About customization, does it have to be anout making the character in your image? Why not you becoming the character? Like RPGs old school.

I don't think anyone mentioned customising the character to imitate their real life appearance. I personally did not mean it that way, and was instead referring to adjusting the name, class, attributes, skills etc. so that the character is as close as possible to the one I want to roleplay.

In games like Diablo, one sorcerer is much like another, whereas in those like Daggerfall, you can adjust almost every aspect so that even if you're playing a character of the same class as someone else, they will not have exactly the same strengths and weaknesses.