when you play Fallout do you make a player character based on yourself?

[Jazzman]

lol

 

Fallout 4 forces us to play as middle aged looking mofos (except females with a simple face retexture). How in the fucking fuckity fuck could i play as myself lmfao

Well, as long as nobody in game tells ya on the quiet that you'd look older than your own son everything is just fine, right?

[Sarishagan]

 

Being a modding fan and a psychologist, I really enjoyed this thread. Not many people asks this question of such a mundane choice gamers are ask of a regular basis.  In my field, it's a big tell about a person much like the music they choose to listen to.

 

If you're interested in more, Read this thread on Quora: 

https://www.quora.com/Why-do-male-female-gamers-sometimes-pretend-to-be-the-opposite-gender-in-MMORPGs

 

thoughts on the people that say they never play as guys because they'd rather see a chicks ass over a guy's?

(imo over-used cliche excuse/phrase)

 

also good link

 

 

Yeah, I agree. That phrase outside Quora is definitely click bait. Well, even in Quora that would be considered click bait. heheheheh

 

You're welcome. Big fan of that site. Reminds me of what the internet was like before 1994.

[Sarishagan]

When I think of a protagonist, I don't see my own image and think I should or would be one. Not insulting my looks, but, I get an image in my head and run with it.

 

If I could make the decisions the exact way I would want to, instead of the way developers decided for me, maybe I could immerse myself into the game AS myself.

 

Regarding gender in games, I tend to play male characters, not because I immerse better with a male, but because I can't really imagine raiders and bandits trying to kill chicks so much as other things, things made in mods that make me uneasy. I've been here to long.     

 

ehhehe, don't sweat it. People have their different reasons of why they choose as they do. The task of an experimental psychologist is to measure the statistics of frequency of certain choices. I don't think there is any industry or other entertainment venue which routinely asks its contributors to create an "Image" of themselves. It is profoundly personal question to be implicitly asking so routinely.  

[Sarishagan]

One doesn't have to be a disciple of Sigmund Freud to know that in a virtual RPG it is always the own mind that drives an alien body - the avatar. Being not in the own body is what defines virtuality. How close or far off the avatar appears compared to the own body depends thus on the individual understanding of comfort as well as the own intentions in a given virtual story. And hardly anybody is still puzzled as to why straight folk that play the opposing sex by above reasons almost inevitably become gay in game. Or as Richard III of England in his role as Mary of Burgundy once has shouted: "My kingdom! My kingdom for a horse strap-on mod!" Legend has it.

 

 

[ ]

 

lol I agree. Any gamer who has a modicum of interest in Psychology can see this to be an easy call. However, academics...especially PhDs generally don't participate in places like these nor do they really care. They're too busy defending the thesis they wrote to get there instead of looking at new forms of data. As an avid gamer, I have to explain what you see to be an easy call in academic speak so they can potentially understand it. Furthermore, I have to explain gaming as whole since many of their experiences with computer gaming is what their grandchildren do when they try to speak to them. If I'm not successful in explaining its possible significance, the human nature of "shutting down anything they don't understand" kicks in. Experiment never approved on the ground the committee didn't understand what an RPG was.  Mind you, these are the same people who got their PhDs before the internet had graphics and at their most hallowed event, they still dress in the same garb they did 400 years ago. Yeah, I'm a masochist.

[Sarishagan]

Physically? No, but who's to say I'm happy with how I look in real life?

Mentally? Might sound obvious or dumb but I do try to make decisions in the game based on how I would in a real life encounter. Whether good or bad. Normally I make a bunch of good decisions then one really big bad one(like killing Shaun with a wrench) that breaks it even : p In the other Fallout games, I would be neutral for a long time in the karma meter(which I miss).

I try role playing in other scenarios but I always end up reverting back to, "How would I truly handle this though?".

 

I can understand the implication about sexuality and body dysmorphia but there are other things like Focus of Loci that I believe can be tested from such data. So far my annectdotal info shows that people who play themselves (physically accurate) in an RPG is a very uncommon choice.  TBH, I'm really trying to see if I can pull enough data to propose a data gathering experiment.

[Sarishagan]

lol

 

Fallout 4 forces us to play as middle aged looking mofos (except females with a simple face retexture). How in the fucking fuckity fuck could i play as myself lmfao

 

heheheh, 

It's all about a question not necessarily the platform. Meaning, it's not limited to just Fallout 4.  Could be applicable to any game but some allow more detailed customization than others. For example, using your case, my question for this experiment would probably be "If you were a middle aged mother puss bucket, would you make your avatar look like you in Fallout 4?"

[Guest]

 

Physically? No, but who's to say I'm happy with how I look in real life?

Mentally? Might sound obvious or dumb but I do try to make decisions in the game based on how I would in a real life encounter. Whether good or bad. Normally I make a bunch of good decisions then one really big bad one(like killing Shaun with a wrench) that breaks it even : p In the other Fallout games, I would be neutral for a long time in the karma meter(which I miss).

I try role playing in other scenarios but I always end up reverting back to, "How would I truly handle this though?".

 

I can understand the implication about sexuality and body dysmorphia but there are other things like Focus of Loci that I believe can be tested from such data. So far my annectdotal info shows that people who play themselves (physically accurate) in an RPG is a very uncommon choice.  TBH, I'm really trying to see if I can pull enough data to propose a data gathering experiment.

 

Interesting Read.

Most of the people who I know or have encounter actually prefer to play as themselves in games that give them an option to do so. I use to work at, ready yourselves, Gamecrazy(inside of Hollywood videos), and most customers I would talk to would find it strange that I wouldn't my my character look like myself. I find it particularly amusing, since most of the people I use to play NBA2k16 with would all look like themselves and then there I was, 7'3 Black dude that looked like Ben Wallace. But I'm sure that might just all comes back to say something about me subconsciously.

Anyways sorry to jump off topic. On a side note, I guess I lean more towards having an "internal locus" based life : p

[KumamonTheWorshiper]

 

lol

 

Fallout 4 forces us to play as middle aged looking mofos (except females with a simple face retexture). How in the fucking fuckity fuck could i play as myself lmfao

 

heheheh, 

It's all about a question not necessarily the platform. Meaning, it's not limited to just Fallout 4.  Could be applicable to any game but some allow more detailed customization than others. For example, using your case, my question for this experiment would probably be "If you were a middle aged mother puss bucket, would you make your avatar look like you in Fallout 4?"

 

uhh

 

While i admit that i'm wrong that the question isn't limited to only Fallout 4, this thread are focused on Fallout games in general. i mean, it's right there in the title dudee: "when you play Fallout do you make a player character based on yourself?"

 

And since my face are still way too far from looking like a middle-aged mofo and can't imagine how my middle-aged self looks like, no, playing as middle-aged me is a no go too.

[Shadow_Hazard]

Yes, I always make my main character as close as possible a representation of myself, in their appearance and in the way they behave and the decisions they make.

[Jazzman]

I know of no such age self-restrictions to play a scripted role at a given age in game. And the age of the protagonist in the Fallout series is given, at least since Fallout-3 in 2008. Only by chance it was always my age group with the consequence that, would I ever again play in DC, I'd automatically construct a 16-18 year-old vault-dweller, 'daddy's little girl'. The fact that I myself - ooops! - don't look like a 16-year old anymore wouldn't have any impact on the creation. You can't be forever young anyway ha. However, I doubt that Bethesda would ever come along with a Methuselah as wise protagonist that leads his people to... nowhere. Simply b/c that might scare the b'Jesus out of the vast majority of customers of the genre in the age group of 15-30. Personally I'd have no problems to play an old grand witch with a laser wand that turns many a frakkin' AI moron to ashes.

[AsariX]

When I played Pen and Paper Roleplaying Games, I never intentionally played as myself either. I played a character who I found interesting who was specifically not me. However, my real personality would *always* show in the characters I played. Not intentionally, but simply because my mind works in certain ways, meaning my mind solves problems in its own way, and so would the character solve problems following those same thought patterns. I simply can't play a "bad guy", because my thought patterns will always come up with a friendly solution. However, that doesn't make much of a difference whether I play male or female, that's simply a role I take on.

 

But, in the end, I think that's always been the core of roleplaying, both PnP and on the computer: to not play as yourself, but to pretend to be someone else.

 

Something psychological that I find a lot more interresting about computer games, is what people do in computergames. Computergames allow people to let their true personality out, unrestricted by personal or social inhibitions, possibly even magnifying some repressed traits. Naturally friendly people will always be friendly, but dicks will be bigger dicks when left unchecked or without risk of repercussion.

[Jazzman]

Something psychological that I find a lot more interresting about computer games, is what people do in computergames. Computergames allow people to let their true personality out, unrestricted by personal or social inhibitions, possibly even magnifying some repressed traits. Naturally friendly people will always be friendly, but dicks will be bigger dicks when left unchecked or without risk of repercussion.

Sure you have played the intro of Fallout 4 already? Friendly people not always remain friendly, far from it. Man belongs to Animal Kingdom, especially under the rule of the laws of the jungle. Thus I for one acted like a lioness that has seen the killing of her partner and, even more worse, the abduction of her cub, and by far I'm not the only furious angel of revenge out there in the rubble of the Commonwealth. Conrad Kellogg could tell a tale, if he only were still among the virtually living. However, my revenge got satisfied when my Other Me stood on his mutilated corpse, alive and roaring. I'm no Black Widow after all that fights political windmills and blows up whole crowds of innocent people in the name of somebody else. This, however, comes at a small price - I can't finish the main story. Cha! Got to live with it, huh?

[Benmc20]

Nah. Never saw the appeal or the point of it. Ultimately it just ends up being a false image of yourself based on who you WANT to be rather than who you are. It's ego-stroking of the highest order.

 

But if that's your thing? Go for it. RPGs are power fantasies anyway - it's a large part of their appeal. Modeling the main character after yourself is just taking it a step further by inserting yourself into the power fantasy instead of using a vessel.

True enough. Maybe this is why, as a mal player, I don't play (usually) a male PC, mostly female ones.

[FauxFurry]

I aim to make a character whom I feel is visually appealing in some way, whether it is through unusual beauty for the setting or through giving them a freakish appearance (the Saints Row series delivers like none other in this regard). It would feel like a waste of an opportunity to design a character in a pre-made game to replicate someone walking the Earth right as of this moment.

Besides, it would create a conflict of identity within me to see someone who looks like myself in-game when I'm clearly on the other side of the screen. There is nothing worse for immersion than that, not for me. I can more easily slip into an alternate persona who fits in the game world than I can tolerate putting someone who only belongs in this world into that game world.

[Monstaah]

Straight off the bat I wanted to just say nope and leave it at that, but upon reflection I'd be lying if I did. I'd say Skyrim was the first game I ever played as a female toon and the truth is it's just because I can create my ideal female body with bodyslide. The asshole in me wants to say it's so I can watch some tits & ass ( which is true..lol ) but then there's this loser rational side of me that has always enjoyed character creation and building something pleasing to the eye.. 

[Laura]

For me it is also that, whenever i made a male character in a game.

I didn't care how he looked.

I choose something that looked fine and went with it.

 

When i choose a female character i do care how she looks.

And because i spent more time customising her, it feels more like my character.

[Pkatt]

For me-

 

If a game requires me to use my steam id as name, 95% of the time I will make the pc look like me, and I'll play pretty much as myself.

 

If the game gives me a choice on character and I get to pick a name, I will always make up a random character, and then play him or her like the personality I've set.

 

I play "me" every day.   With games I get to play something different.

 

 

So to answer the question, for Fallout, I would never make a character based on myself.