Why are skin tones so off in so many RPGs?

[StaceyPowers]

Has anyone else noticed how “off” skin tones often are in so many open world RPGs? Like skin tones that are unnaturally reddish or yellowish, or a strange sheet-white. It doesn’t seem like this would be so hard to get right.

[Head_Hunter]

It is like that for many skins made around video games, to keep it different from one another and keep it thrilling. So, gamers can have varieties of choice to choose from. 

[Justin11]

I love the difference in skin colours, it makes it unique for gamers to have diverse options to choose the best colourful skin pleasing to them. 

[Reality vs Adventure]

I've noticed skin tones being a bit off. Too much yellows and reds. The yellow makes them look like they got hep c or something and the reds look like they got sunburnt. Even many times the whites are a bit pale. And when you want a little color, they get yellow. I guess it's hard to make a peach color because they don't know how to balance yellows and reds. 

[Head_Hunter]

If their is only white and yellow colors, then it doesn't make sense at all. Skins are meant to have different and appealing colors. I can't make a choice with just white and yellow skin, not the type of my colour. 

[m76]

What causes this is lighting. Realistic lighting is a very compute intensive feature to achieve. And games only have rudimentary imitations of light.
Even ray tracing is very limited at this point, it would require the computing power of gaming systems to increase multiple magnitudes to get it close to realism.

Games have single point lights in most cases, and lots of baked in lights. Scattered light and bouncing light are not taken into account by most, and even when it is, it is imitated not natural.  And this becomes most apparent on objects that are not part of the game world but able to move around in it. And that includes the player character.

It is something that we'll have to live with for a while longer no matter how glaring.

What I hate the most is that in many games the character will look different in the character creator than in the game environment, because the character creator uses a lighting model that has no relation to in game lighting.  This is why I find it important for games to have the option to alter the character after starting the game, so you can adjust for these discrepancies.

 

[Boblee]

To be very honest with you, I don't really care much about the skins colors or anything as long my gaming isn't affected by it. 

[Kane99]

Yeah lighting is a big one, but also a lot of these character creators allow you to color your skin however you want. I think in Dark Souls and other games like it, allow you to make your character however you want, this includes the skin color. I think Skyrim was the same in that you could color your skin anyway you wanted. 

[Boblee]

On 3/2/2022 at 8:11 PM, Kane99 said:

Yeah lighting is a big one, but also a lot of these character creators allow you to color your skin however you want. I think in Dark Souls and other games like it, allow you to make your character however you want, this includes the skin color. I think Skyrim was the same in that you could color your skin anyway you wanted. 

When it comes to character's customization, it's something that they do allow well in the game and it makes it hard to resist. 

[Justin11]

I love the diverse options of character's customization. Choose the tone of it's skin, facial look, height etc. 

[killamch89]

I'm not so sure to be honest - A good number of them try to go for the anime/cartoony look and the skin colors are of a more realistic hue so it will look out of place.

[Justin11]

We have some artistic designs out there which can add that artistic looks when it is integrated into a skin to add ultra new look to a given console or controller. 

[Boblee]

On 3/8/2022 at 12:01 AM, Justin11 said:

I love the diverse options of character's customization. Choose the tone of it's skin, facial look, height etc. 

If they leave the decision making in your hands to decide what it looks like, then it's all good because you can't set up trash for yourself. 

[Knight Barida]

On 2/26/2022 at 11:02 PM, StaceyPowers said:

Has anyone else noticed how “off” skin tones often are in so many open world RPGs? Like skin tones that are unnaturally reddish or yellowish, or a strange sheet-white. It doesn’t seem like this would be so hard to get right.

You don't expect everyone to have a similar skin tone in such games. The difference is going to be there for sure. That's where the fun lies.

[StaceyPowers]

On 3/2/2022 at 3:01 AM, m76 said:

What causes this is lighting. Realistic lighting is a very compute intensive feature to achieve. And games only have rudimentary imitations of light.
Even ray tracing is very limited at this point, it would require the computing power of gaming systems to increase multiple magnitudes to get it close to realism.

Games have single point lights in most cases, and lots of baked in lights. Scattered light and bouncing light are not taken into account by most, and even when it is, it is imitated not natural.  And this becomes most apparent on objects that are not part of the game world but able to move around in it. And that includes the player character.

It is something that we'll have to live with for a while longer no matter how glaring.

What I hate the most is that in many games the character will look different in the character creator than in the game environment, because the character creator uses a lighting model that has no relation to in game lighting.  This is why I find it important for games to have the option to alter the character after starting the game, so you can adjust for these discrepancies.

 

Thank you both for understanding my complaint (a lot of people here seem to think I was complaining about skin tone diversity, which I was not, ugh) and proposing an explanation for it! That does make a lot of sense!