My Somewhat Late Introductions

Howdy peoples! Daniel here, and I'd like to discuss a few things regarding Ocarina of Time. Firstly, I'd like to bore you to death talk a little bit about what Zelda means to me as a franchise. Link and I go back a long ways. I think I must have been about thirteen years old when I played my first Zelda game: Link's Awakening, on Nintendo's Gameboy Color. Back then, I was rather obsessed with video games, and could hardly wait to get my hands on another acclaimed series. But there was something different about these games that I noticed right away. Unlike God of War, or Halo, or Final Fantasy or the like, I wasn't playing as a pre-written character. There wasn't anything complex about Link--he didn't have a long, tragic backstory or some extensive circle of attractive and/or powerful acquaintences, or even strange abilities that made him more powerful than the next person. At best, Link was a very vague character, and we are only briefly given an idea of how he came to be in the situation he is. For the Link of "A Link to the Past," we are introduced to a Link that is living with his Uncle, and are led to believe that his real parents have either died or have gone missing, with Link's father being a legendary Knight of Hyrule. In Link's Awakening, all we know about our Link is that he was sailing across the sea, and has suddenly shipwrecked on a strange island. In Ocarina of Time, Link was stated as nothing more than a Kokiri child, different among his peers because, unlike all the other children, he has no fairy. This said, it's very strange that one should become attached to the character of Link at all, because he practically doesn't even exist. What character development that does happen typically happens to those outside our dynamic perspective--those characters that Link meets and associates with along the way. The character of Link, if it can be called that, usually remains relatively unchanged throughout the games--any change that is perceived is perceived by the player, rather than the character. Even the name "Link" can be changed to a more desirable one (such as one's own name), should the player desire it. Why then should one care about the character of Link at all? Put in short, because we are Link. When asked about why the character of Link was given the name that he was, Miyamoto (the creator of Mario, Donkey Kong, Zelda, and many more Nintendo juggernauts) stated, very simply, that he wanted the character of Link to be the "link between the player and the game." Indeed, the very inspiration for the Legend of Zelda series was based off of Miyamoto's own childhood adventures he had in the woods and plains around him as a child. Through these games, he managed to bring not only his imagination, but also our imagination to the very forefront of the gaming experience. Although many people criticize the Zelda games for containing no voice acting, I believe what Miyamoto was trying to do was make the player imprint their own self on the character of Link, and become the person they are playing. Link is given choices throughout the game, and experiences many shocking events (both tragic and happy). To this day, one of my most fond memory of ever playing a video game was when Talon, the owner of Lon Lon Ranch, asked me if I wanted to marry his daughter, Malon (who was a very pretty lass, if I do say so myself). Of course, being a sensible lad back then, I refused, because I was clearly not at the right age to marry, and--afterall, I had Hyrule to save! But that's just it--I stopped differentiating between myself and Link. When I reasoned through choices and decisions I had to make during the game, I reasoned through them as I would, not as the character would. To this day, I have yet to find one person that has the same idea of who the character of Link really is. This is, after all, a pointless matter of discussion, because the character of Link doesn't exist--we are all "Link!"
While many games have since come to follow in the footsteps of Zelda (ie: Fable and most MMORPGS), Link set the standard for "link in between," and because of this has become one of my most cherished fictional characters of all time. It's not because he's fascinating or complex. He's not complicated. He's just me. He's the first person to make me feel like I really was in some fantastic magical land far away, and slaying all manners of evil monsters and dark lords and saving beautiful princesses along the way. In essence, the game reads like a book.
And that's what I have--have had, for many years. Unforgettable memories of exploring the mysterious Lost Woods, climbing the perilous peaks of Death Mountain, and swimming through the clear, cool waters of Lake Hylia. These are my memories of Zelda, and the world I was privileged to see back when my childly imagination was in full bloom. While my vision may (or rather, will) deviate from the visions others may have of the strange and exciting land of Hyrule, I hope that, at the very least, I can shed a little light on my own identity, and explore the rich, deep lessons all fellow adventurers of Hyrule have experienced that make the games so great. It is, if you may indulge me, possibly one of the greatest "coming of age" stories I have yet experienced. Though the adventures may seem childish at face-level, beneath its surface lies very real-world and surprisingly mature themes that I believe anyone can relate to. And it is for this reason I am happy and proud to (for the first time ever) break my "no fanfiction" policy and explore a world that is just as much my own as it is its creator's, and anyone who's ever journeyed themselves through the magical, wonderful land of Hyrule.