The Stoic, Silent Protagonist

You would think that using an undefined, empty character would be a pretty bad choice when creating a story, right? So why is it that the silent protagonist remains a popular form of characterisation in video games to this day? The silent protagonist is a common form of characterisation in which a 'blank-slate' character is used to immerse the player with the story. When the player is expected to reflect aspects of their own personality onto the character, in order to truly integrate the player with the game world, the silent protagonist is used. So how can a soulless husk of a character serving as the drive of the narrative be considered good storytelling? The name of the game is immersion.

Its a consistent trope in all forms of storytelling, that there should be at least one character with whom the reader, watcher or player can project themselves onto in some form as a means of integrating with the plot. This character serves as the reason that all the exotic settings, cultures miscellaneous plot devices are explained in the narrative. The best example of this is the character Tidus in Final Fantasy X, a character who is also new to the main setting of the story, so his ignorance of the world is the narrative device for explaining the facets of the world that the player also does not understand. This form of integration between the player and the game world is also extended by allowing the player to name the protagonist themselves, further moulding the character into this bridge for the player to immerse themselves in the game's world.

Another popular trope of the silent protagonist is the influence of the player on the character as a whole. Most RPG's (Role playing games) will let you to name the main character yourself, there are others which expand on this, giving the player the choices that affect the narrative. In Persona 3, once you've named the character, your given an increasable level of freedom. At least half the game is devoted to your character pursuing relationships with numerous NPC's (Non playable characters) throughout the game world, its ultimately the player's choice who to interact with and how they want to do it. There's the freedom to be an absolute nice guy and then a complete jerk all through one conversation. Its this freedom of choice, the opportunity to shape the characters interactions to your own preference that truly bridges the gap between the player and the games world.

But what about those games that aren't trying to immerse you in this way, yet still use a silent protagonist? There are situations where a character who says little to nothing throughout the course of the entire game ends up being the most important one of all. In ICO, the symbiotic yet charming relationship between the protagonist Ico and his only ally Yorda, or delves into the players psyche through their subtle relationship with barely a few sentences of dialogue between the throughout the entire course of the game. Both characters are unable to talk to each other through a language barrier, Yorda's dialogue in particular is represented through incomprehensible symbols, which are only deciphered during a second playthrough. The game uses this lack of dialogue to focus on the fact that they both need to rely on each other to survive, the result is an incredibly powerful relationship between the two characters that simply has to be seen to be believed.

The use of a silent protagonist offers perhaps the most important contribution of all. For the purpose of immersion, they're the blank-slate the player is able to project themselves onto, perhaps even to provide the player with a degree of purpose and influence over the narrative. Or alternatively, the lack of a voice means the game's plot can portray its meaning in a more complex and subtle way, giving the player a truly thought provoking experience that can leave more of an impact than many well-versed stories. Ironically, the empty husk of the narrative can ultimately become much more important than any other character in its respective narrative than any other character, and remains to this day an effective narrative trope that holds such hidden potential.

- Written by E. Bromage.