Do you actually care what race/sex a main character is?

In a way, I care. Since it's a video game, I like to be able to customize and personalize (clothes, race, etc.). When given those options, I like to make it as close to me as possible (race, height, body type, etc.).

If I can't customize or personalize, I don't care.
 
Non-white male here and I don't really care. I'll play as whomever. That being said I can get on board with people that want more diversity. I can see how it can matter more to others.
 
Race? No.

Sex..depends. If a character is blank avatar for me to pour myself into then I prefer it to be male since I'm a guy. But if it's a character with actual personality then I don't mind it being a woman.

I've noticed I'm much more open to female protags in games than in other mediums. When I see that a movie, tv series, book or comicbook has a female lead my interest in it drops significantly. It's not a dealbreaker and I stilll consume a lot of media of this type, but it definitely makes me less interested overall then if it would be exact same story with male lead. Meanwhile in games I ususally don't mind.
 
Not really, no.
It's rare that a mixed character is the focus in the first place, and pretty much zero chances that their circumstances are similar to mine.
And for a good amount of genres, it makes no differences in the first place for me to even notice.

Don't know if playing games ever since they were a barely noticeable mass of mass of pixels has an effect to that
 
Player_One said:
First, I am a white male individual, just to be clear.

Secondly I don't care, and nobody should. If the writer of a game has chosen to tell the story of character x, which happens to be race y and sex z, then fine. Who am I to tell him what to do?

When given a choice, lots of times I go with the default character. In Mass Effect, for example, I found the default Shepard good enough looking and the voice matched great with his face. I've seen some odd user creations in this game, which subtracted from the feel of the game by trying to use the editor and failing (I've yet to see a great custom Shepard).

Other times I try to create weird characters, like in Destiny beta, I chose to create an Exo Warlock. Or I sometimes create female characters, or whatever other options are there (in ESO i created a female redguard, for example). I like the games that give you choice, but it should be justified by the genre or story or something. THIS SHOULD NOT BE IN EVERY GAME. I don't want to play Uncharted as a woman, or Tomb Raider as a man, or Beyond Two Souls as Willem Dafoe.

I hated the controversy around The Puppeteer (great game, btw), when people were complaining for not having the option to play a female puppet. Well, dooh, it's a story about a BOY who lost his head. BOY.

I belive that people who have problems with the lack of choice in some games are the real racists/sexists/homophobes/etc., not the creators of the games. Because they are the ones that actually CARE what race/sex the character is and act with rage against the game (Far Cry 4 controversy, anyone). All the other people who don't care and aren't hateful against anybody, just enjoy the game regardless. Why is race, sex or sexual orientation an issue in 2014 baffles me. We are all people with equal rights and status. This is not and should not be an issue.
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You don't get to tell me or anyone else what we are allowed to care about.

And lmao at the "real racists" comment. I can't believe you posted that with a straight face.
 
If it's supposed to be a self-insert character then yeah, a little bit. Otherwise I couldn't care less. Hell, when a character creator's available most of the time I'll pick female.
 
dancegrenade said:
I am black and I hate playing black characters. They never say the N word enough times or eat watermelon flavored chicken.

thatsracist.gif
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Player_One said:
I belive that people who have problems with the lack of choice in some games are the real racists/sexists/homophobes/etc., not the creators of the games. Because they are the ones that actually CARE what race/sex the character is and act with rage against the game (Far Cry 4 controversy, anyone). All the other people who don't care and aren't hateful against anybody, just enjoy the game regardless. Why is race, sex or sexual orientation an issue in 2014 baffles me. We are all people with equal rights and status. This is not and should not be an issue.
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I have to come back and touch on this because it took me a minute to fully process what you said. We are not living in some magical post-racial society, the issues of race, gender and sexual orientation have not magically been solved recently. Please examine the recent events in Ferguson if you believe so. Why do you get to play as default characters that look like you but I'm racist for wanting to play as ones that look like me or tell my story?

There is so much wrong and ignorant in your post it isn't even funny.
 
Not really

Preset character, i don't give a darn what race or sex your character. It could be a block, and if the gameplay is good, i'll play it.

Custom character, i'd prefer to play as male with tan skin, average build.
Mostly prefer to play as human.

I'm asian male btw
 
Not even a little bit, as long as they don't look generic dime a dozen buzzcut dudebro.

Best game portal 1-2, where you play a female protagonist in first person.
 
Fuck yes. Not to the degree that i will avoid playing a game because its main character is a white male non character, but if a game has a female MC or someone from another race, i'll probably be much more interested in it.
 
out0v0rder said:
no because its not real. 1's and 0's cant even have a race or sex.
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By the same token, characters in books are all just squiggles of ink on paper, and characters in movies are just colored blotches on film.

No medium is capable of depicting a person, real or fictional. FACT.
 
No.

But I care for different things. Like, if the main character is too much of a steroid-douche... not playing.
I also wasn't able to play GTASA, due to my extreme dislike for hip hop culture.
 
Makes no difference to me really other than being a little tired of the overused standard crew-cut white guy. Most of the types of games I buy involve creating your own character anyway, though.
 
I care but it's not even about race and sex to me. I just want more interesting characters with different experiences. Tired of every game having the grizzled 30 something war vet. Can't relate to those characters and I have a much easier time relating to female characters in video games.
 
shinobi602 said:
I'm not white, don't care what race or sex the main character is. I don't look for 'representation' in games, they're simply forms of entertainment and nothing more for me.
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Same here, but I'd say it might have more to do with the fact that I was brought up never having the option of getting "representation" in a game so I can't really say if I would have enjoyed it or if I've just been taught to deal with never getting it.

All the best games I played in my formative years starred White or Asian men. Street Fighter 2 changed that a bit, but with the movesets being so different I mostly went with who I was comfortable playing, so charge characters at first regardless of gender or race.
 
Mesoian said:
Ultimately you're both saying the same thing.

The overarching problem isn't that the number of protagonists of a male or female persuasion is so off kilter, it's that in most cases, it doesn't matter whether the main character is male or female because the game puts little to no effort into understanding who the main character is, to a point where gender never actually factors into the gameplay or story based experience.

I think that's the bigger problem. Who cares if Samus is a girl if, for 20 years, she never spoke to anyone and no one ever spoke to her? Games need to get better about that kind of thing.
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Samus was characterized as a strong female because of 1) her origins and connection to Ellen Ripley(Alien), 2)the acts you perform as her in the Metroid universe.

Other M tried to characterize Samus the complete opposite way and bastardized everything her character stood for. That's a good example of when story supersedes gameplay and affects the end product.

shidoshi said:
That demographic isn't going to change for the kinds of games we're talking about until more non white males are shown that they're actually part of the club. I know a lot of people don't think the race and gender of the main character matter, but they do.

The first Call of Duty I actually played was Ghosts, because it let me make a female character in the multiplayer (the portion of the game I care about). Yes, it's an FPS, so I can't see my character most of the time. But when that character dies, or is standing around on the menus, or whatever, I see a character that I actually have some connection with. Activistion said "we care about female players or those who identify as female enough to finally represent them in the game", and that action had a direct result on my feeling like I was a gamer the series cares to acknowledge.

For some people, representation doesn't matter, and that's fine. (Or it DOES matter, and they just don't realize how represented they've always been.) For other people, it does, and I've talked to plenty of people since getting more into the topic of inclusion in gaming that have said that when they don't see themselves represented—at least to some degree in gaming—it makes them feel like they aren't being invited to the party. So, they don't come.

My argument is this: unless you can argue why the race and gender of your main character matters, or unless you can actually make a character worth caring about*, then give me a choice. More and more games are showing that you can absolutely craft a compelling and emotional narrative around a character that they player has control over in these ways—you just need to not be lazy about it.

* I realize that "worth caring about" is a complex argument, because there's no one right answer to that question.
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I'm not against choice, but if a story is written for a non-descript male to do "heroic deeds", why does it matter what the character's race or gender is? Heroic deeds are still heroic deeds, contextually. CoD is based around the action hero fantasy. You're one guy against an entire army, supposedly doing heroic deeds(that can be subjective). Gears of War same idea, but third person with aliens. That series also introduced a female Gears soldier(took the 3rd game to do it, but progress is progress).

Why did it take playing as a female soldier for you to play CoD? The games are fundamentally the same in multiplayer.
 
I'm generally not a fan of games with female main characters. Exceptions include Tomb Raider, Okami, and TLOU. If the game allows me to design my own main character, more than likely it's going to look like me (average white guy).
 
Was going to say i dont care but more variety would be better.

And i think customizable characters/ multiple player characters is a bad solution (for story driven single player games).
 
I don't care, however if I've given a chance to choose I will always choose my own gender. No idea why, I just do. Perhaps deep down I feel I could connect better with a male controlled character than a female one (even if it wouldn't change the story in the least). Perhaps it has to do with my gender identity.
 
I don't care about race and gender but i do care about overall design.

Eg Donte looks like a tool even though he fits my demographic

or Faith (Mirror's Edge) is radical even though she is the opposite of me.
 
Fuz said:
No.

But I care for different things. Like, if the main character is too much of a steroid-douche... not playing.
I also wasn't able to play GTASA, due to my extreme dislike for hip hop culture.
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No, I kid, I think it's important that we occationally get out of our comfort zones when it comes to playable characters, else all we ever get is Standard Male Protagonist A, Standard Female Protagonist B, etc etc. I loved the tonal shift between GTA:SA and GTA4, even if said tones often fumble over themselves once you've hit the meat of the game. But good story telling should be able to instill empathy on this character you're playing as or with, we don't see that enough in games these days because it's easier to just make a sprite man and go "Sprite Man! Beat 7 worlds and get the thing to win! It's just that simple!"
 
I don't care about what race/gender/Sexuality people are in movies I watch or books I read so there is no reason for it to effect my game choices. I just like interesting stories and I don't feel like race/gender/Sexuality effect(or should) much of how a story plays out unless it's about those themes(Gone Home).

I do like playing games with kick-ass female leads though.
 
I care about characters. Not race or sex. However, since I care about character, I value playing individuals that are less represented in games since that means the character has a viewpoint that differs from the norm, making them inherently more interesting and original. So I absolutely think underrepresented races and genders are important in games. Like anything, however, they must be well written to truly be useful for the maturation of the medium.
 
Zukuu said:
I don't think it would change the nature of these replies. It's just that race and gender identification is somehow so much more important to (mostly) black people than it is to asians and whites. Someone had a good example illustrating that. "Describe yourself in 10 words". "Black" is usually under the first few words, where as "white" and "asian" doesn't even come up often at all, unless you're in another region.
Even if all games would be gender- and raceless, most people wouldn't care. Hell, we play games where you are a small red bar or an animal.

snip
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I know a lot of asian americans who care quite a bit about race identification, actually, but I'd like to address your "somehow," since this isn't at all a coincidence or accident. They've tested this in other ways, too. Took a diverse classroom filled with students of various backgrounds, ethnicities, gender, etc. Told them to imagine a story. Think of your hero.

Overwhelmingly, they thought of a white man, even if they themselves were not one. Because almost every story we see, particularly in western society, is told from the white male perspective. It's instinct and habit. It's the place you go to without having to think. It's default. White people don't tend to identify themselves as white necessarily because "person" is assumed to mean "white" unless otherwise stated.

Just like gay people are not inherently more fixated on sexual orientation because they have to clarify they are gay or will be assumed to be straight, black people aren't more obsessed with race. They are just assumed to be white in the anonymity of the internet unless they state otherwise. Because the instinctive thoughtless lazy default is white.

Hence games and their copy/paste protagonists.
 
Pastry said:
I have to come back and touch on this because it took me a minute to fully process what you said. We are not living in some magical post-racial society, the issues of race, gender and sexual orientation have not magically been solved recently.
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Will never be solved unless we let it to be solved. (and this thread shows again we don't let it)

Pastry said:
Why do you get to play as default characters that look like you but I'm racist for wanting to play as ones that look like me or tell my story?
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You are not, but neither is the other person (he/she) who gets to play as someone looking like them.
 
I'm probably more likely to buy a game if it stars a non traditional character. Female leads are more interesting to me, since I so rarely have the opportunity to play them.
 
All that matters to me is if what you do in the game is fun. Characters, story, setting, etc. can enhance a fun game if they're interesting to me, but they don't really detract. My wife looks at me funny when I play Project Diva. I don't even like J-Pop or anime, but good rhythm games are just fun in general so who cares.
 
Mithos said:
Will never be solved unless we let it to be solved. (and this thread shows again we don't let it)



You are not, but neither is the other person (he/she) who gets to play as someone looking like them.
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Wait.

Are you suggesting black people who object to racism or under-representation are the ones standing in the way of racial progress?

Maybe I'm misreading this.
 
Player_One said:
First, I am a white male individual, just to be clear.

Secondly I don't care, and nobody should. If the writer of a game has chosen to tell the story of character x, which happens to be race y and sex z, then fine. Who am I to tell him what to do?

When given a choice, lots of times I go with the default character. In Mass Effect, for example, I found the default Shepard good enough looking and the voice matched great with his face. I've seen some odd user creations in this game, which subtracted from the feel of the game by trying to use the editor and failing (I've yet to see a great custom Shepard).

Other times I try to create weird characters, like in Destiny beta, I chose to create an Exo Warlock. Or I sometimes create female characters, or whatever other options are there (in ESO i created a female redguard, for example). I like the games that give you choice, but it should be justified by the genre or story or something. THIS SHOULD NOT BE IN EVERY GAME. I don't want to play Uncharted as a woman, or Tomb Raider as a man, or Beyond Two Souls as Willem Dafoe.

I hated the controversy around The Puppeteer (great game, btw), when people were complaining for not having the option to play a female puppet. Well, dooh, it's a story about a BOY who lost his head. BOY.

I belive that people who have problems with the lack of choice in some games are the real racists/sexists/homophobes/etc., not the creators of the games. Because they are the ones that actually CARE what race/sex the character is and act with rage against the game (Far Cry 4 controversy, anyone). All the other people who don't care and aren't hateful against anybody, just enjoy the game regardless. Why is race, sex or sexual orientation an issue in 2014 baffles me. We are all people with equal rights and status. This is not and should not be an issue.
Click to expand...
Wrong or right, it was his opinion, expressed in a respectful manner. Did he really deserve a ban?
 
DoktorEvil said:
Samus was characterized as a strong female because of 1) her origins and connection to Ellen Ripley(Alien), 2)the acts you perform as her in the Metroid universe.

Other M tried to characterize Samus the complete opposite way and bastardized everything her character stood for. That's a good example of when story supersedes gameplay and affects the end product.
Click to expand...

Eh, 1 is...I don't count that. I don't give Solid Snake toughness points because he's a crude knock off of Snake Pliskin.

But yes, you identify all you can with Samus as a character based on her deeds. We know she is tough because she completes her mission with extreme force and dutiful skill. And that's all we know. For 20 years, it's all we ever knew. So why did it matter that she was a woman? What did her gender add to her character? For characters who are defined by nothing but the task at hand, it just doesn't matter, and I think that's an attitude we need to start moving away from if we're going to make sex, gender and race actually mean something in video games.

As for OtherM, that was just a failing. I feel like that game was written by someone who had never played a Metroid game before, let alone understood what the series was saying about Samus, a woman who prefers working in isolation, needs nothing from anyone, gets the job done using only her training and ceremonial battle armor. Everything about how she is characterized in OtherM is poor and Nintendo should have understood that before letting the game go to shelves.

Parmenide said:
Wrong or right, it was his opinion, expressed in a respectful manner. Did he really deserve a ban?
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That last paragraph was something, especially considering we've been watching a race riot on television for 2 weeks now.
 
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