Player Personality Quiz

In some video games, during the character creation process, you occasionally find yourself tested. But unlike most tests found in video games, this one doesn't test your knowledge of the trivial. No, this test gives you several hypothetical situations and you must choose an answer that would best describe your course of action in the situation. A personality test, in other words. These tests can be used for a variety of things, such as determining a character's class or job based on your play style, determining which of many possible items to give you; where you sit on a Karma Meter, and so on.

The questions on such tests tend to cover a wide variety of topics, from how players would approach difficult problems, to how they react to certain scenarios, and even personal matters such as gender, blood type, and Zodiac sign. Most of the time, it's easy to see how your answers affect the result. Stating you would prefer to sneak into a heavily guarded fortress will give you a character more oriented towards stealth related builds, while saying you would rush in with weapons drawn would yield a character better suited to direct combat. Other games might ask questions that have little to do with the actual gameplay, asking you what kind of friend you are, or what you like to do in your spare time.

Depending on the game, the overall influence of your answers can range from simple differences in physical appearance to the entire make-up of your character.

Like any good personality test, there are no wrong answers. That is, unless there is a particular result you're aiming for. Some games might be generous enough to let you retake the test, or manually override it altogether. If not, you can always consult the Strategy Guide or Online FAQ.

Not related to Secret Test of Character, where the test situations are real, as opposed to merely hypothetical. See also Pop Quiz.

Examples of Player Personality Quiz include:

Video game examples

Adventure Game

Quest for Glory 3 has this when the oracle talks to you. You are then told a fortune based off your answers.
- This one is especially fun because there are always three "reasonable" answers, one "fair" answer, and one joke answer to each question. Picking the joke answers can make the sequence end abruptly, sans the fortune.
Escape from Monkey Island parodies this with the pirate correction school.

Dating Sim

The second Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side game used a questionnaire on the first day of school to decide your character's starting stats and with which character she has an Accidental Kiss early on.

MMORPGs

In World of Warcraft, during the Darkmoon Faire, you are given one of these by the fortune teller, who gives you a buff for a different stat depending on your answers.
In the tutorial area of Ragnarok Online, the last stage before entering the gameworld is a test of this kind that determines which of the original six "first jobs" fits your personality. If you choose to follow the results, you get several extras before entering the game.
The "new" tutorial zone implemented toward the end of the original run of City of Heroes/City of Villains offered a one-question quiz which determined whether your character would be a hero or villain: Help a dying hero or not?

Roguelike

In Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, a personality test determines which Pokemon you become.
- An earlier Pokémon example occurs in Crystal, when you are tested to see if you are worthy of the final Gym badge after you beat Clair. If you answer everything like a goody two-shoes (re: don't think like your rival), you get a Dratini that knows Extreme Speed in addition to the badge!
Ancient Domains of Mystery gives you the option to use one for determining the stat modifiers to your race/class combo, although your only ever asked a random subset of the questions available. You can also choose random stats.

Role-Playing Game

Knights of the Old Republic featured one when determining your Jedi class. You can choose to ignore the results if you wish.
- There's a more standard test of personality in it, when a terminal will only permit one person to use it. The player character has to answer like Revan would to access the console. Strangely, even if you fail the test, you are still permitted access after doing battle with several robot guards (this is explained later).
- And answering like the villain would turns your Karma Meter towards evil. Have Jedi never heard of lying?
  - The computer had already explained that it would know if you're lying. A little odd that you're not even given the option of trying though.
Fallout 3 used a personality test called the G.O.A.T. exam to determine your tag skills. Of course, the game allows you to completely ignore the results if you wanted.
- Right before you sit down to take the GOAT, there is also a Karma Test: Three bullies are harassing your friend and there are any number of ways to deal with them, ranging from violent (negative karma), ignoring it (neutral karma), and talking your way to a peaceful resolution (positive karma) (or, alternatively, beating the bullies back).
- Fallout: New Vegas continues the tradition when the doctor who saved your life in the intro gives you a psych test, with Rorschach inkblots and word association. Again, he admits his test has No Control Group and lets you decide if his suggestion is valid or not.
Ultima IV did this (and could actually be the Trope Maker). It selected your character class and starting location based on the results. They reused the same test in V, VI and IX with a few minor changes to the wording of the questions.
- In Ultima VII, ignoring all of the Copy Protection tests, joining the Fellowship is accompanied by a verbal test administered by Batlin. It handles like a situational examination, with Batlin performing a pragmatic spin on even rather good answers, and, ultimately, you are encouraged to join the Fellowship regardless of how you answer.
In the beginning of Kingdom Hearts, you walk through a door in your dreams and must answer a few questions from your friends. You are then told at what time of day your journey starts, as a metaphor for your rate of experience level-up. Choosing a starting weapon also comes with a descriptor of what qualities you are embodying or discarding, and decides your starting stats and the order of abilities you learn by level-up.
In Elder Scrolls, when you created a character at the beginning one of the options you were given is to answer a series of questions to determine your class. You can also choose to just pick your class.
- Except for Oblivion, though you can quite extensively customize your character including your class. Probably justified in that even a hundred questions asked and answered wouldn't determine such feats as the position of your virtual nose, forehead shape or eye tilting.
  - Oblivion actually swapped out the Player Personality Quiz for a Secret Test of Character, basing the suggested class on what skills you used during the tutorial. However, as there were a number of skills that were impossible to use there were a number of classes it would never recommend.
Grandia II had Ryudo test his character. You choose the answers in order to use the piece of devil in him safely.
There is one of these at the beginning of the SFC and GBC remakes of Dragon Warrior 3 also called Dragon Quest III in Japan. It starts with a series of yes or no questions. Depending on how how you answer, you get put in a different situation. Your actions in the situation determine your character's personality, which affect your characters stats.
- For example, one scenario places the hero in a kingdom that's about to go to war with its neighbor—then has you overhear the Queen gloating to herself about how she lied to the king about the other kingdom planning to attack them so that he'd attack "first". Her real reasons for starting this war? She wants all their jewels for herself. Another scenario looks like a straightforward dungeon, but how you proceed through the dungeon gives you very different results (and personalities)).
Steambot Chronicles opens with a series of multiple choice personality questions to help determine the personality of your avatar. These include such things as "what would you do if you found a lost wallet full of money?", but as far as anyone can tell most of these options don't actually do anything. The game is LOADED with these kinds of personality-shaping questions all throughout.
PachiPara 13 by the same developers on the same engine as the above also opens with one. The possible answers start the game's love of unusual dialog options, with the very first question being your reaction to seeing a kid crying because he lost at a ball game including options of telling him to quit crying, ignoring him or laughing at him. This time it sets the character's initial position on the nice/jerk and introverted/extroverted scales, which really only matters for dating sidequests.
A major aspect of Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne, where personality-defining questions will crop up in demon conversations and in major story events. How you answer these questions has an effect on what ending you get (as well as what endings are even available). The lone exception is the True Demon Ending, which overrides all other possibilities once you fulfill certain gameplay requirements, making all the previous conversations moot.
- Shin Megami Tensei: if...... will ask you about your student life (and what kind of underwear you're wearing with the right series of questions) to determinate your initial stats.
- Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey also uses a quiz to figure out your character's growth type.
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines has one at the very beginning to determine which clan would be best suited to the player. However, the test is optional, and the results are just a suggestion.

Simulation Game

Animal Crossing has you answer questions at the start to change your appearance and gender of your character.
The Urbz on the DS and Game Boy Advance has the player answer several questions at the beginning of the game to decide which "rep group" the player's character will be in initially, as well as which rep group-exclusive Xizzles (secret abilities to ease the gameplay) will be available.

Turn-Based Strategy

Vantage Master, a fantasy turn-based strategy game on a field of hexagons, forced you into a specific character class depending on your answers. This would be okay, were it not for the fact that some classes were just really horrible.

Turn Based Tactics

Ogre Battle for the SNES and PSX used one of these to determine your main character's starting alignment, but in more recent games your answers have other effects, such as the items and equipment you start with, and what your starting characters' classes are.
- The one in the SNES game determined what your Lord's attacks were.
Jagged Alliance 2 uses this to build a custom merc who works for free when you start a new campaign.

Visual Novel

Animamundi: Dark Alchemist does this at the beginning to narrow down which of the twenty-odd endings you'll get.

Non-video game examples

Web Original

The Hitherby Dragons story "What was Really Going On" describes the story of Abraham as if it were a player starting a character in an RPG, including decisions made on whether they want to be a ranger or a bard.
- This is, in fact, a direct parody of the Ultima IV Player Personality Quiz mentioned above.

New Media

The Internet is rife with all manners of supposed "personality tests" encompassing just about every subject imaginable, ranging from the merely funny ("What ice cream flavor are you?") to the downright absurd ("How long could you survive chained to a bunkbed with a Velociraptor?").