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If it wasn’t already obvious by the title of this post, the following piece is free of Tears of the Kingdom spoilers.
Before becoming the Zelda fanatic I am today, I used to work at a high school summer camp. I specifically helped make promotional material such as merchandise, flyers, social media posts, and especially videos. My job was to give students a taste of what this awesome camp was like and inspire them to visit us.
My job had one very important rule though. I was told I could not include specific parts of the camp in my promotional videos and posts. This included the go-kart racing, the “mud day” activities, and the super cool obstacle course they had deep in the woods. It really frustrated me at first. Those were some of the coolest parts of the camp! How could I just keep this information to myself when I know this is something students would really want to see?
But then I looked back on my experiences taking students to these places for the first time. These activities were kept secret. They were all hidden in the trees far beyond the camp grounds, so no one saw them until they were led to them for the first time. I wish I could express the sheer amount of joy and wonder when these students first set foot in each of these locations. All we did was tell them we had something planned, then they followed us through the trees until we stumbled upon the activity. Each day was a new adventure that they weren’t even planning on experiencing. The team at camp knew what they were doing. They knew how to keep these kids on an adventure and always wondering what’s next.
I remember discovering things like that for the first time as a child. Shigeru Miyamoto remembers that feeling too. His adventures as a child are what inspired him to create The Legend of Zelda.
"I wanted to create a game world that conveyed the same feeling you get when you are exploring a new city for the first time. How fun would it be, I thought, if I could make the player identify with the main character in the game and get completely lost and immersed in that world?"
- Shigeru Miyamoto, speaking about his goals for the original NES game The Legend of Zelda in an interview published in 1989.
Miyamoto and his team have succeeded time and time again in creating a world to immerse us in. Every Zelda game I have played in the past has made me feel like I was in a new world. There is always an art behind their world-building and how the information, locations, and characters are presented to us. It takes immense skill to not only create a game, but to create an adventure.
People who are spreading images, videos, gameplay, and other sorts of information about Tears of the Kingdom early are disrupting this creative flow. What once felt like a magical adventure is now becoming just a pile of information dumped at our feet. What is the point in absorbing the information early from random sources online? Do you want quick and easy entertainment, or do you want an actual adventure?
I understand that 4 years is a long time to wait for a new game. We all may feel starved for information, but if you snack too much on leaks then you will be full by the time the main meal is prepared. It will not be a satisfying type of full either. The feeling will be similar to regretting eating too many chocolate bars in one sitting. It was good at the moment, but now it hurts your stomach and it will be hard to truly appreciate that wonderful meal the Zelda team has been carefully crafting for you all of this time.
The team behind Zelda is full of human beings just like you and I. Their work is a passion project. They took their time making this something you will never forget, just like how my camp prepared each and every day to be an experience like no other. Remember to slow down, appreciate what is being made for you, and respect the art behind adventure.