Memorable Black Characters in Video Games | Metal Arcade

Metal Arcade:

In celebration of Black History Month, we take a look back at gaming's most memorable black characters.

Midway through Black History Month in the good ol’ US of A, I thought it would be nice to celebrate in my own way, with a bit of diversity to celebrate a diverse month. Coming from a multi-cultural background myself, I’m always thrilled to see people of color taking prominent roles within my favorite mediums. With that in mind, and in no particular order, I present just a handful of some of my favorite playable black characters in video games.

[thirtyandnerdy]

Great article! A couple of my other favorites are Dr. Eli Vance from the Halflife series and Lee Everett from The Walking Dead Telltale Games series. Lee was bold and as fantastic as we wanted him to be as players with choice, and I remember Dr. Vance feeling fatherly and cool in a rebellious and science-y kind of way. =)

[jujubee88]

Is great to play as on PS All-Stars.

What's the article about, btw? (I haven;t read it yet) :P

[pr0t0typeknuckles]

great list but it should also add
Lee Everett-the walking dead
Jax Briggs-mortal kombat
Nix-infamous 2
CJ, carl muthafucking johnson-GTA san andreas
James heller-prototype 2(ill always miss alex)
Emmet Graves-starhawk

[MetalArcade]

I was thinking Drebin from MGS4 should be in there too.

[Fierce Musashi]

Barret? FF7? Where?...........

[Fishermenofwar]

I agree 100%...the best angry guy everrrr

LOL..When he goes nuts on the speed bag because cloud is being a douche.....

[ApolloTheBoss]

You're forgetting Little Jacob from GTA IV.

[DivineAssault]

The guy in red from NARC (NES)

[The Meerkat]

My Shepard from ME

[pain777pas]

Adam from the original streets of rage.

[HarryMasonHerpderp]

Shadowman?

[rmedtx]

Definitely Shadowman... one of my favorite characters ever.

[HarryMasonHerpderp]

He was a very cool guy, I even enjoyed the sequel Shadowman 2.
Would love to see another Shadowman game one day.
The lore and characters had a lot going for them.

[MetalArcade]

You should check out the new Shadowman comics from Valiant, they just came back. We've been reviewing all the new Valiant comics on our site.

[dafegamer]

Emmeth Graves from Starhawk

[DasTier]

All those pathetic characters pale in comparison to THE Sgt Johnson

[Acquiescence]

Probably the best portrayed representation of the black man to ever feature in a video game.

[plaZeHD]

Why do you class colored people? It's so stupid and leads to racism.

[r21]

Awesome to see Aveline not being pushed aside, gives me hope that we could another sequel involving her :D

[TuxedoMoon]

It's a nice list to acknowledge black characters, but if you look at it...it's kinda sad. Only 1 of those characters is a MAIN character. The rest are side characters. They have interesting back stories, but they aren't the main focus in the game they are featured in. It's something I highly dislike and I strongly believe we need more non-white main characters. The most popular character design these days seem to be the shaved head Caucasian male (Star Killer, Shepard, Cole Magrath, Wesker's son, DOA5 kick boxer guy...)

My favorite non-white main characters were Carl Johnson from GTA San Andreas and Connor from AC3.

[MetalArcade]

I agree but it is getting better, like the lead guy in the new Starhawk for instance. 15 years ago there were far fewer black characters in games that weren't stereotypes.

[r21]

His name is Emmet Graves. Dont you furget that pardner ;)

[DasTier]

Connor was a truly awful character.

[hazelamy]

nobody else remember D'arci Stern from Urban Chaos.

black and a woman, a rare combination for a lead character back then, well, even now come to think of it.

anyway, Urban chaos was a decent game hampered by the technology of the time, i'd love to see D'arci return on modern hardware.

[FrightfulActions]

Jacob Taylor? Really? I was under the impression that most people didn't really care about him at all. Especially if your only bases for him is him as a squadmate in ME2. He actually has his own game, which would be a better example for you to draw from since he actually holds some importance in that.

I can think of two FAR better examples of memorable black characters from the Mass Effect series. Commander Shepard (he/she chould be black) or Captain Anderson. Seriously, you pick Jacob over Anderson? I felt teary eyed when Anderson passed on. I wouldn't blink an eyelash for Jacob was bombarded from space.

The really messed up thing is that Jacob Taylor received acknowledgement on this list but the main character from THE WALKING DEAD did not. How the hell did that happen? Seriously, he should be top of the list imo.