While The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword certainly has its fans, it often tends to get overlooked when compared to some of the other 3D Zelda games. Although, the release of the HD remaster of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword will certainly introduce a lot more players to the game. In the meantime, one longtime fan of the game discovered a real-life equivalent of one of the in-game creatures in Skyward Sword.

One of the staple mechanics of Skyward Sword is the gigantic birds that Link can use to travel to different areas in Skyloft. The birds are referred to as Loftwings and they are one of the most recognizable elements featured in Skyward Sword. Nintendo even made an amiibo based on Zelda's Loftwing in Skyward Sword, but now it seems Loftwings apparently exist in real life in some capacity.

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A Reddit user by the name of flurry_rush_ encountered a bird that bears an uncanny resemblance to the Loftwings in Skyward Sword. The breed of bird known as a Shoebill possesses a number of similarities to the Loftwings, such as the shape of the beak, the eyes, the way the wings are folded. Even the feet and talons are fairly similar to the in-game bird.

It's amazing how often times video game enemies, creatures, or even characters can be influenced by real-world elements. Such as Fallout 4's Dogmeat, which was based on a specific, real-life dog. It's more than likely that the Shoebill bird played a key, inspirational role during the Loftwing's design during Skyward Sword's development.

In any case, the upcoming release of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD is rapidly approaching, and it will give plenty of people the chance to experience or re-experience Skyward Sword with a number of quality of life improvements, such as the fact that the game won't require a specific apparatus like the Wii Remote Plus back when Skyward Sword first released on the Wii.

It will be interesting to see how well this port is received once it finally releases. On the Wii U, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess were both ported to the system and both remasters featured quality of life improvements that greatly helped the experience of the game overall. From what has been shown so far, it seems that Skyward Sword HD will also feature some new gameplay additions to make the experience more approachable.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD will be available on July 16 for Nintendo Switch.

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