Character Creation in Video Games — Immortallium’s Blog
I’ve recently finished playing Dragon Age: Origins and have begun playing its sequel Dragon Age II. One of the first things you will do when starting one of these games is designing the character that you will be guiding throughout the adventure (although Dragon Age II did briefly concern me that I might not be able to do so). This made me think about how enjoyable character creation in video games can be and thought it might be interesting to examine the topic.
The history of character creation in video games can be traced back to tabletop role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest and many others which saw players create a character by choosing their race, gender, stats, skills, background etc. Understandably, when video game developers began to design video game RPGs, many were inspired by these tabletop role-playing games and adapted many of their systems into gameplay.
While undoubtedly associated with RPGs, character creation is by no means restricted to them and can be found in a variety of video game genres such as simulation games like the Sims and Stardew Valley, fighting games such as Soulcalibur and the WrestleMania series and even hack and slash games such as the Dynasty Warriors series.
One of the more entertaining aspects of character creation in video games is designing your character visually. Originally, you would have preset choices that you could pick from when it came to your character’s face and body. While offering a way to differentiate your character, it could still feel quite restrictive. Since then, the industry has moved towards sliders which allow you to adjust your character in a more granular way. While this allows for greater customisation, it’s worth pointing out that many people can find this system quite intimidating and many simply use some presets and proceed quickly to the game.
However, there is a flaw when it comes to creating characters in video games. Unlike in a tabletop role-playing game where a gamemaster can adjust the world to take into account the background of your character, a video game is less capable of making these adjustments. To try to counteract this problem, some video games offer you several background or origin options that give you some choice when it comes to how your character fits into the world. However, this can still feel quite restrictive to the storytelling and it’s interesting to note that many JRPGs and some Western RPGs decide to give you a predefined character that has a more detailed background and more complex relationships with many of the characters in the story.
Even with this flaw, it can be argued that being allowed to create a character is more true to the nature of role-playing and many people can feel very attached to them. I know for sure that I’ve felt strongly attached to many of the characters that I’ve created in games such as Dark Souls, Dragon Age, Stardew Valley and many others. Even though there is something to be said for having a predefined character, for instance my favourite game of all time, Final Fantasy IX, has a predefined character in the from of Zidane, I still feel that character creation is important to the essence of video games as it’s interactive, something that traditional media such as films, TV series, books etc. cannot replicate.
When it comes to character creation in video games, I have to say that I and many others greatly enjoy this process and I’m looking forward to seeing how video game developers continue to improve these systems. Let me know your thoughts on character creation in video games, which ones you have enjoyed most, whether you think being allowed to create a character is better or worse than being given a preset character and any additional information you might have on the topic.
Thanks for reading and if you wish to seek any of the titles I mentioned, don’t hesitate to use amazon.co.uk or amazon.com for all of your needs! For further recommendations of JRPGs, feel free to follow my curator page on Steam “ JRPG Reviews “ for thoughts and opinions on any JRPGs that I play.
Originally published at https://immortalliumblog.com on January 11, 2021.