Most video games star white males.

[Laser Priest]

Most video games star the widest demographic of gamers?

Good god, this is madness.

Note my lack of exclamation point.

Face it, most of the major demographic are going to have trouble playing as a Muslim Black-Latino Hermaphrodite.

It's not some superiority complex. When you sell something, the safest route is to aim it at the largest demographic. It's not a race thing. That's fucking basic marketing.

 

[omicron1]

Most videogames (at least of the genres you're referring to; the case is slightly fuzzier when things like casual titles are included) are made by white males and played by white males.
It's a simple case of appealing to the core audience, and it tends to be true that, racially motivated or not, people like to play familiar archetypes (albeit significantly more capable than in reality) in videogames. Not always - I favor a darker-skinned female when possible, for instance - but (esp. for the megamarket of Call of Duty and its ilk) often.

Next question?

 

[Chairman Miaow]

To be quite honest, a lot of the time video-game characters are macho white men or Busty women. It's either author insert or eye-candy. I have actually never seen a black programmer in any of the making of videos. That is really odd now I think about it. I wonder why....

 

[Omnific One]

Most gamers are white males... it's called appealing to your demographic.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

Racism is more than "actively discriminating against people". It is social systems like white privilege.

In fact, not seeing racism as anything outside of the behavior of an individual tends to the the sign of white privilege.

Racism isn't dead, not in the slightest. In fact, in today's society, most people don't realize they're being racist, that they're supporting racism, and that a standard is racist.

I said names. name me people that...

1. matter

Everyone matters. What kind of ridiculous statement is this. You don't have to have Barack Obama making a "big deal" out of something for it to matter.

You say stuff about racism like it is an exclusively caucasian idea. Everyone has hated everybody sometime.

 

[Aris Khandr]

... it's also creatively bankrupt. Seriously, try to guess which character I'm talking about: grizzly 30-something muscular white man with short brown hair.

How many games let you make your own character? I'd dare say most of them. I have, to my knowledge, NEVER played a game with a grizzled 30-something muscular white man with short brown hair. Most of my characters are female, as I am. Even games that don't allow that, like FIFA, my characters still tend to be of Arabian descent, with long, black hair. In the past couple of months, I have played Alice, Skyrim, TOR, Dungeon Defenders, FIFA 12, Mass Effect 2, War in the North, and TDU2, and not a single one of those games has had my character be anything like you describe.

The trend in gaming is largely shifting to allowing you to own your character, even in games that otherwise wouldn't offer customization. I do believe that the "problem" here is vastly overstated, considering the number of games where the character "on the box" is effectively meaningless.

 

[afroebob]

Surely I am not the only one disturbed by this.

Go play Crackdown than. Nobody cares.

 

[esperandote]

Italians are white? (Talking about Super Mario Bros.)

 

[Seventh Actuality]

Just stop. Most people on here have no fucking clue what they're talking about when it comes to issues of race and gender. They will dismiss any discussion of this issue because of the simple fact that the only stake they have in it is in jumping on any criticism of their precious games, or deflect it with their own half-baked assertions that the real problem is bweh bweh bweh bweh. Any complaint about diversity is inherently overblown or unreasonable to most of this forum's audience because they have no personal investment in it or understanding of it.

Learning more about where the critics are coming from would only take a Google search and a bit of reading, but who's going to bother with that before posting defensive walls of text?

 

[senordesol]

Where are all the fat protagonists? Why do all the male protagonists (who aren't Final Fantasy characters) have short brown hair? Why do all the women look like supermodels? Why does everyone sound like they sucked on the tail pipe of a gravel machine before reading their lines?

Race is just a small factor of what's being left out of the creative wasteland that is videogame story writing. See, where one might see racism; I just see laziness. About the only protagonist I've run across in recent years where the devs clearly asked 'what makes this protagonist interesting?' is Nathan Drake. Everyone else seems inter-changeable (which might also be considered a form of racism, no?)

Now I'm going to go ahead and say that ME, FO, DA and any other game where you can 'create' your character doesn't count. I have less of a problem with someone's race as I do with inter-changeability. Because if everyone's the fucking same, it doesn't matter what color they are.

 

[AnotherAvatar]

This is why I like RPGs, lets me build a strong female character, which is really my favorite type mostly due to rarity (and because strong women are HOT).

Also... something sort of gay about having to watch a man's ass wiggle in front of you for something like 30+ hours of gameplay. Not that there is anything wrong with that, just that I'd rather have it be a girl butt...

Actually I only ever make males for RPGs if I'm role-playing something specific or if it's a first person RPG, and I'm proud to say that my most recent character was a Redguard at that. I've come a long way from when I was a kid just making the character someone I can identify with, usually white with blonde hair and blue eyes and a slightly nordic look (as that describes me).

And you see there I think I've hit why all we see are mostly white male lead characters: Who's making the games? Mostly white males yes? They're just making characters they identify with, clearly, thankfully I don't think it's because of bigotry, though I don't think the same could be said for the television and film industries. However sexism seems more likely, as it's sort of our country's unspoken issue.

Still though, remember that most game designers are nerdy white males, and that most gamers are the same, and as such most games are tailor made power-fantasies for said group, focused on boosting that groups ego. This is why Japanese games traditionally feature Japanese lead characters (even if thanks to Manga they have a horribly warped view of how they're supposed to look...).

 

[slipknot4]

I've read quite a few of your responses and I have a question. If racism is broader than active racism I:e actual race discrimination/prejudice towards ethnic backgrounds, was making Jacob in Mass Effect 3 black a racist thing to do. He could have been white, don't you think?

The sooner we get away from the: "White-Male-21-35" demographic is bad mentality, the better.
I for one think that games should be catered in a way that suits their audience. Anything else would imply that Monthy python is bad and Sister, Sister [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sister,_Sister_(TV_series)] is a good thing.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

Most gamers are white males... it's called appealing to your demographic.

Yes but don't you think that's damaging creatively.

 

[Sentox6]

Mass Effect

Mass Effect stars a white female, thank you very much. I don't care want those fraudulent advertisements say.

I do my bit for gender diversity whenever I have the choice. Racial diversity will just have to be someone else's job.

 

[ms_sunlight]

Face it, most of the major demographic are going to have trouble playing as a Muslim Black-Latino Hermaphrodite.

Seriously? Seriously?

I have absolutely no difficulty playing games where I have to play as a dude, even though I don't have a penis. I have absolutely no difficulty playing games where the main protagonist is black, Asian or otherwise non-white, even though I'm white.

Do you think black gamers find it difficult to play as Gordon Freeman or Guybrush Threepwood? Seriously? Have you found it hard to play as Chell or CJ or Altair because they're not white? Harder than playing an animal like Conker or Sonic, or a robot like Mega Man?

I think sometimes people should read what they wrote and have a think about what they are saying.

 

[Digitaldreamer7]

your list can be topped with lists where the protagonist isn't white or male just as easy. I'll stray away from non human characters.

God of war series (kratos is a black man covered in the ashes of his family)
Tomb Raider
GTA games (CJ and some non typical white males have been protagonists)
Metroid (samus is a woman)
Mario 2 (the princess has her own role)
Street Fighter (each charater has a fleshed out story and chun li is an asian female)
Mortal Kombat (each charater has a fleshed out story and jax was black, sonya was a white female)
Shadows of the damned
50 cent: Bulletproof
El Shaddai (white but not your typical white american)
Prince of Persia (white but not your typical white american)
Portal 1 and 2 (white female)
L4D1
L4D2
Killer7
Prey
Beyond Good and Evil
Parasite Eve 1
Parasite Eve 2
Afro Samurai
Just Cause
Just Cause 2
Stranglehold
Spwan (nothing recent gen, but he's a black guy and has video games)
Men of valor (black male lead)
crackdown
dead or alive 3
turok
Bayonetta
Bloodrayne
Gears of war
Final Fantasy 7



These are just a few of the ones off the top of my head. Some are iconic games such as tomb raider, metroid, God of war, and Portal.

Yes do white men make up a big chunk of the pie? Absolutely, due to the demographic the business is catering to. But other races do have lead characters in video games and are very well represented.

 

[Risingblade]

Only because Game developers can't make non-white characters without resorting to stereotypes. I'm sure there are exceptions like...

 

[Laser Priest]

Face it, most of the major demographic are going to have trouble playing as a Muslim Black-Latino Hermaphrodite.

Seriously? Seriously?

I have absolutely no difficulty playing games where I have to play as a dude, even though I don't have a penis. I have absolutely no difficulty playing games where the main protagonist is black, Asian or otherwise non-white, even though I'm white.

Do you think black gamers find it difficult to play as Gordon Freeman or Guybrush Threepwood? Seriously? Have you found it hard to play as Chell or CJ or Altair because they're not white? Harder than playing an animal like Conker or Sonic, or a robot like Mega Man?

I think sometimes people should read what they wrote and have a think about what they are saying.

Congratu-fucking-lations. "Most of the major demographic" does not mean "FUCKING EVERYBODY"

I think sometimes people should read what others wrote and think what they are saying.