The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom's development team says it didn't take any inspiration from Elden Ring because they didn't have time to play it.
In an interview with RTL Nieuws (translated by Nintendo Everything), Tears of the Kingdom's director, Hidemaro Fujibayashi, and its producer, Eiji Aonuma, talked about where the team gets its ideas from when developing a new Zelda title. When asked if Elden Ring played a part in any way (FromSoftware previously said that the Legend of Zelda series inspired its title), Fujibayashi reveals: "Sorry, but we didn’t really have the chance to play the game."
