psychopathic protagonists

[gamer]

I have been playing Saints Row lately and I've noticed besides the casual mayhem you release unto the city during the course of play your character is most definitely an insane psychopath with few if any redeeming qualities.

There's a ton of crazy shit he does during the plot of the game, this is just two examples

* In the mission where Ultor sends corporate-swat-types to kill you, he's being given the eye by a hot bartender when they burst in. With no hesitation he smacks her head into the bar, vaults over to her side whilst pushing her up onto the bar, and leaves her body up there to be riddled with bullets.

* Julius, former leader of the Saints, meets with you at a church (the old HQ? Didn't play Saints Row, X360 only unfortunately). After beating him near half to death, they're attacked by corporate-swat-types and manage to get away. Julius thinks the Boss is past his attempt to blow him up (I don't know how Boss was in a position to know this, but Julius admits it - maybe it was revealed in Saints Row, or maybe its at the end of the main plot in Saints Row 2 and I'm playing out of order) but at the end of the mission the Boss shoots him in the chest and then the head without hesitation. Yeah, he tried to kill you but ... that's harsh.

The Saints at first seemed to be concerned with eliminating gang violence and bringing peace but your character seems to make it worse and with your character now the head of the Saints he basically creates an empire that is just as bad if not worse than the other gangs.

In contrast in the GTA games while you play a character who does truly awful crimes and is pretty evil deep down your character is actually the good guy you just somehow got caught up in the craziness like in GTA IV Niko Bellic seems to be concerned with protecting his idiot cousin Roman who gets in trouble with the mafia, and so you get dragged into doing the dirty work of the Russian mafia.

Anyway what are your thoughts on evil videogame protagonists?

[Demiurgas]

Play Chronicles of a Dark Lord. It's a downloadable game with Magus Drakhen Lee, a pretty powerful (well, formerly powerful) Dark Lord who attempted to conquer the world. He's not a one dimensional villain despite being completely evil, if that makes sense. He has regret over starting wars when he comes to the grave yard of people who died in wars fighting him.

Anyway, I think antagonistic main characters are fine if they aren't one dimensional.

[Lord of the Abyss]

Anyway what are your thoughts on evil videogame protagonists?

It's often fun. Thing is, a lot of evil behavior is fun (which is why people do it), as long as you don't care about the victims and don't worry about consequences - and in a game, the "victims" are all just pixels on a screen, and you can just reload a save if you get killed. In a sense, games can simulate psychopathy in their players; a real psychopath treats real people like they are just things, while the gamer can treat in-game "people" like things because they are.

[gamer]

Anyway what are your thoughts on evil videogame protagonists?

It's often fun. Thing is, a lot of evil behavior is fun (which is why people do it), as long as you don't care about the victims and don't worry about consequences - and in a game, the "victims" are all just pixels on a screen, and you can just reload a save if you get killed. In a sense, games can simulate psychopathy in their players; a real psychopath treats real people like they are just things, while the gamer can treat in-game "people" like things because they are.

This is true its fun to do crazy stuff without consequences though in real-life I couldn't torment people even if there weren't any consequences it hurts me to see others suffer but in a videogame they aren't people just pixels so its all good. Anyway I was just noticing the protagonist for Saints Row is probably one of the most evil if not most evil videogame protagonist I've played as its almost like the developers looked at a dictionary definition of psychopath and put every trait they can find in one character. Coincidentally Saints Row is also one of my funnest games I've played so...yeah

[Grumman]

I'm replaying the same game, and had the same sort of response. There's also the Brotherhood missions which drive home that the Boss is an awful person. I've got no problem with evil video game protagonists - being evil doesn't mean you can't have friends or lines you won't cross - but the Boss's Joker-esque psychopathy does put me off.

Julius thinks the Boss is past his attempt to blow him up (I don't know how Boss was in a position to know this, but Julius admits it - maybe it was revealed in Saints Row, or maybe its at the end of the main plot in Saints Row 2 and I'm playing out of order)

Spoiler

In the leadup to that mission you have to listen to four wiretaps in the police HQ. One of them is the undercover cop chewing out Julius, starting off with something like "I said talk, not set off a goddamn bomb!"

[jollyreaper]

The best dark lord scenario I can think of is when the existing social structure is well and truly corrupt. Corrupt church, corrupt aristocrats, corrupt merchants, all taking part in a system where nasty, brutish thugs in nice clothes praise themselves for their breeding and crush the poor into dirt.

In other words, take a capitalist hellhole crapsack world and throw in a compelling revolutionary. Not a complete monster like Stalin, more like someone who believes in his mission and you can sympathize with while still not feeling kosher with his actions. Because he's threatening the whole social structure, he's Satan, Palpatine, Castro and Hitler all in one. Everyone who has it good is terrified and will fear this guy like no other. He's their boogeyman. But at the same time, you can see why people flock to his banner.

I find pure monsters to be the most boring of characters because there's no complexity. He's insane. I get that. Or he's not insane but just an amoral fuck. Whooptie do. Someone like Vic from the Shield has complexity. He's a dirty cop and crossed the moral event horizon in the very first episode but you're left watching him for seven seasons rooting for and against him in turns. I don't know how they made that work but they did.