I've been saying this since... Majora's Mask. The greatest game of all time.
They worked so hard on that Wind Waker engine and art assets... only to discard it after one game. It's a damn shame. They should have made Wind Waker 2 for the GC two years later, saved TP for the Wii, then drop TP 2 two years later, etc. It would suck if Zelda U's engine is used for one game, then we're forced to wait 5 years for the next 3D Zelda.
When I think of Nintendo releasing an awesome, groundbreaking title and a direct sequel, I think of OOT -> MM and Galaxy 1 -> Galaxy 2. All incredible games, all with sequels released soon after, all sequels that share assets with the game that came before it, all sequels that improved upon the original. Why don't they do this more? Must we wait five years between entries in the 3D Zelda franchise?
I'm hoping we see this kind of stuff when Nintendo says they are "creating and releasing first party software at a faster rate". While it's nice to see entirely new gameplay and art assets for nearly every sequel they make, MM and Galaxy 2 prove that Nintendo's endless fountain of innovative IDEAS are what make these games great, not necessarily starting from scratch on the entire engine/art for every game. Save those huge jumps for the next console.
