It’s remarkable that, four years after the release of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, fans are still finding new ways to make the game exciting. This time, fans have used a Wii U emulator to see how Breath of the Wild looks in virtual reality.
Gamer, Brian Tate, designed a mod that allows the player to utilize both first- and third-person gameplay. The third-person gameplay also has the added feature of allowing Link’s character to be switched with Zelda, however that was added purely for cosmetic purposes.
It’s important to note that motion controls are not supported by this mod, however, the developer addressed the topic in the video description: “Full motion controls would be amazing, but that would be a very different modding challenge (not sure if that’s possible at this time),” it reads. “We may go with a method that uses similar controls to the Wii (and soon Switch) Skyward Sword where gestures with your VR controller causes different swings. If we rendered the game sword in the player’s hand while in first person (outside of the game engine), it might work well to feel like your [sic] holding the sword (and can be usable, because when you swing it, it causes the swing gesture to happen in the game, doing enemy damage). We’ll see!”
In 2019, Nintendo gave Breath of the Wild VR support through Nintendo Labo. While Labo doesn’t offer VR in a way that’s comparable to PC headsets or PlayStation VR, it may be the first step in utilizing this technology. While the developers haven’t released a set date for when this could go public, they have stated timelines anywhere from several months, to half a year, or even a bit longer.
