Nintendo has confirmed the existence of a game-breaking bug in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.

Gamers will only encounter the glitch if they complete a very specific sequence of events late in the game.

Spoilers lie below.

"We have been made aware of the issue that results in being unable to progress in the Song of the Hero quest," Nintendo of America spokesperson Sharon Matheny said in an email to affected gamers (posted by ZeldaInformer).

"If the game has been saved after completing the sequence of events, it will no longer be possible to proceed through the game on that save file. The only options at that point are to either start the game over or to use an earlier save file to continue."

The Song of the Hero Quest requires players to revisit the game's three main ground-based locations, each of which can be attempted in any order.

The bug only appears when the Lanaryu Desert portion of the quest is completed first.

Even then, gamers must have travelled to Lanaryu Mine to speak with the character Golo the Goron before receiving the song of the Thunder Dragon, and then returned there afterwards to speak with Golo again.

At this point, the remaining two locations will become unavailable, rendering the player unable to progress further.

"This issue WILL NOT OCCUR if the Fire and Water Dragon songs have already been collected before collecting the Thunder Dragon's song," Nintendo clarified. Simply talking to Golo in the Lanayru Caves at any other point in the game "will also not trigger the issue".

There's no word of a patch for the problem, although Nintendo is "documenting all feedback" on the issue.