028OPINION
Laura Francis
It’s time to give people of colour their full time in the spotlight
IT’S IMPORTANT THAT
POC CHARACTERS HAVE
FULL-LENGTH CAMPAIGN
GAMES, NOT JUST
SHORTER GAMES.
G
iven the current zeitgeist,
it’s safe to say that there
is a need for more POC
characters to have lengthy
campaigns built around
them, rather than just
shorter games or expansions. And
I’ve noticed that this has been a
mainstay in gaming for too long –
POC characters just being relegated
to short games or expansions.
Think of Uncharted: The Lost
Legacy, Dishonored: Death Of The
Outsider, or Assassin’s Creed:
Freedom Cry, which are all games
with POC protagonists with short
campaigns. It’s clear that it’s still seen
as a risk by developers and publishers
to put Black characters front and
centre... Yet on the movie front we’ve
had the sheer amazingness of the
Miles-starring Spider-Man: Into The
Spider-verse, a brilliant animated film
that I’ve rewatched to death, which
picked up accolades well into the
double digits. That was released in
2018, the same year as Marvel’s
Spider-Man on PS4, which also teases
Miles as a future hero. Naturally,
hearing of a brand-new story set
within that world with Miles
Morales as the leading man in
the PS4 reveal event I got
excited. Like, I got really excited!
I’m there day one!
The announcement
of Marvel’s
Spider-Man: Miles
Morales was one
of the evening’s
biggest surprises.
I speculated after
seeing the trailer
that it would bea smaller game in terms of scope,
something along the lines of the
games I named earlier rather than
having the breadth of the Marvel’s
Spider-Man’s own The City That
Never Sleeps story DLC. And I was
right. I’m conflicted, though, because
while I’m buzzing about it and
absolutely cannot wait to play it
and see how it utilises the PS5’s
fancy new features, there is a
part of me that wishes it were
more substantial, and as
extensive as its predecessor.CITY LIMITS
It’s really tricky talking
about a game and its
scale when I haven’t
had the chance to
experience it for
myself, and it feels
a bit prematureforming such a strong opinion on a
game I’ve not played yet. But after
finishing Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
and Infamous: First Light each in a
single sitting, it makes me feel a tad
disheartened as I was hoping for a
lengthier game with Miles Morales,
not a game I could finish in one
web-slinging outing.
But it’s best to wait and see as it’s
still unclear as to exactly how long the
game will actually be, and besides,
everyone plays at their own pace. It’s
not enough to go solely by trailers.
And hey, it’s exciting that it is its own
game! But Miles deserves to be a
leading man on par with Peter, and
Spider-Verse and his comics prove he’s
more than capable.
It also shows why diversity and
representation (such as developers
taking the time to show accurate skin
tones, light darker skin tones, and
recreate hair textures outside the afro
and braids) is so important. I would
like to see more POC characters being
given full-length campaigns and as
much story and character development
as their white counterparts. Putting
them at the forefront of shorter games
is becoming an unfortunate trend.
Hopefully, Marvel’s Spider-Man:
Miles Morales will be expansive
enough and feel as much like a
full-length game as possible, and there
will be enough of a compelling story,
an eclectic roster of supporting
characters and villains, to keep us
gripped. But I think it is a step in the
right direction, and games are moving
beyond just having ‘diversity
characters’, especially with Deathloop,
a game with two Black protagonists,
coming exclusively to PS5.WRITER BIO
It’s crazy to think just a couple of very short
years ago, Laura Francis had absolutely no
idea as to who Miles Morales was, and then
she ended up seeing Spider-Man: Into The
Spider-Verse more times than she can count
on her fingers and toes together...028
OPINION
Laura Francis
It’stimeto givepeople of colourtheir fulltimein thespotlight
IT’S IMPORTANT THAT
POC CHARACTERS HAVE
FULL-LENGTH CAMPAIGN
GAMES, NOT JUST
SHORTER GAMES.
iven the current zeitgeist,
it’s safe to say that there
is a need for more POC
characters to have lengthy
campaigns built around
them, rather than just
shorter games or expansions. And
I’ve noticed that this has been a
mainstay in gaming for too long –
POC characters just being relegated
to short games or expansions.
Think of Uncharted: The Lost
Legacy, Dishonored: Death Of The
Outsider, or Assassin’s Creed:
Freedom Cry, which are all games
with POC protagonists with short
campaigns. It’s clear that it’s still seen
as a risk by developers and publishers
to put Black characters front and
centre... Yet on the movie front we’ve
had the sheer amazingness of the
Miles-starring Spider-Man: Into The
Spider-verse, a brilliant animated film
that I’ve rewatched to death, which
picked up accolades well into the
double digits. That was released in
2018, the same year as Marvel’s
Spider-Man on PS4, which also teases
Miles as a future hero. Naturally,
hearing of a brand-new story set
within that world with Miles
Morales as the leading man in
the PS4 reveal event I got
excited. Like, I got really excited!
I’m there day one!
The announcement
of Marvel’s
Spider-Man: Miles
Morales was one
of the evening’s
biggest surprises.
I speculated after
seeing the trailer
that it would bea smaller game in terms of scope,
something along the lines of the
games I named earlier rather than
having the breadth of the Marvel’s
Spider-Man’s own The City That
Never Sleeps story DLC. And I was
right. I’m conflicted, though, because
while I’m buzzing about it and
absolutely cannot wait to play it
and see how it utilises the PS5’s
fancy new features, there is a
part of me that wishes it were
more substantial, and as
extensive as its predecessor.CITY LIMITS
It’s really tricky talking
about a game and its
scale when I haven’t
had the chance to
experience it for
myself, and it feels
a bit prematureforming such a strong opinion on a
game I’ve not played yet. But after
finishing Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
and Infamous: First Light each in a
single sitting, it makes me feel a tad
disheartened as I was hoping for a
lengthier game with Miles Morales,
not a game I could finish in one
web-slinging outing.
But it’s best to wait and see as it’s
still unclear as to exactly how long the
game will actually be, and besides,
everyone plays at their own pace. It’s
not enough to go solely by trailers.
And hey, it’s exciting that it is its own
game! But Miles deserves to be a
leading man on par with Peter, and
Spider-Verse and his comics prove he’s
more than capable.
It also shows why diversity and
representation (such as developers
taking the time to show accurate skin
tones, light darker skin tones, and
recreate hair textures outside the afro
and braids) is so important. I would
like to see more POC characters being
given full-length campaigns and as
much story and character development
as their white counterparts. Putting
them at the forefront of shorter games
is becoming an unfortunate trend.
Hopefully, Marvel’s Spider-Man:
Miles Morales will be expansive
enough and feel as much like a
full-length game as possible, and there
will be enough of a compelling story,
an eclectic roster of supporting
characters and villains, to keep us
gripped. But I think it is a step in the
right direction, and games are moving
beyond just having ‘diversity
characters’, especially with Deathloop,
a game with two Black protagonists,
coming exclusively to PS5.WRITER BIO
It’s crazy to think just a couple of very short
years ago, Laura Francis had absolutely no
idea as to who Miles Morales was, and then
she ended up seeing Spider-Man: Into The
Spider-Verse more times than she can count
on her fingers and toes together...