The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time almost gave Navi a completely different appearance, with one of the game's designers originally envisioning Link's fairy companion as a human-like girl. The newly resurfaced revelation gives The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time fans an interesting look at how Nintendo 64 hardware limitations ultimately shaped one of the game's most recognizable characters.

Navi is now almost inseparable from Ocarina of Time, accompanying Link throughout Hyrule, offering hints, and helping players lock onto enemies with the game's influential Z-targeting system. After almost 30 years, her glowing ball-and-wings design and classic "Hey! Listen!" line are so familiar that it's hard to imagine her any other way, but Navi wasn't originally conceived as a major character at all. Designer Yoshiaki Koizumi was initially working on Z-targeting when he decided that simply placing an upside-down triangle over enemies felt too plain for a Zelda game. What eventually became one of the series' most recognizable companions therefore started life as little more than a prettier targeting cursor.

Nearly 30 years after Zelda: Ocarina of Time's release on Nintendo 64, a port of the game is now available on a surprising platform.

Speaking in a 2011 Iwata Asks interview recently resurfaced by Kit & Krysta, Koizumi revealed that his first idea for Navi looked considerably different. “Usually, if you were to make a fairy, you would make a cute girl,” Koizumi explained, but creating that kind of character wasn't practical on Nintendo 64 hardware. Instead, he settled on a much simpler, glowing ball of light with wings for the finished game, simply because of the console's technical limitations.

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