2008 was a rare year for Nintendo fans, being, as it was, the first in a decade not to see a new Legend Of Zelda videogame on the shelves. And the deprivation hit long-time Nintendo gamers like a sledgehammer, the blow made all the more sore when Nintendo used E3 to unveil a new Wii Sports, rather than the further adventures of Link. Come GDC 2009, many hoped that Nintendo would take the opportunity to finally unveil a new Zelda, but few expected that it would actually happen and even fewer could have predicted the sort of game that it would be.

Many must have expected a proper Wii entry in the series, perhaps using Motion Plus, but the company instead revealed a direct follow-up to Phantom Hourglass in which, incredibly, Link must drive a steam train through Hyrule.

Simply replacing Phantom Hourglass’s steamboat with a train may seem like a backwards step at first. It removes the free-roaming exploration that the open seas enabled and puts much of the game, quite literally, on rails. But this is a Nintendo production, after all, so there is bound to be a unique idea at the heart of this major change. Early footage shows gameplay sequences in which Link must control the speed of his train while firing a cannon at obstacles and enemies. But we would hope that there is more to it than that, perhaps the ability to lay track yourself, using the touch screen, thereby opening up new routes throughout Hyrule and creating a unique way to discover the series’ trademark secrets.

Aside from the train, Spirit Tracks’ other notable additions include the ability to remote control a Phantom Guardian within dungeons. And the fact that Zelda herself does not appear in her Tetra guise, suggests that Spirit Tracks might not actually take place in the Wind Waker timeline.