E3: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword details revealed

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword was playable at E3 2011 and many exciting new details have now come to light regarding the Wii's swansong.

Shigeru Miyamoto's final game for the Wii, Skyward Sword is bound to be highly anticipated, especially as the only true Zelda game to be developed for Wii.

When the game was first revealed at least year's E3, the game's HUD - particularly the large Wii Remote on the right-hand side of the screen - fell in for some criticism.

This has since been changed, as only the buttons and the Control Pad are shown on the screen, and the entire HUD can also be switched off if the player so chooses.

Thanks to Wii MotionPlus, swordplay is now also much more technical: Nintendo says the game includes the "most realisitic sword combat" of any game in the series so far and that different enemies will require different tactics to be defeated.

The game also sets up the storyline for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, with Link coming down from Skyloft to fix the wrong in early Hyrule, a hellish world ruled by monstrous powers and without a royal family to govern it.

Players will also need to backtrack á la Metroid more frequently than ever before, as many dungeons and other areas will need to be visited more than once in order to complete them.

Skyward Sword even includes a sprint meter which allows Link to run more quickly around than he's previously been able to: however, running for too long a time or distance will cause Link to become out of breath.