D games on their system for a bit)

Again, my examples were sequential, not simnultaneous. However, I'd also be careful not to call it recent; The Binding of Isaac was supposed to be on 3DS, Nintendo didn't want it because of its themes.

Blood/Violence/Gore havnt been a problem on Nintendos system for a VERY long time anyway.

This is true, and something I wish people would stop propagating. Nintendo has/had Eternal Darkness, Fatal Frame, Bayonetta, and soon Devil's Third. They're not against mature titles, but they're still heavy sticklers when it comes to their image in other ways (see Binding of Isaac, the YouTube partnership fiasco). They're still controlling and overbearing, and they're still losing support because of it. Like I said, they're learning and changing, but they're moving slowly.

Cheesing It Up said:

I disagree with this.
The Wii U sells more in the final quarter than the other quarters combined, simply because of Christmas. It's a friendly family console after all. If the big game isn't there many people will simply buy another console to put under the tree and that'll be the end of it.
Of course timing is important. One of the main reasons Skyward Sword did so poorly (for a Zelda game) is that by the time it was released many people had already given up on the Wii. If it's not out this year I think the same will be true for this title.

Of course timing is important, but I don't think the absence of Zelda in 2015 is going to single-handedly sink the Wii U, that's all. I can't imagine a console Zelda not releasing for the holiday, I don't remember the last time it happened, so I'm pretty apprehensive, too. I don't see this being a year-long delay, but who knows? In any case, the Wii U has done pretty well each holiday quarter even without a Zelda-sized game to back it.

Skyward Sword came out at the end of the Wii's life. I think it's too early to tell if the same can be said for Zelda U. The NX may not be out until 2018; most people are assuming 2017 but nobody knows. I think the mistake Nintendo made with Skyward Sword was releasing it for the Wii and then washing their hands of the whole console for an entire year until the Wii U launched. They should've pulled a Twilight Princess and released an enhanced version for the Wii U at launch, even if it was already a year old by then. The PS4 and Xbox One launched with almost nothing but ports of games that came out the year before and it worked wonders for them.

If the NX is anywhere close to Zelda U's launch, Nintendo should port it up and release it at launch. You get a better lifespan for a late-launching Zelda, a new console launching with a Zelda game, everyone wins.

( Edited 28.03.2015 15:13 by crackedthesky )

NNID: crackedthesky
My blog, mostly about writing: http://www.davidjlovato.com

I rather see it being delayed than released in the horrible state that many games sadly are released in nowadays. But the Wii U needs its last momentum to sell some more systems to make it a worthwhile system for Nintendo to have released. Otherwise I am worried that investors are going to either force Nintendo to leave the hard ware market or go back in line with the others (who are basically releasing nerfed gaming PCs with no specific features at all justifying them over a PC) and that would be sad as then we would have three overly glorified nerfed PC clone-consoles on the console market. Nintendo's systems are a fresh breath of air to me and have very creative and innovative features that makes them highly enjoyable to me to play on as I am getting bored with the western AAA industry.

And as NX release date has been touched. I think holyday season 2017. I am pretty certain Nintendo wants to try to revert the gaming industry back to five year console cycles as that is highly beneficial for Nintendo due to how their consoles and titles are released.

( Edited 28.03.2015 16:55 by Andre Eriksson )

The difference between illusion and reality is vague to the one who suffers from the former and questionable for the one suffering form the later.

HAHAHA WOW so much buthurt in these comments! (call me a troll, call me negative! I don't care!) Also to add the salt E3 2015 is more likely going to suck for nintendo. why? http://mynintendonews.com/2015/03/28/nintendo-says-e3-will-just-be-focussed-on-wii-u-2015-games/ <----- seeeeeee? Smilie hype deflated. so much for wii u being "the next gamecube" (selling 21 million units). wii u's not gonna sell 21 million units, EVER! this had to be said! I'm sorry! it HAD to!

( Edited 28.03.2015 17:14 by gamemasterB )

formally known as brando67854321

gamemasterB said:
HAHAHA WOW so much buthurt in these comments! (call me a troll, call me negative! I don't care!) Also to add the salt E3 2015 is more likely going to suck for nintendo. why? http://mynintendonews.com/2015/03/28/nintendo-says-e3-will-just-be-focussed-on-wii-u-2015-games/ <----- seeeeeee? Smilie hype deflated. so much for wii u being "the next gamecube" (selling 21 million units). wii u's not gonna sell 21 million units, EVER! this had to be said! I'm sorry! it HAD to!

Settle down Smilie

With all due respect to our friends at MyNintendoNews, that's a pretty narrow way of interpreting that statement. Nowhere does it say they will be focusing only on games for 2015, it just says they will be "highlighting" them, meaning they get the most emphasis. This is to be expected; nobody is going to devote their entire E3 conference to games that won't be out this year at the expense of ones that will.

NNID: crackedthesky
My blog, mostly about writing: http://www.davidjlovato.com

crackedthesky said:
gamemasterB said:
HAHAHA WOW so much buthurt in these comments! (call me a troll, call me negative! I don't care!) Also to add the salt E3 2015 is more likely going to suck for nintendo. why? http://mynintendonews.com/2015/03/28/nintendo-says-e3-will-just-be-focussed-on-wii-u-2015-games/ <----- seeeeeee? Smilie hype deflated. so much for wii u being "the next gamecube" (selling 21 million units). wii u's not gonna sell 21 million units, EVER! this had to be said! I'm sorry! it HAD to!

Settle down Smilie

With all due respect to our friends at MyNintendoNews, that's a pretty narrow way of interpreting that statement. Nowhere does it say they will be focusing only on games for 2015, it just says they will be "highlighting" them, meaning they get the most emphasis. This is to be expected; nobody is going to devote their entire E3 conference to games that won't be out this year at the expense of ones that will.

OH BROTHER, there will be ZERO 2016 games at e3 for nintendo, it will be just 2015 games that we heard a million times! so you asking for metroid? STOP ASKING! other M failed that's why you won't see another metroid! what's stupid about that is that other M was sooooo bad and they blamed it on us. it may have sold a million but it made NO PROFIT! I'm so sick of noting this to people. I'm leaving. bye! >=( Also since nintendo has nothing good to announce (see NX, moble DeNa, zelda wii u delay & no 2016 titles @ nintendo's e3 this year), WHERE'S MY NINTENDO DIRECT!!!! oh and controller interface=/=new controller genius (f-zero will come out on wii u bet on it starfox loving f-zero HATER! >=( ) oh and starfox wii u is a episodic game. it will tank like f-zero gx did! starfox after starfox 64 sold like garbage PLUS the remake was a disappointment & also sold like sh*t why is starfox getting a new game and not f-zero since starfox doesn't sell that much better than f-zero!? OH WAIT MIYAMOTO HATES F-ZERO SO MUCH THAT HE TREATS HIS OWN CREATION LIKE A RED HEADED STEP CHILD! >=(

( Edited 29.03.2015 04:26 by gamemasterB )

formally known as brando67854321

So basically, here's what you do:
1. experience freedom of exploration in Zelda
2. discover new possibilities
3. turn those possibilities into reality
4. new ideas spring forth
5. ????
6. Profit

I wonder what the new possibilities could be?
How about mining?
In the same way it was cool to discover random islands in wind waker, perhaps you will be able dig and find things[treasures, cities, dungeons, etc.] in the new Zelda.

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