Games Starring Positive Portrayals of Black People

[Nz17]

I feel like I'm walking on egg shells... in a minefield. But I've been thinking about this topic lately, and I wanted to get some genuine feedback and thought going on here.

What are some games which star fictional, black "good role models?" (I'd write African-Americans, but not all "black people" are Americans, nor are all dark-skinned people originated from Africa). And I'm definitely not trying to offend anyone, so please try not to be offensive.

What games am I looking for? I'm not looking for sports games as those usually feature a black player due to his skill at his particular sport and that player is usually not the only choice. And let's not count games where you use a random character generator or where you design the look of a character or other things like that where who you play as is up to a player's design. And as we are talking about "good guys," let's not include games where the main playable character is a gangster or a rapper or a convict or a "violent criminal."

We are talking about games featuring a playable main character who is black and is working to save the world or working for the betterment of mankind and who will always (or mostly) choose the path of righteousness.

And while we are broaching the topic, what are your theories on why there are so few games featuring playable black people, and why do you think there are so few featuring good characters that are black? We have all sorts of games, especially in the 80's and 90's, where the hero is white or pale-skinned, but so few where the protagonist is black.

In the beginning of computer/video gaming, there were no humans portrayed in the games, just non-human objects like numbers or paddles or spaceships, so there wasn't this situation initially. Then graphics improved enough to begin showing recognizable representations of humans, and that's when things got started in this topic. Just imagine what it would have been like if the main hero in Dragon Warrior was black, or the warriors from Gauntlet, or the guys from Contra, or even Pitfall Harry. Nothing would have to be changed about the story, and yet these games feature your usual pale-skinned heroes, often due to the designers of the games being Caucasian or Japanese.

Some might say, "It doesn't matter," or "It's all about the gameplay." I understand what you mean, but if it truly "doesn't matter," then why are there so few black characters starring in video games?

[celerystalker]

I can think of a few off the top of my head:
Streets of Rage
Industrial Spy
Quartet
Space Raiders
Choaniki
Dynamite Cop
Michael Jordan in Chaos in the Windy City
Shaq Fu
Power Punch II
Eternal Darkness
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Cyber Lip
Forgotten Worlds

There's a start, anyway.

Anyhow, as for theories, I'd say a lot of classic games were developed in Japan, which has had somewhat of a Xenophobic history, so I'd hazard a guess that many Japanese-developed games were developed with Japanese characters in mind. People tend to create from that with which they are familiar. When white people tell stories, they tend to be about white people. When black people tell stories, they tend to be about black people.

If anything, especially in regard to early game development, I'd say that there weren't enough black developers out there getting to tell the stories they wanted to tell. If racism were to be a factor, I wouldn't say it was from game designers who made the games so much as a lack of opportunities for black game creators, whether from the hiring process or education system that failed to get black creators into that field.

[kupomogli]

I honestly wouldn't really care what color character I played as, but for games in the 80s and 90s, all I can remember is Final Fantasy 7, Shadow Man, and a couple Spawn games.

[Koa Zo]

MC Kids and Global Gladiators

[Gentlegamer]

*not sure if DP or tumblr*

[bb_hood]

And while we are broaching the topic, what are your theories on why there are so few games featuring playable black people, and why do you think there are so few featuring good characters that are black? We have all sorts of games, especially in the 80's and 90's, where the hero is white or pale-skinned, but so few where the protagonist is black.

In the beginning of computer/video gaming, there were no humans portrayed in the games, just non-human objects like numbers or paddles or spaceships, so there wasn't this situation initially. Then graphics improved enough to begin showing recognizable representations of humans, and that's when things got started in this topic. Just imagine what it would have been like if the main hero in Dragon Warrior was black, or the warriors from Gauntlet, or the guys from Contra, or even Pitfall Harry. Nothing would have to be changed about the story, and yet these games feature your usual pale-skinned heroes, often due to the designers of the games being Caucasian or Japanese.



Many, if not most games in the 80s/90s were designed by Japanese, and Japan never had a large demographic of black people. In many cases, I dont think we can be sure that these 'white' main characters are caucasian rather than asian.

What about Michael Jackson's moonwalker? He was a good role model.. for awhile at least.
Also what about Mr. Game & Watch? Not saying he is black but hes definitly not pale skinned.



People tend to create from that with which they are familiar. When white people tell stories, they tend to be about white people. When black people tell stories, they tend to be about black people.

When Japanese people tell stories they tend to be about Italian plumbers.

[SparTonberry]

I can't remember. Was Michael Jackson still black when Moonwalker came out or had he already begun to turn white?

[Emperor Megas]

A few 80's and 90's games had alternate black second player characters, and they were generally selectable in single payer mode. A few I can think of are:

Global Gladiators (Mack)
Forgotten Worlds (Unknown Solider 2)
NARC (Hitman)
Smash T.V. (Player 2)
Toobin' (Jet)
Total Carnage (Player 2)

These are always alternate player though, which makes since considering that blacks are an extreme minority in most of the markets that video games are sold. There are a lot of brawlers and vs. fighters that had black playable characters as well. There are also games that are centered around black characters that already exist in other forms (comic book and film characters for example). I'd wager this is the case with most games centered in black lead characters.

At any rate, you can add Sheva from Resident Evil 5 to the list.

[Nebagram]

Final Fantasy VII was the first one that sprang to mind for me too. Maybe Jax from Mortal Kombat? He's ostensibly one of the good guys, as good as anyone can be in that franchise.

[Gamevet]

Burning Rangers has a black character named Big Landman. He can be unlocked as a playable character on a couple of levels after completing the game as Shou, or Tillis.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/saturn/196841-burning-rangers/cheats

[Hep038]

The Walking Dead is a modern game with a leading black character.

[Nz17]

*not sure if DP or tumblr*

A forum is what you make of it.


When white people tell stories, they tend to be about white people. When black people tell stories, they tend to be about black people.

True, except a lot of anime in the 1970's and 1980's featured black characters. They were almost always part of a squad or a team or the officers on the bridge. Not the main protagonist, true, but since that time a lot less black characters have shown up in Japanese media.


These are always alternate player though.

Exactly. It's only a little difficult naming games with pre-made playable black characters that are good people, but it's actually pretty tough to name games with a pre-made playable black character that is a good person and that is the only playable character or the primary playable character.


At any rate, you can add Sheva from Resident Evil 5 to the list.

What was her character like? Noble?


Mike Tyson

Fails on two counts:


I'm not looking for sports games as those usually feature a black player due to his skill at his particular sport and that player is usually not the only choice. And as we are talking about "good guys," let's not include games where the main playable character is a gangster or a rapper or a convict or a "violent criminal."


The Walking Dead is a modern game with a leading black character.

What was her character like? Could you play the whole thing through an "honorable path?"

[Emperor Megas]

What was her character like? Noble?Yes, I'd say so; to the point of being a tad one dimensional.

[YoshiM]

What about Crackdown 2? Never played it but from artwork and stills it looked like the protagonist was black.

[skaar]

I like a lot of modern games that take the approach of "make whatever character you like look however you like" - let your actions define your character.

[Jibbajaba]

Tecmo Bowl. Fucking Bo Jackson, bruh.

[Gameguy]

Tecmo Bowl. Fucking Bo Jackson, bruh.
Careful, you don't want your post to get moved or deleted.


The rational reason to remove what was there is that what you wrote didn't belong there. The topic is supposed to be about fictional, good black people who are not sports figures. It's all right there in the second paragraph.

I would go with Barret from Final Fantasy VII.

Here's a bigger list of characters. They're not sorted out between fictional and real, or positive or not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_black_video_game_characters

[ALAKA]

Cyborg for Commodore 64.

[Spartacus]

Posts disappearing? That's odd :(
Anyhow, I remembered Captain Benjamin Sisko in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Crossroads of Time on the SNES and Genesis.

[CDiablo]

What about Crackdown 2? Never played it but from artwork and stills it looked like the protagonist was black.

Crackdown is all create a character and next to no story other than them being a cop killing baddies(love that game) though the black create a character is the face of the game on certain box covers.

TBH I can't really think of many characters(good or bad leads) in gaming that are black. I would guess that black people make up less than %5 of all hardcore gamers(taking in North America, Europe and Japan as the top gaming consumers) in addition to a (guess again) <%5 of game designers so the games reflect this. Combine this with how many games do not have a static human hero(either create a character or non human protagonist) and you are not going to see many black or indian skinned people in gaming.

[Mangar]

Boxing on the Atari 2600

8940

[E Nice]

Mortal Kombat: Special Forces starred Jax and his fight against the Black Dragon clan. I never did finish this game, only remember you were able to fight against Jarek, and that it was a boring game.

[ALAKA]

Protoype 2's main character hero is James Heller. Although he is made to be angry all the time and he typically uses foul language when he speaks so not exactly sure if anyone would consider it a 100% positive portrayal.

Example of his salty language:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuS6ZJrfZXQ

[Daria]

What was her character like? Could you play the whole thing through an "honorable path?"

Walking Dead: He. And absolutely. Although in the first episode he's on his way to prison for a murder he didn't commit. But the entire game revolves around moral choices and his attempts to protect a little girl from zombies.

[Daria]

In "I have no Mouth" there's Ellen. She's one of 5 protagonists, who in all honesty have personal flaws (which is a big part of the story). She's ultimately a good person though and has to come to grips with her irrational fear of the color yellow (spoiler: she was raped by a man in yellow).

The "white" guys all have way more horrible stories. One's a wife beater, one's a coward, one's a pathological liar, and the other is a Nazi war criminal.

[kupomogli]

I remembered another one.

Mark from Persona.

http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/megaten/persona-mark1.jpg

*edit*

This one might go over a lot of peoples heads. I don't want to give it away though.

[Emperor Megas]

Boxing on the Atari 2600

8940
LOL Yeah, probably the first ever.

[Haoie]

Sazh from Final Fantasy XIII. Does he count?

[kupomogli]

I remembered another one.

Mark from Persona.

Since no one got it, depending on whether you were in the west or Japan, the character named Mark in Revelations Persona was a different color. On SMT Persona, the remake for the PSP, he was white on all versions. Apparently because of how he acted/spoke, Atlus USA made him black.

https://cheapbossattack.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/persona-mark.jpg

[Aussie2B]

I got it, but I had nothing to say about it previously. Your information on the origin of the character is all wrong, though. The game is set in Japan, and the characters are all Japanese. None of them are white. The character's original name is Masao. He's just the tip of the iceberg of the changes made to Westernize the game, since back in those days they thought the Japanese names and setting would alienate players. They all had their names and race changed.

[kupomogli]

I got it, but I had nothing to say about it previously. Your information on the origin of the character is all wrong, though. The game is set in Japan, and the characters are all Japanese. None of them are white. The character's original name is Masao. He's just the tip of the iceberg of the changes made to Westernize the game, since back in those days they thought the Japanese names and setting would alienate players. They all had their names and race changed.

Okay, thanks for the clarification. I've only played Revelations Persona. Though to be fair, calling them white I don't think would matter that much. How many Japanese characters are actually portrayed as Japanese and not white? Whether Japanese locations or fictional, most characters look much closer to a portrayal of a white character than Japanese one in many games and anime. Ninja Scroll is very Japanese, but both Jubei and Gemma are a much closer resemblance to a westerner than a Japanese character. The main character and main villain of the movie.

The Japanese only have themselves to blame by not making the portrayal of the characters more identifiable to themselves. Any confusion comes from them.

[Daria]

Since no one got it, depending on whether you were in the west or Japan, the character named Mark in Revelations Persona was a different color. On SMT Persona, the remake for the PSP, he was white on all versions. Apparently because of how he acted/spoke, Atlus USA made him black.

https://cheapbossattack.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/persona-mark.jpg


I wonder why they felt it was necessary to change the hat? Did they think the old one was a tinge stereotypical once his skin tone was altered?

[Aussie2B]

Okay, thanks for the clarification. I've only played Revelations Persona. Though to be fair, calling them white I don't think would matter that much. How many Japanese characters are actually portrayed as Japanese and not white? Whether Japanese locations or fictional, most characters look much closer to a portrayal of a white character than Japanese one in many games and anime. Ninja Scroll is very Japanese, but both Jubei and Gemma are a much closer resemblance to a westerner than a Japanese character. The main character and main villain of the movie.

The Japanese only have themselves to blame by not making the portrayal of the characters more identifiable to themselves. Any confusion comes from them.

Uh, every Japanese character is seen as Japanese in Japan. Anime/manga-style isn't exactly a realistic representation of any race, and people among a race don't all look the same either. It's only Westerners projecting themselves on the media that they automatically assume that the characters look/are white.

[Daria]

Uh, every Japanese character is seen as Japanese in Japan. Anime/manga-style isn't exactly a realistic representation of any race, and people among a race don't all look the same either. It's only Westerners projecting themselves on the media that they automatically assume that the characters look/are white.

Not saying this is definitive. But, clearly some Japanese people think anime characters look Japanese:

https://youtu.be/2DhoBuU1Dtc?t=2m6s

[NYLatenite]

Marshal John Dalton - Unreal 2

[Ozzy_98]

I can think of a few off the top of my head:
Choaniki


Ummm... You sure you're thinking of the right game?

[Gamevet]

Boxing on the Atari 2600

8940

I'm guessing that you are just kidding.



What games am I looking for? I'm not looking for sports games as those usually feature a black player due to his skill at his particular sport and that player is usually not the only choice.

[celerystalker]

Ummm... You sure you're thinking of the right game?

Yes. Adon and Samson are portayed as powerful, heroic, and purely good.

[The S]

What games am I looking for? I'm not looking for sports games as those usually feature a black player due to his skill at his particular sport and that player is usually not the only choice. And let's not count games where you use a random character generator or where you design the look of a character or other things like that where who you play as is up to a player's design. And as we are talking about "good guys," let's not include games where the main playable character is a gangster or a rapper or a convict or a "violent criminal."


Rapper doesn't necessarily equate anything bad, whether bad influence or criminal.

[Emperor Megas]

Yeah, that was probably an unfortunate short hand or oversight. He probably meant 'gangster' rapper, or one of an unsavory variety.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

Walking Dead: He. And absolutely. Although in the first episode he's on his way to prison for a murder he didn't commit. But the entire game revolves around moral choices and his attempts to protect a little girl from zombies.

You must not have played the game all the way through. Lee wasn't falsely accused - through certain choices, he openly admits to Clem that he killed the man his wife was having an affair with. That's canon.

Even so, I still see Lee as a positive portrayal of a black person in games if you choose to mold him that way. You can also make Lee into a silent creep or a raging asshole, it's up to the player. My point is it's up to the player to choose who Lee is after he's convicted of murder and the game begins.

[Daria]

You must not have played the game all the way through. Lee wasn't falsely accused - through certain choices, he openly admits to Clem that he killed the man his wife was having an affair with. That's canon.

Even so, I still see Lee as a positive portrayal of a black person in games if you choose to mold him that way. You can also make Lee into a silent creep or a raging asshole, it's up to the player. My point is it's up to the player to choose who Lee is after he's convicted of murder and the game begins.

No I did. Just been a long time. :/ Whoops.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

My point is, Lee isn't a stereotypical black man. It might seem that way since the game begins with a black guy arrested for murder, but it was a situation that had nothing to do with ethnicity, and I don't think that anything of his character would have changed had be been white, a woman, or whatever. The Walking Dead lets the player mold Lee.

[BlastProcessing402]

Why would anyone say Barrett from FF7? If people weren't already going to consider his Mr. T mannerisms problematic in current year, he's also literally a terrorist.

[Zap!]

Forgotten Worlds

I dunno, I always thought he was a guido who hit the tanning bed a lot, or possibly Hispanic. :)

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Z1RhqEgj_5w/Uz8J2PWspGI/AAAAAAAAMVo/1GTYBRASKXY/s1600/forwor1.png

[Zap!]

LOL Yeah, probably the first ever.

Not even close. :)

http://www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/536