PC Gaming's Best and Worst Characters
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You'd expect the ten best to include a number of RPG characters, but that really isn't the case. Some notable mentions:
NUMBER 6And one from the worst.
Mortimer 'Morte' Rictusgrin (Planescape: Torment): Everyone has a friend they don't really like - an abusive arsehole who lives to see you suffer, but who you still like having around. Mortimer Rictusgrin - Morte to his friends - is exactly that guy... well, head.
He's a sarcastic, lying and stunningly witty flying skull. By the end he accepts the blame for the lives he's destroyed (including repeatedly causing the death the immortal, amnesiac Nameless One - your character) but is redeemed through his friendship with you. Amongst a pack of memorable characters, Morte is the one you love Planescape for.
NUMBER 4
Sander Cohen (BioShock): Rapture is full of mad bastards, but our favourite is this particular mad bastard - whose underlying theme is that of the inflated artistic ego (or Ayn Rand or something clever like that).
We're introduced to Cohen's madness with a brilliant scene in which a tortured pianist struggles to bang out Cohen's masterpiece without fault - ultimately failing and incurring the full brunt of Cohen's lunacy.
Andrew Ryan lead the best scene, Atlas has the best lines, Tenenbaum was a vision of maternal loveliness juxtaposed with unethical genetic experimentation (everything got juxtaposed in BioShock), but Cohen's relentless theatrics in the face of desolation bowled us over.
NUMBER 3
HK-47 (KOTOR series): "Shall we find something to kill to cheer ourselves up?" Easily the highlight of the KOTOR series, even if they buggered up his storyline in The Sith Lords, HK-47 is a cheerfully insane assassin droid. The roots of his madness, brilliantly relayed as you delve into his memory banks, lie with yourself, because you corrupted him as Darth Revan.
With a cheery aristocratic tone, and with a love of the word 'meatbag', you also feel a strange empathy for him: not least when he is unwillingly fitted with the HK Protocol Pacifist Package in KOTOR 2.
"Conclusion: There was a brief moment where I felt like I almost understood why some meatbags choose peace and friendship over a high-powered blaster carbine."
NUMBER 1...
SHODAN (System Shock series): Two robotic matriarchs in the top two positions? It can only speak to our male, fleshy weakness, and the thrill of being overwhelmed. The comparisons quickly run dry, however: Portal leaves everything to the imagination - System Shock has a strongly defined storyline. SHODAN provides you with a tormentor, an ally, a betrayer.
Her story is handled in such a remarkable way; her interaction with you completely natural within the immaculate storyline - it's easy to imagine the System Shock games as a movie, but it's the very best example of a filmic storyline playing better as a game.
SHODAN is the benevolent chip who had her ethical considerations hacked away, turning her into a passionate megalomaniac, and a casual liar. She's not mad - she's consistent and reasonable. She's just reasonable on her own twisted terms, which, with an inch of empathy, aren't even that twisted.
We've seen SHODAN at her most powerful and her most vulnerable, and although we never once suspected she'd reform and become a dutiful little AI on a mining vessel again, she never failed to be anything other than an enthralling and intelligent enemy and ally. She gets the top spot because she's every definition of awesome.
NUMBER 2
Martin Septim (Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion): When it was revealed that Patrick Stewart and Sean Bean would be lending their voice talents to Oblivion, we thought we'd have seen the end of the soulless, monotonous verbal dirge that spews from the gobs of the game's moronic residents.
Captain Jean Luc Picard's bleak rendition of Uriel Septim manages to make the Emperor look like a mad old pensioner, but he avoids this list by being killed off so quickly. Sean Bean's character sticks around far longer though, at all times sounding like a man incapable of emotion.
His script is a load of wank too, always going on about some rubbish nobody really cares about. Even when he turns into a giant ferocious dragon he's still a bit annoying, and embarrassing to watch - like if your dad turned into a massive mythical creature made of fire. He even talks about turning into a dragon like you'd talk about ordering a coffee.
"One grande cappuccino with an extra shot, and I'll be turning into a dragon to save the world - is there a discount for that?"
Sean Bean may have been a housewife's favourite in Sharpe, but stick him in a sound recording studio and he's reduced to a painfully dull oaf.
