Design Journal #5 – Character Redesign: Rewriting the Hero (Action-Adventure)

    This one is a little tough for me. First of all, I'm not totally sure what the bounds of "action-adventure" are as a genre, and secondly, I'm really hard-pressed to come up with an action-adventure game I've play where I think the main protagonist is actually one of the issues, so I think the best I'll be able to do is an "I think this would be cool" as opposed to any sort of "fix" of any real issue.

    That said, I think it would be cool if The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker did more with the enemy weapon drop mechanic, and I think this would also have implications for its Link's design and character.

    As he is, Wind Waker's Link is a pretty ordinary kid from an island village. He's actually the first Link in the series not to be a prophesied hero, actually; he is truly Just Some Guy who earns his place in history as a hero of legend through his own courage and gumption. To reflect his humble origins, his outfit and much of his basic gear are quite simple. His initial shield was passed down throw his family for generations as an heirloom, but it's small, and appears to be made largely of wood or bronze. Despite his first sword bearing the lofty name "Hero's Sword", it's a simple, unremarkable short sword given to him by his hometown's resident martial arts instructor. Link is not a kid with easy access to high-quality equipment, is what I'm getting here. But he can actually briefly take and wield enemies' equipment.

    Many of the enemies you fight in Wind Waker wield weapons; primarily swords and polearms, but also occasionally just sticks. Dealing a heavy enough blow to these enemies can cause them to temporarily drop these weapons, which you can then pick up and use yourself with the A button. They're not treated as long-term items, though, and seem to go in the same "slot" as things like the pots and pigs and bombs and such that you can pick up. You can't carry them around long-term, and activating any warp between rooms forces Link to drop them, if I recall correctly.

    I think it would be cool to let Link keep at least one or two of these weapons on hand and use them as his basic weapon, maybe with a durability mechanic like Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, especially seeing as he'd still have his trusty infinite-use Hero's Sword (and, later, Master Sword) to fall back on. To complement this, his design could be made a little more complex in a messy sort of way, like the design of the Link who stars in the original NES Legend of Zelda; a scrappy, determined kid on a mission, scrounging up all the tools he can find to aid on his quest. This would also more strongly convey Link's heavy use of various items and tools through his design, and ground both him and his gear in the world a little more strongly, without sacrificing his personality as a brave, adventurous, goofy kid.