We live in a world where everyone wants everything right now or as close to now as possible. We have been conditioned to think that if something isn’t in front of us soon, we may not want it, or we’ll assume something is wrong with it. The video game realm is very similar to that. Once a game is announced, we want to play it ASAP and hear more about it as often as possible. Even if it’s just tiny details, it can help build up the hype. That brings us to Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom, which has been one of the most-anticipated and quiet titles in recent years.
We’ve known about the game since 2019, but since then, the game has gone silent in terms of updates. The only times Nintendo referenced it for three years was to say it was “still in development” or “delayed to ensure quality,” with only small snippets shown to tease players. It wasn’t until the back half of 2022 that we finally learned the title would be called Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom and got a full trailer to acknowledge that point.
But, as GameRant and others have pointed out, the marketing for the game is basically nothing. Instead, you could argue that social media pages are doing more to promote and hype up the game than anything Nintendo has officially done. That includes the recent Twitter “event” where multiple handles posted how the game was “100 days away.”
So why is this the case? Why is Nintendo doing so little marketing for it? The first answer might be timing. Even now, we’re not technically close to the game’s release. It comes out on May 12, so we’re not even three months away from release.
Second, Nintendo wants people to watch their events where they might drop teasers for the game. The upcoming Nintendo Direct is expected to have the game’s next trailer, and Nintendo is smart to stay silent so that people will watch the Direct and see what happens.
The final reason is that the sequel is so anticipated that they don’t want to spoil everything immediately. Instead, they want people to go into the game and experience it for themselves instead of “knowing what’ll happen,” thanks to the trailers.
In other words, they’re “doing the Nintendo thing” of breaking conventions and expectations to do what they feel is best. Unfortunately, we’ll have to endure this until the game’s release.