How is giving an option for a female Link the same thing as losing a beloved character? What would you even lose?
Let's try this again.
Link is a character. He has a background, friends, sometimes family, and a motive for setting out to save the princess.
The thing is, Nintendo has cast YOU, the player, to act as him. The character on-screen is not the player, but the "makeup" to allow the player to act the role.
You could still be the male Link you want to be.
No, because the Link we all know is a role cast for us to play, not a self-insert character we make up. As soon as you change that, you get a character creator. You are then playing as yourself instead of acting a role that has been set for you.
Link is a different experience than a character creator. He is not an avatar.
Why force the developers into a box because of your views of the character?
Nintendo has made their own views clear on this. I am merely stating they should be free to use whatever box they please, so long as they made it themselves.
I guess we lost James Bond when they cast a blonde in the role, and that time they didn't even give us an option to keep good ol' James Bond the way he was meant to be
The only thing that could make the James Bond analogy work is if YOU were cast to play him. You, I, and the rest of us. That means we would still be expected to act the role of a male british dude who sweeps the ladies off their feet and makes crazy stunts with a ton of gadgets, regardless of what our own personal identity is. We would have a little adlib room to put our own spin on it, but we would not be given the ability to make sweeping changes to his character. If we tried, we'd get fired and not get paid.