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The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Sequel Trailer - Coming 2022
- Thread starter Xavi
- Start date
i'm just catching up on the thread but the addition of those lakes in Hyrule Field is so fascinating. it seems like such a minor change to the world but obviously something that must have a greater importance in the grand scheme of things. really interesting, great find!
thanks, I got a busy morning but will hopefully have some time this afternoon to dig in
More obvious now that I zoomed in that the gate structure repeats. Maybe there's one per island, or group of related islands? Perhaps they drive a mechanic similar to the gates in Bowser's Fury, where walking through them triggers the relevant challenge/quests for that island.
That's the Fused Shadow, a relic created when the power of some ancient dark sorcerers from Hryule was sealed away. They wanted to enter the Sacred Realm, but were defeated and banished by the Goddesses.
If you ever want 8K versions, I can provide them (warning 37MB in size for one image).
breath_of_the_wild_2-7-gigapixel-scale-4_00x.png
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Got it, knew what the Fused Shadow relic was, but that helped so the Manga Elf guy is just one of the Dark Interlopers.
Yeah maybe in a broad sense. But this could be a cleverer way of expanding on the shrine concept without losing the openness. Plus it can allow integration of the open-world environmental puzzles (IMO highlight of BOTW1) with the more traditional-dungeon feeling shrine puzzles.
Some gates have a back wall, but others you can see through, the first type look like they might fling you through the air to another Island somehow.
Skyland as Shrines could work, but I really hope they're not the only flavor of Shrine like locations. That as one of BotWs biggest faults. They need to mix things up more when it comes to those kind of high volume challenges.
Hard to really say what the structure are though. Some Skylands have multiple structures, presumably the Tori gate looking structure and then the the kind of enclosed shrine looking one, but some have more than just 2 structures but like 3 or 4. And the Skylands themselves don't see like they have all that much on them so what puzzles or challenges they hold is still unclear.
Hard to really say what the structure are though. Some Skylands have multiple structures, presumably the Tori gate looking structure and then the the kind of enclosed shrine looking one, but some have more than just 2 structures but like 3 or 4. And the Skylands themselves don't see like they have all that much on them so what puzzles or challenges they hold is still unclear.
I think its a bokoblins's tree camp? i think you can make out the wooden ring around the big tree...
I think you might be right.
I would still like to see mobile tree creatures, maybe coupled with the bokoblin camps
Based on these screenshots I am confused if there are only going to be minor changes like that on the ground or not. I thought the Hyrule field area would be at least a bit more developed for the sequel. Also that dried up lake doesnt make much sense
I've spent way to much time looking at these screenshots, and nearly everything else is 1 to 1...rocks, trees, bushes, etc...all exactly where they are in botw1.
Changes we know (ground level):
- Castle is floating
- Death Mountain not active
- Giant pillars around castle are gone
- Deku Tree is gone
- All Shieka Towers are gone
- All Shieka shrines are gone
- Divine Beasts gone
- strange angular rocks south of Mabe Village Ruins
- three new craters/dry lake beds/sandy areas near mabe village ruins
- line of trees missing near one of those sandy areas
- stone talus with boboblin fort between Whistling Hill and Ranch Ruins
- new skull rock near Orsell Bridge
- new bokoblin tree fort near Hyrule Cathedral ruins
- new bokoblin fort/second talus? on whistling hill
- tree rings missing on trail near Crenel Hills
Bonus: sun direction is different in the trailer, shadow position not possible in botw1
I think thats all the known ground changes known.
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Yeah, I should clarify that billboarding alone wouldn't be so convincing. The reason they're able to pull it off is because the imposters can receive direct illumination and the cloud materials are properly shaded in a way that conveys depth from said illumination. Your mind is using the lighting information and interpreting it as a depth cue, and the illusion should work well enough for most people. However, the illusion breaks down for me because when I see the camera angle change, I notice that the rotational parallax of the clouds compared the the background of very consistent with that of camera facing quads; it's too uniform, and at no point does any part of any cloud geometrically obstruct other parts of itself.
A good way to think about this is to compare a head on view with a view that progressively moves overhead. The bottom of a truly three dimensional cloud should eventually become obstructed from view, but it's clear in the following examples that that doesn't happen:
This is a clear sign of billboarding to me, even though the shading is excellent at conveying depth.
Nevertheless, the clouds still look really good!
Just been looking into these, not sure I understand what you are demonstrating here?
I see a big croissant shaped cloud made from multiple billboards:
You're circling the gap, but even moving through 60 degrees that shape shouldn't change a huge amount, although I'm confident you would see underneath it if you kept falling below it. The shot of Link running clearly has billboards that aren't made for a side-on view.
In the skydiving clip, most of the billboard components are roughly spherical, so it's hard to judge their shape changing, but the lighting shifts makes me think they mix into a new sprite every 30 degrees. There is no need for hard transitions across angles like in that dev video you posted, they can deal with it in a much smarter way than that while using a lot less data.
Just been looking into these, not sure I understand what you are demonstrating here?
I see a big croissant shaped cloud made from multiple billboards:
You're circling the gap, but even moving through 60 degrees that shape shouldn't change a huge amount, although I'm confident you would see underneath it if you kept falling below it. The shot of Link running clearly has billboards that aren't made for a side-on view.
In the skydiving clip, most of the billboard components are roughly spherical, so it's hard to judge their shape changing, but the lighting shifts makes me think they mix into a new sprite every 30 degrees. There is no need for hard transitions across angles like in that dev video you posted, they can deal with it in a much smarter way than that while using a lot less data.
I was just proving they weren't volumetric, as I'm sure you would agree. As I mentioned before, imagine starting from the bottom of the cloud, and then "falling upward" until the camera rotated completely overhead. If the clouds were volumetric in such a scenario, it would be impossible to see the bottom of the cloud (this is not going to happen with BOTW 2's billboarded clouds). I would also agree they're blending billboards as the camera rotates. All that said, if you rotated that croissant that you posted so that you could only see it from overhead, you wouldn't be able to see its 'feet' either.
I'm just saying that you won't be able to see the bottom of the cloud where you shouldn't in BotW either. They will approximately match the viewing angles of volumetric ones.
Well that's patently not true, based on the examples I pointed out. The billboards do change, but they're not perfectly accurate, and there is "geometry" at the bottom that is exposed when it shouldn't be when the view is overhead (not saying you shouldn't be able to see some of the bottom but there was practically no skew on the cloud as the camera rotated). Keep in mind, I immediately recognized the billboarding before even properly analyzing it because it just immediately looked wrong. That wouldn't have happened if the billboards were perfectly blended at the appropriate angles.
If you look at that overhead shot and think the bottom of the cloud's proportions relative to the rest of its shape looks perfectly correct, I don't know what to tell you. I suppose I could take some real life pictures of a croissant at different angles to prove the point, heh.
EDIT:
Another way of putting it is that when you have enough samples for billboards and light and animate them properly, they can appear almost indistinguishable from volumetric clouds (like in the video example I posted). The fact that you can tell they're billboarded should tell you that the billboarding technique isn't indistinguishable from rendering volumetric clouds, and it isn't indistinguishable for a reason.
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Yes that's why I said approximately match, it still comes with all the problems of using 2d impostors.
But if you watch the skydiving video 2 seconds in, the camera starts panning upward, and there the details in the two 'feet' of the 'croissant' start rotating independently of each other, which proves they are 2 separate billboards and that for the distances in the clip, the croissant is a multi billboard object like the close up clouds in your dev video.
Speaking of food, I'm hoping there's at least a recipe book in BotW2. It was nice you can check ingredients for meals you have, but they need a more organised way.
a new cooking system would be nice too tho
a new cooking system would be nice too tho
Right, though even as approximations, I don't find them all that convincing, but that might be due to me unintentionally seeing things from a technically critical perspective when it comes to graphics.
Something that might clear some things up here is the type of camera rotation that we saw in the footage. It was equivalent a what's known in the film industry as a "curved dolly shot", except in film, the rotation is typically horizontal instead of vertical. This differs from a standard tilt shot in that the camera is a tracking shot that moves translationally as well as rotationally. We know this because Link's descent doesn't cause him to fall out of view of the camera as it rotates, instead he stays in frame, and we get a progressively closer view of him, and can see his undergarments get progressively more revealing as the camera continues to rotate (which is yet more proof that the clouds are billboarded, as they don't do this with near that level of granularity along the track).
More to the point, I've approximated the camera movement with my phone's camera, and used some tissue as a make-shift cloud to demonstrate how the perspectives of an actual three dimensional cloud with a similar shape to the one pointed out in my earlier example would look in a similar scenario:
Total rotation was less than 90º and yet there is a significant difference in the visual information we can glean from the tissue cloud. The billboarding in the footage is simply not consistent with this behavior, which is one of the reasons it is stood out to me so much.
All that being said, I still think the clouds look great and continue to remind me how talented the BOTW team's artists are.
not the most interesting difference, but the giant tree rings on the path up Crenel Hills seems to be gone, but the fallen/hollow tree at the top is still there:
botw1:
Botw2:
all these comparisons make it seem pretty clear that BOTW2 is running at a higher resolution natively than BOTW imo.
Honestly a lot of the difference stuff you guys are noticing is so minor I wouldn't have even known while playing it. I mean sure a floating castle, an inactive volcano, and a giant ass missing tree are pretty apparent but stuff like moved rocks or an extra normal sized tree is so minimal it might as well have been the same. If the overworld is really that similar I REALLY hope it means their efforts were being put into proper dungeons in a big way. Sky shrines sounds ugh to me.
the botw2 screens are the 4k upres-ed ones posted by T002 Tyrant, not native rendering.
I totally agree with you, i thought there would be more substantial changes to the overworld even if the geography was the same (why i really liked that 10,000 years ago concept at first...would be radically different even if the landmass is the same). That said, sounds like theres at least another year of development, maybe the mix up the overworld is more of a finishing up thing and they're focused on the new stuff now and just updating where its critical to the new gameplay (those sandy areas/new angular rock things). Theres also lots we don't know yet, what we have seen changed on Hyrule field thats gameplay related is the enemy's. As cool as a stone talus with bokoblins on top is and more skull bases/tree forts are, there used to be several guardian stalkers in that area and the stalkers still seem much more powerful and scary. Suggests to me that Hyrule field isn't going to be the "end game" area like it was in botw1....but again things could level up and change mid game too.
Also, i had fun doing it: "hey mom, that subscription to Highlights Magazine if finally paying off decades later"
I think it's going to be really hard to say how big the changes will or will not be for the map. We have seen very little and more importantly we just don't know what they have in store for us. They could be going for a much more progressive alternation to the location as the game progresses as a means of showing progress and impact of the resurrection of Ganondorf and whatever he's trying to do. Both alterations to the surface of Hyrule could happen in waves, as could the appearance of the Skylands. They've had 4+ years now, like anyone with an ounce of intelligence they would know that making the map feel fresh again is one of the biggest challenges. So I'm sure they've got more than a few ideas and tricks up their sleeves.
It definitely would be nice to have native resolutions at a rock solid 30fps, instead of sub-native with dynamic resolution and an only somewhat consistent 30fps that has severe issues in certain locations.
Anyone else find themselves in an extremely precarious position where you know full well that whatever level of drip fed details about this title we continue to get is going to bring great joy while also knowing that attempting a media blackout now will result in several fold joy down the road?
Issue furthered by the fact that, algorithmically, you're already so locked in and all the media channels surrounding you will be bombarding you. It seems to be such a monumental task. Despite trusting Nintendo to not outright spoil their game, when I imagine how potentially mind-blowing and emotionally satisfying it would be to immerse myself in the game after a blackout circa July 2021… it's undeniable.
the flip side: I voraciously consumed everything I could about Breath of the Wild for years (the opposite of a media blackout), and while it surely made an impressionable difference, there was a massive gap between seeing and playing; there always should be for any successful videogame. I still had an unforgettable time with it
Issue furthered by the fact that, algorithmically, you're already so locked in and all the media channels surrounding you will be bombarding you. It seems to be such a monumental task. Despite trusting Nintendo to not outright spoil their game, when I imagine how potentially mind-blowing and emotionally satisfying it would be to immerse myself in the game after a blackout circa July 2021… it's undeniable.
the flip side: I voraciously consumed everything I could about Breath of the Wild for years (the opposite of a media blackout), and while it surely made an impressionable difference, there was a massive gap between seeing and playing; there always should be for any successful videogame. I still had an unforgettable time with it
Makes me wish you could recruit enemies somehow, or like "free" them from the malice/malice control or something
Has it been pointed out how the bracer on Link's arm is actually made up of jewelry found on BOTH the "Green hand" AND "Ganondorf"?
Here's Link's bracer. Notice the rings on his fingers:
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Here's the Green Hand's bracer. Notice the lack of rings:
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/16333294/Screen_Shot_2019_06_11_at_1.40.01_PM.png)
And finally, check out Ganondorf's hand - with the rings identical to those found on Link:
I have no idea what implications this has, but just an interesting observation!
Here's Link's bracer. Notice the rings on his fingers:
Here's the Green Hand's bracer. Notice the lack of rings:
And finally, check out Ganondorf's hand - with the rings identical to those found on Link:
I have no idea what implications this has, but just an interesting observation!
I think only the first ring kind of resembles what Link has on his hand, but not much else. Ganondorf doesn't have a thumb ring like Link does and the ring on Ganondorfs middle/ring ringer looks to have a large circle on top of it. Think it's more a coincidence than any kind of real connection.
Overall Link's arm brace is a similar style, but not a direct copy of the Sealing Arm.
Overall Link's arm brace is a similar style, but not a direct copy of the Sealing Arm.
skyward sword reference...maybe will be retconn-ed into a botw2 reference now. i still refuse to believe theres some master plan for zelda games with interconnected meanings...they just do whatever each game and then the folks who write the books need to figure out how to connect them.
Does it really make a difference whether it's retroactive though?
i guess not...but the implication is that they planted seeds for the sequel, when in reality its just one of MANY references to the old games. im really excited to see if there are any true planted seeds or what they decide to elaborate on any of the various mysteries (lots of people expect the zonai stuff to pay off, or some of the various interesting places in botw that are devoid of meaning to become relevant). I just dont think this particular one is really one of those.
It has more meaning now though, and it shows that any of those references from the first game could be used as big gameplay/plot elements in the sequel. And BotW1+2 have more connective tissue than other sequential series entries, so it's not entirely out of the realm possibility that this may have been planned to some degree—though that doesn't really matter when it comes to speculation now that there are indeed sky islands.
The dragons leaving through sky portals may have just been references to the portals in Skyward Sword, but now that there are floating ruins, those could mean there's a sky "dimension" in BotW2 like there was in SS.
The dragons leaving through sky portals may have just been references to the portals in Skyward Sword, but now that there are floating ruins, those could mean there's a sky "dimension" in BotW2 like there was in SS.
Fujibayashi is a meticulous lore-master though. The overall 'gameplay first' and experiential driven philosophies of Zelda titles will always, thankfully, win the day but the dude has had a fleshed out grand narrative in mind for a good while, there's no debate. Back in the capcom GBA days he and others were pushing for three connected titles and he's had his hands/brains in Zelda lore for almost 20 years. He's largely responsible for highlighting and deepening cyclical inevitable patterns and the ways in which each race of beings participates in them. It's quite foolish, in my view, to think that the foundations of this sequel's story weren't being conceptualized and formed during the first game's development. This is especially true considering that this sequel began life as DLC. He even oversaw scenario building and writing in Age of Calamity meaning there's plenty of meat on the bones of that game that he wants series fans to keep in mind
he's been officially bookending the traditional zelda framework as we know it over his three most recent directorial efforts including the upcoming sequel. Nintendo's promotional language around Skyward Sword on the heels of the rerelease points to this as well. I'm prepared to eat massive amounts of crow if wrong.
Well him intentionally setting out to create the origin and the conclusion of 'the legend of Zelda' from Skyward sword through to the BotW sequel is just personal opinion and speculation, but you don't really need a source to see that he has been writing for this franchise for decades, and been the lead narrative designer for several games. He's extremely invested in the universe.
Yeah, no matter what, it is very clear that recent Zelda games have put much more effort into the connectivity of the lore than most of the Zeldas before them.
At this point, I think Skyward Sword, BotW, and BotW2 will form a trilogy of sorts (even though Skyward Sword takes place a long fucking time before the other two).
Are we sure this is Link? The outfit is wrong, the hair is different/longer, and there's BotW Link in blue garb elsewhere in the trailer.I'm curious about the markings on him too - I don't feel like they're scarring/corruption from the Malice somehow. They look too...deliberate? And the colors are a dark green + a darker green (it's hard to see but there's varying colors even within the completely saturated part of his forearm).
They match a lot of the Zonai patterns we've been seeing. I feel like they're more related to his new powers - perhaps every time he gains a new ability, the designs spread?
In the shot of him here:
You can see a little bit of the patterns on his chest, but it seems like they don't stretch as extensively as they do here, which basically goes down to his waist:
So idk, I think it'll be some sort of physical representation of his powers growing.
My money is on this either not being Link at all, or it's a future Link.
EDIT: *gasp* The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Future