Echoes of Wisdom devs explain why Zelda was made playable

The developers behind Echoes of Wisdom have opened up on the decision to make Zelda playable and take the starring role as the protagonist.

Interestingly, the team was actually thinking about Link having his standard role as the main character you play as. But as things progressed with the concept of echoes, Nintendo and Grezzo felt that the protagonist needed to be someone who lacked a sword and shield. 

Aonuma also acknowledged fan requests made over the years to see Zelda be the protagonist. After seeing the team struggle over who should be the main character in Echoes of Wisdom, it made sense for Zelda to be playable.

Aonuma and Grezzo director Satoshi Terada shared the following:

An important element of this game is that – for the first time in the Legend of Zelda series – Princess Zelda is the protagonist of her own adventure.

Aonuma: We were initially thinking that Link would be the protagonist. But when we focused on the gameplay using echoes and had Link copying and pasting things into the game field, the sword and shield got in the way. If you have a sword and a shield, you can just fight using those. There’s no need to rely on the monsters’ power, right?

Terada: So, we thought, “What if players could use only echoes at first in order to understand the gameplay, and then as the game progresses, they get the sword and shield?” But even then, we thought that once they got the sword and shield, they would stop using echoes.

Aonuma: That’s just your typical Legend of Zelda game. What are we going to do? (Laughs)

Terada: Echoes plus a sword and shield… They just didn’t work well together. There is a wide variety of echoes, so to get the most out of the gameplay, we decided to stick with echoes only.

Aonuma: If that’s the case, it must be someone who doesn’t fight with a sword and shield, right? Who in the series would be a good fit for these powers and bring their insight to them? Well, that would have to be Princess Zelda.

But didn’t it take a lot of courage to make Princess Zelda the protagonist for the first time in this series, given its long history?

Aonuma: Over the years we’ve been working on the Legend of Zelda series, many people have often asked us, “Will Princess Zelda ever be the protagonist?” and said, “I’d like to play as Princess Zelda.”

When asked this question, I’ve always thought, “Of course, as long as it makes sense for the game and does justice to her as a character to be the protagonist,” and answered that way. I had been trying in vain to figure out what would really do justice to her. But when I saw the team struggling to identify the ideal protagonist for this game, I thought, this is exactly the game for her!

Aonuma went on to say that the team “had a lot of trouble deciding on Princess Zelda’s outfit”, even looking at her attire from previous games. Eventually they settled on the hood, which made sense since she’s going on a secret journey. It was also “touching if Princess Zelda inherited the hood that Link wore”, especially since her goal is to find him in this game.

Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is slated for September 26, 2024 on Switch. It was revealed yesterday that the game started out as a dungeon maker, which you can read about here. Also, today’s interview is located in full here.