A few weeks ago, I wrote about the inevitable weirdness that stems from hearing a new person give a voice to iconic fairy companion Navi in gameplay previews for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake. Well, it sounds like if you’re really jumping to hear the original Navi in your playthrough, you might be able to…if you switch the audio to Japanese.
In the last few weeks, fans have clocked that the voice of Navi in the Japanese trailers for the Ocarina remake sounds remarkably like the original Navi, and may even be the same actor. Navi was originally voiced by Kaori Mizuhashi, an actor who’s still active in both games and anime acting today. She was recently Eirika in Fire Emblem Engage, and voices Mami Tomoe in numerous things related to Puella Magi Madoka Magica across anime, film, and games. It makes perfect sense for her to be available to reprise her iconic role after all these years.
And if it is her, she’s doing a dang good job. Listen!
『ゼルダの伝説 時のオカリナ 公式攻略ビデオ』（1998年）と『時のオカリナ リメイク』（2026年）のナビィの声比較
28年も経ってるのに同じ声出せる水橋かおりさんすごすぎる
まさにプロフェッショナル#時のオカリナ #NintendoDirectJP #ゼルダの伝説40周年 pic.twitter.com/xZLqPnDfjY— あもみん (@Amominnn) September 9, 2026
Yeah, I think that’s probably her! Wow!
I’ve asked Nintendo to confirm that this is indeed Mizuhashi here, and also asked who the English voice actor is. Let me be clear: the English actor is doing an incredible job, and I also understand why it wouldn’t make sense for Mizuhashi (or whoever sounds just like her) to do all versions of the game. The Ocarina of Time remake has a lot more voice acting than the original, and Mizuhashi really only voices characters speaking primarily in Japanese. It wouldn’t be fair to ask her to tackle a bunch of foreign-language dialogue more complicated than “Hey!” and “Listen!” any more than we’d ask most English actors to suddenly start reading lines in Japanese if they weren’t already completely fluent.
Even so, I am now pondering whether I might swap my voice language in Ocarina to Japanese. Just for a little bit!