Guild Wars 2

Putting this out there (But I shouldn’t have too) i’m not trying to offend anyone here. Can’t really see how I could but, whatever.

But I digress, Not saying decent as in good and bad, but an actually African looking black male. Been in CC for a while trying to make my warrior but the character just ends up looking like a white dude with dark skin. I don’t know if the options just aren’t there or they take precise tweaking or what. Went to the female side of things and found slightly better results, but I don’t want to make a female character.

Does anybody know of any pictures or a look at the sliders to make a believably black looking character? Would be much appreciated.

Not really, I had a fiddle but couldn’t really come up with much

for the time being you cant. why? simple: the regions we have aren’t africa like regions. Maybe in the future they would make a human populated africa like region.

This is my ranger. I think I did a fairly good job.

TheLyraki.2893:

for the time being you cant. why? simple: the regions we have aren’t africa like regions. Maybe in the future they would make a human populated africa like region.

What you said makes absolutely ZERO sense. OR has literally nothing to do with why we can’t make a belieavable black characters in general.

^ It’s especially wrong considering that we have Elona, we had settlers/refugees from Elona come to Tyria only in the last few generations (Miyani is, in fact, an Elonian!), so why wouldn’t there be some Elonians around?

We can only hope that one day there will be a Canthan and Elonian expansion that will give us more customisation options though.

I think Natsu Dragneel and Alilinke did a pretty good job of showing us that we can make them. Though any more options would still be welcome.

Dustfinger.9510:

I think Natsu Dragneel and Alilinke did a pretty good job of showing us that we can make them.

Did you observe as much as you envision?
Natsu’s didn’t even look enough like a human could, let alone a Black one, and Alilinke’s made it across the uncanny valley by forcibly mixing in considerable European ancestry.
Not only can we not make a full-blooded Black guy, but the more realistic the results, the more they tend to all look alike. Not that there is much avoiding it, for every man has to go with lengthy Caucasian eyebrows and a straight nose and has to pull the very same beard trick to somewhat hide the obligatory Anglo-Saxon chin.

Bazompora.2635:

Dustfinger.9510:

I think Natsu Dragneel and Alilinke did a pretty good job of showing us that we can make them.

Did you observe as much as you envision?
Natsu’s didn’t even look enough like a human could, let alone a Black one, and Alilinke’s made it across the uncanny valley by forcibly mixing in considerable European ancestry.
Not only can we not make a full-blooded Black guy, but the more realistic the results, the more they tend to all look alike. Not that there is much avoiding it, for every man has to go with lengthy Caucasian eyebrows and a straight nose and has to pull the very same beard trick to somewhat hide the obligatory Anglo-Saxon chin.

You know caucasians don’t all look alike right? there are many different features and those features are shared worldwide through many different full blooded peoples from different cultures.

Now to your point that they all look alike. YES! There are limited options. Which is why I said I’m all for “more options”. I notice you conveniently left that part out when you quoted my post. it seems you envisioned more than was actually in my post and when it didn’t fit your ideal of what you wanted to respond to you tried to change my post into what you wished it was.

So what about Natsu’s character doesn’t “look human”?

What about Alilinke’s character looks European? (His nose looks very un-caucasian and lengthy eyebrows are not limited to Caucasians). meanwhile not all black people need to have beards in order to “look black”.

The women don’t need to have one, sure. But show me a Black male face that’s convincing enough without the beard.

Natsu’s character looks like a polished stitchless version of Frankenstein’s monster: a bunch of human features that never occur together in real life. The color may be “black”, but the rest is a collage of Caucasian bodyparts. There’s no Black man that even remotely looks like that.

Alilinke’s character is so far the most convincing character of African descent I’ve seen – ever (better than the clones from Arenanet even), but he couldn’t get around the eyes lying deep in the sockets. African eyes pooch out, in case you haven’t noticed, and non-admixed eyebrows never are that pronounced either. If his character wasn’t clean bald, his hair line would have been too low. You know that complete baldness isn’t a natural trait for black men? Imagine if you could only make convincing White skinheads.

This is why I previously quoted your first sentence only: so far we’ve been shown that we can’t yet make believably Black men,
• because they have to be Black-White / White-Black mixed instead of actual Black
• because they all converge towards one same face.

You don’t need to tell me White people can look different aswell; The matter of fact is that you already start out with 10 Caucasian options and 0 African ones when it comes to male faces.

What does a black man look like?

Does the guy on the right look like it? How about the guy on the left?

Bazompora.2635:

The women don’t need to have one, sure. But show me a Black male face that’s convincing enough without the beard.

Natsu’s character looks like a polished stitchless version of Frankenstein’s monster: a bunch of human features that never occur together in real life. The color may be “black”, but the rest is a collage of Caucasian bodyparts. There’s no Black man that even remotely looks like that.

Alilinke’s character is so far the most convincing character of African descent I’ve seen – ever (better than the clones from Arenanet even), but he couldn’t get around the eyes lying deep in the sockets. African eyes pooch out, in case you haven’t noticed, and non-admixed eyebrows never are that pronounced either. If his character wasn’t clean bald, his hair line would have been too low. You know that complete baldness isn’t a natural trait for black men? Imagine if you could only make convincing White skinheads.

This is why I previously quoted your first sentence only: so far we’ve been shown that we can’t yet make believably Black men,
• because they have to be Black-White / White-Black mixed instead of actual Black
• because they all converge towards one same face.

You don’t need to tell me White people can look different aswell; The matter of fact is that you already start out with 10 Caucasian options and 0 African ones when it comes to male faces.

On Natsu’s character. You acknoelwge that all Caucasians don’t look the same. But you attribute hard features as to what is black and what is Caucasian. My point there is that so many of these features are shared across so many cultures around the world. There are only so many different combinations features that can be made with a finite number of features. this is why we get people of different ethnicities that look like they could be family and even twins. And these features expand beyond just caucasian and black people. they are found all over the world.

natsu’s character looks fine. I see plenty of features that are not stricjly relegated to caucasians.

Alilinke’s character is also fine. Take the beard away and you have a black man with a shave. Those pronounced eyebrows come with grooming. So does a completely bald head when men start balding. Instead of fighting it they often just shave their head. Look at a groomed Caucasian and then look at a prehistoric one without grooming. That’s what you are basically trying to do with this flawed idea of “black features”.

This, btw is a picture of a genuine African tribal girl. Google African tribeman go to the pictures and you’ll see so many different features that are common around the world. Almond eyes, round eyes, bulging eyes, thick eyebrows, thin eye brows, long eye brows, short eye brows, high cheek bones, low cheek bones, etc. This idea that “actual black people” look a specific way is pretty rediculous.

Is that really what I said: “a specific way”? Does a limited range limit itself to one way?
That Black people are very diverse in appearance isn’t something you would hear me contest. Quite the contrary. It’s those who try to sell Human Character creation who seem to imply that Black facial structures are somewhere from representatively to entirely present in the overlap with big-chinned Caucasian faces.

Dustfinger.9510:

I see plenty of features that are not stricjly relegated to caucasians.

This kind of insensitivity,
I wouldn’t be surprised if it is shared with all whom is responsible for human appearances in Guild Wars 2:
one should just accept any Briton’s head that has a minimum of dark skin, big lips and a broad nose slapped on as Black?

Why don’t you post a picture of what you’d like a black character to look like then? Or maybe a point by point explanation what makes a black person’s face unique or different from others. You’re being a bit vague with your descriptions.

Bazompora.2635:

Is that really what I said: “a specific way”? Does a limited range limit itself to one way?
That Black people are very diverse in appearance isn’t something you would hear me contest. Quite the contrary. It’s those who try to sell Human Character creation who seem to imply that Black facial structures are somewhere from representatively to entirely present in the overlap with big-chinned Caucasian faces.

feel free to brain storm what features are only Caucasion, Black, Native American, Indian, Asian, Arabian, etc. I guarantee you’ll find plenty of overlap. And that’s just going by a sterio typical look. That’s ignoring examples like many Asians having almond eyes and various African tribal tendancies toward almond eyes as well.

This kind of insensitivity,
I wouldn’t be surprised if it is shared with all whom is responsible for human appearances in Guild Wars 2:
one should just accept any Briton’s head that has a minimum of dark skin, big lips and a broad nose slapped on as Black?

It’s not insensitive at all. Features are shared around the world. what makes a certain “look” is the combination of those features. But even certain looks vary broadly. I’ve backed it up with real world pics. Specify what exactly are only caucasian features because neatly trimmed eyebrows, a bald head and a big chin isn’t making your point. Note that both wide and long chins can be found without making that person look “unrealistic”.

This last image is a member of the Wodaabe tribe. Not the sterio typical black look but it is realistic and authentic. Granted it is an extreme example but it illustrates how authentic tribal Africans features can vary drastically. and those features can be shared with feature combinations that are common in Europeans.

My guard.

Me and my friend tried a lot of times to make black characters, but its really hard with the options for faces, specially for girls, where you don’t either have good hairs or good faces to make them look like a black person.

So the only option is to make a Black Norn. At least is (always) easy to make any Norn alt.

When I look at all three of these in-game images, the only thing that seems off are the eyes. As pointed out, there is enough spread on the variety of African features that these are all fairly credible (to me anyway).

I don’t think that we’ll see anything better until we can officially make Elonian characters. In the meantime, you can argue that these characters aren’t good, but they at least seem passable (again, except for the eyes).

I enjoy how this went from “Lets get more character customization!!” to “How dare you think that person is the correct representation for all black people!”

I know that no one said that but it does seem like it went from an issue concerning too little character customization to everyone that tries to make a black character is insensitive and does not believe that there is a need for more customization.

Just seems funny to me.

If we browse through GW art, we see that the Elonian culture and people share a lot of traits with past Africa irl, both sub-saharian and north-saharian. And it’s true that some Elonian made their way to Kryta. Thus, the fact that Elonia is not part of the game shouldn’t prevent players to play a character of Elonian ancestry, or of partial Elonian ancestry.

However, while I agree that the facial customization is limited, this topic turned a surrealistic corner from an educated European point of view (not saying that an European is educated, just saying that some aren’t so!). Black is not Africa (as recognized by anthropologists since the mid 20th century), and as said, even Africa is diversity and history.

I hope you understand why “Anglo-saxon chin” and “full-blood Black guy” made my day.

It’s the voice, not the appearance, I’d like more options for. The current human voice actor (male) does a fine job, but he sounds very much white. If I’m going to make an Elonian character, something I’d like to do, I’d like him to sound the part.

It’s Nolan North’s whitey-mc.white-white whitey whitey white white voice.

I hope they add more African american, Asian, and Hispanic faces in the future. I love lots of diversity in games. . I would wish for them to add Lupita Nyong’o face, she’s so beautiful and for the males add sexy Idris Elba.

P.S. Please add more curly hair options, I don’t want to give my character a afro and I don’t want to give her straight hair.

anyway I hope they listen to us and add more face/hair diversity in game.

As been mentioned, best thing you can do is to make norn and scale him down. Also norn male voice fits black person as well (at least it sounded natural for me).

My main is a norn necro, and I’ve made him too look how I wanted to (I know he doesn’t look that natural). But you can easly adjust some sliders to get more realistic look.

Garm.9750:

My main is a norn necro, and I’ve made him too look how I wanted to (I know he doesn’t look that natural). But you can easly adjust some sliders to get more realistic look.

This guy looks awesome. Does he have any particular passages from Ezekiel memorized?

You guys do know that Caucasians aren’t just white people? And it’s also an incredibly outdated and offensive term. It was coined with other terms which are completely intolerable in todays society, so I dont see why people keep throwing it around. It has nothing to do with skin tone either! Seriously guys, 5 minutes research….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucasian_race

Also, I’m “white” and there’s no good facial options for my people, not even in Norn….

Fintytin.5704:

You guys do know that Caucasians aren’t just white people? And it’s also an incredibly outdated and offensive term. It was coined with other terms which are completely intolerable in todays society, so I dont see why people keep throwing it around. It has nothing to do with skin tone either! Seriously guys, 5 minutes research….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucasian_race

Also, I’m “white” and there’s no good facial options for my people, not even in Norn….

Eh, I don’t think the term itself is offensive. It’s not really used in a pejorative sense unlike the “N” word.

Likewise, I’m Asian, and I’ve never felt offended by the term “Oriental” (in fact, I kinda like it. It sounds mysterious and exotic) or “Chinaman”. But if someone were to use it in a hateful tone towards me, that would rile me up.

Zaxares.5419:

Eh, I don’t think the term itself is offensive. It’s not really used in a pejorative sense unlike the “N” word.

Likewise, I’m Asian, and I’ve never felt offended by the term “Oriental” (in fact, I kinda like it. It sounds mysterious and exotic) or “Chinaman”. But if someone were to use it in a hateful tone towards me, that would rile me up.

You might not find Oriental offensive, but would you find the term “Mongoloid” offensive if someone called you it? It was used at the same time as Caucasian/Caucasoid. Most people don’t find it offensive but its still outdated and groups together many groups who are completely different racially.

Eggman.1405:

This guy looks awesome. Does he have any particular passages from Ezekiel memorized?

Thanks. It’s actually quite ironical that you can make decent looking black person out of the “northen” race, but not out of the race that pretty much lived across whole world. Not sure about second part of you message. The only Ezekiel I know comes from religion, and I’m not good at it.

Fintytin.5704:

You might not find Oriental offensive, but would you find the term “Mongoloid” offensive if someone called you it? It was used at the same time as Caucasian/Caucasoid. Most people don’t find it offensive but its still outdated and groups together many groups who are completely different racially.

The word “Mongoloid” has an awkward mouthfeel to me (similar to how a lot of people have an instinctive dislike of the word “moist”), so I do dislike it on that basis, but I don’t find it offensive, no.

Yeah, I prefer the word damp myself. Moist has sexual connotations that might be inappropriate for day to day use…..

Garm.9750:

Not sure about second part of you message. The only Ezekiel I know comes from religion, and I’m not good at it.

Sorry, that was a Pulp Fiction reference.

TheLyraki.2893:

for the time being you cant. why? simple: the regions we have aren’t africa like regions. Maybe in the future they would make a human populated africa like region.

It’s not an excuse for limited options in GW2, since there oviously would be people of elonian descent, but, yeah, in GW1 elonian characters had much more african features than tyrian characters, as canthan characters had more asian features.
Maybe we see more options with the reintroduction of these regions?

inhearth.2038:

My guard.

Me and my friend tried a lot of times to make black characters, but its really hard with the options for faces, specially for girls, where you don’t either have good hairs or good faces to make them look like a black person.

So the only option is to make a Black Norn. At least is (always) easy to make any Norn alt.

He looks like the rapper Game.

I’m super late here, but I agree. More options would be great. I know I’m not completely satisfied with how my character’s face turned out.

The limited choices are probably more noticeable because as humans, the differences are more recognizable. Unlike for the other races.

Hm. Things inevitably got out of focus in this discussion for a few I see. A few fallacies maybe?

(first post in the forums yay I guess)