Poll: When a game lets you create your own protagonist...

[optimusjamie]

I generally go for an original female character, but not conventionally attractive- e.g. small and nerdy, tall and muscular, a bit chubby, etc. depending on the playstyle I have in mind and the options available.

 

[vIRL Nightmare]

I tend to make characters in phases. When I was younger I tried to approximate a 20ish years old character with confidence/bravado when you are given voice options. Now I tend towards 35-40 aged character with experience.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

Lots of games let you customize the main character. When that happens, what do you do?

I usually make myself, more or less. (Except virtual me has flawless skin and huge muscles, but that's the game devs fault, not mine.) Since I have a good, evil, and neutral save file on Fallout 3, I make myself normally for good, with a different haircut for neutral, and with a dastardly mustache for evil. Did something similar to that in NV with one for each faction.

How about you?

Depends on which kind of customization. A full character editor or if there's just a few options with very few real changes.

Most of the time, I'll play the girl character. My "President" in SR4 is a delightfully curvy lady. Same in The Third, same in SR2. Same in pretty much every "action adventure" kind of game with a character creator.

But if we're talking full blown role play, I would prefer to keep it closer to an approximation of myself. Fallout, Skyrim, all of those games I made different versions of myself. At least for the first play through. Games like Fallout 3 where I wanted to go through it more than once I would often branch out and try different options, but the first one is usually a version of myself. Myself in post-apocalyptic DC, myself born of Dragon lineage, etc etc.

 

[Robert Marrs]

I usually make my first character to not look exactly like me but at least have my features. I find the more I try to make it perfect the worse it gets so I try to find a pre-set that looks good and change things like hair, eye color etc. After my main guy is made I go back and do extremely strange characters that are as fugly as possible just for laughs.

 

[Superlative]

I don't always make a character that looks lik

I always create an original character, one that fits the world, and I will always choose the female gender and have red hair. Not sure how that started but it's just something I do in every game!

That's oddly enough what I did the first time I played through the Mass Effect trilogy, however, my normal response depends on how much of my personalization will be noticeable. If I'm going to be staring at the back of my character's head the entire game, I might only bother with the hair.

Same here, although mine are always black men (or as close as you can get) if they are humans. I generally just try to make faces that aren't ugly if I'm not going be seeing them like in Skyrim, although I now am curious to see how close I can get in Skyrim. For some reason, game developers seem to not know what a proper fade looks like.

 

[Not Matt]

I do my best to recreate my handsome face, or atleast the closest I get. I like to project myself in to the game and make the decisions and choices that I would have made were I in said situation. Regardless if it means I get some special perks or better equipment from the other alternatives, this is my world.

 

[MiskWisk]

Pretty much always an original character. The problem arises with personality though. I find extra ones are me just forcing myself to do things I would never do, while the original is almost always a lawful good guy (although I do branch into neutral and chaotic from time to time) because that is just what ends up feeling most natural.

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

I usually try to create myself as well, but I kind of theme it to the game I'm playing. In saints row I don't run around wearing jeans and a T shirt like I do in real life. If I can surf around on cars and shoot my way through a plane in freefall I can pull off being an urban ninja with no pants. In the new one I'll probably go with some sort of cyberpunk cowboy or something like that. If I lived in a time without electric razors i probably wouldn't shave much, so in skyrim I have a beard. Things like that.

To each their own, I wouldn't say that role-playing a character that isn't you is bad but I wouldn't do it. I feel like it helps a lot with immersion if I feel like the character is supposed to be me, so I take that opportunity whenever it's given to me. If I want to pretend I'm somebody else I'll play one of the other trillion games where the protagonist isn't me.

 

[Soundwave]

I always create an original character, one that fits the world, and I will always choose the female gender and have red hair. Not sure how that started but it's just something I do in every game!

Was it Dungeon Siege?

 

[V8 Ninja]

I generally go with what is the first default character, as I can't be bothered with building a character using the dozens upon dozens of creation options.

 

[Flames66]

I usually roll with a preset with slight tweaks. Don't understand how people can spend hours on nose length or eyebrow placements.

When it comes to choosing classes/skills, sure, I spend a shitload of time there.

Yea, I tend to do the same thing. I'm just not that good with faces, so if I start meddling with sliders too much it'll always end up weird.

If possible I play female protagonists, mostly because I find it easier to identify with a female than with a hulking mass of concentrated testosterone.

I don't really have a pre-conceived notion of what I like, but generally speaking they end up as pretty wiry characters of less than average height. Strong, but not ripped - fighters, not body-builders.

I don't usually fiddle too much with the face, I pick the preset that most closely resembles what I want and make slight modifications.

I've always found the idea of creating oneself in a game to be lazy. It's a roleplaying experience, after all.

I usually go with one of my original characters. Sometimes, particularly in games where roleplaying is less of a factor (such as Rock Band) I will create an established character from fiction. At other times, I will take an established character from fiction and then modify them in some way to create something new. I often do this on second play-throughs of more heavy roleplaying games (like the joke character, but less of a joke and more a chance to explore and adapt a character not my own).

I almost always make my character as close to myself as possible and this doesn't just apply to appearance. I try to pick skills that resemble what I can actually do. I always like to think of it in terms of myself directly interacting with the world.

 

[bossfight1]

In Fallout 3/New Vegas I tend to make guys with brown, messy hair and a beard- virtually indistinguishable from anyone else in the Wasteland. In games that allow more creative freedom, such as Saints Row, however, I make a crazy character and get em in the most amazing (ridiculous) outfits ever. My current main outfit is a lime-green bathrobe and matching top hat, with fishnet stockings and pink bunny slippers.

 

[lalaquen]

I have very few constants in character generation, except for a very strong tendency towards red or black hair and green or blue eyes. Freckles if I'm allowed to have them. I usually play females, but I almost always go through at least once each way if there are some differences between them (like in Mass Effect or Dragon Age). Otherwise, I try to give the character a personality and a little bit of a back story based on what I know about the game universe, and then match their appearance to that. I seem to be developing something of a preference lately for "strong" facial features... wider jaws, longer noses, that sort of thing... and while I usually don't make my characters "ugly", per say, I don't go out of my way to make them conventionally attractive, either. Basically I just play around until I find something I like and that I think "works".

 

[immortalfrieza]

I always like playing a female character, at least with my first runthrough of the game. There's a specific look that I made way back in Oblivion or whenever that I always try to replicate in every game since that has the ability. To wit:

-Tall
-Thin
-Muscular
-Emotionless expression (if only because there doesn't seem to be a character creator yet that can do anything BUT this.)
-Long Dark Blue Hair (black where unavailable.)

 

[Tanis]

I've gotten into the habit of:
Asian
Female
Medium height
Short hair
Blue Eyes
Athletic


:/

 

[Denamic]

I've never even considered making an approximation of myself. I make new characters, usually far removed from how I am.

 

[Bluestorm83]

With me, it depends. I often like to make a world-appropriate character and role play it. It's strange, but I more often play as "Myself" when they put me in an already existing character that has freedom of dialogue and decision. Like in Mass Effect, and more recently Planescape: Torment (Anyone who wants an incredible story, play this now,) Commander Shepard and The Nameless One were both ME, how I would handle these situations. In Skyrim, though, Garsvald (The Nord of Destiny!) does whatever Garsvald wants. If a wandering minstrel gets in Garsvald's way, then Garsvald lets Garsvald's fists do the talking! Garsvald speaks in the third person for some reason, also. In Fallout, New Vegas, Mr. Clive Wyatt was a raging alcoholic who didn't trust them fancy techno-shooters, and would never EVER take off his signature hat for any reason. In Dragon Age: Origins, Murin was a Dwarf who didn't let his crappy past or his facial tattoo make him stop believing that people can be better than they often act, that only a little kindness was needed to show them the better way.

I don't know why, but when they leave me free to create 100%, I make my own new life, but when they give me a half-established character, I just sort of mold it around the guy I actually am.

 

[kahlzun]

Try to create the ugliest sumbitch you ever saw.

Makes it hilarious when everyone wants to sex them.

Or try to make them cross dressers: pick a girl, and make her look as manly as possible.

 

[Tropicaz]

Well given that my last 2 custom characters have been an Argonian in skyrim and a giant bloke with scars on his face, a green mohawk and white eyes, i'd have to say I make pretty far removed characters.

 

[thePyro_13]

Recreating myself always turns out bad. Since I'm pale with red hair, and those two options never seems to look natural in video games.

I usually make up an original character, as I can work with the pro's of whatever given character editor I'm using and avoid the things that don't work.