Who are Four Swords’ Links and Vaati?

Welcome to the sole editorial on the characters of Four Swords. As I said at the end of my previous editorial, due to lack of character development (and characters, for that matter), it was difficult to spread across several editorials, so I compiled them into a single, detailed editorial. Today, I’ll be taking a look at the Links (that’s right, there’s more than one in this game!), and Vaati that feature in this game. Unfortunately, I had to skip out on this incarnation of Zelda because she has very little presence in this game. It’d be like analysing Majora’s Mask’s Zelda (same one from Ocarina of Time, but she only appeared in a flashback).

Even though Four Swords was just a side-game packed in with a rerelease of A Link to the Past for the Game Boy Advance, the characters still have some development, and the manga adaptation of the game offers further insight into some of the characters; from that, we can learn more about these characters. Hit the jump to read more!

Links

In Four Swords, Link is a childhood friend of Princess Zelda. This Zelda is the protector of the Four Sword Sanctuary, ensuring that the evil being that is sealed within the sword stays sealed. But lately, Zelda has sensed something wrong about the Sanctuary, and goes to check it out. Knowing that she may encounter trouble, she brings Link with her. This implies that this Link already has some form of education in the way of self defence, and the fact that he is without a sword suggests that it is in hand-to-hand combat. However, like all previous and future incarnations of Link, he ends up wielding a sword for the majority of the game, implying that he has also been taught how to fight with a sword.

With the knowledge that this Link is already well-acquainted with this Zelda, and that he is educated in the way of combat, suggests the idea that Link was brought up in the castle with Zelda, and trained by the guards of the castle, with the hopes that he could become an official guard for the castle one day, or perhaps even Zelda’s personal guard. As some of you may have noticed, I got this idea primarily from Spirit Tracks, in which Link gets trained by guards from Hyrule Castle (despite the fact that he is not raised in the castle), and, at the end of the game, has the option to become an official guard of the castle. Another possibility is that Link was simply trained by whoever is his parent or guardian in this game, and that it’s not related to his friendship with Zelda, similar to Link’s background in The Minish Cap.

Either way, Link and Zelda make their way to the Four Sword Sanctuary, but don’t find anything unusual. The Four Sword is still at rest in its pedestal, and there is no sign of mischief. Zelda then explains to Link what the Four Sword actually is, enlightening him to the fact that the body of the person who touches the blade will be shattered to pieces, and recounting the tale of how a hero once used the Four Sword in the face of evil; how the hero became as four, and the four combined their strength to seal the evil within the Four Sword.

Suddenly, the Four Sword cocks to the side. Before Link or Zelda can investigate the mysterious, invisible force that moved the sword, a monstrous laugh is heard, and a purple appendage reaches down and snatches up Zelda. Link looks up to see a monstrous, one-eyed, purple mass holding Zelda. As Zelda struggles to free herself, the creature reveals itself to be Vaati, the Wind Mage. Vaati announces that now that he has returned, he shall once again spread terror across the land, and to celebrate his return, he takes Zelda to be his bride. Before Link can do anything, Vaati vanishes, taking Zelda and his stereotypical ways with him.

Link just stands there, absolutely gobsmacked. But that’s understandable; every Link that has ever existed and ever will always knew what to do, but none of them have ever suffered such a quick turn of events. This poor Link was out on a casual stroll with his best friend when, suddenly, a sword in a pedestal moves by itself, his best friend is stolen from his side, a previously-sealed evil returns, announces its plans to destroy the world, and to take your best friend as its bride… all within the space of a few seconds! Link now finds himself alone, knowing that he must get Zelda back and defeat Vaati, but has no idea what he can do at this time.

Luckily for Link, his first stroke of luck for that day comes not long after he was faced with this tremendous task. Three fairies arrive and instruct Link to pull the Four Sword from its resting place. Though it is not stated, these fairies are either representatives of the three Great Fairies that Link later encounters on his trek, or the Great Fairies themselves, but in a somewhat less human form. Despite the fact that Zelda had, less than five minutes ago, told him that the body of whoever touches the blade will be shattered, Link goes forth and draws the Four Sword from the pedestal, and, in a blinding light, is separated into four different Links.

When Link decided to take up the blade, I can’t help but wonder what was going through his head. It is not stated that this Link has the Triforce of Courage, but because the unbreakable spirit of the hero is passed down to every incarnation of Link, we can rule out the possibility that he had self-destructive tendencies (in that, he didn’t randomly decide, “My only friend is to become the bride of a monster who intends to destroy the world; I don’t wanna live anymore!!!”). But on the other hand, the three fairies gave Link nothing to confirm their honest intentions, and given that best friends trust each other with their lives, Link would’ve believed Zelda when she said that touching the Four Sword was suicide…

It would be an interesting dilemma if it weren’t for two simple facts: one, any Link does anything he can to defeat evil and save the damsel-in-distress; and two, fairies are not evil. Link would understand the fairies only had honest intentions, and knew that drawing the Four Sword was the best thing he could do for the time being. Now, having drawn the Four Sword, four different Links now exist.

Obviously, because Four Swords was only developed as a side game, Nintendo didn’t feel they had to include certain details that they would otherwise include in a full-blown Zelda game, such as characters’ reactions to events. This is clearly evident in the fact that Link expresses no surprise in the fact that there are now three identical copies of himself, different only in the color of their tunics. He lives in a world of monsters and magic, yes, but anybody would still be surprised if and when they replicated simply by grabbing a sword.

Now this is where the manga comes in. It is actually an adaptation of Four Swords Adventures, but the same four Links are created when the original Link draws the Four Sword from it’s pedestal. In Four Swords, the extra Links are simple copies, they exist solely to help Link. But to do so, they would require their own intelligence; and if you have an intelligence, you also have a personality. This is another small detail that Nintendo felt was not necessary to include in the game, or excluded due to timing constraints, whichever. In the manga, each Link has his own personality. Again, I must emphasize that I have not read the manga, and that I have instead read about it elsewhere, so excuse any inaccuracies.

In the manga, each Link has their own personality: Green Link is focused and the leader, Blue Link is aggressive and quick to anger, Red Link is the optimist, and Purple Link is the cool, calm, and collected one. You’d think the personalities of Red Link and Blue Link would be the other way around, and they might be, I could be wrong, but my point is the same: while it was not shown that the Links in Four Swords have personalities, neither was it shown that they don’t have personalities.

Given the manga is not canon, I could theorize about the personalities of the four different Links until the cows come home, so I’ll simplify my theory: I believe that each new Link is born of a trait that the original Link had, for example, Link would always believe that he would succeed no matter what, so one of the other Links’ personality would be based solely around that trait, and they would be very optimistic. I also like the personalities that the Links in the Four Swords Adventures manga have, particularly how the personalities of the Blue and Red Links go against the connotations that are associated with those two colors.

Each Link is still Link, so they would all share that courageous, heroic determination to defeat evil, and they soon learn to cooperate with each other, knowing it is the only way to succeed. As you would expect, they do succeed, Vaati is resealed, and Zelda is saved. When Link returns the Four Sword to its pedestal, the four Links return to being one, single Link. But because they have intelligence and personalities, wouldn’t they have a problem with that?

They know that they are just copies, but if they did have their own personalities, they’d all be different, and they’d all feel unique, like they are their own person. If you were in their position, would you simply allow yourself to end? Given that they share the original Link’s lack of self-destructive tendencies, I find it very hard to believe that would simply allow themselves to just go back into the sword. Spoiler warning: they’re not like Fi, from Skyward Sword, knowing that they must return to a potentially unending sleep within the sword.

However, Fi is revealed to have a personality at the end (the strength and quality of that personality can be debated) and the knowledge that she must return to the sword and that her services were no longer required were what ultimately caused her to enter her unending sleep within the Master Sword. I can only feel that similar knowledge within the four Links is what caused them to allow themselves to be drawn back into the Four Sword.

Finally, given that the four Links do return in Four Swords Adventures, would they remember the events of Four Swords. Given that they are copies of a new Link, it is most likely that they wouldn’t: new copies, new memories. Well, that went for longer than I expected, I almost could’ve made a whole editorial out of it, but I can’t make a full editorial out of Vaati, so keep reading to find out about him.

Vaati

When Link and Zelda arrive at the Four Sword Sanctuary, Zelda explains that Vaati, the Wind Mage, is sealed within, but that lately, she has been sensing a weakness in the seal. Okay, I went through that, and you know that Vaati does escape and takes Zelda with him.

It has been said Vaati, for one reason or another, has now forgotten his former life. That’s entirely possible, but it doesn’t account for the fact that Vaati still remembers who he is:

“My name is Vaati. I am the great Wind Mage. The seal is broken… so I shall rage yet again!”

He clearly remembers who he is, and has retained his anger. I prefer to think that Vaati escaped the seal, but at a cost.

Because he doesn’t elaborate on who he is, we can assume that there has been a loss of memories, which isn’t surprising. Seals are powerful magic, it doesn’t matter which franchise they’re from, so escaping from the seal would most certainly have come at a cost: in this case, his memories. However, given that in Four Swords and Four Swords Adventures, Vaati never regains a physical form like the one he had in The Minish Cap, remaining only as the phantom-orb-with-an-eye that he is, we could assume that this was another cost of escaping the seal: inability to retain a physical form. Sure, in The Minish Cap, Vaati was in his phantom-orb-with-an-eye form, but it was a simple transformation of his old form; he could’ve transformed back if he wanted to.

With all this in mind, I believe that a general description of the cost of escaping the seal is as follows: the seal was so strong that, even with Vaati’s incredible power, he could only escape as the essence of who he is; he lost the memories of how he came to be this way and his physical form, but his essence (his identity and his sole desire) escaped, taking a simple form.

So, with only an identity and one desire, he sets out to destroy the world, but wait… he can’t help but notice something else first… Zelda. Vaati decides that Zelda is so beautiful that he must make his bride. This is because of two possibilities: Vaati retained unacknowledged feelings for the Zelda from his past life, and these feelings were reawakened after seeing this Zelda; the second possibility is that it he simply thought, “Oh goodie, a trophy bride which I can use to further demonstrate my power.”.

Perhaps not in those exact words, but that’s the basic idea. I prefer the second idea, to be honest, because, not only were feelings for Zelda never even hinted at in The Minish Cap, but he doesn’t remember his past life, so even if those feelings were there, they would have been forgotten. Plus, this Vaati is every bit the stereotypically villain, and is every bit the stereotypical man if it is true that he simply took Zelda as a trophy bride to further demonstrate his ability to dominate.

At the end of the game, Vaati is once again sealed, Zelda is saved, and the Four Sword is laid to rest. And this brings us to the end of my one and only editorial on Four Swords characters. Short and sweet, you might say. But what do you guys think? Do you think the Links would each have their own personalities? If so, do you feel they are completely unique or based off aspects of the original Link’s personality? To what extent do you feel Vaati is a stereotypical villain in this game? What ideas do you have about his present state? Do you think he had any actual feelings for the Zelda he took to be his bride? Let me know in the comments, and look forward to next week when I start my series on the characters of The Minish Cap!