Each new report out of Nintendo seemed like it could have been the company's death knell: their Wii U console consistently fails to reach sales expectations, barely anyone is buying it, there aren't that many games worth buying for it, yadda yadda yadda. The same things were said about the Wii when it launched, and it sold like hot cakes. True, they now sell for about £30 at your local Cash Converters, but they made millions on their debut thanks to titles that catered for the casual (Wii Sports, Wii Fit etc) and hardcore (Twilight Princess, No More Heroes) gamer. The Wii U, meanwhile, has failed to imitate that success, for a variety of reasons. It could be the pricing, coupled with the fact that most people couldn't really see the difference between the Wii U and the Wii; so we use a tablet instead of motion controls now? What? Why? And it's HD? That's not worth £200. What games does it have? Aside from ZombiU, nothing that's really gotten much press. That's why this new Legend of Zelda is so important. Between this and the new Smash Bros game, the Wii U could finally reconnect the audience that Nintendo alienated by focussing on gimmicks over games, as well as tapping into the huge fanbase the Zelda franchise has built up over the years. Apart from that, though, the game just looks so, so good that investing in a whole new console for it looks like it might actually be worth the price of admission. Now if you need us, we're going to be whistling Saria's Song for the rest of the week.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
