Favourite Gaming Antagonist

[Hands]

Big Boss, hands down. Starting in Metal Gear on the MSX he's fairly basic, but he;s fleshed out a lot more in the sequel. We're presented with a man who took over a nation with the intent to create a state where soldiers would always be valued, even when they couldn't fight anymore. However, he was also a man who was behind numerous proxy wars and terrorist attacks which he caused to facilitate his dream of not just a nation, but a world where soldiers would always be needed. He deliberately created war orphans and then took them in and raised them as his own. At the climatic end of his fight with his young clone he notes that despite everything, they're both still puppets.

Then came the prequels where you played as Big Boss. We went through hell as him, far worse than anything his clone, Solid Snake, ever endured. We watched as everything he believed in and loved was either torn from him or ended by his own hand. We saw him act selflessly time and again only to be done over. By the end of Peace Walker, as players, we no longer cared how dark his path would be, it was a path we were ready to walk with him because we had experienced every moment that had led him there. Suddenly everything he had stood for in MG and MG2 made sense. Suddenly we no longer saw him as a villain, but as a man who genuinely thought he was doing the right thing. We realised he was never evil, never a monster. Just a flawed man shaped by a messy past.

And saddest still is as his life came to an end, he went to Snake to make amends, to tell him that despite being a clone, Snake's life and body were his, not those of his de facto father. Big Boss spent his last minutes alive comforting the clone he'd spent over a decade trying to remove from the world. His last act was of unbridled kindness and warmth. At the end of it all he absolved not just his sins, but those of his final living clone and virtually everyone in between too. Seldom few characters in gaming exist who are as complex and tragic as Big Boss.

 

[Judge Mandolore Shepard]

When it comes to favorite gaming antagonists, my top five favorites are as follows:

Harbinger (Mass Effect series)
Darth Malak (Star Wars KotOR)
Exdeath (Final Fantasy V)
Handsome Jack (Borderlands 2)
Vladimir Makarov (Call of Duty Modern Warfare trilogy)

 

[The Gunney]

8492nd Sq ( Ace Combat 5)
Solo Wing Pixy- Larry Faulk (Ace Combat Zero)
Yourself (Spec Ops: The Line)

 

[JJ Styles]

JONATHAN IRONS​

Aka Kevin Spacey from Call of Duty: Kevin Spacey Advanced Warfare.

Jonathan Irons comes out as some sort of a surprise for me when it comes to some video game antagonists. Not only is he well portrayed by an A-List actor in Kevin Spacey who truly carries the game's story with his performance as the head of the Atlas Corporation, but for also the intents and purposes the character has in Call of Duty Lore. You see, most Call of Duty antagonists in CoD Lore have been designed in such a way that the game reinforces that they are the bad guy, you playing as the soldier for your army is the good guy and the "USA IS DOMINATE" agenda backed up with. In short, most CoD antagonists are designed to be plain "Bad guys - Hollywood style" like most action movies that involve the US Army (and its respective allies) do but Advanced Warfare, being one of my favorite CoD Campaigns in the series, did have an intention to go beyond the whole "USA is dominate" trope and go for a more different direction. Though Modern Warfare does a great job at making you feel gritty nitty at times but I'll discuss about that in a different time (or reality).

But first, more on Jonathan Irons. He starts the his role in the game being the grieving father who hides his grief for the loss of his son by being a classy asshole towards the things he deem as incompetent - the military and the world's governments. He flaunts his corporation, Altas, as a superpower for hire that is ready to solve all of the worlds' problems. He flaunts that he and his army answers to no government nor nation.

The thing I also like about John Irons is that this is a man who does value his men and women a lot, as long as they don't cross him. He treats his inferiors with the respect that they deserve as seen in several cutscenes. He is a very likeable person, from the very first seen of him shutting down the sergeant to many more of the scenes where he interacts with his PMC dudes, he is such a personable individual, as if you almost wanted to be friends with him. Somehow in someway, he blurs the line between good and evil, almost as if he was more of an anti-villain.

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And of course no talk about Johnny Irons is complete without is ever infamous speech that truly shows how interesting this character is. He gives the entire UN a "reason they suck speech" to fully point out how superior he is. And the worst part is that he's basically right.

So going back into the more metaphysical sense, why do I like Jonathan Irons that much? Because of the potential that I saw in Advanced Warfare as a whole. Should this campaign have been written far better and not just pandering to the whole "USA IS DOMINATE. PRAISE THE FLAG" agenda that most of the CoD games have always been, Jonathan Irons and Atlas Corporation could have easily blurred the liens between the "good" and "evil" in CoD Lore.

Some people may even say that he's more likely an expy to MW2's General Shepard. Both him and Irons share the well intentioned extremists who exploit terrorism in order to build an era of supremacy under their faction along with betraying the player character, though unlike in MW2 where it happens near the end of the game, in Advanced Warfare, its in the middle.

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