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LU Character Design Analysis 4

In case you haven’t seen the previous three posts yet, I’m doing this thing where I’m analysing and subsequently ranking all the designs of the chain in LU. I was going to do it 2 at a time, but I’ve got so much to say that I’m doing it one a time.

All the designs are really good, it was hard to come up with a decent ranking system that I was happy with and even harder to apply it. The numbers I scored them are subjective and any one of them can be debated.

And now for...

6th place: Time

Time is a hard character to design if you’re going to age him up and there are lots of ways to go about it, based on the life he’s led so far. That being said, I feel really bad about this placement because I like him, but let me try to explain my decision.

Pros: I love the concept of him being very different to how he was when he was younger. A lot of time has passed for him and a lot of things have happened to him. He isn’t the same person he was when he was a child.

His armour looks quite pretty. The colour placement is on point, with impressive looking golds on his shoulders, chest and lower waist, red accents throughout and the shiny silver taking centre stage. There’s even a bit of blue just below his collar bone to tie into his forehead marking, and I love the triforce and moon symbols on either side of that section. It’s a nice nod to the events of OoT and MM. The moon symbol is the one closer to his heart, meaning that he maybe reflects on that adventure more fondly and holds the good he did for Termina close to his heart.

His sword is held by a red ribbon connected to those two symbols. Which looks really nice and is something I haven’t seen before in other medieval style fantasy designs. I’m going to assume that tying it up was the best way Time could secure it to his back. It’s nice that even after going back in time, Time went out of his way to get that sword again. I like to think that this was just a benefit of him reconnecting with the Gorons like he did in OoT.

I love that his undershirt is a black almost skin tight semi turtleneck. It vastly contrasts his look in OoT, where the undershirt was white with a large collar. It reflects that he’s now a jaded experienced traveller who’s been through hell and despite willingly throwing himself into it over and over again because it’s the right thing to do, it’s wearing him down. He’s tired and deserves to rest but his heroic spirit (the will and power to act) won’t let him walk away from his duty. The fact that he doesn’t wear a flared collar now, but did when he was younger shows that he had an out, he could have stopped whenever he wanted, but chose to keep travelling. Now years later he’s in too deep and can’t quit.

He’s trapped.

I love the face markings and (possibly) missing eye, they allude to previous adventures we’ll never be clued into but can guess the outcome of. It gives Time an air of mystery to him, the feeling that there’s much more to him than what’s on the surface. Countless stories he could share but chooses to keep hidden from all but his wife.

I’m glad that his Ocarina of Time isn’t strapped onto his waist by a thin piece of string. It’s too important and frankly too powerful to be treated like any old trinket and exposed in such a manner. It would be like Twilight having the horse calling charm Ilia gave him just casually hanging off his belt waiting to be damaged.

I also like that after all these years he kept the power gloves, likely going out of his way to find them after being sent back in time as they’re so useful, because they look great with the armour.

Quick confession: I’m an idiot. When I wrote the draft I thought the design was adapted almost exclusively from the Hero’s shade, which didn’t make sense to me because Time wasn’t even greying meaning that he was at most in his mid 30s and he hadn’t even had children yet and hadden developed the hidden skills and TL;DR I thought it was too early to start referencing Shade in his design. But references to Shade are only in the the fact that Time’s wearing a whole suit of armour, and the cloth hanging from his belt and face situation.

The major reference in Time’s design is actually the Fierce Deity. Which in hindsight should have been obvious from the face tattoos...uh...yeah.

It’s a sort of sun version of the moon inspired Fierce Deity suit- and I can’t believe I didn’t notice that before! His undertunic is a warm tan version of the Fierce Deity’s cool grey one, and the style of Time’s armour is virtually the same as the Fierce Deity’s, but with gold accents. Even the fact that Time has seemingly abandoned his fighting style of a single handed sword and shield to focus on a large two handed sword, may be because of an incident in his past. Perhaps Time’s still partly/unconsciously possessed by the Fierce Deity or somehow under its influence and now using a two-handed weapon feels more natural for him.

I might be the only one, but the fact that Time doesn’t use a sword and shield is a strange detail. If what I suggested is the reason why Time wields the Biggoron sword as his main weapon, then that’s some masterful use of subtext on Jojo’s part. But since it’s not come up, for now that’s just my little headcanon.

There are some key differences, like the triangle and moon symbols are moved and the blue beaded necklace becomes part of the armour in Time’s design. But anyway that’s what’s going on here, moving on.

Cons: I know I’m harping on almost every member of the chain who doesn’t wear armour saying that they should, and I just complimented the visuals of Time’s. But to be honest, this is too much for me. And this section is just me complaining about the functionality of it.

Don’t get me wrong, it makes sense to wear armour. Time like the others is a traveller who actively looks for trouble and danger, thus he needs to have some level of protection in the event that he gets ambushed by a pack of monsters. This is also a fantasy setting, so I can easily suspend my disbelief and pretend that running around for hours in chainmail and a few sparse armour pieces is a sensible and necessary thing to do.

But...a full set of bulky fancy looking armour just ain’t it chief. He’s already got a long sturdy chainmail tunic, but he’s also got on a heavy looking piece of armour that’s relatively fitted and goes from his collar bone to his lower waist. Why is he doing that to himself? Who cares if it’s magic when it looks this uncomfortable and restricting.

He’s not a soldier, and given all that he’s been through he’d arguably avoid being employed by the army, so why is he wearing more armour than Warriors? I like the idea of him picking up ancient and powerful pieces of armour from his numerous adventures, but please this is too much.

The colour placement is really good like I said, but it looks too decorative to be viable for combat- or even to be taken seriously. His armour comes with pecs that are outlined it gold, which is a little funny to me. The layered pieces on his midsection are probably there to help with mobility, but they look more cyberpunk than traditional and remember this is on top of chainmail, so I don’t think that’s going to be very effective for mobility.

Instead of the chestplate (if I can call it that) being rounded and smooth like TP darknut armour so that sword swings will bounce off it and disperse the force, it has all these crevices and parts that jut out. Meaning a well placed blow (like just above the gold waist thing) may not cut through the armour, but the impact over such a small area will hurt like hell. Also there’s no armour or chainmail on his upper arms and collar bone, and along with the black skin tight shirt makes those areas look horribly exposed.

The metal pieces on what I hope is a securely fastened belt (although it looks like it’s going to fall from the weight of those metal pieces) are fine enough. They are shaped in a way that will deflect sword strikes, protecting the major arteries in his thighs and other places. That codpiece is awkwardly placed under the torso armour, meaning there’s either a weird large gap there or it is shaped to fit the v shape. Forgive me please but I can’t accept any of this as serious travelling gear. It looks even more ceremonial and less spontaneous battle appropriate than Sky’s flimsy tunic and mondo white cape.

It’s a good thing Epona is too old to ride, because if Time tried to wearing all that he’d surely crush her.

And anyway, I’d argue that he’s not old enough to be able to get away with wearing a full set of armour. I can’t excuse this saying that he’s an old powerhouse and that can walk vast distances in all that armour because he’s done it a million times before, because it’s not like he’s 50.

Also, Time’s red ribbon is pretty and really unique, but it’s really impractical. The material has no padding and secures the weapon in a way that would mean all the weight is on his poor shoulders. I get why the ribbon is there, it would be a shame to put a brown belt across his torso and hide the details in the armour. But since he doesn’t have that belt like the other’s do he needs his weapon to be attached to his waist, that way the weight is distributed to other parts of the body so that the pressure isn’t only on the shoulders.

Wishlist: I wish the armour less extravagant, or at least if it looked more worn and made to look tampered with, like Time had adjusted it to make it more suitable for travel and his style of combat.

On one hand I like that he’s not wearing any green, as that’s the colour that symbolises the hero and he’s all but abandoned that title to reject being a pawn of destiny. But on the other hand he wouldn’t know that as to him the colour green would remind him of his childhood in Korkiri forest, a place near and dear to his heart. But on the other other hand, he would surely grow out of that longing eventually and try to move on from his childhood hangups.

But on the other other other hand I think that would happen maybe half a decade or so further into his life, like early to mid 40s. He’d start to rely more on armour as he ages, when his stamina and agility start to decline, to make up for his lack of mobility. And then stop wearing a tunic.

I’m sorry but I don’t have anything much to add here, which is awful seeing how much I’ve complained, but other than smoothing it out and breaking it up into more conventional chunks I really can’t see any other way to improve it. Putting him in armor was a good visual choice; I like the longer chainmail because it helps Time look older and more mature than the others, and I like the beige tunic because it still has flared sleeves like his old green one. Plus the outfit as a whole looks impressive and thus helps to visually show his authority over the others.

It’s not a bad design. Far from it, I think it’s great, I just also personally think it looks a little funny and impractical and it’s a little too early in Time’s life to start breaking out the armour and turning him into a stationary heavy highting type of fighter. Not when he has yet to develop the fast moving high skilled hidden skills...in fact he should be in the middle of creating them now. Right?

Also...didn’t know where else to put this but I’m just gonna say that I miss his ponytail. I wish he kept it, or better, if it was in a longish braid.

Score:

Aesthetic and visual score (/10): 7 Character representation score (/5): 4 Practicality score (/5): 3 Total (/20): 14

This one was so hard to place. I had a war with myself about how to judge his character design. Because on one hand it’s chock-full of symbolism and visual mysteries, but on the other hand I don’t like it nearly as much as the others higher on the list.

~~~

Thanks for reading! What modifications would you make to their designs? And do you agree with me or not? I’d love to know :)

Masterlist

9th place in the character design ranking

8th place

7th place

5th place

4th place

3rd place

Character analysis posts:

Hero of the Sky, Hero of Time, Hero of Twilight, Hero of the Wild, Hero of Warriors