Spoiler Warning:
The rest of this article contains significant spoilers for Tears of the Kingdom about the story, gameplay mechanics, etc. that you might not wish to see. Continue reading at your own risk.
Most people can agree that Tears of the Kingdom was a huge success. Taking everything that was great about its predecessor, Breath of the Wild, and further reinforcing it, Tears quickly became a developer’s marvel. One of its more impressive features is its version of a “Dark World,” a Zelda trope ever since its inception way back in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. The idea is that this “dark world” is usually a mirror or inverted version of the normal world or “light world” in some shape or form. In Tears of the Kingdom, the Depths are a new installment of the “dark world” trope and it has been met with mostly good reception.
The Depths in Tears of the Kingdom are expansive and span the entire map. They share an inverted sort of relationship with the surface map topography. In a recent interview with Famitsu, director Hidemaro Fujibayashi commented on how the Depths were “made in a surprisingly short period of time.” While you may think this might not have an impact on the fact that it still took about six years for Nintendo to release Tears of the Kingdom, the technical feats that the Zelda team have accomplished with this game in that time frame is bewildering. When asked about the development of the Depths, here is what Fujibayashi had to say:
“By the way, in fear of being misleading, the Depths were made in a surprisingly short period of time. But if you say that sort of thing, you’ll make the staff angry and say, ‘That was not easy!’ Strictly speaking, I mean the base landforms of the depths made from in an extremely short period of time. The Depths and surface have an inverted relationship; areas that are high up in the surface are instead low in the Depths, and conversely, low places and rivers on the surface become tall walls in the Depths. When originally creating the surface area, level designs were separated by rivers so if you were to make the terrain inverted, the areas themselves would be similarly separated by rivers and you would have another naturally terrain-created level. So, I wanted to try investigating this idea, and after conveying some of the conditions we talked about to a programmer, they quickly finished a prototype.”
The detail that went into creating the Depths is nothing short of revolutionary. Though it may seem a bit on the nose to some, anyone that has played Tears of the Kingdom will let you know that the Depths bring about their own sense of excitement and danger as well. There are many types of creatures and challenges down there, so much so that it could have been its own game in itself. Navigating the Depths can be equal parts exciting and terrifying at the same time and you will find plenty of players that love the challenge while others will only come to the Depths if absolutely necessary.
One of the other technical marvels is how seemless this experience is. Anyone who has played can attest to how smooth the transition is diving into the Depths. A feat that isn’t even deterred one bit diving from as high up as you can get to. There is no loading screen and the game doesn’t slow up much if at all while diving from such a high point to a lower one. When asked about if that was a challenging thing to be done, both Fujibayashi and producer Eiji Aonuma had their own responses:
Fujibayashi: “Yes, it is (challenging). The programmers were considerably creative while they made various adjustments and moved forward implementing optimizations until the end.”
Aonuma: “In fact, until the end of development it had not become seamless. While in the middle of loading, Link would stop and not fall among other issues. The programmers would say ‘It’s fine’ but that situation continued until the end and we kept checking ‘Can we really make it seamless?’ But, at the very end, they made it a reality. (laughs)”
Any diehard fan will tell you that having a “dark world” in any Zelda game is remarkable. While not all Zeldas have implemented this, the ones that do are undoubtably extraordinary games, if not the best in the series. A Link to the Past started this trope which carried over into other Zeldas such as the Oracle series with the underworld of Subrosia and having both the past and present versions of Labrynna. While these examples are more point-blank, other games like Ocarina of Time were a little more subtle. In Ocarina of Time, while it may not seem like it, the future when Link is an adult is technically that game’s version of a “dark world.” Even certain events you can do in the past can affect the future in a way and vice versa.
A Link to the Past also established this concept by having what you do in the Light World affect various things and places in the Dark World. In Tears of the Kingdom the core concept of the “dark world” still remains and understanding this concept can help players traverse the terrain much easier. For example, if you understand the relationship between the Lightroots and the Shrines of Light, then you know that wherever you find a Shrine on the surface, you will also find its Lightroot counterpart in the Depths, and vice versa. You will also come to understand that if the terrain is elevated due to there being a mountain on the surface, then you can safely assume that its Depths counterpart is more likely to be a canyon.
I believe the Depths help make the experience in Tears of the Kingdom that much more unique. When you play the game for the first time and are introduced to the Depths knowing nothing about it, you initially think, “oh this is a neat little area that the Zelda team included”. Once you start to transverse it though, you quickly realize that this “little” area isn’t as limited as you originally thought and when that realization comes, a laugh slips out as you begin to understand that this is by no means your typical Zelda game of the past. It’s a whole adventure waiting to be experienced. Just make sure you bring some extra Brightbloom seeds.
