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Games where you're not the protagonist

Mark Richard

Arcane
Joined
Mar 14, 2016
Messages
1,192
Recently the topic has come up on my Codex travels a few times, so I'd like to jot some down for future reference. What I'm speaking of are games where all the important narrative themes (love, friendship, sacrifice, betrayal, redemption, etc) happen to somebody else. You exist to help the true hero fulfil their destiny, and expect to become a footnote in the history books at best.

Enter the Matrix - This game features over an hour of original footage and turned out to be supplementary to The Matrix Reloaded. It follows Niobe & Ghost, two characters with around 5 minutes of screentime in the movie. You probably don't remember them since their sole contribution was to act as a moving platform for someone who actually mattered. They've got more stuff to do in the game, but you're essentially stuck playing the B-team in a story that runs parallel to the events in Matrix Reloaded and occasionally intersects with it to remind you how unimportant you are. It's like playing a nondescript dwarf who follows The Fellowship of the Ring around to occasionally do some busywork for them.

The Lord of the Rings: War in the North - Oh right. That happened. I imagine this is an issue with a lot of movie-based games. So many of them insist on not only creating a new character for the player, but including them in the epic plot of the movie. The result is a game that severely limits your impact on the world so the events of the movie aren't compromised, providing you with tasks that can't possibly compete with the epic quest of the movie characters.

Battletech - The most personal thing that happens to the player in Battletech is when a distant acquaintance who once instructed the player in mechwarrior combat for a season is killed (it happen in the opening minutes, so forget the spoiler tag). The employer gets all the juicy stuff. She's betrayed by her royal family, leads a resistance movement, and is even a formidable mechwarrior to boot. So why are we not playing as her?

The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion - You work for a character who has a classic medieval fantasy origin built for a protagonist. Fostered as a child? Check. Grew up on a farm? Check. Unaware of their true lineage? Checkcheckcheck. Another RPG with the same setup came out recently, except it had the novel idea to put you in the role of that hero. Crazy, right? The name of the game was
Mary-Kate & Ashley: Spear of Destiny
 

Ninjerk

Arcane
Joined
Jul 10, 2013
Messages
14,323
In a sense, Final Fantasy Tactics is built around this theme. The story is told by a revisionist historian who stresses that this great figure of Delita is not really the hero he was thought to be and that a figure almost unknown to history, Ramza, should be recognized as such. I know it isn't exactly what you're looking for since it's essentially a subversion of the trope.
 

Ocelot

Learned
Joined
Feb 21, 2018
Messages
363
Mount and Blade: warband. You can be a noble's servant/commander and assist him with reuniting Calradia.
 

deuxhero

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
11,328
Location
Flowery Land
The 7th Fire Emblem game (released in the US as just "Fire Emblem) should count. You're a tactician who gives the protagonist (whichever of the three main characters it happens to be at the time) and their allies battle orders. You've got no lines, and your only visual appearance is a cloak covered map sprite (plus a tiny corner of one still image with the same outfit). On subsequent playthroughs it's actually possible to remove the tactician from the game entirely.

There's actually a few games like that with a create a character. The story is actually about someone else while you're just their mute friend that's really good at killing people.
 

Jokzore

Arbiter
Joined
Mar 18, 2017
Messages
623
KOTOR2 fits I suppose. In that world the main protagonist of the story has already come and gone. All you're doing is retracing his footsteps and trying to understand him. Every one of the major characters and locations has in some way been touched or influenced by Revan, yet you never meet him.

The whole thing is basically a big epilogue to the first game.

The ''footnote in history'' part is further reinforced in SWTOR. Shadow of Revan is supposed to be the ultimate conclusion of the stories told in KOTOR and KOTOR2 and the Exile is just a minor NPC.
 
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Jokzore

Arbiter
Joined
Mar 18, 2017
Messages
623
Starcraft you're just a commander doing his job, you don't even interact with the heroes of the story.
 

Mark Richard

Arcane
Joined
Mar 14, 2016
Messages
1,192
The ''footnote in history'' part is further reinforced in SWTOR. Shadow of Revan is supposed to be the ultimate conclusion of the stories told in KOTOR and KOTOR2 and the Exile is just a minor NPC.
That might have something to do with SWTOR and KOTOR being made by Bioware, and KOTOR 2 being made by a different company, Obsidian. I haven't played Fallout 4, but wouldn't be surprised if it made references to the Bethesda-made Fallout 3 and largely ignored the Obsidian-made New Vegas as well.
 

Hyperion

Arcane
Joined
Jul 2, 2016
Messages
2,120
Ogre Battle - You (Destin, as named in OB64) lead the revolution with the sole purpose to rescue, and place Tristan, the rightful heir, back on the throne. Doesn't prevent you from the option of usurping the throne for yourself, though.

Tactics Ogre - Same deal, really. Denim just wants to find his father, who was abducted for unknown reasons. Turns out his sister is the daughter of the late king, and everything one-eyed Lans has done was to try and find her.

Fire Emblem: Awakening - Chrom is the protagonist the entire duration of the game, but of course character you control, the Tactician, has a s-e-c-r-e-t.

Chrono Trigger / Chrono Cross - Serge is a little more important than Crono, as he's the dude whose body is capable of crossing timelines, but everything in the Crono universe really revolves around Schala, who's also technically Kid and Harle.

Dragon Age - Alistair is more important than The Warden technically.

The Last Remnant - Rush is adopted, while his sister, Irina is a descendant of some Empress, who can control Remnants.
 

Glaucon

Prophet
Joined
Sep 11, 2016
Messages
1,000
Ogre Battle - You (Destin, as named in OB64) lead the revolution with the sole purpose to rescue, and place Tristan, the rightful heir, back on the throne. Doesn't prevent you from the option of usurping the throne for yourself, though.

Tactics Ogre - Same deal, really. Denim just wants to find his father, who was abducted for unknown reasons. Turns out his sister is the daughter of the late king, and everything one-eyed Lans has done was to try and find her.

Fire Emblem: Awakening - Chrom is the protagonist the entire duration of the game, but of course character you control, the Tactician, has a s-e-c-r-e-t.

Chrono Trigger / Chrono Cross - Serge is a little more important than Crono, as he's the dude whose body is capable of crossing timelines, but everything in the Crono universe really revolves around Schala, who's also technically Kid and Harle.

Dragon Age - Alistair is more important than The Warden technically.

The Last Remnant - Rush is adopted, while his sister, Irina is a descendant of some Empress, who can control Remnants.
There's also the GBA Fire Emblem game, where you're literally a no-name "tactician" helping the Protagonists of the story achieve their goals.
 

Harold

Arcane
Joined
May 10, 2007
Messages
785
Location
a shack in the hub
BG2 - Irenicus is that emofag in the p&p group who rolled an edgy all-powerful elf sorcerer, started the campaign a few weeks before you & is now over-leveled and even more full of himself. Your campaign consists of you trying to catch up to him & tell him 'bitch, you ain't shit, stfu'. The game ends when you do so, because his campaign ends & your camapign proper can now finally start with ToB. Bad news for you is that, in the meanwhile, the GM was lured by the prospects of a curvy gf (NWN! Dem 3D graffix!) so your ToB campaign ends up being short & kinda shit.
 
Joined
Oct 13, 2012
Messages
1,205
Project: Eternity
BG2 - Irenicus is that emofag in the p&p group who rolled an edgy all-powerful elf sorcerer, started the campaign a few weeks before you & is now over-leveled and even more full of himself. Your campaign consists of you trying to catch up to him & tell him 'bitch, you ain't shit, stfu'. The game ends when you do so, because his campaign ends & your camapign proper can now finally start with ToB. Bad news for you is that, in the meanwhile, the GM was lured by the prospects of a curvy gf (NWN! Dem 3D graffix!) so your ToB campaign ends up being short & kinda shit.
Isn't that WotC/Hasbro fault though? IIRC they refused to extend 2e license so full game became small expansion.
 
Joined
Nov 23, 2017
Messages
4,014
MGS V
you're literally not the protagonist although it comes as a surprise

You are the protagonist, the protagonist just isn't who you thought he was. That his unless you picked up on something being up when the game started by having you create your own character.
 
Joined
Nov 23, 2017
Messages
4,014
I guess stuff like Nobunaga's Ambition: Sphere of Influence and Nobunaga's Ambition: Sphere of Influence - Ascension could fall into what you're talking about depending on the role you take.
 
Self-Ejected

RNGsus

Self-Ejected
Joined
Apr 29, 2011
Messages
8,106
Dungeon Keeper and Daggerfall were my first thought.
 

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