Hey everyone, I'm in the process of fleshing out my characters and their personalities and was just wondering how other people go about it. So far I have: -Age -Sex -Where they live -Their goals and reasons for having these goals Now I just need to add in their habits like: Dialect/Speech, Physical habits(ie biting nails, odd gestures etc), how they react to different situations (if they would rather choose safe or sorry) and just their basic personality (comedian, optimist, serious etc) I'm doing this to get a better feel for my characters and to show the changes to them as the game progresses (they become more self confident etc). If you need some examples of what I have and the characters themselves, I can post some. Please if anyone knows how to set it out, or has some suggestions on how, leave a reply. Cheers, James

There are many different ways to write them out. Simply doing a list like that is what our writer is currently doing and it's nice for non-writers to glance at. It's even good for writers as just a reference to glance at.

You could write it in a small paragraph, but you would have to re-read the whole thing every time you want to know about him/her.

I'd consider adding their background as well. Your characters didn't appear out of thin air did they? (Even if they did, how/why did they?)

I think/feel that the development of the character is really important. They are the piece of the environment that we constantly interact with. So yes the physical traits are extremely important. Mannerism make the character unique and believable. But what really brings them to life is how they set the scene. How they interact with the environment. Do they have a cough from the smog in the air or perfect white teeth from years of brushing their teeth like a mad man.

Usually when I start developing a game I look at the skills/traits I want them to poses. Wisdom/Strength/Hate/Love. Each of those feelings or emotions are developed through experience. so then ask your self what type of experience has this person been through. Well, what type of environment have they lived in. I usually ask my self a bunch of questions first. This does two things gets me really excited about the whole project and then gives me a set of guide lines for me to create my person. Also look up demographics of peoples, animals, and plants in the current world. Not only will this give you a decent average of hight, weight, hair color, Eye color, etc. It will also give you clues about behavior. Primates have a fear of the water... but there are monkeys that swim in the water when the need is present.

So sorry to make this so long winded, but I feel to develop a character, you have to know what they are for first.

Hope that helps! Cheers and good luck mate!

You're missing a bet if you don't also check out:
The Nine Character Types described by Laurie Hutzler. http://emotionaltoolbox.com/etb/index.php
The Hero With a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell, and described also by Christopher Vogler in The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure For Writers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Campbell

There is a list of character trait axes in my developer journal somewhere.

More recently, I've become interested in the method of starting with known philosophies in the world and making a character or culture to exemplify each. Not being a stickler for details, but trying to clearly express different basic philosophies, governmental structures, religious attitudes, or stereotypes of professions.

I find these methods to be an OK start but far from complete.

Characters, like real life people, are hardly well served by a bullet list of attributes. I could say I'm a 6' male Christian Republican lawyer from Boston who bites my nails and who just wants to be loved, and you would still have no clue who I am. You might have enough to find common ground for a conversation, but you would have no feel for the person.

I'm not particularly sure how to advise about really fleshing out a character. I like to pit two characters in some situation and write dialog, trying to make them interesting while staying in character. This can work well for two characters that oppose or complement each other.

When doing this, I almost always go for interesting first, believable second. I much prefer a character who makes me laugh or drop my jaw than one I have common ground with.

(Note: I haven't read the books Sloper pointed to or the character axes sun did; perhaps they give more depth).

The Nine Character Types link Tom Sloper posted is a great way to flesh out your characters a little more. Maybe not create a whole character in one go, but it does dive you insight into your character a little more. What really makes them, them.

It asks you to do a map on yourself first to get an understanding of what makes a character 'real'. Although it's more aimed at screen writing and teleplays than video games, it still helps your characters to reveal themselves to you.

The 6 things in the map it asks you for is:
- What is your characters mask? What do they hide behind when people are around?
- What is their greatest fear? What is the driving force behind their mask?
- What are their strongest traits? What helps them through tough times and daily trials?
- What traits do they admire in others that they don't have? What are the traits they wish they could have?
- What are the traits that get them into trouble? The traits that gets them into hot water with friends, family, co-workers etc
- This one is about what traits in other people really make you grind your teeth. The ones that you just can't stand.

This is just a basic overview of the document and the rest is far to complicated to just mention on here, but this is a taste of what the author of the book has in store. It goes into far more detail on answering these questions and them more questions that can link off these.

It really did help me complete my characters a little more and it even showed me pieces of my characters I didn't know. SO definitely give it a look, it will help a lot.

Cheers,
James

Quote: Original post by Nairb
I find these methods to be an OK start but far from complete.

Characters, like real life people, are hardly well served by a bullet list of attributes. I could say I'm a 6' male Christian Republican lawyer from Boston who bites my nails and who just wants to be loved, and you would still have no clue who I am.

I dunno, just from that little description I was thinking "wow this guy has so much in common with my sister". lol And secondarily "Totally philosophically incompatible with me so not a good choice to ever form a game design team with." I think you can create a strong, clear impression of a person with just a few descriptive phrases if they are the right few. And assuming one is talking about minor character, not major ones, their may be only one or two of their traits which have any relevance to the story at all.

Quote: Original post by sunandshadow

Quote: Original post by Nairb
I find these methods to be an OK start but far from complete.

Characters, like real life people, are hardly well served by a bullet list of attributes. I could say I'm a 6' male Christian Republican lawyer from Boston who bites my nails and who just wants to be loved, and you would still have no clue who I am.

I dunno, just from that little description I was thinking "wow this guy has so much in common with my sister". lol And secondarily "Totally philosophically incompatible with me so not a good choice to ever form a game design team with." I think you can create a strong, clear impression of a person with just a few descriptive phrases if they are the right few. And assuming one is talking about minor character, not major ones, their may be only one or two of their traits which have any relevance to the story at all.

As a sidenote, I'm very few of those things in that description. It was an example. ;-)

I'll grant that you can create an impression of a person with a few descriptive phrases. But impressions aren't the whole story or even necessarily the crucial portion. An impression is just that - an at-a-glance viewing. I would posit that you get some impression of the character I introduced, but if what I listed there is all he is, he's a weak character.

Another thing to consider is that characters don't live in a vacuum. They grow and behave differently alongside other characters. They respond to stimuli, often in ways that betray their synopsis. And... now I'm mentally derailed and babbling I think, so I'll wrap up this train of thought. ^^

I like the questions spiderninja asked from the book. I think they're questions that go much further in defining a rich, living, breathing character.

And of course, the conversation is different if you're talking about major versus minor characters. Minor characters can get away with having a handful of defining characteristics, but major characters need a bit more.

Quote: I'll grant that you can create an impression of a person with a few descriptive phrases. But impressions aren't the whole story or even necessarily the crucial portion. An impression is just that - an at-a-glance viewing. I would posit that you get some impression of the character I introduced, but if what I listed there is all he is, he's a weak character.

Your right. There is no way you could know a whole person just from meeting them once. You have to keep growing with them and finding out more about them to learn the true them. And every person is going to have a different view on that person depending on their VAB (Values, attitudes and Beliefs).

Like with the example Nairb gave of the lawyer. If you were raised in a christian home then you may find you get along with him fine. But if you were like most other people in the world, you would hear he was a lawyer and write him off as a scum bag (no offense all those lawyers out there ;) ). The questions from the book just give us a few more clues about a character, there is countless questions that could be asked to determine their personality.

In my game, traits are what set the characters apart specifically as they are based on emotions. Each character has a main emotion and so their traits will project this emotion. This means I have to think about each characters traits very carefully so that they portray these emotions clearly for the player.