Over at our Zelda Forums, there is a discussion taking place about how the Legend of Zelda franchise needs what Casino Royale was for the James Bond movie series. For those of you who do not know, Casino Royale was the first Bond movie in which Daniel Craig played the role of James Bond. With a new actor in the franchise, a newer and more realistic approach was taken. There were no more silly gadgets, no invisible cars, and nothing too absurd. But Casino Royale, while a departure from the regular Bond formula, still managed to succeed and receive high praise and reviews.
So the moral of the story is that Nintendo needs to not worry about maintaining the formula to the Zelda series 100%. Departures can still be highly successful. A movie that spent the majority of its time in casinos still managed to be one of the most action packed and amazing movies. In fact Casino Royale is probably one of my favorite movies ever.