Characters in video games are the people we are spending our time with for the duration of the game. For every good game, there is a good character. In this blog post I will discuss some amazing characters and what made them so great to begin with.

Let’s take a look at Mario. Mario is a plumber from the game Super Mario bros, who takes on Bowser and saves the princess, but you didn’t need me to tell you that. In recent years Mario has become almost as recognisable as McDonalds or Coca Cola, which for a video game character is very amazing. Mario is so popular that Japan considered using him as the face of the next Japan Olympics. But who really is Mario? Well it’s pretty sad to say that Mario actually only has a few lines of dialogue, and most of them are just expressionary sounds like “ow” or “wowowow.” We don’t need to see who Mario is as a person because his sole goal is to save the princess, and it also sometimes feels like that’s the only reason he’s here. While there isn’t much to know about Mario, he is still incredibly popular and well known. I think one reason Mario is so shallow is because he is such an old character, from the beginning of video games. When characters evolved from what were simple games, like playing tennis, it was a new concept. Mario and Link from the Legend of Zelda were very one-dimensional characters in what was a totally new genre at the time. Today, one of the important elements of a video game is the character’s personality and motivations. That is why today’s characters have more substance. 

The next character I would like to examine is the DragonBorn from the Elder Scrolls, Skyrim. The DragonBorn, or Dovahkiin, whose name is decided by the player, is a stoic hero who speaks with dragons. It’s pretty badass, but ultimately, who is he? While anyone who plays the Elder Scrolls knows that the dragon born speaks with dragons, they also decide for themselves who he’s going to be. For me, the dragonborn is a good guy whose only job is to make sure that Tamriel is safe, but if you asked some of my friends the same question they would probably say that he is more of an agent of chaos. This decision about how the character will act makes the DragonBorn perfect for every player because as a base character, you know you are all powerful, and you don’t have to make the hard choices if you don’t want to. Also, the fact that the character can be interpreted in different ways makes the game more interesting. 

While these two characters are widely recognizable, they are far from the only ones. Nintendo is the best at making characters that are recognizable everywhere because they are oriented for kids but parents watch their kids play and become familiar with these characters as well. They also market the characters with toys and other experiences.