The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom takes something old and makes it feel brand new | Hands-on preview
It doesn’t matter how many times they reinvent and rework the world of Hyrule and its denizens, because you know that by hook or by crook, the team will be serving us up a guaranteed slice of Zelda magic. The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom took about thirty seconds to grip me completely, and the 80 minutes I spent playing it went by in the blink of an eye. I spent the rest of the day thinking about it, and what direction things would go after the segment I traversed had ended. The protagonist may be different, and as is par for the course, Hyrule has been redesigned in a new image that is both unfamiliar yet instantly recognisable – but the song remains very much the same.
Echoes of Wisdom shares the same cutesy art style that was first presented to us in the charming Link’s Awakening remake: a top-down, chibi version of Zelda that is bursting with vivid colours and suits the action perfectly. Occasionally the action switches to a side-on platforming view, in a kind of homage to the second title in the storied series, and these sections fit in perfectly, allowing some of the mechanics of the game to be introduced and breathe.
Narratively, this time out the script has been flipped and the player takes control of Princess Zelda, which makes a refreshing change not only for us but probably for her as for once she isn’t being abducted and locked inside a castle somewhere. Ordinarily after a few minutes of play and possibly a bit of cursory puzzle solving and exploring, you would be slaying beasties with a spin of a sword, but not here.
The main draw of The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is the Tri Rod, bestowed upon you early doors by a glowing golden ethereal buddy called, naturally, Tri. When exploring your surroundings you spot certain objects that give off a glow to indicate that they can be zapped with the rod and then copied as “echoes” which you can then summon for your personal use. To begin with you are given furniture to spawn and use to solve environmental puzzles, such as bridging gaps or climbing unreachable areas.
Eventually you encounter your first enemies and can use items you are able to summon, such as pots and boulders, to kill them. You then get to absorb the echoes of your enemies and set them to use in a variety of ways. A sea urchin can be used as a kind of landmine that will repel and damage foes. You can unleash a wave of darting snakes, or use a spider to weave a web that allows you to climb up onto distant platforms. Each echo has a certain cost indicated by a number of small triangles, so there is a limit as to how many times you can use each summon before the first one disappears. You can also clear the decks at any time with a button hold to reset things.
As I moved through the brilliant opening portion of action, the amount of echoes that you can obtain are mind blowing. Echoes of Wisdom has the same dizzying sense of freedom that Tears of the Kingdom has, in that you can pretty much use any echo at any time, and there is often more than one way to solve a puzzle or negotiate a battle. The collecting element tuned into my love of the soul/ability capturing of the Castlevania series, and is also comparable to the many different guises of fellow Nintendo stalwart Kirby.
The abilities of enigmatic sprite companion Tri don’t end with the echo system, either. You can also use the Tri Rod to Bond with objects which then move along with Zelda, or the Reverse Bond which allows you to move objects around. This means a lot of Bonding with moving platforms, or shifting rocks and statues around to hit switches and access different areas. But the Bond can also be used to pull on things – such as popping the head off of a Deku Baba, or snatching a shield from an enemy.
Finding new things to throw at and encumber enemies is all well and good, but the spectre of Link and the Master Sword looms large and eventually you do gain access to Swordfighter form, which allows you to briefly transform into a Link-esque version of the Princess. Energy orbs found in certain sections of the game allow you to charge up a bar that enables this transformation. It feels great to swing a sword, but the Tri Rod is still the star of the show and it is that aspect I am most looking forward to exploring fully.
Even from the small part of the game I saw, the amount of Echoes and abilities were huge, and sometimes it isn’t always apparent what you need to be doing with them. But the menu system is extremely helpful, albeit in a way which does not entirely hold your hand: each echo has a concise description which often hints at the possibilities in your grasp. A good example is when you get to snaffle a seemingly nondescript signpost. What on earth are you going to do with that? The answer makes sense once you figure it out.
The warm, unquantifiable sense of magic and mystique is in the air from the off. We are clearly in a world that has a lot to show us. I get the impression that the things I saw were only the tip of the iceberg, with many more magical Zelda surprises on their way. The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is shaping up to be yet another success for the franchise, which yet again takes something old and makes it feel brand new.
The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom is coming to Nintendo Switch on September 26th.
