The Big Picture: Link Be A Lady

Azure23

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jaibryan said:
Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Oh Bob... Bob please.

Screwing with an established character will always be seen as bad. "Why not a woman jus cuz" isn't an excuse because there's no process for link to change like Dr. Who which COULD produce a female doctor (I think). Otherwise, why not a male black Link? Why not a trans-gender Pakistani if you're wanting to change established characters "just cuz".

However, a different lead character in that universe that's female would be just fine and no one would say anything because it's a new character being established. Same thing went for a dark skinned spiderman, people were into that because it wasn't "black Peter Parker".
Were you not paying attention? Have you played any Zelda games? Link is basically THE DOCTOR (not Dr. Who, pfft)

The "process" for change is the same process that reincarnated the triforce into three people over the generations. The triforce of wisdom is reincarnated in a princess, the triforce of power is reincarnated in a warrior, and the triforce of courage is reincarnated in a hero. There's literally no lore reason why that cant be a woman. Most Zelda games star different reincarnations of Link and Zelda and Ganon anyway, I mean do you remember the timeline where Zelda was a damn pirate captain?

Link is not an established character, he's a completely personality-less cipher who's only job is to the players "link" (get it?) to the game world. I mean the whole why not a lady thing? Really? Because right now the default character design triple a gaming is a boring white guy with some stubble.

Basically Aiden Pierce can fuck off the edge of my dick.

than why not black link or asian link? why is equality only important when it comes to gender and not race?
Umm, I never said it wasn't. If anything I was saying that the characters origins make it possible for him to be anything. Stop putting words in my mouth. Link is not the same character throughout the games and a female link wouldn't be out of line for the lore, nor would any other combination of traits as long as you have backstory to support them.
 

Azure23

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Nurb said:
Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Oh Bob... Bob please.

Screwing with an established character will always be seen as bad. "Why not a woman jus cuz" isn't an excuse because there's no process for link to change like Dr. Who which COULD produce a female doctor (I think). Otherwise, why not a male black Link? Why not a trans-gender Pakistani if you're wanting to change established characters "just cuz".

However, a different lead character in that universe that's female would be just fine and no one would say anything because it's a new character being established. Same thing went for a dark skinned spiderman, people were into that because it wasn't "black Peter Parker".
...Link is not an established character...
That ruins your whole argument.
haha okay, care to back that up or are you just gonna keep talking shit?

Link is a series of character avatars, someone earlier brought up the fact that in some games he has preexisting relationships as evidence oh his character depth, by that same logic the Pokemon trainer who you name and pick the gender of is also a deep character. Link doesn't speak, he doesn't express opinions, he can only facially emote determination, surprise, and getting hurt. The idea that simply being a girl would somehow hamper the amazing characterization (sarcasm) of link in various games is ludicrous.
 

Nurb

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Dec 9, 2008
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Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Oh Bob... Bob please.

Screwing with an established character will always be seen as bad. "Why not a woman jus cuz" isn't an excuse because there's no process for link to change like Dr. Who which COULD produce a female doctor (I think). Otherwise, why not a male black Link? Why not a trans-gender Pakistani if you're wanting to change established characters "just cuz".

However, a different lead character in that universe that's female would be just fine and no one would say anything because it's a new character being established. Same thing went for a dark skinned spiderman, people were into that because it wasn't "black Peter Parker".
...Link is not an established character...
That ruins your whole argument.
haha okay, care to back that up or are you just gonna keep talking shit?

Link is a series of character avatars, someone earlier brought up the fact that in some games he has preexisting relationships as evidence oh his character depth, by that same logic the Pokemon trainer who you name and pick the gender of is also a deep character. Link doesn't speak, he doesn't express opinions, he can only facially emote determination, surprise, and getting hurt. The idea that simply being a girl would somehow hamper the amazing characterization (sarcasm) of link in various games is ludicrous.
It would be a waste of my time when you're trying so hard to take away that Link is and has been a character to justify your opinion.

Somehow a lead female character in Hyrule going on her own adventures just isn't good enough, you need to "claim" the identity of Link and form it to your opinion as well.

If it's just so easy and character so meaningless, he should be bisexual, just because bisexual male characters are fewer in number than main female characters or even gay characters. Where's my representation in videogames as a bisexual man?

If we're going by numbers of representation, my opinion that he needs to be bisexual is more important that your opinion he needs to be female. Here's where you question if gender outweighs sexuality, and only proves the whole thread's argument frustratingly stupid.
 

jaibryan

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Gizen said:
uanime5 said:
The corporate/marketing line likes to say it was the former, but actual logic would lean heavily towards the latter. But admitting it was the latter would require the people in charge to also admit they weren't doing their jobs properly, and what what what? Corporate suits admit fault? Oh heeeeeeeell no, far easier to just blame the consumers and absolve themselves of guilt so they can go back to the status quo.
No idea what this is meant to mean. Care to explain why logic leans towards the latter or why it would be the fault of Corporate suits if the latter was true.

It's more likely that female lead games sell badly because people don't want them. It's not the fault of publishers that the market doesn't want a particular product.
This statement. This statement indicates you are either actively trolling or not actually reading what I'm saying. Either way it makes meaningless to respond to the rest of your points in long-form.

When a female-lead game comes out and is drastically outperformed by a male-lead game while simultaneously being drastically out-marketed and/or suffers from being on a console with a lower install base than the male-lead game, then logic dictates that it will underperform in comparison. To then believe that the female-lead game sold poorly specifically because of the fact that it was lead by a female protagonist in light of other, more rational explanations is simply foolish.

However, if you come out and admit 'our game failed terribly because we didn't market it properly and/or didn't put our full effort into making a quality game' you will lose your job. Or at least you damned well should. Saying it didn't sell because the lead was female shifts blame off of yourself and onto the consumer. It's a convenient scapegoat.

Which is what I already said, but you didn't read it the first time so I don't know why I'm repeating myself now.
but who gets to say why the game failed? everything you said was true but i know plenty of guys who don't like playing as girls, so saying the female protagonist is the reason a game failed is a valid excuse in this day and age.
 

Gizen

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jaibryan said:
Gizen said:
uanime5 said:
The corporate/marketing line likes to say it was the former, but actual logic would lean heavily towards the latter. But admitting it was the latter would require the people in charge to also admit they weren't doing their jobs properly, and what what what? Corporate suits admit fault? Oh heeeeeeeell no, far easier to just blame the consumers and absolve themselves of guilt so they can go back to the status quo.
No idea what this is meant to mean. Care to explain why logic leans towards the latter or why it would be the fault of Corporate suits if the latter was true.

It's more likely that female lead games sell badly because people don't want them. It's not the fault of publishers that the market doesn't want a particular product.
This statement. This statement indicates you are either actively trolling or not actually reading what I'm saying. Either way it makes meaningless to respond to the rest of your points in long-form.

When a female-lead game comes out and is drastically outperformed by a male-lead game while simultaneously being drastically out-marketed and/or suffers from being on a console with a lower install base than the male-lead game, then logic dictates that it will underperform in comparison. To then believe that the female-lead game sold poorly specifically because of the fact that it was lead by a female protagonist in light of other, more rational explanations is simply foolish.

However, if you come out and admit 'our game failed terribly because we didn't market it properly and/or didn't put our full effort into making a quality game' you will lose your job. Or at least you damned well should. Saying it didn't sell because the lead was female shifts blame off of yourself and onto the consumer. It's a convenient scapegoat.

Which is what I already said, but you didn't read it the first time so I don't know why I'm repeating myself now.
but who gets to say why the game failed? everything you said was true but i know plenty of guys who don't like playing as girls, so saying the female protagonist is the reason a game failed is a valid excuse in this day and age.
And I don't know a single guy who doesn't like playing as a girl. In fact, I don't know a single guy who wouldn't rather play as a girl over a male character.

And that's the thing about anecdotal evidence, it doesn't prove much of anything. Evidence requires hard data, but there is next to no hard data to find because not only are female-lead games incredibly rare, but on the rare occasion one is made, it almost never gets the same kind of big push that a male-driven game gets. So to then turn around and say that the reason why it sold poorly was simply a female protagonist, well there's nothing to back that up except for anecdotal evidence. To know for certain, female-lead games would need to receive the same big push as male-lead games, and you need to make a lot of them to get a big enough sample size to come to a verifiable conclusion.

But, on those rare occasions a game with a female protagonist does recieve the big marketing push that all the other games get? Well, it generally still does quite well for itself. One need only look at the most recent Tomb Raider game. Yes, it 'failed to meet Square's expectations', but so did a lot of male-lead games released around that time, and that stems more from a bloated, overblown budget than it does the game failing to sell, because there is no metric by which that game did not do good sales.

But, again, one game does not make a large enough sample size to determine whether a female-protagonist actively hinders, helps, or has a neutral effect on a game's sales, so you need more. In this day and age though, where so many game companies actively refuse to invest in new IPs, creating a new female-lead franchise from scratch is hard enough, let alone then in-turn expecting it to be able to compete with the rest of the pack on a level playing field you would need to come up with real hard evidence.

As a result, taking a big name-brand, previously male-lead title and shifting it to suddenly have a female lead suddenly becomes the easiest and altogether best way to give female protagonists a shot. A great deal of the risk is diminished simply by being part of a large franchise. Being part of a brand-name franchise would essentially give it a much needed head start while also providing an easy reference point to compare to other titles, even if only in the same franchise, to see how it performs... That is, assuming it's also given the same marketing push and not released on a system with a tiny install base.
 

Brad Shepard

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Is there still arguing in here? Good, Look it up, they already said Link is still a dude in the new game.
 

Azure23

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Nurb said:
Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Azure23 said:
Nurb said:
Oh Bob... Bob please.

Screwing with an established character will always be seen as bad. "Why not a woman jus cuz" isn't an excuse because there's no process for link to change like Dr. Who which COULD produce a female doctor (I think). Otherwise, why not a male black Link? Why not a trans-gender Pakistani if you're wanting to change established characters "just cuz".

However, a different lead character in that universe that's female would be just fine and no one would say anything because it's a new character being established. Same thing went for a dark skinned spiderman, people were into that because it wasn't "black Peter Parker".
...Link is not an established character...
That ruins your whole argument.
haha okay, care to back that up or are you just gonna keep talking shit?

Link is a series of character avatars, someone earlier brought up the fact that in some games he has preexisting relationships as evidence oh his character depth, by that same logic the Pokemon trainer who you name and pick the gender of is also a deep character. Link doesn't speak, he doesn't express opinions, he can only facially emote determination, surprise, and getting hurt. The idea that simply being a girl would somehow hamper the amazing characterization (sarcasm) of link in various games is ludicrous.
It would be a waste of my time when you're trying so hard to take away that Link is and has been a character to justify your opinion.

Somehow a lead female character in Hyrule going on her own adventures just isn't good enough, you need to "claim" the identity of Link and form it to your opinion as well.

If it's just so easy and character so meaningless, he should be bisexual, just because bisexual male characters are fewer in number than main female characters or even gay characters. Where's my representation in videogames as a bisexual man?

If we're going by numbers of representation, my opinion that he needs to be bisexual is more important that your opinion he needs to be female. Here's where you question if gender outweighs sexuality, and only proves the whole thread's argument frustratingly stupid.
Sure, make Link bisexual, it would have about the same impact as if he were a woman, which is to say; none. Link's sexuality, much like his gender, has never had any bearing on the narrative, he's never had any real romance because it wouldn't be believable because he's charismatic as cardboard. I'm really, honestly not saying that Link should be a lady, just that it wouldn't matter if he was. I like the Zelda games and I like Hyrule as a setting, I want to play more games set there, Including the aforementioned new heroine going on her own adventures, I've been wanting a Zelda/Shiek game since I first saw the character. It's not a question of whether something is good enough for me, I'll happily play the game when it comes out and pray that it turned out more interesting than Skyard sword.

I just honestly don't understand this impassioned defense of Link's character, he's a relic from back when protagonists didnt need complicated character arcs and dialogue, which is fine. He's a silent protagonist, meant to allow the player to inhabit him. I'm not trying to tear down your favorite character or anything, I promise. I like Link too, in that I like his clean and striking design and the idea of a reincarnated hero.

Saying that Link is a singular character is just patently untrue, he's a series of characters, reincarnated endlessly. Why shouldn't one of those reincarnations be bisexual (once he grows up a bit) or a woman? I don't see any reason, he's not some sacred cow who can never be touched. Do you remember all the vitriol way back when windwaker was announced? It was a massive shitstorm, people thought it was too kiddy or they didnt like their knee jerk reactions to the art style. It turned out fine. And this entire dumb debate is really a moot point because he's just gonna be the same ole Link anyway. And I'm not trying to claim Lnk's identity because the hero of time doesn't have a singular identity, all I've been trying to say this entire time is that of a future hero of time is reincarnated as a woman, or bisexual, or a trans bi Pakistani woman, it wouldn't make a lick of difference. And, just to clarify further, I still totally want and would play a new Zelda game with an original female lead in a heartbeat, I'd even prefer it. I'm not some kind of dumb absolutist, stop acting like I'm trying to destroy some precious childhood hero of yours.
 

jaibryan

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Blue Ranger said:
AdamRBi said:
As for making Zelda a male that has two issues; first and foremost it goes against the LoZ's lore to which all princesses of Hyrule are named Zelda, depending on the game's place in the timeline. Now, real life social progress does hold weight over maintaining a fiction's lore (much to my own personal dismay), but going back on pre-established lore does hurt a series. You can work creatively within the lore without resorting to a simple and gimmicky genderswap; especially since a gimmicky genderswap doesn't leap to much in the way of progress. While a female Link can work due to Link's role as an avatar, Zelda would be seen as just a genderswap; possibly even weakening the effect being able to play as a female Link would bring. Instead of being seen as opening the game to relate to more players it'll be seen much more of a genderswap gimmick.
Absolutely wrong. Zelda's gender has no impact on the story, or the lore. No more than Link's. There is nothing in the lore that demands Zelda be a girl. She's only a girl because it's tradition, just like it is tradition that Link is male. Both Link and Zelda can gender-swap without any real impact to the story. There is nothing demanding their souls be reincarnated as the same generation.
zelda is a female because she is the reincarnation of a goddess. and to many, social progress take a back seat to lore.
 

jaibryan

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you know there were 2 gender swaped zelda games right? some said they were better than the rest. they're called okami.
 

FFMaster

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Azure23 said:
The "process" for change is the same process that reincarnated the triforce into three people over the generations. The triforce of wisdom is reincarnated in a princess, the triforce of power is reincarnated in a warrior, and the triforce of courage is reincarnated in a hero. There's literally no lore reason why that cant be a woman.
Since you mentioned lore ..... there is a lore reason why it would be unlikely, due to the Hyrule Historia manga which chronicles the very first hero and goddess, before the triforce even came into play i think but not 100%. This was confirmed canon i believe around the time the Historia was released, but despite reading this loads around the time, never saved any links and now its basically impossible to confirm due to overload of page hits on Google, but would happily accept I'm wrong if it was confirmed not cannon.

Basically the spirit of the hero has been blessed to be reborn along with the goddess without her powers after Hylia took pity on a hero that still fought for good despite being treating like crap.

Now you could argue "well they could be reborn in the other sexes" but that's not really being reborn as it would mean different things depending on your views on the spirit thing, but i would say changing of the sexes would make sense in a bloodline situation (aka Fire Emblem awakening)

Since Zelda is the reincarnation of the goddess,link is the reincarnation of the hero (note the female and male terms) if you are going by lore there is a reason to keep them as they are. Ganon however is the reincarnation of demises hatred and curse... this is the only one that could be male or female in terms of the lore in my eyes because it could be anything from a person to a shadow to a overly bitey dog.

This is assuming you are going by spirit being reborn means being reborn as it was before, which would be my understanding of it anyway.

jaibryan said:
zelda is a female because she is the reincarnation of a goddess. and to many, social progress take a back seat to lore.
Or maybe game developers should be able to tell the story they want to tell how they want to tell it? Not all games need a social point to them. Hell this was basically the answer of the puppeteer guy when people said to him "why not a female main character".
 

ZexionSephiroth

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I just realized... Considering most recent Zelda games let you name Link whatever you want... I actually have this weird solution.

Name Link as "Girl".

Then again... It would make all the dialog referring to Link sound terrible, and possibly like some kind of horrible stereotype, along with possible other problems I don't want to get into... But I suppose it would sound sassy.
 

theApoc

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Sigh. It doesn't and wouldn't mean anything. Ideological grasping at straws just to have something to bash people who don't agree about.

There will be more female characters, more games geared towards females. More minority leads, more media geared towards them, WHEN THE MARKET DICTATES THAT TYPE OF CHANGE.

Calling something misogynistic, doesn't actually make it so. Culture is not controlled by white men, it is controlled by money and as the money shifts from one group to another, so will the diversiry in media. We don't need people telling us what we should want to see or the game we should want to play. Most of the most popular games don't involve humans at all, are you going to suggest those games are anti-human.

Utter nonsense.
 

Geekeric

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It's funny because I always joked that Zelda was just Link in drag. I mean you must admit, he's a bit girly. That's why it's "Legend of Zelda" but Link is the main character. hehe.
 

Crazie_Guy

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I made the mistake as usual of reading a few comments before watching the video, and it seems like a few people wouldn't like a female link, for various stupid reasons. Then I watched the video and it had all the perfect counterpoints to those reasons. So I guess none of these people were paying attention?
 

God of Path

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Jul 6, 2011
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When I played Skyward Sword, I just imagined Link as a girl. Nothing was significantly different, and as there are few references towards Link's gender in the game, so suspension of disbelief was rarely if ever broken.