A recent Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom leak was revealed to have come from a GameStop employee, who afterward felt the wrath of Nintendo and lost his job.
Rule number 1 on the internet: Don’t mess with Nintendo. The family-friendly games company is ruthless and known for going after anyone who doesn’t play by their rules. The latest victim is apparently a GameStop employee, who dared to leak details about Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.
Nintendo Pressures GameStop To Fire Employee After Zelda Leak
In March, an employee at a GameStop in Massachusetts leaked on Reddit, that a special edition Zelda-themed Switch would be coming, which was subsequently confirmed by Nintendo. This got the good man in trouble, understandably, as he was fired from GameStop this week.
If you're as excited as we are for Tears of the Kingdom and didn't pre-order it yet, you can do so here on Amazon! This didn’t just happen on its own, though: According to the aggrieved ex, Nintendo itself had a hand in this. In an interview with Kotaku, the employee called Mike claims that “Nintendo had forced the company’s hand”, by putting pressure on GameStop. What exactly Nintendo threatened them with is unclear, but it was probably related to exclusive deals with the retailer.
We're super excited for TOTK, but some things have us worried as well:
This is yet another example of Nintendo going after their own fans, even if it is slightly more understandable than recent examples, like going after makers of a popular Breath of the Wild mod. A huge leak, revealing the game's artbook, had Nintendo recently going on a hunt as well. No one got caught for that one though... yet.