As much as I love BOTW and TOTK, for the next Zelda game I’d like to see another top-down game (Link between worlds, the link’s awakening remake, etc).

If they don’t want to make a whole new game I’d love to see the Oracle games remade, or even Minish Cap.

I want a modern game with the Dark World mechanic. I know TotK has a little bit of that with the Depths, but a real mirror world where you have to solve puzzles based on the difference from one world to another would be incredible in a 3d open world.

Plus I want to see Bunny Link again. Tie it into the Zonai lore and explain why he turns into a rabbit in the dark world.

Love this question / thought game.

I could probably spend hours discussing this, and wondered about the future of Zelda games a lot growing up.

I’d like to see Vaati and Twinrova (antagonists other than Ganondorf) be the focus of the next games. Even if that choice lead to a greater antagonists storyline in a sequel, that revealed Ganondorf behind it all.

As you mention, the handheld games are incredible, and provide so much opportunity. If they one day released Oracle of Secrets, in any capacity, I imagine it would break Zelda fans minds across the world.

Gay Gorons

I would prefer a more linear story line while keeping the game open world similar to the Assassin’s Creed games (I’ve only played up to black flag), so that there aren’t as many desynchronisations between mains quests (e.g. completing the dragons tears allow link to find where Zelda is, but he still won’t know when doing Regional Phenomena.

i really miss the feel of classic dungeons. i loved botw but the shrine and divine beasts just didn’t feel like a dungeon.

I would like a more linear story like the older Zelda games. The world can still be open and have plenty of discoverable side items. I mean the first one technically was an open world, you were just blocked off from areas by the need for an item, just like TotK you essentially need certain elixirs, gear, or food to be able to go to certain areas effectively.

I’m just not a fan of the disconnected plot. Every time I went to a new area for one of the sages, it was the same dialogue and the same cutscenes, just with a different sage and tribe mentioned.

All I want is to go back to the classic Zelda formula of a linear story with dungeons. BOTW and TOTK are great, but I miss the old games. I miss getting a new item that suddenly makes new parts of the world accessible.

I’m afraid, however, we won’t ever see this type of Zelda again. BOTW and TOTK have sold an insane amount of copies. This may be the new normal for Zelda.

Also, please let there be more 2D games.

Open world games are awesome, they are like the epitome of emergent behavior, and the simulation aspects are wild!

Yet, I love games that are crafted around a well written narratives. I prefer a cohesive story with good pacing, which the Legend of Zelda series did so well.

I don’t mind spending hundreds of hours playing a game, but I also don’t like wasting time exploring every nook and cranny looking for secrets to “complete” a game.

I don’t know. I like games with a beginning, middle, and ending. I rather sink literal days of playtime in an RPG with the illusion of choice than run around aimlessly in an open world game.

I want a Zelda game set in an a futuristic setting, something like a cyberpunk or space age aesthetic. I am tired of the medieval high fantasy aesthetic. No more ancient advanced technology. I want contemporary advanced technology!

Child + Adult link, with the Adult Link’s worlds being more like TOTK (exploration-based) and child Link being more like OoT (puzzlevania). Each could have their own version of the underground, land and sky - with child Link being before devastation and adult link afterwards. And playing the ocarina you can switch between them while keeping your location.

Underwater and building submarines. It’s such a shame this isn’t in TOTK already.

Like imagine playing TOTK but you start out on a load of islands like Wind Waker and build a small raft, then eventually a sailboat, and then with Zonai fans, and a bit of swimming.

More automation-based gameplay with better object persistence and larger contraption possibility and be able to save and share them more easily. It should be possible to evenutally automate obtaining Zonaite for example, Factorio style.

Koji Kondo music of course. Even if they have both, TOTK has way too little music, and too quiet.

Like others, I do miss the old style dungeons and linear storytelling. I think it could be done by merging the gameplay styles of the new games and Skyward Sword/Wind Waker by turning the series more into a Metroidvania. Just have major regions be unlocked by needing certain equipment, or even have the story advance using a time mechanic of some kind that requires certain events to advance time perhaps.

Also, proper fishing mechanics.

I’d like to see a game where you play as Zelda. I remember there being a question if she was the protagonist of BOTW in the first teaser because Link was wearing the hood up.

I know that the “woke” cries would be ridiculous, but I think it’d be neat to have her save Link for once.

Look like Skyward Sword, button to fast forward through the beginning story movie, cheat code for infinite health, warp points, joystick mode without motion sensor, able to destroy any object.

I love the hyrule open area, but I hope that they move on to a new region. I know it’s kinda out of the series to not have the common land marks, but it would be nice to introduce something completely different.

I loved WW, so maybe it could be fun with a game based on huge oceans which have different levels and tides, such that familiar areas reveal lower levels at different tides.

Even though I like the mechanic of climbing and being able to go anywhere, it seems to be a pretty heavily limiting factor for interesting map design. I’m just worried that the Zelda series will never be able to go back to a more “closed” world.

I would like eliminate the focus on physics puzzles in favor of more combat trials, exploration, and spelunking.

The physics puzzles fun sometimes, but they are so contrived. It doesn’t make you feel like you’re in a fantasy world. It makes you feel like you’re playing a fantasy game. While I still enjoy them when I’m in the mood, after two games of it, I’ve found myself glad I just found a Rauru’s Blessing instead of another physic puzzle. On the other hand, I really enjoy the “here’s a stick, use only what you find in here” shrines, and I love the cave exploration.

I would die of excitement if Nintendo ever made a TotK Zelda roguelike featuring randomly generated caves with a good balance of exploration, combat, and puzzles. And it would need unlockables and meta-progression. Maybe some caves would contain shrines. Not a different zone you enter like in TotK, but some branch of the cave leads to cut stone and you’re suddenly at some kind of randomly generated shrine. When you die, you start an entirely new run. Steal my idea, Nintendo!

But that would be some side release and not the next real Zelda game.

For a real Zelda game I just want the best of all worlds. I want a huge open world to explore, and the freedom not not get trapped by “rails” unless I go down some specific quest line. Quests should be more like the ones in Skyrim or Fallout, but with the Nintendo flair and story writing. I want hidden, but epic quest chains that you might not even find in your first playthrough. Ones that result in you being stronger, but are totally optional. I want less “go help each race to get some key ability you must use once and then becomes totally optional.”

(As an aside, I think the Rito abilities are the only important ones for enjoying either game because the open world requires mobility. The Gerudo power in BotW was badass and maybe a bit too good, but totally optional. TotK’s Gerudo ability is basically a slow and annoying version of that, which made it useless in my opinion.)

I never liked how Wind Waker kept you on rails for so long. BotW was a breath of fresh air in that regard, and TotK, too, but I would be OK with individual quest chains being on rails with maybe only a little variation in how you complete them, but at the same time I don’t want to get analysis paralysis from having to make important decisions that change the whole game. I like how Zelda games don’t have that. You never make any moral decisions except for once in a while you can complete some tiny side quest by being a rogue instead of a saint. I can’t even think of any good examples. Even when you steal something in this game, the NPCs find some wholesome way to forgive you. But I don’t really need the option to “blow up Megaton” in a Zelda game.

Multiple endings would be great based on what you did in the game.

A better weapon degradation would be good. I think the modern Fallout series do a better job with that. Yeah, things break, but you can have them repaired (or do it yourself to some degree.) That one guy in Lookout Landing has been polishing his helmet for 200 hours, and he’s still not done.