Why do Zelda Console games take 5 years to develop.... ?

[DivinePaladin]

mZuzek said:
I feel like the comparisons with GTA here are a bit shallow. You guys are missing something.

Zelda has a lot of artistic creation behind it. For every new game, they have to come up with a new gameplay mechanic, artstyle, world, story, characters etc. etc. etc. to keep the game fresh. If you look at stuff like the artwork in Hyrule Historia, it's clear they spend a lot of time designing each and every part of the game to make it unique.

GTA doesn't have that. They have all the artistic process done from scratch - copy a real world town with realistic visuals, make a cliche story involving crime and corruption, and don't make lots of significant changes to gameplay or new mechanics/twists. They pretty much start development with the artistic process basically done.

The Zelda team delays the games because they shift focus during development with new ideas for what they want to create - GTA doesn't have this problem because from the start it's already set in stone what the game should play like.

You really take a lot away from what GTA accomplishes when you boil it down to basics like that. The choices of what city to work in, what missions to design in that world, what cultural facets should be satirized, etc. are all just as much a part of the artistic process as choosing which new gimmick everyone will hate that Zelda should have this time around. It takes talent to create a world like GTA, where everything is both real and surreal at the same time. You can't just say everything is done for Rockstar just because they base loosely in reality.

 

As an aside, Zelda's delays only further perpetuate the Zelda cycle. While I prefer the games to be done rather than lazily finished (WW), they've been OVERdone in past entries, leading to a fizzle out in interest for many fans (TP and SS). The delays only increase expectations, to the point that perhaps a new gimmick isn't always worth another year of silence.