The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia Author: Patrick Thorpe | Language: English | ISBN:
1616550414 | Format: PDF
The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia Description
- Hardcover: 280 pages
- Publisher: Dark Horse (January 29, 2013)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1616550414
- ISBN-13: 978-1616550417
- Product Dimensions: 12.2 x 9.3 x 1.1 inches
- Shipping Weight: 4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
This book is almost too awesome for me to put into words. I've long been a fan of the Legend of Zelda. It is not only my personal favorite video game series, but arguably the greatest series in video gaming, period. When this book released in Japan for Zelda's 25 year anniversary, many hoped it would get translated and come to the States. Thankfully, our wish has been granted. This book is about as high-quality as they come. The opening letter from Shigeru Miyamoto sets a wonderful, celebratory tone for the rest of the book. I can't think of a better opening.
The first third of the book, entitled "The Legend Begins: The World of Skyward Sword" is devoted to said title, the most recently released Zelda game we all played and loved. It's filled to the brim with the concept and official art that inspired Skyward's Sword brilliant aesthetic style. As one who views Skyward Sword as one of the most beautiful and brilliantly inspired video games ever made in terms of its art design and visuals, this is just fine with me. There's tons here, including a lot of really interesting ideas for characters that didn't make it into the game, like a floating Fi in a massive suit of armor or Zelda designs that are decidedly more elegant and fancy. Really cool. There's also a good amount of location art that is simply gorgeous and really captures your imagination, just like the settings in the game did. Throughout this whole section are notes from the Zelda team, which gives nice insight into the design process of the game. It's a great start to the book, and roughly 60 pages long.
This is the holy bible of the Zelda universe. Contained in this tome is concept art from the games, interviews, the official timeline of the games and more information than you could ever hope for. This is amazing as it gives us a whole new look at the franchise, we see from the concept art how the characters evolved and the production art is amazing. While much of the book is given to talking about games like Skyward Sword and Twilight princess and the recent DS games, I will admit I wanted more discussion of Link's awakening and the Capcom co-produced game boy color games which were among my favorites. The discussion around Ocarina of Time is incredible and in fact all the interviews from those involved in the creation and production of the series are amazing. So much information is given about the games and this really feels worth the long wait. Especially the concept art as it lets us see how the character's looks evolved over time. You can really learn a lot about the characters and universe in this 276 page book.
The info given also fills in on some of the backstory of the games, both in Universe and how they came to be. These interviews are excellent and Nintendo really goes all out to give you your money's worth!
The timeline is something that has been long awaited by many fans but there is something you might be surprised by with it.
As well there is 32 Pages of the skyward sword prequel comic included by the creators of the Zelda Manga and it is awesome. It fills us in on the backstory prior to Skyward Sword and the events mentioned in the game. A really fun comic, it also lets us know there are always more legends of Zelda and Adventures of Link.
The book is in a Portrait format which means this is a coffee table book.
The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia Preview
Link
Please Wait...