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Smash Ultimate has 74 Characters, yet lacks Black/Brown characters (READ OP)
- Thread starter Deleted member 4976
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They seem to be getting the message based on the representation in their newer projects.
You think so? I might be out of the loop but what main characters have been POC?
I'm really pulling for Urbosa, she's a badass. I want her Final Smash to be that lightning zap (coupled with the fierce finger snap) she does in the cutscene in Champions Ballad.
Ah ok, I guess I was thinking in the context of main characters.
Rodin IS indeed in Smash Ultimate, sadly he is only an assist. Is he the only PoC in the game? I tried to find more but couldn't.
I feel like Rodin would have made a great playable character in the game. His moves are close enough to Bayonetta'a that he could have even been an Echo Fighter.
I would love to See Travis Touchdown in Smash, and they could easily have Shinobu join him, as she is also a protagonist from NMH.
Needless to say, I agree that PoC are seriously underrepresented in Smash. And as a Native Canadian, and as discussed in another topic today, this is the only (and very offensive) representation my people have in Smash Ultimate:
There is nothing being bent out of shape. I am pointing out a common trope in Anime/Manga that has not been well documented as far as origins or reasons for the look.
Storm is very easy lightning energy white pupils. In many early films like Bride of Frankenstein (1935) the use of lightning was depicted in the design of the hair with a white streak on both sides. White hair has been a thing associated with lightning and electricity for a long time in old Sci-Fi / Horror films. Storm has little to do with the Japanese White Hair on Dark Skin meme.
Most human characters in Xenoblade X are very clearly white. Vandham for example could not be possibly mistaken for an Asian man. Same with Gwin and Doug. On the other hand, Lin, Lao and Nagi are all distinctly Asian.
This would be fine if there WAS race neutrality. Instead, everyone here is white. White is not neutral, and I personally find it very offensive that anyone would even consider things this way. Nobody is forcing Nintendo to include anything, they are pointing out that with a cast of almost 100 characters, the fact that they ( those that have race) are ALL white, is very concerning.
I understand where your train of thought is coming from. And if the game had a cast of 4 characters, your opinion would make a bit more sense. But I think you are overlooking the sheer volume of characters here, and THAT is what makes this an issue.
Storm is dscended from a line of priestesses who all have white hair and blue eyes. It's not lightning. They wanted the character to feature bits of multiple races.
The same place black people often being the ones in yellow or blue (and consequently often having electricity based super powers) in western media comes from. The contrast with our skin looks good and is more striking than the same on paler people.
It's the same reason that Japanese media also often gives us blue or yellow eyes to boot.
EDIT: The reason this doesn't bother me in the least is because Japanese people are ALSO a people with dark hair and eyes and give themselves a range of hair colors and eye colors they don't naturally have in their own media. It's an artistic choice they apply across the spectrum and not erasure.
Incidentally actual white people in anime are almost always blonde.
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Seriously, it is very clear how the devs built NLA and depicted asians if they really wanted Elma to be asian it is clear what directions they could have gone with her but dismissing Elma from being referred to as black seems to be the issue here so there must be another reason for her look. The problem I have is I might have liked XCX too much I remember I spent well over 2,000 hours in the game by the game clock. I remember the character creation screen and the first thing I wanted to do is try to recreate an Elma twin. She had some very unique features you could not totally get the same look using the character creator. Man did I try for hours though lol. I never did get to my MC looking like Elma.
I am not sure if anyone here remembers the backlash with a lot of people being very vocal about the faces in XCX and Lin got the worst of the hate, it is no wonder Monolith went out and invited new artists to submit designs and went totally anime for XB2
You are talking about Lore that is for the writer dude. I am talking about the art go look at some pics of Storm from 1975 to Present and get back to me on how it has nothing to do with lightning
Writing lore and creating art and design are two different things.
Unless you have actual evidence that was the original artist's intention, it's your headcanon versus that of the actual writers...
What the fuck even is this? Honestly, super glad to see how Blizz handles Overwatch. However, even street fighter and tekken have branched out over the years. Regardless, I feel you're missing the point
I mean, you can't just make shit up. Lore and design go hand in hand in this case. Her eyes aren't blue because of lightning.
Kid Jammer looks seriously cool and reminds me of my suggestion of Skates from Streets of Rage in Smash Bros when we had this discussion in the Black culture community thread awhile back.
In 2018 there is no good excuses for the severe lack of representation for dark skin people. Nintendo sales games all over the world, not just Japan so being Japanese is no good excuse; there are like 50 different blondes in the game and the Japanese aren't naturally blonde.
The characters don't have to be main characters either because most of the smash roster were never main characters in their own game franchises.
And people should stop using Ganon as some example of representation; he's an evil pig dude. Ganon a good example of poor representation, if anything.
Yeah the writers, the intent is more about the writers, how many writers do you think Storm had since 1975? We are all nerds and geeks about this stuff in some level so everyone wants to be right about the shit they know as *facts
I am not saying I know what the OG artist was going for 100% or do I care about what the writers wrote to explain her hair going by the visuals I can clearly see what they borrowed from. This is what you learn if you got to film school, this is what you learn if you go to art school, this is what you learn in design school. The History of Art and Design what makes something Iconic what makes it work. What made this film a classic?
I truly understand the dismissive nature of posting on here it is very easy to brush someone off because you disagree, I welcome your perspective and I am not telling people they are wrong.
I am not trying to hit people over the head with claimed facts, I am pointing out a design heritage where visual are borrowed and evolve from what came before. If you want a lightning user white hair works pretty well as a support of that idea design wise. There is a clear history of characters that came before Storm that had touches of the same design ideas.
I am just giving my perspective from an art and design perspective. You can try ton explain Storm's looks by what was written that she always had white hair because... But just go look at Storm and look at the many covers over the years how her story changed how her looks evolved and only her main theme carries over white hair and lightning a perfect design very Iconic you can't just boil her look down to some tribe and priestesses. The covers the movies she is in her visual look is iconic because the design reminds you of what her badass power is when she starts to use it.
Regardless of what the writers say her hair means, my point was that Storm's white hair in my perspective could very easily come from a design history of using white hair and electricity thus has very little to do with the Japanese trope that caused Elma's white hair. Her being from a line of white haired priestesses takes nothing away from what I said.
Here, so you don't think I'm making it up. Storm was exactly that in the beginning. Black but not quite Black.:
Yep. The people of NLA all have pretty explicit ethnicities. There is even a pretty major plot point regarding this, concerning how Lin and Lao have different perspectives due to their differing histories (Lao is effectively a first-generation immigrant whereas Lin is at least second-generation), but their connected origin highlights Lin's empathy for Lao's struggles.
The devs really don't gloss over or ignore race in XBX. Conflict brought about by immigration, prejudice, and ignorance is one of the main focuses of the game. The choice of New LA as the setting isn't arbitrary; it was done specifically to emphasize the game's central theme of accepting immigrants, diversity, and multiculturalism.
I mean it feels like an anime version, not that it doesn't have a mix of races. Like even Vandham feels based on this kinda of anime character:
The tough, beefy leader/worker guy who usually has his arms crossed but has a sense of humor and a heart of gold.
Elma looks more like Lao than anyone else, imo. Most people have explicit ethnicities but Elma doesn't.
Eh, I often see Ganondorf as a shade of green rather than brown, and to be fair I don't consider anybody from TLoZ to be human in first place and probably they aren't meant to be either, nor the inklings which aren't even vertebrates in first place. So I guess villager alternative is the only one which fits the description, maybe a Fire Emblem character could do, the matter is Fire Emblem characters(most being human) are from fictional locations and fictional worlds so it's kind of complicated to label them too.
Which maybe makes sense since Elma isn't human either.
I think you accused me of making shit up, I never questioned your perspective.
those are your words I never raise an issue with your point I just gave a reply pointing some stuff out from my perspective.
I never talked about her blue eyes so not sure what you are saying there, I posted about white hair and white pupil as being a good design for a lightning user because it works and makes her iconic.
Storm has had many looks over the years
I think we are having a chicken or the egg moment about which came first. Was she always going to be shown in a lightning backdrops? Maybe, maybe not but the design works well. Growing up I can't say how many times I've seen Storm depicted this way in animation, film, and comic book covers. That is the image I get when I read the word STORM this is who she is to me.
But in 1975 a blue eyed white girl with a tan design look is to be expected, if people wanted to say she is not black.
Her design changed many times over the years.
Storm is just a good design to me regardless.
The majority of Smash's characters are Asian, in the same way that all the majority of anime characters are also Asian. I'm not saying the game doesn't have a serious problem with diversity and that it doesn't need more characters with diverse skintones but this isn't a fact that shouldn't be misrepresented on account of their creative origins.
Hehehe I am a fan of the pink haired anime characters lol. You make a good point there.
Hair color use to mean so much more in 1990s early 2000s manga, often used in the plot too. Now I guess I take that for granted so your reply is a great perspective on that topic, thanks.
I think a few pages back some posters talked about Asians in Smash, I don't think the list was very long at all. Which characters are on your list? Just curious.
The list should include Mario, Link, Zelda, Samus, and a large portion of the others because they're characters created by Japanese people informed by a Japanese perspective. They're not white.
Okay (ignoring that the article you link to isn't supporting your point). So is this character black?
From a quick count, 42 are human or human-equivalent (ie homs or chibis) and 6 are humanoid or potentially human (ie Mega Man, Game & Watch, Inklings, Mii).
So you mean as a painter I can't paint white people because anything I paint would be seen as black like me because of my perspective?
I am not sure I can agree, as we are talking about video games these characters are from mostly fantasy worlds but I am not sure I can follow your idea but it is interesting.
I don't think you can consider the Zelda or FE characters Asian when they seem inspired by medieval European fantasy.
As well as both introducing more eastern analogues like the Sheikah and Hoshido.
As well as both introducing more eastern analogues like the Sheikah and Hoshido.
I mean there are black and brown villains (Bald Bull should be in it for a little Mac counter) but no heroes of color in the Nintendo verse I can think of...do you really want Barret as a counter to Cloud or Balrog to fight Chun Li and Ryu? The Arms Dealer from Bayonetta?
Lack of diversity is an entertainment industry wide problem and compounded by the fact that Japan is a very anti immigrant homogeneous society so they just don't know any better.
Lack of diversity is an entertainment industry wide problem and compounded by the fact that Japan is a very anti immigrant homogeneous society so they just don't know any better.
No, characters obviously meant, designed, and stated to be a particular ethnicity would be black, latinx, or otherwise.
Read the article I posted further up. The creators see their creations as Japanese, their initial viewers identify them as Japanese, and thus, they are Japanese. Their resemblance to "white" people is the result of western animation influencing their burgeoning animation, manga, and gaming industries and an attempt to stand out visually in order to be eye catching and unique-looking to Japanese audiences.
That's a touchy distinction to make. When the Sheikah were introduced, Impa inherited the name of a character from earlier in the series and resembled the other Hyruleans almost exactly. The Sheikah's more direct inspiration also comes from indigenous Japanese people like the Ainu, not Japanese culture as a whole. Fire Emblem has also had characters influenced and modeled around Japanese culture and norms well before Hoshido was separated as a separate kingdom.
Generally, you wouldn't not wrong, but in this case, most of the Smash characters aren't Japanese. The stylization makes it difficult to differentiate between asian and non-asian characters, which is why an American or European character shows up, they're explicitly blonde-haired and blue-eyed. All the Mario, Zelda, and Fire Emblem (sans Corin) reps are explicitly non-Asian, Mario, Luigi, and (presumably) Wario are canonically Italian while Peach embodies the B-H B-E trope, while Zelda and Fire Emblem take place in largely European-coded worlds.
got it, thanks for doing the count! I'm not much of a Nintendo fan and don't have interest in most of their IP, so I didn't know
Anime is full of blonde haired and blue eyed characters and full of characters inspired by western fantasy. Is Usagi Tsukino white? She's not really any different visually from Peach or Zelda.
I think the point they're making is like how in a lot of animes and games and such characters don't really look or act like who they are supposed to be and still come across as Japanese. Like when an anime has an episode set in America and the Americans are still super anime tropey. But they're still intended to be Americans so that's who they are.
Maybe they could make a case with fantasy world characters like Zelda and FE characters. They do kinda fit in with other anime characters that are supposed to be Japanese. A lot of anime characters look white. But I wouldn't buy it with Mario.
And you think Nintendo designed Mario, Link, and Samus to be Japanese?
Fair enough with Peach, but Zelda still comes from a heavily European-coded world.
I think you raised some interesting ideas here and the linked article about Whitewashing in Hollywood is going to raise the issue further
Nintendo has had western adaptation of both Mario and Zelda, Mario had a film and a cartoon, Zelda was featured in a few cartoons.
Any new Hollywood films created with Nintendo's IPs and those you feel are Japanese characters might end up falling under the whitewashing label if everyone agreed with the point you are making but I really doubt a western audience would willingly give Mario's live action role to a Japanese actor to fit your point here. There would be some blow back on that I don't think fans would agree as much as GITS fans felt about the recent movie that failed to make an anime character with a Japanese name, Japanese.
- Mario as an IP would be harder to sell to Universal Studios for a theme park in Florida if he was seen as Japanese alone. It is more the fantasy aspect of the world and lore that Mario has that makes it marketable to the west.
- I want to point out that Zelda runs into another unique problem because the games started featuring a made up language for the world - Hylians cannot easily be said to be Japanese or anything else really. But then again when selling the IP for live-action films they are going to make choices. Pointy Ears and all.
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That, again, includes a very Eastern inspired theology and has a fantasy counterpart to the Ainu.
It's not as clear cut as you're making it.
Pretty telling that the same half dozen characters or so get brought up in this thread over and over.
Nothing will change for this game - the DLC characters are already penciled in and I really doubt Elma or Twintelle will be playable - and I'm not sure how much it's gonna change in the future. Nintendo can be pretty insular as far as Japanese culture goes and I don't think western progressive values are high on their priority list.
Video games are gonna need their Black Panther moment before the effects can be felt industry-wide.
Nothing will change for this game - the DLC characters are already penciled in and I really doubt Elma or Twintelle will be playable - and I'm not sure how much it's gonna change in the future. Nintendo can be pretty insular as far as Japanese culture goes and I don't think western progressive values are high on their priority list.
Video games are gonna need their Black Panther moment before the effects can be felt industry-wide.
The problem I have with Elma as a representative of black or, frankly, any race is I see her design as intentionally ambiguous.
Elma isn't human. Her robot body is this racially ambiguous person and Elma herself doesn't understand human tribalism, it's a bit of a plot point at the end. Elma's real body is a generic porcelain white skinned, blue haired space elf. I kinda' hated that reveal.