Disagree, most devs can't even get a character creation like Mass Effect Andromeda where you can create an ugly to a somewhat pretty character. Also, a pretty character means a symmetrical face.
Your video game hot take(s) thread
- Thread starter Dany_the_penguin
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Basically, most devs and their games cannot even do average character creation right. This is why more of us need to start pressuring them.
Also, it is worth the dev's time, do you want to look at a character who doesn't match your preferences for hours on end.
Depends, I don't care much about preferences. I just pick an ok-enough looking character and play the game because the game is more important.
There are tons of premade characters that I can play just fine without feeling like I need to tweak them to some arbitrary liking. Kratos, Nathan Drake, Lara Croft, Kassandra, any Far Cry Character, Link, Mario, Zelda, Crash, Spyro.
Then when it comes to FPS games like Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and Cyberpunk, who really gives shit considering you never see yourself for 99.9% of the game?
I simply don't think a super in-depth character creator does anything for a game long term. Making the game good is the most important part.
"I don't care about it, so nobody cares about it and devs shouldn't bother with it."
Well this is gaming hot takes so.....good retort there.
Can you name one game that was made substantially better because it let you create your character?
Or spending an hour getting your character to look ok like I did in Cyberpunk last week, start the game and the in-game equivalent looks ridiculous. Like he belongs in a Twilight boy band or something. It’s a waste of time. They should just make a handful of fully modeled presets or wait until we can create scans from pictures to load into the game on the fly.
Saints Row, all the Elder Scrolls, Fallout, the recent Cyberpunk 2077.
Eh, for me personally, I do find shaping my character, and choosing their backgrounds/powers/etc, helps to tailor what they look like in my head. Which does help me get into character more if I am trying to roleplay them significantly. I have some defaults I use depending on the character type. Like any kind of mystic/techno mage type character, I tend to give a bald head, with as bright blue/purple eyes as possible (to try and make it look like the mana/technomancy is flowing through them. And a goatee. If I'm playing a paladin, it's usually a grizzled old dude, with silver/grey hair in a ponytail, and a longer beard. They just sort of help me shift mental gears a bit more easily. I might not see them again for the game, if it's a first person one, but a lot of those games, like Bioware, will still cut to let you see your PC during convos. But the time up front helps me "get into character" if you will.
Is it necessary? Nah, does it help? Yep.
How so? None of those games have particularly in depth creators and if the character creation was World of Warcraft basic would it really take anything away?
Im not saying it isnt a plus. Because fine. I just dont see it ever being worth the dev time to make a creator that has the depth of some of those crazy Korean MMOs.
Thats my point. A crazy in depth creator isnt worth the effort for a game like Fallout or Cyberpunk when clearly you need to focus on other things in the game.
Speak for yourself. Not everything going to be like those Korean MMOs. It's not worth your time, but you can't speak for everyone else that says otherwise.
Tell that to the fans. You have some points, but both can work. Time and effort just have to be put in to it and enough care. Saints Row 2 had one of the best character creator I had seen in a sandbox/GTA style game. I have yet to see many open world games match it or beat it in this area. That is sad that a 12 year old game does these features better than recent outputs from this generation.
Like my joke about Souls games. People will spend hours making their perfect character, only for them to turn into beef jerky once they die and that's assuming you can even see the face because you're covered head to toe in armor.
You specifically asked if chargen made a game better. I gave you an example of how yes, it does make the game better for some players.
I'm not very original. I found out that my opinion on games generally fall into one of the major camps, and if a game is not for me, it's not for me. In that regard, I'm someone i believe kids used to call a "basic *****" back in the day.
But the two i can think of rn:
Splinter Cell: ConViction is a perfectly good game. It's a good stealth game. More, it's not a bad SC game either - it just does some things differently, but in a good way, which was a nice change of pace after the disastrous Double Agent, and before Blacklist's back to the roots.
I had more fun with Deltarune than Undertale(hey, those are anagrams!). I only beat Undertale once also, and it wasn't the pacifist run.
But the two i can think of rn:
Splinter Cell: ConViction is a perfectly good game. It's a good stealth game. More, it's not a bad SC game either - it just does some things differently, but in a good way, which was a nice change of pace after the disastrous Double Agent, and before Blacklist's back to the roots.
I had more fun with Deltarune than Undertale(hey, those are anagrams!). I only beat Undertale once also, and it wasn't the pacifist run.
Thank you. I was gonna point out the SR series(maybe not the first one but since it's a console exclusive that has never been ported I don't care much) has a very nice character creator.
One of the few games I really enjoyed just finding all the shops and playing with the character creator.
The fact that cosmetics are completely detached from how the game plays helps a lot so I only look like a clown if I want to and not because I'm trying to stack bonuses from clothes.
Also, now I want to play SR again because it was so much fun to just fuck around in without having to invest a huge amount of time into the game to complete(unlike a lot of open world games).
Also, most games need a "Covering city blocks with liquid shit from a septic truck" rail shooter mini-game. And by that I mean, all of them, regardless of genre or tone.
Character creators are fine, but there are countless examples of fantastic games that do not have character creators. Because narratives lose something when the story has to account for you character being a bowl of Nutella with rainbow hair.
If the developers can put in a character creation engine while also making a good game behind it, then great. However we've seen a few games put so much effort into a creation engine that they forgot to make a game behind it. All Points Bulletin comes to mind, which not only had a crazy character creator, but also had a music creator, and a personal decal logo creator, it was one of the most impressive creation tools ever made. But the rest of the game was a such a mess that the MMO shut down in less that 6 months.
Games having a creator is fine, and most game's creators are frankly pretty basic. Bethesda's creation tool is fairly basic, even Cyberpunk's creation tool is pretty minor, it's just a combination of prebuilt settings.
I just think that a creator is icing on a cake, which is good, but icing doesn't matter if your cake is made of spiders.
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In any game with a character creator I end up almost completely covering my character's face as soon as possible, even if I've spent an hour creating the character.
Take Cyberpunk for example, my character is constantly sporting a gas mask. Makes the character creation kind of pointless.
I'd much rather have like 8 presets to choose from with varying faces, genders, and body styles and which all match the in-game art style an aesthetics.
I don't even know what that is. Never heard of it. Then again, I do not follow MMOs at all. You have a point, but then again, it's an MMO. A lot of those don't survive long or die prematurely. Do you know how many MMOs that died trying to copy World of Warcraft? I never kept count, but many did not survive.
No duh, but it does not mean they should be disregarded, because one or few individuals players don't care or do not spend much time getting creative with it.
Hence why I said SR2 is one of the best ones. It's not that complex either, yet you are given a ton of options while playing a game that still kicks ass.