I drew Miko... (again)

[Lillico]

*Is obsessed with why most lead male characters in these things seem to be faceless for some reason*

The usual reason is because the main character isn't to have a solid appearance or single identity, because you are actively the main player through emotion and actions and so on (particularly as these games have a focus on your personal 'preference' and 'emotions' and are more personal). And there is no way to know what every person who might play the game might look like or generally want to be like... So a lot of games of this genre forego making it up and just give a more neutral/generic appearance, where they're faceless or you just don't see the eyes (because eyes are important when viewing someone, it is the first place you look, and is always why anime eyes are often detailed or exaggerated, to amplify the significance)

However not all of these games do that. Some ignore this and figure the player would rather have some kind of identity regardless of if it would be how they would want to appear personally or not. So they create an appearance (face) for who you play so that you can identify with that *other* character being in the story rather than yourself. Useful for eliminating the uncomfortable problem of if, even with a 'no identity' character, the situations aren't what you personally would do.

Some people prefer the latter, some the other. But the first one must be popular I guess since a lot seem to go with it.

There was a discussion about this on Megatokyo forums I believe, asking whether people would rather have a preset appearance and viewable identity in the game, or for the character you play to be indefinable so as to imagine yourself as the character more. It's mixed as to what people want so I believe the genre covers both.

I could only find these two thread, the one I'm thinking of probably died ina board crash or something or is only obtainable with a less obvious search than "identity" and "faceless":

http://forums.megatokyo.com/index.php?showtopic=735984
http://forums.megatokyo.com/index.php?showtopic=1222443

thats why I really liked the first Lunar (sega cd) more than the PS remake- you actually got to 'be' alex in the orginal and then they kinda take that feeling away from you in the remake- I was really disppointed ^^;