Having Koei Tecmo create a prequel toThe Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wildin the style of itsDynasty Warriorsseries is a stroke of genius in many ways.Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamitypromises to fill the gaps in Link’s memories of the war that takes place 100 years prior toBreath of the Wild, and it makes perfect sense to set that in a hack-and-slash style whereLink, Zelda, and the Champions of Hyrulecan prove their status as legends by defeating thousands of opponents with ease. However, this premise comes with its share of potential pitfalls.
Every prequel is ultimately beholden to one rule: Maintain the status quo. Prequels usually offer a great way to flesh out how a character acted or thought leading up to specific events, but they cannot change those events without larger ramifications. For example,Star WarsEpisodes 1 through 3 set up the fall of the Republic and rise of Palpatine’s Empire, yet they could only do so much with the characters like Anakin because everything needed to build to hisDarth Vader transformation before Episode 4. As great asAge of Calamitymay be, both its story and gameplay could suffer due to these constraints.
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Effects on Story
As soon asHyrule Warriors: Age of Calamitywas announced, many people jumped to the same conclusion: The Champions will all be dead by the end of the main campaign. That is how the war ended based on stories inBreath of the Wild. In fact, a major part of Link’s journey is freeing their spirits so they can help tofire the Divine Beasts at Calamity Ganon in Hyrule Castle. These deaths, and many other plot points, are set in stone and limit how much the cast of playable fighters will ultimately be able to accomplish.
The character who may suffer the most in this regard is Mipha. Based on story beats established inBreath of the Wild, the Zora Princess arguably has the most potential outside of simply being a powerful warrior and icon for her people. Players meet her immediate family, rather than her descendants, because of their long life spans. Thus,Age of Calamityhas the opportunity for players to meet Mipha’s established relatives like Sidon in the past. She is also established to have an unspoken, and perhaps unrequited crush on Link, meaning there’s ample opportunities to see them interact in the past and help justify those feelings.
However, this ironicallymakes Mipha a more rigid characterwith less personal agency. While she can choose where to fight what armies, she cannot choose to tell Link about her feelings; nor can the game introduce as many new Zora characters without it being odd they aren’t around in the future. This may frustrate some players who are invested in learning more about the Champions thatBreath of the Wilddid not establish, as Mipha is somewhat pigeonholed by the status quo. Characters like the Goron Champion Daruk, on the other hand, has more nebulous relationships and interests to build upon in the prequel.
Fire Emblem Warriors, a previous Nintendo/Koei Tecmo venture, avoids this problem by plucking characters out of their original worlds for a separate adventure. Marth and Chrom could express varying interests and form new bonds because the entire adventure was essentially a “filler arc” in their lives. The same can be said for Intelligent System’s mobile gameFire Emblem Heroes, which frequently pairs up disparate characters due to similar interests. The same can’t be said forAge of Calamitybecause it is a direct prequel.
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Effects on Gameplay
One major strength of the originalHyrule Warriorsis that it was not necessarily tied to any canon, so it could go wild with abilities. Innocuous characters like Agatha fromTwilight Princesscould kill hundreds of monsters in single attacks, and pulling from a range of source materials led to fun, inconsequential references like Link attacking with the moon fromMajora’s Mask.The initial trailer forAge of Calamityshows its characters will stick with thisDynasty Warriorstradition of bombastic attacks and solo units slaying armies, but this opens up a strange grey area.
The ultimate problem with this kind of power fantasy hack-and-slash gameplay being applied to the prequel for a game in a completely different genre is that it brings each individual’s strength into question. For example, it makes one wonder how characters like Mipha, Daruk, Urbosa, and Revali can effortlessly kill thousands of opponents with epic, flashy maneuvers, and then still be too weak to defeat fringe vestiges of Ganon in the Divine Beasts. By extension, ifCalamity Ganon is truly that unimaginably powerful, one must wonder how Link defeats it inBreath of the Wildafter presumably being so downgraded during his 100-year slumber that he now focuses on slower, single-enemy combat.
An obvious answer to this question is that it’s a video game, and players should apply enough suspension of disbelief to know Link and his companions were not literally downgraded. This is just the stark contrast between ahack-and-slash titleand a slow, exploration-heavy adventure game. Yet, if Nintendo wants to positionAge of Calamityas official canon, it’s going to be hard for fans to completely turn their brains off when presented with an opportunity to connect the dots like never before.
All of this talk about character agency might not matter as much ifAge of Calamityis more of an interquel, or a framed story focused on Link being given the context for the war with Calamity Ganon. If that is the case, it may not be as important to create satisfying character narratives or keep power levels strictly accurate. After all, it would just be an over-embellished yarn being spun.
However,Age of Calamityis the perfect opportunity for Nintendo to give audiences more reason to care about thecharacters it established inBreath of the Wild. It would behoove them to really do so before moving into the official sequel, whenever that may come out.
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamitylaunches August 04, 2025, exclusively for Nintendo Switch.
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