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The Top 7... Lazy Character Clichés

Copy, paste, unoriginality! The most overused archetypes of all time

Words: Charlie Barratt, GamesRadar US

Description: Dude, your parents and teachers just don't understand... but hey, this focus-tested, anthropomorphic, cereal box reject totally gets you! Whoa, he even wears sneakers! What better way of reminding everyone who's boss than by wasting your allowance money on this bargain bin crap of a game... and its sequels? Kid power!

Common characteristics:

  • Any type of animal species acceptable, so long as it can wear shades, goggles and/or a backwards baseball cap. Radical!
  • Often engaged in some sort of extreme sports activity or mild criminal caper. To the max!
  • Whether flashing a sarcastic smile, mischievous grin or rebellious snarl, must display as many teeth as possible. Wicked!
  • Spiky hairstyle (furstyle?) welcome, but crazily angled eyebrows preferred. Bodacious!
  • Either giving the player a bitchin' thumbs-up sign or pointing defiantly at itself as if to say, "Yeah, I'm a windsurfing hippopotamus. What are YOU gonna do about it, gramps?"

 
(Download this collage as a desktop wallpaper!)

Possible Inspiration:


The Antidote:

Amaterasu, a white wolf goddess and the star of Okami, doesn't need "attitude." She has majesty, wisdom and grace instead. She doesn't need a skateboard or ray gun to make her interesting, because her creators understood that animals are already fascinating enough on their own.


 
53 Comments
Order Comments: Newest First | Oldest First
CuddlyBomber  - 1 year 2 months ago 
Ah Man i just listened to talkradar11 and the top 7 was hilarious.
MSCR  - 1 year 2 months ago 
Pretty good article, a bit preachy sometimes and I fail to see how that raziel thing is a prettyboy. Moody and shit sure, but the guy runs about naked, has no visible genitals and isn't half his face missing?

Other than that, pretty insightful stuff.
Coolbeans69  - 1 year 2 months ago 
That was pretty funny
Psyrate  - 1 year 1 month ago 
The truth has never been so hilarious.
melloe  - 1 year 1 month ago 
well done. but you forgot Samus in the collage of masked characters?
Major_Wuss  - 1 year 19 days ago 
LOL at including Viva Pinata in the Animal with Attitude page.
NeotericDope  - 11 months 30 days ago 
All of these fall into the antidote category:

Black stereotype antidote:Eli Vance (Half Life)

Half naked woman antidote: Alyx Vance (Half Life), Faith (Mirrors Edge), Zoey (Left 4 Dead)

Masked men antidote: (Mega Man) not completely masked, but he's covered in a helmet and owns.

Love interest antidote: Once again Alyx Vance (Half Life)
crustdbeat  - 11 months 29 days ago 
forgot about jax from MK,

they emphasize his arms a tad dont they?
crustdbeat  - 11 months 29 days ago 
Thanks for the wallpaper!!
Cwf2008  - 11 months 10 days ago 
Uh technically Samus isn't always masked. I mean they've shown her face a few times in some of the games
zeldagirl64  - 10 months 19 days ago 
I dunno, Zelda has managed some good emotion from Ocarina of Time and on. Tetra? Yea, the cocky one. Sheik was a cliched character. It was kind of the Brooding Pretty Boy only... Sheik is Zelda so she's a girl. But Zelda has managed more emotion in Twilight Princess, that wasn't SO frail as usual.
93bleach  - 10 months 14 days ago 
Every character in sonic ever has had an atttitude.
synthetictwist  - 9 months 4 hours ago 
I'm glad Chell was on this list. "She's not an effing model? What was Valve thinking?"

Oh that's right. They WERE thinking.
td823934  - 8 months 22 days ago 
You forgot "Mute Adventurer". Like Crono. Or Link. Or Mario.
ryno  - 8 months 21 days ago 
i couldent agree more with ammy from Okami she is awsome
Mr.Epic64  - 8 months 17 days ago 
Actually, Mario says "Yahoo!", "Here We Go!", "Wa, Wa , Wa, WAHOO!", Oh no!" any many other things. Eat that td823934.
Danomeon  - 8 months 5 days ago 
I'm surprised the antidote for stereotypical black people wasn't Luis from left 4 dead. He is skinny, never uses slang or excessively swears, speaks perfect english, appears as a hardworking citizen, is scrawny and not all that muscular, has a positive attitude without saying, "I am awesome.", cracks a few clever jokes, and is completely dressed in fancy office clothes.

Another character would be the black man from the Half-life series (I can't remember his name, one of his legs is missing and he *SPOILER* dies at the end of episode 2.)
td823934  - 7 months 17 days ago 
Ok, Mr.Epic64, he makes sound. I apoligize. But does he ever say anything beyond the occasional onamatopeia? By the way, while I'm here, I just realized something. You missed another category, the "Arrogant Bad-guy". Let's see, there's M. Bison, Seth, Vega, wow, all Street Fighter characters. Maybe I've been playing too much.
td823934  - 7 months 17 days ago 
On a side note, Knuckles actually belongs in the "Brooding Pretty Boy" category as well, I noticed.
kittens  - 6 months 8 hours ago 
I've got to admit, I love the masked mystery man. The sort of half robot cyborg ninja thing will always be cool. In mgs, I didn't really like Raiden until he became a cyborg ninja. Mostly because his jaw was metal, which is awesome.
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