Jimquisition: To Play The Villain

Jandau

Smug Platypus
Dec 19, 2008
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I don't have problems playing the villain or the bad guy. What I do have a problem with is playing unlikable uninteresting pricks, which is why I'm skipping GTA. Not all villains are equal, not all villains are even in their actions and motivations, and while GTA5 might be a good game, its protagonists are not, at least to me.
 

Tanakh

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Jul 8, 2011
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Fappy said:
What can we possibly send him (that's legal) that tops that!? I don't even know.
Not sure if it's a rhetorical question, if not the following tags in hentai are usually way more hardcore than gay furry:

- abortion

- absorption

- alien

- all the way through

- amputee

- anorexic

- asphyxiation

- ass expansion

That is for the letter A, way to lazy to keep going.
 

Zombie Sodomy

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Feb 14, 2013
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I have no problem with the GTAV characters being evil, I like being evil, but they just seem like such douches. I want to be suave and sophisticated evil, not Jersey Shore jock evil.
 

Sean Deli

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May 11, 2011
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Vale said:
I love Niko to bits. Even though his name is as unsubtle as it gets. "Niko" sounds Eastern European, but is not an actual Serbian name.
Niko would be an acceptable shorthand for Nikola - a a popular serbian name.
You know - same as that very little known Serb, Nikola Tesla.

Vale said:
It comes from "Nikovo", Russian (Niko is a Serbian, mind) for "Nobody".
Not entirely correct. "Noone" in Russian would be "nikto" (никто). "Nikovo" is Genitive from "nikto".
 

ThreeName

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May 8, 2013
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So, Jim, curious to know how you think this relates to the whole "No rape in videogames" debate? I mean, if you were going to make a truly reprehensible character, that seems like a mighty effective and limit-testing way to do it.
 

Sheo_Dagana

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Aug 12, 2009
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I am more of a 'good guy' in most video games that I play. Lightside, Paragon, call it what you will, that's generally where my decisions land in games that I play. But when SWTOR came out, I did something a little different. I made a character to play by myself, one quite unlike any other. I wanted to see how the other side lived and made a sith sorcerer. And to be sure I'd get the full, evil experience, I chose to go completely dark side with all of my decisions, which led to me role playing the character as such. Before I knew it, I spent more time logged in as my sith than I ever did as my jedi.

It was freeing in a way that was very interesting. I don't normally enjoy villains and I enjoy villains that are really just super-bullies even less (which I fully admit being dark side in SWTOR can feel like at times). But committing to it and really just making as many widows as possible felt disturbingly fun. I still dislike 'half-hearted anti-heroes' like Kratos, but I can understand the appeal of playing a villain now much better than I would have a few years ago.

I still prefer to play good characters whenever possible, but I've lightened up and taken on the new perspective when I wanna take a break from being a nice guy.
 

Gordon_4_v1legacy

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Aug 22, 2010
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TheMadDoctorsCat said:
What really interests me is when a game, or another piece of media, portrays a character as "the good guy" even when they clearly aren't. Watch Jurassic Park 2, for example, where all of the "protagonists" blunder into the middle of an up-until-that-point successful military campaign, getting a massive amount of the (generally less unlikeable) military bods killed in the process. They're incompetent, they're annoying, they constantly f--k everything up and they show zero remorse for or recognition of the consequences of their own idiotic actions. And these are the guys we're supposed to be rooting for. Yay.
In so much as Ian Malcolm's group's actions were kind of on the wrong side of dumb, it wasn't a military campaign. It's a hunting party to get the Dinosaurs to the San Diego park, led by the new InGen executive. Pete Postlethwaite's character, Roland Tembo, is a game hunter who's pay for leading the hunt is the right to stalk down and kill a Tyrannosaurus Rex on his own. The man's a Grade-A Badass, in fact one of his scenes was deleted because it made him too sympathetic.
 

nyysjan

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Mar 12, 2010
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I like playing as a villain in games, as well as anti heroes.
But i want something out of them, but i need to be able to like them, or respect them, or failing that, or at the least they need to be interesting or amusing.
And from GTA V review, the reviewer seemed to not find any of that in the protagonists.

I don't automatically think worse of the villain if they put babies through a meat grinder, but they do need to have a sane and intelligent reason for doing so, or it needs to be done in a way that is amusing, motivations matter, and petty and pointless (or stupid) motives make me at least loose interest in the character (unless it is to see them get shit kicked out of them).
 

Rodolphe Kourkenko

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Dec 10, 2012
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Playing a bad guy is interesting if the story and the character's development are good. Kayne and Lynch is a good example (even if the gameplay was horrible), Manhunt could be another one, this game was horrible from the beginning to the end (in one level, the player have to kill is whole family to survive).

IMO bad guys are always more interesting than the "main good guy (or girl)", playing one can be interesting but it's harder to write this kind of stuff if humor isn't the main theme.
A game were the bad guys are the main character isn't for everyone but a trend appeared since several years on TV show focusing on the bad guys (Dexter, Sons of Anarchy, Breaking Bad, Mad men and so on) and they are all synonymous with success, it was just a matter of time to see this coming in VG and it's not over (the selled number of GTV just proove that people are asking for this kind of game).
 

porous_shield

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Jan 25, 2012
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I hate it in video games when I'm supposedly a good guy and then I mow down hundreds and hundreds of soldiers without remorse. If I think about it too hard I'm thrown right out of the story so I try not think about it to much and I'm always more than happy to be a bad guy. Even playing a game as Batman I try not think about this whole "not killing" thing since he definitely killed a whole bunch of henchmen in the Arkham games. I enjoyed it much more playing as the Claude and Tommy in GTA 3 and Vice City than CJ because I could see the former being psychopaths but CJ seems so out of place.
 

Valdus

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Apr 7, 2011
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I'll be honest my only issue with playing the villain is the premise of the game. GTA is seen heavily as a sandbox, a "do as you wish" style of game. In that respect it seems silly that it forces you to play as villainous characters. Skyrim was also a sandbox but never forced you to do well...anything really besides get passed the tutorial.

GTA however forces you play as some questionable characters and won't let you skip the cruel elements, such as the torture scene. Either focus more on the story and characters or be a true sandbox and let us at least have the option of not being a dick and I'll be happy with it.
 

FoolKiller

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Feb 8, 2008
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And this is why one of my favourite games on the original Playstation was Tecmo's Deception. The goal was to resurrect the devil and gain his powers by killing innocent people. You start out with a plot for revenge but end up being despicable throughout the game.
 

Strazdas

Robots will replace your job
May 28, 2011
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Villians are often the best characters and i love playing as a villian. Though the escapists review seems to be less of "i dontl ike characters" and more like "look at me im a big boy now, look how i dont like the kids stuff" than anything.
 

ShadowHamster

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Mar 17, 2008
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I'm not into villains but I think that's largely because I have had some fairly villainous things done to me. Don't want to get into it. I certainly think it's a practice underdone in the virtual market, and would probably be a good experience for people to avoid doing in the real world if they could get it out in a game. I think it's just hard to write it in.

That being said, my favorite game may very well be fallout 3, if not one of the earlier fallouts, and you can be pretty villainous in that series.
 

grumpymooselion

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May 5, 2011
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Hhmmm . . . what to say, what to say . . .

I like Pulp Fiction. It's about junkies, mobsters, murderers and people of all sort. I enjoy them. I find them entertaining. I enjoy a good villain, even a psychopath, provided the entertainment value is there.

I have been waiting for GTAV to come out on the PC, rather than getting the PS3 version. I haven't played it yet, but, to see what all the, "they're unrelatable and unlikable psychopaths" fuss was about I've watched a few streams of people playing the game, in the background, as I went about my day. The VGA play through by Fraser and his girlfriend Becky stood out, in my mind, as part of the complaint was that the game was sexist, and misogynistic from some reviews.

I watched these two play through this game, and enjoy it, enjoy its characters. They fully realized Trevor was a psychopath but found things complex enough, entertaining enough and even, sometimes, likable enough, in Trevor. It was interesting to see these two people play. The contrast on Fraser and Becky's opinions of the game, versus journalists both male and female tell an interesting story about what men and women think. They liked the characters, after a fashion. I found them villainous, but enjoyable as well.

It's a steady reminded that reviews really are individual opinions. It reminds me that when I look for reviewers to follow, I don't just pick any reviewer, I pick a journalist that has similar tastes to my own. It's not that other reviewers are wrong, it's that I have particular tastes that many don't share and I need a source of information that both covers mechanics and 'taste' in regard to story and characters. I respect the Escapist's review of GTAV and its opinions even though I've found I don't agree with them. I don't think the score is an issue, other than that, 'scores' in general . . . I don't put much stock in. The opinions in most reviews, by my measure, are things that should stand alone without the need for a scoring system.

So, I disagree with the review. Yeah. Oh well. It's not a terrible review, it's a needed review for people with tastes of that particular thread. If one doesn't agree with it, realize it for what it is, and find a journalist that does their job with just as much integrity, but has tastes in things closer to your own. That helps get a measure on whether a character or story is truly disgusting, by your own standards, and then lets you concentrate on the dissection of the game mechanics, which are the real make or break.
 

Pyramid Head

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Jun 19, 2011
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Okay ignoring the gay furry porn because after i heard that furries and bronies don't get along i'm trying to stay on the furries good side, why exactly are people complaining about playing pieces of shit in GTA V? Did anyone actually think Niko Bellic was in any way moral? You understood what drove him to be the way he was and you understood he regretted it, but in the end he still killed multiple people over Brucie's roid rage, he still took contract assassination missions, he still had a habit of driving on sidewalks, destroying testicles, and expertly shooting drivers in the head when he catches them turning without signaling.

Eh, i haven't played GTA V yet both because i'm shit broke right now and also because i'm on a bit of a strategy bender at the moment and was planning on trying the last two X-Com spin-offs i haven't played; UFO: Aftershock and UFO: Afterlight. If the gameplay is as good or improved from GTA IV and the story is interesting i'll check it out.

But for that info i'll probably wait for a Yahtzee review to land or for a chance to rent it first.
 

Cid Silverwing

Paladin of The Light
Jul 27, 2008
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Funny you should completely skip the Payday games in this one. What about the Command & Conquer Tiberian games or Heroes of Might and Magic?

And speaking as a furry, I'm disgusted that you should be so unfortunate as to be disgraced by the sick fucks sending you gay furry porn. I mean, what prompted this?