I Guess I Actually Like Roguelikes Now - Ash Parrish

I saw a tweet of the game’s different Greek mythological heroes, some of whom were people of color (!!!) and all of whom were smokin’ hot. Then there’s the main character, Prince Zagreus, who my coworker Ian described as a “bratty twink.” A game where the Greek gods and heroes are not all white people starring a moody, bratty twink with different colored eyes and a giant sword?
Sign. Me. Up.

This sort of anecdote always gets to me.

I don’t look at my analytics much, and I’m not even sure if they’d tell me, but the odds are you, yes you, reading this right now are a white dude. It’s okay, I am too!

I can sympathize with this story of getting legitimately excited about a game because you see people like you in a video game, but I can’t really empathize with it. I simply don’t have the experience of living my whole life with the media I consume basically forgetting that people like me exist. And if they do remember, those characters are often noted as “token” characters or something just there to satisfy the SJW crowd. Most characters look pretty much just like me. Make them a little shorter, remove a few of the muscles, and they all look pretty much like me.

I’m glad video games are continuing to expand in terms of gameplay styles, as well as in what groups they represent. If you throw a dart at board, you’re more than likely to hit a game with the white male lead character, but your odds of hitting something else are getting higher, which is great.