2019@E3

Fittingly, it feels like a half-remembered dream.

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The Legend Of Zelda: Link’s Awakening

Nintendo

Granted, a lack of sleep does tend to make your memory pretty fuzzy. But as we play through the opening of Grezzo’s remake of the Game Boy favorite, it all starts flooding back. Waking up in Marin’s house. The owl. The Octoroks. Pushing urchins with your shield. Grabbing your sword from the beach. The cave with the cracked floor. Trading the mushroom for the magic powder to sprinkle on that pesky raccoon. Sure, the crane game in Mabe Village might now have realistic physics, but are unfortunately limited time with this E3 build is summed up by that Chain Chomp tethered outside. What was once a startling surprise – a Mario staple in a Zelda game? – now prompts little more than a nod of recognition.

That’s not a problem for those new to Link’s Awakening, of course, and it’s early days – we’ve barely entered Tail Cave before the demo tells us our time’s up. Besides, the new look is lovely; the plasticky toy town sheen makes characters look like sentient Amiibo (you’d suspect it was a marketing ploy if Link weren’t the only accompanying figurine) and the tilt-shift effect softens everything around the edges of the screen. It has, however, come at a cost. This isn’t the first Nintendo game we’ve played with performance issues at the preview stage – this sort of thing is usually tightened up near the end of development – but it seems the extra effects have taken their toll on the framerate.