A Link Between Worlds almost became a Link to the Past remake

Zelda producer and director Eiji Aonuma has revealed in an interview with Wired that Shigeru Miyamoto originally wanted to create A Link to the Past as a remake for 3DS. Thankfully, for us, Mr. Aonuma told him that he did not want to remake another Zelda title and instead focused on placing the overworld from the SNES masterpiece into an all-new title. Mr. Aonuma also mentions about forgetting that A Link Between Worlds is actually a new title rather than being the identical copy of A Link to the Past itself when completing a level.

Would you like to know how Mr. Aonuma went about creating A Link Between Worlds instead of a remake for A Link to the Past? If yes is your answer then click the jump!

Here is part of the interview Mr. Aonuma participated in with Wired discussing the origin of A Link Between Worlds:

Wired: “I think people are ready for this because of that one level in Super Mario 3D Land where it looked like a top-down Zelda-style game, but in 3-D. It looked pretty cool, that type of top-down gameplay with a 3-D display. I’m assuming you were already well into production on this game before that level came out, but I’m wondering if the reception to that level made you more confident.”

Aonuma: “That was all Mr. Miyamoto (laughs). Those are Miyamoto’s ideas; he came up with the top-down 3-D in Super Mario 3D Land, and he actually gave me a mission: To work on a 3-D A Link to the Past. But I didn’t want to make a remake. I wanted to make a new title but I wasn’t exactly sure how I could incorporate this world into my new project. One of my designers was working on this concept of having Link go into the walls, and being able to access places that he couldn’t get past. If you think about this idea of top down, walking around on the ground and all of a sudden merging with the wall and then the camera angle kind of shifts into this 3-D perspective — if you think about it, maybe Mario Kart is doing something kind of similar to that — but the 3-D representation really matches when you think about shifting between those two perspectives. So that’s when it kind of clicked. And when I looked at how Super Mario 3D Land was also doing the same thing, and the positive reaction it was getting from the users, it did, it reinforced what I was doing and it told me I was on the right track.”

Wired: “You have to think about it in a different way, the ability to merge into the wall and walk around. Because the game looks so much like A Link to the Past, you think about it as acting like A Link to the Past. If you see a window, you anticipate that it’s just a window, just furniture, window dressing. But then you realize, oh, I can actually go on the wall and out that window because this is not actually A Link to the Past. But it tricks you because the visual style is so similar, you expect it acts the same way.”

Aonuma: “I do that same thing over and over, almost every day as I’m playing the game. I’ll get stuck in the game and say, hey, this level isn’t complete, is it? And my team has to say, “Remember, this is the new game,” to remind me that I’m not playing A Link to the Past anymore, there’s actually this other dimension that I need to move into. I want to give users that same feeling of frustration, that frustrating feeling of getting stuck, because I think that’s a great part of the gaming experience. We’ll continue to work on those, find new ways to do that, and we’ll continue tuning the game to make sure that it’s a good experience for everyone.”

It’s great to know Mr. Aonuma rejected Mr. Miyamoto’s request for a remake to be made for A Link to the Past. Also, it sounds like A Link Between Worlds may just be a difficult title judging by what Mr. Aonuma said about giving gamers the feeling of frustration while playing. This information certainly lifts my excitement for the 3DS title to increasing new heights!

Are you glad Eiji Aonuma chose not to create a remake for A Link to the Past? Are you excited to know that a harder difficulty may envelop the game because of the mechanic of “drawing Link”? Do you plan on preordering A Link Between Worlds after hearing this new info? Please be sure to let us know what you think below!

Source: Wired