All this revere, hype, excitement, and doom-and-gloom commentary pile-on about Nintendo's forthcoming hybrid console, the Switch, has left the Wii U out of the conversation altogether. Remember, it's still one of two systems players can play Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on, which should extend the now-cancelled console's lifespan a tiny bit more before the Switch fully takes charge.
Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Open World
Zelda is quite probably the most iconic Nintendo franchise after Mario, and the latest entry, Breath of the Wild, is poised to reinvent that with an open-world element — a massive inflection point past Zelda games didn't have. By the looks of early demos, Breath of the Wild will encapsulate a pastoral world decorated sparsely with crumbling ruins to climb, and it feels enormously peaceful, if not tainted with a healthy dollop of wistfulness, which all Zelda fans will probably love.
Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild File Size
As such, Breath of the Wild should also unsurprisingly come with a large file size because of its open world. For gamers intending to get the game for Wii U, they need to allocate 13 GB of storage, and for the Switch, it's going to be about 13.4 GB, as listed by Nintendo of Japan's website. Granted, that almost covers half of the Switch's 32 GB of internal storage, but keep in mind that Switch games comes in game cards, so the size should only be a problem for those going physical.
For those who do go digital, this would be a problem, and it's probably best to go ahead and buy a separate MicroSD card to expand the console's storage. As per recent reports, the Switch has been confirmed to support up to 2 TB of expandable storage, although that sort doesn't exist yet. 1 TB MicroSD cards do exist, though — for a staggering price — but such a size isn't exactly in the mainstream market. At most, users can probably net a maximum of 256 or 512 GB, which should be plenty enough for some.
When the Wii U was launched in 2012, it came with 8 and 32 GB models, needless to say that storage was also a challenge. Luckily, the Wii U also supported expandable storage via SD cards or external hard drives of up to 2 TB. It's unclear whether the USB port on the Switch's dock will also support external drives, although it's safe to say players will be devastated if it turns out that it doesn't.
Pricing And Availability
Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild's official release schedule had long been contested until Nintendo itself confirmed, to very little surprise, that it'll launch alongside the Switch on March 3. It retails for $59.99, and eager players may preorder the game now.
The game will be available for both Wii U and Nintendo Switch, which is likely one of the last few games that'll ever be launched on the former. The Switch's predecessor has been yanked off the production line after a disappointing sales run. Nintendo hopes the Switch can turn that around.
