During today’s Nintendo Direct presentation, Reggie Fils-Aime announced that a new top-down The Legend of Zelda “set in the world” of the 1992 Super NES classic The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past will be released across North America for the 3DS during the upcoming Holiday 2013 season.
While this new game — which has so far only been referred to as The Legend of Zelda — takes place in the game world of A Link to the Past, it features an original storyline and has completely new dungeons. Nintendo has said that the main goal with this new 3DS Zelda title is to “reinvigorate the flat 2D world” of the Super NES classic, giving it a sense of “height and volume” by using the handheld’s 3D screen. This new mechanic will allow players to more easily see differences in the height of levels in the environment, and provide new puzzles to solve based on those differences.
The new The Legend of Zelda game also gives Link the ability to become a drawing and move along walls within in the game world (similar to the PSN exclusive Sideways). When Link uses this ability the top-down viewpoint of the game changes perspective to show a 3D world, where players can see the connections between areas that could not be observed before. Nintendo promised that this new mechanic will “play a key role” in solving many of the game’s puzzles.
We have include some screenshots (taken from the Nintendo Direct presentation) of the upcoming 3DS The Legend of Zelda in the gallery below, and you can also check out gameplay footage of the title in the embedded Nintendo Direct video by skipping ahead to the 35:10 mark. Additionally, a new 3D video of the game should be available to download from the Nintendo 3DS eShop right now.
Look for more coverage on this all-new The Legend of Zelda game for the 3DS as we get closer to its release this coming Holiday season.
