SkeleTONS: nearly every bony bastard in the gaming universe

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A pictorial history of our skinless friends, from NES to PS3

Oblivion’s straight-up fantasy world doesn’t dick around – these skeletons are of classic design. No more, no less.

With so much gooey red stuff to spew, Kratos’ skeletal enemies take a backseat so he can splatter as much gore as possible. When they’re there, you probably won’t even notice.

Private Eye Fred Neuman gains the ability to swap heads for various abilities, one of which happens to be semi-skeletony, albeit with razor hands and some kind of brain matter lining the sides.

Speaking of stuff lining bones, these baddies are stuck in neither zombie nor skeleton limbo. Just a bit too meaty to fully qualify, but juuuust gone enough to sneak in. Well played, guys.

Costumes play a big part in Bully, Rockstar’s other-other game from 2006 and twice again in 2008. Yes, all the same game.

No, not the latest sequel that’s being criticallyannihilated, we’re talking classic-ass Golden Axe from the arcade, the one that devoured quarters, ended relationships and caused DCFS to remove at least one child from their inattentive parents.

Okay that probably never happened. But still, cool skeleton. Those missing teeth mean he got in a fight, and since he’s still here, that means he won.

Earlier we said Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts was the hardest franchise of all time. Ninja Gaiden might be runner up, partially thanks to this bone dragon from the Xbox remake, or PS3 remake-remake.

Kingdom Hearts sends you a-rescuin’ all over the Disneyverse, but there’s nary a world we’d rather visit than Halloween Town, home of Jack Skellington and most of Hot Topic’s employees.

Brett Elston
Brett Elston

A fomer Executive Editor at GamesRadar, Brett also contributed content to many other Future gaming publications including Nintendo Power, PC Gamer and Official Xbox Magazine. Brett has worked at Capcom in several senior roles, is an experienced podcaster, and now works as a Senior Manager of Content Communications at PlayStation SIE.