How Nintendo Solved Zelda's Open World Problem

How do you make an open world where 
the player is completely free to

explore - but is also led towards key 
locations that will advance the story?

This was the biggest challenge 
that Nintendo faced when making

their very first open-world game, The 
Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

They wanted to give players a 
sense of freedom and exploration,

not seen in the franchise since 
the very first Zelda game on NES.

But they also wanted to make 
sure players were always making

progress towards the overarching 
goal of saving Princess Zelda.

This was no easy task to overcome 
- Nintendo had to go through false

starts and bad playtests before finally 
arriving at the game we all know today.

The one that made us rethink how 
exploration can work in an open world game.

And Nintendo actually shared their experience 
of this difficult development process at the

'Computer Entertainment Developers 
Conference' in Japan, back in 2017.

It was a really interesting lecture 
- and a rare act of Nintendo openly

discussing the nitty gritty details 
of their game design and development.

But that information is sadly 
very hard to access today.

The lecture was never uploaded.

All of the reports are in Japanese (and 
the only English translation is a tweet

thread summary that's been mangled by Twitter).

And Nintendo actually got journalists to pull 
down their photos of the original slides.

So - I thought it was time to right that wrong.

To mark the imminent release of the 
next Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom,

I decided to resurrect that old talk.

I gathered different write-ups of the 
talk, and had them translated into English.

I used internet archives to 
rediscover the lost slides,

and used motion graphics to make them come alive.

And I used AI upscaling to 
bring back old screenshots.

So, without further ado, I'm 
Mark Brown, this is a GMTK Mini,

and here's how Nintendo solved the biggest 
problem in Breath of the Wild's design.

Okay, so Nintendo had built a humongous world 
map for Hyrule, and let players explore in any

direction - but they needed to find some 
way to lure players towards key locations.

The initial idea was to use a 
system of "points and lines".

The points are the the Sheikah Towers: those 
giant, neon-lit spires that soar above the ground.

They're clearly visible from a great distance, 
and they confer a great benefit to the player:

they reveal a massive chunk of 
your map when you get to the top.

So these 15-or-so towers would be obvious

waypoints for the player - which should 
effectively lead them around the map.

The lines are the routes and 
roads between the towers.

And so Nintendo could place 
various events along those lines.

As players walked towards the towers,

they would discover characters, enemy 
camps and other goodies as they went.

But this idea... completely flopped.

The guidance worked - but 
it actually worked too well.

Playtesters felt they were stuck on a linear 
path, and forced to follow the towers.

Many complained about being trapped on 
an invisible, but obvious guide rope.

And those who deviated from the line would just 
get lost, or find little of interest to explore.

And the data bore this out: Nintendo 
tracked the playtesters' movements and

created a heat map to see 
where people had explored.

And they discovered that players were 
split into two completely different groups:

about 80 percent dutifully followed 
the main route from tower to tower,

and the other 20 percent just 
sorta randomly wandered around.

Neither play style was close 
to what Nintendo was after.

So they decided to go for a different approach.

Instead of nudging players to always 
travel towards Sheikah towers,

they could get players to move around the map by

luring them towards a larger variety 
of landmarks and points of interest.

Things like shrines, stables, 
and enemy encampments.

They just needed to find ways to make 
players gravitate towards these places,

like moths flapping towards a flame.

So, they first made sure each area 
would confer obvious benefits.

Completing shrines lets you 
increase your health or stamina.

Enemy bases are filled with weapons to pick up.

And while stables were initially just for 
registering horses, Nintendo made them much more

attractive by adding beds for healing, a shop, and 
NPCs who would hand out rumours and sidequests.

Other areas would be worth visiting 
for the resources contained within.

Nintendo purposefully got rid of 
simple healing items like hearts,

so players would have to go into forests 
to get mushrooms or find animals to hunt.

And they made rupees extremely rare, 
so players would need to go towards

mountains and quarries to mine valuable 
ore, which can be sold to shopkeepers.

For this plan to work, they would 
need to make other adjustments, too.

You see, the Sheikah towers are enormous and 
easy to see - the smaller landmarks less so.

So Nintendo had to make them stick out from 
a distance, or from a high-up vantage point.

Shrines were given a distinctive, lit-up 
look; campfires give off a tall tower of

smoke; enemy bases are often built 
around massive skull-shaped rocks;

and the stable is a gigantic 
wooden statue of a horse.

Wherever you look, you should 
find something interesting to do.

Also, while there's usually only one or 
two Sheikah towers on screen at once,

there could be dozens of other, 
smaller landmarks nearby - and

that many options can be completely 
overwhelming in an open world game.

And that was partly the reason behind 
Nintendo creating the "triangle rule".

You see, Nintendo designed 
the terrain and landscape

of Hyrule to be mostly made up 
of triangles - it's all hills,

mountains, and rock formations that 
are shaped like pyramids and cones.

And this has various benefits 
for the world design.

Like, whenever you face a giant mountain, 
players have to decide whether to scale it,

or go around it - creating 
decision making during exploration.

Also, the player's eye is naturally 
guided to the tip of the triangle - so

you can place points of interest at 
the peek to draw the player closer.

But most importantly: these triangles 
simply block whatever's behind - meaning

that the player is rarely overwhelmed 
by a massive field of things to do.

There's usually only a couple 
attractive places on screen,

and the rest is hidden behind hills and mountains.

But as you go towards these mountains, 
whatever's behind is gradually revealed.

Whether you climb the hill 
or try to move along side it,

more terrain will start to be shown.
And this has an interesting outcome:

it creates a constant source of surprise and 
curiosity as new locations make themselves known.

So you might be going towards one landmark,

but as you travel there - two or 
three new places are revealed.

Perhaps a shrine on the horizon, 
or an enemy camp around a corner,

or a distinctive-looking rock, or a 
curious sight on the peek of a mountain.

Wherever you go and whatever you do,

you'll be given a few new things 
to catch your eye and attract you.

Perhaps that new landmark will distract you,

and you'll ditch your old plan 
and go somewhere new instead.

When you're finished, you'll remember 
where you were supposed to be going

and head back there - only to be distracted again.

Whatever the case, this creates a chain reaction.

An infinite loop of discoveries.

A breadcrumb trail of landmarks.

All of which makes you slowly move across 
the map - in an addictive quest of "ooh,

what's that?", "ooh, what's 
what?", "ooh, what's that?".

And before you know it... 
you're at a Sheikah tower!

Which is exactly where Nintendo 
wanted you to go in the first place.

So now, with this system of attractive landmarks,

players still went from point to point - but, 
this time, instead of following a specific line,

they were simply following a breadcrumb trail 
of interesting landmarks - one that would,

eventually, lead players to Breath 
of the Wild's most important locales.

And where following the towers made players 
feel like they were being forced to travel in

a specific way, the littered landmark approach 
was much more organic, and player-driven.

Players would naturally pick places to go,

based on their own curiosity - and 
depending on their current goal or mood.

Locations might be more or less attractive based 
on what you need: if you're looking to increase

power, then shrines and enemy camps suddenly 
become more attractive than stables and towers.

Then when night falls, other locations 
become more visible and appealing.

So players no longer felt forced 
to follow a certain landmark or

goal - but they still ended 
up where they needed to go.

And Nintendo could clearly see 
this improvement on the heatmap.

There was no longer that awkward 80/20 split

in the experiences - instead, all players 
fell into Nintendo's vision for the game:

they could see that players freely explored 
various places, following their curiosity

from landmark to landmark - but almost all 
players eventually got to the key locations.

And I totally found this when 
playing Breath of the Wild myself.

I never felt particularly guided or led around 
the world - I was just following my own curiosity

and exploring on my own terms.
But I still ended up stumbling into

important locations - and was always 
making progress through the story.

So this was Nintendo's first, proper open-world game.

And the team clearly had a lot to learn.

In the second half of the talk, Nintendo explained 
that to get a sense of scale and density,

it initially used data from Google Maps to have 
Link run around Nintendo's hometown of Kyoto,

and clamber up Japan's famous Himeji Castle.

And they shared how they had to make all new tools

to allow for a large team to 
collaborate on a single map.

But through clever design, driven by a 
desire to create a specific experience

for the player - it solved the biggest 
problem in Breath of the Wild's design.

Nintendo created an open world game that 
beautifully balances guidance and exploration.

A feeling of freeform adventure that I've 
only really seen since in Elden Ring - and,

almost certainly, will see 
in Tears of the Kingdom.

I look forward to jumping in later this week.

Thanks for watching,