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OK, simple question. Do you think that General Leo is African American or Caucasian?
Here are his pics for reference:


I think that he is Caucasian. He just looks too light-skinned to be African American. What do you think?

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

Sprite looks Caucasian, but menu pic looks either very dark skinned caucasian/hispanic. However, i took caucasian

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"Only the dead have seen the end of their quotes being misattributed to Plato."
-George Santayana

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
-Abraham Lincoln, prior to the discovery of Irony.

I think he is caucasian as well mostly because there are no african-americans (umm wait there is no africa or america there...so what do we call them narshe-figaroians?) in the game at all, or ones that I couldn't see. I don't think it was till FF7 with Barrett, who I think is an African-American, or Kiros in FF8, who is definatly, that an African-American was in the games.

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War is for the participants a test of character; it makes bad men worse and good men better. - Joshua Chamberlain

U sir R a n00b >:-( - Cactuar

I chose other 'cause I don't think he is caucasian or african. I know African-american means -- you live in america but are decended from africans-- but what does caucasian mean exactly? Does it just mean having a light skin color or does it actually mean like a specific race?

Now if you wanna know whether I think he is more on the light skinned side or dark skinned side I would probably say light skinned...maybe. I dunno maybe somewhere in between.

By the way that menu pic makes Leo look just plain awful.

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-- You're Gonna Carry That Weight --

I'm gonna ditch the PC terms here. Leo is white, but it's not like it'd be a bad thing if he was black, so don't call be racist or anything. Or he could be half and half, a mullato if you like. He still has blonde hair in the menu pic, and I've never seen a *Naturally* blonde black man. Although I've never seen such a dark skinned white man either. Off the top of my head I'd say white, but if I wanted to be more specific I'd say a mix, although as previously mentioned there are no black people in FFVI. Unless of course you consider Leo black.

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Blood & Fire

I say he is Caucasian. But all those years of serving the empire has turned his face grim.

His menu pic does not do him justice.

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Yeah, I barely post.

I think he's white. The darker element of his face looks like poor shadowing to me.

Quote (Rujuken @ 11th February 2004 19:09)

I know African-american means -- you live in america but are decended from africans-- but what does caucasian mean exactly? Does it just mean having a light skin color or does it actually mean like a specific race?

Caucasian - One from Caucas (could be spelled Caucusus).
It's a mountain range in the Middle East.

Anyways, I null voted because I don't care.

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

He looks sort of like Denis Rodman to me. maybe he's just extremely tanned? he's been chasing espers around in the sun too much? maybe he accidently dyed Kefka's white socks pink in the laundry and he retaliated by attacking him with tanning lotion.

Neh. Not to create stereotypes or anything, but he looks like every Marine we've got around here. No matter what their race, they all look the same. I'm fairly sure they all blonde their hair, too. Despite his rank, maybe he's supposed to look like Generic Army Man or something. I mean, despite his comparative awesomeness in his few scenes, he is the most general of the Generals (assuming Kefka's a general and discounting the RME enemies called generals). Of course, this isn't really making a point. I just think he's supposed to look like an easily identified military man.

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For every step there is a local boy who wants to be a hero. Do you want to do it now outside the butchers with a knife and a bike chain?

Quote (The Raging Newbie @ 11th February 2004 19:40)

I'm gonna ditch the PC terms here. Leo is white, but it's not like it'd be a bad thing if he was black, so don't call be racist or anything.  Or he could be half and half, a mullato if you like. He still has blonde hair in the menu pic, and I've never seen a *Naturally* blonde black man. Although I've never seen such a dark skinned white man either. Off the top of my head I'd say white, but if I wanted to be more specific I'd say a mix, although as previously mentioned there are no black people in FFVI. Unless of course you consider Leo black.

im gonna agree with you on the PC terms... im not caucasian. im white. i would be more offended if people called me caucasian, i know what i am, no reason to dress it up with a big word. finally, figaro, hes not american at all. hence making him simply african. shoulda just said black...

as for what BGrugby had to say, barrett was the FIRST black main character in an RPG. took them long enough i guess. but they just had to go and make him exactly like Mr. T.

and finally, as for general leo, its a tough call, ive never seen ANYONE with that weird grayish/brownish skin tone. he's a race all his own. i always just figured he was a white dude. a horrible looking white dude.

This post has been edited by therandyrhoads on 3rd March 2004 22:29

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You watch the world exploding every single night
Dancing in the sun, a newborn in the light
Say goodbye to gravity and say goodbye to death
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Your time will come...

Some argue that Leo is supposed to be black but because of the fact that his sprite shares color palette with Celes, Sabin and Edgar his skin can only be white. Perhaps he IS supposed to be black and Kefka is racist, which is why he wanted to kill Leo. I'll go along with that.

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FFXI (Siren server)
Tauu the Windurstian Tarutaru!
White Mage & Paladin

(Disclaimer: I am not attempting and/or intending in any way to be racist.)

I'm pretty sure Leo is white, and merely has a VERY POORLY DRAWN menu portrait. He doesn't have the look of a black person, even in the menu pic. Well, nor does he have his menu pic mustache in his sprite. But if you even just look at the sprite and the pic, they look significantly different (as does Banon and Locke, and to some extent Gau and Celes). I personally like the sprites better than the menu pic, and agree with them more. to me Leo was always a young white man, in his twenties, with a solid build and a very short, flat-on-his-head (I don't know what to call it) haircut. In my opinion, the menu pic just smudged that by making his skin a lot darker (grey! not even brown like an African or Indian!), making his head more slim, giving him a mustache (it wasn't a FakeMustache, was it? ), and giving him a slightly mohawk-style haircut.

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I'm sure if he had been a part of the Playstation release's movies, we would see him as a blonde caucasian. They just had a tendency to be inaccurate when translating a person's appearance from mode to mode - i.e. Terra, blonde in the artwork and the movies, but green haired during the game.

Ok, never even HEARD those PC terms. I think Leo is white; everyone seems to be overlooking the fact it might be shadow. I think that is shadow that makes him seem slightly black.

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I think my fanart speaks for itself.



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kame, tortue, tortuga, schildkröte, tartaruga, turtle

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Yes, Kame, your fanart is very good, but I don't think it's the all-deciding.
'Course, maybe you were just trying to voice your opinion in this matter. I dunno.


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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

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Yes, Kame, your fanart is very good, but I don't think it's the all-deciding.
'Course, maybe you were just trying to voice your opinion in this matter. I dunno.

Not to mention that nowhere, menu pic or sprite, does Leo have hair like that. With all due respect, the notion that thats supposed to be General Leo is bunk. Leo's face doesn't look like that and his hair sure isn't similair to what you drew. Again, it's a nice piece of fanart and I know you have the right to think Leo looks like that, but that does not make you any less wrong.

Moderator Edit

Removed edit in light of Neal's post.-R51

This post has been edited by Rangers51 on 13th February 2004 02:51

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Blood & Fire

Or it could just be her interpretation of the character. No reason to get all snippy about it. Posting the fanart was the same as giving her opinion on the topic on hand. And about that topic...let's stick to it.

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Can you hear it breathing?
And hey, put the laptop down for a while
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I feel it, it's leaving me

Dude's black as far as I'm concerned. No good reason to back it up really. I just remember Amano's artwork and figure him to be black.

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Arts

Farts

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I hate the fact that Square gave Leo a train wreck of a menu picture. It's hideous

It is possible that Leo is black, but I've always found it difficult to believe. The story is set in a fantasy world, and the only real life regions and cultures portrayed are either European (Figaro, etc.) or Asian (Doma). That means that the people populating the world would likely resemble real-life people of European or Asian descent.

I've never really been a fan of Leo's stat portrait, though I can see how one could interpret it to mean that he is African. I must admit that the coloring is compelling evidence, but I've never been able to overlook the fact that it would be difficult to place an African styled character in a fantasy world where an African parallel does not exist, at least to the extent of the game's events and locations.

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~Dorothy L. Sayers

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~ Bruce Lee

African enemies: Vargas, Dadaluma, Scrapper, Iron Fist (maybe)

You can't deny that they exist in the game.









This post has been edited by i90east on 13th February 2004 23:59

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FFXI (Siren server)
Tauu the Windurstian Tarutaru!
White Mage & Paladin

Quote (Narratorway @ 12th February 2004 21:54)

Dude's black as far as I'm concerned. No good reason to back it up really. I just remember Amano's artwork and figure him to be black.

Does anybody have a picture of Amano's version of Leo. I think he could he either, I dont think it matters really.

I don't know how to put a picture into my post, but I will link to Leo's Amano picture I found online:

http://www.rpgmaniatikos.net/Galeria/ff6im...3images/leo.jpg

I think the somewhat-unseemly menu portrait of Leo was taken almost directly from the Amano art. Heck, pretty much all the menu pics were almost directly taken from the Amano art, with the exception of Terra's hair color.

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

You can find me on the Fediverse! I use Mastodon, where I am @[email protected] ( https://sakurajima.moe/@glennmagusharvey )

Still makes him look awful. I'm starting to worry more about why Leo looks like he was beaten with an ugly stick than whether is skin is dark or light. But going off the Amano portrait Glenn posted I'd say he has an even skin tone. Not really light not really dark.

Still if I had to choose whether he was black or white I'd probably still lean more towards white.

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-- You're Gonna Carry That Weight --

After seeing all these arguements, all the pretty pictures, and the arguments about being politically correct, now comes the real question:
Why does it matter? What difference does it make?

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

Why does anything we discuss about FF6 matter? Because we care about this game. This is the topic of the thread, so anything said in this thread that has to do with the topic matters.

So with that said, let's get back on topic.

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FFXI (Siren server)
Tauu the Windurstian Tarutaru!
White Mage & Paladin

I've kinda always thought of Vargas as a really dark-skinned Hispanic kinda dude, but Black works, too... ^^;

As for Leo, I think he's just a really fugly white guy.

This post has been edited by Zephir on 14th February 2004 04:16

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~Status Report~

* Completed... Dragon's Head
* Completed... Soldiers of the Empire: Disciples (release pending)
* In Progress/Undecided... Of Love and Betrayal
* Planning/Assembly... Where it all Began

I once had a strategy guide that had an artwork with Leo, and he was black.

I remember my older brother drawing weird mustaches and afros on all characters
in the guide. I must say, Leo looked really cool with an afro.

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