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[Myriadis]

Get cutscenes out of my Zelda game unless they are few, short, and special like Ocarina or Majora.

It seems you haven't played these games in a while, did you? I counted more than 100 minutes for Ocarina of Time alone.

Also, I'm one of these guys who absolutely loves cutscenes, ever since they appeared in A Link To The Past (even if used very sparingly there). And none of the 3D Zeldas ever disappointed me in the cutscene department, so combined with the awesome look the game already has I'm sure I'll enjoy it.

 

[PooBone]

Uhhhhhhh..... really?


*sigh*

 

[foxuzamaki]

It seems you haven't played these games in a while, did you? I counted more than 100 minutes for Ocarina of Time alone.

Also, I'm one of these guys who absolutely loves cutscenes, ever since they appeared in A Link To The Past (even if used very sparingly there). And none of the 3D Zeldas ever disappointed me in the cutscene department, so combined with the awesome look the game already has I'm sure I'll enjoy it.

Yup, the cutscenes in 3D zelda have never been boring

 

[JinjoUnchained]

Uhhh...while there were less then usual, ALBW had cutscenes, and there not being in Zelda U does not sound good to me.

The ALBW "cut scenes", if you want to call them that, were very few and far between. IIRC, there were maybe 3 or 4, they occurred only at very important points, they were fast, and they looked visually similar to the actual game play. I'm OK with that.

Aonuma said in the E3 reveal that he wants the game to be more like the original Zelda. I interpret that as less "telling you a story", and more "you experience your own story". No one is saying that the game shouldn't have story, just that it should be more nonsequential and driven by game play, instead of passive cut scenes. The problem with cut scenes is that, in most cases, games that have them have to be more linear b/c the cut scenes need to be viewed in a certain order. That's why I'm saying to get rid of them and let us tell our own story. I don't want the game to stop me from visiting the snowy mountain b/c i haven't seen some dumb cut scene where they spend 15 minutes explaining the lore of the snowy mountain. Just let me go and explore!

 

[SonicMegaDrive]

Sounds like I'll be passing on this Zelda. Hopefully the next portable Zelda goes in the opposite direction.

 

[James Scott]

I don't want any cutscenes in a Zelda game.

Zelda games have had cutscenes since LTTP (maybe even before then?)
The latest game, Link Between Worlds, had less cut-scenes and I felt that was a bit of a detriment to it.
edit: Pretty surprising responses I've seen from people. He isn't saying "we need a ton of cutscenes everywhere and no gameplay!" He's saying he wants the quality of the cutscenes to be a good as possible.
Having every aspect of the story be told by the environment seems like it would be hard to do and a lot of people wouldn't' appreciate it as much. Having cut-scenes doesn't mean you can't have both forms of story telling.
I would hate to lose stuff like this myself

 

[Refreshment.01]

Any comments that reinforce a cinematic direction for a Zelda series makes me sad.

The most cinematic exposure the game needs is an opening and the ending, the rest let the player feel in the blanks with his/here exploration of the gaming world and NPC interaction.

 

[Nintendojitsu]

Sounds like I'll be passing on this Zelda. Hopefully the next portable Zelda goes in the opposite direction.

 

[Myriadis]

The ALBW "cut scenes", if you want to call them that, were very few and far between. IIRC, there were maybe 3 or 4, they occurred only at very important points, they were fast, and they looked visually similar to the actual game play. I'm OK with that.

In ALBW I was actually kinda disappointed that there were so few cutscenes, given that the ones in the game are so good. I must say that the last cutscenes just hit me in the right spot.

 

[Real Hero]

cut scenes are the last thing I care about in a Zelda game.

 

[zruben]

Zelda U to have the best water.

ahahahaha

does this guy has a post where he doesn't like the water of the game??
I'm curious if he gets extra-pissed if the water is poorly done.

 

[Mango The Magician]

The ALBW "cut scenes", if you want to call them that, were very few and far between. IIRC, there were maybe 3 or 4, they occurred only at very important points, they were fast, and they looked visually similar to the actual game play. I'm OK with that.

I'll agree that they were pretty quick, but them looking like the actual game doesn't really mean much sense ALBW, like every other Zelda game, has in-game cutscenes.

And to be frankly honest, I felt like the cutscenes and story telling were sub par in ALBW, and I'd rather they went with the WW, TP, or SS approach to story telling with Zelda U.

Aonuma said in the E3 reveal that he wants the game to be more like the original Zelda. I interpret that as less "telling you a story", and more "you experience your own story". No one is saying that the game shouldn't have story, just that it should be more nonsequential and driven by game play, instead of passive cut scenes. The problem with cut scenes is that, in most cases, games that have them have to be more linear b/c the cut scenes need to be viewed in a certain order. That's why I'm saying to get rid of them and let us tell our own story. I don't want the game to stop me from visiting the snowy mountain b/c i haven't seen some dumb cut scene where they spend 15 minutes explaining the lore of the snowy mountain. Just let me go and explore!

I actually don't think what Aonuma said in regards to Zelda 1 at E3 had anything to do with anything other than overworld. Plus given their stance with story telling, and the fact that while it's incredibly held back and mostly hidden in the manual, Zelda 1 has a story, I don't think Zelda U will be anything like Zelda 1 in regards to story telling, or at least I hope it wont. I can understand wanting to explore, but exploration without a goal is only fun for so long before it becomes absolutely boring and tedious, at least in my opinion. So for me, I'd rather have a linear game that tells me about the story of the mountain, then let's me go explore, and not a game that doesn't tell me anything and I end up on a mountain that isn't significant or in other words not worth exploring. Also, on the note of linearity comming from story telling, to be honest I don't really care if I can explore areas at my leaisure or not, and story telling is far more important than the ability to do any dungeon in any order, so yeah.

To sum up, I don't think Aonuma was talking about story telling at all at E3, and I'd rather be told a story than make my own, as I easily find myself bored in games with little story presence.

 

[Kouriozan]

Another divisive Zelda game, who knews?!
Plus it's just all talk, if I remember right, he said tons of thing to do in Skyward Sword and in the end nothing was there.
Also, Skyward Sword cutscenes were fine.

 

[Shion]

Well, ALBW had almost no cutscenes and a lack of storytelling.

Narrative =/= cut-scenes.

Zelda doesn't need cut-scenes, it needs a deep and engaging lore to explore through gameplay, strong world-building and memorable characters to meet and interact with during your journey.

 

[The Boat]

I was actually thinking about Zelda cutscenes just now, people don't usually give them enough credit, they're very, very well done. "Camera work" in cutscenes was something they gave great importance to in OoT and they've always done great work, I just hope they don't go overboard with them.
Edit: Btw Hyrule Warriors just has a few cutscenes.

 

[WrenchNinja]

Too bad the cut scenes will continue to be bad with the lips flaps, continuing to have no sound coming out of character's mouths

 

[shouamabane]

Why would he put down a game that comes out in a few weeks? Of course he is saying good things about HW.

I'm curious to see how story and exposition is presented in Zelda U. SS wore me out with text in the first few hours.

 

[Shockhog]

Nothing wrong with that. If you're going to have cutscenes, they should be of high quality. They were really well done, but somewhat intrusive at times due to their length.

I'm not into the whole "cinematic experience" that so many AAA games have been striving for lately, but some of the reactions here seem a bit radical. Up until this point, Aonuma has exclusively discussed gameplay elements and the emphasis on exploration.

The fact that he also wants cutscenes (like every game since ALttP) doesn't undo anything that has been said up to this point.

 

[Nanashrew]

Cutscenes in Zelda aren't a new thing to the franchise. It just sounds like Aonuma wants to improve the look and cinematography, using better techniques. He definitely doesn't want to be shown up by Hyrule Warriors.

Majora's Mask had cutscenes and some cinematic flare using new techniques with the extra RAM of the expansion pak.

 

[Jackano]

I believe the good comments by fans on miiverse relies on two things:

- It's the first cutscenes from a HD Zelda;
- It has been 8 years since Twilight Princess and the last appearance of this art style.

It's true we didn't got the chance to see such cutscenes often.
And also in those cutscenes, Impa looks amazing and Lana is cute and Cia got boobs.

 

[TwEE-N-Toast]

This has me worried.

 

[manueldelalas]

Aonuma is worried about non important things as always. As long as he is in charge of the series, it will never return to greatness.

Cut scenes in Zelda games have always been from mediocre to awful (WW was specially awful).

I liked in OOT where cut scenes were minimum and most of them were the overview of a city, dungeon, or the introduction of a boss.

 

[JinjoUnchained]

I actually don't think what Aonuma said in regards to Zelda 1 at E3 had anything to do with anything other than overworld. Plus given their stance with story telling, and the fact that while it's incredibly held back and mostly hidden in the manual, Zelda 1 has a story, I don't think Zelda U will be anything like Zelda 1 in regards to story telling, or at least I hope it wont. I can understand wanting to explore, but exploration without a goal is only fun for so long before it becomes absolutely boring and tedious, at least in my opinion. So for me, I'd rather have a linear game that tells me about the story of the mountain, then let's me go explore, and not a game that doesn't tell me anything and I end up on a mountain that isn't significant or in other words not worth exploring. Also, on the note of linearity comming from story telling, to be honest I don't really care if I can explore areas at my leaisure or not, and story telling is far more important than the ability to do any dungeon in any order, so yeah.

Interesting point, I see where you're coming from. I have no problem at all exploring without a goal, to me it makes the quest more exciting and unpredictable. But it's not like it's one or the other, there can be balance. I think Ocarina of Time did this perfectly. You always had a goal and a sense of where to go with cut scenes and all that. But there was also nothing stopping you from going to Lake Hylia, the road to Zora's Domain, the road to Gerudo Valley, Lon Lon Ranch, or the many grottoes. But even though it was open, it didn't feel like you were just blindly exploring. You learned about those areas from the people you met there and by exploring the land. That's a pretty good compromise, IMO.

 

[Nickle]

As long as I can skip them then it's okay. I'd rather that they jam the story into cutscenes then jam the story into endless unskippable text boxes.

 

[Ashodin]

To people scared of cutscenes in Zelda

This is a cutscene. You can't move, you can't do anything but watch the text.

 

[LegendofLex]

To people scared of cutscenes in Zelda

This is a cutscene. You can't move, you can't do anything but watch the text.

That has more to do with technical limitations than anything else. Today that same text could scroll while the player is moving.

 

[KiefbladeMaster]

To people scared of cutscenes in Zelda

This is a cutscene. You can't move, you can't do anything but watch the text.

.

 

[Ashodin]

That has more to do with technical limitations than anything else. Today that same text could scroll while the player is moving.

It's still a cutscene by definition.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Aonuma is worried about non important things as always. As long as he is in charge of the series, it will never return to greatness. .

I like how Anouma has talked nearly nonstop about gameplay, but yet the second he talks about the story "Nope, Anouma sucks, he's worried about all the wrong things!11!!!"

 

[jett]

What an absolute misguided notion to have. He should strive for Zelda to have fewest amount of cut-scenes possible.

 

[manueldelalas]

I like how Anouma has talked nearly nonstop about gameplay, but yet the second he talks about the story "Nope, Anouma sucks, he's worried about all the wrong things!11!!!"

He has not talked about the gameplay. We don't know how the next Zelda game is going to play AT ALL.

 

[JinjoUnchained]

To people scared of cutscenes in Zelda

This is a cutscene. You can't move, you can't do anything but watch the text.

That kind of "cut scene" is fine because the game isn't making your character do something. When I beat a dungeon in Link To The Past and one of the maidens gives me a speech from a crystal, that's fine. I'm just standing still and listening, it's really not any different from talking to an NPC. The problem many of us have is when the game stops, takes control away, and shows a pre-recorded movie of your character performing actions. It's jarring and disjointed, makes you feel like you're not really in control.

 

[Crossing Eden]

He has not talked about the gameplay. We don't know how the next Zelda game is going to play AT ALL.

He has talked about the premise and what he wants to achieve multiple times. This is the first time he has even mentioned cutscenes. And it's completely ridiculous to ignore all the times he hasn't talked about cutscenes and then suddenly pretend like he views them as the priority due to one interview.

 

[manueldelalas]

He has talked about the premise and what he wants to achieve multiple times. This is the first time he has even mentioned cutscenes. And it's completely ridiculous to ignore all the times he hasn't talked about cutscenes and then suddenly pretend like he views them as the priority due to one interview.

Goalposts, I see them moving.

 

[Molemitts]

I don't care too much about voice acting but Hyrule Warriors would have been a great game to test the waters on that. It's a spinoff title so, no one would have lost their shit if it was awful and if it the voice acting was great, it could have convinced a lot of people for it in the next game.

But, oh yeah, subtle story telling make it more like the Souls games and all that.

 

[Nanashrew]

What an absolute misguided notion to have. He should strive for Zelda to have fewest amount of cut-scenes possible.

MM had over 200 major and mini cutscenes. The natural progression to tone them down has been making them a tad longer to account for detail.

Right when you start Majora's Mask, it has about 3 moderately sized cutscenes which adds up to about 10 full minutes of reading text.

 

[James Scott]

What an absolute misguided notion to have. He should strive for Zelda to have fewest amount of cut-scenes possible.

He did not mention anything about the number of cutscenes, just the quality which he hopes to be as good as possible. Not sure how anyone can take that in a bad way aside from "Zelda U will have cutscenes" which it should.

 

[Toxi]

Zelda U to have the best water.

This guy really likes to get wet.

 

[jett]

MM had over 200 major and mini cutscenes. The natural progression to tone them down has been making them a tad longer to account for detail.

Right when you start Majora's Mask, it has about 3 moderately sized cutscenes which adds up to about 10 full minutes of reading text.

So? That's no good.

 

[Refreshment.01]

Narrative =/= cut-scenes.

Zelda doesn't need cut-scenes, it needs a deep and engaging lore to explore through gameplay, strong world-building and memorable characters to meet and interact with during your journey.

This a fantastic post, explains so much in a very concise manner.

Besides, while the story telling and cinematics are competent in the Zelda series in the end for the most part these elements are not special and can't compete with other franchises that go all out with them. What we end up having is pretty standard of the mold plot, so i would rather have the team employ those resources in other parts of the game.

Not saying people that like the cinematics are wrong, but you guys have had your fun with most home console entries in the franchise when Nintendo brought them to 3D. So is only fair that the other part of the user base that want less emphasis in non interactive elements get their due no. Although it won't happen. XD

 

[Shockhog]

That kind of "cut scene" is fine because the game isn't making your character do something. When I beat a dungeon in Link To The Past and one of the maidens gives me a speech from a crystal, that's fine. I'm just standing still and listening, it's really not any different from talking to an NPC. The problem many of us have is when the game stops, takes control away, and shows a pre-recorded movie of your character performing actions. It's jarring and disjointed, makes you feel like you're not really in control.

This is a problem in a lot of games, but Zelda cutscenes rarely show Link actually doing anything like using his sword, bow, or any other items/weapons. Those actions are almost always reserved for when the player has control.

I've never really felt like the game was taking control away from me because, as you said about the past games, most cutscenes in Zelda games involve listening to or watching another character.

 

[Nanashrew]

So? That's no good.

How is that no good?

 

[Ryker]

I'm one of those people who enjoyed every second of the cutscenes in Xenosaga(often panned for having excessive cutscenes that break up the gameplay flow), so I say.. do your worst Aonomu.

 

[LegendofLex]

It's still a cutscene by definition.

And I wanted to skip the text the first time I played it, and still want to skip it now.

 

[jett]

How is that no good?

Because of everything you just described? Cut-scenes in the Zelda games are boring almost to the point where they are unbearable.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Goalposts, I see them moving.

You do realize that a creative director has to focus on every aspect of the project right? Gameplay gets as much attention as cutscenes. Do you not know how game development works or are you just deciding that Anouma is saying "welp, gameplay is no longer the priority"

 

[Nanashrew]

Because of everything you just described?

Twilight Princess had roughly 25 major cutscenes. That's a far cry from the older Zelda games. What added up in Majora's Mask was a mixture of smaller scenes mixing with bigger scenes and there was also how you interacted with the people and the world.

In Majora's Mask it went like this:
first main intro > second main intro > horse stolen/chase> cursed deku > twisted hallway> meet mask salesman

In later games they just condensed this type of stuff for fewer cutscenes.

 

[manueldelalas]

You do realize that a creative director has to focus on every aspect of the project right? Do you not know how game development works or are you just deciding that Anouma is saying "welp, gameplay is no longer the priority"

Gameplay has never been top priority in Aonuma's Zelda games, that's the problem.

WW destroyed the balanced combat of OOT by adding the unnecessary and awfully achieved counter attack (feels like bad QTE IMO). TP tried to revert this, and succeeded partially, SS is a disaster gameplay wise.

GBA Zelda was made by Capcpom, and DS Zeldas had almost no enemies to balance the simplistic combat.

The only post Aonuma game that excels in Dungeon design is TP, and the only games with decent puzzles after OOT (or LA, because OOT didn't excel in those either, but was good enough) are Phantom Hourglass and LBW.

So yes, I would love to see him more worried about the gameplay, dungeons and puzzles, and less about crap like graphic style, world style, cut scenes, voice acting and trying to mimic the popular game or trend of the time.

 

[Nanashrew]

Gameplay has never been top priority in Aonuma's Zelda games, that's the problem.

WW destroyed the balanced combat of OOT by adding the unnecessary and awfully achieved counter attack (feels like bad QTE IMO). TP tried to revert this, and succeeded partially, SS is a disaster gameplay wise.

GBA Zelda was made by Capcpom, and DS Zeldas had almost no enemies to balance the simplistic combat.

The only post Aonuma game that excels in Dungeon design is TP, and the only games with decent puzzles after OOT (or LA, because OOT didn't excel in those either, but was good enough) are Phantom Hourglass and LBW.

So yes, I would love to see him more worried about the gameplay, dungeons and puzzles, and less about crap like graphic style, world style, cut scenes, voice acting and trying to mimic the popular game or trend of the time.

And that's all he has been discussing up to this side note from Hyrule Warriors. That's all I take from this is that it's a side note learning from a different team. He's done nothing but talk about gameplay and puzzles in every interview.

 

[manueldelalas]

And that's all he has been discussing up to this side note from Hyrule Warriors. That's all I take from this is that it's a side note learning from a different team. He's done nothing but talk about gameplay and puzzles in every interview.

Again, we know NOTHING about the gameplay, NOTHING.