The Silent Protagonist. The Brave Heroine. The Sarcastic Anti-hero. The Regular Guy. All of these stereotypes have been portrayed in most video games. These characters are the good guys; whether you're Mario, stomping Goomba's to save Princess Peach, Nathan Drake cracking one-liners and jumping cliffs, or Ethan Mars, a normal dude who just wants to save his kid. These games are great, and being a hero is great; everyone likes the feeling of doing something noble and brave. I love the heroes that have graced my gaming life, and I can't imagine a world without them.
There are times though, when I just want to be bad; not the kinky kind of bad either. I mean the 'get in a car in GTA IV and mow down pedestrians until I have a six star rating,' kind of bad. While this is satisfying for the moment, it's got me thinking. Why aren't there more games with the player playing as a villain? Not an anti-hero such as Kratos or John Marston. I don't mean some sort of karma bar either, like in inFamous or Fallout. A full blown dastardly, malicious, evil, twisted, sick bad guy. I think there are definitely some difficulties with creating this experience, but if it could be pulled off, it'd be one hell of an interesting outcome.
The issues I see with this are probably the same as the issues anyone sees with this. If a game puts the player in the shoes of a terrible person, then a lot of controversy will surround the actions the player performs while they're this person; which makes sense. Imagine Far Cry 3, but instead of being Jason Brody, you're Vaas: possibly one of the most villainous characters to emerge this year. Slave trader, psychopath, murder; all of these words describe who and what Vaas is. Some of the crimes that Vaas commits are extremely brutal: outright murder, burning people alive, and even torture. But, really, is it any different from being Jason Brody? I mean, I, as Jason, spent countless hours killing people in Far Cry 3. Yes, they were pirates and slave traders and probably deserved to die. But killing people is killing people. And yes, at first I was doing it to save my friends. The thought of being inside of Vaas' mind though, absolutely fascinates me. I think that is one of the big draws, for me at least, to play as a truly twisted villain. It's hard to compare this idea of being a true villain to Far Cry 3 because that was one of the games main themes. The player was supposed to question whether or not what they were doing was wrong or right, justifiable or unwarranted, real or fake; part of what made the game so great.
Another huge, unavoidable issue with being a villain is obvious. The villain, almost always, dies. Very rarely does the villain ever succeed and plunge the world into darkness. The hero wins, rescues the damsel, and conquers evil. I think that this is okay though, for some games. In games like Red Dead Redemption though, I can't imagine it ending without John Marston dying, even though I tried frantically to keep him alive. When Red Dead ended though, I didn't feel as though evil prevailed. I felt that my anti-hero had lost and that neutrality had won. Which, when all is said and done, is still not an evil ending. I've always wanted a game that ended with evil prevailing over good. Games are at their best when they conjure up strong emotions from the players, and I think it would be extremely interesting to play as a villain, or even as a hero, and have evil completely win. I'm not sure how I would feel, and to me, that's an exciting possibility.
I want games to strive for new things. Instead of using the same old recipes, mix it up; experiment. I want them to pull on my heart strings, and make me question whether what I am doing is right or wrong. I want an experience that makes me feel angry, not because it offended me, but because it did something that was inevitable and horrible. Games are beginning to push boundaries that no other medium could ever dream of reaching. I don't know whether a game will ever do what I am imagining, or if any of this even makes sense to anyone else. I can only hope that games continue to evolve and surprise gamers everywhere.
Hey gang, It’s been a whirlwind few months here at the Larian castle, attending some of the biggest awards ceremonies in our industry, and we are absolutely humbled by the recognition we’ve received from our players and our peers.
Publisher One or EIGHT and developer Team EARTH WARS will release physical standard and Deluxe editions of LOST EPIC for PlayStation 5 and Switch on August 8 in Japan, the companies announced.
Golf With Your Friends gets better again, with the introduction of a Critical Hit DLC pack and the launch of Speed Golf.
I hear you completely, good sir and you are spot-on. I long for more games in which we no longer play the hero. Some games would have been a lot more interesting if we had embodied the villain.
Depend on who you ask, you've played the villain in plenty of games, and still can.
1. Shadow of the Colossus you played a person who went through great lengths to reawaken and unleash an ancient and terrible evil upon the land. It was obvious in the end he was warned not to do what he did by the heroes. The heroes did not stop him per se, what he unleashed betrayed and overpowered him.
2. In any war where a group invades a country, unprovoked by the natives of that land that invader is the bad guy. CoD and games like that concerning the recent ME conflicts, you're the bad guy in those games from the perspective of the native inhabitants. The insurgents are bad guys as well, but as many documentaries shown no one in those countries asked for anyone's help.
3. Any cop game where you don't follow procedure, guess what? :D A crime is a crime. Criminals are merely citizens who do not follow civilian procedure the law, if you follow me.
4. The ISA are Uber villains in that not only did they kick the original inhabitants off of Vekta, but then they decimated them later on on their other homeworld.
5. In every Metal Gear game you played the bad guy. Liquid, Vamp, and those guys are the heroes.
6. Kratos was probably the worst villain you've played: he didn't go straight, he went rogue. He didn't do anything for the good of anyone except for the tail-end of GoW III.
7. Haze and Lair you played bad guys for half of the game.
8. Rapelay you play a pervert.
9. In every Twisted Metal game you played the bad guy. Everyone was self-centered except for Thumper in the first Twisted Metal and maybe Outlaw and Axel in TM2. Thumper wanted to end violence in LA, Outlaw wanted to rescue the first Outlaw, and Axel wanted to find out why his father put him in that contraption. The rest of them were thoroughly evil if memory recalls.
10. Gears of War you play the bad guys because the Locust were there first; the C.O.G. invaded their planet, not the other way around.
There are already loads of games where you play as a bad guy or can choose to play as a bad guy - The Darkness, Wario, Dawn of War, GOW. You mention that you want to be in the head of a true nutcase like Vaas but apart from a voice over how is that different from playing a villain in Fallout or Infamous ?
In fact in a lot of games you can be interpreted as being the bad guy, its just a matter of perspective where the game paints you as the good guy.
Its all in the perpective - Im pretty sure the Nazi's didnt think of themselves as evil genocidal assholes.
...have you played SpecOps:TheLine?
Thanks for the spoiler for red dead redemption. Hadn't gotten that game yet but I plan to. Would've appreciated some warning.