Favorite game characters and villains

This is another list folks. This one is my most memorable characters in video games.I am going to list some of the most memorable ones that I remember and give a little bit of tidbits about each one as I go along. We've all come to love the characters we get to play as in the games we love. I've tried to compile a list of all the most memorable ones that I personally loved and played... Nothing is in any particular order.

Pacman is the... uhh.. What is pacman? Pacman is the.. circle with a chunk taken out of it.. I guess. Who cares what he is. He goes around nom nomming those pellets and then eating even bigger pellets and then taking a bite out of some ghosties. I don't understand why there are ghosts chasing a yellow circle until the circle basically takes a steroid pill or something and goes all big bubba on them and they run away, but I guess what is there to understand about pacman. It's strange when you think about it too much, but aren't the most strange games the most addicting? I am sure when pacman released, people had no clue what they were in for.

Seeing this big yellow circle thing on the side of an arcade machine with a big mouth and a hunger for pellets and sometimes ghosts. I mean what was going through people's minds when they first saw pacman. The concept is insane honestly but it works. Pacman was remade time and time again for so many consoles back then. It was a craze and some people still play it religiously to this day. Hell, pacman even ended up having a family at some point with Ms. Pacman (who had her own game) and Pac Jr. (Who also had his own game I believe). Pacman evolved over time. He was like a little yellow tadpole.. He suddenly grew legs and his face became more detailed as game generations past. He became even more odd looking. I mean look at the pacman world games or even the earlier pacman 2 game on the snes.

He looks alot more like a character now then he did back then. He was more defined and got more back story to him. The later game had him going on adventures for his family and overall just being pacman. It became different. He still had pellets and ate ghosts, but he did it in more of a platform kind of way. Those games were fun on their own but it wasn't no classic pacman. Hell, I even had fun with Pacman 2 the adventures on snes which was a very different game in itself. Overall pacman went a long way and is still being remade and has more games poppin' out every year. It's crazy how popular this thing is, but it's understandable once you play pacman and I mean who hasn't played pacman.. You? Shame on you.. Shame..

Everyone knows who Mario is and I am sure everyone will forever have his theme stuck in their head because it's the catchiest and most memorable tune ever in video game history. Mario is an awesome character who was thought up by one of the most awesome people in the video game industry, Shigeru Miyamoto. Mario was originally the hero in Donkey kong way before he was known alongside his green other half, Luigi. Mario was jumping over barrels and climbing up ladders like it was nothing back then. He moved onto bigger and better things when he was thrown into his own world and become a popular gaming icon almost overnight. Mario was now eating mushrooms and flowers, jumping on enemies, and warping through pipes like no other. Mario was unique and was really one of the first video game icons to really leave a mark on the gaming industry. There were others before him sure, but he really nailed the mark.

He had many games across all the nintendo systems. If there is a nintendo system, you better believe there is a mario game on it. Even more than one. Mario was odd because I mean what was a plumber doing in a world with these weird goomba creatures, fireball spitting plants that come out of tunnels, flying turtles that you can jump on and use as a weapon, and all sorts of other crazy things. How was this possibly thought up? Mario's platforming skills evolved over time as consoles evolved more. He went from bits to polygons and textures in Super Mario 64.

Yep, he was in a new 3d world and man was that game just as sweet as the 2d ones. Mario quickly spun off party games that were a successful hit and are still worth plenty of money today. Mario even went further into sports titles and spawned off toy lines, his own television show with his brother (which was awesome and is netflix if you didn't know), and grew even more popular. Mario is one of the biggest game characters in the industry today and he still has a strong hold on it since the very beginning. You know what though, I bet you didn't know that Mario wasn't even called Mario in the beginning. It was actually Mr. Video. What if his named never changed to Mario? Super Mr. Video brothers? Mr. Video 64? Mr. Video party? Just doesn't sound as good as Mario and the creator knew this, thus Mario's catchy name was born. Overall, Mario is one of the greatest and longest running characters in video game history.. He stands the test of time.

The nemesis of Mario pretty much. Sonic and Mario grew up on opposite sides of the fence. Mario was for Nintendo and Sonic was for Sega. Both were rivals and thus began the console poster-boy rivals. Sonic was different and was very cool and unique than what we got in video games before. He was essentially a 15 year old blue hedgehog deeming the name "Sonic" and could rack up as many speeding tickets as anyone else since he could run at supersonic speed. He could also roll up into a ball and attack enemies. Sega made him hip and he was a hit soon enough. He sold over 70 million copies.

Very unlike Mario though, Sonic has died down and hasn't been having a good run in awhile. He still has games being made to this day, but they don't hold the true classic sonic. Even remakes are not even up to par like breaking out the old Sega Genesis and firing up the original games. The originals hold true and they show it. The mystery behind Sonic's odd blue skin is that at the time, the creators wanted something to match Sega. The Sega logo was blue so they decided to coat the same color on Sonic to give him a more Sega feel since after-all, he was the poster-boy for Sega.

You probably wouldn't of guessed, but originally Sonic looked a lot different on paper. He originally had fangs and was in a band. He also had a human girlfriend named Madonna apparently. Wow, this sounds like a totally different Sonic than what we know today. He wasn't alot more edgier while in development, but they ultimately decided to go with a more softer character so that he had a better impression and approach overall. It did work.. Sonic has evolved and had a number of 3D games and alot of them were not that successful. There were a few gems here and there, but these days the Sonic team seems to have lost their touch. I for one just say let Sonic rest in peace.. Let it go already. The old Sonic games will live on though.

Sonic was a great character for Sega and in the early games, he was drawn by Naoto Ōshima' who drew him more rounded with short spikes. However Yuji Uekawa re-designed Sonic in a few ways. Made him quite the opposite. He gave him long legs, long spikes, and a less rounded body. Also he gave him green eyes. Originally from what I remember, Sonic just had black eyes originally. He even had different voice actors throughout Sonic's games. Overall though Sonic is still Sonic and to me, he will always be that blue hedgehog who can break the sound barrier (Can he?... Not entirely sure). Overall Sonic is unique to sonic and he was a great character back then. I hope someday we can get that classic Sonic back.

This is my all time favorite video game character. Why you ask? He just so badass. He doesn't ask questions, he just does what he does best which is chew bubblegum and kick ass.. Until he runs out of bubblegum. Then he just kicks ass. He has spanned over dozens of games. He originally was developed for these side-scroller shooting games that were on PC. They were DOS games and I remember playing them fondly in school. My science teacher used to let me play Duke Nukem. Yes I played it in school. Back then though, he wasn't the rugged character that we know him as today. It wasn't until Duke 3D that he was made into the ladies man that we know now. He isn't for kids that for sure. Duke Nukem 3D is probably the high point of Duke. Anyone who had a PC and was into gaming had that game at some point back then.

Duke was the kind of guy that were shade all the time and didn't care. He was in your face and that's how everyone liked it. He fought aliens and saved babes. He didn't have much of a character change after Duke 3D because they pretty much nailed the character then. He's perfect the way he is now. In the original DOS games, Duke rarely spoke and was pretty much just portrayed a basic hero of the game. There wasn't much more to it back then. When Duke 3D came out though, Duke got a full makeover that he needed to survive the gaming industry. The industry was already full of your typical run of the mill heroes. Duke Nukem 3D brought in a wise cracking Duke Nukem. One that was egotistical, chauvinist, macho, and all around womanizing tough guy.

He was irresistible to women and it was awesome. Duke Nukem's character roughly combines John Wayne, Arnold Schwarzenegger (wow what a last name.. Spell check please?) Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, and a few others all rolled into one ball. He has a stable of one liners and some of them were pretty much ripped straight from other people. His "it's time to kick ass and chew bubble gum, and i'm all out of bubblegum" line came from the movie "They live". His "Hail to the king baby" essentially came from Evil Dead. His appearance also resembles closely to Dolph Lungren and Jean-Claude Van Damme. Also who could forget about the voice of Duke, Jon St. John which you could make sweet love to his voice.. I mean seriously. Silky smooth voice like Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry. Overall Duke can't be summed up with one word. He also (FINALLY) has his game releasing in June of 2011. Duke Nukem Forever which has been in development since I believe 1997. It's been in development hell and will finally be released in June which I personally can't wait for. Overall Duke is Duke and he will always kick ass and chew bubblegum.

How can I make a list without the mention of Donkey Kong? I couldn't.. Now I pretty much talked about the early days of Donkey Kong when I mentioned Mario. Mario and Donkey Kong essentially went side by side. Basically their first game was together. We've already pretty much covered that game. The second and probably the most popular game for the character is the Donkey Kong country series. The series was such a classic series. It's somewhat similar to the route mario went. It was a platforming game, but it had a completely different feel at the same time. The character in the Donkey Kong country games though is the grandchild of the Donkey Kong from the Donkey Kong game.

Donkey Kong also went the way of Mario 64 with their own game dubbed Donkey Kong 64. Now I never had a chance to play Donkey Kong 64.. Yes I know.. Shame on me, but I know it was 3D very similar to the Mario game that was out at the time on the Nintendo 64. Also just like Mario, you didn't have a nintendo console without Donkey Kong. Mario went in one direction with it's Mario party games which are awesome and then Donkey Kong went in the other direction with it's rhythm game, Donkey Konga. Mario and Donkey Kong also had similar tastes in racing style games. Diddy Kong Racing was for Donkey Kong which had many different vehicles to choose from which was great.

Mario Kart was Mario's game and it was very different than Diddy Kong. Diddy Kong racing was pretty much an open world from the beginning and you have to race to unlock more levels. Mario Kart was more about circuits and tournaments to unlock more levels and it was essentially karts and that was it, but Mario Kart succeeded with many popular Kart games to come. Now these days, you can't have a nintendo console without a Mario Kart game on it. Though Diddy Kong Racing was certainly fun in it's own right. Donkey Kong has a fascination with barrels. Almost all games has the barrels in it even since the very beginning when he was throwing them at mario. The only game I don't remember having it was the racing game and I could be wrong about that. Overall Donkey Kong is a great character and he even has a new Donkey Kong Country game out on the Wii which I could get in the future, but I have heard nothing but awesome things about it.

Vault boy is from the fallout series and I couldn't go without mentioning him because I love the fallout games so much. Vault boy is a simple looking vault-tec mascot with his bright yellow hair and blue with yellow vault jumpsuit. He however wasn't presented in the original games themselves. He was called Vault man originally in the fallout instruction manual. It really wasn't used after that though. They just kind of forgot about him after that point. According to the developers of the fallout series, they always referred to him as vault boy or fallout boy. The manual really calls him vault man though.

There is alot of inconsistencies to vault boy. He had alot of different names apparently and a checkered history when it comes to the games and he really wasn't vault boy until the release of Fallout 3. Vault boy always represented the perks, stats, and the equipment within the all of the game and he also made an appearance on the vault-tec television commercial on TV in the fallout intro. He also was in the vault dweller training video in Fallout 2 and he was also a special encounter within Fallout Tactics. He also made an appearance technically in the game Run Like Hell. I believe he was on the candy bars in the game.

Vault boy also had an African American version in Fallout 2 who had a crew cut, but it was pretty brief. Vault boy to me, was more apparent and "there" in Fallout 3 and he really hit his stride in that game. He was around every turn in that game in some way or another. He was the stats, perks, and equipment. He was also in the form of bobble-heads within the game that you had to hunt down. He is also in Fallout: New Vegas and I am sure that he is going to keep appearing in Fallout games to come. He is always going to be a part of fallout and to me, he represents the game.

This is my second most favorite video game character ever. Snake was originally introduced into gaming in 1987 I believe. It was the first metal gear ever and it was very different than the metal gear style we know now. The snake from the old metal gear games was pretty much the same snake we know now. He just was less graphical. He still had conversations with the colonel and he still was able to sneak around trying to avoid enemies, but it was a very different game than what we know now. Solid snake is a soldier. Well, more of a combination between a soldier, a spy, and a mercenary. He was a commando for FOXHOUND. His mission time and time again was always the same. Disarm and destroy the metal gear.

Surprisingly to everyone, the first metal gear on NES (First introduced on the MSX2) was a hit and sold a million plus copies. That is when the creators knew they were onto something and they put Solid Snake back into action in a sequel deemed Snake's Revenge. Snake was becoming popular, and Kojima made his own sequel to Metal Gear called Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake. This was his own sequel to the first one since he wasn't apart of Snake's Revenge. That was back in 1990. Solid Snake didn't have another action packed game until 1998 when he re-emerged like a great phoenix out of the ashes. Yes, out came Metal Gear Solid for the Playstation. That game was really the beginning for me.

Snake is a character that you grow attached to and you feel pulled into the games because of the emotion or lack there of with Snake. You can see his passion for wanting to stop the metal gear and how hard he fights in the cut-scenes. The series started to hit a stride and the story got more and more complex with the many releases of metal gear games all the way up to Metal Gear Solid Peace walker on the PSP. Now Metal Gear Solid Rising is being developed but as far as I can tell, Snake isn't a part of it but I have a strong feeling that he will at least appear once or twice within the story. As the games went on from 2 and continued on to 3 and 4, the attachment grew to the character especially with his partner throughout the games, Otacon. By the end of Metal Gear 4, I had such a sense of emotion for the character that it was unbelievable that I could feel such a thing for a character that isn't even real. Snake made me feel for him more than any other character in video game history and that is what I call.. One hell of a memorable character.

I must say that I absolutely love everything Castlevania. The games are just amazing and the character, Alucard also stood out to me. His first appearance was in 1990, when he appeared in Castlevania III. He was known more for the role in the awesome Castlevania: Symphony of the Night released in 1997. He was designed and created by Ayami Kojima. In the series, Alucard is known as the son of dracula (couldn't you tell by his name? Pssst... look at his name backwards clueless ones..) His mother was however just a mortal human thus he became only half vampire. He decided to fight his own father due to his mother's death. He fought against his own father alongside vampire hunters. I mean wow, who does that kind of thing right? Hunts down his own father ironically with vampire hunters. I guess his dad is after-all dracula.

He actually appears in many of the games in the series especially the hand-held ones. Many publications for video games have praised Alucard's character. Especially for his role in the hit Symphony of the Night. The complexity and depth of him being Dracula's son was enough added to the plot as it thickened. Alucard was actually intended to be a mirror image of his father, Dracula (makes literal sense from his name), but much of the original artwork was lost in an unfortunate earthquake. The character design pushed on further until they finally were able to get it done. His dark gothic look works for him. I mean come on, it's Castlevania. Everything is supposed to be quite dark and gothic. Overall Alucard was a great dark character with many daddy issues and it really worked for him and it shows through the series.

Glados, or Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System is a character from valve's 2007 Portal game and she is pretty much a super computer. Not a big game, but a powerful one all the same. Glados is an awesome character because of the way the she played with the main character of the game. At first Glados seems fine and everything is good, but isn't that how all games start out? Everything is all fine and then BAM the plot thickens with the sudden attempt to kill you. Glados is eventually revealed to be completely mad and purely insane in the game (can a computer be insane?) Just the lines spoken by glados is hilarious. Some of the things that she says is absolutely pure awesome comedy. She was the goal of the game really. Players were more determined to get through each room and puzzle just because of the computer guiding you through the environments.

The game was going to have multiple characters and add more complexity to it than was already there, but in the end we really essentially just got Glados and you know what? I was absolutely fine with it because it really worked well. Other characters would have probably just ruined it for me. I liked the pure interaction and words from Glados and just Glados alone. Glados was so very well received that the game was considered to be one of the greatest game characters ever created. I have to agree. The quality of the writing in the game was spot on and every line was engaging. Glados was just purely witty. A number of websites even had her as one of the greatest game villains which I also agree with. Overall she was a great character and even though she wasn't even the main character, she was awesome.

I had to include this villain. Mario might have been jumping over barrels in the beginning thrown by Donkey Kong, but Bowser was his real enemy. It wasn't known then, but this over-grown powerful turtle-like (He is a turtle right?) koopa is Mario's true enemy and arch nemesis. Bowser has been Mario's enemy since the first Super Mario Brothers game. His plan (as always) involved in him kidnapping the princess and taking her away. I think the only time they weren't really enemies is in the Mario and Luigi games on GBA and DS (I could be mistaken though). Since his debut, Bowser has appeared in nearly all the mario games in the series even the Kart racers.

You wouldn't think, but Bowser was first envisioned as an Ox.. Yes a freaking ox. However he ended up looking more like a turtle than the ox that they had planned him to be. They wanted Bowser to look cool. He looks kind of cool I guess for a turtle. I still like the ninja turtles better. Maybe if he was like a big mutant ninja turtle, but evil.. He has everything down, but the ninja part. Anything can be solved with lessons. Go get some ninja training now Bowser! Bowser's voice pretty much consisted of growls and roars. Bowser is the king of koopas, but he isn't the king of villains in my opinion. His plans always fail and backfire in his face. He still is great though, but he is not number one for me. Overall, Bowser is an evil turtle, but at the same time.. He is an evil turtle. (Does that make sense? Knowing me probably not).

That closes my list of my favorite and most memorable game characters. If you noticed, I didn't include alot of the new game characters out there like Kratos, Masterchief, Nathan Drake, and so on. It's not that they aren't cool (because alot of them are). They just don't hold enough history for me yet. They are still too new in my book. All the characters I like have a past. A very deep past. I however would like to honorably mention Bubsy and Kirby because they were a big part of my gaming past too. Hope you liked my little trip into my favorite characters and I hope they are some of your favorites as well. Thanks for reading!