Space World 1995 Ocarina of Time Demo

[Mases]

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is often times given the label as the greatest video game of all time, but it was quite a long road for it to get to that level. Part of what made Ocarina of Time such a huge commercial success, was the massive buildup for the game, and much of that started way back in 1995. At Nintendo's video game trade show known as Space World, Nintendo showed a video filled with clips from a bunch of games that were being developed including Super Mario 64, Goldeneye, and what was known at the time as simply Zelda64. The clip for Zelda was spliced up, but all together it ran at under 12 seconds and here it is. The silent video below is the first glimpse of what would eventually become known as The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oav_0MiyJpA

Link is shown battling with a shiny metallic knight and the Link resembles that of the Link from the original Legend of Zelda and Adventure of Link. Ocarina of Time was originally being built on the same engine that Super Mario 64 used, as can somewhat be seen in the video, but was later modified so much that the end result was far different than this original demo.

This video has been added to a new section at the site, Zelda Trailers and Demos. I will be uploading videos and adding more to this page over the coming weeks. Be sure to head on over to our Zelda Forums to discuss this interesting clip.

[zeldafreak]

The video seems interesting for its time of development.
I can see the major difference in detail from the game and the video.
And I thought Oot had bad graphics when I first played it.

Why is Link right-handed in the video?

[lonely_moon]

I understand how this must have been exciting at the time (well, everything was exciting; games were making the jump to 3D), but looking back on it now, it's a fairly boring trailer. Most likely because they were probably only a tiny way into production.

But still, I would have liked to have seen more effort. Everything is extremely basic. The knight has only one texture. They seem to be battling in the Generic Cave of Nowheresville. The animation is fluid, yes, but the characters act weightless. Also, Link has the exact same design as he does in the official artwork for the original NES games. It's not very interesting, all things considered.

But hey, if this is what led to Ocarina of Time, I'm not complaining.

[Waker of winds]

This is how OoT was supposed to look back there, in the 95's.

Things like this make me wonder, a game with this character design would be as successful as the final version OoT?
I think not. The final version OoT was wonderful and looked perfectly. But as lonely_moon said, I cannot complain. This is what led to OoT.

[MrMosley]

From what I understand, didn't OoT start out as a remake of the original? Either way, its pretty obvious that Link's look is quite similar to that of say, AoL. Which, that might have been the limitation they believed they had with the engine at the time. Obviously, Super Mario 64 was very basic compared to later games. The metallic knight shown seems to be a copy of Link (and makes me think a lot of Metal Cap Mario from 64). It would have been weird if they actually released it in that format, years early. Part of me wishes that they had, to see what it would have been like. The other is very glad that OoT turned out just the way it did.

[Cucco Lady Anju]

If OoT would have been released in that style, I highly doubt that it would be such a success. I know that I wouldn't have been interested back in third grade when I picked up OoT for the first time if Link looked like that, no matter how awesome the game would end up being.

[Petman1325]

Now, that was pretty much Ocarina of Time's conception. However, like Wind Waker, the Space World demo looked nothing like the final product. For starters, the art style in OoT was different from the Space World demo. The art style was more of a polygonal version of A Link to the Past Link. The polygon count and visuals in there resemble something off of Super Mario 64, actually. Yet, its the slo-mo that is a bit of a turn off in that video, but nowadays, its the nostalgia that makes it awesome.

[Dungeon killer]

Originally Posted by Petman1325

Now, that was pretty much Ocarina of Time's conception. However, like Wind Waker, the Space World demo looked nothing like the final product. For starters, the art style in OoT was different from the Space World demo. The art style was more of a polygonal version of A Link to the Past Link. The polygon count and visuals in there resemble something off of Super Mario 64, actually. Yet, its the slo-mo that is a bit of a turn off in that video, but nowadays, its the nostalgia that makes it awesome.

I agree with Petman, they did change alot of stuff and does have more of a Alttpl feel to it, than the Beta version and the space world demo.

[Bluelink6]

oooh...that looks awful. But, hey, if that's the early demo..