4C Pixels: A Look at Black Hair in Video Games

 

I've been playing video games for a very very long time now and one of the things that has been bugging me in my adulthood is the lack of afro-centric hairstyles in video games. I play a lot of RPGs and these games often have character creation and customization. As a creative I love any game that gives me freedom to express myself. I love designing the look and the playstyle of my characters. It's just frustrating that my options are so limited when it comes to making a character that looks black and the most egregious part is the lack of hair options. If the title does possess any black hairstyles it's going to be a Party City looking-ass afro, cornrows with no hangtime, and maybe some locs. I would count the low cut, but it's really just a buzz cut.

The Grand Theft Auto games is one of the few games I recall that had a good amount, specifically San Andreas since most of Franklin's options in V were just variations of fades and Cesars, but it really shouldn't require for the main character to be black for people to get a variety of black hair options in video games. It's frustrating when you're spending so much time designing your characters facial features, outfit, body type, and then you get to the hair and you get this:

According to a study in 2010 Black people make up only one percent of the video game industry workforce, that has increased slightly over the years. The amount is unclear as different sources cite different numbers as for instance The New York Times says it's went up by two percent while Fortune says it's currently residing at five percent and IGDA says it's at four percent. Regardless, it's still quite small so it's not surprising that representation is so weak, but Black people are not a rare or obscure population so it's not an excuse either.

One of the reasons I was so hyped for Cyberpunk 2077 was because it was an adaptation of Mike Pondsmith's tabletop RPG. Mike Pondsmith is a black man and this was the closest I ever seen a black man get a AAA title. Despite fully well knowing that Mike Pondsmith didn't have heavy involvement in the development in the game, the fact this was an adaptation of his game gave me hope that there would be a lot of afro textured hair options in the game. Unfortunately, Cyberpunk 2077 was no better. It had more than three options at least, but I was still incredibly disappointed. I tried to make the most of it however and I liked how hairstyles can change depending on if your character is wearing a hat or not. From what I've heard recent titles like Pokémon Legends Arceus and Elden Ring aren't any better. Diversity in video games has gotten a little better in these past few years and while nothing has improved in the character creation front, we've seen just the ever bit more variety in predefined characters.

The only black hair option in Elden Ring is this single afro

 

In the Beyond Good and Evil 2 trailer that felt like ages ago the black girl in that game sports an accurate-looking twist-out. Barret Wallace from Final Fantasy VII has been a favorite in the community depending on who you ask and while his design is great I'm still irked about how his hair looks off in the remake. I'm not sure if the Japanese devs know the texture of afro hair, but Barret's hair is too straight looking when it should look kinky. It's the same situation in Mortal Kombat 11. They greatly improved Jacqui Brigg's model from X to 11, but her hair looks really bad. In MK 11 Jacqui is now sporting locs, but the texture looks straight and it has this weird glossy shine to them. The hair for her space marine outfit just makes her look old. I think it's a reference to the movie Aliens, but still it just looks bad. Horizon Forbidden West also has some good hairstyles for their black characters and they also improved the shader on their skin tones because a lot of the black characters in Zero Dawn had a weird glossy look to their skin. That being said if you look at Varl's locs in the header image of this article they still look bit off. The style is cool, but the ends have a pointy tip. The ends of dreadlocks on black people's hair are round. The pointy tips usually come from people with a straight hair texture. I also quite like Master Raven's weird braid and dreadlock combo in Tekken 7. She even has a couple of dyed locs. It wasn't just standard straight down dreads. They added some flavor by having a bang in the front with a long ponytail in the back with some dye as well; things that black people actually do. 

Afro puffs as shown in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

It's just a shame we don't see more of this and this implemented in character customization. Black gamers have long been impatient with this problem and sometimes when we do get it others try to claim it. Back in 2020 Animal Crossing: New Horizons came out with one of their first DLCs and Nintendo added a few new hair options with afro puffs being one of them, but a lot of non-Black people were calling them space buns on Twitter. Some gamers have even created a library of 3D rendered hairstyles  for game developers to use and reference. There's currently no word if any known developers have utilized this library.

I love video games with all my heart. They are my number one passion in life. I just really hope I can see more of myself in them. The core of this problem lies in the lack of Black faces in the industry and those with positions of power and honestly believe we won't see any significant change until there are more Black people in games. Hopefully people like me and many of others in the community can spark enough interest to get people invested in game development and for current developers to add more options for the people that play their products.