Wednesday, December 14, 2011

a new book about Link

So I entered the contest by The Indoor Kids podcast this month. I mentioned I was gonna try a couple of posts ago.

The results came in and I won a copy of Gears of War 3. Totally awesome. Really excited. The contest was 'Make something related somehow to video games and win something related to Gears of War 3 (the game, an xbox console, game art, etc.)'. You can see a bunch of the other entries on the Indoor Kids facebook page.

For my entry I put together a 3-page story about Link from the very first Legend of Zelda for NES. I told Link's story from his perspective. But instead of starting out from home and ending in a dungeon somewhere, I tell it in reverse. It starts with the end of his journey and him, sadly, losing this life. Then it goes in reverse back to when he's just left home on his quest. It's a mix of different kinds of writing and drawing with some collage too.

Here's a bit more detailed description of what the book is about. It's called Link's Story (or you can just scroll down and read it below):
  • The main page is the title page. Link's Story. There's a short description in the top half of the page that tells you what's on all the pages to come and what will happen. On the bottom is a poem written inside one of the dungeon rooms. If you haven't given up yet after seeing this page :) the story begins on the next page.
  • The first page of the story shows Link losing his life. He's comforted by a woman there. The writing in green is Link speaking or thinking. He is basically trying to convince the woman to help him up. He doesn't know how badly he's hurt. She's telling him to rest now. At the very end she gives him a bit of advice about approaching things differently next time. There are other things on the page too. There are a bunch of small boats around the main picture. There's also a lot of writing, some legible, some not so legible. That's all the stuff going on in Link's head at this point. It's the end of his journey, and he wasn't successful. This is sort of the messiest page of them all. Not to worry, they get less messy as we go.
  • On the second page of the story Link is fighting a battle. The writing is all him. He's talking about this weird feeling he has that a boy just like him will come after him and finally succeed, even if he doesn't. He snaps out of it and starts to motivate himself to fight.
  • The third page of the story is Link writing down his thoughts relatively shortly after he's left home on the quest. The writing is all from his voice again on this last page. He talks about what he remembers, what he misses. The picture is home.
  • SPOILER! There's one last little hidden thing that I may as well explain. I wanted the book to be like the Triforce. Just like the Triforce has three parts (Wisdom, power, courage), each page represents each of those parts in that order. And if you haven't already noticed it, if you take the odd looking boat in the upper right of the first page (not the cover page) and flip it over, it fits into the picture on page two. And take the garage sort of building to the right of the house on the last page, flip it over, and it also fits into the picture on page two. Just tried to tie the whole thing together from the start.
Here's my entry:
Link's Story

That's all there is to it. I hope you hung in there for it and maybe even enjoyed it.