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Short Brown-Haired Guys
Why are there so many 30-something year old male protagonists with short brown hair?
4 Min Read
When I say "Short Brown-Haired Guy", I'm mostly thinking of this one in particular:
Nathan Drake
I could just as easily have put Gordon Freeman or Commander Shepard in there. However, Nathan Drake is the embodiment of a strange trend in Western Gaming, which is the short brown-haired guy. He's usually in his 30s, is athletic, characters in the game tend to find him witty or charming, and there's a good chance he's voiced by Nolan North. Characters like Alan Wake, Alex Mason, Ethan Mars, Desmond Miles, this list could go on forever. Even Japanese developers like Capcom are getting into the fun: what do you think Chris Redfield and Frank West are?
Whenever I bring this up to people, I always hear the same joke: The Japanese equivalent is the angsty spiky-haired teenager. However, that's a different matter entirely. It's obvious to look at the SBHG and see that he's supposed to be a character for the player to project onto. Having short, brown hair myself, I can easily see where that fits in. The hero is given a generic profile so the average video game player can slip into his shoes. I also find it curious that the extent of your character creation in Mass Effect is how short and brown you want your hair to be.
However, there's much more to it than that. What about characters like Mario, Link, or Samus? They're mutes. Nothing more than a blank slate for a player to put on for the sake of gameplay. Are they SBHGs? My answer is "no". You may be controlling these characters, but this is still their story. Link is the hero of time, Samus is a bounty hunter in space, and it's Mario's job to defeat the dragon and save the princess. You aren't Link. But you are the heroic, athletic, wise-cracking Nathan Drake.
In a way, he's the idealized version of you. Nobody can put themselves in Samus's power armor, but they can picture themselves as the athletic Nathan Drake. Gordon Freeman's a college-educated nerd with thick glasses, but he still managed to save the human race. Commander Shepard may also be a soldier in space, but it's your choice whether or not to punch that obnoxious reporter mid-sentence. What would you do?
I also feel that just because a character has short, brown hair does not make him a SBHG. Characters like John Marston, Niko Bellic, and Ezio Auditore da Firenze have that "generically handsome" look to them, but those characters have their own histories and personalities. You're watching their story, not driving it. In fact, some games intentionally make their character distant in order to reinforce the idea that the player is not the character. For example, in Just Cause 2, the main character is Rico Rodriguez, a latino. Does that change the story at all? I can't say that it does. The guy doesn't drive the plot at all. So why make him latino and not another generic American male?
Because Rico Rodriguez is a freaking psychopath. When you play Just Cause 2, you're a monster. You blow up people's homes, tie them to your car and drag them down the street. Steal sports cars and drive them off cliffs in high speed, watching them explode beneath you as you glide away in your parachute. Is this someone you want your player to project on to? Of course not. So, Rico's design is intentionally distant so the player doesn't have to feel that connection, and can ruin this beautiful island guilt-free.
(I am fully aware of the unfortunate implications of this last paragraph)
For all the complaining about how we need more varied main characters, a large problem is that giving the main character a unique nationality already assigns certain traits to him. Since games are an interactive medium primarily driven by gameplay, it's simply better for the story's sake to make the main character as generic as possible. Even for more narrative-driven games like Heavy Rain or Alan Wake, the main character is still "normal", as the player is expected to feel the same frustrations those characters have. Of course, the other logical explanation is that people tend to write what they know, and the majority of people making these games are short brown-haired guys.
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