The Difference Between an Avatar Character and a Silent Protagonist

Hello everyone,

This is a continuation of "How to Analyze a Silent Protagonist."

The Avatar character and Silent Protagonist are frequently combined. The reason is that sometimes the Avatar won't always speak like a Silent Protagonist - so you can fully immerse yourself in the figure.

In the previous guide, "How to Analyze a Silent Protagonist," I wanted to show how a Silent Protagonist can be just as much of an individual as the voiced Game Protagonist.

In this guide, I would like to show how the Avatar and Silent Protagonists differ.

With that said, let's look into the Avatar character types.

One version of the Avatar types allows you to design and choose what they will be. Though some may have a backstory, you create them the way you would like. We don't know their mindset, personality, internal feelings, etc. You choose who they are, how they will treat others, and more. (Examples: Fallout 3, Skyrim, and Star Wars: The Old Republic).

The next Avatar type is one you can find in an RPG, - known as a role-playing game where you immerse yourself in the individual you pick or create.

Some RPG characters are *not Avatars and have their own stories and personality.

In an RPG, the story can be predetermined, which gives the character you picked or constructed an overall personality (seen by what you guide them through in the game).

The personal traits and thoughts of a figure we play in a game or read in a story help us to understand who they are as people.

In an RPG, you or other players can pick or build a version or multiple versions of the character that's established; or who's a random person in the game. That individual will follow the same narrative, personality, or lore (if they have a role in a game) as another persona you or other players will make. Even if there are minor differences to the alternate version of the character we select, their essential nature will be the same.

Because one of the characters possesses the same facets as an alternate version of the figure - it makes them not their own individual.

The figure we created or picked isn't the objective individual who did the events in the game. Since we can create or choose who we want to go through the story, we give our interpretation of the person who carried out the narrative's developments. (Examples: Nioh 2, Pokemon X and Y, Fire Emblem: Three Houses).

Some of the characters you made or selected may have few characteristics, and you give them more or extra details of background, story, personality, and so on.

In contrast to the Avatar character, the Silent Protagonist has an established character that you do not have to create or choose how you would like them to operate. The Silent Protagonist would already have a set personality, opinions, and motives - enabling us to determine who they are.

Who the Silent Protagonist is isn't up to interpretation. The character we play is the one going through the events. The Silent Protagonist's personality traits, motives, and mindset are personal to themselves, and you won't have another version of the individual that will have the same story or character.

With the Voiced Game Protagonist, Silent Protagonist, and the Avatar character, you still make choices for their actions, for example - deciding where they will go or what they say.

~

This completes the series of “How to Analyze a Silent Protagonist.”

I hope I gave another idea showing the difference between an Avatar character and a silent protagonist.

Thank you so much for reading.

I also want to say a thank you to others that helped with this project.

Previous - https://www.giantbomb.com/forums/general-discussion-30/how-to-analyze-a-silent-protagonist-1899125/

Resource:https://wallpaperaccess.com/blue

I'm a little confused with this one. Didn't seem to add much, perhaps because it feels like a side step from your main point? If the point is that the protagonist's inner life, relationships, etc can and should be visible even if the player doll never speaks, wouldn't it then make sense to follow that with how "avatar characters" would handle that; perhaps by putting the inner life and relationships of the protagonist directly in the hands of the player? Do you see what I mean? The points shouldn't be orthogonal to one another.

Anyway, some suggested viewing and reading:

• Video Game Writing and the Sense of Story [Writing]

Personally, I think silent protagonists are an outdated relic that we've moved past. Even if, as you say, a silent protagonist can have a fully developed character with clear motivations and personality traits, at that point why make them a silent protagonist? The whole point of a silent a protagonist is to allow the player to project themselves onto the protagonist, which is much better done with an avatar character that you can actually customize or make dialogue choices with.

Setting aside the fact that a silent protagonist is just a worse way of allowing the player to project themselves onto the character than an avatar character, and that it creates unnecessary barriers and oddities in storytelling and presentation, a silent protagonist that has their own motivations and personality defeats the entire purpose of having a silent protagonist in the first place.

I can not think of a single game with a silent protagonist that wouldn't be better with either a fully authored character or a player driven avatar with decision making and dialogue choices. Silent protagonists are a weird middle ground between these styles with tons of issues of their own and almost no benefits you couldn't have done better with either an authored or player driven character.

A silent protagonist like Gordon Freeman is a character, he has a family, qualifications, he's acknowledged by his colleagues and his actions change the world around him, whereas my character in Black Desert Online doesn't really exist, it is an avatar for killing and earning XP (and ordering drunk monsters to grow crops). Even avatars that speak like in Guild Wars 2 aren't really too important, the story acknowledges you and your achievements but as soon as the conversation ends your only purpose is to complete quests, if Half Life's enemies vanished Gordon would have to go look for surviving family members, find a place to stay, help rebuild society, get a dog.
That's not black and white of course, there's probably a properly embedded avatar character out there somewhere i'm not thinking of, i was about to say Alpha Protocol but that's more a character with some customisation, Mass Effect has you choose background history but it's still more of a multiple choice character.

@ll_exile_ll: Overall, I agree with you and can't stand silent protagonists. As you can see in my reply to his previous post though, I do see one exception, who I legitimately don't think would be better as a speaking character and that is Red from Transistor. I won't detail the reasons (I'll paste my reply here as well), but in the main, it's because her being mute is explained in the story, affects her as a character and is a big plot point. She is a famous pop singer so losing her voice should be devastating and it is treated as such. Games like the Stanley Parable wouldn't really work with a voiced protagonist either (though that game plays with the distinction between protagonist and avatar) but that feels like a separate case.

...While Red is a well realized character, what really sets her apart for me is very simple; Red losing her voice is not incidental to the plot and has a large effect on her personality.

Red used to be a famous and talented pop-singer who filled up stadiums. She loves singing and expressing herself, so losing her voice, her most distinctive trait on the surface at least is a big deal. Her lover who is stuck in the Transistor can give one sided communication, but you get the sense that even though he is chatty, he also feels nervous about her silence. While red cannot sing, she can hum along to the background music, flourish the sword and sometimes gives it a hug. She also makes her own decision in direct opposition to what her lover wants and can act mischievously towards it, establishing that this is her story (not HerStory though), but not a story happening around her. What further helps establish her personality is that though she is silent in the classical sense, she does communicate with her lover using consoles she comes across, and even sends out brief comments. Through this, you really get the sense that she is devastated and angry about losing her voice, and wants to communicate but is simply unable to.

This might be cheating when speaking of silent protagonists, but what really cements her personality are her songs. They were all (presumably) recorded before the events of the game and are all emotional in her own way. Even though you are never supposed to equate the art with the artist, in this case, the game seems to be using the music to hint at her feelings about her lover, the society she is in, and herself. I won't get into any text analysis here, but I reallyrecommend you checkthose out.

@nuttism: I personally don't consider Red a silent protagonist. She is a character that is incapable of speaking, not a character like Link or Gordon Freeman than are just conspicuously silent for no given reason. Red's lack of ability to speak is also part of the plot, whereas in the case of an actual silent protagonist their silence is almost never even acknowledged.

Silent protagonists are characters that should speak based on all rational human logic, but do not. Situations where a character like Red's physical inability to speak is part of the narrative are entirely different.

@ll_exile_ll: I feel like it's getting a bit into "no true Scotsman" territory here. If the only characters you consider silent protagonists are those who are handled badly, of course you aren't going to like any of them. However, I feel like that's a weird definition of silent protagonist as Red is also a protagonist who is silent (she can hum, but most of those you would consider silent protagonists grunt) so I don't really see why she shouldn't be in the same category just because it is acknowledged in her case. I think it's a bit strange to have the definition not depend on the character itself but rather the world around them and the plot.

As I mentioned in my other comment, I mostly agree with you that the vast majority of silent protagonists feel like a cop out and drive me up the wall, and I do think it is mostly a relic from a previous era of game design as you mention. However, I don't think the few examples there are of good silent protagonists should be placed in a category of their own, and I doubt you can have a good one without their silence factoring into the plot somehow or at least there being a good explanation.

I just thought of another one actually (minor SPOILERS for Omori). Sunny, the Hikikomori protagonist from Omori, doesn't speak due to his severe depression. However, as most of the game takes place inside his own head (he doesn't speak there either), it's possible to ascertain what he is thinking and what view he has of the people around him. The gorgeous cutscenes also reveal more about the character and how his past has shaped him. Due to the emotion battle system you can also read into the character by his expressions in battle.

It should be noted that as with most silent protagonists, it is never directly stated what he is thinking (otherwise I wouldn't consider him a silent protagonist as he would be "speaking" to the player), only what his emotions are, so what you read into the character is mostly conveyed through visuals. Overall I prefer Red as she is more expressive in her movements and has a clearer agency, as well as her silence factoring into the plot in a larger way, but upon thinking about it, I think Omori is also a great example of how to do a silent protagonist well in a turn based RPG (where I dislike them even more).

Hello ll_exile_ll, I am sorry for the late reply. For some reason on Giant Bomb, I do not get notifications for comments, and I'm not sure why. I checked my settings, and everything is on, but I still do not get notified.

While reading your comment, I can understand what you are saying. It would be nice sometimes to verbally hear the silent protagonist speak how they feel about a situation.

When thinking about the silent protagonist to me, I feel in a way it's another way of a character expressing themselves outside of words. There are times when the creator will purposefully make the character silent to add to their character or convey a message. In the new Metroid game, the creator purposefully wanted Samus to be silent in-game which represents the main theme of the game being dread. The creator thought that by her being silent it would be better to show her the situation, or what she is thinking. He says it would be better shown if the player did not see it through words or a voice but through visuals and action. He wants the player to think about what is happening and what are her thoughts.

Sometimes we as humans do not always speak as well.

As an example in the previous article, even a voiced Game Protagonist will not always speak. Kratos is viewed as a voiced game protagonist who talks. However, in quite a few games (for example gow 1) he is silent most of the time. The actions he will do are things he has done in the story, but you are controlling him. By doing this, we still see his whole character still.

A character like Nathan Drake, however, will tend to talk on his own. However, we still control him at the end of the day to get to his goal.

Overall, like people, some can talk a lot, but some do not want to though they can.

With both the Silent Protagonist and the voiced game protagonist, while playing them it shows their decision-making. By controlling them, it tells the story of how they got to that position. Even if they can say where they want to go, at the end of the day, we the player has to guide them there.

Though a silent protagonist doesn't speak, overall it doesn't really take away or add to their character in a way. It will just verbally express how they are feeling, which can be done in other ways. In general, most of the time they do speak but we do not hear them.

With that said, I thank you for your comment and for reading my article!

@ravey

Hello Ravey,

I apologize for the late reply.

I want to begin by saying thank you again for your feedback. I apologize if the article wasn't as enjoyable as the first one.

Overall, both parts were supposed to show how the Silent Protagonist can be viewed as their own character like the voiced game protagonist (the character type that talks and emote like Nathan from Uncharted or Joel from TLOU).

The first part was supposed to go over many of the concerning factors regarding why the Silent Protagonist can't be viewed as their own character. Many feel they are supposed to be like an avatar character, where you put your own thoughts and feelings in. However, it doesn't work because they have their own motivations and personality.

It could be something as simple as Mario wanting to save Peach. He wants to save Peach, but someone could have a different goal. It connects to how the voiced game protagonist has their own goals as well.

Though the silent protagonist is silent, the actions that they must do show their personality. The things we guide them through are things that they really did go through, in the game.

Since both parts were supposed to show how they aren't Avatars the second part was supposed to add more regarding how they are different.

Regarding covering the inner life of the Avatar character, since they are supposed to be viewed as you, I was trying to focus on that aspect showing where their inner lives are and how you create them. It's different for a Silent Protagonist because they were written to have an inner life.

You gave links to very helpful articles, thank you so much! I will be sure to look at them. I find this subject interesting regarding the video game types.

Anyway Ravey, I thank you so much for your comment! I hope this was helpful!

If you don't mind me saying, I don't know much about Gordon Freeman, however, for Link, he's shown to speak for the most part. However, we the player do not hear him.

In the game BOTW, he's given a reason why he doesn't speak, which is due to pressure overall. He used to be happy as a kid we find out. His personality was akin to Wind Waker Link when Mipha talks about him as a kid. However, as he got older, he was no longer the way he used to be as a kid.

They call him a man of few words and there's never any indication he participates in conversations. Gordon Freeman is a certified mute.

I agree with you as well. I think Silent Protagonist works well if the execution is done right overall. As you mentioned in a game like Stanly Parable (my little sister loves that game btw), it wouldn't work well if he talks

I think it can come down to the way the character is supposed to be written, and the execution.

Hello Clikame, thank you for reading my article!

I agree with you! It's hard for me to speak on Gordon, because I've never played the game, but for Black Desert, I agree with you.

For Guild Wars, to me, what you are saying shows how a video game character can talk, but it's something that might not be needed if it's not really important.

Indeed! Mass Effect does! I never played the game but heard of it. It's a good example of what an Avatar character is supposed to be.

Thank you so much again!