Protagonist Research
For this section of research, I plan to look into a number of different protagonists, mostly from games aimed at a younger audience, to gain a better understanding of some existing protagonists.
One type of protagonist that appears in quite a few games/stories (especially those that are PEGI 7), even in today's generation, is the 'silent protagonist'. As the name suggests this is a protagonist that doesn't talk throughout the game. Many of these characters still make sounds/noise, but throughout the game, they don't have dialogue that is spoken. However, there are reasons for there being silent protagonists in games/stories.
"The reason this is done is to typically make it easier for the player to put themselves in the game via this character. To accomplish this they try and make the main character something of a blank slate so that it easier for the player to project themselves onto this rough outline of a character. " (Gamasutra, 2014)
But what games make use of silent protagonists?
Mario Odyssey - Mario
Mario has been around for many years and has been within a number of games. In many of which he has been the protagonist, and in others, he's just been one of many playable characters.
But almost all of the different versions of Mario do not talk.
Mario is like many other silent protagonists as he lacks personality. Although personality is lacking, however, the objective of the game/story, and his 'call to adventure' (almost always being to save Princess Peach who was just kidnapped) is portrayed in the game, and because of this there are some character traits that could be associated with the character, although these aren't developed throughout the events of the game/story.
(Nintendo, 2017)
But although lacking personality, Mario is a character and game series that is loved and enjoyed by many, and therefore he is one of the perfect examples of an effective silent protagonist.
Most of the Mario games focus on gameplay rather than story, which is another reason as to why I believe Mario being a silent protagonist works particularly well. Pretty much all Mario games have an occurring story and a narrative present, but for the most part, the people that are playing the game are doing so for the gameplay, mainly since the story is almost the same for each game (E.g. Peach is kidnapped by Bowser and must be saved).
One of the latest Mario games, being Super Mario Odyssey (2017) did have more of a story than other games (although it kept the tradition of the story revolving around peach getting kidnapped), but I would still argue that even this game is more gameplay focused as opposed to story focused.
The Legend of Zelda - Link
Another example of a silent protagonist would be Link fro the Legend of Zelda series.
However, unlike the Super Mario games, I would argue that most of the 'The Legend of Zelda' games are a lot more story focused.
But the protagonist being silent doesn't negatively impact the story.
In 'The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild' (2017) there are certain areas of the game which explain this version of Link rather well. One of these areas is in Hyrule Castle, in Zelda's room, where a journal is located. In this journal, Link is talked about, and we as the players can learn about Links personality but also the reason that he's silent.
Additionally, although Link
(IGN, 2016)
Sonic Series - Sonic
Sonic is a character who has been a silent protagonist but has versions, especially in the newer games, that do talk (meaning he's no longer a silent protagonist).
In the older/original games (an even Sonic Mania which is a more recent game), the characters didn't talk. However, moving forward to Sonic games such as Sonic Unleashed (2008) and Sonic Forces (2017), Sonic and the other characters included talk (although Sonic forces had a player-customized character which was silent).
Looking back, the games that Sonic was silent in were all
(WeHeartIt, 2013)
more gameplay focused than story focused. This is also apparent in Sonic Mania (2017), where no character talked. This game was like the early/original games, where there was an apparent story, but the main reason you'd play the game was for the gameplay itself (and the story wasn't really needed to be understood to play the game/enjoy playing the game).
When Sonic began speaking in games, the first being Sonic Adventure (1998), it was apparent that the character did, in fact, have more of a personality. This was mainly shown as the use of dialogue and character interaction allowed the audience to see how the character of Sonic would react to different situations as opposed to us as the players.
This of course was shown with Sonics playful, laidback and somewhat humorous personality.
Research Evaluation/My protagonist
After looking into some examples of protagonists (that are relevant to my audience), I have somewhat of an idea as to what I want to do for my own protagonist.
Originally I had the idea of also making use of a silent protagonist for my story, and then also using a narrative that allows player option throughout the game. However, I previously decided that I would make use of a linear/nodal narrative, and try not to include player options (for the reason of the project becoming a little more simple for me due to my only needing to write one narrative path). Although a silent protagonist could still be used effectively, I feel as though I will most likely make use of a protagonist who does talk, as otherwise, I feel as though the story that I currently have as the concept won't work too well.