Zelda Next-Gen Remake Footage Has Us Hyped For The Future

2 weeks ago 27

Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom Zelda looking shocked in front of the Breath of the Wild poster featuring Link - Gaming Featured Image

Published May 9, 2026, 2:01 PM EDT

James is a gaming writer from London who has spent thousands of hours exploring titles from every genre. Though he has a particular affinity for multiplayer titles like World of Warcraft, Destiny 2 and League of Legends, he has also put thousands of hours into single-player experiences, from deep RPGs to epic PC strategies. When he's not playing or writing, he can usually be found supporting his beloved Brentford FC.

The Legend of Zelda is one of the most iconic franchises in history, successfully navigating several distinct eras over the course of 40 years and coming out the other side more popular than ever. Right now, it feels like we're at the end of one of those epochs, with Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom rounding the period of domination for the original Switch off nicely.

The Legend Of Zelda's Future Is Bright

Link, Zelda, and the Champions in a screenshot from a memory cutscene in Breath of the Wild.-2

Over on YouTube, you should be able to find the channel Digital Dreams, which regularly uploads game footage with some marked technological improvements. This time around, they have turned their attention to Breath of the Wild, adding a ray tracing shader to proceedings and dialing up the fidelity, all while running the game on a beefy RTX 5090 at 8K resolution and 60 FPS.

The comments were all amazed at just how good the game looked, with one saying,"Gorgeous! But the draw distance on the ground seems to be equal to the original, where fallen leaves and flowers keep popping into view only a few meters ahead. Extending the draw distance as well would significantly improve the visuals!"

While another added, "Dude, that's straight up leaked footage right there."

If you want to give it a try for yourself, you'll need to get the game running on one of the Nintendo Switch emulators initially, though make sure you have a legit copy of the game to keep everything above board. Then you can download the shader presets from Digital Dreams' KoFi page, and follow the instructions to give your game a very shiny coat of paint.

Zelda's Switch 2 Debut Is Coming

Shocked Zelda with the Nintendo Switch 2

It should hopefully be a big year for the Zelda franchise as a whole in 2026, with the 40th anniversary massively ramping up expectations from the fan base. The Switch 2 Ocarina of Time remake still seems likely, and the movie is continuing production without much in the way of hiccups. The next mainline game may be a little further away, but we can keep everything crossed for a big announcement regardless.