Mass Effect 2 - Old Fashioned Prejudices

[Dhruin]

I'm not sure what to make of this, so I'll just turn it over to you. Omega spotted this piece at Rebel Yell that looks at racial diversity (http://unlvrebelyell.com/2010/04/12/geek-beat-state-of-the-art-graphics-old-fashioned-prejudices/) and related issues in modern games, using Mass Effect 2 as a example that looks progressive on the surface, but perhaps isn't - or so they argue:
In an interview with gaming industry blog Develop, Raven Software’s Manveer Heir says that “lack of diversity, specifically race but also gender and sexuality, is across the board with in-game characters… How often do we play as the white space marine?”
Going by that criteria, “Mass Effect 2” seems like a fairly progressive, if not outright diverse game. But let’s take a closer look.
The Commander Shepard on the game’s box – the thing that markets the game to the public – is a white male. He actually looks a lot like most other action game (and action movie) protagonists: He’s Heir’s “white space marine.”
More information. (http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/newsbit?newsbit=14786)

[Davion]

This is why the Masterchief is the best videogame hero ever. He kicks ass and isn't being a racist at the same time.

Now, if only the single player campaigns in his games were a bit better…

[JemyM]

I haven't considered Shepherds race since I am not a racist.

[DArtagnan]

Yawn......

[elkston]

Yawn……

While I don't agree that this topic in general is not worth discussing, I think he absolutely picked the wrong game to make an example of.

The Mass Effect games let you CHOOSE whatever your vision of Cmdr. Shepard happens to be. I play as a black male Cmdr. Shepard and I appreciate that Bioware gives me the flexibility to do so. Furthermore, both games feature strong black characters in prominent roles and #2 even lets you have a romance with one (if a female).

Now go back and replace every instance of "black" with "female" and the accuracy of my statements will not change. Honestly, ME2 is probably the most progressive CRPG I have ever played.

Now as a black CRPG gamer I realize I am a minority within a minority. I don't make too much of a big deal when I am "forced" to play a white character -- I focus on the game. However, when given the chance to pick my race, I'll jump at it. I don't care much how the game is marketed as long as the choice is there when I am actually playing it.

[Foreigner]

I'm not black, nor any shade of brown, but I think Bioware missed a great opportunity in not making the Kelly Chambers character black (or Pakistani/Indian/Asian, but I would have preferred black). If it's rare to have a black male game character, I can't remember the last time I saw a leading black female character. Not to mention, if they had worked that into her background she would have been a much more interesting character, and not the over-excited puppy she came across as in her early dialogue.

[Alrik Fassbauer]

I usually don't care much, although I prefer to use not green or blue skin colours, like BG1 allows the player to actually use. I hve played BG1 once with a darker skin colour, too.

What strikes me, personally, is the lack of NPCs with darker kin in most games i know of. I'd think they would be equal to the numbeer of other skin-coloured NPCs in any games, but even in Star Wars, most people are "white"-skinned. Humans, I mean.

From that perspective ... Well, Drakensang kind of reflects mediaval Europe ... But there actually *are* peoples with a darker skin ... The odd thing is only that here are so few in the game ...

I think any game just reflects the developing bureau. The philosophies, the team, the skin colours, the languages used, the philosophies, the sexes, the ages, the prejudices ... Everything. Imho.

So I'm not that much surprised. even females are in my opinion much too much underrepresented in both teams and in RPGs.

[Chekote]

I don't really care if people make games that are diverse. Developers can express themselves however they feel.

I am somewhat offended by the fact that there are sound files for a gay relationship, and they were deliberately not used while leaving the lesbian one in there. It's the same typical male homophobic crap that's in every media.

I'm not happy with the decision, but I can see why they would do it, considering their target audience.

[CraigCWB]

As far as Mass Effect 2, yes you can make the character lool however you want. However, your character will be ass ugly if you don't go with the default as the face morphing tool is much cruder than whatever they used to create their version of "Shepherd". Also, there's the name... that's a stereotypical Anglo-Saxon name. It's the equivalent of having a character named "Abdullah" and then letting people make the character look however you want him/her to look. A more generic name would have been better. And lastly, I didn't think the default male commander shepherd looked "white". I thought he looked latino. Anyway, enough about that. On to the larger issue.

In general, game developers have always made games with their target demographic in mind. That used to be young white male computer nerds. Now it's just about everyone, broadly speaking. Western game companies still target people who live in Western countries, though. As Asian game companies target people who live in Asia. Why no mention of the 2,457 South Korean and Chinese online games that feature nothing but Asian anime characters?

Bottom line is that I'm perfectly fine with game companies targeting the people they expect to sell their games to, as long as they offer a choice when it comes to player character. I can rationalize a backstory for myself to explain how I might have ended up in virtually any environment. What I can't do is rationalize for myself a backstory that explain how I am not me. An example of that would be a game where the main player character is obviously gay. I did play a game like that once, and the campy voice acting for my character was really a major turn off that resulted in me not playing the game for very long, despite it being a generally decent game otherwise. And before anyone objects to me characterizing the voice acting that way, there was a lot more going on with the story line and character interaction that made it pretty clear the main character was gay.

That's really not cool. It's not cool even if the developers did believe most of their customers were gay, which I don't think is the case. I think one or more of the developers was gay and thought that'd be pretty fun to make a game with a gay character.

And finally, not everyone wants to play a character that corresponds to their own alter0-ego. That's what I do, but the fact that in any given online game right now you'll find over 50% of the characters to be female when the stats indicate less than 10% of the players are female is pretty good evidence a lot of players are comfortable with some pretty large "virtual" identity shifts.

[DogInARocket]

I'm a white male and I can't say I've ever cared whether my avatar corresponds with that. In fact, when given the choice I actively choose something as far from my ID as possible, whether it's race, sex, age, # of arms etc.. As far as this topic is concerned all games are role-playing games. I see it as the opportunity to assume an identity other than my own and to play that role. I don't play games and say to myself.. "I'm playing ME, here; this is ME killing these goblins. This is how *I* would cast magic missile in this situation, etc." I'd never play an animated version of myself in a game, it'd be ridiculous.

[CraigCWB]

I don't play games and say to myself.. "I'm playing ME, here; this is ME killing these goblins. This is how *I* would cast magic missile in this situation, etc." I'd never play an animated version of myself in a game, it'd be ridiculous.

Is it more ridiculous than making a conscious decision that the character you are playing is NOT me? That's NOT me doing all these things? lol

Well, as somebody who has been playing RPGs since before there were computer versions I can testify to the fact that's pretty unusual. People always tended to create and play characters that roughly corresponded to their own personalities. I personally think the trend towards moving away from that in recent years is mainly because people aren't even playing RPGs anymore, they are just playing games that call themselves that.

To each his own, though. Which is what this discussion is really all about :)

[Arhu]

People always tended to create and play characters that roughly corresponded to their own personalities.
Indubitably. When it comes to different people, however, you may have to take varying degrees of "detachment" into account. Some like ROLE-playing, others prefer role-PLAYING.

I always tend to play more along the lines of how I, personally, would act if I were in the shoes of the character I'm playing. Others don't care about this sort of "acting out" too much and just play along, or in other words they think more of how their character would act, not how they would act as their character. And then there are gamers who are even more detached and play, say, as a total jackass because they think it's funny. That's normally just ... playing, nothing to do with roles.

[DogInARocket]

Is it more ridiculous than making a conscious decision that the character you are playing is NOT me? That's NOT me doing all these things? lol

Well, as somebody who has been playing RPGs since before there were computer versions I can testify to the fact that's pretty unusual. People always tended to create and play characters that roughly corresponded to their own personalities. I personally think the trend towards moving away from that in recent years is mainly because people aren't even playing RPGs anymore, they are just playing games that call themselves that.

To each his own, though. Which is what this discussion is really all about :)

All I was saying was ridiculous (to me) was the idea of a literal computer representation of myself in a game setting, not the inner dialogue stuff of the preceding sentence.

I'll defer to your stated credentials and accept what you say is the majority. I don't mind being unusual.:)

[CraigCWB]

Arhu, that was a great synopsis of some of the different "releplaying' philosophies :)

All I was saying was ridiculous (to me) was the idea of a literal computer representation of myself in a game setting, not the inner dialogue stuff of the preceding sentence.

I'll defer to your stated credentials and accept what you say is the majority. I don't mind being unusual.:)

Oh, I'm not in the majority anymore. Far from it. I was talking about the old days. I'm totally baffled by what I see people doing in online RPGs these days.

[JuliusMagnus]

Indubitably. When it comes to different people, however, you may have to take varying degrees of "detachment" into account. Some like ROLE-playing, others prefer role-PLAYING.

I always tend to play more along the lines of how I, personally, would act if I were in the shoes of the character I'm playing. Others don't care about this sort of "acting out" too much and just play along, or in other words they think more of how their character would act, not how they would act as their character. And then there are gamers who are even more detached and play, say, as a total jackass because they think it's funny. That's normally just … playing, nothing to do with roles.

Then there are those who play a female character simply because they like to look at a female derrière.

[elkston]

I'm not black, nor any shade of brown, but I think Bioware missed a great opportunity in not making the Kelly Chambers character black (or Pakistani/Indian/Asian, but I would have preferred black). If it's rare to have a black male game character, I can't remember the last time I saw a leading black female character.

You're right. Black females are exceptionally rare in these type of games. Hell in ANY games. When the designers are thinking of love interests in particular, they stick to what they are familiar with. The kind of women they lust after.

It is a known fact that the sexuality of black women is downplayed by popular media. When they aren't being ignored completely, they are often presented as "bossy", angry, or otherwise a-sexual. Of course there are exceptions, but the general fact remains -- if a white guy wants to find out what I already KNOW about black women (that they are sexy and desirable) he's got to do his own legwork.

[Zloth]

Surprisingly, only 10 percent of playable characters are women – not even remotely representing real-world population.
But very close to the game player population - at least for action games.

What baffles me is the lack of asian characters. Look at Final Fantasy 13's playable characters: five white, one black. This is a game made in Japan with a huge Japanese audience. The other FF games seem similar. Xenosaga - all white. The Last Remnant had dozens of human characters - almost all white. What's going on here!?

ME2 was definitely not the best pick for a game to examine. You interact with a heck of a lot of 'aliens' that don't fit into any racial classification. Plus it is set well into the future so, if you really want to check for accurate race balance, you have to guess at what the racial mix will be at that time.

Edit: Elkston, want I should play my Tesslah (http://www.wegame.com/view/Charged_Bolt_5/sizes/) character around more game designers, then? ;)

[JDR13]

What baffles me is the lack of asian characters. Look at Final Fantasy 13's playable characters: five white, one black. This is a game made in Japan with a huge Japanese audience. The other FF games seem similar. Xenosaga - all white. The Last Remnant had dozens of human characters - almost all white. What's going on here!?

There's nothing surprising about that at all. It's not really about race, Japanese gamers simply prefer the anime style characters, which typically look more Caucasian.

[Thaurin]

Now go back and replace every instance of "black" with "female"

Okay.

I play as a female male Cmdr. Shepard and I appreciate that

I am outraged at my inability to play a transvestite Commander Shepard! Out of protest, I will not subscribe to your newsletter!

I'll shut up now. What was the article about again? :-/

[Alrik Fassbauer]

Why not play Cats and Dogs, then ? ;)

I mean - if it all doesn't matter, after all … ;)

Seriously, I'd like to see the experiment to play a Unicorn - I'm totally "into" unicorns, they are my far favourite fantasy creatures ;) - but that would be very, very, very difficult, not only because it would mean one would have to "think down" of how to fill that role, but also, because developers and designers would have different approaches as how a Unicorn would be - maybe even differently from country tio country. I'd expect japanese developers seeing them differently than american ones or european ones.

And that leads over to another point: To cultural differences. Not racial ifferences, but cultural ones.

Someone once used the term of "cultural races" within humanity. I think this is an interesting approach. There aren't genes that make people kind of "incomptible" with one nother, but rather there are cultures whoch do it. Lovers from two different cultures always have it quite hard.

I hve never met people from so different cultures, but i once had a deep friendship with a lovable woman from Siberia. She was highly intelligent (she was originally a doctor, actually), and I learned quite a lot about her and her culture. Yet there were some things between us that were just "cultural differences". At a few points we couldn't understand one another, and we had to ask a lot as what meant the ther one. Unfortunately she had a new frind at one point, and after the learning course we were in broke up, our ways parted. I haven't seen her since then, unfortunately.

Germany has the policy to "accept" people who have German ancestors in what's now Russia, for example. These families have been living there for generations (which means for a few hundred ears), and now they come back.

They have grave difficulties with integrating in German society. They might still speak German with an ancient accent, but their culture is different from our current culture. Hence their difficulties to integrate.

We don't see these cultural differences that much in games. Rather between aliens than between humans.


Of course there are exceptions, but the general fact remains — if a white guy wants to find out what I already KNOW about black women (that they are sexy and desirable) he's got to do his own legwork.

And perhaps vice versa. ;) I mean, here in Germany i have often the impression as if people rather cose to stick with one another, than to "opn" each group … It' a bit difficult to put down into words.
My impression of the U.S. is that the groups are more open to one another, so to say, because they just live in the same towns for so long. The society often appears to me to be rther "mixed-through" than i know it from here, so to say.


One good thing in becoming older and mture is imho that things like the colours of skin and/or cultures on't matter that much anymore.

Becaue everyone knows, if there was really love striking like a lighning, then it wouldn't care at all.

At one point I began to leave it all behind me. At one point, only the sympathy is important, neither skin colour nor culture.

[DeepO]

Out of all the articles whose sole purpose seems to be to generate some traffic via namedropping Mass Effect 2, this one is particularly pathetic. Just lol.

Some like ROLE-playing, others prefer role-PLAYING.
Personally, when I play the game for the first time, it´s in the vein of how I would act in the shoes of the protagonist. For any potential replay, the more detached approach it is, especially since I can´t really "roleplay myself" anymore for the reason of having metaknowledge gained in the first playthrough.

Then there are those who play a female character simply because they like to look at a female derrière.
Or, as is the case of Mass Effect, those who find female character has more … character (mainly thanks to voice acting).

[Tragos]

I don't get why race/sex are that important in gaming , to tell the truth i have never thought that some people take notes on this stuff.

[KnightPT]

I honestly think people (in this case a person who writes in a website), have too much time on their hands and too little real things to talk about.


This whole issue is a waste of time. Who in the hell cares if the hero of a computer game is human, or alien, black or white, man or woman, american or european, asian or indian. In my humble opinion, the people who actualy care are the ones with the biggest prejudice, not the people (like me) who didnt even notice that shepard is "a prototype", just played the game, had fun, finished it, re-done it, and put it aside for a couple of months until a new playthrough.

Honestly, write about important stuff, leave the revolutionary mumbo-jumbo to stuff that realy matters, not a video game.

[lostforever]

I don't get why race/sex are that important in gaming , to tell the truth i have never thought that some people take notes on this stuff.

You must be new to RPGs then. Its for the same reason why you see countless threads in forums about people wanting gay/hetro/whatever romance in games etc.

I *think* people want the games they play to identify with them in some level.

[Tragos]

You must be new to RPGs then. Its for the same reason why you see countless threads in forums about people wanting gay/hetro/whatever romance in games etc.

I *think* people want the games they play to identify with them in some level.

I am not new to RPGs but to tell you the truth i don't like romance in (most) games .
If i get you right you are saying that very few played as a female redguard in TES games.... not true .
The whole "identify" issue is RPG defeating if people play a game more than once unless humans can play themselves as a good , a bad or an ugly woman or dude and feel like home both inside an assassin and a monk .

[SveNitoR]

Honestly, write about important stuff, leave the revolutionary mumbo-jumbo to stuff that really matters, not a video game.

One could argue that it is important since computer games like this one helps to maintain the white, heterosexual, male norm as though it is the natural first choice.

I think it is good to make people aware of their own prejudice. Everyone is prejudiced, no matter if they think about ethnicity, culture, age, sex, etc., or not. That is simply how our brains work.

[Zloth]

SveNitoR beat me to the punch. These kinds of things DO end up mattering. If all the important people you see, real or fictional, are almost always white males then you are going to start associating them with success. Period. I don't care how smart you think you are or how fair you think you are. If all we had to do was decide that all races are equal, racism would have died out long ago.

[ortucis]

Heroes being white, Americans saving the world, aliens attacking only America (or some some random video feed, show the destroyed lesser world who couldn't fight). The only other race they bother adding are Africans or Chinese as side-kicks.

Same old same old, but learn to live with it. Unless games are going to be developed by South-Asian developers (like from India) in masses, you will always end up seeing same crap over and over again. Too bad game development and gaming isn't a big thing in this region (despite Indians buying companies like Codemasters, it's still just the beginning).

Personally, I play games cause of gameplay, it's not like any of these games are actually coming up with something new and revolutionary (like Dragon Age for example..) anytime soon as far as story is concerned. Actually, come to think of it, it didn't bother me that most characters in DeusEx and VTM: Bloodlines were white. The story and world was so well that you didn't care. These days however, with crap like Crysis on the front page, you find it hard not to notice the stuff like "racial diversity" (esp. those racist otherwordly aliens preferring to attack only American cities :P ) .

Also, Mass Effect is still fun. Story is so-so but love the characters they throw at you (gameplay is as challenging as playing Mario with unlimited lives even on hardest difficulty). At least it's better than Dragon Age which gave the false illusion of huge open world to explore. ME sticks to linear design and doesn't waste your time making you explore corners expecting some secret (only to be disappointed yet again).

PS: Master Chief is white. :P

[Prime Junta]

Well, as somebody who has been playing RPGs since before there were computer versions I can testify to the fact that's pretty unusual. People always tended to create and play characters that roughly corresponded to their own personalities.

As someone who's been playing RPG's for a quarter century, that's not my experience at all. In fact, I think one of the main attractions of role-playing is that it lets us explore those sides of our personalities that we suppress IRL.

I've been playing with my current group, more or less, for over a decade. This time has spanned three campaigns in a variety of settings -- one Arabian Nights themed, one in Planescape, and the latest kung-fu Chinese themed. In these, we've had the same players playing pretty damn different characters -- one guy going from an idealistic, somewhat simple "holy fool" paladin to a cunning and inquisitive rogue/explorer, to a straightforward barbarian of questionable moral fibre; another going from a near-psychotic cold-blooded assassin who practically never speaks to an official highly conscious of his status and responsibilities and highly conscientious at executing them... and that sort of thing. I think there's really only one guy there who always ends up playing more or less the same character, no matter what the stats say.

[bkrueger]

On the side topic:

If people were playing themselves in RPGs, why have their mages an int of 16 or 18, while fighters have a strength of similar amount?

If people were really playing themselves, they would have strength and int of 8 (if they are nerds, maybe an int of 11). They would be Level zero peasants.

If anything, people play what they would like to be.

Anyway, role playing from the real meaning of the word means playing somebody else. A good actor doesn't play herself but the role in the script of her film/play/whatever.


On topic:

If you analyse games scientifically, you will probably find lots of subconscious prejudices realised in there, even if developers actively try to do the contrary on the conscious level. You can't get rid of your socialisation by a design decision.

How much you care about this as a player is an entirely different question. I usually don't.

[Prime Junta]

On the side topic:

If people were playing themselves in RPGs, why have their mages an int of 16 or 18, while fighters have a strength of similar amount?

If people were really playing themselves, they would have strength and int of 8 (if they are nerds, maybe an int of 11). They would be Level zero peasants.

If anything, people play what they would like to be.

IMO the stats are largely immaterial when it comes to playing a role. I can play someone with my personality, values, and worldview regardless of what the character sheet says; ultimately the stats only affect the game mechanics, with everything else up to the player. Some players choose to mold their role around the stats, with more or less success; others don't.

I honestly have a very hazy recollection of the stats each of the PC's in my group has, but I have a very good idea of their personalities -- which are often very different from the personalities of the players. And these personalities don't have much at all to do with their stats -- someone isn't "intelligent" or "strong" or "wise" or "unwise," they're things like "conscientious" or "larcenous" or "manipulative" or "benevolent."

Anyway, role playing from the real meaning of the word means playing somebody else. A good actor doesn't play herself but the role in the script of her film/play/whatever.

Unless s/he's a character actor, of course...

[jhwisner]

While I don't necessarily argue the validity of the point made in the article in general, I would have to take issue with it in regards to Mass Effect 1 & 2. It has some of the stronger non-white characters of any RPG in recent memory and does do a somewhat good job touching on the ideas of racism - abliet indirectly and in the guise of xenophobia.

Beyond the fact that you can make your character look however you want - with one or two decent non-whte presets included, many of the more memorable human NPCs are fairly clearly non-white as well. Captain Anderson, Admiral Kohaku, Jacob Taylor, Emily Wong, and Khalisah Al-Jilani are all decidedly not white. If you only consider the human characters that exist in both games then the list of white:non-white ones is fairly similar in length. Of course, the depth of these characters is arguable though the same can be said for almost any of the characters in the game.

As a bi-racial gamer I found ME 2 to be relatively refreshing in its inclusion of non-white characters and their progressive treatment - I mean to say that no spear wielding space-zulus come to mind. While I think such a far future setting stand to see a bit more racial and cultural diversity in its human character set, I have to admit that what there is is at least encouraging. This is especially true if you look at any Bioware staff photos - I'm fairly certain that if the entire Bioware staff were to go to the beach on the same day the collective glare reflecting off of them would result in the beaching of wayward ships and small planes.

If non-white gamers want to see better representation through non-white PCs and NPCs in games then they need to consider going into game development themselves. Failing that, we should encourage our children to consider game development as a valid and desirable career path if they are so inclined. If nothing else, we should encourage our kids to be character designers for Bethesda so if their models' faces must look so deformed, at least the non-white models won't have to look down right subhuman.

[xSamhainx]

it's just easier to use white people. Use anyone else and you run the risk of:

A) Stereotyped appearance and behavior no-win situation. For example black guy's lips too big so he's a sambo, or too small he's not black enough. To Fro or Not to Fro, that's the question. Guy acts too white he's an Uncle Tom, other way he's a stereotyped ghetto monkey. Chinese guy's accent isnt authetic enough, or he sounds "too chinese". What do you do? Make em white, you dont have to even consider any of this.

b) If portrayed as anything other than heroic, noble, powerful, brilliant, and glorious, it's called a racial or sexist insult. Some people would likely even consider it a hate crime. Use a white male, and you can make him be the worst or most weak person possible w/ no problems.

I just see it as a combination of them knowing their market on one hand, and on the other just not wanting to mess w/ all the modern "sensitivity" bullshit that comes up.

[Prime Junta]

There's an easy way around all that, though.

Don't be white, and then make the protagonist your ethnicity.

I have a hunch that most cRPG writers and designers are white, and therefore they find it easier to write white protagonists -- partly for the reasons you listed.

(FWIW, I would probably get seriously nervous if an actual real-life Chinese person wanted to join my kung-fu PnP campaign -- at the very least, I'd be worried about inadvertently causing offense by my mangling of the culture. I'd be even more nervous if I had to write that PnP game up as a cRPG that got distributed to thousands or -- horror -- millions of people.)

[Tragos]

Guy acts too white he's an Uncle Tom, other way he's a stereotyped ghetto monkey.

I am the only one here who cannot understand what sir XSam is trying to say ?

[Dez]

Such term is quite famous in popular culture. "Uncle Tom is a pejorative term for a black person who is perceived by others as behaving in a subservient manner to white authority figures, or as seeking ingratiation with them by way of unnecessary accommodation.[1] The term comes from the title character of American writer Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. Critical and popular views of both the character and the novel have shifted over time,[2] leading to the shift in the term's use….."

[holeraw]

it's just easier to use white people. Use anyone else and you run the risk of:

A) Stereotyped appearance and behavior no-win situation. For example black guy's lips too big so he's a sambo, or too small he's not black enough. To Fro or Not to Fro, that's the question. Guy acts too white he's an Uncle Tom, other way he's a stereotyped ghetto monkey. Chinese guy's accent isnt authetic enough, or he sounds "too chinese". What do you do? Make em white, you dont have to even consider any of this.

b) If portrayed as anything other than heroic, noble, powerful, brilliant, and glorious, it's called a racial or sexist insult. Some people would likely even consider it a hate crime. Use a white male, and you can make him be the worst or most weak person possible w/ no problems.

I just see it as a combination of them knowing their market on one hand, and on the other just not wanting to mess w/ all the modern "sensitivity" bullshit that comes up.
nailed it...

[elkston]

it's just easier to use white people. Use anyone else and you run the risk of:

A) Stereotyped appearance and behavior no-win situation. For example black guy's lips too big so he's a sambo, or too small he's not black enough. To Fro or Not to Fro, that's the question. Guy acts too white he's an Uncle Tom, other way he's a stereotyped ghetto monkey. Chinese guy's accent isnt authetic enough, or he sounds "too chinese". What do you do? Make em white, you dont have to even consider any of this.
...
I just see it as a combination of them knowing their market on one hand, and on the other just not wanting to mess w/ all the modern "sensitivity" bullshit that comes up.

Better to be represented with a few missteps, than to be ignored all together.

Throwing your hands up and being afraid to actually engage the issue is not the answer. It only widens the racial divide.

If game makers are committed to creating more realistic and diverse "minority" characters, then they should be eager to hear feedback so they can improve future offerings.

You're right -- everyone shouldn't be brilliant, noble, heroic. There should be a range of character types in the mix. The point is -- do more characters and the other stuff will fall into place.

P.S. - A recent example of a good black character was Grace Holloway in Bioshock 2. She's sort of like a Billie Holliday-type who runs a section of the slums. Well written and well voiced.

[Cassius]

This deeply disturbing, completely un-sophomoric, not at all paint-by-numbers article comes as no surprise to me. CRPGs have long been a bastion of jackbooted Aryan supremacy. Even the otherwise progressive Ultima games only offer the option of playing as a white guy (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/89/Ultima1-3.gif).