What Colour is Your Hero?

A couple of days ago at GDC a panel discussion convened with the title ‘What Colour is your Hero’, discussing the role of race in game characters. I wasn’t there, sadly, as this is a subject I’ve always found interesting, instead I’ve had to rely on Michael Abbot’s fine write up to try and formulate my own ideas on the subject.

Sadly, the panel only really covered the issue of race in developer created characters, not player created ones, an issue I intend to cover in the second half of this article.

First however, I was struck by one of the panel’s opening statements, from the Brainy Gamer article:

“Consalvo led off with some startling data on depictions of characters in games. 150 games released in ’05-’06, across platforms and genres, were studied to record the appearance of every character seen by a player. A total of 8,572 characters were coded, out of which only 10.45% were female. White characters accounted for 85% of the primary characters appearing in those games. Not a single Hispanic or Native American character played a primary role in any of the games studied. Black characters depicted were overwhelmingly athletes and gang bangers.”

Firstly I find it important to mention that although I broadly agree with this statement, this survey apparently (due to either cut off dates or randomisation) does not include two of the games I have cited as examples. Just Cause (Hispanic protagonist) and Prey (Native American protagonist) were both released in 2006. While I am sure there was no attempt at deception on the part of the panel, I do feel that “Not a single Hispanic or Native American character played a primary role in any of the games studied” whilst defining terms that only just cut off both Prey and Just Cause (the former is even mentioned in the discussion) does not add weight to their argument.

So rather than simply calling for more racial diversity in games, let us first investigate those games which do feature ethnic minorities in starring roles. I feel they can be broken down roughly into three categories:

1: Ignore it

Examples: Mirror’s Edge, Left4Dead, Just Cause

In this option the character’s ethnicity is a purely cosmetic consideration at no point is their ethnicity actively considered part of their character, nor do they conform to obvious stereotypes regarding their said ethnicity. The character could just as easily be white, or any other colour, yet the developer has chosen not to do this, either because of practical considerations, aesthetics, or in a deliberate attempt to include diversity.

Both Just Cause games star a Hispanic protagonist, top CIA agent Rico Rodriguez. While neither game is noted for it’s narrative or depth of character, in both Rodriguez is depicted as highly competent and qualified, if somewhat ruthless. The conceit of the game is that the CIA are tasked with overthrowing a South American dictatorship, and while it would have been all too easy to make Rico American, developer Avalanche stuck with the sensible option of creating a character who would blend in the people of the region.

Impressively, three out of eight of the protagonists in Left4Dead games are black, the original game sported optimistic office worker Louis, while the sequel (moving to the 30% black Louisiana) doubled the number, bringing in burly American Football coach ‘Coach’ and Rochelle, a production assistant at a TV station. Valve protagonists tend to be deliberately shallow, but the Left4Dead crowd, some of the most talkative player characters they’ve ever made, never once mention race, not even in the second game, set in the Deep South.

Finally Faith, the protagonist of Mirror’s Edge has been deliberately designed with mixed race Eurasian heritage, interestingly this does not in any way impact on plot or character, nor is it (as is the case in Just Cause or Left4Dead 2) dictated by the setting. Instead her design is purely aesthetic, chosen because the designers felt that Asian features suited the look of the character they were trying to create.

Some advocates would say that this approach is unhelpful, that it merely creates ‘token’ minorities, changing a percentage of formerly white characters, without ever considering the deeper issues. However on the other hand the creator may not wish to tell a story about race, which is certainly their prerogative, yet doing so puts them in an awkward position, where if they fail to reflect a multicultural society they are lambasted, yet do not wish to be forced to deal with issues irrelevant to the story at hand. It must also be said that failing to comment on a character’s ethnicity is itself a comment it states that the race is not an issue, that society has moved beyond the need to comment on such matters. Whether the intention is to depict a post racial society or to simply blindly tick off quotas, in cannot be denied that the ‘ignore’ option in and of itself represents a powerful statement.

2: The Stereotype

Examples: Gears of War, Grand Theft Auto

The stereotype is what typically happens when a minority character is written by an unskilled writer. We all know the drill, the hip black gangster, the nerdy Asian, these are well known caricatures built largely from ignorance and self propagating, the more we see a ethnicity depicted this way, the more we assume it to be based in fact, even if we haven’t actually met a real person who conforms to these stereotypes.

Gears of War is a series that has become wildly successful yet two of it’s four major characters are non-white. While sidekick and co-op player character Dominic Santiago appears to hail from the ‘ignore’ school, Augustus ‘Cole Train’ Cole rooted tightly in the stereotype of the black athlete. Loud, ignorant and muscular, Cole is even explicitly identified as a former Football player, and he constantly whoops as if he has just scored a winning touchdown.

Meanwhile you’d be hard pressed to find a nation, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation that isn’t viscously stereotyped in a Grand Theft Auto game. While San Andreas is the most obvious in this discussion, for it’s black gang culture setting, plenty of cultures, both white and non white, have been given the same treatment. Notably Eastern Europeans in the most recent instalment. There is a longstanding debate in the games community regarding how much GTAs stereotypical characters are designed as deliberate parodies, something that has become questionable as GTA games have grown progressively more serious over time.

Interestingly both GTA and Gears of War are extremely popular with the regular, non games journalism reading, public. When we talk about racial attitudes in the gaming community, we often attribute the theoretical resistance to minority heroes to someone other than us, to the public at large. Yet the sales figures would seem to indicate many of these people own a copy of Gears of War or GTA: San Andreas.

Most advocates would consider that stereotypical minority characters do more harm than good, and they may well be right, however other factors need to be considered. One is that stereotyping in itself is no indicator of malicious or racist thought, in the cases above a large portion of the characters, both white and non-white are two dimensional stereotypes, speaking not to the racial ignorance of the writers, but to their comparative lack of skill in crafting believable characters in general. Another is that people like this do exist, as much as we do not wish to create the illusion that all black people are gangsters, some are, and sometimes their stories need to be told. Finally is that it is impossible, and indeed undesirable, to police access to police access to minority characters. If a studio announces that it’s next game is to feature a black protagonist, are we to deny them if we don’t feel they have sufficient skill to tackle the subject matter? While we can condemn stereotypes post release, attempting to prevent them from appearing in the first place in counter-productive. If we were to prevent everything that might conceivable propagate the black gangster stereotype San Andreas would not have been made, but neither would acclaimed TV show The Wire. In the end I feel that if we are to promote the use of minority characters, we must accept that stereotypes are the inevitable result of unskilled writers approaching this material.

3: Full Integration

Examples: Prince of Persia, Prey

The theoretical holy grail of most advocates, full integration is where a minority character is featured prominently, and their ethnicity and/or heritage form an integral part of their story or character. An attempt is made to construct a three dimensional character around their ethnicity and deliberately avoid stereotypes. It is important to point out that this does not necessarily mean the portrayal is flattering or indeed well written, but the attempt has clearly been made.

The Prince of Persia is possibly the most unambiguously ethnic hero you’re likely to come across, he is explicitly referred to as Persian (the ancient equivalent of modern day Iran). In fact just about every character in the Sands of Time series is either Middle Eastern or Indian in origin. While I haven’t a huge amount of experience with the original games, I’ve played and loved the Sands of Time trilogy, and it’s a truly great example of cleverly using the mythology and folklore of another region. The Prince of Persia games clearly take a lot of their ideas from the ‘Arabian Nights’ tales, and carefully tie in with them, including an appropriate hero and cast. It’s interesting to note that the Prince of Persia movie is currently in production, and stars an American (Jake Gyllenhall) and  a Brit (Gemma Arterton) in the roles of the Prince and Farah. Games 1, Hollywood 0.

Prey’s main character, Tommy is a Native American, this status is, however, more than just window dressing. The core of his character is one of a man conflicted between his heritage and modern society, he desperately wants to leave the reservation, and considers his people’s spiritual roots to be embarrassing and pointless. Even the game mechanics are built heavily on Native American concepts of spiritualism and the afterlife. It isn’t all gold however, introducing these beliefs as a physical, tangible aspect of gameplay trivialises Tommy’s conflict. Also, although I know little of real Native American beliefs, Prey’s ‘spirit world’ comes across as a rather juvenile, dumbed down version of complex beliefs. Nevertheless, not only Tommy, but all the main characters in Prey are Native American, and they all present different perspectives on their culture and beliefs. The writers of Prey are not by any stretch the most talented in the business, but nonetheless they deserve a certain amount of praise for attempting to tackle a difficult subject, even if they did not have the tact required to fully do it justice.

Both of these games demonstrate not only a three dimensional hero whose ethnicity is present but not dominant within his character, but also use the culture and folklore of their origins to weave a unique and refreshing mythology into their games. The Prince of Persia in fact was so successful that his character was carried over into the recent relaunch, despite the fact that the Arabian Nights setting was no longer present. It has also created a trend within the developer, who followed it up with the Assassin’s Creed series, which experiments with unique regional settings including the Renaissance Italy and the Middle East during the Crusades.

The Bottom Line

One of the most obvious arguments against increasing minority representation in games is that publishers are only putting out what sells, and that ‘Middle America’ is less likely to buy a game with a black hero. How do the numbers bear out with these games?

As an amateur blogger, I don’t have access to that much hard data here, but I will do what I can:

Mirror’s Edge sold a roughly one million copies in it’s first three months, although the developers expected demand to be much higher. While I could not find any hard data on the sales of Just Cause, it nevertheless did well enough to merit a sequel, despite underwhelming reviews. Left4Dead provides possibly the greatest argument for the marketability of black characters, with the second game garnering sales of 3 million in the first three months at retail (without even factoring in Steam, the primary method of distributing Valve games). Importantly it performed far better than the first game in the series, despite featuring twice as many black characters. While I would think assuming a correlation between the increased sales and minority representation to be unlikely in this case, it certainly flies in the face of any theory that relies on a negative correlation of the same kind.

Grand Theft Auto is one of the most successful franchises in the history of gaming, crucially despite San Andreas adding a black protagonist, instead of GTA 3 and Vice City’s white player character, it outperformed both it’s predecessors (although it was in turn bested by GTA 4, which sported an Eastern European main character). Gears of War, meanwhile, was hailed as a ‘system seller’ at the time and rapidly become one of the hottest properties in console gaming, although it’s sales on the PC have been far more tame.

Prey was announced to have sold 1 million copies in it’s first three months,  the developer called it a success and a sequel was announced, although not much has been heard of it since.  The Prince of Persia series meanwhile, has become one of Ubisoft’s strongest franchises, providing four main titles so far, with more planned, and spawning the aforementioned Hollywood adaptation.

Every single game I have listed here, which comprises the majority of games I could recall with ethnic player characters, has been, on some level, a success. Offering a strong suggestion that there is no discernible retail loss from featuring ethnic minority heroes, and why should there be in a world where the President of America is Mixed Race, in a world where Will Smith remains one of Hollywood’s most bankable stars? While I accept that there will always be some to whom a black hero is off putting, the figures here and in other entertainment industries strongly suggest that this is a negligible minority, that is (theoretically) offset by the increased sales amongst minorities themselves.

The sales excuse is clearly not valid in this case, any claim that is does in simply based on an overcautious attitude due to inadequate market research. There is clearly an appetite for these games out there, and there are several ways to approach the subject whilst maintaining critical and commercial success.

At this point we’ve reached the limits of my ability to answer the question, now it simply has to be asked, developers, why aren’t you making more games with non-white protagonists?

Part 2 is here. It contains a more a more personal article, regarding characters created by gamers, specifically answering the question, “What colour is my hero?”