A rom hack turns Ocarina of Time's fixed 2D backdrops into real 3D environments

Back in 1998, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time used a technical trick common at the time: certain areas, like the streets of Hyrule Market, weren't real 3D environments but pre-rendered 2D images displayed behind the character with a fixed camera, saving on the Nintendo 64's limited processing power. Spanish modder Reonu, a professional 3D artist, has set out to rebuild these backgrounds entirely in full 3D with a project called OoT unJPEG.

Using Blender and the Fast64 toolkit, Reonu is recreating each existing background while staying true to the N64 version's visual style, rather than the rounder look of the 2011 3DS remake. Hyrule Market, previously split across several screens separated by loading times, becomes a single seamless scene thanks to a custom CPU culling system and level-of-detail setup specifically designed to stay within the original console's limits.

Exploring Hyrule from a whole new angle

In practice, players will for the first time be able to freely move through areas previously locked behind fixed camera angles, as if discovering certain corners of the game for the very first time. Reonu plans to release two versions of the project: a rom hack for original Nintendo 64 hardware, and a mod for Zelda 64 Recompiled, the game's unofficial PC port. The modder confirmed no generative AI was used in the work, and is actively looking for a 2D texture artist to help finish the project.

No release date has been set yet.

Source: Time Extension