Gender is something which always discussed among the Zelda community. Like, for example, Sheik's. Or the latest hero in Zelda U. Although Anouma confirmed him as a male, it was not until Anouma said anything that the discussion wasn't over; mainly because Link can perfectly be a woman.

If you try to hard to be inclusive you risk becoming bland. Characters need to have characteristics like gender, age, appearance and other physical attributes to avoid being bland.

If you want a video game with a female character make a new game series, don't go editing the past.

This is, in my opinion, the same thing as George Lucus editing his prior films to match his updated vision when he should have been trying to make new films, which he did and were disappointing.

Also the way he talks is though you can only enjoy the characters if the character is a complete reflection of yourself, rather than enjoying the character for his personality and actions.

He is insulting his own daughter in a way by assuming she is someone so shallow as to care that Link is a boy in the first place.

That's a pretty condescending attitude to take, claiming that everyone who's disagree's with his reasoning for changing the name is crying about it.

Dude, seriously? 

In the real world Link is a fictional character, whose gender can be changed when the creators damn well please. 

OT: The reactions in this thread disappoint me. It's the guy's daughter, who probably likes girly things and maybe won't like to play as a male character. Kids prefer characters that are more like them. He's being a great dad, and it's not a waste of his time. 

How is Sheik's gender put into question? Sheik is Zelda. Nothing ambiguous there.

The guy who changed this is not the creator, and creators going back and editing past works is what people like George Lucus do and it sucks for the most part. I would equally be opposed to someone editing a metroid game to make Samus male.

While I admire the effort of the Dad, would it not have been more fatherly of him to encourage his daughter to look at Link for his personality and deeds rather than Links gender.

The fathers comments on Transgendered people being left out is also dishonest, because while transgendered people may think of themselves as multigendered on the inside, on the outside, which is what we use to determine male or female (and very rarely hermaphodite), they are either male of female and have thus been included in many games as playable and non playable characters.

It's been discussed to death whether it was merely Zelda in disguise or she swapped bodies to fool Ganondorf. Both the manga and the official Ocarina of Time guide stated that Sheik is a male (plus some vague comments Princess Ruto makes in-game). Super Smash Bros states that Sheik is a female. I don't think Miyamoto/Anouma have ultimately said anything in this regard.

Bollocks.

They couldn't have been more clear about it than this:

I'm just stating things that have been discussed in the past:

From Zeldapedia:

Since the release of Ocarina of Time, many arguments have been raised regarding Sheik's true gender. As revealed in the ending of the game, Sheik is actually Zelda in disguise and not a separate character. Fans debate what methods were used by Zelda to make herself appear more masculine; whether it was a literal transformation or a disguise. Zelda's masculinity as Sheik may merely be the product of clothing (breast bindings, shoulder-pads) and not any literal magical transformation. Official art of Sheik shows tape around his/her chest, implying this could be a binding. However, shoulder pads would restrict mobility and breast binding does not explain every physical difference, such as the difference in the shoulder-to-hip ratio and muscled arms shown in the official art.

In the game itself, some of Sheik's grunts seem vaguely masculine. Additionally, Zelda and Sheik do not share physical characteristics, such as Zelda's helplessness when trapped by a ring of fire in Ganon's collapsing castle; this is a jump that she would presumably be able to make as Sheik, implying an actual transformation or magical augmentation as opposed to a mere clothing difference. When Princess Ruto describes Sheik to Link, she refers to him as a "nice young man", and in the original Japanese version, Sheik introduces him/herself using boku, a pronoun mostly used by young males; these may simply be examples of an effective disguise, however.

Several sources considered non-canonical, or otherwise unreliable, touch upon the subject of Sheik's gender: the official PrimaGames strategy guide consistently cites Sheik as being female, given that she is merely Zelda in disguise; in the Ocarina of Time manga, Impa seals Zelda's consciousness, telling her to "live as a boy" until the time comes for her to awaken. Other moments in the manga, such as when Sheik remains unaffected by the Desert of Illusions, also hint at the fact that Sheik is a different personality that houses Zelda's body; Sheik's trophy in Super Smash Bros. Melee states the the magic used to change Zelda's form affected only her skin, hair, and eye color, whereas the Brawl trophy states that she remained female throughout the entirety of Ocarina of Time. These descriptions, however, are in the English-language version of the games only, with the original Japanese versions not using any female pronouns. Additionally, the Japanese official site uses 'seinen' to describe Sheik, meaning 'young man' (which can also be translated as 'wakamono', the descriptor Princess Ruto uses in Ocarina of Time). According to Bill Trinen of Nintendo of America, Sheik is female. In many non-canonical games, such as Hyrule Warriors, as well as the Super Smash Bros. series, Sheik has a notably more feminine body figure and face, which could be taken as hints toward a possible definitive gender.

I was incorrect earlier, the guide says Sheik is female.

Like, seriously? The discussion isn't about sheik's identity. it's about if Zelda is just cross dressing or using magic to actually have a man's body (it's the latter, by the way). NOA stated recently that it's just clothes but that means nothing when NOA contradicted NOJ many times regarding characters genders and sexual preference (birdo, vivian...) What we have is the information from the original game, where sheik clearly has the body shape of a man and far more agility than oot zelda has and different eye color. Plus, zelda uses the triforce of wisdon to revert back, making it even clearer that magic is involved.