Theres a brand new Zelda adventure coming to DS this year. The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks was announced by Satoru Iwata in the final moments of his presentation at this mornings GDC keynote address in San Franciso. The exciting new title sees the return of the Wind Waker-styled Link, taking advantage of Phantom Hourglass-style touch controls in an all-new adventure. In comforting news, the announcement capped off a presentation that catered towards Nintendos core-gamer user base a reversal of last years casual-focused appearance of Nintendo Bigwigs at E3. More inside The game will be a traditional handheld Zelda adventure with dungeons, puzzles and bosses. Instead of a boat, this time around Link will travel via railroad. Railroad mechanics will be similar to the Phantom Hourglass boat system, as you can shoot your cannon defensively whilst traversing across the game world.

Link has the power to summon an armor-clad sidekick or take control of enemies and have them fight for him. The dynamic created by controlling the side-kick in tandem with Link allows for creative approaches to combat- the player can distract enemies with the ally whilst Link sneaks around and lands a few critical blows.

No release date is set, but the game appears to be close to completion and Iwata announced that we can expect it this year. Remember – there was a four month hiatus between the release of Phantom Hourglass in Japan and elsewhere in the world, but a pre-christmas local launch is very likely for Australians.

Source: IGN, MTV Multiplayer