Echoes of Wisdom features Zelda’s first female director | Kaser Focus

Like many gamers, I’m going to be dipping into The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom this weekend. Normally I put that sort of personal information further down the KF, but in this case I’m mentioning it because it’s also part of one my favorite stories this week. Nintendo lifted the curtain on the game’s development in its Ask the Developer interview series — which featured stories from series producer Eiji Aonuma; Satoshi Terada, director of the game at partner studio Grezzo; and Tomomi Sano, director on Nintendo’s side of development.

Sano has several years of experience in the industry and multiple titles under her belt. As other’s have pointed out, Sano is the first woman to direct a mainline Zelda title, and from the look of the game, she knocked it out of the park. I was already excited to play Zelda’s new standalone adventure (no offense, Link), but seeing Sano — and Terada and Aonuma — speak about how Echoes developed over time from a make-your-own dungeon title to a mischief-making sim all about finding creative solutions to your problems really pushed my dial up to 11. It’ll definitely be my game of choice this weekend.

The rest of the week has been a bit of a rush. First we had the State of Play, which revealed the beautiful new game in the Ghost of series, Ghost of Yotei. That wasn’t the only thing it revealed, of course, but it was the one that stuck in my mind the most. We also got to see the Horizon Zero Dawn remaster — which didn’t look like too chunky of an upgrade, but who am I to judge? The PS5 Pro Limited Edition sold out almost instantly, so y’all lucky suckers need something to play on it.

The other big thing this week was Ubisoft’s meltdown. The company delayed the next Assassin’s Creed game to next February — which is already starting to look a bit crowded with Civilization VII, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, Monster Hunter Wilds, Avowed, Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii and now AC: Shadows jockeying for prominence. It also admitted that Star Wars Outlaws underperformed to the point where it’s having to revise its financial estimates. It’s been a bit of a week, hasn’t it?

What to play this week

This list contains games from both last week and this week.

What’s new:

• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom
• Frostpunk 2
• The Plucky Squire
• Ara: History Untold
• Enotria: The Last Song
• EA Sports FC 25
• Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster
• Epic Mickey: Rebrushed
• Shadows of Doubt
• Train Sim World 5
• Balatro

New on subscription services:

• Wargroove 2 (Xbox Game Pass)
• Final Fantasy I-VI Pixel Remaster (Xbox Game Pass)
• Trials of Mana (Xbox Game Pass)
• Legend of Mana (Xbox Game Pass)
• Under The Waves (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Night in the Woods (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Chernobylite (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Wild Card Football (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Space Engineers (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Road 96 (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Ben 10 (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Far Cry 5 (PlayStation Plus Extra+Premium)
• Pistol Whip (PlayStation Plus Premium)
• Secret Agent Clank (PlayStation Plus Premium)
• Sky Gunner (PlayStation Plus Premium)
• Mister Mosquito (PlayStation Plus Premium)
• Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales (Prime Gaming)
• The Falconeer (Prime Gaming)
• LEGO: The Hobbit (Prime Gaming)
• I Love Finding Cats & Pups (Prime Gaming)
• Kerbal Space Program (Prime Gaming)
• Mystery Case Files: Black Crown (Prime Gaming)
• Ghost Song (Prime Gaming)
• Ynglet (Prime Gaming)
• Black Desert (Prime Gaming)
• Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams (Prime Gaming)
• Final Fantasy XVI (GeForce Now)
• Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven (GeForce Now)
• The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak (GeForce Now)
• REKA (GeForce Now)
• Battletoads Double Dragon (Nintendo Switch Online)
• Big Run (Nintendo Switch Online)
• Cosmo Gang The Puzzle (Nintendo Switch Online)
• Kunio-kun no Dodgeball da yo Zen’in Shūgō! (Nintendo Switch Online)