The Legend of Zelda is a series that adorns the Mount Rushmore of video games. Link’s face sits right up there with the likes of Super Mario, Solid Snake, and Master Chief. Other than the off-kilter games on the Phillips CD-I console, there has seldom been a “bad” game within the series in over thirty years, a claim only a handful of other franchises can make.
The games have given players thousands of hours of enjoyment over the years from the care, consideration, and expertise gone into designing every boss fight, every dungeon, and every puzzle. But what about the stuff that didn’t make it into the games? From Triforce guitars to a playable Zelda, there’s a lot of cool stuff that Nintendo left out for one reason or another.
10 Starfox Used Kokiri Forest As A Hangar
Link’s fought many enemies over the years, but few are as cool and confusing as the tiny Arwing found in the starting area of Kokiri Forest. Far from just a random asset lying around in the game’s files, the Arwing is a fully-fledged enemy. Accessed by manipulating the game’s files or using a Gameshark, the Arwing has its own introductory cutscene. It can be targeted, be damaged, and deal damage to Link, flying around the area shooting its lasers, and having a defeat animation.
In an Iwata Asks interview, art director Satoru Takizawa talks about how the Arwing was used to replicate the movement dragon boss Volvagia. Once the logistics were worked out, the spaceship was swapped for the creature, but the Arwing’s code was left in the game’s files.
9 The URA Expansion For Ocarina Of Time
Back when the Nintendo 64DD was very much in the prime of Nintendo’s vision, they had plans to use the N64DD’s additional tech on many games, including Ocarina of Time. “Zelda 64” was to be the champion of the 64DD, but it was decided after over a year of development to stick to a ROM cartridge as opposed to the 64DD’s magnetic discs. In 1998 though, Miyamoto spoke in an IGN interview about an expansion for the 64DD called “URA Zelda”.
This expansion was mentioned to add in post-game content for players, like quests and additional dungeons. While it technically was finished, the 64DD was a commercial failure and many games were simply never released, including URA Zelda. It’s thought that the Master Quest version of OoT on the Nintendo Gamecube is the spiritual successor of URA Zelda.
8 Fire Rods And Water Boots Didn’t Make The Cut
Depending on the entry, Link has a number of items at his disposal. Among things like Hookshots, Master Swords, and Bows, there were some tools that were changed due to story conflicts or were dropped altogether. In Wind Waker, the Iron Boots had a companion item dubbed the Water Boots which served the identical function to the Iron Boots in OoT. They can be found in the files with a placeholder image reading “Water Boots” in Japanese.
The Minish Cap was also going to have a Fire Rod as an item, as detailed by the Ice Wizrobe’s trophy denoting they can be damaged with said item, and it has its own detailed pick-up text.
7 Modern, Minish, And Music
Before Link got his blue robes that we know him for in Breath of the Wild, he had a very different look. Detailed in the book Creating a Champion, which is a behind-the-scenes/development diary of BotW, Link wore a zip-up hoodie and track pants in his first concepts. He also played a golden electric guitar called the Tri-Caster that included a Triforce pick to play it with.
Similar to Majora’s Mask, he was going to have access to other instruments like Din’s Drum and Nayru’s Keyboard. In the same book, Link was seen with a wolf/dog companion (with the caption “Wolf Spirit?”), and a Picori Champion using a whip is also seen among the Champion’s sketches.
6 The Original Armogohma Was Terrifying In A Different Way
There have been various enemies over the years that haven’t quite made their way into the LoZ games, from cannon-wielding soldiers to Moblins armed with axes. One of the most visually intimidating was the gargantuan ogre originally conceived for the Wind Waker, towering several feet over the Hero of Time. It was going to use two spiked clubs to attack, which it would combine into a roller to try and squash Link.
Regarding the boss Armogohma, rather than fight him directly in a claustrophobic arena, the Game Developer’s Conference 2005 trailer showed him being relentlessly pursued by a giant one-eyed spider.
5 Two Links Are Better Than One
The Legend of Zelda: Triforce Heroes had some more unique elements in it owing to its multiple playable characters, but some things, although creative, weren’t feasible to include. While the totem mechanic was left in, there was originally an idea to have two Links fuse into one. The problem lay in the fact that Link would only move when both players moved in the same direction.
So unless players had mutual coordination and agreement on where they wanted to go, it made it a frustrating experience that only slowed the game down while annoying players in the process.
4 Zelda’s “Second Adventure”
The character of Princess Zelda got her first playable outing on the infamous series of LoZ games on the Phillips CD-I console. However, the plan for Skyward Sword was to bring back this element of controlling her in various sections. In the book “The Legend of Zelda Encyclopedia”, the development team seriously considered having these parts playable as the princess herself. The focus remained on Link, however, and Zelda’s story was instead told through cutscenes.
Skyward Sword was also going to have a “Remote Boomerang” that Link could use to maneuver around certain areas. This idea was soon abandoned as the player could end up missing important items and gave the developers headaches when trying to guide the player properly.
3 Sunken Hyrule Was Going To Be Much Bigger
Wind Waker had a good amount of content that never saw the light of day, but the biggest and potentially most disappointing was the lack of being able to truly explore the land of Hyrule beneath the Great Sea.
There was potentially going to be a mechanic where Link could travel between two overworlds by grabbing a fishing hook in Sunken Hyrule to be teleported back to the surface. Players have also found a crack/door in the mountain wall and a hidden area in the Sunken Hyrule area to further add to this.
2 The Canceled Twilight Princess Sequel
After 2006’s Twilight Princess was met with a fantastic reception from fans and critics (par for the course for a Zelda game), work began on a direct sequel soon after. This would follow in the same vein as the duo of Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask being closely linked. Nintendo however grew impatient, and knew to deliver another sublime LoZ would take considerable time.
Nintendo wanted to put out a subseries game in the meantime developed by a smaller secondary team. Thus, we got Link’s Crossbow Training instead. Unused ideas for the Twilight Princess sequel were either dissolved into what became Skyward Sword, shelved for later games, or scrapped altogether.
1 The True Triforce Story
Something that’s become almost legendary among the fanbase of the series and of Ocarina of Time in particular, the original story to OoT was something markedly different. The ability to obtain the Triforce was a mythical tale within video games similar to GTA San Andreas’ Bigfoot and Super Mario 64’s Luigi.
This rampant rumor mill is due to the Spaceworld 1996 trailer for the game which showed Link opening a large chest that revealed the Triforce. The developers obviously ended up going in a much different direction. However, for players that really want to see the real story of Ocarina of Time, check out the TASBot speedrun from Summer Games Done Quick 2022.