Weekend Question: How long do you spend in character creators?

PCG Jody

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Dec 9, 2019
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I ask the PCG staff a regular Weekend Question and post the answers on the site. If you'd like to throw in an answer here, I'll squeeze the best into the finished article!

This week's question is: How long do you spend in character creators?

When a videogame opens with so many sliders you'd think it was a 1990s sci-fi series starring John Rhys-Davies, do you dive right in and start adjusting your character? Do you wallow in that thing for hours until you've created a face perfect enough to shame God? Or do you just say 'good enough' and get on with playing the actual game?
 
do you just say 'good enough' and get on with playing the actual game?
That would be me, 15-20 minutes max in the few games where I've had character creation options. But there have never been 'tweaking' options, like size of eyebrows or mouth.

I would spend much longer cumulatively in Photo Mode, making adjustments for each shot.
 

Zloth

Community Contributor
I normally don't spend a lot of time adjusting my characters' looks. Maybe 5 minutes. There are some exceptions when there are a LOT of options for the looks, though. City of Heroes/Villains is going to take a good half hour per costume slot.

I would spend much longer cumulatively in Photo Mode, making adjustments for each shot.
Which you then completely keep to yourself instead of posting on this forum!
 
I ask the PCG staff a regular Weekend Question and post the answers on the site. If you'd like to throw in an answer here, I'll squeeze the best into the finished article!

This week's question is: How long do you spend in character creators?

When a videogame opens with so many sliders you'd think it was a 1990s sci-fi series starring John Rhys-Davies, do you dive right in and start adjusting your character? Do you wallow in that thing for hours until you've created a face perfect enough to shame God? Or do you just say 'good enough' and get on with playing the actual game?
My process is to glance at the default, male character. and decide if he is acceptable. If so, then I just skip it altogether. That's how it goes the majority of the time. Every now and then I'm not a huge fan of Mr. Default, so i might cycle through some faces and hairstyles, but it doesn't take but a minute. If it's one like in Fallout 4 where you can change even the smallest detail, I might fiddle with it a couple of minutes.

But, see, none of these characters can compare to me IRL. I'm so hot the air around me gives off a faint sizzling sound. i look how bacon tastes.
 
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you then completely keep to yourself instead of posting on this forum
Hey, gimme break! I just started exploring Far Cry 5's photo mode a couple of days ago—still getting used to it, so patience asshopper :)

I'm … hot … air … me … faint … i look … bacon
Yeah. You need to spend more time with RL character creator :p
 

Sarafan

Community Contributor
I spend a lot of time in character creators, but not in the character look editors. Usually most time consuming is selecting the appropriate set of abilities and skills. This can take ridiculously long especially if there are some random variables. My personal record is 8 hours spent to create a whole party in the first Icewind Dale. It’s something fascinating in re-rolling dices of all those stats until you get a satisfying result.
 
Being an RPG fanatic, I love a deep, detailed character creation system, I will spend literally hours in character creation, depending upon the complexity and how many characters I'm creating. If I'm only creating one character, as in the Elder Scrolls games, it might only take me an hour or two, and I'm not overly fanatical about a "looks-type" creation (although appearance & body type can be important for a 3rd person view and/or a photo mode).

But what really consumes my time are games where you create a party of 2-6 characters and your game experience & survival is going to depend upon the choices you make and there's no included "re-spec" option later in the game. Make your choices wisely and live or die by them.

D&D games are a good example, where your choices of race, class, profession, alignment, stats, skills, and proficiencies will dictate your success or failure in the game world. Roll those dice, again & again & again, to get that perfect build you're looking for. I'm envious of @Sarafan 's 8 hours spent on his Icewind Dale party. Solasta Crown of the Magister is a more recent D&D game (party of 4) that I've spent hours in character creation, Rolling dice over & over, and spending points on skill, abilities, and feats. A very old-school and detailed system.
 
Spore! Anyone remember Spore? The game where character creation was more fun and took more time than you spent on the rest of the game :)

I spent hours on the creature creator before the main game was even released. For all of Spore's (many, many) faults, the creature creator was really well made. As were the other creators in the game for that matter.
 
For the most part like everyone here probably half an hour tops. i would like to spend an hour or 2 refining and making the perfect character, but there's only so far i can push those sliders and modify the cookie dough skin. Most cases the changes aren't significant and don't deviate that far from the template faces at all. CRPGs i might take slightly longer thinking about stats, but again i usually fall back to tried and tested template builds of warrior or magic / rogue and hope for the best to excel in one area instead of a jack of all trades. Would like to play more unique classes but without experience picking them could be a costly mistake.
 

Zloth

Community Contributor
Being male I prefer playing male characters. I tend to do as little as possible except to add hair to the face and head.
Well over half the characters in Asheron's Call looked like that - including my first one. I never fit in so well in my entire life. It was horrid! So, I made the exact opposite. I've been using the Tesslah model off and on for almost a quarter century now.
full
 

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