What keeps our hero going?

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

What motivates the protagonist to do what he is doing?
What keeps them doing it? What force drives them forward?

What are the most interesting and boring hero motivations you came across until now?

I seriously have difficulties finding more than a handful, because it seems it's always the same.

[hr]
One brilliant jewel of RPG gaming let's you decide the reason for adventuring yourself and it covers up all relevant (and mostly boring) possiblities:

Revenge (HRRRaraaarrar I kill you for that, and you clones, and your family, and your dogs)
Loss (whine, whine, there is nothing else I have left to do, emo-wristcutting move)
Wanderlust (Oooh, nice treasure, mind if I borrow it? Let's have another sightseeing tour over here)
Being forced out (The Lone Wanderer anyone?)
Money (or Power like MORE POWER TO ME!)

Apart from that I can think of two more, the most boring of all is:

"just following orders" (FOR THE EMPERARARHHH)

and the other one is

"search for the holy grail McGuffin thing" (Uuuuh, I lost my memory let's see if I can get it back when I stab some monsters.)

Ok while some heroes change their motivation into something gloriously chintzy like "saving the world/galaxy/universe" or something I'm more interested in the rare cases of motivation that are not covered here. Do you know of any?

 

[That Greek Guy]

to save humanity?

 

[Knight Captain Kerr]

If only there was some sort of index for motivation.
Oh wait. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MotivationIndex

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

@That Greek Guy
Yeah, I covered that in the last bit, but honestly I personally find it boring. It's mostly presented in a presumptious speech driven holier-than-thou iconic super-hero (surrogate) bland way, I find lacking any imagination. Do you find "saving humanity" interesting? Considering how many times I have played games over the years, I have saved humanity far more often than it actually deserved.

@Ryan Kerr
Good job, now you provided us with an overview. Thank you. But what about our beloved Videogames, tell me of your heroes and don't stray to far away from the topic if you don't mind.

 

[wooty]

For the ability to sleep with the love interest in the story which is played by Scarlett Johansson.

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

Really? Who is the hero who is doing it all for the boobies of a platinum blonde? Give more details, goddamit!!!

 

[Casual Shinji]

I've always found Guts' motivations in Berserk the most gripping, though they were not wholly original.

He goes from being:

- A child soldier trying to gain the respect and love of his asshole of an adoptive father.
- Accidentally mudering his adoptive father.
- Being a mecenary for hire.
- Becoming a raiders captain in a mecenary band.
- Getting betrayed by his closest friend.

And from that moment on his motivation is that of revenge and loss. Though lately it's become something of a "search for the holy McGuffin" story... It hasn't been terribly good for a while now.

 

[Deverfro]

I'd like to see a game where the protaganist embarks on a quest because theres was nothing good on TV.

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

Yes, me too!
Or because he is just batshit crazy and it's part of his therapy.