Nintendo’s upcoming remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time involved developers who had only a hazy memory of the 1998 original, or had never played it. Rather than dictate every change, series producer Eiji Aonuma gave the team space to decide how the game should be reimagined, he said in a recent Nintendo developer interview.
Aonuma said he wanted younger members of the team to make Ocarina of Time their own and stepped back to see how they would approach it. He also noted in an interview with AFP that younger developers are increasingly part of the teams he works with.
Their influence was felt more in the remake’s visuals than its mechanics. Project director HokWai Ng described the guiding principle as changing the appearance while keeping the experience the same. The team aimed to create a richer, denser and believable version of Hyrule while preserving the original’s atmosphere, art director Aya Shida said.
The developers initially used ideas such as puppet theatre and practical-effects films to guide the look. Both can create the impression that characters inhabit their worlds without reproducing reality exactly, Shida explained.
The team also considered adding teleportation points across Hyrule, but reconsidered after noticing that stopping to explore unfamiliar sights was part of the game’s discovery experience, Aonuma said.
Sources: Jeuxvideo.com.