Protagonists You Can't Get Behind

[Neonsilver]

Spongebob Squarepants in his interactions with his friend Patrick. There are plenty of episodes where Patrick manipulates Spongebob in giving him what he wants. Episodes where he steals from Spongebob or just causes him some harm in his stupidity.
Considering that it's a cartoon for children it gives a somewhat questionable message, especially considering that the few times that Spingebob gets angry at Patrick he suffers even more for it.

 

[Archer666]

Captain America and Superman. The characters are so dull I just can't get behind them. Characters who are written to be always right are as fun to watch/read to me as a cardboard box.

 

[FPLOON]

Spongebob Squarepants in his interactions with his friend Patrick. There are plenty of episodes where Patrick manipulates Spongebob in giving him what he wants. Episodes where he steals from Spongebob or just causes him some harm in his stupidity.
Considering that it's a cartoon for children it gives a somewhat questionable message, especially considering that the few times that Spingebob gets angry at Patrick he suffers even more for it.

And to think, at first, people we're actually hating Squidward for calling out both Spongbob and Patrick on some of the things that they did...

Regardless, I agree with you and, to an extent, I can't get behind Patrick a lot more than I can't with Spongbob because of how much of a dick Patrick is in comparison to just Spongebob... I mean, if Squidward, the "antagonist" of this duo, actually makes sense as to why he despises them both with a passion, even while at times trying to change, at least, Spongebob to be less of an "annoying neighbor", then the show better check who we're suppose to be "rooting" and "not rooting" for...

 

[Super Cyborg]

Post decent hair-cut Luke in Tales of the Abyss. Once you see the big twist (which I wont spoil) and Luke cuts his hair, you actually realize he actually makes a lick of sense. How he acts towards anyone in the cast or plot, as well as the entire main story, made a huge amount of sense, although it already did before when you just thought he was an Amnesiac prick who had been locked in his house all his remembered life and didn't know a damn thing about the world because of it.

And the side characters constantly beat him down and yell at him for somehow not being naive when its the only thing he could be.

The reason I hate post hair cut Luke is that he is essentially no longer a character, but just a voice for the main character. He doesn't have even a semblance of personality anymore, and simply talks to further his own plot. Its like he just suddenly disregarded the obvious truth behind nearly all his words shortly before the big twist and agreed to everyone that he is a colossal prick and everything ever is his fault even tho it clearly wasn't and Ion was far more to blame. Because reasons. It didn't help the game goes so incredibly downhill from that moment in terms of pacing and generally writing that it completely ruined the game.

Its hard to feel for a colloidal prick. Its harder to feel for a tool with the personality of a rock.

Tales of the Abyss was one of my favorites, and I thought Luke was handled well, but I do see your point. I don't think it was right away, but after a certain point, yeah he stops being a character. I think part of the problem was that everything that was part of his character post cutting his hair went to fast. His character growth was good, but when he becomes someone with little personality and nothing to really bring until the end, it does present a problem. Now for me, I didn't mind over all, because the rest of the game begins to focus on the other characters, which is why it's a strong game. The problem is the rest of the cast is great so Luke is overshadowed by everyone else the second half of the game. While he didn't have lots of personality, he did have a little.

Some one I would have to go with is Vash from Tri-gun. Now for most of the anime series, I didn't mind him. He was goofy and I liked him overall. The problem is the last few episodes of the series. I won't give it away, but the events that unfolded and the reaction that Vash had really pissed me off, which in turn really made me not like the series as much as I could've.

Most heroes that have a strict no kill rule really get me. Let me explain, if someone was bad one time, and they were barely a threat or even turned around, fine. The Justice system is in place to give help to those who can possibly turn around. The problem I have is when villains who have done countless acts of crime, who will never change, are allowed to live. It's worse when these criminals have gotten out countless times as well. After one person has caused so much death and destruction, with no signs of remorse or changing, that person should not be allowed to live. They got out many times before, they will get out again to do stuff. It's worse for super powered villains, cause they can cause greater destruction easier.

 

[Super Cyborg]

I actually hate the rest of the cast because their extremely insensitive and essentially an asshole to Luke for no reason the whole damn game. While they have the occasional funny dialogue (Jade and Anise had some fucking hilarious moments together, but Jade was continuous hilarity) and that was helped by the large amount of voiced dialogue in my Japanese version (I only used the un-dub patch because of the voiced skits, I'd have preferred an English version).


And to be quite honest, the part where every character suddenly had to get in a line to do their tragic backstories was right when the game became INCREDIBLY tedious. Sync's death scene had so little impact on me by the time in showed up despite being a fairly well done scene it wasn't even funny. After that, I just gave up and havn't felt the urge to touch in since, no matter how much the amazing opening tugs at me to continue. It wasn't helped that they used all their best music tracks early on, causing the soundtrack to become boring and repetitive. I believe the anime FMA Brotherhood is a perfect example of holding your ace until its needed in terms of its soundtrack, and everything should use it by example, regardless if its a videogame or anime or show or whatever.

Yes they were a bit of a prick towards him, but I feel that he deserved a bit of it, and it got better after the post haircut, but that's me. Some of them are just dicks to a certain extent because that's who they are (Especially Jade), and you might just be getting hung up on the picking on him part to much, or I just didn't notice it because I liked the game a lot. I'd still say it's my third favorite at the moment, behind Symphonia and Xilia, both had better cast and stories.

It's been a while since I saw FMA Brotherhood, so I can't say much about it's soundtrack, but I always think the soundtrack should fit the mood, not that the best should be for last, though it can work together if done right. It's to bad you couldn't finish the game, but from what you said, it's probably best to not try to finish it. I assume you've played some of the other Tales Games?

 

[masticina]

Lightning from FFXIII. She spent the first half of the game whinning and murdering innocents. Then become the leader of the group (somehow) and she was literally the same person. Am unlikeable brick that wouldn't stop killing.

I have to agree with that, she might be a hit in japan but. Wow doesn't she works at all. Why should we care about lightning, oh she has a sister called serah okay .. still not caring.

Now Han Solo I like, it is a flawed character yes. But every character should have flaws. Which leads to indeed that Dunes paul pretty much is a jesus. Oh dear and nobody likes perfect beings. Han Solo ah so what he does it for the money and fun. Why not.. ever heard of chaotic good.

My biggest petpeeve is when you already know the character will lose/die. That automatically wipes all interest and energy I put in that character. Why do games do this..

Oh I been watching some disaster movies. And this happened in a movie called Category 6: Day of Destruction. Hooray for netflix to have such terrible but such enjoyable movies. But there is a kidnapping of a daugther of an important person. And at the end point that is being unraveled they are together with a good cop like character and. Whoops a kidnapper shows up and the good cop like character lowers the gun. Serious... one guy you got a gun. One shot one kill.

But no obviously being the "good guys" they only should shoot when the morality is 100% agreeing with them.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Spoiler

Hmmmm, I like that one.

And it wasn't always the case. I haven't played WoW, but in the original "Warcraft", the Horde were first summoned by a guy who technically I believe was human, although he was the son of an immortal divine being, so... not sure on that one. Anyway, the Horde appear, fleeing their dying planet of Draenor, find a village in Azeroth, and promptly have the bad manners to slaughter everyone inside it. Some armed humans come along to fight them, and thus the war begins. It's quite interesting, though, that it's the son of one of humanity's protectors who starts the whole thing off.

From that point on, the Horde's portrayal changes throughout each iteration of the franchise. In the original Warcraft, they're a single tribe of unruly savages who rely on cunning, brute force and primitive magic, rather than strategy or intellect.

In Warcraft 2, they've become a race of what are essentially treasure hunters, but there are orcs with the skills to use powerful trinkets - principally, Gul'dan. Now the orcs can negotiate with allies - specifically the put-upon ogres and trolls - and also have abilities that go far beyond the necromancy of the first game. (Unfortunately what they can't now do is summon demons. I understand why - the demons pretty much broke the game in the first "Warcraft" - but it still feels kinda like they were nerfed.) They've gone from being a single tribe of refugees to an organised force that looks to conquer. In "Beyond the Dark Portal", the expansion for Warcraft 2, this was more pronounced, with the Orcish tribes having their own specific identities and backstories.

In Warcraft 3, they're no longer savages. They have a leader, Thrall, who has plans beyond just fighting the humans. I don't think anybody would ever claim that the alliance were the "good guys" in this game - their leader, Arthas, pretty much goes crazy (unfortunately you have to control him while he does it. Seriously, he's one of the more annoying protagonists in gaming history. What a whiny jerk.) He kills his father at the end of the Human campaign, becoming an enslaved undead lich in the process. Now the undead take the place of the orcs, looking to "recruit" the dead of war using necromancy (previously a tool used mostly by orcs themselves, who no longer have access to it.)

I don't know what happens at the end of Warcraft 3 as I've never yet managed to finish it. I presume Thrall gets his people away to somewhere safe, the elves stop the undead, and the remaining humans try and find a leader who isn't a powerful lich. Although given that I've heard Arthas is a major boss character in WoW, maybe that doesn't happen. Anyway, it's interesting to see just how much the Horde have changed over the course of three full games and at least two large expansions.

The orcs weren't really refugees in 1, were they? Their world wasn't dying so much as they'd run out of people to conquer. I'd also say they weren't treasure hunters in 2, even though Guldan was doing that.

In 3, I'd say the Alliance were the good guys...ish. Arthas flipped out at some point, but most of the other people didn't.

Not sure how soon after 2 3 was supposed to be. Some of the orcs in the concentration camps were, I guess, war criminals, but some of them weren't, I think Thrall was younger and missed all that. In which case things are getting murky.

The game doesn't quite end like that, what happens is

Spoiler

Most of the orcs flee to a new continent with Thrall, Jaina rallies the surviving humans and runs off there as well. They fight each other, and the elves that are already there for a bit, but then Medivh/The Prophet comes back and tells them to put aside their differences and fight the undead, and it gets a bit Star Trekky

 

[sanquin]

-Protagonists that 'never kill'. I'm of the firm belief that pacifism doesn't work. Some people are just beyond help, and if some guy killed several people I don't see how it makes you 'just like him' if you kill him and end a serial murder spree. Killing a serial killer does not make you a serial killer as well. (just an example of course.)

-When a protagonist goes all emo in the middle of a fight when it isn't called for at all. Kurosaki Ichigo from Bleach and Simone from Gurren Langann are good examples.

-When the protagonist decides he/she has to do it all themselves, when he/she clearly needs help. Anime have this problem a lot with male protagonists. "It's a man's job to protect women" or "I decided to put my life on the line to protect whom I hold dear, but when others come to that same conclusion I tell them it's wrong or they shouldn't." Stop being a selfish hypocrite please...

-Protagonists that have godly fast progression with seemingly little effort. I'm talking about characters like Goku, Simone (once again) fall under that category for me. An exception can be the 'normal character suddenly gets a powerful power' thrope, but even this is usually done wrong.

None of these will prevent me from getting behind a protagonist by themselves. But add 2 or more together in a single character...

 

[Roofstone]

Kratos! He is the most evil douchebag I've ever had the unfortunate pleasure of knowing about. He straight out kills people for things they are already offering him! He kills the gods of the sea and the skies, he probably killed millions if not billions of people because of that!

There is next to nothing that might potentially even be considered redeemable if he did it for a good cause, which he doesn't. I absolutely loathe him. >_<

 

[Zombie Badger]

Joel from The Last of Us. I just found him to be a boring, generic and unpleasant arsehole who I never found it in myself to care about. The game tries to excuse this by admitting that he's a bad person but that doesn't make him any more interesting. It's really not helped by the game refusing to let the player be involved in the story, every major plot point between the first and last levels are entirely contained in cutscenes so I never identified with Joel through playing as him, unlike Cpt Walker in Spec-Ops: The Line.

 

[Cecilo]

Now in WOTLK, Cata and Mists the Orcs were clearly the villains again, In Wrath they ambushed the Alliance who were fighting Scourge forces infront of the Wrath Gate, The Alliance soldiers give you a quest asking for Death, the Horde Soldiers give you a quest to finish off the Alliance soldiers.

But the ones betraying at the wrathgate where... the forsaken. Not the orcs. And the forsaken that did so even went against their own kind, under Sylvanas nose. Then, the Alliance invaded Undercity (wich was occupied by the forsaken seperatists, who where keeping the horde out as well). Thrall tried to keep things under controll, but when the forsaken where killed (by both horde and alliance forces) Varian Wrynn was the one to attack the horde. Jania stopped him and Thrall realised that this meant the uneasy peace was over.

In Cata Garrosh's obession with the Alliance leads him to get most of his fleet destroyed in the Twilight Highlands, and in Cata the Forsaken show their true colours, Sylvanas is nothing more than a less powerful Lich King, and the Royal Apothecaries are still up to their "Experiments" In Hillsbrad, oddly enough as you mentioned, The Horde in Hillsbrad bears a striking resemblance to how the Nazi's acted, except these references straight up preform experiments on the people and kill them en masse, as opposed to the Old Hillsbrad, where the most that happened was Manual labor, and this is the big part, slave fighting (Which is referenced by one of the COT: OH bosses).

Agreed, Garrosh is terrible in Cata and so is Sylvanas. And for horde players this is seen clearly as the beginning of the storm. Garrosh and Sylvanas are butting heads because one does not trust the other (Garrosh hates the forsaken because of what some of them did at the wrathgate) and the other has no respect for the "warchief". Meanwhile the other races are just trying to hold the crumbling horde together.

In Mists, Garrosh goes completely overboard, destroys towns fully, and well, There is no part of what Garrosh did during Mists that could be considered okay. In any respect.

Indeed. That is why even the horde (including orcs) turn against him.

I realise I might come across as a bit too know-it-all but one thing I always liked in later expansions where how both horde and alliance where shown to be good and bad. Both sides are both trying to survive and destroy, but not everyone agrees within the factions. Politics, I think it's called.

OT:
I'll just say most anime protaganists. Seriously, it's like every anime deliberatly tries to make the main character less interesting/likeable than pretty much everyone else.

Also some voiced protaganists whose lines I can't control. So many are just so... poorly written.

No not the wrathgate in uh. Dragonblight. The first gate in Icecrown. If you go there you will find tons of dying Horde and Alliance corpses. The horde launched an attack on the Alliance forces who were beating back the Scourge in an effort to take that gate. While this happened the Horde attacked their flank, both forces were decimated as the Horde warriors focused on the Alliance soldiers, Alliance were decimated because now they were being attacked on both sides, and the Scourge just mopped up both sides.

And I would disagree with your idea where both sides are trying to destroy each other. The Alliance could have destroyed the very much weakened Horde, or at least pressed them to the brink after Mists. They didn't despite Jaina's urging.

 

[TheMigrantSoldier]

Yeah, I dislike Minato from Persona 3. A lot of the times he involves himself in other lives, it feels wooden and out of character. He remains quiet and distant for most of the game. It gives off an impression that Minato doesn't really care much for those he makes bonds with, only their social links. At least P4's protagonist can become more upfront and casual in his dialogue.

THANK YOU. That is exactly why I hated Persona 3 and people claiming the main character isn't an emo. In all of the main plot, he acts extremely distant and quiet, so every social link is completely out of character. Persona 4 may have made him more of a Mary Sue, but at least he was consistant.

I think Minato's mary sue-ishness is a bit more obvious. He's cold, unfriendly and distant yet everyone looks to him as the leader they adore. Yu from P4 at least gives off a friendly, if withdrawn, demeanor to those around him. It's clear that he is more than willing to try and keep everyone satisfied and together, unless you're going for an alternate character interpretation.

It's the same thing with how Marie is loved by everyone despite how rude she is.

 

[peruvianskys]

Been reading Dune recently.

Gotta say, the main character, Paul, is so bloody capable that I find it damn near impossible to give a shit about him.

He's super-duper smart, highly trained in the ways of basically everything. has perfect observation and perfect memory, can figure out almost anything at a glance, can learn any skill super quickly, can read people so well that he can almost read their minds, can kinda-sorta make people do what he says just by commanding them to. Oh, and of course he's physically adept at pretty much anything he tries his hand at.

Oh, and I almost forgot that he's also The Chosen One As Foretold by Prophesy And Legend. Although I'm pretty sure the author's going to try and pull something cute with that.

But yeah, makes it pretty hard to sympathise or fell any kind of tension. Even when the plot is getting all "Ohhhhh! Treachery! Drama! Danger!" all I can think is, "Eh, whatever, fucking Wunderkind here will have it under control in no time."

Strongly agree - I don't think there's a better example of the sci-fi trope "main character is literally perfect, can do anything, but also be so afraid he might come to danger!!" I don't understand how people can get invested in that book.


I remember playing God of War and just being confused about it - I liked being a violent badass but the actual character of Kratos was really odd to me. Like, yeah, kids are dead, but I can't help but think about all the children the people you're slaughtering for health pickups have...

 

[mitchell271]

Been reading Dune recently.

Gotta say, the main character, Paul, is so bloody capable that I find it damn near impossible to give a shit about him.

He's super-duper smart, highly trained in the ways of basically everything. has perfect observation and perfect memory, can figure out almost anything at a glance, can learn any skill super quickly, can read people so well that he can almost read their minds, can kinda-sorta make people do what he says just by commanding them to. Oh, and of course he's physically adept at pretty much anything he tries his hand at.

Oh, and I almost forgot that he's also The Chosen One As Foretold by Prophesy And Legend. Although I'm pretty sure the author's going to try and pull something cute with that.

But yeah, makes it pretty hard to sympathise or fell any kind of tension. Even when the plot is getting all "Ohhhhh! Treachery! Drama! Danger!" all I can think is, "Eh, whatever, fucking Wunderkind here will have it under control in no time."

I've been thinking the exact same thing. I'm about halfway through so far and every time he's in danger, I think, "He's going to use a combination of his mother's and his father's training to get past whatever obstacle this is because he's the prophecised one." And lo and behold, as I turn the page, I reveal my incredible powers of clairvoyance. Paul is the main reason I've only gotten through the first half, there's no tension around him so I'm kinda bored.

 

[maidenm]

No not the wrathgate in uh. Dragonblight. The first gate in Icecrown. If you go there you will find tons of dying Horde and Alliance corpses. The horde launched an attack on the Alliance forces who were beating back the Scourge in an effort to take that gate. While this happened the Horde attacked their flank, both forces were decimated as the Horde warriors focused on the Alliance soldiers, Alliance were decimated because now they were being attacked on both sides, and the Scourge just mopped up both sides.

And I would disagree with your idea where both sides are trying to destroy each other. The Alliance could have destroyed the very much weakened Horde, or at least pressed them to the brink after Mists. They didn't despite Jaina's urging.

Remeber that both the horde and the alliance got into icecrown proper AFTER the wrathgate. After both horde and alliance attacked undercity. After the human king attacked weakened horde forces in one of their main cities himself. After the wrathgate it officially became war after a shaky ceasefire, I hardly think it's "evil" to fight back after that. Much of icecrown is about how the scourge is using the two factions against eachother (on both the airships there are memeber of the argent crusade that point this out).

And I respectfully disagree as well. The alliance has not failed to destroy the horde for lack of trying. The horde is not so much weakened as it is explosive during cata and mop. The wrong poke from either side could topple it and take everyone around with it. Varian makes no seacret that he wants the horde dead and gone, but what is stopping him during the last two expansions is not the horde, but the alliance. The dwarfs are a mess, the gnomes are a mess, Tyrande is... pining for Malfurion (isn't that all she ever does?). In short, the alliance is not much of a alliance, and they suffer for it. Both sides are weak, and that is why neither could defeat the other.

One thing I like about WoW is that once you have played both sides, and really taken the time to think about the quests and the people, it becomes easy to see how it really is a war. There are no real "good guys" during war. But not everyone are bad guys. (northen barrens is a great scene for this, I played all quests for both sides and you really see how neither side is right AND neither side is wrong there.)