In case you haven't been paying attention, heads up: Video games are improving. Their visual quality, physics engines and plots have advanced to a point that was unimaginable even just a few years ago. But their characters — well, some of them could use some ironing out.
We created this illustrated guide to the characters we seem to meet time after time, game after game. We love them, hate them and have witnessed them die disturbingly often. We control their fates like we control their movements: recklessly and selfishly. Trust us, we know them when we see them.
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Scroll through our list and see if you recognize any of these characters from your gaming experience. Did we forget anyone?
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
This hero has spent a lifetime doing little besides brutally killing hordes of extraterrestrials. He majored in alien murder in college, and his resume is just 36 pages of the names of his victims. Lately, though, he's been questioning everything.
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
Your squadron is the best group of pound-for-pound warriors ever assembled. You work fast, you work quietly and you work clean. Well, except for Toby. Toby just runs into walls all day. How did he even get out of basic training?
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
Sure, he just blew up a hospital and stole a helicopter, only to crash it into a congested highway seconds later. But he's a decent guy, really. You haven't seen the cutscenes; you don't know him like we do.
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
What terrible parents this poor fifth grader has: "Timmy, before you learn how to swim, you have to save the world from the greatest threat it's ever seen. And don't come home until you're done, either. Here's a twenty for food, now take your unpredictable wild animal and get out of here, mister."
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
Nothing ruins believability like a skilled master of the battlefield, wearing nothing but a skimpy sheet of pixels over his or her private parts. The sacrifices he's made for this country alone should warrant him at least some pants, don't you think? Maybe some mittens? Somebody get him a robe so he can cover up.
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
Here's Keith. He's going to be your sidekick for the next 18 hours of gameplay, and you're going to develop a hatred for him that will far surpass any you've ever felt before. He'll take your health packs and hide behind a wall, forcing you to incur all the damage. You can admit it, you've thought about joining the forces of evil just to take him out.
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
The Grunts have by far the most logically sound reason for wanting you dead: You've killed about 4,000 of their friends and family. These low-tier villains are so weak and easy to mow over, you might actually start to feel bad for them.
Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch
Alas, you've made it all the way to the final boss. He is all-powerful, indestructible, he knows your every move. You have absolutely zero chance in killing him, so just forget it. Oh, wait. What's that obvious glowing orange thing on his chest? Have you tried shooting that?
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Image: Mashable, Max Knoblauch