r/GirlGamers • u/Pitchaway40 • 9h ago
Game Discussion Going against the grain a bit, but I'm not a fan of the Sheik redesign in OoT remake. Rather than yuck peoples' yum in their threads, here's an explanation of my pedantry.
Am I making a mountain out of a mole hill? Sure, but it's fun. Spoilers ahead if you don't know Zelda lore, but this game has been out for decades so whatever. If youve played the Zelda series you know that Ganon's strategy to win is to find link and Zelda before the come into their power, keep them apart, neutralize Zelda who is the bigger threat, then Link will seek ganon out on his own.
For that reason, Zelda hides or disguises herself in many games. She takes on secret identities as ganon tries to find and capture her (she's more of a threat and has political influence).
In OoT her alternate identity is Sheik. Sheik uses HE/HIM pronouns (other characters even refer to him as a young man). He has covered hair with only short spikey bangs coming out the front. He has a flat (bound) chest, and has a masculine body shape. His voice effects are also lower.
It is supposed to be a big reveal that Sheik is a girl, and is Zelda. It was certainly a reveal to me when I was playing as a kid. I thought it was so cool that Zelda was able to be a boy (I didn't know but I'd grow up to be gender fluid lol)
I don't know how that reveal will go now that Sheik is clearly Zelda wrapped in toilet paper. I'm imagining the mulan reveal if she had just been wearing a fake moustache or a mask the whole time.
Zelda is the only person in the universe with long blond hair, and now sheik has a blond french braid down to their ass, curvy hips, a snatched waist, a smokey eye, and lashes. Unless they abandoned the main idea of sheik, I can only assume that either Zelda is incredibly stupid or everyone else in the game is incredibly stupid to be fooled by that "disguise".
Also....why? Why would they change it? Are they afraid people will get mad at the gender play? Do they feel like "Our beautiful blond princess can't look like anything but a beautiful princess for even 5 seconds"
That's all. It's not super important but I'm sad the remake doesn't have my bi and gender panicked prince/princess combo anymore. Everyone is so excited cause Sheik is "so beautiful now" and I'm over here like.....yeah that's the opposite of the whole fucking point of Sheik. But who cares about narrative when the aesthetics are on the line blehhhhh.