Character creation tip

[Celianna]

When creating characters, give each and every one of them ambition - a dream. There's some exceptions here and there (very small NPCs with one line of dialogue, or a character who is depressed and has no idea what to do with their life etc.), but when creating a central character, give them a goal to strive towards.


Whether it would be to be a knight and protect people, or to become the best bakery in town.


Give your characters dreams and hopes, and it will in turn make them much more relatable and more importantly, human. You will avoid obvious traps such as "I'm going to create a sidekick for my hero, whose main purpose in life is to serve my hero," or "I'm going to create a love interest for my hero, who exists purely only for this reason."


Sure, you can create those characters, but give them something to strive towards that doesn't hinge upon other people (usually your main character). If you want a lovely princess to fall in love with your main character, that's fine, but at least give her a goal that isn't "fall in love with a knight," even if it that goal is simply "to see the waterfalls at the far ends of the earth."


Have you ever stopped to think about what, aside from your main character, your character's goals in life are? If so, what are they?

 

[Ms Littlefish]

Yep! Having a goal and a motivation for the characters drives the plot and character interactions forward. If that character lacks a personal goal, what is compelling them to be somewhere with someone? It makes you think about the steps they've taken toward their goals; what succeeded and what failed. All the cause and effect. They don't even have to be revolutionary or world-changing goals either. They can be goals like ours. 


In fact, I wonder a lot about my characters. What they like to do in their free time, what they eat. Their annoying and endearing little habits. What events or circumstances developed certain personality traits they possess. When I write their dialogue I even develop speech patterns. And, I never stop asking why they'd be that way. Designing characters is by far one of the most enjoyable aspects of game design for me.  :

 

[Blackyu]

Ooooh. I never noticed how easy it can be to humanize characters using only simple things such as giving them hopes and dreams.


When it comes to that, I notice that I don't even take my main character seriously. I mean, his whole games can all be called "Okay" quest :


(The following abridged dialogues are more or less accurate according to my actual projects)


"You are the Chosen One of ROCKS ! You will go on many adventures, aided by people with better character design than you !


-Okay." ~Main Character's Backstory~


"HAHAHA ! I have dragged you and your closest friends in this forbidden dimension in order to destroy you before you get stronger than me, Chosen One of ROCKS !


-Okay." ~First Game~


"Chosen One of ROCKS, we need your help ! By travelling back and forth in the forbidden dimension from the previous game, a weird space-time continuum distorsion has appeared and is slowly growing ! You must destroy the Distorsion and all of its sources around this place to prevent it from being obliterated !


-Okay." ~Second Game~


He's basically a random Chosen One guy that gets dragged in many adventures without anything to say.


However, all the other characters in my game have goals.


For instance, the Chosen One's love interest is the personal student and future successor of the Mentor (basically the ruler of the land), therefore her life goal is to become a respected and worthy ruler after her Mentor.


The Bad Guys also have goals. Most of them are just corrupted mercenaries, but some have better goals. One of the Main Villains wishes to harness the power of the Distorsion to become powerful, then there's another villain who failed to cure his sister's amnesia, then got rejected by all of his friends and family members, so he found a way to get back in time, meet his Father, convince him to help, he'll get rejected again, will go back to the present, and become the leader of a whole group of Baddies that share the same goal, using dark magic to speed up the awakening of the Distorsion's power in order to destroy this worthless world.


Yup, my games have really intricate, almost inconceivable backstories (now with time travel woooo), most of them just made for the sole purpose of original character design. And I've been putting a lot more effort in dialogues and interaction between characters recently, as if I wanted to make my characters look way more human, just not some random pawns that are forced to follow the story.

 

[Kes]

I have a list of questions I ask myself when putting together a story, and some of them chime well with your tip.


1) Why is this character in this place, at this time? (this applies to all characters.)


2) Why the heck should this character go along with the party?  What do they get out of it?


3) Why does this character stay with the party when it's clearly a dodgy prospect for a long life?


4) In what way(s) does this adventure/quest/whatever change how the character sees their life and what they want from it?


All of these can be seen in the light of the question about hopes and dreams.  All of them have to be answered in the light of what those hopes and dreams are.

 

[Celianna]

Those are some pretty good questions to ask, ksjp. Especially the "Why are they here, at this time?" If you're going to have a chance encounter with a future party member, you need a reason as to why they are there in the first place. Expand on your character's backstories, and create a believable reason for them to run into your main character.


For example, in my story, I have a character who walks into the main character's shop, this would be their second meeting. It seems random at first, until later on, you find out the character was simply hiding from someone else and jumped into the nearest shop to take cover.

 

[Eraine]

My NPC's dreams and ambitions are almost the main focus of my game. But then, I'm not building an classical RPG, it's more my take on Harvest Moon-type games (or actually, changing everything that ever annoyed me in those games that I like so well in concept, but get bored of halfway through summer year one). So no fighting, a little farming, and a lot of making choices and seeing the impact of that: NPC come to you with requests, sometimes ask you to interfere in a quarrel (which you can also choose not to), etc.


I have character flaws and strengths and an ultimate dream for each one of them. I so much love thinking about this, and coming up with logical reasons for them to act as they do!! I have 20 NPC's now with very different dreams, ranging from owning an pet or an painting of oneself to the return of a petulant but beloved wife. (and a 40+ pages textdocument detailing all that, that is nowhere near finished... )

 

[PsychicToaster]

Don't forget to bear in mind that your character does not have to accomplish his or her goals. Growth doesn't always mean a positive change. A character can grow negatively either as a whole person or just in different parts of his or her personality. Motivations can change provided something happened to cause that change. Becoming disllusioned by a dramatic/disturbing/epiphanic moment or event can be more interesting than "I did the thing and now I am happy forever" (At least to me, as an aspiring transgressive fiction author in addition to a game designer lol)

 

[Milennin]

Spoiler

When it comes to that, I notice that I don't even take my main character seriously. I mean, his whole games can all be called "Okay" quest :


(The following abridged dialogues are more or less accurate according to my actual projects)


"You are the Chosen One of ROCKS ! You will go on many adventures, aided by people with better character design than you !


-Okay." ~Main Character's Backstory~


"HAHAHA ! I have dragged you and your closest friends in this forbidden dimension in order to destroy you before you get stronger than me, Chosen One of ROCKS !


-Okay." ~First Game~


"Chosen One of ROCKS, we need your help ! By travelling back and forth in the forbidden dimension from the previous game, a weird space-time continuum distorsion has appeared and is slowly growing ! You must destroy the Distorsion and all of its sources around this place to prevent it from being obliterated !


-Okay." ~Second Game~


He's basically a random Chosen One guy that gets dragged in many adventures without anything to say.

Reading that only brought one image to mind:

But yeah, I like to give backgrounds to the characters in my story. I dislike it when, in games, people just join your party without really any reason, or if they have a reason it's vague or weak, so that's definitely something I try to avoid in my game.