The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Hyrule Officially Announced — Here’s What It Is

• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Hyrule has been officially announced by Game Press — it is a fan-made hardcover book, not a Nintendo game.
• Written by author Anna-Victòria Teixidó (known online as Kurusonna), the book retells Ocarina of Time through the eyes of forgotten background characters.
• Stories are arranged chronologically and start even before the events of Ocarina of Time, going beyond the borders of Hyrule itself.
• Link still appears throughout, but as a connecting thread rather than the main protagonist — the spotlight goes to NPCs who shaped his journey from the sidelines.
• The book is available in two editions: the Deluxe Edition (€25.95) and the limited Hero of Time Edition (€35.95), which is exclusive to Game Press.
• The announcement is perfectly timed with the Zelda franchise’s 40th anniversary and the upcoming Ocarina of Time remake for Nintendo Switch 2, launching November 5, 2026.
• The English edition is expected to arrive in May 2027.

Alright, let’s clear something up straight away before anyone starts losing their minds thinking this is a new Nintendo game dropping out of nowhere. The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Hyrule is not a video game. But honestly? The more you read about it, the more you realize it might be one of the most interesting things to come out of the Zelda community in years — and for fans of Ocarina of Time specifically, this is genuinely exciting stuff.

Game Press, a publisher that focuses on gaming-adjacent books and merchandise, just officially announced Echoes of Hyrule — a 332-page hardcover book that retells the story of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time entirely from the perspective of characters who were always there but never really got their moment. The background people. The NPCs. The silent figures who watched Link pass through their villages and quietly helped make the adventure possible.

What Is Echoes of Hyrule Actually About?

Here’s the concept, and it’s a genuinely clever one. Everyone who’s played Ocarina of Time knows the broad strokes of the story — young Link, the Kokiri Forest, the Master Sword, Ganondorf, the whole thing. But what about all the characters who surrounded that adventure without ever getting their own story told? The people who gave Link items. The ones who warned him. The ones who carried on with their lives while the fate of Hyrule was being decided around them.

That’s exactly the angle Echoes of Hyrule goes for. Written by Anna-Victòria Teixidó, a writer who goes by the name Kurusonna online and who says she’s been thinking about these stories since she first played Ocarina of Time as a kid, the book presents a series of short stories arranged in chronological order. They start before the game even begins and stretch beyond the boundaries of Hyrule itself by the time they’re done.

Link still shows up throughout — this isn’t a story that pretends he doesn’t exist. But he functions more as a thread that connects the different characters rather than being the one the book is actually about. It’s the kind of storytelling approach that makes a lot of sense for a game like Ocarina of Time, which has always been celebrated as much for its world-building as for its main quest. Games like this one and other beloved classics from the same era built entire universes that fans never stop wanting to explore further.

libro ecos de hyrule

Two Editions — Here’s What You Get

Echoes of Hyrule is being released in two versions, and there’s a meaningful difference between them beyond just the price.

The Deluxe Edition is priced at €25.95 and includes the full 332-page hardcover, an Ocarina of Time GP Card foil print, and two exclusive bookmarks. That’s a solid package on its own and will probably be the one most fans pick up.

The Hero of Time Edition steps things up to €35.95 and is exclusive to Game Press’ own website. This version adds an Ocarina Manual, a Character Map, and two additional exclusive sheets on top of everything in the Deluxe. For collectors and hardcore OOT fans, that character map alone sounds like something worth having on a wall.

It’s worth noting clearly — as Game Press themselves have explicitly stated — that Echoes of Hyrule is not an official Nintendo product. It’s a fan-created work. It doesn’t add to or change Ocarina of Time’s canon. What it does is give beloved side characters their own imaginative spotlight, which is a creative endeavour fans have been doing through fanfiction for decades. The difference here is the production quality and the formal presentation through an actual publisher.

The Timing Could Not Be More Perfect

Okay, so even setting aside how cool the concept is — the timing of this announcement is genuinely smart. Zelda is having one of its biggest years in a long time right now. The franchise just celebrated its 40th anniversary, and Nintendo’s September 2026 Direct was absolutely stacked with Zelda content as a result.

The biggest announcement out of that Direct? The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is officially getting a full remake on Nintendo Switch 2, launching November 5, 2026. That’s the kind of news that sends the entire Zelda fandom into nostalgia overload, and it means there’s an absolutely massive audience right now who is either replaying Ocarina of Time for the first time in years or playing it for the first time ever ahead of the remake.

Dropping an Ocarina of Time-focused book in the middle of all that? Extremely good timing. The Spanish original, published under the title Ecos de Hyrule, actually released back on June 4, 2026 — so it already has some real-world footprint. The wider English release is currently expected in May 2027, which still feels frustratingly far away but gives plenty of time to finish the Switch 2 remake first.

Why Ocarina of Time’s World Is Perfect for This Kind of Storytelling

If you’ve played Ocarina of Time — and if you’re reading this, there’s a very good chance you have — you know the game is packed with characters who feel like they have entire lives happening off-screen. Talon sleeping at Lon Lon Ranch while Malon runs the place. The carpenters getting distracted from their work in Gerudo Valley. The Happy Mask Salesman and whatever is going on with him. Bongo Bongo sitting in the Shadow Temple and clearly having a whole backstory.

Ocarina of Time’s NPCs have always felt more alive than they technically should be for a 1998 N64 game, and that’s a big part of why the game still holds up the way it does. The idea of giving those characters actual narratives — proper short stories with beginning, middle, and end — is exactly the kind of thing a certain type of Zelda fan has probably already written in their head while wandering through Hyrule Market late at night.

It also connects nicely to what Nintendo itself has been doing with the franchise in recent years. Echoes of Wisdom on Switch gave fans the experience of seeing Hyrule’s story through Princess Zelda’s eyes for the first time in a mainline game. Echoes of Hyrule takes that same impulse — looking beyond Link’s perspective — and applies it to literally every other character in one of the most iconic entries in the series.

Is This Worth Picking Up?

If you’re a serious Zelda fan and Ocarina of Time has any kind of sentimental hold on you, the answer is probably yes. A 332-page hardcover with original illustrations, built around one of the greatest games ever made, coming out right as a full Switch 2 remake is about to put Ocarina back in everyone’s hands? That’s a pretty compelling proposition at under €30 for the standard edition.

Just go in knowing what it is: a labor of love from a passionate author, not an official Nintendo release. Treat it like a really high-quality fan work — which it is — and it sounds like something genuinely worth adding to a Zelda collection. The same instinct that makes you want to dive deeper into a world you love is what drives projects like this one, or the kind of community energy that keeps older gaming worlds alive, whether that’s fan-built browser games keeping classic titles playable or books that fill in the gaps the original stories left open.

Pre-orders are open now on Game Press’ website. The English edition is slated for May 2027. And between now and then, you’ve got an Ocarina of Time Switch 2 remake to look forward to — so honestly, your Hyrule calendar for the next several months is looking pretty full.

If you’re already deep in the Zelda hype cycle, you’ll also want to keep an eye on other major gaming news dropping this month — there’s a lot moving right now across the industry as we head toward the holiday season.