We Need To Fix Black Hair In Video Games - The Blessing Show

Black hairstyles and video games - let's talk about both of them if you've been following her journey, going Smash Brothers, player pandemic beard, the most handsome member of kind of funny, and even though those four different looks Encompass me in only the last three years, video game options When it comes to black, hairstyles can surprisingly be more limited than this. Over time, video games have gotten more advanced, we've seen steps forward in areas like riding and graphical Fidelity, we've seen more detailed art assets, greater amounts of content, jam-packed into releases and yet character creation tools stay the same for many demographics of players, especially black players. This is unfortunate because for a medium that provides opportunities for its audience to exist as an extension of themselves through features like character. Customization representing myself in a video game through something as simple as hair, often comes down to an afro or cornrows, and that's it and kudos to game. Devs are often including cornrows, a hairstyle that can be dated back over 3 000 years to Subs the hair in Africa. My one question, though, is who is this dude with cornrows that every single video game developer seemingly knows? I see cornrows every now and then in the wild. But if you're going by video game logic, you think 50 of the black population are rocking cornrows. But the truth is that black hairstyle are as diverse as any other ethnic group. We'Re talking high top Fades low top Fades, twists, locks sister locks, hidden, curls, Jerry curls. If you're my dad and two knots, frohawk habered afro 360 waves finger waves, sponge curls and whatever the [ __ ] is going on with Drake's hair. That'S barely scratching the surface and we're also talking about Limitless ways to style all those hair options I just mentioned, and yet, even with all these options, when I put a Belden ring, I'm forced to make characters that look like this. This looks like if Baby Kane joined My Chemical Romance, and I admit, fixing this fairly common issue with a representation and inclusion isn't easy game. Development is difficult period in a common obstacle brought up in regards to Elden ring and other games are cultural barriers. A good amount of popular games are developed in countries like Japan, where access to diverse Dev teams and an understanding of black texture hairstyles isn't readily available. However, understanding of monstrous crows, dragons and giant hands with way too many fingers come. Naturally, black representation is complex compared to alien Frogman. I'M sure it's way easier to conceptualize this than a fade. Elden ring is the highest selling new IP in years, and I guarantee you from software and Bandai Namco understands that Their audience extends internationally. When, given the option to create a black character, I'd like to create a version of myself that doesn't look like a little NOS X thing lead for Fallout Boy. For many, I'm sure this seems like a very minuscule and specific thing to complain about there's plenty of noteworthy areas of improvement. The games industry can still make, even in just the area of representation and inclusion, the. Why is black hair when the harp on well? For folks who just listen to me on podcasts and have never seen a kind of funny video before the prize, I'm black but also believe it or not, black hair is a sensitive topic. In 2020 High School senior Asia Simo was kicked off of her cheerleading team. Due to her hair being too thick for the half up, half down standard that the team required in 2018, a viral video circulated of high schooler Faith fannity being humiliated after having to leave school because of the hair policy in 2019, 16 year old, high school wrestler. Andrew Johnson was told to cut his dreadlocks before a match or forfeit, and he did it. Black hair discrimination has been prevalent in schools and workplaces so much so that just last year, laws were passed to try and fight against it. Even the editor of this video, Roger corny's partner, lianza dealt with facing suspension when wearing a natural hairstyle, but I went over to her house to sit down and talk about it. I'M very excited to talk to you about this because, of course we're doing a video about black hair in video games. While working on this video I've been looking through and going through examples of black hair discrimination, Roger brought to my attention that you have a story. That'S in that vein, are you able to share that story, yeah absolutely just to preface that I went to a Catholic School most most of my youth. I went to Catholic school, so I was kind of used to being like one of the only you know. Kids of color in the class in the handbook, it literally says that we can't have any ethnic ethnic hairstyles quote. Unquote, we can't have dreadlocks, we can't have cornrows, there's this rule where, if your fro was too big, you'd have to cut it a few inches or you would get expelled. Oh wow and I remember it was prom and I feel like I really wanted to look cute. I never had my hair long, so I was like. Oh, let me just do an extension style very long twist, very fluffy, so I went for prom with my hair that way, and it was fine. I didn't hear anything from anyone in charge. I went to prom. I had a good time, so the next day is graduation, and so I show up - and I cross the stage to get my diploma - you get your diploma after you get off the stage, so I get off the stage and I go around around back to where All my friends are, the vice principal pulls me over and she looks very mad and I'm wondering why she's mad she starts yelling at me. She starts berating after graduating yeah at graduation, like after you walk across the stage yeah. She says: you're, not getting your diploma. You'Re going to detention actually on Monday you're going to take that that out of your hair you'll get your diploma after that, that's crazy, yeah! All my friends around me are crying and celebrating, but I'm crying for a very different reasons, so it was very dehumanizing. The fact that it was just because of my hair really stuck with me, was there anything specific to the hairstyle that you were rocking that they mentioned, or was it? Was it being too ethnic that they didn't like a lot of other girls in the school? Had hair that was colored, they dyed their hair like bright red, like orange. That was giving me. My next question was like were all the other students dressed like nuns like? Did? They all have just straight hair, no, the rules kind of like extended to certain people. It honestly like lit a fire in me at that point, because then I was like this is something that should never happen to anyone. So why is black hair such a big issue? Well, it simply comes down to Western beauty standards. The idea that black features aren't normal or common enough for consideration. It'S just back to a history of anti-blackness in the West. In Black American history, black hair was stigmatized in order to dehumanize black folks during slavery, and so, if I ideas of Western beauty standards and even after the abolishment of slavery, those standards stuck around seeing black Americans use products to strain their hair to try and fit. In and Elevate their status, a shift in Black Culture toward accepting our natural hair actually came during the Civil Rights Movement. Some African-Americans started embracing hairstyles like afros and cornrows interesting right. Martin Luther King Jr in a speech even went as far as to say. Don'T be ashamed, love, meals, saying about your color, I am black and beautiful yeah. I bet you didn't think you were going to get a black history lesson on a channel called kind of funny games and yet from the limbless examples, I can give you of black hair discrimination. Western beauty standards are still a big issue which begs the question: why can't we let natural hair be what it is natural? This extends to the games that we play in Love. Last year, Pokemon scarlet and violet came out with a more expanded Carriage creation system for the franchise so expanded that the second darkest skin tone is almost as dark as Rachel dolezal babylon's fall last here couldn't even attempt to acknowledge the existence of black folks in their Character, creator and then there's Horizon for hidden West, a game that actually features a lot of good black representation from allies like Rural and zou to villain, characters like Regala and silence played by Angela Bassett and Lance Reddick Horizon features a refreshingly inclusive cast in viral. One of my favorite characters in the game rocks locks that I can only dream of having, and I love it is this type of creativity and Variety in exploring black textured hairstyles. That makes me genuinely excited, because it's obvious that somebody or multiple people on their team cared. You don't just have it onto a hairstyle like this, and even though Horizon is one of the best examples in recent memory of a game showing effort toward depicting black hair. It still doesn't get it perfect Laurel, for example, has incredible locks. But when you zoom in on his sides, it's glaring that his fade is using white textured hair at a quick glance. It might not be noticeable, but what is noticeable is varro's beard, which also looks to be using a white hair texture. I use Horizon as an example of how far we've come and how far we still need to go go in order to get things right, because these things are noticeable and that same sit down with lianza. We talked about another Super popular game, Animal Crossing and how she's been let down by that franchise in the past, I specifically play a lot of live Sim games. It'S really hard to make me in those games. What'S it like trying to create yourself as an avatar in animal crossing, the main thing that bothered me was before New Horizons like dark skin did not exist. Oh well, yeah. You had to a new Leaf. I believe tan. I remember leaving my DS out. While I went to like Grandma's house and then I would come back, my character would be like a little dark like not really stuff like yay. That'S why yeah so now that they have some variation for skin tone, there's a little bit more variation on the options, but at the same time it's still a little hard to see me. None of them are resonating with me in that like this is what people wear now. I think it's fair to say that there's more than three black hairstyles yeah for sure between Animal Crossing Pokemon and Elden ring it's almost like the more popular the game. The less options you'll have to be black in the game, and you know you're on the wrong side of history, when the Harry Potter game is on the right side of History. I took one look at this game and I thought it was NBA 2K. That said, there are people in game, development, doing great work and who want to see Blackness better represented. One of those people is Dell. Walker. Dell formerly worked for Rocksteady and designed Deadshot for the upcoming Suicide Squad game and is now a character artist at naughty dog. I talked to Dell to get some perspective on working on hair as a video game developer. So for you as a character artist, how much effort goes into just the hair portion of a character. It starts off with an exhaust like an education lesson. First, that usually need a thing that takes the most amount of time, just introducing people to the idea that they're a different head textures with black hair. Specifically, you kind of want to take two directions. You don't want to simplify as much as possible, or you want to take the other route where we're actually going into fine detail by placing loads of polyglots um. The problem we had with maybe the generation before the generation just before that, like Xbox 360 Arrow um, is you were trying to do that in the in between there right. You didn't have enough alpha glass to like really fill out on black hair, and you didn't want to go too simple. The advantage now is, you don't have excuse, because the tech can support what you what you need now, it's just about having the knowledge or using the resources of black people to ask. Is this right? What are the next steps for Studios to to go to in order to start taking better steps toward getting black hair right, but deciding to build a library of information first and going to the source who's going to know a lot more than you going to someone Who knows a lot like uh someone who has experience not just being black but knowing about blackhead but saying? Can you just show us lots of things that you think is cool and just work down from then, rather than coming with them himself, a cloth baked and being like hey? Could you just like just stand up the edges and make sure, like you see in a completely different experience, so they'll? I want to do an activity with you. I'Ve collected an assortment of images of black characters in video games. I want you to tell me something that these characters do well in their design, we'll keep above it. Let'S do it. Let'S keep positive. So here we got Miles Morales from Marvel Spider-Man y'all. What can you tell me about this character? There are so many things right about this. That was not just someone just said. I'M gon na look at some reference like there are a lot of cultural decisions here. One other thing that people often get wrong is um about black hairstyles is the the hairline a lot of the time if black people are to style the air. The first thing you do is make sure that the hairline is symmetrical. If you can't make it straight, you make it as symmetrical as possible. There'S a bit of a widow speed he's trying to straighten out as much as possible, which is what they they got for. It yeah man 10 out of 10., okay, so first off the fact that they did like huge big, throw braids it's great, because what often happens with Street Fighter characters is you need the character to be read really clearly from of almost like a shrunken down version And the fact that they chose their hair to be the biggest breaker of the silhouette means that it's almost celebrating her head, like her hair, becomes the crown a definitely true hairstyle is like 50 of the women and for the other game developed out there, like just Don'T treat black hair like an afterthought like it's an entire spectrum and realm and there's so much untapped cool stuff happening in it just take a day or two to just be, like I'm gon na just check out why I don't know like, rather than being like We'Ll think about that at the end, chaded everything plenty of games are getting it right Del praised Miles Morales, but it deserves even more of a spotlight. Gavin gold in the game's art director has talked about Shifting The Game's hair, rendering style to be strain based in order to account for Miles more textured hair, and it shows because I can't even get a haircut. This clean in real life. Bowser'S hair was a focus for Insomniac with them, even taking advantage of the ps5's power miles literally has a neck Shen fade and jokes aside. It'S this type of effort to push forward inclusion that makes black folks feel seen. As is evident from the response. The game got on the internet when seeing Spider-Man Miles Morales originally revealed, and yes, I know Spider-Man Miles Morales is probably an easy example to give it's a single player action game with a Sony budget, literally starring an afro-latino character. So in that case, let's talk about neo2 and action. Rpg develops by team ninja say what you will about cultural barriers, medieval fantasy settings not being black, inclusive and RPGs. Having way too much going on to get something like hair right, neotu's black hairstyle options are dopest. Not only does the game include black textured hair, but in a game about being a badass Warrior, they give variations on stylish locks that make me actually feel like a badass Warrior and for one of the few franchises competing in the same space as from software's games. Neo2 puts the soul in Souls like and then there's GTA online, a game with honestly very limited hair options, but I bring it up because in September 2021, eight years after the game's release Rockstar in an update added exactly only one new hairstyle. It was low-key and unceremonious, but it did spawn this post in the GT Online subreddit titled. Finally, a decent hairstyle for black players. Is it a random addition to the game? Yes, but also it's a thoughtful gesture from Rockstar that was meaningful for a section of the community. For me, as an avid gt online player, I was elated and then I remembered I still don't have enough cash to buy a DeLorean, and I was bummed out again speaking of communities. The Sims Community is another example of an audience demanding more from their hair options, but the fascinating thing is that when Sims 4 didn't live up to providing his black community with the hairstyle options needed, the audience Rose to the occasion. Instead, The Sims 4's custom content Community is so vibrant that you can find videos of Kiki Palmer rocking custom black hairstyles in The Sims 4.. The thing that these examples have in common is that the people at the center of making these changes happen hair and are knowledgeable because they're people of color. They understand what it feels like to be left out. Why it's so important to be included? Better representation in video games starts with having better representation in the studios who make these games, and I promise you I'm not speaking out of my ass here. I have a personal friend who works on a free-to-play game with a primary feature is character. Customization. This game has over 100 million downloads and when I told my friend that I was working on this video it hit close to home, because this is the exact struggle that her team is facing. Currently, their game is doing a big push on black hairstyles. The art team can manage to create styles through browsing, Instagram and Pinterest, but the Styles they're producing are shots in the dark because nobody working on the game is black. There'S a lack of cultural knowledge to know what's in, what's out, what's fresh and what's been worn through, because so much of the culture moves through beauty, shops and through black hairstylists that push the envelope in their salons. Knowing what type of box braids to go with or what styles women are rocking currently is a very difficult thing to become an expert in. If you don't come from that culture, to quote my friend directly, she says I don't want to discredit the work that my team is doing, because we do want to do better. We'Re taking active steps in the right direction and diversity is all always been important to our game, but all of us realize that, as an industry there's a huge gap that only black Talent can fill a lot of black girls love our game. We just really want to make sure that they feel seen and represented the people that make the games that you and I love, know the importance of representation, but the needle is only going to get pushed by hiring more diverse people to work on our games. So, what's the call to action here being informed is the first crucial step, because the more we have an understanding of the diverse hair options that exist in real life, the more they can be normalized in the games we play. The second thing you can do is be vocal and supportive. If you see a dope ass character, creator or thoughtful representation, celebrate it out loud. If the next from software game features Simple Plan, lead singer, Big Sean call it out and don't be an [ __ ] about it, because that helps no one and, like I said earlier, game development is hard, but a shift in our games require a shift in The conversations that we have about our games and that's going to have to start with the audience that plays these games, we're the same audience contributing to 10 million sales of Pokemon scarlet and 16.6 million for Elder ring. The least you can do is get our hair right. Thank you so much for watching this episode of The Blessing show. If you enjoyed it, I encourage you to share it on Twitter Instagram, wherever you can until next time I've been blessing, it's been our pleasure to serve you