Do You Care About Race in Games?

There were several pieces up this past weekend, and a resulting lively dialogue, about the role that race plays in videogames. Game|Life talks very cogently on the subject, which got kick-started by a post on the microscopiq site highlighting important black game characters. The article asks "Jade Is Black?", highlighting the role that racial ambiguity can have in making a player empathize with a title's protagonist. Writes Kohler: "Video games put the control of the main character into the player's hands. They ask us to become the character. It's easier for anybody to identify with Jade because Jade can stand in for anything. Ellis wants more black characters in video games, and Jade, if we go by the layout of his article, is his number-one favorite. It is quite possible that he felt a stronger connection with Jade than with other game characters who are definitely black. What does that say about the power of racial ambiguity? " So, do you care about race in videogames? If so, how so?

Missing several black characters...

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

The author is missing several key black characters I remember along the way, some from the 1980's. MIKE TYSON from Mike Tyson's Punch-Out. The black player from Smash TV. (I don't remember ever fighting over who got to play who.) MICHAEL JORDAN from Jordan vs. Bird. (Believe me, no one wasn't buying this game to play as Bird.) JAX from Mortal Kombat.

No

[Madpony]

No, I do not.

Re:Color doesn't matter, character type does.

[Anonymous Coward]

"but if I want a strong tough battle hardened character, I'll probably take a black guy"

How is that not racist?

GTA: San Andreas

[serial_crusher]

I was a little perturbed when GTA: San Andreas brought out a black protagonist. Not because I'm racist or anything, but because the game had previously centered around white Mafiosos. A black character brought all sorts of racial stereotypes with him, which had to be incorporated in the game. I was afraid the game would involve more street-gang type crime, instead of the grandiose organized crime that you saw in the previous games. In the end, they did a good job of fusing the two together though.

Depends on the game

[Rob Kaper]

For games where different races represent different starting properties: I'd care only because of those properties.

For games where different races exist with the purpose of having a more personal experience by means of an avatar: hell yes and not just race either. Kind of pointless to have a customised avatar if you can't even customise these basic differences in appearance.

For any other game: not at all. I'm no hedgehog, Japanese prince(ss) or Italian plumber either, but that that never stopped me from playing any of those games.

Applies for nationalities as well, playing some loony state in C&C Red Alert squirmish was more fun than being US/Russia *once* again, while when properties don't matter I'd surely pick a nation I actually like.

Re:This is an issue because....?

[TubeSteak]

It's easier to imagine myself as a Japanese guy if I'm playing as a samurai than it would be for me to imagine that somehow my honky ass is accepted by the townsfolk without question in feudal Japan.

You must not have seen that movie.
It had Tom Cruise in it
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0325710/ [imdb.com]

Re:Blacks over represented

[king-manic]

source PDF [cab-acr.ca]
Source HTML [64.233.167.104]

-excerpt from link:
"Primary Recurring Characters: White (80%), African
American (15%), Latino/Hispanic (2.0%), Asian/Pacific
Islander (0.8%), Multiracial (0.6%), Native American (0.3%),
Indian/Pakistani (0.3%), Apparent Minority (0.3%),
Arab/Middle Eastern (0.1%)"

It's the first reference I found. It's an ip address because it's a google digest of a pdf. I had different numbers from another study. but the general gist is right. The actual proportions of race in the us are:

White 74.67%
African American 12.12%
Asian and Pacific Islander 4.46%
Other 5.99%

source [wikipedia.org]