Recently Discovered Zelda Novel Features a Bizarre Name Change for Link

By Marc Deschamps

Back in 1992, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past received a novelization in Japan as part of the Futabasha fantasy novel series. Information on the novel was recently discovered and shared online by the unofficial Zelda website History of Hyrule, and there are some interesting things to be seen. Notably, the novel featured stunning art for some of the main characters that has never been uploaded online. Under each character is a brief description, along with their name in English. Most of those names remain fairly close to the games, with one pretty major exception: Link is named "Paul."

Now, it's worth noting that A Link to the Past allowed Super Nintendo players to name their character anything they wanted; anyone that wanted to could have named their hero Paul. However, most Zelda-related fiction has seen the character given the name "Link." Perhaps someone playing the game gave Link the name "Paul," and writer Katsuyuki Ozaki used that copy for reference. Because this is a 30-year-old piece of forgotten Zelda merchandise, there's simply no way of knowing for sure. Whatever the case may be, it's very strange, making this a really neat find. Readers can see the images in the Tweet embedded below.

Since its release in 1991, A Link to the Past has been widely considered one of the best games in the entire Zelda franchise. The shift to the Super Nintendo hardware offered an impressive evolution for the series, and it maintains a passionate following after all these years. The game has been released on a plethora of platforms since, including Game Boy Advance, Wii, and Nintendo Switch. As such, A Link to the Past remains one of the most easily accessible entries in the franchise, and gamers that haven't had the opportunity to check it out just yet can do so fairly easily. The same cannot be said about a lot of other Zelda games, but this adventure of Link (or Paul), is a notable exception!

Are you a fan of A Link to the Past? Do you always name your character "Link?" Let us know in the comments or share your thoughts directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp to talk all things gaming!

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