For all his charming flaws and self-aware one-liners, as a player character Nathan Drake is very conventional. Uncharted's lead is a well-built male who saves the world and gets the girl, slotting neatly into the always prominent Hollywood hero trope. In video games, this trope traces its origins right back to Jumpman saving Pauline from Donkey Kong, yet still defines many contemporary titles.

The history of player characters reveals an assortment of branching types that are much more noteworthy than said Hollywood trope. Some have yet to be fully explored, others are waiting to be reprised and revived in the modern era. Here are six such branches warranting further examination.

Reviving the Mascot

The mascot movement began in 1980 and with Pac-Man, a simplistic character swept up in his game's opportune worldwide success. Said success quickly made Pac-Man into a cultural phenomenon as marketing centred on him rather than the game, with everything from cereals to panties displaying his yellow visage. He even got his own animated series depicting his family's adventures in Pac-Land - Pac-baby et al. The simple Pac-Man design had become iconic.

His cultural impact was not lost on competitors. Other early 80s games like Frogger and Pitfall tried but failed to ape the Pac-Man formula in their heroes, and then a plucky plumber named emerged. Even though he started life playing second fiddle to the afore-mentioned Donkey Kong, he went on to star in his own game, 1985's Super Mario Bros. which would go on to sell over 40 million copies worldwide. With Mario's commercial success came a similar whirlwind of merchandising and spinoffs, but unlike other gaming icons Mario's cultural status and significance would never fade.

Mario became a mascot both for and gaming, his challengers fading while his success surged over the late 80s. Then 1991 produced Sega's mascot with attitude, Sonic. The stylish, impassive hedgehog aptly represented the detached generation, and his cultural relevance threatened to oust the moustachioed, chubby Mario from his mascot throne. The 2D platforming heroes fought at the centre of their manufacturers' decade-long console war, but Mario's emphatic transition into combined with Sega's financial problems brought battle to a close.

Despite the emergence of iconic player characters like Lara Croft, Pikachu and Master Chief, there's now a gap in the market for another mascot to emerge, one to rival the all-conquering Mario. While it may seem an impossible feat, the push made with LittleBigPlanet's Sackboy proves the importance places on finding a face to represent its systems. Mario's ability to adapt over time ensures he'll never be outdated, but someone like Sackboy could present a more current, fresher icon for gaming's oft-forgotten younger generation to get behind. If Sackboy somehow achieves anything near to the cultural impacts of Pac-Man and Mario then he could also represent the cutesy face needed to remind the public that gaming still has a charming, imaginative side.

More than Just a Bow

While 1981's Ms. Pac-Man had quicker and smarter AI than its predecessor, in truth gaming's first female player character only represented a blatant scheme to bring women to arcades, albeit a highly successful one. It took six more years for gaming's true first lady to surface.

While inspired by the sci-fi films Alien and Aliens' lead female, held back its protagonist's gender right until its ending. With gaming's abundance of male leads and developer Nintendo's reverence for men saving princesses, the revelation of a female Samus behind the armour stunned players with its strong feminist commentary even if that wasn't necessarily the intention. As a lone but capable bounty hunter, Samus is often cited as an important leading lady. Yet her sexualisation over time not least in her tight-fitting Zero Suit arguably detracts from her initial impact.

Hyper-sexualisation would be a criticism levelled far more at gaming's next prominent heroine, Lara Croft. Her emergence at the height of the 90s girl power movement, combined with the wild success of her games and movies, propelled her into cultural stardom. But any girl power she may have had was demeaned by her enormous bust, supposedly accidentally produced by the slip of a designer's mouse. Her sexualised image combined with the game's controllable camera gave a strong voyeuristic element, one which Lara has failed or arguably never tried to escape from.

Silence is Golden

The silence of Nintendo's early player characters was more circumstantial than by design. The technological limits of initial Mario, and Metroid iterations only allowed for minimal dialogue at best. While Samus grew a narrative voice in future incarnations, Nintendo decided to keep Mario and Link (mostly) silent, even as Zelda games became more complex and Mario entered the sphere of role-playing games. After witnessing their animated series, it feels like an agreeable decision.

In 1995 there were no technology-based excuses for Crono's silence in Japanese Chrono Trigger. With the series producing astonishing narrative depth and plenty of dialogue for its time, many players were surprised by Square's decision to give their new J-RPG a silent protagonist. However, Crono's silence only served to magnify the personalities of his colourful supporting cast, while expressive touches in his animation gave him enough of a personality to not feel soulless.