Aonuma didn’t like the Zelda GameCube tech demo

The infamous Zelda tech demo that was shown at SpaceWorld 2000 to show off the capabilities of the GameCube received a rather strong fan reaction. It caused a lot of people to suspect a more realistic looking game was in the works but then we ended up with The Wind Waker which wasn’t particularly well received. The Wind Waker ended up being a great game and it sounds like the HD remake has made the game even better. It then became apparent that Twilight Princess was made a much darker game due to the strong reaction to the GameCube tech demo but it has also been revealed that, despite all that praise, series director Eiji Aonuma didn’t agree with what everyone was saying.

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In an interview with Keza MacDonald for IGN, the SpaceWorld 2000 tech demo was mentioned and Aonuma stated:

“I saw that movie and I thought, ‘No, this isn’t Zelda. This isn’t Zelda at all, I felt like this wasn’t what I imagined Zelda to be. It wasn’t the Zelda I wanted to make. That video clip didn’t actually contain any big surprises. There wasn’t any kind of revelation going on. It was more like a continuation of the previous version.”

It’s true that the video didn’t have an massive surprises but, as far as I was concerned, it wasn’t meant to. It wasn’t a trailer for an upcoming Zelda game, just a demo to show how it could look and it looked great. When Keza mentioned how it just looked like a scene from Ocarina of Time only better looking, Aonuma replied “That’s right. I wasn’t interested in it at all.”

Though I can see where he is coming from, it seems to me that Aonuma has been a bit narrow minded on the subject. Just because it looked like an Ocarina of Time scene doesn’t mean it had to be Ocarina of Time. From what fans, and myself, suspected from the tech demo was that it showed the direction the series was heading in for the next instalment (a more ‘mature’ game that would appeal to older gamers) rather than what the next game will actually be (a better looking Ocarina of Time). He could have used that demo as a starting point and built around it adding in any plot, characters, puzzles and areas to explore he liked but, instead, just because it wasn’t completely revolutionary new in itself, he pretty much discarded it. Shame.

What do you think about this? Could the tech demo have lead to a great game or did they make they right choice going in a different direction? Let us know your thoughts in the  comments below.

Source: IGN