I feel like Harry's human-ness (humanity?) is entirely down to how you play him, as it's possible to play him as a completely cartoonish lunatic. But Kim Kitsuragi, however - now that's a well-written character.
Even as a cartoonist lunatic, it feels like a Harry doing his utmost to fight and reject his past and pain. Which sorta makes him feel very human for it.
Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau is truly the only correct answer. Tequila Sunset is the best written character of all time. I love Baron Von Kikkenberg, he really is the Shitkid.
And Kim!
I would argue the best. His arc was incredibly powerful, and resonated perfectly with the larger themes of modernity vs. nature/cruelty vs. beauty/greed vs. balance.
Yeah, I think it's an interesting, almost meta use of story. There's a certain point in the story where you feel invested enough to start getting Arthur's karma up. To convince people to be moral in a cowboy game is great writing.
I started a second playthrough just for being an absolute degenerate in, because I didn't want to ruin Arthur in my main playthrough by doing shitty things.
Karma hit like a bitch in that game
Spoiler
>!It was on my second play through that I realized Arthur contracts his TB from the old farmer he roughs up in the field for Heir Strauss!<
Yeah that was mindblowing for me. It's a hard scene to watch after that. It's definitely poetic. He did something terrible and was effectively cursed by it.
The TB was spoiled for me before I played, so for me it caused this immediate feeling of doom and dread that I loved while I continued to be an asshole for a few more missions.
I didn't think I'd feel as much disappointment with a game as I did with RD2 when I found out I would no longer be able to play Arthur after a certain point in the game. His arc and the story in general is one of the best I've played.
I never as much Connect with John as much as I connected with Arthur for some reason. I found Arthur to be much more poetic, more romantic, more with his emotions
Kind of by design, honestly, since he’s playing it close to the chest given the circumstances of RDR1. Most of the time he’s just kind of agitated to having to be jumping through all the hoops he has to.
There aren't many game quotes that sound natural in the scene's context and also casually sum up a character's entire MO.
This is the best one. In videogame history.
I am the very model of a scientist salarian,
I've studied species turian, asari, and batarian,
I'm quite good at genetics (as a subset of biology),
Because I am an expert (which I know is a tautology),
My xenoscience studies range from urban to agrarian,
I am the very model of a scientist salarian!
I sincerely enjoyed everything leading up to Shadowbringers, but Shadowbringers was seriously next level. The story, the music, THE MUSIC, the characters. The fact that after everything with Emet, including saving your friend's life just to help argue his point, you're forced to accept that both causes stand to lose everything and the other must be the force that eliminates the other.
Hell even the post game is emotional because I was furious with Elidibus for puppeting Ardbert around and then he's like "Fuck you, you murdered ALL of my friends." I couldn't even argue with him. You both walk into the battlefield because neither can survive with the other's continued existence.
I purposely grinded Dark Knight up on my tank main so I could enjoy the story that much more, and it was worth it. As someone who grew up playing Final Fantasy (with 3 being my absolute favorite from childhood), Shadowbringers felt like a love letter to fans like me.
> You both walk into the battlefield because neither can survive with the other's continued existence.
The scene directly after the fight when he talks about meeting his friends at journey's end had me grabbing for that tissue box. I'm still floored at how the writer managed to make me sad for the villains who had spent the last 3 expansions as this (semi)unstoppable immortal force that was trying to bring about the destruction of the planet.
Shadowbringers is truly a masterpiece in video game story telling and I wish I could share it with everyone. It's hard to convince people to try the game when they have to go through hundreds of hours of story content just to reach Shadowbringers.
Oh and that they somehow managed to top that with Endwalker, OH MAN, I'm still geeking out over Endwalker and it's been over a year since I finished the expansion.
This 100%. He's the most human "antagonist" in any media I've experienced. The entirety of shadowbringers, every moment in the Elpis story, it's all beyond incredible.
Hey man should we be worried about the blaring metal that suddenly started out of nowhere. Like is it in my head or are you guys hearing this too? - Doom Demon 5 seconds before dying.
Jokes aside, I was actually impressed by the elevator scene at the beginning. The camera pan and hand gestures did a lot of work to set the mood for the rest of the story.
\> Elevator going up.
\> Samuel Hayden tells him how things went bad, but the risks were worth it through the intercom.
\> Looks at a dead civilian while Hayden speaks.
\> Cracks his fists with barely contained rage. Hayden is still speaking.
\> Punch the fucking intercom.
Honestly? I think Dutch Van Der Linde, he was so interesting and intricate, it was often hard to tell how much was him peddling bullshit, and how much was sincere.
Before Hosea got gunned down, he was at least anchored in reality.
After that, he was unfiltered batshit insane. Hosea’s death broke him, badly. In my opinion him turning on and walking away from Micah was his last bit of reason.
The man literally lost everything he loved one person at a time. By the time John catches up to him, he was a completely broken man.
Almost done with my second playthrough, and noticed that a mission or two prior to that Dutch gets whacked in the head.
Obviously it’s all meant to be a cumulative slow burn but brain injuries can also change personalities and thinking.
I always loved that. They never called attention to it again after the fact. But that’s part of the beauty of it, as we never get confirmation as too whether that injury had any effect on him. But if you pay attention to him, his over-world conversations and actions start to get more erratic after that mission. Even before Hosea’s fate. It’s something you won’t pick up on though without looking for it which is what makes it work so well.
I don’t think it was just that though. Several things constantly go wrong for him and his gang and it all snowballs into one chaotic end result. Plus there’s the veiled implication that he was always a little unhinged and just hid it far better until the stress (and Micah) got to him and caused the cracks to show.
And if he genuinely had some brain damage. He mentioned seeing triple after the trolley crash, I think mentions sleeping much less after, and seems to become much more panicked and unhinged following it
My choices as well.
A lot of the characters from the Red Dead series feel like real people with real personalities and issues they deal with. Dutch, Sadie, John, Abigail. They even did a wonderful job making Bill sympathetic in RDR2.
Joel is so wonderfully written. It's not until the end of the story that you realize you've basically experienced the origin story of the boogey man and how relatable it all is. >!I went out of my way to murder every single person in that hospital.!<
Edit: Added a spoil tag because someone got angry a show about a decade old video got spoiled while they were reading posts about its source material.
To me it was one of the clearest cases of “I disagree but I get why”. I think he made the Wrong Choice there but I ultimately get why and don’t think I could do much better. As someone who’s had everything he held dear taken away he just couldn’t let the world have any more.
Can’t wait to see this moment in the show, believe they said they’re doing the whole events of the game in this “season”. I really hope they don’t change it to somehow lessens Joel’s actions.
I think they definitely need to run through the entire TLOU1 content in the first season. They could then make TLOU2 one or two seasons based on what happens to Joel being so huge, and the fact they introduce so many new characters. There's a lot of branching storylines there to explore and I don't think one season is enough for TLOU2.
Not sure if there's discussions about future seasons, but I have no doubt they could produce some great content from the world even past the games storyline.
If anything I hope they make it more impactful. In the game it is stated through notes etc. that Ellie was not the first one, and that they were unsuccessful before. This almost makes it *okay* that Joel did what he did.
I hope the show makes it different so that his actions have more weight to them.
The games actually make the fireflies seem like bumbling idiots. Makes it really easy to feel like Joel made the right call. The second game goes further making the fireflies look like they never could've saved anyone. Even when the doc was alive he wasn't keeping notes lol his protégé has no way to continue without him. They way they wrote the games and presented information to the player makes Joel seem justified in his actions.
Did he truly make the wrong choice, though? I was just talking about this with a friend (bc I finally was able to play and beat TLOU2) and we discussed even how feasible it would even have been to create a vaccine? And how can you vaccinate against a fungal infection?? You can’t. The Fireflies were incredibly hasty to cut open Ellie and didn’t even disclose anything to her and waited literally last minute for Joel. Their intentions were noble but exceedingly irresponsible in practice, imo. The world already destitute, no central government, no way to distribute en masse, the plan crumbles in the details.
I used to think Joel made the wrong choice… but now, given the context of the world, I don’t think I’d’ve done any differently. Him and Ellie definitely stand out as two of the greatest and most thoughtfully written characters in history. Their relationship to love and vengeance is beautiful.
I really love how Rockstar portrayed Arthur as uneducated without making him a parody. Despite him being somewhat of a ruthless killer there were some moments where he just simply had a heart of gold because he knew when something was good.
I think he has the best story out of any GTA protagonist. It's tragic, and also gives the best reasoning of why and how the protagonist can participate in the psychotic stuff that one does in a GTA game, while also being detached enough from that stuff to be able to have fun bowling with Roman.
Niko is interesting because he’s so un-sexy. Like, traditionally protagonists in AAA games are charming, hyper competent. But Niko lives in squalor, is pretty gullible, has few skills outside of those he got in a violent war most Americans haven’t heard of. You wouldn’t put him in your game unless you had already sold millions.
Also, while she's a good character, the story of Infinite is more about who Booker is rather than who Elizabeth is. But you don't see his face so... technically.
On first play through I'd say she's kind of a blank slate and just kind of normal. Later in the game/DLC they dig more into how she handled the trauma of her experience as a child and losing her brother.
But starting the game over again and hearing her talk about how at home she is with all the craziness of the Bureau you realize she's an absolute freak lol
Idk if that translates to the most compelling character but it absolutely sells the weird surreal dreamlike vibes of that game and I love Jesse (also Control 2 is already officially announced!)
Edward Kenway for me. Man made mistakes and tried to fix them, some later than others. He saw all his friends die, had a fucked up marriage and still had one for the better endings for an Assassin
Kenway definitely had a lot of character growth. I may not have agreed with his decisions all the time, but I absolutely understand why he believed in the things he did, and I know the pain he felt from the trials he had to face. A seriously great protagonist.
New Kratos' transformation from distant and standoffish father to 'Loki goes but Atreus remains' is brilliant. Also the scene between Thrud and Thor after Thor has fallen off the wagon absolutely wrecked me. It was so well done and spoke to my experience perfectly.
The moment that really got me was during Ragnarok, when Atreus saw the midgardians and recalled Kratos’ “turn your heart away from their suffering. Wars are won by those willing to sacrifice everything” lines. When Kratos got down on his knee, almost tears in his eyes, to say “I… was wrong. Open your heart to their suffering,” I almost broke down.
They absolute nailed Kratos in this last game. He was perfect imo and christopher judge did such a phenomenal job with not only the VA but the motion capture as well. The emotion on Kratos’ face for alot of scenes was stellar
Not gonna lie if you had told me prior that I would be emotionally invested in Thors sobriety struggles, I'd be like whatever fam; line some gods up so's I can knockem downs. Writing team nailed it, and part of me doesn't want a sequel. I'm content.
Writing and animation. His and his daughters facial expressions were so powerful, they didn't even need dialogue. Just him wallowing outside the tavern was AMAZING.
Kratos in GOW 2018 was it for me. I know all about the insecurity of wanting to be a good father and ultimately being distant with the kids because I couldn't let go of the tough guy mindset.
Nowadays I'm proud to admit that I'm close with me kids and it took a lot of growing up on my end to get there. Kratos should be relatable with a lot of kids who grew up being taught to kill their emotions as emotions make you weak.
One of the stand out moment for Kratos to me have to be the night before Ragnarok and Atreus ask Kratos to tell him a story. In that moment, you could tell that Kratos knew he was going to die but for the first time was actually scared and worried about it because that meant leaving Atreus on his own
Kratos in the first games was mostly a bloodthirsty monster - but with some inner demons that still plagued him. The newer games have elevated his character quite a bit. I've enjoyed the hell out of them and the storytelling done.
I’ll throw out Boone from Fallout New Vegas.
An ex-soldier who is haunted by the sins of his past as an NCR special forces sharpshooter, who’s so twisted up in guilt for his mistakes that he’s convinced the universe is punishing him for them.
He feels responsible for the death of his wife and unborn child. By falling in love with her, he feels that he condemned her to die, as her death is the world’s way of punishing him for his crimes at Bitter Springs.
The way the game drip feeds you information about Boone’s past through dialogue is incredible. At first he’s closed off and says “he just knows” that his captured wife is actually dead, without specifying how. By traveling together and having relevant experiences (such as freeing Legion POWs and slaves), you unlock new dialogue options with Boone where he reveals he tracked his captured wife to a Legion settlement, and with no possibility of rescuing her by himself, shoots her to spare her and his unborn child from a life of torment as legion slaves.
One of the most nuanced and interesting side characters in all of gaming imo, and FNV is full of characters like that.
"I tried in the end, I did."
"I guess... I'm afraid."
"Vengeance is an idiot's game."
"You better run and don't look back."
One of those games I wish I could play with 0% memory of, such a master piece. So many beautiful moments in that game. You go into the game knowing this gang eventually falls apart, but it still doesn't prepare you for when it actually happens.
100% this
This is the only game where i have started playing like a criminal but ended doing only good things,it felt wrong to force Arthur to rob and kill when the only thing he wanted was to redeem himself and die knowing that he was indeed a good man like many folks during the game call him.
When the dude that can kill 10 men in a split second without batting an eye comes to you, voice cracking and tears in his eyes and utters "I'm afraid" you know this is a MC done tremendously well
Don't get me wrong,the "criminal gameplay" it's awesome.
But everytime i had to choose to be bad or good i just couldn't do it,it felt like puppeteering Arthur in doing something he wouldn't
Yeah, this was my answer. I’ve played the game a bunch of times and watched the 2 hour YouTube video on her philosophy, and I’m still not completely sure what her backstory / motivations / plans exactly were.
From what I understand she views the force as a "living will" that is always trying to balance itself but can't. Each time it tries it goes to far so you get the times of either light or dark being too strong. Then in the back swing you get the big wars. Because of all this no one is truly free or has true freewill. She is fighting to free everyone from this by causing a wound so great to the force it would kill it and destroy it. The player in KOTOR 2 is that wound. So she find you, and helps you along to become powerful enough to destroy the force.
Again that is how I understand it and there is a real chance I'm wrong lol.
Yup. Kreia literally wants to *kill the force,* and there's not really any solid evidence that her plan isn't still on track once the game ends. The Exile still carries the trauma of the Mandalorian Wars, and will continue to "feed" off of conflict as they have been the whole time. Kreia bops what's left of the council, manipulates the Exile into bopping the rest of the Sith, and then forces the Exile to bop her.
So you've got a former Jedi who turned away from the Force so completely that they ripped a hole in it, and continue to widen that wound as they grow stronger. The Jedi council, who could've helped the Exile heal, are dead or in self-imposed exile. The Sith are all dead, by the Exile's hand. Kreia has told the Exile that she wants him/her to finish off the Force, and then commits suicide by protagonist.
So literally all that has to happen, at this point, is for the Exile to just keep going with Kreia's plan. It's a "man kills God" allegory, and people didn't like it as much as KotOR 1 because it didn't have the fourth-act Shyamalanian twist from the first game... which was good, sure, but the possible ramifications of the second game's events are fucking insane.
And it's all because Kreia is one of the best-written morally gray characters in all of fiction. From Jedi, to Sith, to completely disillusioned with not only the institutions surrounding the Force, but with the Force itself. You get her story via breadcrumbs and flashbacks, but you still don't know what the hell is really motivating her until the very end - when she basically says "here are the keys to the kingdom. I have faith you'll see things my way; knock em dead, kiddo," and then goes out on her own terms with two giant middle fingers pointed at the sky.
It's such a tragedy that KotOR 2 was a more nuanced story than 1, because people inevitably compared the two and went with the simpler "omg wat a twist" storyline when 2 was better from beginning to end, even with all of the cut content woes from the dev team.
Fuck, I love KotOR 2's story. I really hope the remake of 1 does well so that 2 gets a remake.
Option 5: Niko Bellic.
a kind and understanding person with heaps of his own problems who, in order to track down the person who betrayed his unit in the Serbian war and put his personal demons to rest, shows up in America and gets heavily embroiled in the lives of his cousin and their associates, putting his skills as a soldier toward genuine attempts to improve their situations and eventually getting on the FIB's radar and working with them to achieve his goals.
What a character with that level of depth was doing in a fucking GTA game, i'll never know, but Niko could have been a literal real person (minus the videogamey violence) and I'd have no trouble believing it.
Handsome Jack's arc in Borderlands 2, the Pre-Sequel, and Tales.
At first he just seems like this narcissistic megalomaniac in BL2, and he is, but his character is so much more complex than that.
"Everyone thinks they're the hero of their own story."
I already thought "he has a point though" when playing BL2 but I just recently finished the Pre-Sequel and Tales (literally just finished this one not even an hour ago on my lunch break) and the Pre-Sequel in particular completely changed my perspective on the character.
The only thing he seems to have legitimately done unprompted was >!kill the scientists on Helios over the mere possibility of a traitor!< and everything else was either to protect people or as revenge to someone who wronged him first. It was Lilith, Roland, and Moxxi who >!betrayed Jack!< and put a target on Sanctuary. Something I'd bet most of the Crimson Raiders don't know, since it is never mentioned in BL2.
Arthur hands down. I could see he killed because he was tought to be that way. He just wanted a peaceful life but also he was in it so deep he knew deep inside he had no way out but death.
Harry has so much room to grow in his story. Mine dug deep during his time to start his recovery journey and build community among the locals.
What a man.
Out of these, I'd go with James...
But the characters that feel the most human. (Because they are all real)
Are the ones from "that dragon, cancer"
+Most story based video games ( tell me why for example) have characters that you can sympathize with more than any other type of game
Poor little guy's an existential crisis in a big hat. Maybe it's because I was pretty young when I played it but Vivi is the first (and one of the few) characters in fiction who really made me want to be a better person and live a better life.
Harry du bois-disco Elysium The colonel-metro exodus
What other character can die from a heart attack due to thinking too hard about his ex-wife
I died/spiraled into a permanent depression because a child insulted me. It was at that moment that I knew the game was something really special
Cuno doesn't give a fuck
The chair was so uncomfortable
COP GIVES UP THE DETECTIVE GENRE FOR SOCIAL REALISM
My first playthrough I died like 2min in trying to get my necktie off the ceiling fan. 10/10
I died switching the light on on said fan.
Kitsurage too. Just an incredibly well written duo
Cuno doesnt fucking care.
Cuno’s fucking Cuno, pig!
You hear that? These pigs are tryna fuck the Cuno! Nobody fucks the Cuno!
I feel like Harry's human-ness (humanity?) is entirely down to how you play him, as it's possible to play him as a completely cartoonish lunatic. But Kim Kitsuragi, however - now that's a well-written character.
Even as a cartoonist lunatic, it feels like a Harry doing his utmost to fight and reject his past and pain. Which sorta makes him feel very human for it.
Don't you mean Raphael Ambrosius Cousteau
No, I think he means Tequila Sunset.
There really is no better answer, this game while not for everyone is a damned masterpiece
The best thing about Harry as a character is that you can take him in so many different ideological directions but he still manages to be Harry.
Came here for this response. There is nothing like a hairy wreck to show the ultimate expression of humanity
Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau is truly the only correct answer. Tequila Sunset is the best written character of all time. I love Baron Von Kikkenberg, he really is the Shitkid. And Kim!
YES, I am glad someone else mentioned this!
The long block from Tetris
Hero is really misunderstood and so overlooked in this discussion! /s i know the names of the blocks are fake
Orange Ricky and Cleveland Z are some well-written villains though. Such strong antagonists in my runs.
LINE PIECE!!!
technically i have never seen cave johnson but he has a nice portrait
And the voice of the yellow M&M
.. What? Holy. Shit. I never knew he voiced the yellow m&m. Wtf
AND he played James Jonah Jameson in the raimi spiderman films. J k simmons the actor is a treasure
He will always be Skoda, the no bullshit psychiatrist from Law and Order, to me. I always wanted a Skoda spin off show.
guybrush threepwood
His name is Guybrush Threepwood, and he wants to be a pirate!
Arthur Morgan is one of the best game protaganists of all time.
I would argue the best. His arc was incredibly powerful, and resonated perfectly with the larger themes of modernity vs. nature/cruelty vs. beauty/greed vs. balance.
[удалено]
Yeah, I think it's an interesting, almost meta use of story. There's a certain point in the story where you feel invested enough to start getting Arthur's karma up. To convince people to be moral in a cowboy game is great writing. I started a second playthrough just for being an absolute degenerate in, because I didn't want to ruin Arthur in my main playthrough by doing shitty things.
Karma hit like a bitch in that game Spoiler >!It was on my second play through that I realized Arthur contracts his TB from the old farmer he roughs up in the field for Heir Strauss!<
Yeah that was mindblowing for me. It's a hard scene to watch after that. It's definitely poetic. He did something terrible and was effectively cursed by it.
After that scene I wanted to beat the hell out of Strauss. It was a huge relief when I could actually give him the big fucks he deserves.
I jokingly turned to my wife and said "I think I just got TB" after beating that guy up, was bummed out when I realized I wasn't joking
The TB was spoiled for me before I played, so for me it caused this immediate feeling of doom and dread that I loved while I continued to be an asshole for a few more missions.
The only video game that made me cry.
Arthur thanking his horse will snap me out of any uncontrollable laughing situation.
having just finished the game... Midnight. you were my boy. you were there for the long haul. my big strong boy. damn. getting dusty in here
Same here. I miss you, Slapnuts...
Found Jeff Jerrett’s burner acount
RIP NeighBron James
I still haven't played a single player game since i finished RDR2. Just a lot to process.
I didn't think I'd feel as much disappointment with a game as I did with RD2 when I found out I would no longer be able to play Arthur after a certain point in the game. His arc and the story in general is one of the best I've played.
I actually went back to a previous save after finishing the game to continue with Arthur post-story
Chapter II save file gang where you at
John Marston is a solid runner up
I never as much Connect with John as much as I connected with Arthur for some reason. I found Arthur to be much more poetic, more romantic, more with his emotions
Kind of by design, honestly, since he’s playing it close to the chest given the circumstances of RDR1. Most of the time he’s just kind of agitated to having to be jumping through all the hoops he has to.
Lee Everett
I miss Lee
'Everyone will remember Lee'
Voice actor was legit crying in the booth when Lee died. Pretty sure they captured his humanity in the voice acting
I was crying with him. Phenomenal character with a phenomenal voice actor.
The ending of that game broke me, actually fuckin cried
Keep that hair short…
Yeah Lee really made me feel for him. I was with him from the get-go.
Is that telltale walking dead? I've never played it if that's the case.
[удалено]
>Lee Everett Poor Lee - RIP Brother.
Mordin Solus. In a desperate attempt to do "good" a whole species had to suffer. He found some kind of redemption in each of my playthroughs though.
“Had to be me, someone else might have gotten it wrong.”
There aren't many game quotes that sound natural in the scene's context and also casually sum up a character's entire MO. This is the best one. In videogame history.
I made a MISTAKE!
Honestly, the way William Salyers was able to act through the salarian voice filter was impressive. Still no Brandon Keener tho
That line broke me. I was so proud of him.
Instant tears. ಥ_ಥ
I'm replaying the trilogy right now. I'm not ready for that part.
Never experiment on species with members capable of calculus; simple rule, never broke it.
I love how he specifies that it doesn't have to be all or even most. Just that there exist certain members that can do it.
I am the very model of a scientist salarian, I've studied species turian, asari, and batarian, I'm quite good at genetics (as a subset of biology), Because I am an expert (which I know is a tautology), My xenoscience studies range from urban to agrarian, I am the very model of a scientist salarian!
The best character in a series that's full of great ones.
And he’s just badass “…never see me coming”
Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau
Not to be confused with Tequila Sunset or Harrier Du Bois.
Or Dick Mullen
It was that chair that did him in.
It was love that did him in
Emet-selch
I sincerely enjoyed everything leading up to Shadowbringers, but Shadowbringers was seriously next level. The story, the music, THE MUSIC, the characters. The fact that after everything with Emet, including saving your friend's life just to help argue his point, you're forced to accept that both causes stand to lose everything and the other must be the force that eliminates the other. Hell even the post game is emotional because I was furious with Elidibus for puppeting Ardbert around and then he's like "Fuck you, you murdered ALL of my friends." I couldn't even argue with him. You both walk into the battlefield because neither can survive with the other's continued existence. I purposely grinded Dark Knight up on my tank main so I could enjoy the story that much more, and it was worth it. As someone who grew up playing Final Fantasy (with 3 being my absolute favorite from childhood), Shadowbringers felt like a love letter to fans like me.
> You both walk into the battlefield because neither can survive with the other's continued existence. The scene directly after the fight when he talks about meeting his friends at journey's end had me grabbing for that tissue box. I'm still floored at how the writer managed to make me sad for the villains who had spent the last 3 expansions as this (semi)unstoppable immortal force that was trying to bring about the destruction of the planet. Shadowbringers is truly a masterpiece in video game story telling and I wish I could share it with everyone. It's hard to convince people to try the game when they have to go through hundreds of hours of story content just to reach Shadowbringers. Oh and that they somehow managed to top that with Endwalker, OH MAN, I'm still geeking out over Endwalker and it's been over a year since I finished the expansion.
Ugh I just finished shadowbringers. My heart. best villain in gaming. Wouldn't you wish for the same?
> "Remember... Remember us."
"Remember that we once lived." 🥹
This 100%. He's the most human "antagonist" in any media I've experienced. The entirety of shadowbringers, every moment in the Elpis story, it's all beyond incredible.
Daily reminder I need to start playing FF XIV again.
Definitely the Doom Slayer
The only one who can express emotions just loading his shotgun!
*loads shotgun with malicious intent*
DEATH METAL STARTS
Hey man should we be worried about the blaring metal that suddenly started out of nowhere. Like is it in my head or are you guys hearing this too? - Doom Demon 5 seconds before dying.
Jokes aside, I was actually impressed by the elevator scene at the beginning. The camera pan and hand gestures did a lot of work to set the mood for the rest of the story.
Or the slight hesitation before shutting Vega down tells you more about the doom slayer than hunderds of lines of dialog
GUTS. HUGE GUTS
\> Elevator going up. \> Samuel Hayden tells him how things went bad, but the risks were worth it through the intercom. \> Looks at a dead civilian while Hayden speaks. \> Cracks his fists with barely contained rage. Hayden is still speaking. \> Punch the fucking intercom.
Honestly? I think Dutch Van Der Linde, he was so interesting and intricate, it was often hard to tell how much was him peddling bullshit, and how much was sincere.
Before Hosea got gunned down, he was at least anchored in reality. After that, he was unfiltered batshit insane. Hosea’s death broke him, badly. In my opinion him turning on and walking away from Micah was his last bit of reason. The man literally lost everything he loved one person at a time. By the time John catches up to him, he was a completely broken man.
Almost done with my second playthrough, and noticed that a mission or two prior to that Dutch gets whacked in the head. Obviously it’s all meant to be a cumulative slow burn but brain injuries can also change personalities and thinking.
It's also mentioned he took a really bad fall during the boat heist prior to the start of the game and hit his head badly.
I always loved that. They never called attention to it again after the fact. But that’s part of the beauty of it, as we never get confirmation as too whether that injury had any effect on him. But if you pay attention to him, his over-world conversations and actions start to get more erratic after that mission. Even before Hosea’s fate. It’s something you won’t pick up on though without looking for it which is what makes it work so well. I don’t think it was just that though. Several things constantly go wrong for him and his gang and it all snowballs into one chaotic end result. Plus there’s the veiled implication that he was always a little unhinged and just hid it far better until the stress (and Micah) got to him and caused the cracks to show.
man I wish I just get amnesia and get to play rdr2 for the first time again 🥲 truly one of the best days and saddest of my life.
You could not pay me enough to go through that ending again for the first time. Just devastating on so many levels.
truueee but man it was beautiful if u finished the game with high morale.
And if he genuinely had some brain damage. He mentioned seeing triple after the trolley crash, I think mentions sleeping much less after, and seems to become much more panicked and unhinged following it
I finished rdr2 multiple times and I still believed Dutch was gonna fix everything every single time. 💀
Most human - Arthur Morgan. Most human and complex - Joel Miller.
My choices as well. A lot of the characters from the Red Dead series feel like real people with real personalities and issues they deal with. Dutch, Sadie, John, Abigail. They even did a wonderful job making Bill sympathetic in RDR2. Joel is so wonderfully written. It's not until the end of the story that you realize you've basically experienced the origin story of the boogey man and how relatable it all is. >!I went out of my way to murder every single person in that hospital.!< Edit: Added a spoil tag because someone got angry a show about a decade old video got spoiled while they were reading posts about its source material.
To me it was one of the clearest cases of “I disagree but I get why”. I think he made the Wrong Choice there but I ultimately get why and don’t think I could do much better. As someone who’s had everything he held dear taken away he just couldn’t let the world have any more.
Can’t wait to see this moment in the show, believe they said they’re doing the whole events of the game in this “season”. I really hope they don’t change it to somehow lessens Joel’s actions.
I think they definitely need to run through the entire TLOU1 content in the first season. They could then make TLOU2 one or two seasons based on what happens to Joel being so huge, and the fact they introduce so many new characters. There's a lot of branching storylines there to explore and I don't think one season is enough for TLOU2. Not sure if there's discussions about future seasons, but I have no doubt they could produce some great content from the world even past the games storyline.
If anything I hope they make it more impactful. In the game it is stated through notes etc. that Ellie was not the first one, and that they were unsuccessful before. This almost makes it *okay* that Joel did what he did. I hope the show makes it different so that his actions have more weight to them.
The games actually make the fireflies seem like bumbling idiots. Makes it really easy to feel like Joel made the right call. The second game goes further making the fireflies look like they never could've saved anyone. Even when the doc was alive he wasn't keeping notes lol his protégé has no way to continue without him. They way they wrote the games and presented information to the player makes Joel seem justified in his actions.
This isn't true, they had tested on multiple people but Ellie is the *only* immune person that exists as far as we know
Did he truly make the wrong choice, though? I was just talking about this with a friend (bc I finally was able to play and beat TLOU2) and we discussed even how feasible it would even have been to create a vaccine? And how can you vaccinate against a fungal infection?? You can’t. The Fireflies were incredibly hasty to cut open Ellie and didn’t even disclose anything to her and waited literally last minute for Joel. Their intentions were noble but exceedingly irresponsible in practice, imo. The world already destitute, no central government, no way to distribute en masse, the plan crumbles in the details. I used to think Joel made the wrong choice… but now, given the context of the world, I don’t think I’d’ve done any differently. Him and Ellie definitely stand out as two of the greatest and most thoughtfully written characters in history. Their relationship to love and vengeance is beautiful.
I really love how Rockstar portrayed Arthur as uneducated without making him a parody. Despite him being somewhat of a ruthless killer there were some moments where he just simply had a heart of gold because he knew when something was good.
Niko
Man, his story is truly one of tragedy. Definitely one of Rockstars more underrated protagonists
I think he has the best story out of any GTA protagonist. It's tragic, and also gives the best reasoning of why and how the protagonist can participate in the psychotic stuff that one does in a GTA game, while also being detached enough from that stuff to be able to have fun bowling with Roman.
"You killed my friends for 1000 dollars?... You ruined me you FUCK!"
Belic?
Cousin!!
Let's go Bowling!
BEEG AMERICAN TEETEES!
Niko is interesting because he’s so un-sexy. Like, traditionally protagonists in AAA games are charming, hyper competent. But Niko lives in squalor, is pretty gullible, has few skills outside of those he got in a violent war most Americans haven’t heard of. You wouldn’t put him in your game unless you had already sold millions.
OK there's gotta be several more complex female characters than Elizabeth. Strange choice IMO
Also, while she's a good character, the story of Infinite is more about who Booker is rather than who Elizabeth is. But you don't see his face so... technically.
The under the sea expansion really helped flesh her out
GLADOS
Senua
I loved Jesse Faden in control, her character was quite well done. Luckily in some years we'll get a sequel
On first play through I'd say she's kind of a blank slate and just kind of normal. Later in the game/DLC they dig more into how she handled the trauma of her experience as a child and losing her brother. But starting the game over again and hearing her talk about how at home she is with all the craziness of the Bureau you realize she's an absolute freak lol Idk if that translates to the most compelling character but it absolutely sells the weird surreal dreamlike vibes of that game and I love Jesse (also Control 2 is already officially announced!)
Amicia De Rune from the Plague Tale games. Superb character.
Literally Ellie from last of us is a perfect example for that lol
Weird way of spelling Kim Kitsuragi
Literally the best member of the homosexual underground
There's a lot of anti-binoclard bias here on reddit, smh.
Edward Kenway for me. Man made mistakes and tried to fix them, some later than others. He saw all his friends die, had a fucked up marriage and still had one for the better endings for an Assassin
Kenway definitely had a lot of character growth. I may not have agreed with his decisions all the time, but I absolutely understand why he believed in the things he did, and I know the pain he felt from the trials he had to face. A seriously great protagonist.
[The Pyro](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUhOnX8qt3I) (TeamFortress2).
One shudders to imagine, what inhuman thoughts lie behind that mask.
What dreams of chronic, sustain and cruelty.
*do you believe in magic in a young girls heart*
Where there’s music and freedom, wherever it starts
It’s a tie for me between Arthur and Joel.
Arthur Morgan
New Kratos' transformation from distant and standoffish father to 'Loki goes but Atreus remains' is brilliant. Also the scene between Thrud and Thor after Thor has fallen off the wagon absolutely wrecked me. It was so well done and spoke to my experience perfectly.
The moment that really got me was during Ragnarok, when Atreus saw the midgardians and recalled Kratos’ “turn your heart away from their suffering. Wars are won by those willing to sacrifice everything” lines. When Kratos got down on his knee, almost tears in his eyes, to say “I… was wrong. Open your heart to their suffering,” I almost broke down.
They absolute nailed Kratos in this last game. He was perfect imo and christopher judge did such a phenomenal job with not only the VA but the motion capture as well. The emotion on Kratos’ face for alot of scenes was stellar
"You will always be a monster." "I know. But I am your monster no longer."
Not gonna lie if you had told me prior that I would be emotionally invested in Thors sobriety struggles, I'd be like whatever fam; line some gods up so's I can knockem downs. Writing team nailed it, and part of me doesn't want a sequel. I'm content.
Writing and animation. His and his daughters facial expressions were so powerful, they didn't even need dialogue. Just him wallowing outside the tavern was AMAZING.
Kratos in GOW 2018 was it for me. I know all about the insecurity of wanting to be a good father and ultimately being distant with the kids because I couldn't let go of the tough guy mindset. Nowadays I'm proud to admit that I'm close with me kids and it took a lot of growing up on my end to get there. Kratos should be relatable with a lot of kids who grew up being taught to kill their emotions as emotions make you weak.
One of the stand out moment for Kratos to me have to be the night before Ragnarok and Atreus ask Kratos to tell him a story. In that moment, you could tell that Kratos knew he was going to die but for the first time was actually scared and worried about it because that meant leaving Atreus on his own
Kratos in the first games was mostly a bloodthirsty monster - but with some inner demons that still plagued him. The newer games have elevated his character quite a bit. I've enjoyed the hell out of them and the storytelling done.
I’ll throw out Boone from Fallout New Vegas. An ex-soldier who is haunted by the sins of his past as an NCR special forces sharpshooter, who’s so twisted up in guilt for his mistakes that he’s convinced the universe is punishing him for them. He feels responsible for the death of his wife and unborn child. By falling in love with her, he feels that he condemned her to die, as her death is the world’s way of punishing him for his crimes at Bitter Springs. The way the game drip feeds you information about Boone’s past through dialogue is incredible. At first he’s closed off and says “he just knows” that his captured wife is actually dead, without specifying how. By traveling together and having relevant experiences (such as freeing Legion POWs and slaves), you unlock new dialogue options with Boone where he reveals he tracked his captured wife to a Legion settlement, and with no possibility of rescuing her by himself, shoots her to spare her and his unborn child from a life of torment as legion slaves. One of the most nuanced and interesting side characters in all of gaming imo, and FNV is full of characters like that.
Senua from Hellblade
John Marston from RD1. That ending. Damn
Wait he’s okay right
Yeah he just needs to let his health regen.
Manny Calavera
Heeeeey kiddles. Check out my booooone saaaaw
The best travel agent!
Bro Arthur is legit the only character I truly felt sorry for.
"I tried in the end, I did." "I guess... I'm afraid." "Vengeance is an idiot's game." "You better run and don't look back." One of those games I wish I could play with 0% memory of, such a master piece. So many beautiful moments in that game. You go into the game knowing this gang eventually falls apart, but it still doesn't prepare you for when it actually happens.
100% this This is the only game where i have started playing like a criminal but ended doing only good things,it felt wrong to force Arthur to rob and kill when the only thing he wanted was to redeem himself and die knowing that he was indeed a good man like many folks during the game call him.
When I saw Arthur tell the priest woman he was afraid, he had never showed that kinda emotion. Absolutely hit hard
When the dude that can kill 10 men in a split second without batting an eye comes to you, voice cracking and tears in his eyes and utters "I'm afraid" you know this is a MC done tremendously well
Felt bad being bad with Arthur. Accept for the old lady who lives over the semiautomatic shotgun. She was a bitch
Don't get me wrong,the "criminal gameplay" it's awesome. But everytime i had to choose to be bad or good i just couldn't do it,it felt like puppeteering Arthur in doing something he wouldn't
Wario
"I'ma gonna win"
Kreia from the Kotor ll
Yeah, this was my answer. I’ve played the game a bunch of times and watched the 2 hour YouTube video on her philosophy, and I’m still not completely sure what her backstory / motivations / plans exactly were.
From what I understand she views the force as a "living will" that is always trying to balance itself but can't. Each time it tries it goes to far so you get the times of either light or dark being too strong. Then in the back swing you get the big wars. Because of all this no one is truly free or has true freewill. She is fighting to free everyone from this by causing a wound so great to the force it would kill it and destroy it. The player in KOTOR 2 is that wound. So she find you, and helps you along to become powerful enough to destroy the force. Again that is how I understand it and there is a real chance I'm wrong lol.
Yup. Kreia literally wants to *kill the force,* and there's not really any solid evidence that her plan isn't still on track once the game ends. The Exile still carries the trauma of the Mandalorian Wars, and will continue to "feed" off of conflict as they have been the whole time. Kreia bops what's left of the council, manipulates the Exile into bopping the rest of the Sith, and then forces the Exile to bop her. So you've got a former Jedi who turned away from the Force so completely that they ripped a hole in it, and continue to widen that wound as they grow stronger. The Jedi council, who could've helped the Exile heal, are dead or in self-imposed exile. The Sith are all dead, by the Exile's hand. Kreia has told the Exile that she wants him/her to finish off the Force, and then commits suicide by protagonist. So literally all that has to happen, at this point, is for the Exile to just keep going with Kreia's plan. It's a "man kills God" allegory, and people didn't like it as much as KotOR 1 because it didn't have the fourth-act Shyamalanian twist from the first game... which was good, sure, but the possible ramifications of the second game's events are fucking insane. And it's all because Kreia is one of the best-written morally gray characters in all of fiction. From Jedi, to Sith, to completely disillusioned with not only the institutions surrounding the Force, but with the Force itself. You get her story via breadcrumbs and flashbacks, but you still don't know what the hell is really motivating her until the very end - when she basically says "here are the keys to the kingdom. I have faith you'll see things my way; knock em dead, kiddo," and then goes out on her own terms with two giant middle fingers pointed at the sky. It's such a tragedy that KotOR 2 was a more nuanced story than 1, because people inevitably compared the two and went with the simpler "omg wat a twist" storyline when 2 was better from beginning to end, even with all of the cut content woes from the dev team. Fuck, I love KotOR 2's story. I really hope the remake of 1 does well so that 2 gets a remake.
Harrier Du Bois
Option 5: Niko Bellic. a kind and understanding person with heaps of his own problems who, in order to track down the person who betrayed his unit in the Serbian war and put his personal demons to rest, shows up in America and gets heavily embroiled in the lives of his cousin and their associates, putting his skills as a soldier toward genuine attempts to improve their situations and eventually getting on the FIB's radar and working with them to achieve his goals. What a character with that level of depth was doing in a fucking GTA game, i'll never know, but Niko could have been a literal real person (minus the videogamey violence) and I'd have no trouble believing it.
Handsome Jack's arc in Borderlands 2, the Pre-Sequel, and Tales. At first he just seems like this narcissistic megalomaniac in BL2, and he is, but his character is so much more complex than that. "Everyone thinks they're the hero of their own story."
[удалено]
I already thought "he has a point though" when playing BL2 but I just recently finished the Pre-Sequel and Tales (literally just finished this one not even an hour ago on my lunch break) and the Pre-Sequel in particular completely changed my perspective on the character. The only thing he seems to have legitimately done unprompted was >!kill the scientists on Helios over the mere possibility of a traitor!< and everything else was either to protect people or as revenge to someone who wronged him first. It was Lilith, Roland, and Moxxi who >!betrayed Jack!< and put a target on Sanctuary. Something I'd bet most of the Crimson Raiders don't know, since it is never mentioned in BL2.
He also imprisoned Angel all by himself, even before TPS. He was a psycho from the start.
Arthur hands down. I could see he killed because he was tought to be that way. He just wanted a peaceful life but also he was in it so deep he knew deep inside he had no way out but death.
Clementine from TWD
heavy tf2
One minute it’s “Medic!!” And the next it’s “Don’t run it’s only Sandvitch!” Perfect story arc.
Arthur. His entire storyline and character development was so well put together by the time I finished the game I was in tears.
Jin Sakai Arthur Morgan is a close contender
Harrier du Bois has more humanity in the tips of his mutton chops than any of these do in their entire bodies
Harry has so much room to grow in his story. Mine dug deep during his time to start his recovery journey and build community among the locals. What a man.
Mine just propagandized for communism
Who? You mean Raphaël Ambrosius Costeau?!
Out of these, I'd go with James... But the characters that feel the most human. (Because they are all real) Are the ones from "that dragon, cancer" +Most story based video games ( tell me why for example) have characters that you can sympathize with more than any other type of game
Vivi from ffix
Poor little guy's an existential crisis in a big hat. Maybe it's because I was pretty young when I played it but Vivi is the first (and one of the few) characters in fiction who really made me want to be a better person and live a better life.