A leaked TV ad for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has revealed some new – and ever-so-slightly spoilery – details…
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom may have just had its final trailer ahead of its launch next month, but that doesn’t mean Nintendo will stop promoting it in other forms. And, while most of us were still combing that third and final trailer for clues, a leaked, “slightly unfinished” TV spot for Tears of the Kingdom suddenly appeared on Reddit.
Said TV spot will probably be taken down by Nintendo soon, so we won’t bother embedding it here – though you can have a look at it via the link above. Be warned that both the video and the following text may contain mild SPOILERS, though, so click away now if you feel like you’ve already seen enough footage of Tears of the Kingdom.
Still here? Then we shall continue.
Although brief at around 30 seconds long, it’s still possible to glean some interesting morsels of information from that TV spot. The most prominent is the appearance of a three-headed Gleeok, a type of dragon that has plagued Link since the series began. As commenters on Reddit have already suggested, that it’s a Flame Gleeok implies that other forms might appear, such as Water and Ice.
Perhaps the most significant shot in the trailer, though, comes some 20 seconds in. It shows Link travelling through what at first looks like a benighted wood, solely illuminated by one of Link’s enchanted arrows. But a look at the minimap on the bottom right shows that the Z axis is -479 – meaning that Link is exploring a catacomb deep underground.
So far, Nintendo has placed far more emphasis on the Sky Island aspect of its Breath of the Wild sequel. Gradually, though, we’ve begun to see more and more evidence that there could be at least as much to explore underneath Hyrule. Tears of the Kingdom's second trailer, for example, shows what appears to be a Bokoblin mining away in a large cave that looks similar to the one in the leaked TV spot:
If the underground theory really is true, then Tears of the Kingdom’s map will be even more gigantic than we were initially expecting.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is out on 12 May 2023 for Nintendo Switch.