Helldivers and identity

[vanillahapynis]

With this latest warbond we see armour sets that add skin tones to our helldivers.
You will notice they are randomised and cannot be controlled unlike our helldivers body type and voice.

This has reminded me of Master chief from the Halo series, and his success as a character (or rather lack thereof).
"he's a husk, he's a big green suit of armour that you move around"
"There's something good about having the master chief be a blank slate, that helps each individual person connect with the character"

One of the bigger selling points for me about the characterisation of the helldivers, is that we are given the same thing but with a little bit more customisation.
Your character has enough wiggle room to let you slip on that uniform and become a helldiver for a few missions and immerse yourself in this world, even with all the blatant comedic tones on top of it all, its still a world we can feel compelled to care about to the point of playing the game.

However, with the addition of visible skin tones we cannot control, i feel myself slightly ripped away from that immersion, simply because now that i have seen my helldivers skin tone and i know for a fact it is not my own, or that each time i respawn it is a different one, my personal attachment to the character and therefore the world itself loses a bit of meaning it once had.
The simple remedy to this, is of course allowing us to control skin tones, which will in turn reset that loss of immersion and characterisation.

Edit: some folks like the idea of randomised skin tones it seems. So the answer is simple and would please everyone. Add the option for skin tones to be similar to the voices.
You can keep skin tones randomised or select a preference. That way nothing is lost but the players gain another choice for customisation.

[SPIGOT]

I mean yeah sure I think they should add it in as a customisable option like with voice and body shape, but having it randomised does fit into the Helldivers lore way more.

A big point of the game is you're not the cool Master Chief character. You're the generic Star Wars trooper who oafishly dies then gets replaced with a completely different guy immediately after. Leaning too much on character customisation over randomisation detracts from this insanely funny premise imo.

[Greb]

Been a few threads about this already and I don't wanna repeat myself. I'll just say I agree with you, it makes no sense that they let you pick your characters voice and build but then decide not to let you pick your skin tone, lol.

I wish they just didn't bother including skin in the first place. I was initially pretty happy when I noticed there were like 30+ armour sets in the game and not a single inch of skin showing, and then when I saw the Viper trailer I just rolled my eyes at how that theme was completely pissed away.

Then when I heard it was going to be random, well I knew nothing good would come of that. I assumed it was going to be there to champion a new skin / texture system added to let players modify and apply skins to different armour sets, you know? With a bunch of freebie skins letting us pick skin tone. That apparently was too much wishful thinking though.

It's never a bad thing to allow more customisation. Not doing so feels like deliberate punishment for the player base.

If the devs had this "vision" where every Helldiver is unique and special and different, they wouldn't even let you pick your voice and sex, it would have been 100% random from the start. Pulling that now out of nowhere just seems very odd, and not at all organic.

[Yaltiaj]

I think if it was made clearer that the skin tone was random upon spawning many wouldn't care. Not really a big issue in my eyes, but eventually it would be a good option to have assuming we'll see more armor in future with exposed skin.

[DeMasked]

The Gunship Patrols are annoying. They can literally spawn on top of you.

That being said I do find it stupid that the game allows you to choose Body Type, Voice Type and Random yet not Skin Type.

I go full random because I'm playing a new Helldiver after each one dies - but not everyone will do the same.

Arrowhead either needs to embrace customisation or change the cosmetics. Skin Tone should be under Body Type.

edit: And the devs could've done this as they did it with Ship Module allowing for cosmetic changes to the Pelican, Mech, etc....

[Greb]

I just want them to be more consistent, and pick one or the other.

Either let me choose and lock my skin colour like I can lock my voice and my "body type" or make everything random and at the whim of fate itself.

I don't care which one, but you can't have both.

[vanillahapynis]

Originally posted by SPIGOT:

I mean yeah sure I think they should add it in as a customisable option like with voice and body shape, but having it randomised does fit into the Helldivers lore way more.

A big point of the game is you're not the cool Master Chief character. You're the generic Star Wars trooper who oafishly dies then gets replaced with a completely different guy immediately after. Leaning too much on character customisation over randomisation detracts from this insanely funny premise imo.

Not to me, for my head cannon i just ignore the whole premise of being replaced by some other helldiver.
I want to feel attached to my character otherwise whats the point of caring at all? Even nameless grunts who die in droves are people with individual characteristics, they are not just randomised NPCs.

[esilva9]

considering that the game expects you to go through helldivers like copy paper, im not too concerned about it especially since it displays how dispensable these guys are. my question is are you stuck to one specific skin tone or does it change with each respawn, if your characters change on respawn then its a distinct reminder that your helldiver is not a clone.

[SPIGOT]

Originally posted by vanillahapynis:

Originally posted by SPIGOT:

I mean yeah sure I think they should add it in as a customisable option like with voice and body shape, but having it randomised does fit into the Helldivers lore way more.

A big point of the game is you're not the cool Master Chief character. You're the generic Star Wars trooper who oafishly dies then gets replaced with a completely different guy immediately after. Leaning too much on character customisation over randomisation detracts from this insanely funny premise imo.

Not to me, for my head cannon i just ignore the whole premise of being replaced by some other helldiver.
I want to feel attached to my character otherwise whats the point of caring at all? Even nameless grunts who die in droves are people with individual characteristics, they are not just randomised NPCs.

You can have whatever head canon you want, but that doesn't mean the creators are gonna go out of their way to cater to your vision of the game when it directly contradicts their own vision.

[vanillahapynis]

Originally posted by GovernmentSecrets.gov:

I think if it was made clearer that the skin tone was random upon spawning many wouldn't care. Not really a big issue in my eyes, but eventually it would be a good option to have assuming we'll see more armor in future with exposed skin.

Imagine if in halo, each time you died you were still master chief, but now he is a different race. nothing else changes about him, but you KNOW he is a different race now.
It's not a big issue in terms of gameplay or anything like that. But it takes the player away from the game for the briefest of moments and reminds them "you are not this person, you are a player controlling someone else". And to me that is bad design when it comes to a game like this with no real story or established characters within a linear narrative like normal story based games.

[Forblaze]

I think forcing the nazis to play as a black person is incredibly funny

[Corey Greyfox]

Originally posted by vanillahapynis:

Originally posted by GovernmentSecrets.gov:

I think if it was made clearer that the skin tone was random upon spawning many wouldn't care. Not really a big issue in my eyes, but eventually it would be a good option to have assuming we'll see more armor in future with exposed skin.

Imagine if in halo, each time you died you were still master chief, but now he is a different race. nothing else changes about him, but you KNOW he is a different race now.
It's not a big issue in terms of gameplay or anything like that. But it takes the player away from the game for the briefest of moments and reminds them "you are not this person, you are a player controlling someone else". And to me that is bad design when it comes to a game like this with no real story or established characters within a linear narrative like normal story based games.

Except in Halo you are playing a distinct character. In Helldivers you are playing Random recruit number 1 and when that recruit dies you are playing random recruit number 2. I think I'm on random recruit number 380 or so.

[vanillahapynis]

Originally posted by SPIGOT:

You can have whatever head canon you want, but that doesn't mean the creators are gonna go out of their way to cater to your vision of the game when it directly contradicts their own vision.

And what is their vision exactly? do they want the player base to care about the world they are creating and feel immersed, or do they want us to not care at all, log in for teh lulz then log back out?
They set up a good premise of "no identity" characters with the helldivers.
Both my headcannon and your want for more lore strict rules could co-exist before this warbond introduced randomised skin tones. Now only the lore strict rules can exist.

[vanillahapynis]

Originally posted by Corey Greyfox:

Except in Halo you are playing a distinct character.

A character who is as defined by the original creators "a husk" for the player to immerse themselves in individually.

[vanillahapynis]

Originally posted by Forblaze:

I think forcing the nazis to play as a black person is incredibly funny

I'm mixed-race, you can spout your buzz words on twitter if you want to start arguments for no reason.

[Zane]

I don't understand why this is such a big issue. Who cares about the skin tone, immersing yourself as a helldiver? Most of you guys wont get off the couch to go vote let alone fight a war, you're kidding yourselves if you are using that the reason to be racist or victimizing yourself.