Fighting against insurmountable odds against a world-ending threat that could bring about the apocalypse to eventually save the day is the main storyline for a lot of games. There is a natural allure to playing the hero that draws people in, and games take advantage of that.
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Some games, however, flip the script. Instead of saving the world from something, you are the thing that the world needs saving from. In some cases, the truth is out in the open, and the game invites you to revel in the chaos and dance on the ashes. In other instances, the fact that you were the ultimate villain of the game is hidden until the very last second, when the developers pull the rug out from under you in a surprise twist.
Furi
The Harbinger of Death
The Stranger is the enigmatic protagonist of Furi, whose only goal is to escape the prison he finds himself in to secure his freedom by cutting down everyone who stands in his way. When the Stranger finally escapes from the prison, he finds out that he is bringing death and decay to the land through his existence alone. Simply by standing on land, all life around him withers and dies, indicating that his very presence is corrupting the Free World. The Stranger escapes to orbit to seek answers, where he finds The Star, an AI-controlled Mothership that tells him that he was originally a creation of the ship itself, a vanguard meant to see if the planet was worthy of assimilation.
The Stranger is then presented with two choices. He can either agree to help The Star assimilate the Free World, fulfilling his original purpose and bringing about a complete apocalypse, or fight against The Star and go against his own race. The Star warns him, however, that going with the latter option will not change the nature of his corrupting existence and that more invaders will come even if The Star perishes.
Elden Ring
The Lord of Chaos
The fate of the Lands Between is very much in the hands of the Tarnished in the lore of Elden Ring. They can help maintain the current order of things, break the cycle in favor of something else entirely, or burn the entire world to ashes.
In Elden Ring’s Lord of the Frenzied Flame ending, the Tarnished becomes the Lord of Chaos, drowning the world in fire and brimstone to destroy not only the Greater Will but everything else as well. Similarly, the Blessing of Despair ending also brings about an apocalypse of a sort, though one that is more of a slow death than an immediate cataclysm. In this ending, the Elden Ring gets infected with the Fell Curse, leaving all beings in the Lands Between subject to it, with no escape, even in death.
Plague Inc.
Design the Perfect Apocalypse
From the very outset of Plague Inc., there is no ambiguity in what the game wants you to do: end the world. Players assume the role of a sentient plague, one that can decide how it needs to grow and which mutations will help it circumvent human efforts to stop it in its tracks. When managed correctly, the plague can grow from a minor influenza-level disease into an extinction-level event in a matter of months. The goal is to help the plague grow, while ensuring it does not get neutralized by the world’s medical professionals and vaccines.
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The best part? The nature of the apocalypse is entirely in your hands. To start, there are the bog-standard evolution pathways for the plague to follow like bacteria, virus, fungus, and parasite. But the real fun begins with the special plagues like the Necroa Virus that can turn people into zombies, the Neurax Worm that can turn the infected into mind-controlled slaves, the Simian Flu that can give apes sapiences (inspired by Planet of the Apes), and the Shadow Plague that can bring about a Vampire apocalypse.
Destroy All Humans!
Slapstick Human Extinction
Destroy All Humans! Is an open-world action adventure game where players assume the guise of an alien named Crypto (Cryptosporidium-137) whose goal is to harvest brain stems from humans in 1950s America to gather special alien DNA that can save his species from extinction. Crypto uses everything from alien guns and his psychic abilities to UFOs mounted with Death Rays that can level entire districts to wreak havoc on any and all humans he comes across.
From the perspective of the player, Destroy All Humans! Is a fun game filled with unchecked violence, slapstick comedy, and raunchy alien jokes that are all in good fun. For the humans caught in Crypto’s warpath, however, it is very much the end of the world.
Prototype 1 & 2
Biological Weapon of Mass Destruction
In Prototype 1, Alex Mercer firmly falls into the anti-hero category. He is ruthless, violent, and does not seem to care overly much about the loss of human life in his quest for survival and truth, but cannot be called “evil” in the strictest sense. Between the military trying to erase Manhattan from the map and the super mutants terrorizing the city with abandon, Mercer seems like he’s making the best of a bad situation. By the end of the game, Mercer even saves the city from a virus outbreak that would’ve spelled its doom, saving the lives of the people inside.
Fast forward to Prototype 2, and Mercer is no longer the anti-hero players knew, but a true villain disillusioned by humanity’s cruelty. Betrayed by his lover, he grows to think that all humans are worthless and deserve to be consumed as biomass to create a unified whole that would put an end to all suffering.
InFAMOUS
Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
At the end of InFAMOUS, players learn that Kessler, the antagonist, was actually Cole from an alternate future who had traveled back in time in order to stop the Beast, his nemesis and an extremely powerful Conduit who killed his wife and children in the alternate timeline. Kessler’s goal was to prepare present-day Cole for the future, to have him kill the Beast in his stead. Depending on which type of Karma players accumulated during their playthrough, there are two possible endings for InFAMOUS.
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In the good ending, Cole decides to heed the warning Kessler (future Cole) gave him, taking up the mantle of the hero of Empire City and getting ready to face the Beast. In the bad ending, Cole becomes arrogant, believing himself to be the strongest, scoffing at Kessler for being fearful of the Beast. Empire City falls to ruin as a result of Cole’s actions, turning from a thriving metropolis into a wasteland without laws or rule, where the strong rule and the weak are their slaves.
Spec Ops: The Line
What Was It All For?
Spec Ops: The Line’s protagonist, Martin Walker, is one of the best examples of the protagonist being the villain all along. In his belief that he alone has an understanding of what’s really happening in Dubai, he unleashes White Phosphorus on a company of soldiers, killing them to the last man, guns down “rebels” and “insurgents” he believes to be working for the enemy, and helps destroy the city’s last water supply, dooming everyone in Dubai to a slow death.
At the end of the game, it is revealed that Walker was suffering from some serious hallucinations that made him think he was talking to Konrad, justifying the atrocities he was committing, when in actuality, Konrad had been dead for a long time. Because of the CIA’s involvement, he thought that the 33rd Battalion had turned traitors, when it was really the CIA that was there on a covert mission to kill everyone in Dubai in order to prevent the news of American intervention in the region from leaking out. Only at the very end of Spec Ops: The Line does Walker truly realize the extent of his mistakes. But by then, the only choice he has left is whether he can face them head-on or hide his head in the sand once more and shift the blame to someone else, like he’s always done.
Shadow of the Colossus
A Deal With the Devil
In Shadow of the Colossus, players take on the role of Wander, a warrior wielding an ancient sword who wants to revive a sacrificed girl named Mono. In his quest, Wander encounters Dormin, a mysterious entity that promises him that it can bring Mono back to life if he completes a task for it: kill the sixteen colossi that roam the Ancient Lands. Dormin warns Wander, however, that he will have to pay a large price to see the girl fully resurrected, but Wander agrees to complete the task anyway.
Only, Dormin doesn’t reveal the whole truth. When players eventually succeed in killing all sixteen colossi and return to Dormin to resurrect Mono, they find out that colossi existed for a reason. In actuality, these beings were living seals meant to imprison Dormin in the Shrine of Worship. By killing them, Wander had unknowingly released this mysterious being from its prison. Although Dormin does get sealed again by another NPC at the end, the fact remains that all of Wander’s efforts leading up to this moment may very well have been in service to an entity that would bring about the apocalypse if it were allowed to go free.
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