Does anyone sincerely want to play as "ugly" characters in games?

[cleric of the order]

I do know people that for shits an giggles make the dumbest looking charterers they can.
That's it, I go with the easiest char' to make because i want to play the game, I don't a flying shit about my charterers appearance. Voices however, I do care about, if there is a voice option (and that's rare) I'll give them all an ear and choose carefully

 

[Shoggoth2588]

I like to assume that this is why first-person games seldom show off their main characters. The Master Chief probably has an Officer Murphy/Robocop kinda thing going on (ie; behind the helmet he's just a human face stretched over circuitry). Marcus Fenix is already an ugly Mo-fo...and some of the most interested created characters in Bioware RPGs, Bethesda RPGs and, Saint's Row, etc have been the really ugly people. It adds a bit more comedy to those games which is especially great in Mass Effect 3; it's meant to be super-cereal and yet here you are playing as Commander Shepard whose ME2-opening surgery went horribly wrong at some point...more games could use a gender slider instead of a binary option...Saint's Row 2 had that and I want to play as (undeniably not ugly) David Bowie in more games.

 

[Don Incognito]

Does anyone sincerely want to play as "ugly" characters in games?

Absolutely, yes.

I am a very sexy son of a *****, and I want to see how the rest of you trolls live your sorry lives.

 

[beastro]

Of course I'd play ugly toons. It's what I love about Trolls and Gnomes in games.

A good start is to look at EQs old Troll and Ogre models, especially their females:

 

[SquallTheBlade]

If I had to choose from ugly and good looking character of course I would choose the good looking one. Why wouldn't I? Might as well enjoy all the aspects of the game.

Well, if you enjoy playing as ugly character then the other option might be the best for you. It all comes down to personal preference in the end.

 

[Murahk]

Does anyone sincerely want to play as "ugly" characters in games?

Absolutely, yes.

I am a very sexy son of a *****, and I want to see how the rest of you trolls live your sorry lives.

I've been laughing at this for the last 15 minutes. It's easily the funniest thing I've read in the last week. XD

On topic, I like pretty things. So, whenever I'm given the option, I will create my character to be my perceived notion of physically appealing. I can and have played as "unappealing" characters but I opt out of doing so when I can.

I don't think I could play as an outright ugly person, though. Even all the "unattractive" people being mentioned have a fairly inoffensive design to them. Once I had to stop reading a book because I found the main character very physically unattractive and the author drew attention to the unattractive features regularly. It got in the way of my enjoyment of the story, which wasn't actually that engaging looking back on it.

 

[Don Incognito]

I've been laughing at this for the last 15 minutes. It's easily the funniest thing I've read in the last week. XD

Kind of you to say so, sir and/or madam.

On a serious note, regarding the question, yes, I truly do enjoy playing as an "ugly" character. Also as pretty characters, handsome characters, statuesque characters, hideous characters, whatever. Why wouldn't I?

 

[Tsun Tzu]

In a (this word is so loaded now) vacuum?

I'd rather play attractive characters. Visually appealing = Better, on its own.

As a few folks have mentioned, however, it depends on the context and writing chops of the people involved. I'll take an ugly and interesting/awesome protagonist over a Stepford any day of the week.

 

[MetalShadowChaos]

Whenever I'm given a character creator, I always make ugly characters. Either for the fun of it (beak nose creature sin Bloodborne, best race), or because their character I've come up with in my head works better with specific facial features, the odd scar, tasteless facial tattoos, wrinkled old skin, the like.

Thing is, the demand isn't that people WANT to play as ugly people specifically, though of course there are some, it's that writers and designers shouldn't feel like they HAVE to create 'good-looking' characters in every game. Survival horror for instance, you don't necessarily need to create a very good looking character when you aren't giving the player a power fantasy, they haven't come here to look up to and aspire to be the person they're playing as, they came to live the same fear that they do.

 

[EyeReaper]

Well, considering that Wario is my weapon of choice in Super Smash Bros, Mario Kart, and Party... I can definitely say yes. It probably helps that he's had some of the best platformers and party games in the entire history of Nintendo.

I always go for ugly characters in creation, especially in RPGs. It never fails to garner a chuckle out of me when my sunken eye'd, nose as big and wide as an apple'd, completely bald elf is being called a sexy man beast and getting all the ladies in games like Dragon Age, or becoming as fat as possible and still being able to outperform anyone in Fable. For extra hilarity, make your character the most hideous thing in existence, then max charisma. It's what I did with my halfling thief in DnD, and it's a ball.

 

[someguy1231]

Wow, I never expected such a massive response! Thanks for all the replies.

Perhaps I should have been a bit more clear in my OP. I think I should've asked whether you'd rather play a character you find ugly or aesthetically pleasing in a game where all other things are equal.

 

[Doom972]

If a character is going to be that ugly, there should be a good reason for it. Doing it for the sake diversity is no better reason then "because I can". For example, it could be a reason for a character to be a social outcast, but then again there are plenty of better and more interesting reasons for why a character would be a social outcast.

 

[Arshaq13]

Well, can Trevor from GTA5 can be considered ugly?
Because I had an absolute blast with his character.

 

[Nazulu]

Pffft, I find it hard to play as what most people call pretty. Some of those Japanese designs with the spiked up spiffy hair are really hard to tolerate.

On topic though, it depends how ugly we're going for here. I need a good example of what you had in mind. Say for instance, they are deformed with a hunched back and crooked face, I could deal with that. Now say if they have hair growing out everywhere with warts that kept pulsating or releasing puss and they drooled everywhere, that would probably make me sick.

 

[Eddie the head]

You mean games like borderlands? Psychonauts? Oddworld abes odyssey? Dungeon keeper? Team fortress 2? Giants? Evolve? Left 4 dead? Planescape torment? Among the sleep? Alien vs predator?
Yeah. Yeah people play that. Good games.
You see "ugly" doesn't have to equal boring and who doesn't want to play as the monster or the zombies?
Who was seriously so put off by razs deformed potatohead and everyones general butt ugliness that they couldn't bring themself to play psychonauts?

If you consider most of those characters "ugly" your standards are much higher then mine. That being said I grew up in a town with a big meth problem. There are things between "porn star" and "oh good burn it with fire."

Wow, I never expected such a massive response! Thanks for all the replies.

Perhaps I should have been a bit more clear in my OP. I think I should've asked whether you'd rather play a character you find ugly or aesthetically pleasing in a game where all other things are equal.

If all else is equal why wouldn't you? It's everything the other guy has plus being aesthetically pleasing. There's really no downside.

 

[loa]

Wow, I never expected such a massive response! Thanks for all the replies.

Perhaps I should have been a bit more clear in my OP. I think I should've asked whether you'd rather play a character you find ugly or aesthetically pleasing in a game where all other things are equal.

What does "aesthetically pleasing" even mean?

I find final fantasy 15s main cast to be incredibly dull and uninspiring looking even though they are what the unwashed masses would refer to as an "aesthetically pleasing" japano boy band kind of thing.
I hate tidus from ff10 on an instinctual, irrational level simply based on how he looks even tho he's "pretty".
Most "shooter guy" bald space marine stereotypes are boring as hell and there's nothing "aesthetically pleasing" about them since they are nothing but derivative yet people gobble it up.
Abe from abes odysey is butt ugly and has 0 appealing curves or shapes to him yet he's an endearing character.
Psychonauts. The entire aestetic of this game is to do the opposite of what people would find "conventionally attractive". Cult classic.
Robo from chrono trigger. "Lame design with nothing cool to it" to some, "a welcome change to all those sleek animu robots" to others.

There are so many ifs and buts, so many variables, even people answering with a definite "yes" or "no" probably aren't as cut and dry as they may think.

And even if you have an answer, say most people like appealing characters, then what of it?
I like ori and the blind forest cause it has a cute cat thing for a main character which is rare for games with that budget nowadays but the next guy may want to have none of that furry shit.
You can't really do anything useful with that statistic since there are so many wildly varying sensibilities.
Can't make a generic "aesthetically pleasing" character that appeals to everyone to begin with.

 

[Flames66]

If the story was well written and it was vital to the character, yes. But then again I don't play story driven games much anymore. If I can't create my own character I'm usually not interested. For NPC characters, I like them to be visually interesting. They can be beautiful or abhorrent, as long as they are interesting. Here's an example of what I mean:

Spoiler: Generic military men

Spoiler: Interesting Characters

The use of different colours, clothing styles and pieces, equipment and how they are worn all say something interesting about the character. This can be overdone, if there is too much to look at it all becomes a vague mess of parts. For example:

Spoiler: TOO MUCH

 

[PlayerDos]

Ehhhhhh, depends what kind of ugly. But usually no, I like playing as pretty characters, if I'm playing an RPG I don't want the character to look like shit.

 

[Someone Depressing]

Yeah, I don't mind.

I'm ugly as fuck myself, so I think it's about time to let the escapism die and accept it. I also make incredibly ugly Bioware protags, made funnier by the fact that everyone enthuses about how hot you are. It's like a deviantArt comment section.

 

[Mutant1988]

Is anyone actually asking for ugly, rather than representations of beauty outside of a narrowly defined norm?

To say that people are just asking for ugly characters is disingenuous and insulting.