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General Zelda Link As Royalty?

Joined
Aug 26, 2014
In most Zelda games, Link is an average village chap. Oh, sure, he's sometimes descended from previous heroes or the knights of Hyrule, has an intimate relationship with the princess or future princess (*cough cough Skyward Sword cough*), or has a connection to the Triforce. But he is never directly associated with royalty.

Zelda games may have a different storyline, but overall, Link usually comes from the same background. ALttP, OoT, WW, MC, TP, ST, SS and ALBW all show him as coming from a house in a rural setting, usually in a village. Most of the games where he doesn't such as TAoL, LA, OoA/OoS, and PH are direct sequels to games, and so the character is already on an adventure.

The only exceptions to any of these are TLoZ, FS, and FSA.

So, what about a game where Link is more directly connected to royalty? Perhaps you start off as the son of the Knight captain, and are destined to lead troops into battle? Or maybe you are a prince, sister to Princess Zelda (allowing for other romantic interests)? Maybe even reverse the roles, placing you as a young king and Zelda as a peasant girl?

This would allow for new gameplay, possible examples including having knightly companions that fight by your side, or even controlling armies to fight hordes of enemies on Hyrule field. Perhaps the game could take some things from Fable and have the players actions affect how people view him as a leader?
Being King, you could maybe conquer lands previously ruled by evil, unlocking new areas.

As an added feature, you might have to look out for assassins, or, to allow for character development, one assassin that you learn more about throughout the story.
There are many possibilities, as you can see, and I wonder if Nintendo might do something similar in the future.

I hope you enjoyed this, and look out (if you care enough to) for my next article, which will be to do with items in the Legend of Zelda.
Zeldosopher out.
 

Firice da Vinci

Distinct lack of Leonardo
Joined
Jun 15, 2010
Location
Renaissance Italy
As cool of an idea I think this is, I am not certain it would ever happen on a larger scale that it already has. Link is meant to form connection between the player and the game. In other words, he has to appeal to the average Joe or Jane. Royalty does not conform to said belief. Having Link began his adventure as a normal boy and maturing along the way to become a hero really resonates with most people who are likely not of royal blood and just grew up as just another kid with hopes and dreams to one day shake the world on an immeasurable scale. Link is pretty much the embodiment of that ideal and princes are the complete opposite, as they are great from birth.
 

Curmudgeon

default setting: sarcastic prick
Joined
Dec 17, 2012
Gender
grumpy
i'm all for a change. country bumpkin / no-name schmoe turned legendary hero is a pretty tired trope, and not just in zelda. the titular princess herself has a pretty strong fanbase despite being virtually unrelatable in a socioeconomic context. we form connections with characters that not only speak to our own circumstances and values, but our aspirations of what we hope to become. in the course of the adventure, a royal Link would be no less susceptible to doubt, fear, and uncertainty, whatever his quest might be. a modification of approach, no matter how subtle, would certainly be welcome to this player.
 

Mangachick14

Nerdy and Proud
Joined
Jul 8, 2012
Location
Behind My Computer Monitor
Interesting.
If this would be done, the way I'd like to see it done would be in a way similar to what WW did regarding Zelda's royal status. I think it would cool for her to be a 'lost princess' of sorts (again, like WW) where she's grown up in hiding in a small, remote village. And then Link would be a prince, the nephew (since we all know Nintendo hates Link's parents for some strange reason) of the Usurper King/Queen. Perhaps one day the Usurper finds out about the prophecy that a hero with the mark of the goddesses will rise to defeat any threats to the land, and lo and behold, his/her nephew has that very marking. With this new knowledge, the usurper begins to target his/her own nephew for fear that he will turn against him/her. This prompts Link (who we'll say was never a fan of his aunt/uncle in the first place, and had spent his life being chastised for rebelling against his aunt/uncle's injustices) to set off in search of the 'lost princess' in order to put a final stop to his usurping aunt/uncle. (Huh. I might write this as a story someday...)

Btw, many of the Links aren't related (or at least aren't confirmed to be as of now) besides OoT Link and TP Link. So, he wouldn't have to necessarily have been intimate with any of the princesses to have been born into royalty.
 

PalaeoJoe

The Diplomatic Dinosaur
Joined
Jul 1, 2012
Location
Early Cretaceous North America
Royalty? I'm not so sure, I have no problem with the idea, but I doubt Nintendo would take that exact rout. I would like and expect that the closest thing we will see to link being royal, for a while at-least would be to see him serving the Royal Family. Like as a soldier.... Hang on, in Hyrule Warriors link begins the game as a normal soldier except he has a relationship of sorts with the Princess (see Mangachick14's Signature above^). This as seen in HW may be a precursor to seeing Link involved with the Royal Family in a main series. From what we have seen from Z-WiiU so far it seems that Link will begin the game in a more traditional small town setting, but it is still to early to tell with any certainty, we may still be surprised.

Again I like the Idea of Link coming from a higher place in society as it A) would be a nice change of pace and :cool: could lead to a more "Hyrule Oriented" game one that could flesh ought Hylian society. I just don't see Nintendo any time soon making him Royalty.
 
Oh man, if the only connection of sorts we see Link establish with the royal family aside from Zelda is a cutscene showing the events of the Hyrulean Civil War and Link's father battling as a loyal servant of the crown, I'll be satisfied. For a kingdom that supposedly has a rich history, Hyrule's history hasn't been well explained outside of a few nods in The Wind Waker.

If Link were to start the game as royalty, I'd prefer to see that in a direct sequel where Link is rewarded for his actions in the game prior by being promoted to an honorary member of the royal family. It would feel a bit out of place without explanation as Link has always grown from humble origins.

Regarding fighting alongside knights, I don't want to see that in a main game. While it works for a spin-off such as Hyrule Warriors, part of the fun in standard game combat is overcoming unlikely odds by strategically assessing the situation. While this likely wasn't the developers' intentions, battle in more advanced games like Skyward Sword could be interpreted as Link using his cunning and fighting prowess to decipher his opponents and learn how to defeat them outside of standard sword slashes, i.e. attacking in a specific direction. This probably wouldn't be capable of knights and from a purely programming perspective, helper AI tend to be severely handicapped as they run around doing nothing.
 

Aewon

Emperor of the Flesh-Eating Replicators
Joined
Apr 22, 2014
I like to think that OoT Link's mother was queen of one of the many minor kingdoms that existed before Zelda's father unified the country. I kind of got that idea from the manga, where Link's mother is seen escaping on horseback from a burning castle (that is not Hyrule Castle) in a dream that Link has. Yes, I know the manga isn't canon, but that's beside the point.
 
Joined
Aug 3, 2017
Ok in some incarnations of link he is a knight or his family are knights like in Breath of the wild, hyrule warriors and so on do forth. In the olden days commoners couldn't be knights it would have to be nobal blood. Link could have the blood of nobility in his veins and if you think about it we never see links family in the majority of the games and that he generally was an orphan. Now we know oot s links mother was killed but we don't know of the father and we never see zeldas mother in oot so they could be siblings if the deli tree mentioned that link was of royal blood he could be a prince. Generally royalty gets passed down by the males in the family and when the war happened the mother of link wanted to save link and Zelda but could not so she ran with link know of what could have happened if they stayed. That's a bit of a theory of mine but I stand by the fact knights would have to be of nobol blood to be a knight. So link in hyrulr warriors, breath of the wild and oot must be from nobility. Link in Breath of the wild followed in his father's footsteps in becoming a knight. Oot link becomes a knight in the child timeline which is showed in twilight princess. The hero shade was a knight and since shade and OOT link was the same person and since TP link is related to OOT link who was a knight he could have Noble blood in his veins. We also know that TP link was raised by rusl and since there is no mention of zeldas parents they could have died a long time ago. Both link and Zelda have the features of a true hylian while everyone else doesn't I find that quite strange. They both look alike in a way but Zelda has brown hair in TP while links is blonde and the difference in physical structure due to their gender. But I believe it is a possibility that Link and Zelda are siblings whether twins or Zelda being younger I do not know. Link could also be related to a different royal family that isn't mentioned in the games but that's my opinion
 

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
Staff member
ZD Legend
Comm. Coordinator
In BotW, he WAS the son of a royal guard captain. But, anyway...

I wouldn't be opposed to it. But honestly, I really like the idea of Link being someone who just takes it upon himself to do something, rather than it just being expected of him from the start. This is something I like a lot about WW, he didn't start off guided by destiny, he eventually had to go and prove himself in the Tower of the Gods. Originally, he was just in it to save Aryll, but as he became more involved he knew he couldn't just stop there because that's the kind of person he is. I find that type of character far more appealing. If he was royalty, he would be expected to play a role in some way because it would be his duty to his country and his people. It's better when he doesn't have a reason to stand and fight other than his own courageous heart, because that really exemplifies the kind of person who would be chosen by the Triforce of Courage.
 

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