Report: 'Zelda: Breath of the Wild' delayed, won't make Nintendo Switch launch

By Gabe Gurwin November 15, 2016

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - New Temple of Time Footage

Nintendo’s Switch console is scheduled to release next March, but it appears that the system’s biggest launch title may no longer be able to release simultaneously.

Nintendo insider Emily Rogers, who had previously revealed that the Nintendo Switch was set to be fully unveiled in March and would feature 4GB of RAM (the jury is still out on the latter detail), reported that the localization for Breath of the Wild is well behind schedule.

Several sources have told Rogers that the localization for the game could take until December to complete, and would then require roughly four to six months of testing before the game would be ready to ship.

This would seem to put Breath of the Wild‘s actual launch date as somewhere between April and June 2017. The extra time, however, could make for a more polished final product — Rogers has also been told that the Switch version of the game is running “more smoothly” than the Wii U version we’ve seen at E3.

Rogers stressed that, even with her multiple sources, fans should take this information with “a grain of salt.” Eurogamer, though, was able to corroborate the report a short time after the original was posted.

“Eurogamer had separately been told of the same schedule, as Nintendo is committed to launching the game in as close to perfect a state as possible after so long in development,” said Eurogamer’s Tom Phillips.

Phillips added that the 3D Mario game we saw a glimpse of during the Switch announcement video will likely fill the void left by Breath of the Wild.

It’s not particularly unusual for a Zelda title to miss a Nintendo system’s launch. Wind Waker, Ocarina of Time, Link to the Past, and the original Legend of Zelda all released well after their respective systems were made available. The sole exception is Twilight Princess, but that game was delayed from an original sole GameCube release in order to move it to the Wii, as well.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will be available for both Nintendo Switch and Wii U.

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Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…

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