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Eiji Aonuma Wants To Preserve Freedom For Future Zelda Games
Eiji Aonuma, the series boss for all things Legend of Zelda, wants to make Breath of the Wild's sense of freedom a key aspect of future games, the producer told IGN UK.
After Breath of the Wild's critical acclaim, fans and reviewers praised the game's complete freedom of choice to go anywhere you want or even defeat Ganon right off the plateau. This feeling of leaving Link completely untethered is something Aonuma wants to keep for 3D Zelda games in the future.
"You know, I can't speak to what other people, other companies will do in their own games, but I think for me, especially just in terms of the Zelda series, the incredible freedom that this game offers you and how well that's been received…to me, it means that freedom, that level of freedom is something that needs to be maintained in Zelda games going forward," Aonuma said. "My eyes have been opened to how important that is."
Aonuma announced a few weeks ago on Nintendo Power's podcast that Breath of the Wild has ended development with the latest piece of DLC and stated that production on the next game has begun in the latest Zelda encyclopedia.
Our Take
That freedom meant you can do dungeons in any order, but it also means that every area in the game was designed as if the player was encountering it before anything else. That lead to some dungeon design being flattened out so hopefully they can nail that aspect next time, too.
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