Is Link in the new "Legend of Zelda" game female?

[Aielyn]

Nearly everyone is arguing over whether it's female, yet I see only one person even suggesting it might not be Link (and their suggestion seems to be that it's Zelda).

It seems to me that, when asked if Link was female, they responded in a way that implies that Link is still male... but leaves out a key question. Is it Link? Could it be that this is a new protagonist? After all, Aonuma was quite explicit that this Zelda is going to change up a lot of the conventions of the Zelda series... and what's the one convention of the Zelda series that has pretty much held 100% constant (if we ignore those CDi games)? They've all starred Link as the primary protagonist.

I have a scenario to propose:

Similar to the intro to Hyrule Warriors, Link is the Royal Guard of Hyrule, and is a full-fledged adult. Zelda is not just Princess, but officially Queen. Link has a daughter (with it implied that Malon, who is no longer alive as of the start of the game, is the mother), who has just begun training to follow her father into the guard. And as part of her training, she is to begin with some Field training.

While out in Hyrule Field, the trouble starts. She is tasked by Link (initially) with discovering the cause of the trouble. Link's task is to protect Zelda (it's implied that there's more than just queen-and-guard in the relationship, hence his decision to stay by her side). And so, our new protagonist begins her quest.

Reason for thinking this? Well, Link and Zelda are implied to be love interests in most cases (except the TP story), but typically don't end up getting to be together (except the WW story). And if you look at Hyrule Warriors, which is a celebration of all things Zelda, there are two curious things to note. Link doesn't generally start as part of the Hyrule Guard, and there were designs for a female Link amongst the concept art for Hyrule Warriors.



Her name is "Linkuru", which has been speculated to anglicise to "Linkle". And a translation of the text alongside the design is “The hero Link’s girl version. She was [originally] planned to be Link’s younger sister.” [according to Siliconera]. This is strange, given that they've worked so hard to stay true to the franchise in so many other details.

This isn't to say that it'll happen, but it seems plausible, to me. It would make sense for Link's daughter (or sister) to look a lot like Link. And it certainly would challenge one of the fundamental conventions of Zelda.