It may not be obvious, but The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening was influenced by the work of director David Lynch, according to longtime series creators Takashi Tezuka and Eiji Aonuma, citing Twin Peaks as inspiration for the 1993 game.


No, it didn't feature high school murders, treatises on pies, or the bizarre cast of Twin Peaks. The Game Boy adventure and fourth in the Legend of Zelda series features what Aonuma calls "suspicious types" in its cast of characters, a design choice influence by Lynch's then-popular and increasingly wacky murder mystery serial.

"At the time, Twin Peaks was rather popular. The drama was all about a small number of characters in a small town," Tezuka explains in the newest "Iwata Asks" roundtable discussion.


"I wanted to make something that, while it would be small enough in scope to easily understand, it would have deep and distinctive characteristics," Tezuka says of Link's Awakening.

"I thought, 'You really want to make Zelda like that?!'" says Zelda series director and producer Eiji Aonuma of Tezuka's Twin Peaks inspiration. "Now the mystery is solved. (laughs) When I was reading Tanabe-san's comments in the strategy guide, I saw, 'Tezuka-san suggested we make all the characters suspicious types like in the then-popular Twin Peaks.'"

Who knew that Nintendo executives interviewing each other could be so revelatory? More Iwata Asks awaits you.

Zelda Handheld History [Nintendo Europe]