With the release of the Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword’s release, and the series’s 25th anniversary ending, it has come to my attention that there are a lot of different Links. With 16 different games in the series canon, Link has gone through many changes throughout the years in skills, abilities and equipment. The question, of course, is who is the best? When was Link at his strongest?

The idea for this came from Fraser of Video Games Awesome. In VGA’s playthrough of Skyward Sword, Fraser mentions that the existence of Link’s stamina gauge made him the “weakest Link.” When I first heard that I agreed, but the more I thought about it, the more I disagreed. While Skyward Sword’s Link may be weaker when climbing walls, lifting large objects, and trekking through deep sand, in a battle, the sprinting ability that comes with the gauge gives Link a great advantage.

The thoughts gave me the idea. I’ve been trying to think of something to write/blog for a long time, and I believe this would give me ample to talk about for quite some time. I’ve decided to make up a tournament: pit Link vs. Link in heated battles to see who comes out on top. For each battle I’ll be researching each Link’s skills, equipment, magic, and accomplishments to see which Link is the best of the best and which Link better have 10 bottled fairies with him at all times. I will be using a tournament bracket generator to create a 16 seed randomized tournament bracket with each Legend of Zelda game. With each article, two Link’s will be researched and compared in six fields in a manner similar to ScrewAttack’s Death Battle: Natural Ability (Rolling, Sprinting, etc), Sword & Shield, Additional Weaponry (Bow and Arrow, Bombs, etc), Support Equipment (Golden Gauntlets, Zora Flippers, etc), Magic (Din’s Fire, Quake Medallion, etc), and “Recent” Accomplishments (Finding the pieces of the Triforce, Defrosting Zora’s Domain, etc). In the event of a tie, Link’s Allies (Groose, Tetra, etc) will be added to the equation.

A few important notes:

1. I do not have any animation skills, so most likely there will never be a video of the Links actually fighting. Sorry, I know that’d be cool.
2. Each Link will viewed as they are seconds before their final boss battles as if the player were performing a 100% completion run in the game’s most recent version.
3. If the Link in question has varied interchangeable equipment, it will be assumed that Link can pause to change this equipment as necessary as he would in his respected game (i.e. Skyward Sword Link can change between shields in his pouches, but cannot use Item Check).
4. “Recent” Accomplishments consists only of the events of the game in question (Phantom Hourglass Link’s accomplishments will not include those of Wind Waker even though they are confirmed to be the same Link). This is to remove Time Line speculation from each battle completely, as that’s a topic for another day. This also means that Oracle of Ages Link and Oracle of Seasons Link will be treated as separate. This eliminates any buys.
5. There will be varied amounts of spoilers in each examination.
6. Just as each winner will fight each winner, each loser will also fight each loser.
7. Just in case it was unclear, I will be posting a blog for EVERY battle.

Without any further adeu, here’s the tournament bracket (click for full size):


My tournament can also be found on Down and B and ScrewAttack.

I'll be starting in a few days. Put any predictions in the comments below!