Summary
One ofThe Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom’s best features is undoubtedly Link’s Ultrahand ability, which allows players access to a level of in-game creativity the franchise has never seen before. With Ultrahand, players can build a variety of structures, with most of them being useful as mounts to enhance traversal and exploration through the game’s vast open world of Hyrule. Unfortunately,Nintendo is abandoning Ultrahand afterTears of the Kingdom, so things will likely be much different in the series' next installment. However, there is one feature Nintendo could continue to implement into the series, even after the days of Ultrahand are far behind.
Despite nothing being confirmed yet about the nextLegend of Zeldatitle, there has been speculation surrounding what the series will look like moving forward, and whether it will revert to its traditional formula followingTears of the Kingdom’s focus on survival and open-world exploration. Assuming it’s retaining the open-world formula now established byBreath of the WildandTears of the Kingdom, it may be logical for the series to continue allowing the use of various mounts in each subsequent installment, despite Ultrahand retiring. After all, now that players have gotten used to exploring both the grounds and skies of Hyrule by vehicle, not including the feature in later entries may feel like a step backward.
The Legend of Zelda Should Introduce More Mounts as a Core Traversal Feature
The Legend of Zelda Is No Stranger to Mounts
SinceOcarina of Time,The Legend of Zeldahas occasionally allowed players to hop onEpona, Link’s faithful steed, and traverse each game’s world more quickly and efficiently than they could on foot.Breath of the Wildexpanded on this even further by giving players the ability to tame wild horses that they could then use as mounts, even though Epona was still obtainable via Amiibo and was arguably the best mount in the game.
The biggest shift inThe Legend of Zelda’s mounts actually came later inBreath of the Wild, with the introduction of theMaster Cycle Zeromotorcycle in the game’s second DLC pack,The Champions' Ballad. Despite taking on the appearance of a horse, the Master Cycle Zero was a fully functioning motorcycle that players were able to use to get around Hyrule more quickly than they could on horseback and was a departure from the series' traditional approach to mounts. All of this to say, mounts aren’t necessarily a new feature to the series, but they were certainly drastically changed inTears of the Kingdom, as players can now design and build just about any type of mount they want as long as it obeys the laws of the game’s physics engine.
The Legend of Zelda Could Do More With Mounts in the Future
Breath of the WildandTears of the Kingdomhave set a new precedent forThe Legend of Zeldain terms of scale, and due to the massive success and popularity of both games, Nintendo is unlikely to bring the franchise back to its smaller-scale roots anytime soon. As such, new mounts might be in order, since large worlds require more efficient traversal methods and it may feel like a step backward to revert to the simplicity of horses. Perhaps subsequent installments could introduce new flying mounts of some kind, whether they be technical creations or animals Link is meant to tame. Either way, it’s a feature Nintendo shouldn’t so readily remove the series from.
There is plenty moreThe Legend of Zeldacould do with mounts, as it has shown in games likeTears of the Kingdom’s custom vehicles. Nintendo could even use player-made creations inTears of the Kingdomas inspiration while it develops the nextLegend of Zeldatitle. Wherever the series goes, mounts are no longer the future ofLegend of Zelda, and that arguably can’t be reversed.
