It's easy to forget that not long ago, the Zelda series' formulaic gameplay left fans feeling bored: Twilight Princess was often criticized for overly copying the template of Ocarina of Time, and while Skyward Sword received critical acclaim, it was also heavily criticized for its overly guided design. These titles are now regarded as classics by players, but at the time, the series truly needed a revolution.
Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom now seem to be facing similar controversies, with many active players online calling on Nintendo to completely abandon the open-world model and return to a more traditional Zelda experience. But it was precisely the bold attempt to send Link into the vast land of Hyrule that saved the series. Former Nintendo employee Christa Yang bluntly stated that Zelda games at the time had "dismal sales and were practically unsellable."
"I remember attending player focus groups; it was truly a dark time. Feedback showed that the core fanbase was steadily dwindling," added Kit Ellis, a fellow former Nintendo employee and co-host. "The series wasn't attracting new players. We had detailed data for each game, with sales dropping with each release and player interest continuously declining. They had to take drastic measures."
Kit believes that the notion of the Zelda team starting from scratch during their "peak popularity" to create an experimental open-world title is a "retrospective narrative"—at the time, fans had already lost interest in the series. This is confirmed by comparing sales figures: Breath of the Wild sold over 36 million copies across Wii U and Switch, while the original Skyward Sword on Wii sold only 3.5 million copies. Tears of the Kingdom has also sold nearly 23 million copies. It was the open-world titles that brought Zelda back to the ranks of top-tier IPs.
Of course, the lesson from this success is not that open-world Zelda is inherently superior or that Nintendo should keep producing Breath of the Wild-style titles. It was precisely gameplay stagnation that led to the series' initial decline. The real takeaway is: bold innovation and breakthroughs in core gameplay are what yield rewards; development teams must not confine themselves to a single style, or they will once again cause player fatigue.