The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom turned out to be a much more unique and inventive experience than most had expected when Nintendo first confirmed that it would be a direct sequel to Breath of the Wild, but with the next mainline instalment in the series, it looks like Nintendo will once again look to head into completely uncharted waters.
Speaking in a recent interview with Famitsu, The Legend of Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma confirmed that there are no plans to work on DLC for Tears of the Kingdom, and added that the focus now will instead shift to the next game in the series- which, he says, will be something “completely new”, even if it does end up being set in the same Hyrule as Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom.
“In the first place, the reason why we decided to make a sequel to the previous game was that we thought that the gameplay was valuable to experience in that Hyrule,” Aonuma said. “If such a reason is born again, we may return to the same world again. Whether it’s a sequel or a new one, I think it’s going to be a completely new game, so I hope you can look forward to it.”
And what form will that next game take? Unsurprisingly, given how fresh Tears of the Kingdom still is, there’s no concrete answer for that yet. Aonuma said: “I’m thinking about what the ‘next fun experience’ will be. I can only say that we don’t know at this point what form it will take.”
Regardless of what direction Nintendo chooses to take the series in next, given how long the gaps between mainline Zelda releases tend to be, it seems safe to assume that it will be a while before we hear what’s next for the franchise.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is available on Switch. As of June 30, it has sold 18.51 million units worldwide.