Daily Debate: Should Musical Instruments Return to the Zelda Series?

From the early days of using the magic Flute to reveal secrets in The Legend of Zelda, to swinging your Wii Remote around to play the Harp in Skyward Sword, it’s pretty evident that music has played a pivotal role in the Zelda franchise since the beginning. With such a key part of this franchise being its instruments, it’s safe to say that it was a huge surprise to have them removed with the release of Breath of the Wild.

While the instrumental past of Zelda is not forgotten in Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom, with characters like Kass and his singing daughters, or the Stable Trotters, it’s evident that Nintendo loves the music, and will never stop. However, there’s a certain charm to being able to play the music that is missed here. As tedious as it was at times to whip out your ocarina and play a song to solve a puzzle in Ocarina of Time or Majora’s Mask, or to conduct a change in the wind’s direction in The Wind Waker, it was still a fun and immersive gameplay mechanic. The interactive minigame of playing your instrument gave more depth to the world and story for me.

However, there are those who prefer to keep the past in the past, and look towards an instrument-less future. Sure, it does make gameplay more seamless; no more new UI’s to play the instrument, or long cutscenes after the music solves the puzzle. At the end of the day, it saves precious gameplay time. But who knows? It could be cool to see a new instrument come into play in a future title, or to see an old instrument make a return!

What do you think? Should instruments make a return to the Zelda franchise? Or will Link remain a non-musician forever? Let us know in the comments!

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Sorted Under: Breath of the Wild, Daily Debate, Games, Majora's Mask, Ocarina of Time, Original Content, Skyward Sword, Tears of the Kingdom, The Legend of Zelda, The Wind Waker
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