As you’re probably aware, Valentine’s Day is tomorrow. To hell with that. Friday the 13th is today, and aside from developmentally disabled serial killers with machetes, that means one thing: bad luck.

Over the years, continually playing as the hero in videogames has taught us to have a generally optimistic outlook when faced with challenges, to believe deep down that, whatever happens, we can overcome any obstacle. But for every dauntless hero, there are about a million hapless losers who, try as they might, just can’t win. Ever. Usually they’re the guys you thoughtlessly fill with bullets, but videogames are littered with sympathetic nobodies who serve as a constant reminder that success doesn’t come easy, if at all. They’re just plain unlucky, and these are the unluckiest of them all.

WARNING: The following article is filled with spoilers. Proceed at your own risk.

From: Metal Gear Solid series

Unlucky because: The story of Metal Gear’s lovable whipping boy is long, sad and almost tiresomely gross, but it at least has a happy ending. That’s the main reason Johnny Sasaki is No. 13 on this list, instead of No. 1. Johnny wasn’t always unlucky, either; in fact, to hear him tell it, he was on the fast-track to a promising military career, when all of a sudden he was swept up in the madness of Metal Gear Solid’s terrorist plot. Since then, his luck turned to shit. We mean literally; his chronic, uncontrollably noisy diarrhea is the stuff of legend.

Sasaki’s been a running joke ever since his memorable first appearance in Metal Gear Solid. You might not have recognized him or his importance at the time, because in the end he was just another in a long line of incompetent armed guards in balaclavas. But you probably remember his catchphrase.

Even if you don’t, you probably remember seeing his bare ass lying on the freezing Alaskan concrete after one Meryl Silverburgh bonked him on the head and stripped him of his uniform, dignity and health in one fell swoop.


Above: It’s like one of those dreams where, instead of doing your job, you pass out naked and everyone stares at your taint

For all his horrible luck, Johnny’s blessed with the ability to survive just about anything. So not only did he resurface later in the game with a cold and his first case of the runs (only to be bamboozled by Solid Snake and a bottle of ketchup), but he escaped the destruction at Shadow Moses and resurfaced in Metal Gear Solid 2. He was a little hard to find, but he’d show up from time to time to complain, if you knew where to look and where to listen.

Above: It’s hard to listen to this and not feel a little sorry for the guy

Johnny might think his streak of bad luck started when he met Meryl, but as Metal Gear Solid 3 and MGS: Portable Ops revealed, the poor guy never had a chance. Incompetence and bad luck run in his family, as we learned from the elder Sasaki, who befriends Naked Snake/Big Boss, ultimately joins him and then dies in his arms in one of Portable Ops’ saddest scenes.

Above: This isn’t where he dies

Above: This, on the other hand…

It wasn’t until Metal Gear Solid 4 that Johnny – now codenamed Akiba – really played a major role in the series. Granted, it was still a role that revolved largely around farting loudly, pooping his pants, exposing his ass and basically being a clown, but it was major nonetheless.

Above: Seriously, this is all anyone remembers about this game

We did say his story has a happy ending, though. We won’t spoil exactly what it is, but apparently all he had to do to dramatically reverse his fortunes was to take off his mask and sunglasses, proving that bad things only happen to supporting characters who cover their faces. That’s a lesson someone else down this list could stand to take to heart.

Above: Johnny Sasaki’s finest hour. Well, maybe second finest

From: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney series

Unlucky because: Somehow, Phoenix Wright’s feckless childhood friend can’t seem to keep from being involved in murder cases, at least peripherally. It’s not that he’s a bad person, or even particularly suspicious; it’s just that he has an unusual knack for always being in the exact wrong place at the exact wrong time. And also for being gullible, easily manipulated, more than a little dim and prone to hiding key facts if he thinks they’ll get him in trouble.

Consequently, he’s always in trouble, to the point that there’s a running joke among Wright and his friends that “if something smells, it must be the Butz.” And never is he in greater trouble than in the game’s first case, in which he’s been framed for murder. Even after his name is cleared, Butz can’t seem to keep his nose clean.

Huge chunks of his time throughout the series are spent sitting on a witness stand, blithely stumbling through cross-examinations with no clear idea of how he got there or why people keep asking him all these questions. He means well, but somehow he just keeps (unreliably) witnessing crimes, accidentally tampering with crime scenes and involving himself with people who’ve committed crimes and/or tampered with crime scenes. And while that’s going on, he somehow finds time to be dumped by an endless series of models and celebutantes with names that vaguely evoke real-world celebrity couples.

Despite his frequent, irritating and mildly loathsome appearances, Larry is, in the end, a nice guy. It’s hard not to feel sorry for him on some level, if not exactly like him outright. We just wish he had the ability to learn anything from experience, ever.

From: Leisure Suit Larry series

Unlucky because: The original 40-year-old virgin, Larry Laffer has exactly one goal in life: to get laid. It’s not easy, considering he’s a four-foot-tall, balding, hydrocephalic dork whose fashion sense was laughably dated when his series debuted in the mid-‘80s. But Larry’s remained dauntless, aggressively pursuing the beautiful women he meets with results that, at best, could be described as “mixed.”

His games might be sex comedies, but sex is something that’s always dangled just out of Larry’s reach. He’ll do anything to get it, often to the point of putting his own life in danger, but even when he lives, something usually happens to interrupt his conquests. A piece of machinery might explode, an “erotic” workout session might go horribly awry or his intended might suddenly reveal an inconvenient penis. He’ll usually find romance by the end of the game, but by the time that rolls around, his PG-13 sexual misadventures will have left scores of misinformed teenage boys just as frustrated as Larry.

The final insult to Larry’s self-worth came when, after six adventure games, he was abruptly retired and replaced by a near-identical nephew named Larry Lovage. Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude sees him shoved into a greatly diminished role as the game’s tutorial narrator, although he does make an appearance at the seedy Lefty’s Too bar, glumly circling personal ads and trying to forget how good the spotlight felt, even at its most humiliating.

From: Punch-Out!!

Unlucky because: Poor Glass Joe. Poor wimpy, pathetic Glass Joe. Poor wimpy, pathetic, useless 99-time loser who’d probably lose a fistfight to a baby, assuming the baby wanted to sully its record by fighting Glass Joe.

Above: That one KO is from the time Glass Joe knocked himself out by slipping in the shower

If you lose against Glass Joe, you lose at videogames. All videogames. In fact, if there were any justice in the world, your loss would be met with a huge, pixelated middle finger just before your NES self-destructed. Glass Joe isn’t meant to win. He’s meant to be a vaguely French punching bag that occasionally remembers to hit back with weak jabs.

Above: We expect even less from him now that it’s 22 years later

And yet, there’s something weirdly poignant about a man who fights a hundred matches and loses all but one of them, but keeps on fighting. Joe doesn’t even seem to want to win; he just wants to survive the match and go home. What could he possibly hope to achieve? Does he really think this is his night? Maybe fighting an opponent half his size is a last-ditch effort to salvage his dignity and convince himself that, yes, he can be a winner.

Above: Joe tastes the glove, and finds it delicious

Even after he realizes he doesn’t stand a chance, he continues to fight on, like Rocky Balboa without any discernable talent or strength. Is he getting off on this? Maybe if we give him his hundredth thrashing, he’ll finally give up on this mad dream of his.

Above: And then we can all laugh at his ridiculous 1980s trading card