Unlike the set characters found in Japanese RPGs, western RPGs almost exclusively deal with created characters, with modifiable skill sets, gender, background, and most of all, looks. The downside is that this can lead to lifeless tabla rasas on which you are supposed to project yourself, egotist that you are. The upside? Big hot bears in RPGs! Who doesn't want that? So, firstly, we look at Bethesda's shake at the hugely popular Fallout franchise. How hot can a man wandering the nuclear wastes get? (If Mad Max's leather bound bears are any help, plenty hot.)Then we head over to the fantastic futurespace that is BioWare's Mass Effect, and finally check out the creepy troll-things that you can create with Bethesda's Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion!