Nintendo reveals the origins behind the Ascend ability in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, something which originally had a very different purpose during development. After a lengthy development cycle, Nintendo has finally launched The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, a game which builds upon its predecessor and continues to expand upon it in different ways. The most notable is the return of Breath of the Wild's version Hyrule, though things have evolved a bit as new towns have popped up, islands can be explored in the sky, and much more.
In fact, Link has managed to change a bit in the years between games, as his trusty Sheikah Slate has been replaced by a new suite of abilities like Ultrahand. Original staples including Stasis, Magnesis, and Remote bombs are gone and replaced with new things like Ascend, Fuse, and Recall. While Nintendo's Eiji Aonuma showed off these in a recent developer gameplay segment, fans are now getting more background details on each one including how the powerful Ascend feature came to be.
In a recent interview, The Legend of Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma was asked which of the four abilities was his favorite. Speaking candidly, Aonuma admitted that he's not above looking for ways to making things a bit easier, so he really gravitated towards Ascend. As Nintendo revealed, Ascend allows Link to essentially swim up through cave ceilings and roofs to reach the top without having to climb or find an exit.
Interestingly enough, Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom game director Hidemaro Fujibayashi followed up by mentioning that Ascend was originally created as debug feature for developers to quickly leave areas instead of moving back through them. Aonuma believed this could be something usable in the game to cut down on some of the more tedious backtracking sections and that cheating can be fun. However, just turning on an ability to let players phase through a ceiling nearly anywhere did present some challenges including ensuring for any and all possibilities that a player may engage in.
Leading up to release, new interviews have begun popping up online, including from Nintendo directly, revealing all sorts of new details about the experience including confirmation of the long rumored dungeons returning. Aonuma also went on record stating that he has completed Tears of the Kingdom from start to finish around 20 times, with some ending much faster than others. After all of that, Aonuma recommended that players take their time at first as Tears of the Kingdom is "more fun with detours, even more so than in the previous game."
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is available now on Nintendo Switch.
Source: Polygon