• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Gaming While Black

T

TheSpoiler

Member
A long time ago, I had a friend make this comment when I was talking about the lack of inclusion of PoC in games.

"Well, sometimes it feels forced which is worse than having black people in at all."

I asked him what games were forced, and he couldn't find one.

I can't even think of a game that had a forced black person.
 
M

Massive Duck. C.M.

Banned
"no black people in my game with werewolves and tesla cannons in victorian london"

The Order made for some wild times.

Seriously, we need more people in the industry
 
V

Valkerionseven

Member
Lot of this is too true. I slightly give Japanese games a pass on this for all the various reasons that come with a society that has literally 3 "famous" black people that live here and like 1 that almost visits yearly (Will Smith.) Also can't stand using anime as an example of Japan using "white characters" when all it is 99% of the time is another generic anime styled character who's background or way of speaking is supposed to be a non-Japanese region lol.

Randomly I noticed that a lot of Japanese youtubers who play games with character creators make black characters. No idea why since our usual picture of Japanese character created characters are loli anime girls.

That said, yes, things should be better. Especially for wider reaching games, ala Pokemon, Final Fantasy and more.

For whatever reason all the imagining I've done for the potential Final Fantasy 16 stars a black male lead lol... it also is in the world style of FF4 so maybe that shows how crazy I am. Also will fully agree on how disappointing it is to see the "black" hair options as Bald, Afro, or Cornrows in most games.
 
V

Via Purifico

Banned
RRockman said:
I'm sorry but this would be HARD to anime effectively. The guys and gals who worked on BRAVE made a huge deal about the hoops they had to jump to master coily springy hair. Perchance in a hand drawn game?
Click to expand...

Naughty Dog seemed to do pretty well with Nadine. It's possible.
 
D

Deleted member 465307

Unconfirmed Member
Fuchsdh said:
Because hair is the hardest part to model. Remember how Pixar spent years developing the curly hair for Merida in Brave? Remember how shitty all that hair tech in The Witcher and Tomb Raider has been? Remember why we had so many bald space marines?

We're years away from being able to customize hair styles the way you want, and even then it'll probably be janky as all hell.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I get that it's super difficult to render. Hair and fluid simulation tech is what I love seeing develop with each generation. I'm just surprised we don't have more "static" options. I understand that accurately rendering Merida or Rapunzel or Moana in a game would be impossibly intensive, but I'm surprised they don't just heavily simplify the physics or remove them altogether, given that a good number of games do still have hair that doesn't animate or only does so basically. But I suppose that would look pretty terrible in any games with close-ups or high-fidelity graphics everywhere else. Maybe I'm still thinking of PS2-era character creators.
 
S

Scrooge McDuck

Member
RRockman said:
I'm sorry but this would be HARD to anime effectively. The guys and gals who worked on BRAVE made a huge deal about the hoops they had to jump to master coily springy hair. Perchance in a hand drawn game?
Click to expand...

Games rarely animate hair well to begin with. Bioware games have high ponytails that don't even sway, yet they still include them.
 
P

Prototype Viktor

Member
RRockman said:
All I wanted was an afro in Sun and Moon. Mirror B got one! Why cant't I?

*Cries in corner*

I'm not at all bothered by a lack of diversity in Japanese games because of their culture, you draw what you see after all. I was however pleasantly surprised by how diverse the denizens of aloa were compared to past games. It really felt like they were trying this time around. I feel hairstyles is a complaint that will be addressed as things continue to improve. However, western games have no such excuse in this matter.
Click to expand...
Can't use that argument still after all this time and their media creator's consume and use other cultures habits for things. That crutch can't be always used if it will be use a wheelchair then
 
R

RRockman

Banned
flkraven said:
I'm sorry but this is a bullshit excuse. "The Japanese are ignorant so it's fine but westerners should know better". Dude, everyone should be held to the same standards.
Click to expand...

I'm not saying its ok, it's more like I have accepted that they are going to suck at it because they are/were ignorant. They have been getting significantly better as time marches on however.

I dont see characters drawn like this any more for example

hqdefault.jpg


other than the returning ones from long running shows like DBZ

However developers like us in the west who can actually go down the street and encounter black people significantly more often then those in Japan SHOULD be setting the standard for the rest of the world to follow, but that isn't quite the case either. I can't remember the last time we had a black lead character who didnt swear profusely (an example stereotype) since Lee from The walking dead and that isn't good enough in my opinion.

I probably phrased that initial post wrong now that I think about it.
 
V

Via Purifico

Banned
This isn't gaming but Michiko and Hatchin is an example that should be brought up. It has a kickass brown skin woman of African descent who is the lead and that's from Japan so there really shouldn't be any excuses.
 
M

Mr. Smiley

Member
Prototype Viktor said:
Ignores Square (of all people) doing extra work for Laura Croft's hair
Click to expand...

Is that every single strand of hair? I'm not saying CD's work isn't something to be admired but I'm not asking for pristine, simulation-esque physics just to make a black woman with long natural hair.

RRockman said:
I'm not saying its ok, it's more like I have accepted that they are going to suck at it because they are/were ignorant. They have been getting significantly better as time marches on however.

I dont see characters drawn like this any more for example

hqdefault.jpg
Click to expand...

From One Punch Man
superalloy_darkshine_91118.jpg
Click to expand...
It's still very much a thing, even in popular anime.
 
G

GhostOfSparta305

Banned
These tweets have some truth, but they're first & foremost trying to be funny.

I really hope those in this thread don't lose sight of that.

One of the biggest struggles of being black imo is feeling like you have to walk on egg-shells every time the topic of race is even brought up (remember that Pachter thread)?
 
B

BlackBanditSho

Member
here's a story.
Last night I was pumped to try Werewolves Within for PSVR.

Before you enter the game, there's a spectator mode that allows you to check out a game in progress before you're able to jump in.

This party was having a ball. As a social game, it's a blast.

So you've got your selection of avatars, and one of them happens to be black. I couldn't tell if the real life person playing was black because he was silent most of the time.

However, the point of the game is to figure out who's the hidden werewolf, conspire, and out the person in order to win. In this game, the black guy was the suspect -which is fine. No reason to read deep into that.

But...

I don't know the whys and wherefores because I came in to the game en motion, but let's just say that there was a whole bunch of 'Black Lives Matter ' jokes and riffs on the 'black man criminal' that made me feel really uncomfortable and I'm glad I was a silent observer. Realized that i didn't want to join this group, and it really put a damper on my hype about social VR.

I'd forgotten how gross gaming culture can be. Ah well...
 
R

RRockman

Banned
Via Purifico said:
This isn't gaming but Michiko and Hatchin is an example that should be brought up. It has a kickass brown skin woman of African descent who is the lead and that's from Japan so there really shouldn't be any excuses.
Click to expand...

Yes, but do we have any good western games/films that are animated to compare? I'm trying to find something more recent than The princess and the frog to prove myself wrong. I think we have some indies filling this void but I'm drawing a blank.*


*Wait we've got Broken Age, Hunter: The Reckoning, and Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation. among others

Those were positive and I should have mentioned them.
 
SystemUser

SystemUser

Member
RRockman said:
All I wanted was an afro in Sun and Moon. Mirror B got one! Why cant't I?

*Cries in corner*

I'm not at all bothered by a lack of diversity in Japanese games because of their culture, you draw what you see after all. I was however pleasantly surprised by how diverse the denizens of aloa were compared to past games. It really felt like they were trying this time around. I feel hairstyles is a complaint that will be addressed as things continue to improve. However, western games have no such excuse in this matter.
Click to expand...


Weird to give Nintendo a pass on this because they "draw what they see". How many Nintendo characters are Japanese? Mario, Samus, Link, Ash, etc all look white to me. What is their most prominent Asian character? An f-zero driver? E Honda? Is Brock Asian? Nintendo did have Ken Griffey baseball at least I guess. (Why didn't Ichiro get a game?)
 
I

IDKAboutThat

Member
GhostOfSparta305 said:
While these tweets may have some truth to them, they're first & foremost trying to be funny. I really hope this thread doesn't lose sight of that.

For me, one of the biggest struggles as a black man is feeling like you have to walk on egg-shells every time the topic of race is even brought up (remember that Pachter "racist" thread?)
Click to expand...
White people are generally unwilling to have a grown-up discussion about racial issues because at some point in the discussion, inevitably, some of the white people think they're being called racists and become upset and defensive.

GhostOfSparta305 said:
Llamar in GTA V comes to mind.
Click to expand...

I think they meant forced as in token, not forced as in ridiculous.
 
R

RedSwirl

Junior Member
You tend to only get a lot of choices for black hairstyles in sports games or other games where, because of the setting, having black people is absolutely unavoidable (like GTAV). What I don't understand is why developers of other games don't talk to the modelers for those games.

Do EA Sports games still have character creators? Why can't BioWare talk to those modelers? Hair may be a hard thing to model, but I think all it takes to properly model afro hair is a bit of experience which some people working in games evidently have.

Fallout 4's character creator is a little better than most games in this regard. I forget how many specifically afro hairstyles are in it, but it's at least like half a dozen, including more "natural" looking styles.

Another tidbit: no matter what you do with the character creator in Fallout 3, the player character's mother is always black.
 
S

SENPAIatLARGE

Banned
Shout outs to Dragons Dogma for letting me design an honest to god black man and woman despite being a Japanese game. Multiple hairstyles, an abundance of skin tones, and genuine African facial features are all present. Not to mention the black preset are realistic as well.
 
K

Kthulhu

Member
TheSpoiler said:
A long time ago, I had a friend make this comment when I was talking about the lack of inclusion of PoC in games.

"Well, sometimes it feels forced which is worse than having black people in at all."

I asked him what games were forced, and he couldn't find one.

I can't even think of a game that had a forced black person.
Click to expand...

The only forced black character I know of is Shadow the Hedgehog.
 
I

Inuhanyou

Believes Dragon Quest is a franchise managed by Sony
flkraven said:
I'm sorry but this is a bullshit excuse. "The Japanese are ignorant so it's fine but westerners should know better". Dude, everyone should be held to the same standards.
Click to expand...

Its not an excuse. Not every place in the world is as used to dealing with race as America is. There are such things as homogeneous societies that don't have the experience or the mindset to actually think about things outside of what they know directly.

In America, the conversation about racial topics in the society in which we live is actively forced into the limelight every day and is something that does not have the right to be ignored.
 
G

GhostOfSparta305

Banned
SickWheelchairCombos said:
White people are generally unwilling to have a grown-up discussion about racial issues because at some point in the discussion, inevitably, some of the white people think they're being called racists and become upset and defensive.
Click to expand...

In those people's defense...many people (of all races) often do start prematurely calling them racists or suggesting it. It's a problem on all sides.

Remember Resident Evil 5, where people thought a dude shooting black zombies...in Africa...was racist?

Or just look at the first page of this thread. Someone asks a question about black haircuts & people assume the worst *sigh*
 
S

Silver Arrows

Banned
GhostOfSparta305 said:
This video somewhat covers it (1:20).

Llamar's presented as so over-the-top and the exact type of fictional black person modern rap songs brag about that Franklin almost seems to have been created as a reality check. I genuinely hope this isn't how children playing this game view black people.
Click to expand...

Then again, didn't the actor who played Lamar actually write the majority of his lines?
 
L

LiveFromKyoto

Member
Naked Prime said:
In some 1st person ganes & VR titles, its the hands that kill it for me. RE7 recently and Batman VR. Though the latter its when you look in the mirror. Its unavoidable in a title like that, but I could've' been Batwing.
Click to expand...

Batwing's abilities would break the shit out of every Batman game, lol.
 
C

Crossing Eden

Hello, my name is Yves Guillemot, Vivendi S.A.'s Employee of the Month!
Professor Beef said:
Good character design sure, but God awful characterization.
Click to expand...
As a native american male in the time period he's actually portrayed incredibly accurately, especially his opinions on the things happening to his people. It's a perspective that many gamers aren't used to, playing as an oppressed colored individual who's looked down on by everyone around them. I think if AC3 were released today Connor would be much better received compared to pre-GG times.
 
N

NastyBook

Member
Dreams-Visions said:
3 hair styles + bald. So true.

Like, Do devs not know about the black hair style barbershop chart?

qcZldkn.jpg


Just give us these or cuts from any of the other 20 style charts out there.
Click to expand...
#27 all fucking day. I like my shit LIGHT. I'm not trying to come back in a week, so stop playing and cut this shit off.

Also, all those tweets were true.
SENPAIatLARGE said:
Shout outs to Dragons Dogma for letting me design an honest to god black man and woman despite being a Japanese game. Multiple hairstyles, an abundance of skin tones, and genuine African facial features are all present. Not to mention the black preset are realistic as well.
Click to expand...
THIS. Dragon's Dogma was the ONLY game last gen where I created a fantasy version of me (and my wife) that wasn't a complete joke. MGSV was that game this gen. It even had a default black dude who kinda looked my brother, it was so good.
 
G

grandwizard

Member
Storm Chamber said:
This thread won't last but:

tumblr_inline_odjvknTPfl1t3082v_540.png


This is the most etherous. Ya'll eat that shit up too, but it's whatever.
Click to expand...

Whjw2yy.jpg


killatopak said:
At least the blacks are still present in a game. Where's the indians, south east asians and middle eastern people who aren't portrayed as bad guys?
Click to expand...

While I think this is a topic for another thread, the lack of Indians and other south asians in video games is basically a shot through the heart of the false rationale that game characters aren't already made to pander to an audience. People believing that we just randomly lucked into straight white dudes being the default can't find an excuse for there being a billion Indian people in the world yet the only video game they can come up with that has an Indian lead is Far Cry 4.

GhostOfSparta305 said:
In those people's defense...many people (of all races) often do start prematurely calling them racists or suggesting it. It's a problem on all sides.

Remember Resident Evil 5, where people thought a dude shooting black zombies...in Africa...was racist?
Click to expand...

This is a mischaracterization of what the discussion was about. The problem was RE5 using racist imagery to sell you fear, especially when it wasn't neccessary. The early chapters of that game portray the locals to be nothing but gangs of savages with death stares even before there is an infection, and then you are literally chasing after a blonde white woman who is being dragged through the streets by a gang of africans while crying for help. They eventually drag her into a structure and by the time you get in there she has been 'infected' by them. It's imagery that comes straight from old 'dark continent' scare movies and birth of a nation, and the fact the developers use that to instill fear in people is the issue.
 
B

Bold One

Member
All so very very true, it's what makes it really aggravating when I come here and see people patting each other on the back about progress that we got another white girl lead in a game. Whilst the plight for representation for poc continues.
 
P

Prototype Viktor

Member
RRockman said:
I'm not saying its ok, it's more like I have accepted that they are going to suck at it because they are/were ignorant. They have been getting significantly better as time marches on however.

I dont see characters drawn like this any more for example

hqdefault.jpg


other than the returning ones from long running shows like DBZ

However developers like us in the west who can actually go down the street and encounter black people significantly more often then those in Japan SHOULD be setting the standard for the rest of the world to follow, but that isn't quite the case either. I can't remember the last time we had a black lead character who didnt swear profusely (an example stereotype) since Lee from The walking dead and that isn't good enough in my opinion.

I probably phrased that initial post wrong now that I think about it.
Click to expand...
Oh yea well Terra Formas says hi

terra-formars-guns.png
 
J

Jeffrey

Member
Wonder if there is a technical reason as well? I mean outside of a few games like the recent tomb raiders that use some fancy tech, hairs are kept fairly short and simple on whomever generic male dude.


Haven't played many modern sports games though, how is the hair there these days? I assume pretty terrible because of the amount of characters on screen and having to target 60fps?
 
T

TheYanger

Member
Messofanego said:
I never played Ass Creed 3, but Connor still has the best character design.

eec5fc41fe0d146529adadee30ad52d0.png

connorkenwayworkout.png
Click to expand...

Legitimately saddening how bad the game was, because I love Connor's design. Also am native american. I like the article that got linked about Pharah's native designs as well - I mean I'm pretty damn white in culture, but it still makes me happy to see any decent representation rather just acting like everything is appropriation. Even someone including something just because they think it looks cool is better to me than not representing something at all, it can encourage people to want to seek out and learn more.

People like to dig on his character personality, but I thought it was a pretty good representation, yeah it might not be the most exciting thing but I wouldn't want him to just be Nathan Drake either. Ultimately I think he'd be more liked if the game weren't so bad regardless of his attitude.
 
G

GhostOfSparta305

Banned
grandwizard said:
This is a mischaracterization of what the discussion was about. The problem was RE5 using racist imagery to sell you fear, especially when it wasn't neccessary. The early chapters of that game portray the locals to be nothing but gangs of savages with death stares
Click to expand...
You mean like Resident Evil 4?

and then you are literally chasing after a blonde white woman who is being dragged through the streets by a gang of africans while crying for help. They eventually drag her into a structure and by the time you get in there she has been 'infected' by them. It's imagery that comes straight from old 'dark continent' scare movies and birth of a nation, and the fact the developers use that to instill fear in people is the issue.
Click to expand...

Seriously? The first time you meet an infected, he's a black man being held down by another black man shoving the virus into his mouth. But once they do it to a white woman, that's racist?

And the scene you're talking about never appeared in any trailer. Only ones that did depicted zombies chasing an American guy with a gun...aka the same premise as RE4.

But alas, those zombie hordes were black, so people just convinced themselves that RE4 was God's gift to man and RE5 was the KKK's?
 
P

Prototype Viktor

Member
I dunno about you all but in all character creators I make the PC white for historical gaming PC reasons

TIL my phone autocorrects white into suite
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

  • Locked
[Black Girl Gamers] Forspoken wouldn't have received this same level of criticism had Frey not been Black.
2
84
4K
Mod of War replied
VGC: Black Myth: Wukong is China's most important premium game
Opinion
35
2K
StereoVsn replied
Xbox Black Friday starts on November 17
News Hype Platform 2 3
121
7K
Leonidas replied
Mental health is a problem in the games industry
2 3
131
6K
cash_longfellow replied
GameStop CEO Says Disc Drives Should Be Required On Game Consoles
Opinion Business 2 3 4 5 6
269
12K
TheBTL replied
Top Bottom