Zelda producer apologises for lack of Breath of the Wild 2 updates

Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma has apologised to fans for the lack of updates on The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2.

Speaking during a Nintendo Direct presentation on Wednesday—which was also used to announce The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD—Aonuma said development of the Switch sequel was “proceeding smoothly” and Nintendo planned to provide more details later this year.

“I‘m sure a lot of you saw me and thought there might be news about the sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild game,” he said. “Unfortunately, we don’t have anything to share right now. We apologise.

“Development is proceeding smoothly, and we should be able to bring you some new information this year,” Aonuma added. “For now, we’ll have to ask you to wait just a bit longer.”

Nintendo announced Breath of the Wild 2 in June 2019 with a trailer featuring Link and Zelda together, but the game hasn’t been shown since.

Aonuma previously asked fans for patience during an update in September 2020, when he said the team was working hard “in order to make the vast world you enjoyed exploring in the original game even more impressive”.

In February 2020 it was claimed by a noted Nintendo insider that Breath of the Wild 2’s development was taking longer than expected and that its release would likely miss 2020.

Aonuma confirmed in June 2019 that Breath of the Wild director Hidemaro Fujibayashi had retained his role on the sequel.

In an interview with Game Informer, Aonuma said: “We’re working together really hard on this game. One of the reasons we wanted to create a continuation was because I wanted to revisit that Hyrule again and use that world again, while incorporating new gameplay and new story.”

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Aonuma also said that younger members of the sequel’s development team had drawn inspiration from Red Dead Redemption 2, while Fujibayashi was playing Skyrim during the creation of the original Breath of the Wild.

An abundance of ideas for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild DLC resulted in Nintendo opting to develop a full-blown sequel rather than continuing to add to the original game, Aonuma told Kotaku in 2019.

“When we released the DLC for Breath of the Wild, we realized that this is a great way to add more elements to the same world,” he said. “But when it comes down to technical things, DLC is pretty much data—you’re adding data to a preexisting title. And so when we wanted to add bigger changes, DLC is not enough, and that’s why we thought maybe a sequel would be a good fit.”