My Top 5 Female Nintendo Characters

Well it has been a long break hasn't it? I hope you all managed to regenerate from excessive Halloween Partys or extensive family dinners. I had both and so it took a while for me. After all I'm not the youngest anymore.

But anyways now that October is gone, and with it all the spooky stuff, we can refocus on other areas of the video game world. And with Nintendo Switch on the horizon and the new Pokemon games launching soon there is enough to talk about in the World of Nintendo. Which is why I will completely ignore these two topics for now and focus on something other this week.

For many Youtuber and Blogger November is their theme month. A time where they dedicate all their output to some specific area. Be it ZeldaMonth, Pokemonth or whatever. But I don't like the idea of dedicating a whole month to one specific topic, so instead I will do four theme weeks in November. This should keep the content on the blog reasonably fresh. Hopefully you'll agree.

As you can read in the title this week I'd like to talk about Women in Videogames... again. I'd like to focus on the positive things again, and because of that here is a list of the Top 5 female Nintendo Characters.

A quick reminder about the ruleset. Only one character per franchise. Also the women needs to actually have a character. So no Pokemon Trainers, even though they are great avatars, but only because they allow for the player to fill them with life. Also the chosen characters don't have to be playable. So without further ado let us jump right in.

5: Captain Syrup:

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Now this pic may surprise you because Syrup is neither a playable Character nor a Hero, but that is exactly why she is on this list. She is a great villain and through her appearances she has managed to build quite the character. Ok to be specific she managed to become a great character in Wario Land: The Shake Dimension. But let us start at the beginning. Captain Syrup was introduced in Mario Land 3: Wario Land as leader of the Black Sugar Gang, a group of pirates, which steal stuff, as pirates often do. When Wario lost his castle and riches (which he stole from Mario) at the end of Mario Land 2, he sets out to rebuild his fortune the only way he knows. Working hard and starting a honest and righteous life?
Of course not. Of course he intends to steal his way back to wealth. He sets his eyes onto the riches of the Black Sugar Gang stashed away at Kitchen Island. He manages to beat the leaders of the gang and finally Syrup and robs her of all her hard stolen money.

Of course she retaliates in the same way during Wario Land 2, but our greedy Anti-Hero manages to get everything back, leaving her broke once more.

And now we head to Wario Land: The Shake Dimension. Here she enlists Wario to save the Shake Dimension and promises and endless Coin Sack as reward. We get to know a completely new Captain Syrup. Flirty and sarcastic she manages to wrap Wario around her finger with ease. And in the end, when the Shake King is beaten, she snatches the endless coin sack away from under Warios nose. Because, as we all know, Heroes don't need payment. With this she proves several things. First and foremost she shows her ability to adapt and learn from her mistakes. After getting beaten in raw power by Wario two times already, she instead outwitted him this time. And while being just as self centered as Wario himself, she gets the spoils in the end, so you can't help but to admire her a little.

I really like her as this kind of untrustworthy guide. With only a few short appearances Nintendo has managed to give her a well developed character. She is a smart and ruthless Pirate leader and quite manipulative. Nintendo needs more good villians like her.

Captain Syrup shows you don't need a dramatic or dark backstory and endless exposition to be a good villain. And that is why she is Number 5 on this list.

4: Palutena

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Another entry that owes her place on that list the most frequent game she appeared in. Palutena is the Goddess of Light and the rightful ruler of Angel Land. While she hardly ever engages in direct combat, she is the one that leads her army to victory against the Underworld and gives Pit the ability to fly. Again she isn't a playable character (outside of Smash Bros), but a very important support character and quite essential for Pits success. Without her he literally couldn't fight with his full potential. This becomes quite evident during the course of Kid Icarus: Uprising, when Palutena falls under the control of the Chaos King. Her missing guidance makes the quest to save her quite hard for Pit.

But the main reason, why she is on this list, is simply her great character and wits. It's quite the shame that Kid Icarus: Uprising is such a hard and fast game (not that there is anything inherently wrong with that), but because of that you'll going to miss a lot of the great conversations between Pit and her. If you are able to multitask, or play on a lower difficulty or simply watch them on Youtube, you'll see what I mean.

Despite her warmhearted nature, she often teases Pit and is quite mischievous. Also her play on words, or rather saying common phrases incorrectly, is quite charming. She manages to be a great guide, without becoming boring and one dimensional in the Process. And although Hades calls her Professor Palutena or ''Know-it-all'' Paluten, she never comes across as such. Her natural charm and warm attitude coupled with her playfulness make her a great and entertaining character. If this serves as the blueprint for the modernization of old property I hope Nintendo digs out some more games from the NES and gives them a sequel on an actual console.

3: Princess Rosalina

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From all the entries on this list Rosalina has the most engaging backstory. At least in my opinion. As a young Girl the later princess of the Stars found a young Luma inside a rusted starship. She took him in and together they rebuild the Starship to search for the Lumas mother. While traveling through the Universe she took even more young Luma under her protection and together their starship grew bigger and bigger. Their Home grew... But after countless of days spend in space, when Rosalina and her Comet Observatory pass her own homeplanet the Princess grows homesick. For a moment she forgets about the Lumas, she took under her protection. She forgets about being a mother to them. For a brief moment she just wants to return home... to her own mother.

But she can't return and finally Rosalina comes to terms with the fact that her mother is dead. She traveled space for hundreds of years. In this dark situation the Luma, which she found on Earth so long ago, comes to her and tells her that no matter what happens her mother will always be part of her, before transforming into a comet. This comet allows Rosalina to visit her home every hundreds of years.

I find her backstory really engaging. It shows how she became the cosmic entity that you met in Mario Galaxy, but it also provides a human side to her that everyone can relate too.

But not only her backstory makes her an engaging female character, but her powers and, yes, lack thereof. You see Rosalina and Mario are dependent on eachother. Neither can succeed without the other. I will delve more into this tomorrow, when I talk about her in detail. But for now let me say that the first Mario Galaxy is often regarded as the best Mario Game and Rosalina is a huge part of that.

Oh and she's also the best character in Super Mario 3D World. Prove me wrong. I dare you!

2: Samus Aran

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One of the first women in video games. A proven ass kicker, badass and overall great character. For years she was the epitome of the silent protagonist, allowing you to take in the great atmosphere of her games. And the only reason, why she is not Number One, is the sole game that broke with that tradition. Yes Other M has been lambasted enough over the last years, but it can't be said enough. This game dealt great damage to the character of Samus Aran. It's gameplay was great, but the Story was all over the place.

But let's not focus on the contradictory and bad characterization in Other M, but the great way they showed us Samus before. The Metriod games, bar Other M, are perfect examples of how you can create a strong character with minimalistic tools. From the groundbreaking reveal that Samus was a Women in Metroid, to the perfect step into the 3D space with Metroid Prime, Samus has evolved as a strong and independent women, without uttering a single word.

Especially during the Prime games Retro did a perfect job in characterizing Samus. Most of the time you spend the game in firs-person perspective, but the short moments, where you see your heroine from a third-person angle, they show her with a confident posture. She never hesitates, she never compromises. Her body language shows Samus as a women, who is in control. Even in the most hostile of environments. And that is the reason, why the people love her. So hopefully they return to that image of Samus Aran, which they were showing the last 24 years before Other M.

She deserves it.

1: Princess Zelda

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Of course it's not Peach.

Zelda hat it quite easy in regards to her competitors because she isn't a single character. But to her defense I have to say that I like nearly each incarnation of Zelda in the last decade. She is a versatile character without limits. From the stoic ruler in Twilight Princess to the tomboyish Pirate in Wind Waker to the young Women following her own Path in Skyward Sword. Each iteration of Zelda has brought something special to the table.

And it doesn't matter that she ends up as damsel in distress at the end of nearly each game. It's a simple truth that there can only be one Hero in a classic story. And while I think Zelda is more than capable of being the Hero of her own story, and I would welcome a spinoff with her as the protagonist, in the end the role of hero falls to Link.

But just like with Rosalina and Mario, Link can't succeed without Zelda. In each and every game the Princess plays a vital role in preparing Link for his final battle with Ganon.  Like I said each Princess Zelda brings something new to the table, and each princess Zelda keeps the franchise fresh. And because Link will most likely always remain a blank slate for the player to reflect upon, the tough duty of carrying the Story of the Zelda series often falls to her. And so far she has carried that weight graciously.

Reducing Princess Zelda, any Princess Zelda, only on her role as damsel in distress doesn't do the character justice. There is so much more to her than that. And that is what we should focus on.

Agree with my choice? What female Nintendo characters do you enjoy the most? Let me know in the comments.

And as always

thanks for reading