Earlier this year, it was revealed that Metroid Prime developer Retro Studios had pitched an idea for a new Legend of Zelda title called Heroes of Hyrule that would play a lot like Final Fantasy Tactics.
Well, as promised by Did You Know Gaming, the channel has now released a follow-up video that explores more aspects of the cancelled project after gaining access to the full design document from Retro Studios.
As a quick reminder, Heroes of Hyrule would take place decades in the past and feature three playable characters: Dunar the Goron, Seriph the Rito, and Krel the Zora. According to the new video, however, this is only part of the complete game.
While you'd play as the titular Heroes of Hyrule for "two thirds" of the game, the other third takes place in the "present day", during which you play as a young boy called Kori (pictured nestled between the Heroes of Hyrule in the above image). It's here where you'd experience more traditional Zelda gameplay with real-time exploration and role-playing. You won't encounter dungeons or experience combat, but instead spend your time interacting with the town's residents and carrying out events and mini-games.
As Kori completes more objectives, he obtains pages from the 'Book of Ganon', which subsequently unlocks adventures featuring the Heroes of Hyrule, and it's here that the game will revert back to the past and allow you to play out each adventure. This is where the gameplay moves away from the more traditional Zelda approach and instead opts for something bearing more resemblance to Final Fantasy Tactics.
Of course, Heroes of Hyrule never materialised, with Nintendo rejecting the pitch before any kind of gameplay prototype could be completed, urging Retro Studios to work on Metroid Prime 3: Corruption instead. There's plenty more information in the video itself, so we'd highly recommend you watch the whole thing; it's an eye-opening look into what could have been had Retro been allowed to follow through with its idea.
Let us know in the comments what you think of Heroes of Hyrule! Did Nintendo miss a trick with this, or was it wise to focus on Metroid Prime 3?
[source youtube.com]
Comments 21
Very unsatisfying to see that no explanation was provided for this game's rejection. From the description of the pitch in this video, it sounds amazing and unique.
Maybe back then Nintendo were much more protective of what "Zelda" was allowed to be, before they eventually allowed it to become a Warriors game or a Necrodancer game.
Either that or they just didn't want Retro to make Zelda because they needed them to make a third Metroid right there and then, and any pitch at all would have been rejected just for not being Metroid.
Very sad that we don't get to play this game, but very interesting to learn about it.
Perhaps once Retro Studios is finished with Metroid Prime 4, we'll get to see them take a shot at The Legend of Zelda, assuming Donkey Kong isn't on their list at the moment.
@EarthboundBenjy
To be fair, one of the reasons why Hyrule Warriors and Cadence of Hyrule exist is because Link is playable, whereas this game didn't feature such and Nintendo probably didn't want to alienate fans; this is also probably the reason why Ancient Stone Tablets was never re-released outside of the Satellaview.
The more I hear about this the less it sounds like Zelda. While Nintendo experiments more with the IP now (well more obviously. It isn’t like they haven’t farmed out the IP before) I can see why they would have been wary at the time. I do wonder if it paved the way for the champion set up in BOTW. Not in a let’s repurpose it but more it exists in the nebulous soup of influences the devs pull from.
Retro Studios has turned into something of a disaster for the past decade. It’s been a LONG time since we’ve seen a game from them.
This makes me think of the GBA FF Tactics Advance for some reason. I like the idea a lot. Like others, I'm guessing not playing as Link might've been the bridge too far.
@Hero-of-WiiU Why does that make it a disaster, exactly?
@Ryu_Niiyama It's intresting how it's similar to the champions. Two people can have similar ideas, so could be coincidence, but it could also have been influenced, in some way, by this. Like you said.
I used "two people can" to simplify what I wanted to say. Of course you could say two developers, two companies, two studios, two teams, just Nintendo and Retro Studios, etc, instead, if you want.
I would like to see a Zelda game where you play as Zelda as your main. It seems fitting, tho I always will like playing as link, I think having every game titled legend of Zelda is a bit limiting for this series. I think of a game like majoras mask and links awakening as examples, these games didn’t really have much to do with Zelda at all. The adventures of link is a bit more like it but legend of Zelda sounds so good after all these years.
@MarioFan432 It is always interesting the things that influence and nurture ideas. Majora’s Mask (and OOT) already introduced the concept of others just as important to the story as the main trinity and Zelda has been fleshing out it’s NPCs for years but I have always loved BOTW’s take as even though you are Link again it feels like he is part of something bigger than him. I feel like other Zelda games tried but BotW hit that sweet spot. The world moved on without him. And even under constant threat (that Zelda held at bay) people lived their lives as best they could.
I'm curious about what would have happened if this project has been greenlit. The concept seems quite interesting on paper.
I do think I get why it never did see the light of day though. It's definitely more spinoff material, and historically Nintendo has always been pretty protective of the Zelda IP with a few exceptions. The stance has relaxed a little in recent years, but the series sets quite a high bar; I agree that bar should be maintained.
I like the idea of playing someone other than Link in a world where Link is doing his thing. The book concept feels both fun and a little tenuous, and a little derivative of The Neverending Story. Also focus on item gathering over levelling up and XP sounds a fun and quite Nintendo twist on a genre staple.
It would be interesting to know the reason it never went forward, and maybe frustrating too. But it's nice to see that some elements, somehow, seeped into BotW with the Guardians. I wonder if those extra Divine Beasts and the Guardians that would have come with them had not been cut, if we'd be making the comparisons so freely?
I can see why both games had the Goron, Rito and Zora species represented, they are the most iconic and the Gerudo addition rounds them out nicely. Had we also got a Picori, Korok, Sheika, Twili, Hylian etc and 6-8 Guardians would we immediately think of them when we see this? The actual characters seem quite different after all.
Shame this never got off the ground. But outside a fun take on a strategy game with the Zelda license, Nintendo probably thought there weren't "enough new ideas" to do the project. They've always been weird about what is greenlit.
Keeping in mind this was right around when the first Fire Emblem was released in the West. The genre was unproven in Nintendo's eyes outside whatever sales numbers were for Advance Wars. Pitched today, this might have a better shot at becoming a reality.
Makes you appreciate how many ideas are left on the cutting room floor.
@Ryu_Niiyama I feel like even Twilight Princess did that, with exploring Hyrule Castle Town and creating the Twilight Realm and those living in it. Yep it's true, BOTW does that. It kind of makes sense that we are always Link, at least so far. As they base the stories on us playing him... It's good to make the world more alive with other characters, so it makes sense they try to add that in and keep improving upon the idea. And it is good they do! It does a lot for BOTW, even in OOT as you said. Having all the different races is great and helps a lot.
Of course Nintendo rejects something potentially interesting like this and greenlights a billion crappy musou spinoffs.
Too bad it didn't happen. This seems interesting.
Seems like an interesting take on the franchise, but my totally unverified take on this is that Ninty was already in the early stages of developing Breath of the Wild and rejected it as they bear too many similarities, particularly with the heroes.
Still sounds like a game I could get into.
This is a pitch, not a game. It has never existed and never will. What would happen if Nintendo revealed all the pitches they have ever received from internal and external partners? There are bound to be several far more interesting and ambitious than this. Would your mind be blown forevermore? The thing is, unless there's a game at the end of the equation, an idea is worthless. We can come up with ideas all day, they are really not worth anything.
Also, as a personal opinion, I don't like the idea. Zelda doesn't need a tactical spin off. Would I play it if it existed? Yes, but it doesn't. Blaming Nintendo and/or Retro for a failed pitch that you have little to no insight on and normally shouldn't even know of is plain dumb. There are hundreds of projects like it that we never hear of. They don't get picked because other games are considered higher priority. It's that simple, resources are limited.
@Olliemar28 Perhaps disaster wasn’t the right word, but more so a disappointment. They are still elite at game making but hard to judge that when we haven’t seen anything new from them in so long.
Sounds interesting. I would like to have seen how that might have been.
Thank god they went with Link's Crossbow Training instead.
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