"Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom - Exclusive Interview with First Female Director"

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is a landmark entry in the iconic series, heralding the first time a female director, Tomomi Sano, has taken the helm. Dive into the fascinating journey of this game's creation and the pioneering spirit behind it.

Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom Details Revealed During Nintendo’s Ask the Developer Interviews

Meet Tomomi Sano, the Zelda Series’ First Female Director

The Legend of Zelda series is renowned for its intricate storytelling, challenging puzzles, and immersive dungeons. With the upcoming release of The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, Nintendo has shared exciting details in their Ask the Developer interview, highlighting two groundbreaking aspects: it's the first Zelda game with Princess Zelda as the main playable character and the first directed by a woman.

"Before this project, my primary role was to support the director," said Tomomi Sano, the director of Echoes of Wisdom, in her interview with Nintendo. Sano's previous contributions include working on Grezzo’s remakes such as Ocarina of Time 3D, Majora’s Mask 3D, Link’s Awakening, and Twilight Princess HD, as well as the Mario & Luigi series.

"My role was to manage and coordinate the production for this project, suggest adjustments, and then check the outcome to ensure the gameplay created by Grezzo aligns with the Legend of Zelda series," Sano elaborated.

Series producer Eiji Aonuma praised her involvement, stating, "I almost always ask her to be engaged in the Legend of Zelda remakes that Grezzo works on."

Image from Nintendo's Ask the Developer Vol. 13

Sano's career in the gaming industry spans over two decades, beginning with her role as a Stage Texture editor for Tekken 3 on the PlayStation 1 in 1998. Her early work with Nintendo includes the Japan-only Kururin Squash! and Mario Party 6, both released in 2004. Since then, she has contributed to numerous Legend of Zelda and Mario & Luigi titles, as well as several Mario sports games like Mario Tennis Open, Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash, and Mario Golf: World Tour.

Echoes of Wisdom Started as a Zelda Dungeon Maker, Revealed Aonuma

The concept for Echoes of Wisdom emerged following the success of the 2019 remake, The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening. During the interview, Aonuma disclosed that Grezzo, the co-developers of Link’s Awakening, were initially tasked with creating a blueprint for the franchise’s future, which they thought might be another remake. However, Grezzo proposed a more ambitious idea: a Zelda dungeon maker.

Aonuma posed the question to Grezzo, "If you were to make the next new game, what kind of game would you like it to be?" This led to multiple proposals, with the winning concept evolving into Echoes of Wisdom. Early prototypes explored a "copy-and-paste" gameplay mechanic and a mix of top-down and side-view perspectives similar to Link’s Awakening.

"We were exploring a few different ways to play the game in parallel," said Satoshi Terada from Grezzo. "In one approach, Link could copy and paste various objects, such as doors and candlesticks, to create original dungeons. During this exploration phase, this was called an ‘edit dungeon’ because players could create their own Legend of Zelda gameplay."

Grezzo spent over a year developing Echoes of Wisdom with a focus on the dungeon creation mechanic. However, the project took a significant turn when Aonuma intervened and "upended the tea table"—a term used by Nintendo to describe a drastic change in development direction.

While Aonuma appreciated their previous ideas, he believed the dungeon-maker feature would be more impactful if players used copied-and-pasted items as tools to progress through the adventure, rather than solely creating their own dungeons.

"For example, in The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening, there is an enemy called a Thwomp that falls from above and crushes things below and only appears in the side–view perspective," Sano explained. "If you copy that and paste it into the top view, you can drop it from above and crush things below, or conversely, you can ride on the Thwomp and use it to climb upward."

Aonuma initially struggled with imposing restrictions on Echo usage, fearing players might exploit the system. However, the team eventually realized that these limitations were unnecessary and removed them entirely in the final version.

This approach encouraged players to "be mischievous," a principle the developers emphasized to foster creative and unconventional gameplay. As Aonuma explained, "We wanted to do some things that were really out there." This led to features like spike rollers, which, despite their unpredictable interactions, were deemed essential to the experience. "If we didn’t allow for this possibility, it wouldn’t be fun," he said.

Sano added that the team created a document defining "being mischievous" to guide development efforts. Terada and Sano outlined three key rules: "’Be able to paste things however, wherever, and whenever you like,’ ‘Make it possible to complete puzzles using things that aren’t there,’" and "being able to find uses for echoes that are so ingenious it almost feels like cheating should be part of what makes this game fun."

Freedom and creativity have always been at the core of the Legend of Zelda series. Aonuma compared the game’s allowance for "being mischievous" to the Myahm Agana Shrine in Breath of the Wild, where players can guide a ball through a maze or use motion controls to flip the board and bypass obstacles.

"It’s like finding a secret trick in the game, just like the old days," said Aonuma. "If this kind of solution isn’t allowed, then it’s not fun."

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is set to launch on September 26 on the Nintendo Switch. In this alternate timeline, Zelda takes the lead in rescuing Hyrule from countless rifts tearing through the land. For more insights into The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom’s gameplay and story, explore our detailed article below!