WiiU Daily Rumors
On September 4th, 2012 rumors serviced at website WiiU Daily from what was described as a source from Japan.
Wii U Zelda has the biggest development team ever. They got hundreds of people working on the new Wii U Zelda game. It's a 4-year development cycle with a new console, new technology, new engine etc. It'll end up being the most expensive game they've made to date. It's a huge investment for them [Nintendo] in money and manpower, this is Rockstar/GTA territory. They targeted a 2013 release, but quickly abandoned that goal. This is the biggest project they've [Nintendo] ever done, no way is it gonna be ready for Q3 2013. At least from where I see it.
Biggest, most ambitious Zelda game to date. About the same amount of dungeons as previous Zelda games, but these will be vastly bigger in scope and will be totally different from each other. Some dungeons are so big they're broken up in 3 parts and will literally take hours to complete. The Wii U Zelda game will also have mini-games and side quests, but these are still on the drawing board. Finally, the game's composers are creating a brand new orchestral soundtrack with "hours of music". No word on whether any characters will speak in the game. Regarding the story, he said "I really can't comment on that [the story] because I have no idea what it is. I dunno where it's set in the Zelda timeline. I've seen a grown up Link who looks like a much higher detailed Link from Skyward Sword. I haven't see any cut scenes or boss fights either at this point. I'm not sure they've made any of that yet. The first test dungeon they made was a giant forest running on early and buggy Wii U hardware — the dungeon was bigger than the Hyrule field in Ocarina, and the whole thing is one dungeon. You use the gamepad to navigate, avoid traps, follow clues etc. It's dark, lush, with a ton of trees, foliage, some which you have to cut your way through. Its scope and details are unlike anything you've seen in a Zelda game
No online multiplayer, but will have online features. Online multiplayer was never on the drawing board, they're sticking with the tried and tested Zelda formula. It'll have some online features like Miiverse and some sort of system where players can leave hints and help each other in the dungeons. That's about it. As far as I know, none of this [online] stuff has begun development as of Summer 2012. It's still on paper only and will probably be one of the last things they'll add. It's not a big priority for them. Unless they got some separate team elsewhere working on it.
HD graphics, same visual style as Skyward Sword. They're using a new, state of the art engine that's being built from ground up in parallel with the game. It's got the most advanced visual features Nintendo has ever made, and includes a lot of third party tech like Havok for physics and rendering middleware from Umbra (which was recently confirmed for the Wii U). The Wii U Zelda stuff you saw at E3 2011 was just a tech demo, nothing else. I've seen none of that in the real game. The tech demo was even made by an entirely different team with an older engine.
"Most innovative game ever". At least one of the hardware features added to the GamePad were solely implemented because the Zelda team figured out they could do something cool with it. Zelda designers started sketching out concepts as soon as Nintendo decided to include a screen with the new console. Everything in the game is built around the controller and its unique abilities. Every single feature in the controller is used to its full potential. Some of this stuff is still in early stages of development, but they've already implemented enough to show just what's possible with the new controller. They showed some of this stuff to key third party devs behind closed doors last year to get them to realize the possibilities of the new tech. It'll have some revolutionizing gameplay. It has stuff that would never be possible on any other console, and it's not just one cool feature, it's one cool feature after another. Each dungeon will offer a different gameplay experience with the tablet controller. It'll be the most innovative game ever, they got stuff that will be copied by others for years.