News - Link immortalized in gay magazine
Posted by
Ash Paulsen
at 07:53:04 AM EST on 5.29.2006.
Any gamer worth his or her salt certainly knows that the
Zelda series has won many accolades, awards, and much respect in general for the supremely high quality and craftsmanship of its games. The series' Hyrulian, pointy-eared hero, Link, is certainly no stranger to winning awards.
But Link's latest distinction has nothing to do with the quality of his games, but rather his game (sorry). This time, Link has been dubbed the "Hottest Video Game Character" in the recent June issue of
Out, a magazine focusing on gay and lesbian individuals, for his lead role in the upcoming GameCube and Wii release,
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.
For those who have access to or read the magazine, this special distinction can be found in the magazine's "What's Hot Now" section. For those who don't, however, check out this excerpt from the publication:
"When darkness enshrouds the land, Nintendo's sexy farm-boy-turned-wolf sets out to save the day in this upcoming game. His weapons: a sword, a bow, arrows, and kick-ass grooming skills."
Now, seeing as I'm not up on gay and lesbian culture, I'm not exactly sure how popular or big a magazine "Out" is. Still, this is quite a special distinction for Link, as he is the first video game character to receive recognition of this kind (to my knowledge).
Comment away, folks. :)
Source:
GameSpot
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deeblite 6.5.2006 at 01:36:45 PM
Link isn't gay, he's asexual. His interest in Sheik is purely professional.
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rsquared 6.2.2006 at 10:48:00 PM
Am I the only one who thought Ada looked hot in body armor (the Agent Ada costume)? Somethin' bout that butterfly...
And c'mon, Leon is Squall with a human personality.
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animetayl 6.2.2006 at 08:00:16 PM
hypersonicexe: Well, I guess you summed it up. If women must be unrealistically portrayed in games to appeal to the mass-market male, the males are going to be likewise to appeal to the female. Although I would highly argue the 'anorexic' charge. Anorexics don't have muscle because the muscle atrophies to feed their bodies. And if you swung a sword 10 billion times a day and ran every time you moved, I would imagine you'd be pretty fit.
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fillerbunny9 6.2.2006 at 05:35:20 AM
to be fair, there are 2 types of video game males; skinny, or enormous.
I would also argue the charge the Leon is anorexic, as he looks pretty toned without his jacket.
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hypersonicexe 6.2.2006 at 02:36:02 AM
Link, Squall, and Leon, eh?
I'm seeing a definite theme here. Anorexically skinny, soft skin, pale complexion, and hair in a forward-arch/covering the forehead somewhat.
Furthermore, let's drag in someone wildly popular with ladies that can help me prove my theory, I dunno, say:
http://www.johnnydepp-zone.com/h2.gif
I rest my case.
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pixy misao 5.31.2006 at 11:16:07 PM
He does have cross-over appeal, but I thought that meant for girls. Fascinating.
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shin gallon 5.31.2006 at 04:33:51 AM
Are you talking to me, or the bigot?
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darcman0 5.31.2006 at 12:55:40 AM
oh link in that tight green tunic of his....swoon....
if you're angry at that, loosen up a bit.
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shin gallon 5.30.2006 at 11:34:43 PM
That's our boy captainm1, even being a bigot.
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mar 5.30.2006 at 11:04:04 PM
Never thought of Wind Waker Link as shota before.. thanks, GAF >_
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capitanm1 5.30.2006 at 10:58:21 PM
Thats our boy Link, even impressing the faggets.
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visual77 5.30.2006 at 02:49:50 PM
I agree with zepyulos. I think Link was more immortalized due to the Legend of Zelda series of games spanning the NES, SNES, Gameboy, N64, Gameboy Color, Gamecube, Gameboy Advance and upcoming on Wii and DS than a magazine article putting him as Hottest Video Game Character.
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zepyulos 5.30.2006 at 02:00:17 PM
I wouldn't really count being in a magazine as being immortalized. I mean, it's only paper.
...
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animetayl 5.30.2006 at 11:11:21 AM
hypersonicexe:
As far as male video game characters being hot to me, I would have to say Link, Squall and Leon are my top three. Link is just... Link. It's a unique sexiness that comes from his entire being. Squall has the hair, the eyes, the perfect, chiseled features, the lips, the taut body, the fur and the silver.. yeah. He's dang good too. And Leon. I've never played RE4, but dang. He's just so manly in the most beautiful sort of way. He's certainly not 'pretty-boy' like Squall and Link are seen as. I guess he's a classic example of perfect handsomeness. Like he exudes all the best qualities of 'man'. He's tall, built, very handy with a variety of 'tools' (a.k.a. guns), and well, he just has it all together.
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i kick tits 5.30.2006 at 10:21:59 AM
Tingle is way hotter.
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nabulsi 5.30.2006 at 06:24:58 AM
Ada Wong is hot.
The quote "See you around" makes me horny :D
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oni 5.30.2006 at 04:02:59 AM
actually, i was thinking....forget leon
have we all seen the pre-renders for re5?
...
i gotta play me some of that!
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shin gallon 5.30.2006 at 03:53:37 AM
talbyn: That's precicely why I don't go into Gamespot or GameFAQs comment sections/forums...they're basically cesspools of immature, homophobic, insecure and otherwise generally unpleasant "people".
As for Leon, he's damn hot for a game character, and he has the benefit of being in one of the best games ever made, to boot.
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hypersonicexe 5.30.2006 at 03:00:41 AM
That Link; can style his hair like no one's business, but keeps milk in the same glass jar he does bugs. XD
A question to any female gamers out there (yeah right, pigs fly, David Spade gets a haircut, etc.):
What male video game character, if any, is hot or appealing to you, the female gamer?
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fillerbunny9 5.30.2006 at 02:50:16 AM
blkstarr, you are FAR from alone in your sentiment. the problem is, the cookie cutter gay-boy is more noticable than those of us who don't spend 4 hours preening before we set foot out of the door.
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c 5.30.2006 at 02:43:57 AM
nambit - i think you misunderstood what i meant. because i have no idea what you mean by your comment.
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blkstarr 5.30.2006 at 02:21:36 AM
While I challenge the perception of what defines a "man" in any meaningful capacity, I do rather appreciate the sentiment that he isn't a pretty boy. I do necessarily have anything against that, but I do often get put off by the plethora of gay men who feel the need to fit into a stereotypically gay role. If I wanted to have sex with someone adopting the mannerisms and aesthetics of a woman, I'd actually have sex with a female.
To each their own though.
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thehawk 5.30.2006 at 02:13:46 AM
"no leon either....cmon, that s*** is hot eh?"
The thing I like about Leon is that he's not really a pretty-boy. He's handsome and he's a MAN, plain and simple. He's a very capable and tough man, too. All this time I've been playing RE4 I keep thinking, "Ashley, you better appreciate how awesome I am." And Ashley's kind of funny-looking, even if the President did equip her with ballistics.
I like Link, but if somebody calls him a pretty-boy I don't have much ground to argue.
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sugoi 5.30.2006 at 01:29:56 AM
I can certainly understand why people would think Link is sexy. I do wonder where they got this 'grooming skills' idea from. He's too young to shave, so his grooming skill sare limited to combing his freaking hair... which he doesn't even have to do, because he has a FREAKING CAP TO HIDE IT.
That said, it is a rather fetching cap, isn't it? Stylish, yet functional!
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fillerbunny9 5.30.2006 at 12:52:49 AM
well talbyn, in all fairness, when 2/3 of the posts were deleted by moderators, I guess it doesn't take much.
generally GAF is better than most sites forum comments, and outside of the unavoidable flame wars, are quite mature.
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oni 5.30.2006 at 12:30:50 AM
yeah... really, not one of those highly effiminate final fantasy characters made it?
seems all they've got is kickass grooming skills
not to mention their super-stylin gel!
no leon either....cmon, that s*** is hot eh?
haha
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talbyn 5.30.2006 at 12:11:29 AM
Actually, I would like to say that it's a credit to this website's readership that the comments made thus far have been rather mature, especially compared to the mass failure of humanity that ensued in the Gamespot comment area.
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polster 5.30.2006 at 12:04:30 AM
Being a gay man, I find this funny. I dont know if anyone is attracted towards videogame characters, I know I kinda fancy Solid Snake...but doing a whole feature in videogame characters is a little bit too much.
But hey, whatever floats their boats at Out I guess. I would think they pick another blonde "spikey-haired" character to be the winner personally.
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thehawk 5.29.2006 at 11:58:31 PM
Dear goodness, PLEASE don't turn this into a homophobe hunt. Some people LOVE accusing others of homophobia because it makes them look like the enlightened tolerant one.
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dhowerter 5.29.2006 at 10:45:18 PM
Actually, I'm not real big on HETEROSEXUALLY fantasizing about video game characters either.
It just seems WRONG ya know?
I think I'd like to keep people's sex lives completely separate from the hobby I love, thank you -_-
I'd like to TRY and keep videogames as innocent as possible, at least for myself, like it once used to be.
(well at least the games I play ;)
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cubesquared 5.29.2006 at 10:25:12 PM
SOMEONE'S a tad homophobic. Actually, not just you, dhowerter, I'm not just picking on you. I don't see why it's okay to HETEROSEXUALLY fantasize about imaginary game characters, but it's oh-so-very-wrong when others do it. Like this is all that different from Aki Ross being in Maxim, or the countless articles about Lara Croft. Gays and lesbians (and my good friends the bisexuals, of course) are every bit as capable and entitled to worthless fantasy as heterosexual folk are.
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dhowerter 5.29.2006 at 10:18:34 PM
Oh GOD. Keep video game characters OUT of the whole gay thing PLEASE.
*shudder*
MOVING ON.. :-D
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fillerbunny9 5.29.2006 at 09:32:40 PM
this is no different from the "video game swimsuit babe" BS that gaming magazines have run for a while. well, I guess that since it is in a non-gaming mag, that might mean SOMETHING, but I would hardly call Out relevant. they have the occaisional interview with a gay person of note, the rest is all fluff. there's a small fashion section (gee, I'm gonna spend $1000 on that shirt!) and some other stuff. though the mag is generally targetted towards gay males, probably mid-late 20s to 30, I doubt this will come as any surprise. I've known a few gay men who thought "adult" Link was cute from OoT, and as a gay male, sure the design could in theory be attractive in real life. what I find funny, is that rarely are the male lead characters "sexy." Solid/Naked Snake? hell no. Cloud? yeah, everyone thinks emo = hawt. Vaan? he might LOOK gayer than most of San Francisco, but hot he is not. seriously, how many games with a male lead, might the character be construed as sexy? Ryu Haybusa maybe, when you see him outside of his mask, but that's about it. now, think of all the buxom young females peddled to us as eye candy.
the industry knows its key audience, and they aren't the people who want an attractive MALE lead. congrats Link, for even though you turn into a wolf, you're still a more attractive human than the rest of the industry's males.
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animetayl 5.29.2006 at 09:16:23 PM
I think there's something very sexy about a man with two earrings. Don't really know what it is, but I'm sure glad that Link has 'em. ;) With ears as long as his, I actually wouldn't mind if he had one more, near the tip of one of them.
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thehawk 5.29.2006 at 09:11:04 PM
I definitely liked it better when Link didn't have earrings. I dislike earrings.
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d 5.29.2006 at 07:57:54 PM
I tried to resist this, but alas it was too much:
With this game they get a semi feminie link who also turns into a wolf. Pretty boy furry = ewwwwwwww.
I think I liked link better when he had too few polygons to be "sexy". *shudder*
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nekofrogisadoofus 5.29.2006 at 06:31:04 PM
The article does not say that Link is gay. It is just saying that gay guys think he's hot.
This reminds me of the time about 2 years ago, when when I went to see Miyamoto and some other guys have a panel discussion about games at the Smithsonian museum in Washington DC.
Before everyone took their seats, a Smithsonian worker passed out notecards to everyone waiting in line to get in, and asked them to write down a question that they would like answered by the panel members. They said that they would go through the cards and pick several of the questions to ask the panel, which included Miyamoto.
I was annoyed at the people wasting their questions. I saw some cards that looked like they had a paragraph written on them (trying to look intelligent I guess), someone asked questions that have already been answered, like, "how did you come up with the names Zelda and Donkey Kong?"
I wrote 3 words on the card and handed it to the lady: "Is Toad gay?"
Needless to say, they did not ask that question, so gamers everywhere are still losing sleep over this Nintendo enigma of a character.
Sorry guys, I tried.
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thehawk 5.29.2006 at 06:11:41 PM
In Ocarina of time, Link had girls all over him! A few wanted to marry him. But who was Link chasing the entire time? Sheik, who he thought was a guy. It's not hard to see why a gay magazine is so keen on this elf in tights.
In Twilight Princess, Link needs to either get the girl or come out of the closet. Nintendo shouldn't keep us wondering like this.
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blkstarr 5.29.2006 at 05:24:19 PM
Vaan shouldn't have won it. Vaan is not in the least bit attractive. Link on the other hand? I'd hit it.
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oni 5.29.2006 at 05:11:20 PM
birdo prefers to be called 'transgender'
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mahew 5.29.2006 at 04:42:46 PM
Nintendo is kiddy, now? Go go Link, our pretty boy!
Vaan doesn't count because he's a woman.
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kokichi 5.29.2006 at 04:25:04 PM
Birdo still wins out in the most confusing gender-related issue for a transvestite videogame character.
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animetayl 5.29.2006 at 03:20:19 PM
Well, I'm not about to read any sort of gay/lesbian media. However, I most certainly agree with their sentiments. :P
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nambit 5.29.2006 at 03:13:12 PM
Wind Waker Link reference?
So you're saying a story about a young boy is gay? That's lame.
The nice thing about the Zelda games is that they apply the notion of childhood friendship and acceptance to a story that usually depicts an adult theme. It's quite brilliant in that respect. It brings us all back to our childhood roots, regardless of how old, what religion, what sexual preference, what socioeconomic group we belong to, etc. It's a classic tale of good against evil.
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c 5.29.2006 at 02:54:31 PM
shin galleon - i was most certainly not referring in any way to the wind waker link, haha :D
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wolf line 5.29.2006 at 02:42:45 PM
bluelander - 5.29.2006 at 07:56:42 AM
Everyone is gay for Link.
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parte241 5.29.2006 at 02:13:42 PM
Vaan from Final Fantasy XII, I'm assuming.
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duque501 5.29.2006 at 02:00:33 PM
Tingle has something to do with or used his influence over the contest
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troid23 5.29.2006 at 01:55:56 PM
Wait....Vaan? Vaan as in...Legend of Legaia Vaan? Or what?
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toiletduckbaby 5.29.2006 at 01:36:51 PM
meh
at least more publicity for the game
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shin gallon 5.29.2006 at 01:29:18 PM
Actually, I never thought he was all that hot (and yes, I'm gay : P )
Though I must admit, the Twilight Princess version of him does rank much higher on the meter than, say, the Wind Waker version (and I loved Wind Waker's graphical style).
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nambit 5.29.2006 at 01:27:28 PM
Being a gay gamer has *NOTHING* to do with it, even though my comment below was a bit of a joke. What matters is that they recognize a character that doesn't isolate them.
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x51 5.29.2006 at 01:16:47 PM
Maybe a lot of gay/lesbian people will buy Wii now... appeal to the non-gamer...
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cubesquared 5.29.2006 at 01:09:37 PM
If you guys actually take the time to PLAY the game instead of inferring from screenshots, you'll find out how utterly inconsequential and not really badass at all Vaan actually is. His only real value is that he's rather balanced as a melee fighter, but other than that he could easily have been removed from the game and no one would shed a tear; he hardly even gets lines. Gay: maybe, badass: NO. He definitely would not have won this award; which from what I can tell is based on the fact that Link is hot and kickass. Vaan is neither.
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pook 5.29.2006 at 01:01:47 PM
dude, that's so gay.
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!!m 5.29.2006 at 12:24:14 PM
i know nintendo wants to shead that whole "kiddy" image but come on.....
xD
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siraileron 5.29.2006 at 11:56:23 AM
All of a sudden I feel warm and fuzzy inside. XD
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joesteele 5.29.2006 at 10:24:54 AM
"Vaan should have won it"
Damn straight. Probably should have stuck with something they probably knew more about though.
btw, since this is a gay and lesbian magazine, did any umm..."gay" females win anything for the VG category? Or was it just link?
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nabulsi 5.29.2006 at 09:52:13 AM
I knew someone that thought Link (as a boy) was cute in OoT. He's a male as well. Whatever floats your boat :)
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drumlord 5.29.2006 at 09:51:14 AM
Vaan should have won it
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hailthed 5.29.2006 at 09:19:20 AM
Heres how to tell your reading a magazine published for the gay/lesbian demographic.Whenever one of your strongest qualities in fighting evil is Kick-ass grooming. Anyway i think thats pretty cool that games are getting recognized not just by the gaming communit anymore.
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c 5.29.2006 at 08:27:15 AM
Is there anyone who doesn't think that Link is hot?
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esuzumy 5.29.2006 at 08:22:38 AM
Hot.
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nambit 5.29.2006 at 08:02:29 AM
This is a perfect example of all-access gaming.
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bluelander 5.29.2006 at 07:56:42 AM
Everyone is gay for Link.
digg this story!
