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Linktober #2: Weapons
Aonuma on weapon durability as a repeating cycle of play, 2017.

Source: Den-fami Nico Game Magazine

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

news.denfaminicogamer.jp/english/1706...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 54. Breath of the Wild Producer. QUOTE: Aonuma: [Breath of the Wild’s item durability system] is a cycle that allows the player to keep playing in such a big world without getting bored. The reason for the repetition of the “taking weapons from the enemy and the weapons gets demolished” is to use it for the cycle. Also, the player has the goal of fighting off the enemies on the plain, instead of just avoiding them.
October 2, 2026 at 5:53 PM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Aonuma on how Breath of the Wild development reminded him of Ocarina of Time, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote, #OcarinaofTimeQuote
#AonumaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/Creating-a-C...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 54. Ocarina of Time Dungeon Director. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Aonuma: Watching everyone [during Breath of the Wild development], I remembered what it was like making Ocarina of Time all those years ago. When Zelda first went 3D there were no rules on how to make 3D games in the way there are now, and it was my first time making a Zelda game, so, in a real sense, I had no idea how to properly create a 3D Zelda game. We had a blank slate. We would think of something, try it, and if it didn't work, do it over. Breath of the Wild was similar. It was a type of game that didn't have defined guidelines for development and which none of us had experienced before. It felt like Ocarina all over again. … I’m very happy we were able to reach such heights once again.
September 18, 2026 at 6:21 PM
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Aonuma on the lack of button remapping in Zelda titles, 2019.

Source: Kotaku

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

kotaku.com/breath-of-th...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 56. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Aonuma: In some ways, if we freely let players do customizations on key assignments and such, I feel like we're letting go of our responsibility as a developer by just kind of handing everything over to the users. We have something in mind for everybody when we play the game, so that's what we hope players experience and enjoy as well. But we understand also that players have a desire for free customization. Q: Also, physically disabled players might not be able to play the way developers intended. Aonuma’s: Definitely, that's a very good point, and that's something we'll keep in mind going forward, thinking about that.
September 5, 2026 at 1:23 AM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Fujibayashi on sparse vs dense areas of Breath of the Wild's world, 2018.

Source: Hyrule Interviews

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#FujibayashiQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/Nintendo-Dre...
PEOPLE: - Hidemaro Fujibayashi, age 45. Breath of the Wild Game Director. QUOTE: Fujibayashi: We divided the [Breath of the m Wild] map into sections resembling checkered flags, and cut this section into ‘dense' and this section into ‘sparse' to balance the terrain, and then asked the people in charge to make it. However, as time passes, the ‘sparse' erodes and the 'dense' spreads. We would request, ‘horses will run there, so please make it flat!
September 3, 2026 at 7:04 AM
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Shinoda on the design of Breath of the Wild's Gorons, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#ShinodaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/Creating-a-C...
PEOPLE: - Hirohito Shinoda. Lead NPC artist for Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Shinoda: [Early in Breath of the Wild] we tried to dramatically change the Gorons' appearance … I made their heads bigger, made them more human-like, and explored a lot of different ideas, but none of them really fit. So I returned to their roots and [leaned] into their design from Ocarina of Time. In recent titles the Gorons have had tattoos, but I thought that due to the anime-like styling of this title, we should aim to make use of empty space rather than trying to fill it, so I went with a very clean design. Rather than just making them round, I paid close attention to the 3D model to ensure they felt like a sumo wrestler, someone with body fat and muscles, and that they looked powerful.
September 1, 2026 at 11:47 PM
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Aonuma on how the move to an open world was informed by the reaction to Skyward Sword, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#SkywardSwordQuote, #BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Producer of Skyward Sword & Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Q: What motivated the choice of such an open, systemic world [for Breath of the Wild] Aonuma: The wish to create an open world game came shortly after Skyward Sword was finished. We realized that the way you flew from one area to another, with no opportunity to walk instead, had frustrated a lot of people who wanted to know what was hidden between the regions. One of the greatest thrills of the Zelda series lies in exploring and looking for hidden things, so after a few preliminary tests, we reckoned that the Wii U had the power we needed to create a satisfying open world—one that would allow players to visit the entire world with no loading times. Everything stemmed from that intention.
August 18, 2026 at 2:52 AM
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Takehara on beautiful nature after the calamity, 2019.

Source: Hyrule Interviews

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#TakeharaQuote, #YonezuQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/Translation-...
PEOPLE: - Manabu Takehara. Breath of the Wild Lead Architecture Artist. - Makoto Yonezu. Breath of the Wild Lead Landscape Artist. QUOTE: Takehara: Something the terrain lead told me when the Breath of the Wild team met together: … “The grass fluttering with the wind”, “The feeling of adventure as you push your way through the grass”, these experiences create presence. He thought that they would help establish the worldview that even after the calamity, “Beautiful nature remains regardless of human life”. He then asked the programmers to “Grow a lot of grass in the game!”, and the end result was a volume of moving grass far past his imagination, resulting in him crying from joy.
August 16, 2026 at 1:11 AM
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Aonuma on how tweaking simulation values can affect things on the other side of the map, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Aonuma: [Breath of the Wild’s simulation systems] took a lot of time for a simple reason: when you have a single physics engine to manage all the rules that will apply to a world, if you change even a tiny value at one place, anything can happen on the other side of the map. For example, we had one dungeon designer who wanted to make a puzzle that made you move clay pots with wind, so he changed a slider value so that the wind could carry the pots. When I tested this build of the game, I went to another place where there were supposed to be pots and I couldn’t find them. They had actually been carried by natural gusts and got stuck at the base of a distant mountain.
August 13, 2026 at 1:36 AM
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Aonuma on how they decided where to hide things in Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote, #TheLegendofZeldaQuote
#AonumaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Q: On what criteria did you … scatter the key items, place the shrines and temples [in Breath of the Wild]? Aonuma: … We chose an implementation that followed the building of the game, by wandering on the map and deciding when we should place an important element or a secret. If you want to hide areas, it’s even more complicated in 3D because the player doesn’t necessarily know what he’s looking for. So we made all those measures by walking in the game’s world, in order to have a good understanding of the travel times and the distances between all points of interest. It’s not a well-known fact, but Mr. Miyamoto actually did the same thing in 2D to place the dungeons in the very first Zelda.
August 7, 2026 at 7:27 PM
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Aonuma on polishing the Breath of the Wild world based on testers’ paths, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Aonuma: [During Breath of the Wild development] I asked the team to create a tool displaying a map on which the movements of a hundred players would be drawn in real time, with a marking point every hour. [If I saw] that many people were going to the same place at one time, I asked them why they had gone there. … Often, it was something I’d never thought about or seen in this angle during development, but sounded very funny. It also allowed us to detect locations no one was going to because it wasn’t very practical, in order to modify or add a path, change the topography, make a place more attractive… It was instructive to observe and allowed us to do statistics and make every portion of the world interesting.
August 4, 2026 at 8:59 PM
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Aonuma on convergent ideas with Fumito Ueda, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote, #TheLastGuardianQuote, #ShadowoftheColossusQuote
#AonumaQuote, #UedaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Zelda Franchise Producer. - Fumito Ueda, age 46. Director of Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian. QUOTE: Aonuma: It’s funny that you’re mentioning this game, because we are friends with Mr. Ueda and he’s always said that he wanted to make a game like Zelda—hence the similarities in Shadow of the Colossus. Mr. Ueda was kind enough to send me a copy of The Last Guardian late last year and as I was playing it, I noticed the moments when you climb on Trico’s head to find a path, and jump to reach places that were inaccessible from the height you were at. Without seeing each other or talking about it, I realize we had the same idea. It’s amusing to see we had the same inspirations, the same gameplay [inclination] at different times.
August 2, 2026 at 6:51 PM
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Aonuma on the two ways to get lost in a game, and the essence of Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Everything

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

nintendoeverything.com/aonuma-on-ze...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 53. Producer of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Aonuma: There are two ways for you to get lost in a game: because you don’t know where to go, or because you feel like checking out other places out of curiosity. While the former isn’t remotely interesting in terms of gameplay, the latter is something I look forward to making the players experience. That’s why the game mechanics encourage you to explore. From the beginning of the adventure, Link is able to climb high enough to allow you … to observe the landscape and head for the place that caught your eye using the paraglider. This loop made of climbing, contemplating and gliding is the essence of exploration in this Zelda, and I really wanted to make getting lost in this world a pleasure.
August 1, 2026 at 6:01 PM
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Fujibayashi on how they wanted to include tiny people in Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Nintendo Youtube Channel

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#FujibayashiQuote

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3Cs...
PEOPLE: - Hidemaro Fujibayashi, age 44. Director of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Fujibayashi: We had this idea of including tiny people [in Breath of the Wild]. Since this is a 3D game, we could have all these tiny-sized towns, and Link himself could shrink. We thought it'd be super fun if we had all these tiny characters all over the place... but with all these other characters that stand out, we thought it would be difficult for these little guys to be able to live out their own place in the game. So we really wanted to have them in there for the gameplay, but sadly had to give up on the idea.
June 14, 2026 at 7:31 PM
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Shinoda on how Revali's design defined the Rito, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#ShinodaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/Creating-a-C...
PEOPLE: - Hirohito Shinoda. Lead NPC artist for Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Shinoda: The core design for the Rito [in Breath of the Wild] hadn't been set before production started, so finalizing Revali defined how the rest of the Rito would look. I experimented with a number of different bird motifs, like swallows and woodpeckers, but settled on birds of prey. Creating a design that communicated a character that sees Link as a rival—but could not be honest with himself about it—took a lot of trial and error.
June 5, 2026 at 7:07 PM
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Fujibayashi on transforming walls from boundaries into optional paths in Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Game Developers Conference (GDC)

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#FujibayashiQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/febaddf2a123...
PEOPLE: - Hidemaro Fujibayashi, age 44. Breath of the Wild Game Director. QUOTE: Fujibayashi: Our first approach was to remove those impassable walls, which were a convention of Zelda, by transforming the walls and allowing the user to climb them in our experimental game field [Breath of the Wild prototype]. By transforming walls … into another optional path, it's as if the entire landscape that lays before the user opens open up, asking them 'So, which path are you going to take?' It was at this point that I realized this was the kind of game design I was striving for.
April 14, 2026 at 6:29 PM
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Takizawa on simulating all the senses through visuals in Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#TakizawaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/13c41fe961fd...
PEOPLE: - Satoru Takizawa, age 45. Breath of the Wild Art Director. QUOTE: Takizawa: In the real world, there is a very specific smell right before it rains. I wanted to create the illusion of that smell with the visuals in [Breath of the Wild]. … If we could simulate senses like smell and touch through visual information, the world would truly feel alive, and that was one of our big goals. We focused a lot on the air itself. The tropical rainforest is very humid, with particulates in the air. The sunlight is strong in the desert. The amount of dust in the air changes depending on what the wind is doing. The game adjusts light and air quality to more clearly express the differences in weather across regions.
March 17, 2026 at 10:42 PM
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Takizawa on “gutto kuru” art and “violent work”, 2017.

Source: Game Developers Conference (GDC)

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#TakizawaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/febaddf2a123...
PEOPLE: - Satoru Takizawa, age 44. Breath of the Wild Art Director. QUOTE: Takizawa: In Japan, when we remember something that “stirs the soul”, we use 'gutto kuru' to capture that feeling. … To create an appealing, never-before-seen world, you need to break conventions. You need to be creatively reckless. So perhaps it's safe to say, in some ways, we game creators really enjoy violent work. In what way did our artists add that gutto kuru feeling to their art [in Breath of the Wild]? They wracked their brains each and every day throughout development to fully manifest their individuality.
February 28, 2026 at 8:22 AM
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Kiuchi on designing the Bokoblins in Breath of the Wild, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#KiuchiQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/13c41fe961fd...
PEOPLE: - Takafumi Kiuchi. Lead Enemy Artist for Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Kiuchi: I designed the Bokoblins first and worked hard to design each of the monsters [in Breath of the Wild] to be kind of charming. Rather than making them eerie and off-putting, I wanted them to have an element of cuteness and humor. I thought building in this kind of charm would make people want to play the game more. I applied this way of thinking to their behavior and reactions as well. They snore while they sleep. They devour meat. They look up at the sky when it rains. I tried really hard to create details that would keep players engaged.
February 9, 2026 at 11:48 PM
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Aonuma on games where players never get lost, 2018.

Source: Zelda Encyclopedia

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#AonumaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/e6aaedfa0594...
PEOPLE: - Eiji Aonuma, age 55. Producer of the Zelda series. QUOTE: Aonuma: [In past Zelda games] we would place numerous landmarks so that players could follow them, and so on. We did things like that to ensure players wouldn’t get lost. But thinking critically, making a game in which players never get lost is like the development team saying that it’s actually just linear. When making a Zelda with that structure, and then examining it from a distance, it starts to feel like “Is this really interesting?”
February 1, 2026 at 10:33 PM
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Wada on his thinking when illustrating the Breath of the Wild key art, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#WadaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/13c41fe961fd...
PEOPLE: - Takumi Wada, age 34. Illustrator for Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Wada: When I drew the official box art and E3 illustration, I wanted to give the sense that Link was confronting the world. My first sketch portrayed Link looking out over Hyrule with his back to the viewer. I then experimented with several other compositions that more prominently featured Link, but eventually settled on the direction of my initial idea. I felt that the world itself, not just the characters, had a leading role in [Breath of the Wild]. I also wanted to convey that this was the beginning of a new Zelda, so I drew the sky at daybreak.
January 28, 2026 at 2:30 AM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Fujibayashi on the the root ideas of Breath of the Wild, 2024.

Source: Retro Gamer Magazine

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#FujibayashiQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/2e741fe961fd...
PEOPLE: - Hidemaro Fujibayashi, age 51. Director of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Fujibayashi: [Breath of the Wild] didn't come to me right away as a fully formed idea. For a long time, I went from idea to idea before I finally reached what I think are the very roots of Breath of the Wild's gameplay: the idea of cliff climbing and paragliding back down, the keyword “survival", and the idea of “creativity of combination” whereby players make use of things that happen when their actions interact with objects placed on the map—for example, lighting wood with fire to create a bonfire.
January 14, 2026 at 3:25 AM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Shinoda on other motifs that were considered for Mipha's design, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#ShinodaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/13c41fe961fd...
PEOPLE: Hirohito Shinoda. Lead NPC Artist for Breath of the Wild. ART: Next to the quite is a black and white sketch of a version of MIpha that was inspired by a Lionfish. She has large fans of spikey fins coming out of her head and elbows. QUOTE: Shinoda: I ended up using a dolphin as the inspiration for Mipha's design [in Breath of the Wild], but I also considered several other ideas, including using an oarfish or a rockfish as a motif. Her outfit incorporates the delicate design of the Zora in her accessories, as well as an ephemeral feeling that reflects Mipha's personality.
December 29, 2025 at 6:07 AM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Takizawa on choosing an art style to allow suspension of disbelief, 2017.

Source: Creating a Champion

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#TakizawaQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/13c41fe961fd...
PEOPLE: - Satoru Takizawa, age 45. Art Director of Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Takizawa: We wanted to create a world [for Breath of the Wild] that could accommodate the fantastical elements of Hyrule without sacrificing a more realistic art style, and we went about that by crafting a hybrid of the two that would allow the players to suspend their disbelief when certain things happen. That allowed us to include a broad range of ideas from the designers and enabled us to have some crazy stuff happen. For example, the player is able to toss a bunch of ingredients into a pot and have a dessert pop out. We found that injecting humor into the visual shorthand helps players forgive the break from reality.
December 24, 2025 at 9:57 PM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
Miyamoto on how he isn't denying the importance of story, 2017.

Source: Time Magazine

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#MiyamotoQuote

www.hyruleinterviews.com/02e5a62ee904...
PEOPLE: - Shigeru Miyamoto, age 64. Creator of Zelda & Mario. General Producer for Breath of the Wild. QUOTE: Miyamoto: It’s not that I don’t like story, that I’m denying the importance of story. I think after someone has played a game, it’s important that a story lingers in their mind. But what I do think is a challenge, is to cut down on playtime to set up and explain a story that’s already been set. I think what’s important, especially for the Zelda series, is for the person to be able to think it through for themselves, and to really live the story. I think that’s [what] we’ve been working on through the many iterations of Zelda. And so in [Breath of the Wild], while you’re playing, you start to kind of dig the narrative out and see the overarching story that lies in the background.
December 4, 2025 at 11:48 PM
hyruleinterviews.bsky.social
#Linktober 30: Wild/Untamed

Takehara on beautiful nature after the calamity, 2019.

Source: Hyrule Interviews

#Zelda
#BreathoftheWildQuote
#TakeharaQuote, #YonezuQuote

www.notion.so/7323c6d27865...
PEOPLE: - Manabu Takehara. Breath of the Wild Lead Architecture Artist. - Makoto Yonezu. Breath of the Wild Lead Landscape Artist. QUOTE: Takehara: Something the terrain lead told me when the Breath of the Wild team met together: … “The grass fluttering with the wind”, “The feeling of adventure as you push your way through the grass”, these experiences create presence. He thought that they would help establish the worldview that even after the calamity, “Beautiful nature remains regardless of human life”. He then asked the programmers to “Grow a lot of grass in the game!”, and the end result was a volume of moving grass far past his imagination, resulting in him crying from joy.
October 30, 2025 at 10:44 PM