The Legend of Zelda series has never been heavy on the storyline, but that doesn’t mean Nintendo can’t treat gamers to a good story. Nintendo of America’s Head of Localization Bill Trinen revealed a few interesting points in the lastest Game Informer magazine:
“With Twilight Princess, the depth of story and its connections to past games means not only does it have twice the text as Wind Waker, but it includes a fair number of legacy terms that originate in past games, so consistency is a big focus there,” Trinen noted. “We’ve also been given the opportunity to provide a lot of input on everything from play control to character design, so over time our role has grown from simply localizing the Zelda games to almost being a branch of the development team itself.”
Twice the text means deeper conversations with non-player characters, more storyline, and more characters to interact with. In Wind Waker, I personally was very happy with the story on Outset Island and Windfall Island, but things quickly dropped from there as the island hopping increased and story interaction decreased… and yet Wind Waker may have the best storyline in the series! I don’t think any gamer wants Nintendo to turn this series into Final Fantasy, but they could at least hold the story writing to the same standards as they do the controls, gameplay, and graphics. Based on Trinen’s comments, there is reason for optimism.
If anyone cares, Trinen expects the game to get a T for Teen ESRB rating.