Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition Character Unlock guide: how to unlock all characters including Skull Kid, Tingle, Medli and others

Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition features over thirty characters, with the cast hailing from all over the Zelda series. Some of them are famous series staples, other one-offs, and some of them ar ejust downright zany additions that serve to give a little more flavor to the hack-and-slash proceedings.

The characters are essentially split into two camps: a large group of characters who are automatically unlocked in the game as soon as you complete the first story mode mission (which doubles as a tutorial), and other characters who'll require a litlte extra work. Remember that once all characters are unlocked there's a range of costumes for each character, too, so you won't be done with unlocks so quickly. Remember if you're grinding to level up and improve newly-unlocked characters that you can get higher rank weapons by scanning amiibo.

Anyway - here's how to unlock all the characters, broken up into those two sections:

Characters Unlocked as soon as you complete the first Legends Mode mission

These characters will be unlocked for your use as soon as you complete the first story mode mission 'Prologue: The Armies of Ruin'. This mission serves as a tutorial and stands between you and everything else in the game, including a slew of characters, Adventure Mode, my fairy mode and more. The following will be instantly unlocked in all modes once that first mission is complete:

In previous versions of the game, these characters would've been unlocked as you progress the story, but given this is the third release and not everyone might want to play the story Nintendo kindly unlocks them as soon as you've polished off the tutorial. It's not so simple for everybody else, mind.

How to unlock every character in Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition

The following characters aren't unlocked so easily, and include classics from other games who aren't present in the story mode. Most of them are unlocked via the Adventure Mode, but let's get into exactly where and on which map - as it's a little different here to previous releases.

Characters Unlocked via Story Mode (Legend Mode)

• Linkle: fan-favorite Linkle, the female version of Link, is unlocked once you complete your third mission in the story of Hyrule Warriors, 'Legend Mode'. A new bonus mission will appear above that third mission tile - this will be her format for the whole game, where her missions unlock as an offshoot side story of the main missions. You need to unlock the first one to play as her elsewhere, however.
• Tetra: spunky pirtate captain Tetra can be unlocked one of two different ways. One is just to keep playing Legend Mode - after the main story of Hyrule Warrirors wraps up you'll get the chance to see some missions from the villain's perspective. Finish those missions and you'll finally unlock a series of Wind Waker missions, during which Tetra will unlock. Alternatively, she can be unlocked via the Wind Waker themed Adventure Map.
• King Daphnes: Like Tetra, this Wind Waker legend can be unlocked for character select either by waiting for the Wind Waker missions in Legend Mode or on the Wind Waker Adventure Map - the latter method is detailed below.

Characters Unlocked via the first Adventure Map (Young Link, Skull Kid, Twili Midna, Tingle)

These characters can be unloocked by completing the missions on certain tiles of the first Adventure Map of Hyrule Warriors' Adventure Mode. We list co-ordinates as if the rows are lettered A-H and the columns numbered 1-16 - or you can see the annotated locations of the characters on the image above.

• Young Link: on the first, easy adventure map, find Young Link in G-9.
• Skull Kid: area C-13
• Twili Midna: area C-6.
• Tingle: area A-12.

Characters Unlocked via the Wind Waker Great Sea Adventure Map (Toon Link, Medli, Tetra, King Daphnes)

Two Wind Waker characters can be found on the Wind Waker themed Adventure Map - on its normal difficulty variant. Two of the characters here (Toon Link & Medli) can only be unlocked here, but there is an alternative way to unlock Tetra and King Daphnes.

• Toon Link: Unlocked very early on - on the first tile, B-9.
• Medli: tile B-8.
• Tetra: Tile C-11, or via Legend Mode.
• King Daphnes: Tile C-13, or via Legend Mode.

Characters Unlocked on other Adventure Maps (Marin, Toon Zelda, Ravio & Yuga)

A handful of other characters are unlocked on other adventure maps, but it's only one or two per map so it's not as worth doing the diagrams you saw above for the other eight characters. We're going to keep using the same grid-based coordinates to help direct you to the correct mission for the character unlock, however. Here's how to get Marin, Toon Zelda, Ravio and Yuga.

• Marin: Marin is from the excellent Link's Awakening, and she can be therefore found on the Link's Awakening themed Koholint Adventure Map. She's on Square E-3.
• Toon Zelda: Appropriately Toon Zelda is on the Grand Travels map, themed after Spirit Tracks. She's found at F-11.
• Ravio: Item-seller Ravio is found on tile E-7 on the Lorule map, themed after A Link Between Worlds.
• Yuga: Lorule villain Yuga can be unlocked on the Lorule Adventure Map. He's on square H-11.

Challenge Mode Characters: Ganon and Cucco

The final two characters you can unlock and play as in Hyrule Warriors Legends are a little different, since they both have very specific ways they're played that limit their use.

Ganon and Cucco are powerful characters indeed - a lord of darkness and a friendly chicken that, if provoked, can become a lord of darkness all of its own, of a sort. Both can only be played as in Challenge Mode.

Simply progressing through the content of Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition will eventually get you these unlocks - you won't be able to play as Ganon until you've seen him in the story, for instance. Once unlocked, they can only be used in their specific Challenge Mode challenges.