How The PS4 Reinvigorated Gaming Protagonists

PS4 Updates: PlayStation 4 has brought about a new revolution of relatable characters that makes the player feel more involved in the game. Since the start of video games, the medium has been defined by protagonists like Pac-Man, Mario, and Sonic the Hedgehog.

The problem with these early video game protagonists is that they didn’t carry much depth, leaving them one-dimensional. The characters in the video games were goal-driven and lacked layers that make a character relatable and interesting.

Sony’s PlayStation brought a new trend to video games. Heroes were shown as growing and adapting as the stories continued to evolve. Even though the characters were fun and carried distinct personalities, they still lacked the relatability that was needed in gaming as a whole. PlayStation protagonists continued growing and became more realistic and fleshed out with problems and flaws.

By the time PlayStation 4 appeared, characters had become very relatable and humanized. This can be seen in Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn. Raised in a world where humanity has all but been erased, she is on a hunt for truth and must fight against mechanized creatures on the way.

Aloy’s drive for knowledge and her sense of justice is commendable and reflects our own idealism or want of idealism. Aloy reminds us what it means to be a good person who doesn’t back down in the face of adversity and doing the right thing no matter what.

PS4 All The Characters

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Another character that must be mentioned here is Kratos from 2018’s God of War. Kratos is a veteran of the older era of video games. Therefore, when he first made an appearance, he was just like the other protagonists of the era whose purpose was to defeat his enemies with his brutish strength.

The character of Kratos has evolved in the new version of God of War. He now has a son and is struggling to bury his past while trying to be a good father to his son. It was a massive transition for his character and addressed a relatable topic like fatherhood.

Ghost of Tsushima put a player in a position of deciding the fate of the character Jin Sakai. Through Jin Sakai, the characters must decide what is more important, whether to do the right thing or the honorable thing.

Jim’s identity crisis is a very relatable thing as we all must go through it at some point in life. While deciding Jin’s identity, the players end up deciding their own too.

PlayStation 4 has acted as a forerunner for more games with relatable protagonists. an example of this is in the Gears of War franchise putting a heavier focus on characters and story.

These characters show that no matter how impossible their worlds may seem, their struggles are real just like ours. It is commendable how PlayStation 4 and brought about the trend of human and relatable protagonists in video games.

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