Preview: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword is the latest title in what is one of Nintendo’s biggest and oldest franchises. This particular game is actually said to be the 1st in the timeline dating even further back then Ocarina of time… how about that for a shocker!

The game has promised to give precise 1 to 1 control over links sword with the help of the motion plus, also new gameplay elements that give this old series some fresh air. Surprisingly it’s just as they said. Link’s sword moved perfectly with my motions and replicated all of my attacks (while it looked cool on Link, in the real world it looked pretty silly on me.)

There were three parts of the demo but I only managed to get through two. One of them being some dungeon exploring and the other going head to head with the newest playground bully, Demon Lord Ghirahim.

Yes... I am evil!

 If any of you were afraid Skyward Sword would be easy, well it’s not! From my battle with Demon Lord Ghirahim I found two things. One he is a pretty difficult boss to beat and two, don’t try to act cool and win straight away. All Demon Lord Ghirahim does is walk up to you in a weird way and pretty much counters all your sword strikes… with one hand!

Getting past that can be a challenge but it becomes even harder when he decides to pull out his own sword and start attacking. This can only be a good thing of course; I mean the one thing Twilight Princess was put down for was the fact that its boss fights were way too easy; at least it’s good to see that in Skyward Sword, the difficulty has been upped quite a bit.

It's my sword, let go!

See gameplay from the new game below!


As for Link himself, there were a few new things regarding him too. First off, he has a bar for sprinting… no I'm serious; this bar affects him when he’s climbing too! I’m not sure what they’re trying to accomplish here, maybe having it adds a sense of realism to the game or its going to be used in a more technical way later down the line, like in a race against time or something.

Gotcha ya nose aaaaaand the rest of your face...

The game has been made in a way that instead of swinging recklessly, you have to time your attacks and swing to counter the enemy. For Example, the Deku Baba’s can only be sliced horizontally or vertically depending on which way it opens its mouth. I like that the even the small time enemies are harder to beat because then, that only means each victory is even more satisfying.

So far Skyward Sword looks good to go, it seems to innovate on the traditional Zelda gameplay a whole lot more than any of the previous titles, now all that’s left is to pick up the game when it’s released on November 18th in Europe and November 20th in North America!