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What do you think of playing as a custom character of a different race than you?
- Thread starter Aizo
- Start date
poodaddy
Member
Hell to be honest I wish I woulda been allowed to customize my Link in BOTW; he woulda been black too. I just don't like playing as white people much in video games, particularly if they're generic angry looking Badass white guy with shaved head and heaven chiseled jaw. I can handle playing as white guys if the design is interesting or unique though. I loved playing as Geralt.
To be fair, outside of Japanese people most people feel this way
A lot of Japanese games feature white people too though
bobbychalkers
Member
If your nonwhite/non-Japanese, you are probably accustomed to playing as characters that dont reflect your ethnic background.
F31 Leopard
Member
I'm an asian male and I always make a red headed white female. Reason being is because I'm a Sega fanboy and name all my characters Naomi. I make a female because Naomi is a female name. I make her a red head because of the red O on the Naomi logo. Red heads are of Caucasian decent. I make my support characters like in Dragon's Dogma and Freedom Wars a white blonde female named Lindbergh. I also make her female because I'd rather look at a fake girl than a dude if I'm going to be playing hundreds of hours. Same reason for the hair because of the Lindbergh yellow hardware and blondes are Caucasian.
True but there probably more Japanese protagonists of games than say Mexican, or latinos in general
Hibiki Kurosawa
Member
I don't see how this can be considered weird. The choice is there so you can play as whoever you want. I'm a guy and if I play Life is Strange, it's not weird because I'm playing as a girl. Same goes for if I choose to play as a girl or black person or japanese person in a game that allows that choice through character creators. It just happens to be who I chose as the star of the narrative I'm about to experience.
Chaos2Frozen
Member
I'm very certain if anyone always plays an Asian character they get labeled a weaboo.
So yes, I think there are some stigma involved.
So yes, I think there are some stigma involved.
It wouldn't bother me at all. I'd probably think it was pretty cool. I'm a black woman and frankly tired of playing as white dudes so I always make non-white female characters though. I suppose if I hadn't spent most of my gaming years playing as white men, I might choose that option more in custom characters.
ShinMaruku
Member
I am black and I play things always different from what I am. But I can see how some people try to create themselves, people are a mystery.
There are no separate human races (sub species) in a biological sense. That's an incorrect, non-scientific (and terrible) social construct that was disproven by anthropologists at least 70 years ago.
By referring to "race" when talking about humans of different geographic or ethnic origin, you perpetuate Nazi stereotyping and pseudo science. Racism exists, races do not.
By referring to "race" when talking about humans of different geographic or ethnic origin, you perpetuate Nazi stereotyping and pseudo science. Racism exists, races do not.
It feels weird to make a character that's a different human ethnicity than me, but I have no problem in RPGs playing as a lizard person or a alien or something along those lines.
When character creators first came out I'd spend hours trying to create someone that looked as close to me as possible. No I care less and less especially since odds are it's an rob where every part of the character will be covered by armor. Nowadays I usually just do the randomize until I see something I like.
When character creators first came out I'd spend hours trying to create someone that looked as close to me as possible. No I care less and less especially since odds are it's an rob where every part of the character will be covered by armor. Nowadays I usually just do the randomize until I see something I like.
Monocle
Member
I don't project myself into my custom characters. It feels normal for me to try all kinds of types. If I can't use the character creator to make a steamy hunk, I usually go for a badass lady. Ethnicity will vary depending on any number of visual factors specific to the game I'm playing.
I tend to prefer tall humanlike fantasy races like dark elves just because they look cool. Anything overtly animalistic like cat or lizard people doesn't interest me. Unless they're like Fran from FFXII where any animal features are superficial.
I tend to prefer tall humanlike fantasy races like dark elves just because they look cool. Anything overtly animalistic like cat or lizard people doesn't interest me. Unless they're like Fran from FFXII where any animal features are superficial.
Mcleon6494
Member
I really like playing as a dwarf. Usually if I can name them it's something dumb like Edgar. Other races like lizard-people or elves are less frequent but they happen. It's a lot of fun to play races other than humans
Not that I don't support where you're coming from but let's not get into that here. People still use race as a shorthand when it comes to identity.
J_ToSaveTheDay
Member
Biracial white+Korean here. Almost always roll white female. I played a black male in The Division last year because he was my favorite out of all of the options available.
Biracialism is so dynamic that its pretty hard to visually represent, I feel, so the option feels sparesely available in character creators. In pen-and-paper style RPGs, there seems to be the half-elf option that can kinda feel close in terms of lore largely being seen as abnormal by both elves and humans alike, similar to how I dont feel like I am accepted/belong to either of my racial backgrounds completely. Biracial seems doable if its reinforced through other forms of acknowledgment, like explicit lore and scripted reactions to it... But as far as character creators go in games, they seem to strictly go for very defined visual features a lot of the time, and biracialism obviously can mean a very large range of racial combinations that dont necessarily adhere to those rigid features.
Spocks characterization in the JJ Abrams Trek films is the closest Ive seen to my own biracial experience being portrayed in media (I dont have much experience with classic Trek). I kind of feel like Aragorn from Lord of the Rings comes close in some ways, too, but that whole part of his background is kind of obscured in the films, which is probably where most people have experienced that story.
So yeah, not really sure I feel like biracial let alone my personal type of biracial is even an option ever, so Im usually just playing someone quite unlike myself as far as looks would suggest.
Biracialism is so dynamic that its pretty hard to visually represent, I feel, so the option feels sparesely available in character creators. In pen-and-paper style RPGs, there seems to be the half-elf option that can kinda feel close in terms of lore largely being seen as abnormal by both elves and humans alike, similar to how I dont feel like I am accepted/belong to either of my racial backgrounds completely. Biracial seems doable if its reinforced through other forms of acknowledgment, like explicit lore and scripted reactions to it... But as far as character creators go in games, they seem to strictly go for very defined visual features a lot of the time, and biracialism obviously can mean a very large range of racial combinations that dont necessarily adhere to those rigid features.
Spocks characterization in the JJ Abrams Trek films is the closest Ive seen to my own biracial experience being portrayed in media (I dont have much experience with classic Trek). I kind of feel like Aragorn from Lord of the Rings comes close in some ways, too, but that whole part of his background is kind of obscured in the films, which is probably where most people have experienced that story.
So yeah, not really sure I feel like biracial let alone my personal type of biracial is even an option ever, so Im usually just playing someone quite unlike myself as far as looks would suggest.
Same here, except I'm southeast Asian.
I love the Iksar. I wish every game had a race like them. Tired of all the damn human-analog races. Too samey and boring. Too unimaginative.
At first I thought you were saying you'd play anyone except a Southeast Asian.
TheTylerRob
Member
My friend models all his custom characters after Kanye West.
RuinerPrime
Member
Play/make whatever you'd like id say.
In FF14 I play as a black human female and that was mostly because you do not see that very often in FF14. And she looks cool.
In FF14 I play as a black human female and that was mostly because you do not see that very often in FF14. And she looks cool.
GenericUser
Member
I always thought we are all the "human race"? Anyway, I mostly play middle aged white man. I like to roleplay.
NipplesAndToes23
Member
Show me a pic.
In twenty years of playing both tabletop and computer game RPGs I've played as a wide variety of both human and non-human characters at this point. If someone I knew always played exactly the same type of character, whether it was very different to them or as close as possible, I'd be curious enough to ask why. Nothing wrong with using an idea of what 'your' fantastical adventurer(s) look like across multiple games, I think I've approximated the same characters in multiple games too just because if a game calls for me to name a generic warrior type, I've created several over the years that would slot in. Sometimes I even use the same character in different games to avoid creating a new one from scratch but change it up by saying 'this game happens in their early life, they are young, optimistic and naive' or 'this game is them after a severe knockback where lots of their previous allies were killed, they lack trust at this point'. It's not unusual for roleplayers to view 'their character's' loose overall development as more important than any individual campaign. I've had a knight appear in most of my dungeon crawler parties for many years, and for some reason I kinda see him as hailing from somewhere like the Mediterranean rather than a 'Western European' where I'm from. In most games he's the backbone of the party, solid and dependable, an experienced adventurer that takes time to warm up to young characters and weird, oddball classes. He's kinda like that roleplayer that plays a fighter out of the book and sees a kid turn up with a multiclass dragon-dancer-necromancer and just lifts one eyebrow. The fact that I set his skin colour as a different shade to mine is far less important than his demeanour, should there be options to make choices in the game, being familiar to me and increasing my enjoyment of it, especially as I've aged and maybe become a bit set in my ways too. I suppose that's a bit of a tangent compared to non-RPGs though.
As a brown guy, having people like myself as protagonists is so rare that I pretty much always make a character that at least has my skin color. It doesn't necessarily have to be me.
As for people playing as characters of other races... I dunno, I guess it's fine as long as it not fetishistic or as a joke, I guess?
As for people playing as characters of other races... I dunno, I guess it's fine as long as it not fetishistic or as a joke, I guess?
TheGreatMightyPoo
Banned
Play as whoever the fuck you want to play as.
But like the post above says, dont do it as a goof, thats not cool.
But like the post above says, dont do it as a goof, thats not cool.
It doesn't matter to me. Lots of Western games use Caucasian characters and Japanese games use Asian characters.
I'm an Asian guy but I normally make female characters anyways.
I like how I can make characters or see a story by being a scripted character which is why games exist in the first place.
I'm an Asian guy but I normally make female characters anyways.
I like how I can make characters or see a story by being a scripted character which is why games exist in the first place.
lastplayed
Member
I love playing as a dwarf.
IronicSonic
Member
Im fine playing as a hedgehog so you can tell me
MontlyCure
Member
It doesn't matter to me at all. If possible I usually just hit randomize and take whatever the game gives me.
RuinerPrime
Member
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
I'm a white female and my default is to create a character more or less resembling me. But on replays, if I do replay the games (I always do in Souls games, I make multiple characters) I make a variety of them. I've even made drow characters and Raziel, in Dark Souls. 
No lies detected
DeceptiveAlarm
Gold Member
As a cow man this pisses me off. Just because we don't have thumbs doesn't mean we don't WoW.
I usually play as my self. If its part of the story then fine. If I just love being a little asian girl then I find that weird. I'm an adult male btw.
LordPhantX
Neo Member
I don't care, always try to create the best looking character available in any race.
kraspkibble
Permabanned.
i'm white and always go with a white character and never anything else.
it doesn't really matter if you go a different race. it's not weird. i just like to pretend my character is meant to be me so it wouldn't make sense if i was black.
it doesn't really matter if you go a different race. it's not weird. i just like to pretend my character is meant to be me so it wouldn't make sense if i was black.
Unless you only game to experience wish fulfillment that's weirdly tied to your race
My main in Mario Kart 8 is one of the only PoCs in the whole game: Purple-Haired Inkling Girl. Guess that's not really a custom character though.
Rats Off To Ya
Banned
As a white human dude, when given the choice, I very rarely play games as a white human dude.
Bornstellar
Member
My preference is to play something that I am not.
lucebuce12
Member
Always play as the hot alien/elven female when given a choice.