Santa Claus. Father Christmas. Kris Kringle. St. Nick. He's the most benevolent man in the history of the entire existance of the world. The human embodiment of the generosity, joy and Olympic-standard eating that Chrstmas is all about. Truly, he is the best of all of us. So why on earth would you want to fight him? As non-instinctive actions go, it's right up there with sending kittens to war.

But video games make us do it more than you might expect. In fact there are plenty of games that take in, or even culminate in, a violent throwdown with the best person ever. Sometimes these games try to come up with a good reason for it. Sometimes, of course, the jolly bearded man you battle isn't the real Santa at all. And in one case it turns out that fighting Santa is possibly the best thing you'll ever do. You're intrigued, aren't you? So click onward and find out what we're on about.

How and why are you fighting Santa? It's a pre-Christmas apocalypse and this time the Mayans are not involved. Instead, the awesome, fearful power of a long out-of-use stone calendar is replaced by the slightly more effective threat of a DNA warping zombification virus. It's early December. The streets are awash with blood. Chaos and violence erupts from every doorway and back alley. A hackneyed joke about Christmas shopping rears its ugly head, but fear not. We're going to be far too classy to run with it.

Being one of a tiny percentage resistant to the tasty delights of cranial offal cuisine, it's your task to fight your way through the stinking mob in order to find someone who can turn your vein juice intio a bona fide cure. Given the time of year, the flesh-hungry masses comprise an influx of bearded, previously jolly men in red coats. But mid-zombie apocalypse, there's no time to be sentimental. He needs detonating into pate just like the rest of them.

Is he the real Santa? We hope not. A world without Santa is not a world worth saving.

How and why are you fighting Santa? Back to the Multiverse uses parallel universes to create a wildly eclectic, thrillingly unpredictable narrative/really cheap method of mixing up the level design without requiring any reall attempt at coherence.

In one of those universes, Stewie and Brian discover that due to the rise of online shopping (satire!) Santa has become redundant and has turned his factory into a freelance manufacturing plant for any and all bidders. He's currently building weapons for main antagonist and Stewie's evil(ler) twin Bertram, so the pair ignore that none of this makes the slightest bit of logical sense when you really think about it and head off to take the big man down. Which they do via a rather dull boss fight.

Is he the real Santa? Yes, but only in the universe that this particular level takes place in, so ours remains completely safe. Hurrah!

How and why are you fighting Santa? Because Clayfighter has always been such a 'hilarious', 'quirky' and no doubt quantifiably 'wacky' series, and because its mascot character is a snowman, it was crushingly inevitable that Santa would eventually appear. And in the third game he did. In an explosion of pioneering obviousness he was conceived and realised as a walking fat joke, fighting in a pseudo-sumo fashion and with his belly out because "LOL LOOK SANTA IS FAT!". Oh, and his finishing move is to butt-slam himself on top of his stunned enemy, wedge them up his crack, and fart out their bones. Keep it classy, Clayfighter.

The storyline reason for fighting him? Sumo Santa is sort of an evil version of Santa, and a rival of Bad Mr. Frosty. He's been exiled to the tropical Klaymodo Island since Frosty took control of the North Pole and he now wants it back. So, you know, fighting.

Is he the real Santa? Probably not. Though it' s all a bit vague. Let's say no, because the real Santa couldn't possibly be that crap.

How and why are you fighting Santa? Discovering that the deadly Maimtron 9000 that attacked their street was sent by Santa, Sam & Max head to the North Pole and immediately have a defensive Santa stick a gun in their faces. Which, let's face it, is a bit of an upgrade from coal in the stocking. Eventually discovering that one of the elves is possessed by a demon, they perform an excorsism and seal said eldritch nightmare in a jelly. Day saved?

No. Santa then eats the jelly and turns the gun on them once more, this time less as a defensive measure, more as a deliberately murdery gesture. The two eventually knock him out using a Rube Goldberg contraption comprising a cannon, a present and a toy plane. Eventually the source of the demon is revealed as an administration error. He was meant to be sent to Satan, not Santa, so Sam & Max box up the bearded fella and post him to Hell.

Is he the real Santa? Unfortunately it seems so, despite looking a lot like Colonel Sanders.

How and why are you fighting Santa? It's basically self-defence. He just turns up halfway through the obligatory ice level and starts attacking you. You see this Santa doesn't have toys in his bag. He has only death, by way of a seemingly infinite supply of bombs. Which makes it rather a shame that we used up the "worse than a lump of coal" joke in the last entry. Damn.

Anyway, given that it's the caring, sharing season of peace, goodwill and forgiveness there's only one way to deal with the little bugger. Through the tried and tested medium of a barrel to the face. Given how cold it is, that's really going to sting. Incidentally, the boss of this level is a naked white-bearded muscle mutant with literal claws. We think we see what they did there.

Is he the real Santa? Possibly. Don't let the colour of his suit fool you. Traditionally Santa doesn't have to wear red. Though we can only justify his behaviour by theorising that someone swapped the sherry and biscuits for PCP this year.

How and why are you fighting Santa? Very little reason other than that it's Christmas. Literally. Every year, brutal co-op arena shooter Killing Floor has a special Twisted Christmas event, bringing a themed festive map and the gift of new high powered weaponry for all. During the event, the game's enemies are reskinned as evil Santas and evil cyborg Santas, as well as mutant elves, drill-handed nutcrackers, murderous carolers and the most horrific snowman ever to ruin the Christmas dreams of an innocent child.

In 2010, the event took place in a sinister grotto. In 2011 the festive fragging occured in an ice cave. In 2012? Space. Obviously. Seriously, what did you expect? Weirdo.

Is he the real Santa? We like to assume not, given that a) there's more than one of him and b) the thought of this guy having nocturnally snuck into our bedrooms year after year makes us want to hose our childhoods down with bleach.

How and why are you fighting Santa? Because you don't realise he's Santa until you've defeated him. You see the boss of Secret of Mana's Ice Palace is the mighty bearded Frost Gigas, the coldest and most blue of the world's three elemental giants.

Once he goes down though? Santa. He turns into Santa. Or rather he turns back into Santa. You see he's not really one of the Giga bros. What actually happened was that after becoming disheartened by children starting to lose faith in the true meaning of Christmas, Santa hatched a plan to grow an epic Christmas tree using one of the world's mythical Mana seeds. The idea backfired and the seed turned him into the Frost Gigas. But now he's saved! Because you, er... tried to kill him.

Is he the real Santa? Yes! His grand, selfless plan for the benefit of the world's children proves this, as does the appearance of Rudolph after the fight. So not only have you liberated the Ice Country and taken another step towards saving the world, you've also saved Christmas as well, probably for all worlds in the multiverse. Consider yourself coal-exempt for the rest of your life.

Are there any more games that force you to beat down the benevolent beard?* Do you know of any games with particularly note-worthy Santa fights that we didn't include here? Let us know in the comments.

And while we're on the subject of nonsensical face-offs, why not check out a couple of our semi-related features? Our ultimate character battle would be a good place to start, as would our investigation into just how messed up Marvel vs. Capcom 3's character power levels are.

*There definitely are. We found a few when we were researching this feature.