THE LEGEND OF ZELDA (campaign concept / vaporware)

 Dark Lord Ganon was on the cusp of victory. The kingdom of Hyrule under his thrall, the royal family slain and scattered, and the seal to the Dark World finally broken -- the armies of Ganon had poured into Hyrule, and the Hylians were under his heel. But the boy knight Link and the surviving royal princess Zelda confronted Ganon at the entrance to the Dark World in the pinnacle of Hyrule Castle, and slew him. And in an instant, his grip on Hyrule was broken, and his armies scattered, leaderless. The people of Hyrule felt the breath of hope again.

But Link was mortally wounded, and breathed his last on the steps of Hyrule Castle. And in Ganon's death, the Triforce which he held within his breast, and which was the anchor that kept the Dark World apart from Hyrule, shattered, and the Dark World merged with Hyrule, filling the once light filled kingdom with poison swamps, cursed forests, burning mountains, and strange ruins that did not exist before. And Zelda remained trapped in the pinnacle of Hyrule Castle, held captive by the burning malice of dead Ganon's spirit.

The broken people of Hyrule try to rebuild their ruined lives, but the monsters of the Dark World bay at their doors, raiding their villages and killing them in the wilderness. The old adherents of Ganon work feverishly to find a way to resurrect him--a dark wizard has arisen, spurring Ganon's lieutenants to greater evil. What hope could remain in a ruined world such as this?

It is said that Link was buried by the last sages with the Triforce of Courage, contained within the Master Sword that was used to slay Ganon, but all who have tried to draw it from its stone have failed. And it is said that Princess Zelda holds the Triforce of Wisdom, though she is held captive beyond the reach of every hero who has tried to reach her. But the Triforce of Power, which was held within Ganon's breast, was quickly recovered by his evil servants, and hidden within the wretched dungeons which fell from the Dark World. If they could be retrieved, maybe the holders would have the power to separate once again the Dark World from the Light, and bring peace to Hyrule once again...

A SANDBOX CAMPAIGN POINTED TOWARDS DUNGEONS

So exactly how would this work? A Zelda campaign would need an open sandbox structure (like Breath of the Wild), but with a large number of menacing dungeons acting as center pieces and centers of gravity. Each dungeon would be fairly large, but by no means a megadungeon. The megadungeon would be the world itself, and the dungeons would be the sections of the megadungeon. So we need a way to lure the players to the eight dungeons--a gimmick, a story hook, and a meaningful reward.

Basically, at the center of the map is Hyrule Castle, with Ganon's Palace hovering inverted over it. Arrayed around it like spokes on a wheel are the eight dungeons. The exact location of some would be obvious, but some would be hidden, some more cleverly than others. The players would be given an accurate map of Hyrule to help navigate, but the merging of the Dark World would have deleted or replaced any number of landmarks. You might expect to come over a certain hill and see a grassy field and instead find a vast lake of blood, and where there should be a sacred temple, there would be a Palace of Darkness. Finding a village where it's supposed to be would be a relief.

Seems pretty obvious to me that the pieces of the Triforce have been hidden in these dungeons. It would make sense that Ganon's evil subjects would be pretty pleased to have the worlds merged, and would do everything they can to keep the Triforce broken. They already got their victory, except that their master is dead. As a bonus, each dungeon could contain a special power, item, or spell that fundamentally alters some basic problem that occurs in the overworld. The basics could go for some of these, like a pearl that lets you breathe underwater or a Firerod to burn flammable stuff, but I could go weird for others. Presumably, some of the dungeons would have problems that could be greatly ameliorated by these items, but since I want the game to be an open world, they wouldn't be necessary.

Link also has one third of the Triforce -- the Triforce of Courage -- but his tomb is a sacred place, either in the Temple of Time or the Lost Woods. There would need to be some test or problem to solve before you can go inside. Maybe you need a certain number of hitpoints before you can draw the Master Sword, which contains the Triforce of Courage. Or maybe you need to find and help the three Divine Beasts, or have the blessing of the last sage. Something like that.

Zelda has another third of the Triforce. You can go to Hyrule Castle to try to free her at any time, but at first this will be a challenge beyond your abilities. I imagine freeing Zelda would be a mid to late game activity, though very clever and courageous low level players might be able to make some progress before that. Freeing her would grant you a powerful ally. At this point presumably Zelda knows how to channel the power of the Triforce--this could be a versatile and powerful tool, but someone you need to protect as well. Wouldn't it be fucked up if you saved Zelda, only to have her killed by Ganon's minions?

Ganon's Palace would be the final tenth dungeon, hovering inverted over Hyrule Castle, the last remnant of the Dark World that has not fully merged with the Light. You probably need the Master Sword to proceed from Hyrule Castle into Ganon's Palace. But you know.. maybe not! Just doing an open world is fun. As for who the final boss is, well, that's a secret, but I'm sure you can imagine. Do you even need all the pieces of the Triforce to defeat it? I would say -- no, you don't. But without the Triforce, the Dark World can't be made separate again.

POWER PROGRESSION

Possibly, gaining hitpoints would be impossible from simply fighting monsters, finding treasure, and getting XP. Maybe you would need to find heart containers in the world, or defeat the dungeon boss. Would that be fun, or would that be annoying? It would be the classic Zelda incentive to search every nook and cranny -- maybe here I can find the Heart Piece I need to get another hit dice. How would this be tied to the normal level up system? Maybe you have to finish a dungeon to level up, but you can get small amounts of extra hitpoints in the overworld.

This would turn monster encounters into obstacles, rather than a situation with its own reward. Monsters would have to drop appropriate treasure to make the fight feel worth it. It's nice in D&D and other rpgs that just fighting monsters gets you XP -- it never feels like a total waste of time.

Another drawback is that in the overworld, you would need to manually hide heart containers around, rather than relying on the game's natural rhythm to change over time. That's one of the main benefits of experience points -- the game changes on its own, without you fiddling with it. If heart containers were hidden in the world, it would work to leave a dungeon, fuck around, and come back a little more powerful. Would heart containers actually level you up, or just give you more hit dice? I'm thinking they would actually level you up. In that case, we would probably need a 20 level system, whereas if you only leveled up from dungeons, a 10 level system would be fine. 

I've been enjoying White Hack. Maybe there could be a way to stretch that out into more levels and eliminate the experience system. 

And then, what if the players really prefer to just fuck around in the overworld? Isn't the whole point of an open world that you can do whatever you want and play the game? Shouldn't there be some power progression tied to that for its own sake?

RACES

Not the Breath of the Wild races!! I do not vibe with Rito, Goron, and Zora. Nothing against them in their specific context, they work well in that game. But I am not drawn to imagining my players as them.

Rather, I think it would be primarily Hylians. Maybe you could be part fairy or part monster. Part fairies are the Hylians we typically imagine with pointed ears, psychic powers, magic, glimmering light, and so on. Part monsters might have fangs, horns, vivid skin color, weird eyes, etc. There should be a big hulking character option. Maybe some moblins are trying to integrate into society. Would it be cool to play a Moblin? Maybe there should be a Goron. I don't think Kokiri should be an option, neither LOTR elves and dwarves. This is a different world from LOTR, therefore different characters to imagine being, and different archetypes to fill.

On the other hand, I know some players really get a kick out of playing distinctly non-human races. So... I don't know.

I like having different anime people of different sizes. Little fairy guys, tough dwarf guys, regular people, big hulking brutes. I'm reminded of BREAK! What ever happened to that?

CLASSES

Swordsman, archer, psychic, mage, forest dweller, ranger, beast-tamer, princess, assassin, knight, marksman, bounty hunter, trapper, bug hunter, mercenary, and so on. It's easy to imagine the world of Berserk kind of merged with this one--a savage, cruel, dark world of romantic personalities, subject to violence that should not exist in their world. Anything that fit in Berserk would fit here, easily. Clerics would channel holy power, remnants of the sacred realm that was once the Dark World. 

MONSTERS

I like the weird diversity of Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time over the austere orderliness of Breath of the Wild. So there would be the hits, but also an infinite variety of new monsters, based on whatever the DM comes up with. Bokoblins, moblins, zora, octarock, lynel, poe, stalfos, rock golems, hinox etc, but also weird little scurrying creatures and werewolves and goblins and vampires and sand worms. At the end of the day it's dungeons and dragons, and D&D works best when it's a new monster every session. 

WHAT ARE THE DUNGEONS?

This is a secret! But more based on Link to the Past than Ocarina of Time or Breath of the Wild. Rather than Temples or Divine Beasts, they would be ruins, weird horrible ruins brought from a cursed world, or once nice places inhabited by twisted demons from a mirror dimension. I like the Palaces of Link to the Past: these were maybe literal palaces of a civilization long past, but now they are used for another purpose.

Rather than being puzzle focused like Zelda, they would be filled with OSR style problems. But I always like in Ocarina how there's a central figure or gimmick that changes as the dungeon progresses. So that's something to keep in mind.

Some of them would be elementally themed. I love the Ice Palace. And I like the idea that the Dark World brought new horrible problems to Hyrule -- melting glaciers, volcanos where there shouldn't be, evil woods, etc. It would make sense that the dungeons could be at the center of some of these problems. But not all of them. There has to be variance.

Beating a dungeon causes the others to scale up in power. Maybe they absorb more power from the Triforce, or redouble their defenses, or their wizard general summons new kinds of creatures. 

As for size, I'm split on this. They would be smaller than the average level of my megadungeon for the most part -- I would want each session spent in a dungeon to feel like you're making progress. At the same time, I would want this campaign to create the Zelda game I wish existed, and most Zelda games seem to have dungeons that are just a touch too small because of the constraints of video games. Some of them, especially dungeons a little further from the start, could be pretty massive -- 50+ rooms maybe. And the final dungeon would be that big as well or a little bigger, so there's plenty of room for players to explore for the duration of the campaign. But the early dungeons might be a little small, maybe 20-30 rooms, so players wouldn't feel too discouraged, and could test their strength at low levels, and if they skip them and come back, could work through them quickly.

WHAT IS IN THE OVERWORLD?

I don't know exactly how to make this fun! Definitely there would be little towns, more along the lines of Breath of the Wild's Hateno Village than the faction cities, and more like Ocarina's Kakariko -- secrets to discover, NPCs that change depending on time of day, hidden treasure, weird little stores. Everything would be larger in scope than a video game can account for: traveling for in-game days rather than the hand-waved minutes. Fast travel might be a good idea after a certain point, to incentivize exploration into unknown areas: maybe finishing a dungeon lets you teleport to its entrance.

I don't care about "shrines," but mini-dungeons are always nice to stumble upon. 1-5 room scenarios with a little reward at the end. This could be a place to hide "heart containers" if I go that route.

Wandering NPCs to befriend, rescue, and fight! Not everyone in this version of Hyrule is nice. Maybe the old armies of Hyrule are trying to regain power, and thieves are trying to steal the Triforce for themselves, while bandits take advantage of the chaos to raid highways and villages.

I'm tempted to re-introduce the Divine Beasts, but as literal Divine Beasts: sacred creatures, manifestations of Hyrule itself, ancient, imbued with sacred power and energy. Like the Great Forest Spirit of Princess Mononoke. If you find and help them, they could grant a powerful magic spell, or some boon that really alters the course of the game.

Breath of the Wild bokoblin camps are not in the mix, for me, nor Stone Taluses, nor korok seeds, or any of that stuff. Ganon's forces would need to be reimagined entirely: there might be war-camps of beastmen and moblins, but this would be more literalized. What would it actually be like if there were a war camp of bokoblins? What would it actually be like if a hinox were guarding a mountain pass you needed to get through? Could you talk to it? Could you trick it? What would it want? 

Horses! Always need horses. Could there be other mounts? Lizards? Chocobo?

Fairy fountains! Pretty crucial. A place to recover hitpoints and be granted blessings by the ancient fairies of Hyrule. 

True to Hyrule there would be a variety of environments: icy glaciers, lightning struck mountains, deserts, dark forests, nice forests, great lakes and rivers, rolling plains, but also weird stuff dropped in from the Dark World: shining obelisks, disgusting idols, rivers of gore, forests of thorns, pyramids, swamps, and so on. But there wouldn't be a switching back and forth between worlds: it's all one place now. 

I"M RUNNING OUT OF IDEAS

Next step I'd need to make a map, a bunch of dungeon ideas, and starting getting specific. Sounds like fun!