Though first-party Nintendo games have earned a reputation for being family-friendly outings, The Legend of Zelda series has cultivated its own reputation for including lots of dark and depressing elements. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time shows a nightmarish version of Hyrule that is overrun with undead, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is home to a dark realm of shadows that exists parallel to the real world, and The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask is all about the residents of a doomed town preparing for an end that Link can only stop with the aid of time travel.

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening is one of the more upbeat entries in the series, as Koholint island is full of merry residents and cameos different Nintendo characters. However, players of the original game have noticed that there is a dark undertone concerning the ending of the game, as Link is left in a predicament that could easily lead to his death.

Related: The Link's Awakening Amiibo Will Summon An Evil Shadow Link

The ending of The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening has been explored in outside materials relating to the series. Fans now have a definitive answer to the question: did Link survive the conclusion of the game?

[Major Spoilers For Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, A Game That Is Old Enough To Legally Drink & Drive]

The Ending

via Zeldapedia - Fandom

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening involves Link being lost at sea and waking up on a strange island. Link eventually discovers that the entire adventure is taking place within his dreams and that completing his quest to awaken the Wind Fish will result in him waking up and the island being destroyed.

Once Link awakens the Wind Fish, the island disappears along with all of its residents.  Link wakes up in the middle of the sea while still clinging to the wreckage of his ship. He looks up in the sky and sees the Wind Fish blotting out the sun, causing him to smile, as it suggests that the dream had become a reality.

If the player finished the game without dying, then they would see an additional scene that hints that Marin also survived and was reborn as a seagull in the real world.

The Death Theory

Via: My Nintendo News

Fan theories about a character being dead the whole time exist for every franchise and they are usually baseless. However, the one concerning The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening holds some weight, considering the grim predicament that Link is left in at the end of the game.

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening ends with Link being trapped at sea with no rescue in sight. If the Wind Fish was real and not a hallucination, then why didn't it help Link get back to dry land?

Link's adventures on Koholint island may have been a result of Link dying of dehydration while lost at sea, with his dream journey being one final quest that he has to undertake before being able to go to the other side.

(UPDATE: The Nintendo Switch remake does nothing to confirm or debunk this theory, simply showing an anime-style cutscene of Link waking up and maybe a flash of Marin as a seagull of you get the secret ending.)

What Happened - Hyrule Historia

Via GameSpot

The timeline of The Legend of Zelda series was a mystery for a long time. It wasn't until the release of Hyrule Historia in 2011 that the chronological order of the series was laid out for fans.

According to Hyrule Historia, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening takes place in the timeline where Link is defeated by Ganondorf during the events of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The version of Link from The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening is the same one that appeared in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and the two Oracle games, but there is a space after it in the timeline. The next game in that timeline is the original The Legend of Zelda, which is set in a version of Hyrule that has been demolished by Ganondorf.

The gap after The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening in the timeline doesn't offer a concrete answer. However, the suggestion that Link died and left the realm undefended against Ganon holds some weight considering the state of Hyrule in the first game in the series.

What Happened - The Legend of Zelda: Encyclopedia/The Website

Via: nintendo.co.uk

The timeline of the series has since been updated in The Legend of Zelda: Encyclopedia and on the official website for the series. The timeline where Link is defeated is now different, as The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening has been placed between The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and the Oracle games. According to The Legend of Zelda: Encyclopedia, the same version of Link is present in all four of those games, which means that Link survived being shipwrecked and went on to have adventures in different lands. If the book and the website are taken as canon, then Link did indeed survive the events of The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening. 

Still, the exact circumstances of his survival remain a mystery. Perhaps the upcoming remake will shed some more light on a twenty-year-old conundrum.

Next: Nintendo Hasn't Ruled Out Multiplayer For Link's Awakening Remake