Ocarina of Time leads the rumor as Switch 2 speculation heats up.
It will be 40 years since The Legend of Zelda came out, and fans are already making guesses about what will happen. There have been hints, developer words, and high hopes for the anniversary, but the big question still stands: what is Nintendo planning? A whole new version? A group with a new sound? Or something totally out of the ordinary?
A modern version of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is one of the ideas that has been talked about the most. There are a lot of fans who think this is the best movie in the series and the one that deserves a serious remake.
If the Switch 2 hardware comes out in 2026, would Nintendo really have a whole new game ready by then? Or maybe we’ll see a clip first, and the full game won’t come out until 2027?
The question of scale comes up, too. When people hear the word “remake,” they quickly think of completely new graphics, reworked gameplay, and improvements to the quality of life. If Nintendo really is suggesting a remake, Ocarina of Time might be the only game that fits the bill perfectly. Some other possible options are more like “remaster” than “full reconstruction.”
This difference is important because the words “remake” and “remaster” are being used more and more interchangeably in current gaming talk. But in the past, they meant very different things. A remake starts from scratch and builds the game back up. A remaster improves and simplifies a version that already exists.
Remake or Remaster? figuring out the difference.
Things would be very different if Nintendo chose to improve The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD instead. On the Wii U, both games got HD remakes, but neither has made the jump to the Nintendo Switch family of platforms yet. Even if they were ported to Switch 2 at 4K resolution and 60 frames per second, they would still be considered remasters and not remakes.
Now, in marketing speak, these terms are, of course, hard to tell apart. People sometimes use the word “remake” to refer to a game with better graphics, smoother speed, and other small improvements. But by normal measures, just making Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD bigger would not be enough.
Still, a combo release makes sense from a business point of view. A $70 bundle that includes both Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD would be similar to what Nintendo did to celebrate Mario’s 10th anniversary.
It would also be a pretty safe and reliable way to make sure that Zelda material gets to Switch 2 in time for the 40th anniversary window. Actually, that might be the most reasonable hope: something important but not necessarily huge.
Why this time Ocarina of Time feels different.
It’s not just memories that keep Ocarina of Time at the center of all this talk. There have been small signs that keep the talk going. People are interested in playing the game again after hearing interviews with longtime director Eiji Aonuma.
There have also been questions about the new LEGO sets that are based on images from The Legend of Zelda. If the phrase “in due time” was meant to be a reference to the famous title, fans have looked at it and speculated that it might be.
It’s easier to picture Nintendo going all out when you add those hints to the word “remake” that keeps coming up in anniversary talk. It would be a big deal if Ocarina of Time were fully updated with new graphics, better combat, better camera systems, better dungeons, and easier entry. It wouldn’t just honor the past; it would change it for a new age.
A hardware changeover year would also be a great time for this kind of project. A reboot of that size could be a great way to show off what the Switch 2 can do.
But hope needs to be paired with care. Full remakes take a long time to make and require a lot of resources. An exact start window of 2026 might not work well with a project like this that is already underway. It’s still very possible that there will be an anniversary reveal and then a later release.
Zelda is definitely coming to Switch 2.
Although the size of the project is still unknown, one thing seems less likely than the other: Nintendo won’t bring a big Zelda game to Switch 2 for another whole year. No matter if it’s a remake, remaster, or collection of games, the series is too important to let a big anniversary pass without being celebrated.
That alone is reason to be excited for longtime fans. Even a group of remastered games would fill in a big hole in the Switch library and make Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD available to a lot of people again.
While this is going on, expectations must stay in check.
There is no formal word on anything yet. Every idea that is being talked about right now is based on interpretation, pattern recognition, and educated guesses. Everything is still just a guess until Nintendo makes an official statement.
That might be the best way to go about it. The excitement about an anniversary can quickly turn into arguments online about vows that were never kept. In the end, people decide what they expect. If a copy comes out, it will be a big deal. If it doesn’t, the franchise’s history will still be there.
As 2026 draws closer, Nintendo will be in the spotlight. The 40th anniversary of Zelda is going to be one of the most exciting periods in the series’ history. It may be a daring new take on Ocarina of Time, a long-awaited HD compilation, or something else that comes out of nowhere.
