It’s very easy to see how much gaming has changed, you can see differences in games developed and released this year from games released three years ago, trace it back further, ten, twenty and thirty and you can draw a timeline and a map of how games have evolved. As a very visual medium it’s pretty simple to do, the consoles, the packaging, it has all changed but there’s been a bigger shift in developing the ‘heart’ of a game.
The main difference between games back in the day and now aside from graphics is the actual characters themselves and more specifically their personalities.
Pong, Pac-Man, Sonic and Mario, some may argue that these characters still had a lot more personality than some modern day characters and I’m not disagreeing with anyone on that point. I’m just pointing out the changes and advancements that have happened since they first exploded into the world of gaming allow characters to express themselves easier and more in depth.
Now when I look back at these games and the golden era of gaming there is a lot of personality but it was more the game overall not the character (not all games of course). Obviously due to limitations back in the day such as not enough ram to hold full sound files for the characters to converse, this took away from character development to a certain degree. As well as this there was also the obvious limits to the animations that they had to work with again impacting on the personality. You had sonic who just tapped his feet while waiting for you or giving you the peace sign when you finished a level. You had Mario’s victory stroll after each level. As subtle as these traits were (because the game itself was so simple in terms of design and gameplay) they made a big impact in the characters overall personality. Then of course you had the enemies pinned against them which helps bring to life your heroes.
Gaming has made steady improvements in this area over the last 20 years in particular. Even if you look at the evolution of Mario or Sonic over the last 30 years they have been overhauled with graphics and have been given more characteristics with each game.
Nowadays the gaming industry has surpassed the movie industry in terms of money both spent and earned on its productions. Forbes estimates that the industry will hit $87 billion in annual sales by the year 2017. With this has come many upgrades in gaming such as sound, visuals, animation, CGI, green screen as well as many others. Due to the above, characters how now developed into human beings. the essence of humanity at least in terms of actions, thoughts and movements.
Let’s take a look at a well know icon such as Nathan Drake from the Uncharted series. Aside from the high definition renders that make up Nathan and what not, let’s actually get into the human traits Nathan Drake possesses. Nathan is a very childlike character is some ways such as his naivety and in his humour. 
However at the same time even though he is somewhat naïve he also understands to a degree what might come of his actions and knowing the possible consequences. To top this all off he has an impressive knowledge of the ancient world that one can simply only get through years of study or attaining a degree. This proves my point on how far gaming characters personalities have come. We no longer have linear personalities in gaming (so to speak). We now have as all humans have, very contrasting personality traits that work together to create a one of a kind person.
Further proof and a perfect example of different personalities is Lara Croft and . The new side to Lara shows her starting out her journey on becoming a tomb raider. With this her characteristics consist of being vulnerable yet strong, naïve yet aware and young yet extremely capable of making well thought out decisions in a matter of seconds. Aside from all this Lara also has a very loyal side to her and her friends mean the world to her. She is the type of character that goes out on weekends and has a good time with friends but yet she can still explore the world and be the much needed bad ass. There are many other factors that we could look at as well but already I think the point is proving that in video games, characters personalities are more prominent.
Characters have now been given proper characteristics and animation which helps bring to life their personality.
The interesting thing about Lara Croft and her personality now is the fact that she pretty much came from nothing. When Lara came out on PS1 she was despite her look, a generic character – she adventured for the sake of adventuring. She also had a sort of cheeky flirtatious personality but it felt very tacked on, very corny but for her time, this Lara still maintained a personality. Consider the new Lara and her adventures in Tomb Raider (2013), the young woman full of drive and ambition, a young woman struggling against the brutality of man and nature.
We have also seen many characters battle their inner demons or overcome a particular trauma only to become stronger in the end or in some cases defeated and end up in a terrible state of mind. These then tend to become evil or they get taken away to the asylum. Speech and personality has definitely made it a lot more interesting for these stories to be told and even in some cases more relatable. A very good example of the above to leave you pondering is the Joker from Batman Arkham City?
On a final note the last thing to be considered is games that give you control of a characters personality and what they do. There are many different types of games you can do this in such as The Sims, Fable, The Walking Dead even World of Warcraft. This opens up many different evolutions in terms of personalities. Create your own Sim, give them a personality but watch how your own impacts their world, the same with Clementine and Lee, what they do is a reflection of who you are
The heroes, the villains and the inhabitants of the worlds we play every day impact us but as individuals and a community we impact and shape the world of gaming, it is a reflection of who we are, it’s important that they see our best side, the best we can be.
