In 1950s Japan, a young Shigeru Miyamoto, while exploring the countryside surrounding Kyoto, came across a cave. After some hesitation, he returned with a lantern and ventured inside. The rest, as they say, is history.
In 2023, Polygon is embarking on a Zeldathon. Join us on our journey through The Legend of Zelda series, from the original 1986 game to the release of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and beyond.
This singular act of childhood curiosity became the core of The Legend of Zelda, a series about exploring strange worlds and their even stranger depths. This helped propel Miyamoto, along with Eiji Aonuma, Koji Kondo, and Yoshiaki Koizumi, to video game stardom. It has influenced everything from action-adventure titles to role-playing games to open-world epics. He, in large part, built video games as we know them.
To coincide with the upcoming May release of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Polygon is launching Zeldathon, a weekly series that will explore the franchise from every angle we can find. We’ll revisit older games, tell you the best places to play them, explore the series’ continued influence on today’s video games, and, in keeping with Miyamoto’s inquisitive mind, go down all the rabbit holes. which we come across in dealing with it.
We’re kicking things off with our first story next week. We will then publish new stories every week with a view to tears of the kingdom, and every week thereafter. So grab a lantern, fill those empty jars, and join us on this adventure.
