Culture in Video Games !
There are many great African-American characters in media, especially in gaming, and those have the added benefit of playability. I will be talking about three great African-American characters in no order. This list is basically to show you great characters from great games. Every character is from a different franchise so I won’t focus exclusively on one series. So, no more wasting time, and now it’s time for the list.
From one of the best and at the same time most overrated games of all time, Final Fantasy 7 has some of videogames most iconic characters, one of them being the heavy hitter and your first teammate of the game, Barret Wallace. Right off the bat we know what kind of guy Barret is: he’s brash and takes nothing from anyone, but he still has a good heart. He is the leader of an eco-terrorist group named Avalanche that fights the Shinra Corporation who abuse their planet’s life energy as a power source. Barret is also a single father who takes care of his daughter Marlene, which contrasts with his violent freedom fighter side in an organic way. All in all, great character from a great game.
Unlike like the last game which could be played by almost any age, this game uses its Mature rating to the max. You take the reigns as James Heller after the last games protagonist Alex Mercer becomes this game’s main antagonist. James was a sergeant in the military before he was infected by Mercer by the Blacklight virus. And just to put the icing on the cake, his wife was murdered by Mercer, who had also kidnapped his daughter. Now you must play as James
and get both your daughter and get revenge on Alex Mercer in this gore- and violence-filled extravaganza of a game. Hey, I told you this game used its M rating, don’t expect everything on these lists to be recommendations.
Another great African-American character from another violent game series is Jax Briggs from the Mortal Kombat series. Like James, he was in the military trying to fight off a demonic force from taking over the world, losing his two arms in the process. He then gained enhanced cybernetic arms that he uses to heighten his fighting style. He is surprisingly level-headed considering where people die and get resurrected on a whim all the time. In the later games he fights alongside his daughter, which he opposed at first wanting to make sure that she didn’t die like his wife. And that is the end of the list, I hope that you enjoyed it have the knowledge on some great African-American characters!
