Jul 21, 2010
I love Halo. I mean I really love Halo. If Halo was a girl in a bar, I’d probably buy Halo a drink so as to loosen Halo’s inhibitions and increase my chances of having sex with Halo. I’m considerably less attracted to Halo’s hero, Master Chief, however. He’s taller than me, for starters, he doesn’t talk much, probably can’t dance, and he has zero personality. Also, the armor would probably chafe.
Great for blasting aliens, not so much in conversation.
Worst of all, he’s boring. It’d be better if he just didn’t talk at all, then I could go about my business without pretending to care what he had to say. But he talks, and interrupts me, but he has nothing interesting to say, and he’s typical of 90% of game protagonists out there today – boring, faceless things who want me to pay attention to them, but have nothing really to add. I’m pretty sure Master Chief is like 78% of women on the planet. He’d be like 100% of women if he bitched about me taking out the trash or showering ever day.
You know who gets my attention, though? Kratos. That dude is scary, he’s human (kinda), but most importantly he’s actually got something to say, he’s gonna make an impact on your experience and by the time you’re done with that Spartan freak you’ll have a strong opinion about him one way or another. So why aren’t more characters like him? Why are developers so often content to feed us nameless, faceless, meaningless characters we couldn’t care less about? My best guess, in between fantasizing about what Halo looks like in a REALLY short skirt, is that too many developers like to play it safe, they’d rather give you something to feel ‘meh’ about than take a chance of alienating you altogether. I don’t like this.
Because it sucks.
Yeah, it sucks, and there’s really no reason for it. If you’re not going to bother developing your main character, why not go the Valve route and make them mostly nameless/faceless? I have no idea what Gordon Freeman thinks of the situations he’s put in because, well, he’s supposed to be me and when I’m playing I’m supposed to be him. Kudos to Valve for making me an MIT physicist, by the way, $60 was a lot cheaper and easier than having to be rich or, you know, smart (two things I lack in abundance).
Playing as Gordon, or Chell in Portal, gives me the opportunity to place my own persona into the character I am playing. Whatever is supposed to be felt I get to feel myself, because there’s no stupid male bimbo in the way. Can you say the same when you’re playing as Bender in Gears of War? Er, I mean Marcus Fenix, but wouldn’t you rather play as Bender? At least that guy is interesting and talks about fun stuff, like booze and hookers, two of my favorite things.
Hello, ladies. You know these muscles aren't just for show.
It really is time that developers got savvy to the idea that we maybe don’t want third rate heroes getting in the way of our first rate gameplay. I’d love to sit here and rattle off a list of games marred by poor protagonists, but you know the score; you play games, too. Who wants a Marcus or a Chief or a Hale when we can have a Kratos or a Solid Snake? Why bother trying at all when companies such as Valve and Infinity Ward have proven so well that you can create the atmosphere you want without muddling things with a shitty, middling quasi hero?
At the end of Metal Gear Solid 4, when Snake puts the gun in his mouth, I was genuinely concerned for the fate of his character. When Chief gets lost in space at the end of Halo 3, the best I could muster in terms of caring was hoping Cortana didn’t nag him into a murder suicide. I had to create a fantasy just to get closure. There are so many great examples of both empathetic characters and brilliant avatars in gaming, I’ll never feel content with developers who are so lazy as to simply fit me with yet another empty, heavy gun.
I've thought the same before about Chief. He's pretty much a silent protagonist while you're in control, rarely if ever actually talking even when being given orders or spoken to, but then he talks in the cutscenes and he's just kind of a stoic military guy (and obviously Valve and Infinity Ward never take you out of first-person and into cutscenes). The Arbiter is a more interesting character.
It's rare that we get something like a Duke Nukem in first-person shooters, where his personality is stamped all through the game with his one-liners and actions. Nathan Drake is a more modern one but then he's strictly third-person, the character is always present, much like Kratos or Snake.
I prefer the silent protagonist in my games.
Playing HL2 I was adding in my own lines as Gordon as the game progressed. Like in the beginning when those troops raid the building you're in. I was all like " Looks like those guys are after some poor guy...oh wait, they're after me!!" Or my added commentary when I was with Alex. In way it lets you use your imagination more, and is a better experience compared to scripted dialog you don't have a say in.
Maybe that's why I like Mass Effect so much. Sure he has dialog, but I get to chu-chu-choose it. I get to add my personality to Shepard as the game progresses, and make decisions I think are best. I play Renegade most the time, but I do have some kind of soul and make Paragon choices here and there when it comes to saving the galaxy.
if i can actually decide how my character interacts with the world as a personality, i like it, but half-life games arae perfect example of a silent protagonist kiliing it for me. if i'm in first-person, i need to feel like i'm that character, and i talk a fair bit. this chump doesn't say a word.
Playing HL2 I was adding in my own lines as Gordon as the game progressed. Like in the beginning when those troops raid the building you're in. I was all like " Looks like those guys are after some poor guy...oh wait, they're after me!!" Or my added commentary when I was with Alex. In way it lets you use your imagination more, and is a better experience compared to scripted dialog you don't have a say in.