Adventure games typically have people play as noble, selfless heroes, like Link from The Legend of Zelda series or Batman from Batman: Arkham Asylum, but there are a few adventure titles out there that actually let people play as villains.
Many of these protagonists may not seem like outright villains at first, as some may be comedic or begin paths based on well-intentioned goals, but by the end of their respective games, they have turned into complete villains, at least in the eyes of several other characters.
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Here are 10 adventure games that allow players to embody villains and sow chaos throughout numerous areas and worlds using a vast arsenal of destructive weapons and abilities.
Spoilers below.
8 Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
The Wrath of Starkiller
Most single-player Star Wars games typically have people play as heroic Jedi or starfighter pilots, but Star Wars: The Force Unleashed standouts among other SW games as it not only has people play as Darth Vader briefly but has people play as his secret apprentice Starkiller.
Set in between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, The Force Unleashed sees Starkiller dispatched to wipe out rebel militia groups and surviving Jedi across the galaxy before being manipulated by Vader to round up the Imperial Senate’s most outspoken opponents to eliminate any emerging threat to the Galactic Empire.
While Starkiller does canonically help the Rebel Alliance leaders in the end, players can choose to kill Vader in the end but wound up doomed to serve the Emperor as a new cyborg warrior called Lord Starkiller, who later goes on to kill Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and turn Luke Skywalker to the dark side.
7 Middle-earth: Shadow of War
Talion and Celebrimbor’s Fall to Darkness
Games based on The Lord of the Rings oddly do tend to feature alternate dark campaigns with Sauron defeating the armies and conquering the people of Middle-earth during the events of the books and films, but one game that allows people to play as a reluctant villain is Middle-earth: Shadow of War.
A sequel to Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, Shadow of War has players embody the possessed ranger Talion and the Elf spirit Celebrimbor once more as they forge a new Ring of Power to dominate the armies of Mordor in an effort to destroy Sauron and protect the bordering cities of Gondor.
What makes Talion a reluctant villain is that it’s eventually revealed that all of Talion’s efforts were in vain, as Celebrimbor planned to simply replace Sauron with himself as a new, dominating Bright Lord and Talion himself is eventually forced to become a Nazgul, becoming corrupted and following Sauron’s orders during the events of the books.
6 Shadow of the Colossus
The Cost of Saving One Life
One of the most famous adventure games to feature a protagonist who is eventually revealed to be a surprising villain is Fumito Ueda’s Shadow of the Colossus.
At first glance, Shadow of Colossus‘ seems like a fairly generic fantasy game with a young hero, Wander, setting out to slay 16 massive colossi in an attempt to save a fallen damsel. But as people play through the game, they quickly begin to realize that these colossi may not be as monstrous as they seem.
In the end, by the time the girl is bound to be revived, it’s eventually revealed that the colossi were peaceful creatures all along whose deaths were all part of the plan of manipulative spirit Dormin to possess Wander for his own evil machinations.
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5 Assassin’s Creed Rogue
Shay Cormac’s Templar Rise
Villains are often the heroes of their own story and one of the best games to exemplify this concept is Assassin’s Creed Rogue, which follows the young 18th century Irish Assassin Shay Cormac who betrays the brotherhood and becomes an elite member of the Templar Order.
Set primarily during the French and Indian War, Rogue begins with Cormac being an enthusiastic and aspiring member of the Colonial Brotherhood of Assassins, but as he begins to assassinate seemingly selfless Templars, he begins to have doubts about how just the Assassin cause truly is.
This culminates in a trip to Portugal where Cormac, under the orders of his Assassin leaders, inadvertently caused the 1755 Lisbon Earthquake, pushing Cormac over the edge in rebellion against the Assassin’s and leading him to join the Templars and personally hunt down the Colonial Brotherhood’s leadership.
4 God of War III
Kratos’ Pantheon Shattering Rage
Kratos is a very complex character, as, on one hand, he’s justifiably angry for how the original God of War, Ares, tricked him into killing his family and how Zeus stripped Kratos of his godly powers, but on the other hand, he can be perceived as a merciless villain with how his vengeance practically destroyed the Ancient Greek world.
This can be seen in God of War 3 with Kratos launching a war against Olympus, resulting in the deaths of numerous Gods, demigods, and Titans that satiate Kratos’ quest for vengeance but result in the world being all but destroyed after each deity is slain.
After Helios, Hermes, Hera, and Poseidon are killed, the world is flooded, plunged into darkness, ravaged by plagues, and rid of all plant life, making the Ancient Greek world an inhospitable hellscape.
3 Prototype
Alex Mercer’s Dive Into Insanity
Even when video games feature villains as protagonists, they tend to have some redeeming qualities or elements that allow players to sympathize with them a bit, but one protagonist who virtually has no redeeming qualities is Prototype‘s Alex Mercer.
Players begin Prototype with Alex Mercer as an amnesiac who has few memories of his past, but despite losing some of his memories, Mercer has no qualms about using his new shapeshifting abilities to brutally attack Blackwatch soldiers, mutated Manhattan civilians, and normal civilians as he strives to learn about his past.
However, once Mercer discovers his past as being one of the lead scientists who created the mutating Blacklight virus, he becomes resolved in enhancing the virus and using it to infect all of humanity as seen in Prototype 2, where he serves as the game’s primary antagonist.
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2 The Last of Us Part II
Two Sides of the Same Coin
Much like Kratos, the primary playable leads of The Last of Us Part II see one another as villains while they perceive themselves as righteous heroes, with those characters being Ellie and Abby.
Abby is revealed to be the daughter of the Firefly doctor Jerry Anderson, who, after her father was murdered by Joel four years prior during The Last of Us Part I, went on a crusade to hunt down and brutally murder Joel for revenge, causing Ellie to hunt down Abby and her group to avenge Joel.
Both Abby and Ellie see themselves as justified in their quest to hunt down those who wronged them, but on both of their journeys, they wound up getting relatively innocent people killed, people who likely would have lived peaceful lives if Abby and Ellie simply went on with their lives instead of dragging others on their quests of vengeance.
1 Destroy All Humans!
Crypto’s Invasion of Atomic Age America
Possibly the most villainous, and hilarious, protagonist to lead an adventure game is the extraterrestrial Furon Cryptosporidium-137 of 2005’s Destroy All Humans! and its 2020 remake.
Taking place during the late 1950s, Destroy All humans! has Crypto sent to Earth in order to rescue Cryptosporidium-136, harvest Furon DNA from human brains, and weaken the United States government in preparation for a full Furon takeover of the planet.
What makes Crypto truly villainous is how much joy he gets from killing and tricking humans, especially when he disguises himself as humans and basically calls them all stupid to their faces before jumping into his flying saucer to destroy towns and vehicles.
8 Games Where Evil Is The Only Option
You’re the bad guy, deal with it!
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Author: 360 Technology Group
