‘Baldur’s Gate 3’ Fulfills My Dream of More Asian NPCs in RPGs
Initially, I wasn’t going to write about this, but then I realized that a good portion of my Steam screenshots for Baldur’s Gate 3 are of random Asian NPCs scattered throughout the world. Clearly, this means a lot to me!
A while back, I wrote about how I wished there were more Asian characters in Western RPGs. This was, predictably, met with a lot of backlash, much of which I still think is made up of the laziest arguments. These arguments tend to run the gamut from, “It’s based on medieval mythology, so it wouldn’t make sense,” to, “Just another braindead SJW trying to get angry about nothing!”
To which I say: One, we don’t live in medieval times, and I am not the only Asian person living in the west, so, you know. Let us have this. And two, I promise you, I’m plenty braindead about a lot of things, and many things get me angry, but this is simply something I want, and in a meaningful way befitting the modern society we live in. I get more properly angry about having to commute to Trader Joe’s and deal with the people there. Chill out, girlies.
So, laid bare before you, I doth proclaim: I love the fact that the world of BG3 is so diverse, and that I see so many Asian faces everywhere I go. This became especially noticeable in the actual city of Baldur’s Gate, where I saw Asian NPCs everywhere.
What I particularly love is the fact that these “Asian features” aren’t limited to one race. They’re present in every humanoid race, which has made it incredibly fun to create new characters; I no longer feel like my only option is to create a “spicy white” character:
These are just a few examples of the faces we get in the character creator. As you might expect, most of the Asian faces are for humans, although there’s a great deal of ambiguity across the board that my mixed-race self personally appreciates. For instance, I feel very attached to this particular half-elf face, resulting in my feeling closer to my player character than I usually do in RPGs:
However, I also think it’s neat that another option does actually look more like my real self—which might prompt me to play as a bona fide human next time around:
And of course, I’d be remiss not to mention that one of the game’s antagonists, Cazador Szarr, is, in fact, an Asian elf—which I found to be really cool, despite the fact that he’s a real SOB:
No matter what studios do to push things forward, dorks and grifters are still going to complain, so it really means a lot to me that Larian made efforts to diversify this beautiful fantasy world. It doesn’t matter if the “lore” technically comes from medieval or European origins—I mean, are we that creatively puritanical? My very existence is proof that the world is way past those days, and we should now feel free to create worlds that showcase and embrace the beauty of the multicultural reality we live in.
At the very least, I found it really cool and joyous to be able to walk around a fantasy city and not be the only Asian chick there. We out here in Baldur’s Gate.
(featured image: Larian Studios)
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