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Man Edits Wind Waker so 3-Year Old Daughter Doesn't Feel 2nd Class

It would have been funny if he could have swapped the Link and Tetra character models...

especially when Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule turns up at the castle and makes Link wear a pretty pink dress

1386834-zelda.jpg


I would totally have played a swashbuckling Tetra spin off adventure


edit: while looking for that image I found this, awesome!

 

SovanJedi

provides useful feedback
Clever...and his heart is in the right place.

His small child shouldn't be watching Wind Waker however.

Oh please. Wind Waker has nothing that the average Disney or ESPECIALLY (good) Don Bluth film has in terms of fright factor. Parents shouldn't shy away from that kind of exposure to the bad and scary, especially if it is a focal point of the bad against the incredibly cheerful good.

I think this is great. Kids love having versions of popular things that are tailored to them, or even call them by name. My dad redubbed part of Daffy Duck's "Duck Amuck" cartoon to have him actually shout my name out and I freaking loved it.
 
It's a cute gesture, certainly. Makes me wonder when or if there will ever be a Legend of Zelda that actually stars Zelda as main character.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
I think there's an good intention here, but it just superficially addresses the underlying problem with gender normativity in games.
 

Eusis

Member
Oh please. Wind Waker has nothing that the average Disney or ESPECIALLY (good) Don Bluth film has in terms of fright factor. Parents shouldn't shy away from that kind of exposure to the bad and scary, especially if it is a focal point of the bad against the incredibly cheerful good.
I actually tend to look back on those moments fondly. Not that I'm sure I can fully explain why, maybe it's because they're a low from which they then rise triumphantly? Or it was because I was a huge Transformers fan and watched the movie multiple times as a toddler and that was amazingly dark for a kid's cartoon film.

... Wait, why are we worrying about Wind Waker being too dark again? Even if something like Transformers is an extreme case Wind Waker is absolutely on the Lion King level of darkness, and I doubt many batted an eyelash at showing that to their kids.
 
"Will this introduce problems later when the girl discovers that she has the only version of Wind Waker in which Link is a boy?"

Hey in my copy Link is also a boy. Imagine that. '__'
 
I actually tend to look back on those moments fondly. Not that I'm sure I can fully explain why, maybe it's because they're a low from which they then rise triumphantly? Or it was because I was a huge Transformers fan and watched the movie multiple times as a toddler and that was amazingly dark for a kid's cartoon film.

... Wait, why are we worrying about Wind Waker being too dark again? Even if something like Transformers is and extreme case Wind Waker is absolutely on the Lion King level of darkness, and I doubt many batted an eyelash at showing that to their kids.

I have a three year old nephew who is really into a show called Fireman Sam and he loves Toy Story -- I was worried he'd be horrified by the dark moments towards the end of Toy Story 3, because that shit nearly scarred ME for life
holding hands at the furnace ;_;
, but he loved it... and when he runs around our house letting his imagination go wild, he's always asking us to follow him and pretending to be a hero trying to save people from peril - be it fires or zerg or whatever

I think stuff like this is great stimulation for little minds
 
For fuck's sake. Give her some Metroid games.

Seems overreactive. Especially considering she's 3 and probably hasn't questioned any of it yet. I can associate with any character regardless of gender or race. I dunno why people get so pressed about it.

Corollary: I would play and enjoy a Zelda game with a female Link. I really just don't care.
I'm sure he got her Wind Waker cause modern Zelda games are easy enough for a three year old to complete
 

FyreWulff

Member
Cool. We do need more games to allow you to play as a female character where possible, especially ones where the character is supposed to be "you".
 
I mean on the surface its sweet. But its also kinda confusing, eventually shes going to realize that Link is Male. Just give her actually examples or females who kick ass. Samus Aran, Chell, Jade, etc
 

FyreWulff

Member
I mean on the surface its sweet. But its also kinda confusing, eventually shes going to realize that Link is Male. Just give her actually examples or females who kick ass. Samus Aran, Chell, Jade, etc

Beyond Good and Evil is a great game for a well done female lead, but it's also rated T for Teens for a good reason.

Wait, are you suggesting that a three year old isn't capable of ... emotional response?

I can't tell if you're being serious or not.

If you've ever looked at other threads, you'll notice a significant segment of GAF thinks young children are not capable of anything.
 

sonicmj1

Member
When I was three, I couldn't read.

I don't think there's anything wrong with doing it, I'm just not sure it'll accomplish anything.
 

Orayn

Member
My overwhelming reaction is one of D'AWWW, rather than Fox News outrage. Why? Just on principle, because he's romhacking to make his daughter the star of a video game.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Are mods for PC games lies?

Because this is pretty much the equivalent of someone modding a Source game to play as a different character. But nobody would feel that a mod to play as Alyx in Half Life 2 would be "going too far". They'd go "oh, that's an interesting mod *click* *install*"
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
My overwhelming reaction is one of D'AWWW, rather than Fox News outrage. Why? Just on principle, because he's romhacking to make his daughter the star of a video game.

NO, this is pointless and stupid and if Link isnt a boy my world doesnt make sense ;_;
 
From the article, for those who don't bother to click:



It's a good point.

Not really, it doesn't make any sense. You can give Link a different name, that doesn't change his gender, he's still Link.

Zelda is not an RPG where you create your own character and choose the gender, you can just give a name to the protagonist, who is a fixed character and is male, that's it.
 
Unless you're playing other M you hardly even know shes a girl under that suit.
How many people have said samus was a guy? Way to many to count.

As I said before, why do you need to know the gender at that point? Samus is a badass one way or the other - and she happens to be female as well.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
And the other options for this man are...?
Play Beyond Good and Evil.
Shit, lots of people have already said that. lol

But, why not just fire up RPG maker and make your own game at that point? Presumably if you're hacking up a ROM and playing it on an emulator, you have some idea of how to do these things.

Or if that's too high tech, make a LBP level using those tools. There's got to be a way to make games that can provide positive role models than to take an existing game and superficially changing the words in that game.
 

Kazerei

Banned
This. Give her some game with some female lead instead of LYING TO HER

There's very few games with female leads that are appropriate for 3-year-olds. Besides, he wants to play Wind Waker because it's an awesome game. And really, what's the problem with "lying" to her?

Not really, it doesn't make any sense. You can give Link a different name, that doesn't change his gender, he's still Link.

Zelda is not an RPG where you create your own character and choose the gender, you can just give a name to the protagonist, who is a fixed character and is male, that's it.

Link is androgynous enough in Wind Waker that you can swap his gender and the story still makes sense.

Play Beyond Good and Evil.
Shit, lots of people have already said that. lol

But, why not just fire up RPG maker and make your own game at that point? Presumably if you're hacking up a ROM and playing it on an emulator, you have some idea of how to do these things.

Or if that's too high tech, make a LBP level using those tools. There's got to be a way to make games that can provide positive role models than to take an existing game and superficially changing the words in that game.

All great options. And now someone has modded an existing game to provide one more option!
 

FyreWulff

Member
Not really, it doesn't make any sense. You can give Link a different name, that doesn't change his gender, he's still Link.

Zelda is not an RPG where you create your own character and choose the gender, you can just give a name to the protagonist, who is a fixed character and is male, that's it.

Link is supposed to be you, the blank slate, the "link" between the player and the world.

The opening of Skyward Sword even had female "Links" in terms of clothing and training in the academy. It's really not a far stretch at this point to have the next Zelda game let you select between playing as a female hero of destiny or a male hero of destiny.


Or to use another game series, it wouldn't make much sense to change Master Chief to a female, since the story is written around him being male. However, in Halo: Reach it works perfectly to let you be female or male since Noble 6 is a true 'blank slate' character and the story works either way regardless of the gender you're playing as. It wouldn't make sense to rig up an avatar to reflect the player and stop before allowing them to change the character to the gender they identify as.

You couldn't really have Metroid work with letting people change Samus to a male, either. But if you had another story in the universe where you're not Samus, it would make sense to let you play as a female or male bounty hunter.

Modifying Link to be a female to follow the name being changeable really isn't that far of a stretch and especially since it was a simple hex edit search -> replace. It's interesting to see people feel so threatened or angry at this. Especially on a forum where people are gung-ho about mods being supported in games.
 

Eusis

Member
I know right. He has a penis and everything.
That sounds like grounds for an instant M or AO rating.

Another thing to consider: he may well have told her that Link's supposed to be a boy, but he's making pretend that for their game he's a she, and so she gets to follow him play this alternative version. Even if not, well, it's similar to the Santa Claus/Easter Bunny/Tooth Fairy stories anyway; you think she'd really care when grown up and finding out? Though I guess there might be more basis when she goes to play something like Skyward Sword and there's no way to interpret it any other way, but if she wants to relive that there's still entries like LttP that don't make a big deal about gender.
 
I have a little girl and she plays as Link all the time. I always saw Link as a Peter Pan type role anyway, a male part played by female actors.

Lack of female characters is a bad thing though.
 
Link is supposed to be you, the blank slate, the "link" between the player and the world.

The opening of Skyward Sword even had female "Links" in terms of clothing and training in the academy. It's really not a far stretch at this point to have the next Zelda game let you select between playing as a female hero of destiny or a male hero of destiny.


Or to use another game series, it wouldn't make much sense to change Master Chief to a female, since the story is written around him being male. However, in Halo: Reach it works perfectly to let you be female or male since Noble 6 is a true 'blank slate' character and the story works either way regardless of the gender you're playing as. It wouldn't make sense to rig up an avatar to reflect the player and stop before allowing them to change the character to the gender they identify as.

You couldn't really have Metroid work with letting people change Samus to a male, either. But if you had another story in the universe where you're not Samus, it would make sense to let you play as a female or male bounty hunter.

Modifying Link to be a female to follow the name being changeable really isn't that far of a stretch and especially since it was a simple hex edit search -> replace. It's interesting to see people feel so threatened or angry at this. Especially on a forum where people are gung-ho about mods being supported in games.

Having Link be a 'link" might have been the idea at the very beginning of the series, but in the 3D games, he's pretty much a character, not just a blank slate. Especially in Skyward Sword, where he has relationships with other people and a romance with Zelda. And if I remember the ending of that game correctly, Link and Zelda are supposed to have started the Hylian race together, Adam and Eve style. That would be quite a challenge if they had the same gender. ;-)

And he's male because his creator designed him as a male, that's really all the reason he needs.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Pointless waste of time as others have said. Also silly attention seeking for it to even become known on the internet to begin with, there was no reason for that as it's not like it will spark any kind of important debate, other than the horror of defacing potential works of art to suit one's biases, however noble the cause may seem to some. What's next anyway, changing little prince to little princess? There are games (and books and movies) with female leads, optional or not, just play those, as well as games with male leads, there's no reason to change such things, and at least getting the games with real female leads would add to their sales and make companies more likely to keep making them. Not that gender should be so focused on to begin with, it shouldn't matter if the lead is male or female, the kid should learn to respect and look up to people based on who they are, not their gender. Y so sexist?
 

daviyoung

Banned
Why do artists paint women when there are men to paint? I think it sets an unfair precedent for children looking at paintings and wanting to look like what they see.

Mona_Lisa_with_Moustache.jpg


There, that's better.
 
Bayonetta doesn't seem a good role model for girls to me. I only played the demo but the character seemed ridiculous and something that would appeal to 15 year old boys.

Reason women (particularly on this board) enjoy Bayonetta is partially because she owns her sexuality, and in a different way. Some guys seem to look at it and assume it's deleterious to females, but it's similar to why women enjoy characters like Power Girl and She-Hulk. Sexualized characters are a bad thing in absence of character traits.

Being meguca trans is suffering.

Well (as you know) people are born trans, so I don't think that's what he's talking about. He's talking about her crossdressing period. Which ultimately doesn't matter.

My overwhelming reaction is one of D'AWWW, rather than Fox News outrage. Why? Just on principle, because he's romhacking to make his daughter the star of a video game.

More specifically her gender. I'd prefer he keep away games that are more deleterious to females. I forget who posted this anecdote, but the whole soccer game thing? Where the girl couldn't find her favorite female soccer players and quickly lost interest? Well that was because she was introduced to the female soccer players first and in a specific way. What happens with the Legend of Zelda series? When she figures it out or when she decides to play other games in the series?

I'm not going to hate on the father, but he is certainly misguided. The message shouldn't be "girls can be heroes too" brought about by modding games to change male characters to female ones, rather, "anyone can be a hero, male or female." She should be able to play as any character and be able to associate with them for reasons beyond gender (being able to associate with others outside your gender is a valuable trait... as we all know). And should she recognize the problem with the lack of female characters, she would be able to create fresh female characters when she's older (should she choose to be a writer, filmmaker, game developer, whatever). And there'd be fresh ideas instead of reskinning male characters. Different and new motives in general, for male and female characters. Then hopefully, in the future for some other little girl, she can play games with male and female leads.
 
This is pointless for many reasons, least of which is that she can't read. He probably did it to make it easier for him to read the scenes to her. So what happens when she grows up to find out that her dad made Link transgender instead of what he actually is? He should have used his #1337haxinsKillz to at least swap out link to a female character model.
 

Kazerei

Banned
More specifically her gender. I'd prefer he keep away games that are more deleterious to females. I forget who posted this anecdote, but the whole soccer game thing? Where the girl couldn't find her favorite female soccer players and quickly lost interest? Well that was because she was introduced to the female soccer players first and in a specific way. What happens with the Legend of Zelda series? When she figures it out or when she decides to play other games in the series?

Do you think it would have been better if the one father had not introduced his daughter to female soccer players at all, because she lost interest later when she found no female soccer players in videogames?

Do you think it would be better if the other father had not introduced his daughter to female Link at all, because she might lose interest later when she finds no female Links in other Zelda games?

I'm sure if the first father could mod female soccer players in to FIFA, he would have done so. The second father was actually able to.
 

FyreWulff

Member
This just in: hexediting is an elite hacking skill.

Seriously people, it's like opening up Word and doing a find->replace. It requires some knowledge of how to use a keyboard and the use of CTRL-F.

People are really complaining about this? REALLY?

The hypocrisy on display is mindblowing by some people.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
I'm sure if the first father could mod female soccer players in to FIFA, he would have done so. The second father was actually able to.

I will say, I thought it was kind of interesting that EA chose to include two female hockey players in this year's version of the NHL game. Yeah, they'll probably never have full rosters of female players, but if you're a girl and you want sports role models in your video games, there's actually a place to go now.
 

Dunan

Member
Now somebody go mod Skyward Sword back to the way it should be, so that left-handed kids are not made to feel second class.

(Edit: Firehawk, ever play the NES baseball classic Baseball Stars? You could sign and develop female players. It was great.)
 
Do you think it would have been better if the one father had not introduced his daughter to female soccer players at all, because she lost interest later when she found no female soccer players in videogames?

Do you think it would be better if the other father had not introduced his daughter to female Link at all, because she might lose interest later when she finds no female Links in other Zelda games?

I'm sure if the first father could mod female soccer players in to FIFA, he would have done so. The second father was actually able to.

No , but she should have been introduced to both before buying FIFA. Her favorite soccer players were female, introduced in an all-female squad. It probably wasn't a matter of sex, rather a matter of there were none of her favorite players (sports teams are homogeneous with sex).

Female Link doesn't actually exist. If the message is that everyone can be heroes, why not show that in lieu of modding games? Let her play games with male and female leads. I did (and, again, as the privileged sex I should be more adverse to it).

Now somebody go mod Skyward Sword back to the way it should be, so that left-handed kids are not made to feel second class.

(Edit: Firehawk, ever play the NES baseball classic Baseball Stars? You could sign and develop female players. It was great.)

But they are, that's totally different. :p
 

JorSneezy

Banned
I feel like folks should procreate and actually hold their newborn in the arms before commenting. It's life changing.

I completely understand what this dad is doing. Good for him.
 
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