The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild delays due to dual release, physics engine

Remember when Breath of the Wild was promised for a 2015 release upon it’s first unveiling?

While that release date is now 2017, we now have learned why. Shigeru Miyamoto, speaking to IGN, has revealed the challenges and troubles the game has had during development and why it was eventually delayed.

The first problem? Having to develop the game for two systems – the second? The physics engine;

It’s complicated because as we’re developing this — obviously development of NX started a while ago — and unfortunately, I’m sorry, but the development of this game took a lot longer than expected. We really felt like we would be able to get it done last year, but there was a lot of struggle with using the physics engine, so that’s why it took a long time.

Miyamoto said if they didn’t bring Breath of the Wild to the NX at launch, the next Zelda title would be “way further day” the life of the system. Because the game wasn’t “Wii U’ heavy, they decided to port.

 This game, rather than really focusing on the unique features of the Wii U, it’s really a game you sit down and get into. There was a change in direction, so we decided to develop for both consoles a while ago.

Eiji Aonuma, series producer was also in the same interview says despite the delay, there are real positives in bringing it to the NX;

From the beginning we were thinking of releasing this title on both platforms. With Twilight Princess, I was looking at, this [then-new] platform called Wii and I had more of an outsider objective view of, ‘Oh this is coming out’.

Advertisement

But for this one I was slightly more involved with NX and just judging on the timing of development. When we were going to finish this, we thought it might be fun to have that available for NX as well. I don’t see it as something too unfortunate. I think it’s nice to have a single title that can be played on two different platforms.

Delays to the Breath of the Wild may have been painful, but after seeing the game at E3 and the improvements and just how amazing it looks – we think it was worth the wait. No matter what console you’re going to buy it on.

Source: IGN