So, the Switch is out, and its big headliner, the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, is already garnering massive praise (be on the lookout for our first impressions of the game soon!). That being said, because of the games development cycle, I.E. it was meant for Wii U alone then ported to Switch, it lost the ability to contain certain features. Mainly, the HD Rumble.
For those who don’t know, the HD Rumble is part of the Joy-Cons, and can actually give rather impressive feedback via the control to make you truly think you’re doing certain tasks. This is prevalent in games like 1, 2, Switch, where the HD Rumble actually helps you accomplish goals. But, it’s not in Legend of Zelda…yet…
For Eiji Aonuma talked about this feature with Gameinformer and noted that while it’s not in Breath of the Wild, he is thinking about it for the future:
“Force feedback is something I am keeping in the back of my head. I want the users to feel that immediate reaction and with HD Rumble, we’re able to do that with a further in-depth experience. In Skyward Sword when you’re swinging your sword, whether you’re attacking a hard-shelled enemy and have a little bit of resistance, or cutting through something really easily, those kinds of differences in attacks, you will be able to create them with HD Rumble.
In the future it is something I would definitely like to visit. Of course the 1-2-Switch dev team is part of our group, so there are other developers on our team that are thinking about it. As I am talking to you, I just thought about with HD Rumble, how about if you’re putting a sword back in its sheath, or taking it out? That little bit of movement can also be expressed with HD Rumble, so that could be kind of fun.”
Eiji Aonuma has stated that he’s fine with just making Zelda games, so one that uses the Switch and HD Rumble to its fullest is already something we’re excited about.
