While their press conference was centred around the announcements of new Mario and Metroid games, Nintendo had another ace up its sleeve, albeit it a small and vague one: artwork from an upcoming Zelda game for the Wii.

Teaser art for the new Wii Zelda

From an interview with Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of the Zelda franchise:

Well, the story setting for this Zelda is, of course, in a completely different era and Link is older than he was previously. More approaching adulthood. There is one hint. Maybe from the art work you can see that he’s not holding a sword.

Source: Siliconera and IGN

Interesting, indeed. Considering that The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess was actually a game developed for the Gamecube and then ported over to the Wii, it will be interesting to see what Nintendo brings to the table with the first Zelda title developed from the ground up with motion control in mind.

In any case, considering it’s only a piece of artwork, one can assume that we won’t be seeing it on store shelves until 2010 at the earliest.

Discussion
  • Mark June 6, 2009 at 8:13 am

    I never got around to Twighlight Princess, although I did love Wind Waker. I’ll be interested to see this first proper Wii Zelda game, but personally I’m looking forward to Super Mario Galaxy 2 more :)

  • edifanob June 6, 2009 at 1:00 pm

    As a fan of the Zelda games I read your post with pleasure.

  • Texcap June 9, 2009 at 8:14 am

    I really enjoyed Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and the Phantom Hourglass in recent years and am really looking forward to finding out what Shigeru Miyamoto has in store for Link, Zelda & Co. this time around. Not holding a sword eh? …

  • NiteShade March 4, 2010 at 1:18 pm

    I can’t wait for this Zelda to come out! It will probably be the next game I buy for the Wii! But really, what’s with the swordless Link?

  • Chris May 31, 2010 at 4:54 pm

    look, as you can see, Link isn’t holding the sword. The girl is the sword. Look at her figure. You can see the shape of the hilt, the jewel is on her forehead, her cape is the flared edge, and her straight legs is the blade.