RPGs and the improbable age of characters

I'm bored. Let's talk about how young RPG protagonists tend to be. According to the cliche, they are usually young, and by young they mean teenagers, usually around 15 but not really older than 20. It doesn't even matter what gender, either. The protagonists tend to be super skilled in a lot of traits, like just about any hero ends up being, yet remains young. And apparently in contrast, older characters tend to consider themselves too old for battlefield stuff anyways, well, those who are NPCs anyways. Older party members end up not staying long in comparison, and are somehow less skilled, possibly due to losing it along the way or perhaps by other means.

Honestly I'm fine with most protagonists anyways, so the whole teenage thing doesn't bother me too much. But it does if the characters honestly look older than they ought to be most of the time. I mean, Dart from Legend of Dragoon, Squall from Final Fantasy VIII, and most Phantasy Star protagonists actually look like they could be in their early-20s as far as what they look like. These characters, well, they act between the ages of 18 and 20, Squall is just committed to his job for instance, ending up lovestruck later on, but that's usually normal for him, if a tad into the teenage angst sort of deal. Dart also does the same thing except he was already lovestruck, but again this isn't necessarily a problem. Other protagonists tend to actually be teens in some way where they are slightly less smart at most and generally decent heroes overall. Or just silent, whichever is first. Silent ones tend to not have a lot going for them.

To get further into why Final Fantasy VIII is pretty bad on the Logan's Run rule, the oldest permanent party member is Quistis, who is eighteen. She looks like she's 30, honestly she does. Seifer, Irvine, and Squall all look like they are at least 20 years of age but younger than 30, while Rinoa looks less older and Zell and Selphie are the youngest-looking and acting ones overall. Yet as I have stated before, Quistis is 18, while Seifer is also 18, putting them even. Squall, Irvine, Rinoa, Zell, AND Selphie are all 17 years of age. Holy crap. And Laguna is 27, at least out of flashbacks, which is odd considering he's only ten years older than his son. It's just amazing how despite the fact that pretty much every character looks like young adults rather than teenagers, their actual ages are that of teenagers. It just simply makes little sense.

I can't name a whole lot of examples off the top of my head that completely avoid Logan's Run Rule altogether, except The 7th Saga maybe which has several different characters, all adults. But eh, it's not a cliche to get too worked up about as long as the characters actually look and act like teenagers. Man, I'm still not done ripping on Final Fantasy VIII am I?