PrimePlus assesses the current state of black characters

by Alexander Sliwinski on Feb 9th 2009 2:59PM

PrimePlus has a fairly interesting piece about the current state of black characters in video games. The editorial maintains a very moderate approach to the charged subject, covering the differences between Western and Eastern development, along with how black characters have been portrayed over the years.

The piece mostly focuses on upcoming titles and games from the last decade, like Mass Effect, Half-Life 2, Gears of War and GTA: San Andreas. Without getting "politically correct" or preachy, the editorial notes that representation isn't an "exclusive concern to the population of black individuals." It points out that "more socially imaginative avenues of inspiration" would be welcome, which is something we can agree about.

[Via Edge]

Source

Tags: african-american, black, culture, gears-of-war-2, half-life-2, mass-effect, minority, race, resident-evil-5

Reader Comments (102)

Unless this post was typed by "Most people of non-white ethnicity", I don't think it is an accurate assesment. In fact...are you being sarcastic or just plain ridiculous?

Reply

An excerpt from the article:
"...Fran (pic here) of ‘Final Fantasy XII’ (12) is an attractive, philosophical black female sub-lead character. Though one problem remains: she and her entire race of black characters–exclusively women–, possess actual bunny ears in lieu of real ones. What? It can be called creative from an artistic viewpoint, but they are seemingly the only black characters in the game."

No dude, the Viera are not black characters. Their skin color ranges from brown to white, but they don't have any facial characteristics of black people; in fact they have bunny-like characteristics (small pointed upward nose, short/small face....bunny ears -__-). That is like calling night elves black people. Viera are a fictional race: not white, not black, not Asian, not Hispanic (sorry if I left anybody out :O)

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