Here’s 10 minutes of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom gameplay, new abilities, weapon fusing and sky islands

Nintendo has released 10 minutes of new footage for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, showing off new abilities, enemies and the sky islands.

In a special gameplay video, we get to see Link use a new Recall ability, that allows him to rewind time. Link uses this to ride a rock that had fallen from the sky back up to where it came from. Here, he then glides on to one of Tears of the Kingdom’s sky islands, where he comes across new enemies known as “constructs”.

This trailer also gives us a look at the new weapon fusing mechanic. Link can add keese eyeballs to arrows to make homing arrows, and mushrooms to shields (yes, mushrooms to shields). When the shroom shield is struck by an advancing enemy, the mushroom creates a cloud of spores that engulfs the fight in a fog. This fusing technique can also be used to make vehicles like rafts from stray logs and fans, or even flying ships, thanks to the Ultrahand ability.

Another new ability is Ascend. It pretty much does what is says on the tin – it allows Link to ascend through surfaces. We have seen this ability in previous trailers, but now we have more detail about the new mechanic, and let’s be honest, it’s a game changer for climbing.

Lastly, the heavily expected Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Switch Oled is indeed a thing. It will will launch on 28th April, ahead of Tears of the Kingdom’s release on 12th May. Meanwhile, a Tears of the Kingdom Switch Pro Controller and Switch carrying case will release separately on 12th May. Here’s how it all looks:

Ok, I am more than a little excited! But, I still have some questions… Like, what is Zonai charge? Does this mean we are going to meet the Zonai in Tears of the Kingdom? After all, their ruins were in Breath of the Wild.

I have a theory that the Zonai Tribe are the Interlopers first mentioned in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, who went on to become the Twili. I wonder if Tears of the Kingdom will explore this more?

Also, where did the sky islands actually come from? Have they been there all along, but for some reason are only visible now? Also, why are the rocks falling from them (other than it being handy for Link to hitch a ride back up to the clouds)?

Lastly, where is Zelda? I am still holding out hope that she will be playable in some way, but Nintendo is certainly keeping the titular royal’s role in Tears of the Kingdom a closely guarded secret.

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