Mr Nash
square pies = communism
http://www.armchairempire.com/Interviews/eiji-aonuma-legend-zelda-twilight-princess.htm
If you could explain to somebody that has never played a Zelda game what is a Zelda game about?
If I was trying to get them to buy a Zelda game?
Yes. If they asked, What will I find in a Zelda game? Why should I play a Zelda game?
To me Zelda is a game that isnt really a game. Its really a place that you go a place where you go to touch things in the world and interact with them and you explore and you experience this vast world all around you. And thats really what its about. Its about experiencing something you can never experience on your own. And while the game does have fighting and enemies that you battle against, its also about learning new skills and learning new ways to attack and fight these enemies, thereby finding ways to defeat them more easily. So, its a place where you go this vast field, this vast world that you go to experience and see whats there and find the hidden secrets.
Links transformation to the wolf; will that be something that happens on a cycle, like night time, full moon or any time he wants to turn into a wolf, he can turn into a wolf?
I think a lot of people probably were guessing that perhaps the moon comes out and Link transforms into a wolf, but thats not actually the case. This time, in the game the kingdom of Hyrule has been transformed into this twilight realm a dark magic power has overtaken the land. Link, who has grown up outside Hyrule, when he enters this twilight realm, its in there that he gets transformed into the wolf.
Is Link able to jump between these two realms?
Its not two worlds really, what it is is one world and a section of the world has been covered in this twilight. So, when Link goes into the twilight then he gets transformed. And in order to get back out of the twilight he has to find a way to drive the twilight back push it back further toward the source.
Do the mechanics of the combat change when Link is a wolf? Compared to regular combat?
The other games have always had strong swordplay. With Wind Waker we added a lot of very special moves that were unique to that game where depending on how you were fighting the enemies you could do certain special moves to swing around and attack in different ways. So one thing were focusing on doing this game, is really expanding upon that so that we can help the game feel more realistic. So thats going to be a very strong focus, whereas with the wolf gameplay what were doing is, in addition to improving upon that kind of standard Zelda combat weve seen over the years, building upon that with the wolf, we can really change that around. Obviously, the wolf cant use a sword or shield. Instead he partners up with this mysterious character that you saw in the trailer riding on the wolfs back. Together those two characters are able to fight the enemies in the twilight realm.
Are there going to be a lot of side quests alongside the main quest?
As I was explaining before, Zelda is really about the full experience. Instead of just being a simple game where you go from one dungeon to the next and work your way to the end of the game, its really about the entire world the events that are going on outside the main quest and things that weve hidden throughout the land for the players to find. We will be providing a lot of those sidequests and things like that.
I read somewhere that youd love to create a game that includes cooking and baking. Could we expect to see something like that in Zelda?
[laughter] That is kind of a personal thing that I still think about. If Link were to cook, I think that would probably surprise a lot of people. But who knows, maybe it will happen. In the game, Link has empty bottles and he can put items and liquids in. And when hes got liquids in the bottle you see him drink the liquid so you can see Link drinking, but you never see him sitting at a table and eating. That would be kind of fun to add to the game.
What has been the hardest part about bringing Link from the toon-shade style to the more mature, dark look it is now?
One thing we were focused on in Wind Waker was creating a seamless cartoon experience. In doing so, it required this deformation of the animation where you had to really create character models that were very cartoon-like and then animate them in ways that were very natural and cartoon. And we found in shifting from toon-shaded graphics to the realistic graphics, a lot of the functionality that we built into the Wind Waker engine in order to achieve that very fluid and smooth animation actually got in the way of trying to create realistic graphics. Essentially we had to build upon the Wind Waker engine and almost replace it with a new type of engine that was better suited towards creating realistic graphics and doing more realistic animation.
In Wind Waker there was such an emphasis on music and harmony. Will music and maybe use of an ocarina be used for anything in this Zelda game?
One thing that you can see in the playable version here at the show, is that in the game there are reed whistles grass that forms reeds that Link can pick up an blow into. The sounds that they play are kind of set from the beginning but each of the different types of reed whistle will do a different thing. You can pick it up and blow it and it will play a song and cause something to happen. Thats one element where music would be important music has always been an important element of all the Zelda games. Another idea we have, in terms of being able to control sounds yourself is doing something with the wolf that might have some effect. Were not showing it here at the show but [you should look forward to that in] the future.
Are the familiar musical themes going to appear in Twilight Princess? And who is composing the music for the game?
The Zelda music in general has been handled by a gentleman Koji Kondo. And while he has moved on and is more a sound producer now, it is his team that will is producing the music.
But the themes will be recognizable? I remember when Ocarina of Time came out, I was actually doing demos for it in movie theatres. And when people heard that familiar tune there was quite a reaction to that people have quite an emotional attachment to the music. Will those references be strong in terms of getting an emotional response from people?
Zelda has a very strong musical past. With a lot of the past games, including Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker, we have taken themes from the original game and reworked those in ways that make it sound new and fresh, yet they still sound familiar. And think thats a very good way for us to continue to create music for the Zelda games.
