Legend of Zelda developer explains how an unexpected item became Tears of the Kingdom's best vehicle-creation tool: "Even we didn't predict that"
May. 27, 2024The cooking pot has incredible suspension
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdomis a rare game that lets players build both their own fun and the wackiest contraptions slumbering in their noggin. Though, even Nintendo developers had no idea that the cooking pot of all things would become such a juggernaut vehicle-construction tool.
The Hylian Shield, for example, is an object familiar to those who’ve been playing the series at any point over the last four decades, “but I doubt anyone imagined that you’d be able to attach a piece of icy meat to it and [then] use it to surf at high speeds in the latest game,” Dohta quipped.
“This is a sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, so you may have guessed that there would be a portable cooking pot,” mainly used for making recipes in both games, “but I doubt anyone predicted that [a] cooking pot would also have excellent suspension,” Dohta continued, alongside a clip of four pots glued to a makeshift vehicle’s wheels. “Even we didn’t predict that.”
Dohta explains that these endless possibilities were enabled because the developers wanted players to “combine actions and objects to create many different ways to play.” Essentially, the sequel’s “multiplicative gameplay” was built to “create a system that makes fun things happen,” rather than Nintendo employees stuffing the game with pre-built “fun things.” And that’s how we get hundreds of Hylian vehicles held together by cooking pots, ancient superglue, and the unbreakable hope that nothing will fall apart.
Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom’s biggest change from Breath of the Wild was made to give players unrestricted freedom in a “world free from self-destruction.”
Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter
Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more
Kaan freelances for various websites including Rock Paper Shotgun, Eurogamer, and this one, Gamesradar. He particularly enjoys writing about spooky indies, throwback RPGs, and anything that’s vaguely silly. Also has an English Literature and Film Studies degree that he’ll soon forget.
The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom finds its place on the official series timeline, and it comes right before the events of the first game
After Echoes of Wisdom, Zelda actor says having the princess as the playable character in a Breath of the Wild-style open-world game would be “amazing”
I’ve waited 8 years for American Truck Simulator to recreate my hometown and I wasn’t prepared to see the 200-year-old tree my entire university mourned brought back to life
