A fan has pointed out all the things that can be gleamed from the initial reveal screenshot of Zelda Wii U. It’s amazingly meticulous, as you can see. There are so many things to be gleamed from the far distance. We detail them here below.
1. The game could have dynamic weather. We could see the sun rising, as well as the clouds moving and casting shadows while they do so.
2. There may be no instanced cities on this Zelda. Instead, we could see houses scattered throughout the game map, fitting game design instead of the other way around.
3. Regarding the people that we see in the background, the shepherds, it seems to indicated there will be many NPCs, but they may be generic. Of course, this does not disqualify the possibility of unique NPCs.
4. It looks like the game will have complex structures laid throughout the map, that still has that characteristic Zelda charm.
5. There is a fortress out in the distance. As you remember, Aonuma mentioned you can go to anywhere in the distance of this image. One wonders if the tower is fully explorable.
6. One crevice, which our source has dubbed ‘Death Mountain’, indicates that there could be a lot of variation in the terrain. We could see more than this too, areas like marshes , steep ocean cliffs, and snow-capped mountain tops.
7. There are ruins in the far distance that also stand out, made conspicuous by their distinctive details.
8. The picture has mist and fog. As I alluded to above, certain areas will feel very different.
9. There’s even a mountain split in two out there. It’s the sort of thing that’s so attention-grabbing, you can’t help but want to go there and find out what the deal is.
10. Again, to reinforce Aonuma’s statement, even the mountains in the far distance are part of the game.
11. Did you notice this one? The trees on the left and on the right look completely different.
12. Based on the density of trees, this seems to be a full forest.
13. There are many large bodies of water. Seeing as Link loves to kill time from saving the world by fishing, this shouldn’t be a surprise, but perhaps being able to catch distinct saltwater and seawater fish will be. Hey, Nintendo’s already doing it for Animal Crossing.
14. Finally, Link seems to be wearing clothes and doing things that fit a nomadic tribe. Chasing down animals with a bow and arrow, using a trained mount, these certainly are things that support that idea.
It should be fun to look back at this a year from now and see which one of these observations match reality. In the meantime, check out the images below to see where each observation fits in the screenshot, in full resolution. Zelda Wii U is coming 2015.
