We're now getting closer to the release of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and Nintendo is sharing everything we need to know about the upcoming game. Here is the latest news on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, including the Sky Island, new features, mechanics, and OLED Switch.

New Gameplay Features and Mechanics

We're just a few months away from the release of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and Series Producer Eiji Aonuma shared at the start of the Direct that the game has gone gold; meaning that development is complete and the game is now ready for release. But apart from that, Aonuma also shared gameplay footage to give us a glimpse of what new stuff we can expect from the game when it comes out.

At first glance, one could be forgiven for thinking that The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is just the same game as The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. After all, the game retains much of its predecessors' foundational gameplay mechanics. It's great for those who loved Breath of the Wild and just want a new game that is close to that experience. Thankfully, any doubts that Tears of the Kingdom will have anything new for players to enjoy should now be laid to rest. As shown in the latest Zelda Direct, there are a lot of new gameplay mechanics and elements that players can discover in the game. Here are just a few of the new gameplay elements Link has access to in the game:

  • Recall – A Sheikah technology that allows Link to replay an object's movement; in the Direct, Link uses this to ride a boulder upwards. That same boulder fell from the sky just moments before.
  • Fuse – Link can now interact with more things around him in the game world. He can use the Fuse ability to fuse together random objects he could find. In the Direct, Link used the ability to fuse an otherwise useless stick with a rock, turning it into a makeshift weapon. Fused weapons take on the properties of each fused object, like a Keese Eyeball turning arrows into homing arrows. This is definitely going to be something we'll experiment on a lot!
  • Ultrahand – In the previous game, Link can use Magnesis to move big objects around – but that was just limited to metals. With Ultrahand, Link can now interact with a wider range of objects and materials, and as shown in the Direct, could have these objects stuck to each other to create makeshift objects, like rafts.
  • Ascend – This fantastic new ability lets Link attach to any ceiling and pass through it! This will make a lot of exploration much easier and would make climbing up steep mountains much easier – provided that there's a cave underneath. This literally makes it impossible for Link to get stuck or imprisoned.
  • The Sky Islands – There are a variety of landscapes that Link can explore above Hyrule – the Sky Islands that are suspended in the sky. Link can explore these Sky Islands but the player will have to be creative and really rack their brains to figure out how to get to them. The player can also always just dive down back to the surface, gliding down safely with or without the paraglider.

New Enemies

We also saw new enemy types in the Direct. Here are just some of the new enemy types we've seen Link fight in the Direct:

  • Construct – An enemy that is made up of the same old Sheikah technology as the Guardians in the previous game. They hover slightly above the air and have two arms, with one arm usually wielding a weapon; sometimes fused ones even! The Constructs also have the same tracking eye that the Guardians used to have, which alarms them when they spot Link. It appears that the Constructs roam the Sky Islands.
  • An unidentified flying creature – Towards the end of the Direct, there's a yellow winged creature with a forked tail and a snout that splits two ways. It also appears to be lifting an unidentified object as well.
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Tears of the Kingdom OLED Switch

The new Tears of the Kingdom OLED Switch model is one of the most exciting announcements made during the recent The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Gameplay Demonstration. The new console version sports a white surface with gold patterns on the dock and a pair of cream-colored Joy-Cons with green and white patterns. This OLED Switch will be coming out on April 28, 2023, a few weeks before The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Release Date.