78 réponses à ce sujet

[Phoe77]

I just personally don't see the value in me creating a character with a different aesthetic simply to say I did it.  I like guys with dark hair, beards and somewhat broad noses.  I could make my characters without including those types of features, but where is my incentive to do so if "going for a new look" isn't enough?  For me it doesn't have anything to do with creativity.

[SofaJockey]

I have actually never created a white 30-something male with dark hair in a game (unless that was the set protagonist)

 

and I am a white 30-something 50-something male with that used to have dark hair 

[BSpud]

I just realized I have never created a white guy.

 

In recent memory... Morrowind: dark elf guy; Skyrim = Redguard guy; Mass Effect = white woman (she originally had light brown skin in ME 1 but for some reason turned whiter on importing); DAO: "white" elf woman; DA2 = default male Hawke (yes, white guy, but not customized); DAI: white woman not made to look like a model. No white guys in paper rpgs I played when I was younger, either.

 

I guess I'm not a part of the OP's great irony. Personally, I think it's a feedback loop of gamers and lowest common denominator market pandering.

[Sylvius the Mad]

True, but no character in NWN was anything special to look at and, as you said, that was over a decade ago. The best examples I can think of that are more recent are the Fable games and TOR. It's unfortunate that fat Jedi seem so awkward to me.

But that's my point. The graphical advancements pursued since NWN have come with significant costs, and unless we acknowledge that we can't ever make an honest assessment of whether those advancements were worthwhile.

[Qunquistador]

My Shepard was a dark skinned lady who looks nothing like me. My Hawke was a dark skinned lady who looks nothing like me. My Dovahkiin was a dark skinned lady who looks nothing like me. I've been gaming since I got a Nintendo at 5 yrs old and I always tend to create characters that you never see leading movies or games, people I'd like to see. Or simply people I think look unique and different from your average protagonist.

 

My quiz is 7 feet tall with horns and perma-murderous pout. We're twins, obviously, and I only created her because giant horned Qunari like myself need representation.

[DragonKingReborn]

I have actually never created a white 30-something male with dark hair in a game (unless that was the set protagonist)

 

and I am a white 30-something 50-something male with that used to have dark hair 

Brilliant.

 

I thought about basing my first DA:I character on myself, then I decided I couldn't get her horns right and just made her look badass.

 

I have a lot of DA2 characters that look the same, but that was due to the limitations of the character creator.

 

To be fair, my Human Noble Warden was ALWAYS a white (although suntanned) dark haired male...because...role playing..?

 

Have only had fem Qunari and male Dwarf so far in Inquisition - with female elf up next, so I guess I won't be following the trope any time soon.

[Phoe77]

But that's my point. The graphical advancements pursued since NWN have come with significant costs, and unless we acknowledge that we can't ever make an honest assessment of whether those advancements were worthwhile.

 

Okay, but what does that have to do with my wanting to play as a fat guy?  Games with better graphics than NWN have had overweight characters.  I always thought that Fable 1 and 2 did a pretty good job of it for the most part, so long as you were clothed.  

 

It's not a matter of developers being unable to create fat models.  As a matter of fact, such models existed for npcs in DAO.  They simply don't want to do it, especially in games that are meant to be taken more seriously than, say Saints Row or Fable.  It's mostly included as a gag.  

 

If I'm missing your point then I apologize.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Okay, but what does that have to do with my wanting to play as a fat guy?  Games with better graphics than NWN have had overweight characters.  I always thought that Fable 1 and 2 did a pretty good job of it for the most part, so long as you were clothed.  

 

It's not a matter of developers being unable to create fat models.  As a matter of fact, such models existed for npcs in DAO.  They simply don't want to do it, especially in games that are meant to be taken more seriously than, say Saints Row or Fable.  It's mostly included as a gag.  

 

If I'm missing your point then I apologize.

Character models are much more expensive now.  There's more to worry about with cinematics and animation.  The cost of providing fat models has risen dramatically.

 

I think we should acknowledge that.

[Phoe77]

Okay, done.  I still want it though

 

I don't know the specifics behind creating character models, but Inquisition has four different playable races.  Is it out of the realm of possibility then for a game to be developed in which you can only play as humans (for instance), but you could choose between different body types?

[Alan Drifter13]

Well, I've checked what seemed like a recent thread for inquisitor pictures: http://forum.bioware...-together-here/

and can't say like if feels it supports that opinion too well. At the least, it demonstrates that there's willingness to play plenty characters other than the dark haired stubbly dudes (the complaint about the dudes is that they dominate as the game protagonists, not that they exist at all)

edit: the other character screenshot thread, http://forum.bioware...inquisitor-herealso appears to have large number of characters who are not male, or not dark haired. Sometimes even both~

 

Interesting. So, OP, where are you getting your "data" from, exactly?

 

I personally played that standard white bearded male only once in an RPG, the first time I played DA:O. In DA2 first I removed the beard and then I played my 2nd (and favorite) PT with a female character. In DA:O I played a male elf with a huge tattoo covering half of his face (and orange eyes) in the 1st PT, and a female qunari (yellow eyes) in my 2nd PT. And honestly, one of the things that I liked was to radically change the looks of the character. I also changed a lot the looks between my male Shepard (the only RPG character that I ever created who looked a little bit like me) and my female Shepard.

 

I would find it really surprising if Bioware fans didn't like changing their characters' looks quite a lot between PTs.

[Jestina]

My ancestor's came from Norway and Scotland, so yes i'm going to be partial to white European looking people when i'm gaming.

[Vader20]

These games are about fantasy... People make characters they feel fit the story based on their imagination. I usually play as a female because I hate the stereotypical male alpha jock that looks like his been on steroids and hitting the gym all his life. I've tried making a male character, but those body proportions are just gross. If I were to pick, I'd say the male elf looks at least normal compared to the human one.

 

 

Again.. why the typical male hero has to be a muscular alpha d**khead is beyond me. So yeah, this is my view on this male stuff. .

[Lebanese Dude]

I love playing characters I find attractive. 

 

That most of them turn out to be hot, rugged, olive-skinned human men is a coincidence.

 

and that like most men my age, I'm rather thirsty.

 

Spoiler

[Akkos]

Tanned-Skin spanish european guy here... And I've to admit my stereotype main character in gaming is just like Nathan Drake, Aidan Pierce, Joel..... which I think derived from North American game hereos.

 

I don't like having "young face anime male character, long hair blonde"...  I mean exactly short-dark haired human male characters in his 40s is what I aim for first. I also make them tanned slighty like me of course.

 

Then a female red/brown hair dwarf-kirby..... Or any small female character is the other though.

[RinuCZ]

There is definitely the aspect of people being used to create a familiar character.

 

I am female and I recognize my tendency to choose a dark-haired female looking Caucasian or of mixed race, without makeup and with sharper features, atypical nasal bridge and thin mouth, a face scar if possible and 30+ yo. I am not modeling a character based on me.

 

On the other hand, I am more open to... that is not a right word, my protagonists started to feel a bit boring, so I am more likely to mess with a character editor nowadays - a dark-skinned librarian, a freckly rounded sociopath, a short-haired macho blond adventurer, a mighty kind-hearted woman with dreadlocks, hispanic rough momma, etc.

 

My last attempt - taking hours - was to come up with qunari because the option looks really, really tempting for many reasons but after difficlties to come up with a decent looking model, I admit I got lazy and just picked kinda okay looking Face 1 with minor touches here and there.

 

I am unable to bring myself to play as male, though. Too many male defaults in my gaming past.

 

One thing which affects my pick a lot is if there is a character generator throwing at me characters at random. The Secret World offered me a PoC with cool glasses as the first choice and I was like, "Heck, why not, she looks cool." I was pleasantly surprised DA:I editor does that too.

Let's face it, crafting a eye-pleasing model in editor can be time demanding and people - or at least me - are lazy (Hello, default Hawke).

[Merwanor]

This is somewhat true, but concerning Dragon Age I tried to make a character I thought fit the voice, as I always do. In ME I just used the default character as I thought it had better textures than the one you make yourself, and he fit the voice anyways. In DA2 I also used default Hawke (not impressed by his default face in DAI btw) as he also fit the voice imo.

 

My DAI character did turn out about to be that 30 something guy with brown hair and stubbles, a rugged mage type character. Though I gave him some features that makes him less perfect such as a big nose (Male mages must have a strong nose ) and complexion that has wrinkles and such, just to make him look more real and not to much like an actor. My first try at a character was very different, I wanted a more rough blonde knight type of character with a longer beard. But DAIs beards looks so terrible on humans I decided to do something else.

 

I doubt I would ever try to make myself in a game like this, because I could never take it seriously.

[Phoe77]

I love playing characters I find attractive. 

 

That most of them turn out to be hot, rugged, olive-skinned human men is a coincidence.

 

and that like most men my age, I'm rather thirsty.

 

Spoiler

 

QFT

[Cespar]

I'm glad that I can actually roll a black character, instead of being "red" as the previous Dragon Age and Mass Effect had.

[Panda]

Personally I like to make very different kind of characters. 

 

Like if I think my male characters:

 

- DAO: Pale dark-haired Cousland.

- DA2:  Dark-skinned mage with blond hair.

- ME: Asian-looking guy.

(-Skyrim: Imperial who I tried to make as much Roman as possible. I also have Orc guy.).

 

Some pictures but most are low quality cause PS3 player ^^: https://charahub.com/characters (ignore DAI, I haven't played it yet).

 

I have noticed that I like some contracst combos though like pale skin and black hair & dark skin and blond hair

[TMJfin]

My first character is always blond male (elf if possible) and second character is female with red or black hair. Had to go white with inquisition because my second inquisitor was a qunari. Haven't done stereotypical dark haired male protagonist ever. But now I just might when I finally do my human male Inquisitor. With stubble of course

[nightscrawl]

Interesting point. However, I think the type of game needs to be taken into consideration as well. A game like Dragon Age where you can create any custom character that you want should be looked at differently from a game with a set protagonist like Uncharted or The Witcher. Those games are forcing that type of character onto the player, whereas Dragon Age and similar games give you the option.
 
Also, just because a majority of people might create characters -- for themselves to play -- that fit that model doesn't mean that they also don't want to have the option to create or play as something different. Having the freedom to choose, even if you don't take it, is a powerful thing.
 
 

I love playing characters I find attractive.

That most of them turn out to be hot, rugged, olive-skinned human men is a coincidence.

This applies to me as well when I make male characters. When I make female characters I more or less design them to be how I would prefer to look.

[Seraphim24]

 ideal hero.

 

I honesty don't see this character nearly as much as you might think. Most people seem to prefer creating kind of edgy/side characters with crazy hair or whatever. Plenty of people maybe role-play the kind of "hero" at times, but very few seem to actually prefer it.

 

Nathan Drake is far from an idealized hero, he's chummy chum cool kid on the block.

 

It may be true that some gamers really don't like the industry's idea of the ideal hero.

 

I think this is BS, people should be allowed to make what they honestly like, if  that's a white 30 year old male fine. I think what gamers don't like is the notion that the industry has to make alternative characters to fulfill some abstract moral obligation to the universe.

 

That's different from say, wanting more female characters, but I'd want the person creating one to actually and honestly desire to create that character, not because the world told them to do it.

[Orian Tabris]

You know what I blame for this, OP? Most gamers are white, usually American, males with dark brown or black hair. A lot of them put themselves into the game, for a reason other than that's what they are comfortable with (LOL, it's probably their ego and hubris). For me, however, I am a white male, but neither have dark hair, nor am American.

 

I've found that in Dragon Age, my first character (who I always want to be a warrior, due to my criteria for my characters in DA), are white male, lawful-neutral warriors who are straight (buuut, I identify as more true neutral than lawful). My 1st was a white-haired elf, 2nd had dark red hair, and 3rd had black/very dark grey. One day, I hope to make a female warrior.

[Helgagrim]

I guess I always make the white, female character with brown/black hair. And also a warrior. Been true for every DA game so far. (and also oblivion and skyrim >.<)

[Auztin]

I honestly think it's great they give a choice.Everyone uses a stereotype & adds to it when making completely different characters while most people use that particular stereotype most often is because believe it or not is very popular.I always stick with default since they usually fit the voice.One thing I hope that doesn't become a thing is all devs changing something for representation or being "different" sake alone.I dislike Saints Row because of the whole not funny but stupid comedy in 3 & 4 just to be different from other games.