Current Events > Which is better in games: questionable representation or no representation?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm playing Gain Ground for Sega Genesis and the game starts you out with three characters: a white man with a gun, a white woman with a gun, and a black man with a spear. Now, the game is about a simulator gone awry and features character types like ninja, knights, and a viking warrior. But that still doesn't change the fact that the most prominently featured black character in the game is an African tribal warrior type.

It got me thinking about games which lack diversity or inclusion. What if the next Legend of Zelda game saw Link stranded on an island with an elfin eared Friday as his companion throughout the game? What if Mario featured a Hispanic bandito right out of Treasure of the Sierra Madre? "I don't gotta show you any stinkin' mushrooms!"

Obviously, neither is truly preferable. But when it comes to exclusively questionable or completely absent, which is the lesser of two evils?

Well, there's diversity in gameplay and game design and then there's diversity with the intention of reflecting real life, and I'm not honestly sure if they are comparable. In a fighting game, for example, you don't want a dozen fighters that all look the same, so of course you would give them each different weapons, abilities, and physical characteristics to keep the game fun and fresh.

Now, simply saying a character is gay, for example, when it has no bearing on the story, or going out of your way to mention that it includes six black characters in its marketing campaign, is terribly pandering, and I say that as a liberal. As a gay man myself I can't honestly say I ever felt the need to be "represented" in media, whether it be games or TV or otherwise because I'm secure with myself in real life and feel there are a dozen more interesting things to define me before my sexuality. Social justice warriorism is completely out of control, so for the sake of your poll I have to vote "no representation" as the better option.
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I dunno, I don't see much of a problem here.

There's a white dude with a spear and two black people with modern weaponry, and I can't name any of them even after playing the game.

I guess if the order characters are unlocked in is an important social issue, then I dunno.
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The game had already inspired the question by the time I came across the other characters. And it appears that Ashra is the only black character in the arcade version.