The franchise has evolved since 1998, but the first 3D Zelda stands up incredibly well in its Switch 2 remake.
by Andrew WebsterNov 4, 2026, 11:00 AM UTC Image: NintendoPart OfAll the news about The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remakesee all updates Andrew Webster is an entertainment editor covering streaming, virtual worlds, and every single Pokémon video game. Andrew joined The Verge in 2012, writing over 4,000 stories.Breath of the Wild changed everything. Two decades after The Legend of Zelda made the transformational shift to 3D, Breath of the Wild reinvigorated the franchise with an open-ended adventure that was built around player freedom and expression. Instead of following a set path, players could go wherever they wanted and tackle challenges in a variety of ways. That philosophy filtered down to subsequent games, letting players author their own creative solutions to puzzles in titles like Tears of the Kingdom and Echoes of Wisdom. As a result, Zelda has never been bigger, and the traditional, more linear Zelda games had become a thing of the past. Or so it seemed.
