This Issue of Racial Diversity in Video Games

As an African-American gamer, the issue of race in video games has been a concern of mine since the around the middle of my adolescence. Much like in many forms of media consumed in America, it could be quite hard to find people of color within them, especially in leading roles and in video games it's even harder. Why is that? The simple answer to that in my opinion is because we don't have many people of color in the game industry. The game industry is dominated by Western whites and the Japanese. Those people will typically make characters that look more like them, but the odd issue with that is that despite Japan being a Japanese company, they make plenty of games with white protagonists such as these following franchises: Super Mario, Metroid, Contra, Castlevania, Metal Gear, Resident Evil, and Dragon Quest. Japan might be contributing to white population in games video games considerably because a large part of their market is the Western market, but the thing is there are plenty of people of color in Western nations. It doesn't make sense even if you apply that they are taking in popular media from America, Europe, and Canada. All of our popular media isn't just full of white leads and icons. They aren't oblivious to those otherwise we wouldn't get characters like Lucky in King of Fighters, Balrog from Street Fighter, or the many Bruce Lee tributes out there.

I honestly can't put a finger to why, but mentioning those last three things brings a good subject in here. In fighting games we typically see a more diverse cast than in any other genre. Tekken and Street Fighter are probably the two with the largest diverse when it comes to representing races and cultures, but both this brings us to another point in regards to race in video games. We often end up with stereotypes.

For a while a lot of black characters in fighting games were either boxers (Balrog, TJ Combo, Dudley) or basketball players (Lucky, Sean). If there was a Latino character he would likely be Mexican and a Luchador (El Fuerte, El Blaze, King, Armor King). If the character was Native American than you had feathers, wore warpaint, and likely fought with Tomahawks (Nightwolf, T. Hawk, and Thunder). Stereotypes proceeded into other genres as well such as the famous NPC from Deus Ex, and the jive talking Cole from Gears of War. Results of these kind of characters are probably stemmed from there being a bunch of developers who have little experience with black people and there aren't many or any on their team to call them out on it. Things start to seem to be getting just slightly better however. We are getting a few more characters of color in lead roles in games, but we still have quite a ways to go.

There are some characters I like of color within video games despite the stereotypes out there. I've only played the first episode of The Walking Dead, but Lee and Clementine are two black characters that I enjoy quite a lot. They aren't stereotypical and have some depth to them. Alyx Vance from Half-Life 2 appealed to me. Her more cheerful disposition among the horrors of the world she lived in resonated with me and not to mention she has an incredible pet robot named Dog. She is also notably one of the few if the only video game character of black and Asian descent. Barret Wallace of Final Fantasy VII does have some stereotypical traits about him; he throws out profanity a lot and has a gun for an arm, but in terms of his character, he is admirable. He works for a cause to save the planet and he also is taking care of his deceased friend's daughter. The events in the game that reveal his background is one of the highlights in the Final Fantasy series.

As for characters of people of color that aren't black I can't name much that I find compelling from beyond a gameplay perspective because they are even rarer than black characters. Some examples of Native Americans outside of fighting games I can think of are the main characters from Prey, Turok, Assassin's Creed III, and I'm not sure if the character of Mark of Kri is, but if so him as well. That is relatively short and for other races and ethnic groups its about as small or even smaller. Having more diverse characters within video games will provide us with more diverse settings and stories. With an industry that often makes claim about how they are different from the competition, they often end up doing the same thing in regards to characters across most video games. For the industry to improve in this area the Western part of the industry needs to break away from the idea that games with female leads aren't profitable. Fans themselves need to break away from similar and ridiculous mindsets such as mythical creatures such as werewolves and dragons are more realistic than a black person in a game.

Depictions of race in media can have a detriment on a person's self image which is another reason why we need diversity. There is long road ahead of us, but I am certain that we will reach our destination.