Why is the Protagonist so ugly?

Off-topic
#48

Well something being drab or bland is a matter of personal taste (we don’t all share the same perceptions of the world around us). Its interesting that you assume they are intentional making mundane character rather then them just presenting people as they would have been.

The thing I think you don’t realize is many faces (not all and Idk which one Henry is, some are stock models) of the NPC’s are faces of real people particularly the faces of developers.

As far as I have seen they are not modeling any of the faces, they are using 3D scans to make life like models of real world people.

#49

I kind of understand what the point is. I don’t care if he is ugly or not, right now he lacks the real “something”. Maybe it’s like in many stories I have seen or tried: that all characters are more unique than the main one. You just don’t dare to give him peculiarity, born from the fear that someone might not like it or you wouldn’t like it. But without them he doesn’t look alive.
In a pen&paper roleplay I play you must add strengths and handicaps to your character and first you don’t really like it, but very soon you begin to love this character. With appearance it’s the same, although more subtle.
Well, if a character lacks character it’s in 90% the eyes :octopus:

1 Like
#50

I think Henry is even to beautifull for 15th century Bohemia. However, his face is ok and regarding the shaving… well arround that time the Gilette Mach3 Razors were to expensive at the super market.

1 Like
#51

If you put it that way… okay I can kind of see what the point is, although I still say, that in an RPG a less interesting main character is not a bad thing per se, for you can fill it with your own imaginations. But yeah an interesting protagonist can be very good thing for such a game cough Geralt cough.
But for now, I think they´ll focus on the less subtle things that make him unique, like his motivations, his past etc. and if that is finish, they can link it to his appearance. For example: he is the son of a blacksmith, so his hands could be full of blisters. His village was burned to the ground, so he might have a wound on his face because of that.

#52

I thought it was clear that my intention with my comment was purely sarcastical. :smiley:

#53

Hm, I don’t mean he has to be interesting in an outstanding way. His face may be still too “average”, as if the sliders all rest in the middle, and since the majority of people doesn’t have an average face it looks a bit plain. Maybe the shape of the eyebrow and eyes, the wrinkles around them, the shape of the mouth, the eye reflection material …
It’s a complicated matter regarding to character design and very hard to know what exactly to change. The best way may be to first draw a caricature and then reducing it to lifelike shapes.
I think the pictures of members of the Warhorse Team showed it well. Most of them have a kind of intense gaze and a face people could immediately connect with something, be it a role or character trait.
If I look at Henry I feel neither sympathy nor antipathy. Just … nothing.
But let’s see what power the Character Creation Tool gives us once modding gets started. This is all personal opinion and thus should be approached by the player himself. :man_with_gua_pi_mao:

3 Likes
#54

First of all… I fear what might happen to poor Henry when the modders start working with the char creation tools :smiley:

Second

Aye ^^ There is a reason that character creation is that popular, even when the tools for it aren´t that great and you don´t see the character that often, like in the elder scrolls games or Fallout

For a conclusion I would say…if i don´t like the way Henry looks in the final game, for whatever reason, the first thing I´ll buy is a big helmet with a closed visor :smiley:

#55

Hmm, I would say he is looking to good!!!

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A little sad, and Robin Hood like, or like a Jedi Knight…
Personally if I would look like, it would be an enhancement for 33%… :joy:

Just for you!

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By the way: On the left side,… is she a woman??? It would be a surprise if this is the playable character… :grinning:

3 Likes
#56

I’m pretty sure that’s a man…

7 Likes
#57

I actually really like the look of him. He has a fairly average appearance about him, but I genuinely think he still has a distinct and interesting look.

I wouldn’t have any trouble singling him out in a crowd.

2 Likes
#58

Wow, this post got so many more replies than I anticipated. Fun to read them all. So first off.

Lamproly pretty much sums up MY most important issue. If you put Henry in the crowd of 10 people I would not be able to tell he is a protagonist. Put Geralt of Rivia in the group of 10 000 and I could see that he has something the others in the game don’t have. Put Nathan Drake in a crowd of 1000 and I could single him out.

Saying “normal” standards for the period is not a valid argument simply due to the fact that in reality we don’t get attracted to ugly unless they’ve got something special. And special is the word here, Henry is just meh. Doesn’t mean he needs to be Brad Pitt, that’s not what I mean. But attractiveness also goes a long way.

Again, look at Nathan Drake who was described as “an average dude”. He is so far from average but still people think of him as a normal guy albeit with stellar looks. But that is because of his written dialouge. He makes fun of himself, he shows weakness but also a will to fight for what he believes in.

Argument number 2 is also wrong and I think Bethesda recently proved this by adding voice acting to their main character for Fallout 4. You are NEVER the person you play as. You take on a role and you lead that person, but the reason the world itself comes alive is because the protagonist is actually showing you. You never connect emotionally to yourself, you will never cry in Portal because you fall in to acid and die. You will however cry for Cloud in FF7 or laugh with Nathan Drake. Why? Because there is an emotional connection between you and someone else. It’s not just you, sitting there.

That’s why voice acting is so important. But that also applies to the face. You never make an “ugly” character in Skyrim, and for good reason. You’d get annoyed after the first few hours of laughter has passed. Interesting is key.

Now admittedly the current voice acting might actually make me biased in a negative way… And of course I know that will change. By god I hope it will be Sean Bean… Or even better Simon Templeman, voice of Kain in Blood Omen (brilliant voice actor).

I don’t mind if he is ugly or whatever, I think I might enjoy this game, but only if they shape up the storytelling and lessens the tediousness of their alchemy system.

But I want, and I hope they also want this game, to be a huge success, selling hopefully a million or more units. In which case you can’t always make an argument for authenticity…

Just look at The Witcher 3. Perfect example, loads of characters with interesting voice acting from Irland, Scottland and real weird sounds some of the time. But when it comes to the main cast, they all sound like perfect Americans. Why? Because people can relate easier to that.

Anyone here try and make a boring character for a protagonist and see how popular that will be.

This is for a different time and topic but my two cents to the developers right now is. Take a good hard look at the difference in writing between The Witcher 1, 2 and 3. Because there is a lot to learn, mostly because The Witcher 1 had aweful writing, but it still managed to be a good game. In the second and most of all the third installment you can see how the writing has evolved. The dialouges are so much more interesting.

Number 2: Have Simon Templeman be the lead voice actor. He is phenomenal. Just listen to anything he did for Blood Omen… Fun fact, he was also in Diablo 3, Uncharted 3 Dragon Age, Mass Effect and many many other games.

1 Like
#59

I don´t think that anyone wants to make a boring protagonist. It´s about a ‘normal’ looking protagonist. Normal looking does not equal boring.
Let´s look at one of my favourite protagonists, the ‘unnamed hero’ of Gothic 1, 2 and 3
He´s from a time, when you weren´t able to make a character very handsome or interesting to look at. But the protagonist is memorizable, not because of his looks or his background story (he looks average and you know nothing) but because of the way he interacts with his environment the people he meets (at least in part 1 and 2, Gothic 3 not so much).
What I am trying to say is, that the appearance, while it can be a powerfull tool, isn´t everything that makes a character interesting or likeable and in my opinion not even the most important. But you said that yourself, at least that´s how I understand this passage

And are you really sure you could single out Nathan Drake in a crowd of a thousand if he is in normal clothes and not full of blood and dirt? I couldn´t :smiley:

Lastly I wanted to say: if your problem is that he is not interesting enough, you should write that in the headline, not that you think he is ugly, to avoid the misunderstandings which are caused by that ^^

3 Likes
#60

I could spot Godzilla in a crowd of several billion people, therefore the main character should look like Godzilla.

7 Likes
#61

For some reason you think that there needs to be some kind of attractiveness of the protagonist in order for him to be something special. I feel as though you are conditioned into believing that aesthetics are directly linked to success and a powerful story. This story… however… wouldn’t feel the same if Henry was another Geralt or Nathan Drake. I don’t think we want Henry to stand out in a crowd of 10,000. That would ruin the sense that things might not be ok. We want there to be an urgency to actually put an effort into the next sword fight because Henry isn’t a superhero like Geralt. I don’t want to feel that Henry is invincible. Whenever we see someone attractive we immediately assume that they’ve got it together or that things will be ok or that we can walk up to any chick in the street and they’ll have sex with us. I want this story to feel real. Not just another hack and slash “kill-die-respawn” game. I want to walk into a pub and NOT have all the waitresses flirt with Henry. I want to work hard to make my way in this game. That way, in the end of the game, I can feel that I actually did something special.

5 Likes
#62

It’s not a discussion about gorgeous or ugly protagonist. It’s a discusion about well made / poorly made protagonist. And poorly made protagonist is uninteresting one. I aggree, it’s alpha. He will get more polished etc…

1 Like
#63

How is he a poorly made protagonist? Your only reasons are hes not good looking. So clearly this is about

2 Likes
#64

godis777, gladix, post examples of what you think are interesting, well made, etc male protagonist faces.

bonus question, do you think bioware and ubisoft protagonists have interesting faces that stand out? this will basically tell us about your taste(or lack thereof) and whether or not we should take you guys seriously.

2 Likes
#65

What you describe seem to me like another super hero with super deep voice.
I really dislike that clische and wish that Henry will be an average man who will stands out thanks to the story.

PS. I love Witcher 3 but Geralds voice drives me mad.

4 Likes
#66

He’s drab. Incredibly bland for main character in my opinion. That makes him poorly made.

#67

Bioware definetly. Ubisoft, nope(well except the villains). But then again, Bioware makes RPG’s with the faces of everyone being on display constantly. Ubisoft doesn’t.

The latest great example of excellent character design is Witcher 3. The witchers for example, each and every single one of them is interesting. Geralt is the good loking one, Eskel is the ugly, Lambert is slightly weird. Each recognisible and interesting. I think the main protagonist of Kingdom Come is on its way to be interesting. But he’s not quite there yet.

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