Gaming's maddest mad doctors

Dr. Ned

From: Borderlands: The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned
Speciality: Bringing the dead back to life, totally not being related to Dr. Zed

Dr. Ned claims that he's just trying to help people, but the facade soon wears off when it becomes apparent that he's turned almost the entire population of Jakob's Cove into a race of violent, vomiting zombies. Dr. Ned tried to bring the dead back to life in an attempt to "extend the lives" of the island's workers, but carelessly ignored the possibility that his creations would grow powerful and hunger for human flesh. He accepted this might be mad, but that it didn't matter because at least he doesn't make popcorn when people are trying to work. Unlike his assistant Bill. Bill's corpse is now stitched to parts of Ned's other assistant, Frank. This is because Dr. Ned is nuts.

Dr. Wily

From: Mega Man
Speciality: Robotics, amazing hair

Dr. Wily is one of the original and most recognizable mad scientists in gaming. His notorious struggles against Mega Man, not to mention that inimitable hairdo, have made him a household name. He's also one of the least sane villains in gaming history, due to the fact that every plan he cooks up involves the creation of eight stupid robots with predictable patterns and weak spots. He designed Sheep Man. If that's not proof of insanity, then what is?

The Vykkers

From: Munch's Oddysee
Specialty: Animal testing, sadism

The Vykkers are an entire race of mad doctors, famed throughout Oddworld for pharmaceutical products created through intense animal testing. Their experiments aren't just driven by profit, however. They're also cruel sadists who delight in causing suffering to others, although they despise feeling pain themselves. Their scientific breakthroughs allow them to survive for a very long time, able to outlive their own bodies. The fact they'd want to keep living when they look like tripedal raisins is a rather solid confirmation of madness, too.

Dr. Robotnik

From: Sonic the Hedgehog
Speciality: Cyborgs, eggs

Dr. Robotnik (or Eggman if you prefer) is one bad prat. While clearly a gifted mind, his obsession with trapping innocent woodland critters inside murderous robotic sarcophagi is more than a little worrying. So is his alarmingly lush facial hair – what sane man thinks that’s a good fashion statement? That is to say nothing of his lust for all things egg-like in nature. Seriously, an egg is more aerodynamic than a brick, but its shape is nonetheless an unacceptable stencil when designing airborne vessels. Oh Robotnik, you maniac, when will you learn?

The Medic

From: Team Fortress 2
Speciality: Healing, hurting

To sign yourself up for Team Fortress, you'd already have to be pretty unstable, and the Medic does little to dissuade the assumption. The Medic is crucial to any successful team as a healer and protector, but he generally regards the healing process as an unintended side effect of his playing God. If anything, his many in-game quips indicate that he'd rather be hurting as opposed to helping. Years of medical training just for a chance to stick a bonesaw in someone's head? Yeah, the Medic is out of his German mind.

Dr. Steinman, Dr. Suchong, Dr. Alexander

From: BioShock, BioShock 2
Speciality: Being part of Rapture's 1,000-strong mad doctor population

Apparently, when Andrew Ryan was designing Rapture, his vision of an underwater utopia included as many moonstruck medical professionals as he could fit in a bathysphere. The BioShock games are crawling with mad Splicer doctors who scream about there being semen all over the place while firing revolvers at anything they don't like. However, the common delirious docs pale in comparison to Dr. Steinman, Dr. Suchong and Dr. Alexander, three men who compete only with other for the privilege of being called gaming's most psychotic practitioner.

Steinman is a plastic surgeon/reconstructive artist who became convinced he was blessed by Aphrodite and started to use unwilling human flesh as his canvas. Suchong was a guiltless monster with zero compassion and the lack of conscience needed to perform medical experiments on little girls. Meanwhile, Gilbert Alexander used himself as a guinea pig and tried to become a walking memory bank, only to turn instead into a pulsating mass of warped flesh and total, gibbering, incurable lunacy.

Suddenly, having a fetish for eggs doesn't seem so bad.

Mar 30, 2011

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