This seemed mainly to just be a list of characters that are good and while I agree that Snake is the best if you wanted manly characters you need look no further than the cast of Gears of War.
Cloud? For real? From what I know of Cloud, he was a pretty moody guy who freaked out under pressure and attempted to assume the identity of his mentor. In all honesty, although PTSD is a real issue, (it shouldn't be a real issue in games, I know) that doesn't sound all too manly.
I don't know, I thought Nico from GTAIV was pretty manly. He actually had feelings and everthing, family was important to him, he always had nice cars and clothes, he's brave, he takes care of people around him, and at the end of the day after caving in a gang member's skull with a baseball bat he always has time to go out on a date with his girl.
@Cerunnos: your saying that Mario isn't manly? way more so than Master chief (remember GR you asked how many words a flame war could be stared with) Drake's killed an islandload of pirates and mutants, and for god's sake just LOOK at Captain Falcon. don't go making assumptions
@ corsair 89:
yeah, I considered Auron... choosing only 10 is a limiting factor. he'd definitely be part of #11-20
@ lots of commenters:
murdering people doesn't make you a Man. i chose to focus on characters who have personal qualities that make them worthy role-models.
@TheSuburbiaRuins:
Good eye sir, that is in fact the woman who shrilly wails "They're killing the women," etc. and points you in the right direction. However, I used that footage because it was an easily digestible visual representation of Conan freeing women from bondage.
it may be a while - the first one took forever and i've been too busy to dig into the PC machinima tools. (my studio is Mac-based, so that doesn't help either!)