HomeFeatures
The 10 most annoying children in PC gamesOne Off The List
One Off The List
Children, life’s great copy-paste. Adorable, drooling idiots with no self-control and a habit of yelling embarrassing facts to the entire supermarket. In our everyday lives, human children are a snotty emblem of hope, vulnerability, and aspiration. In videogames, they are a cursed harbinger of escort missions, narrative roadblocks, “cutesy” voice acting, and precocious dialogue. They are annoying. But hold on, that’s the point. Many of them are meant to be that way. So here is a list of the 10 most annoying children in PC games. And perhaps, the best annoying?
Cuno -Disco Elysium
Your second-eldest son -Crusader Kings 2
Listen, Sancho, we both know Marcos was here first. He is the heir, and you are the spare. Stop trying to squeeze the kingdom’s spymaster for information. You are playing a dangerous game. She has been involved in the suspicious deaths of 15 men, and only half of those were on my orders. No, I won’t let you learn the noble art of warfare either. I told you, you’re going into the priesthood. When you are cardinal, you’ll thank me. You don’t want the Kingdom of Leon anyway. It’s full of dust. The neighbours are always singing at the crack of dawn about God, but it’s the wrong God. We need you in Rome, Sancho, where you’ll be nice and comfortable. No, don’t write to me. Write to your mother, the spymaster.
Jason -Heavy Rain
Jason? JASON. Oh, he’s right there.
The Little Lamplight gang -Fallout 3
The first words you hear from the children of this horrible cave community contains the phrase: “I’ll blow your fucking head off.” That’s inconvenient. You need to pass through this cavern to continue the main quest, and there is no getting around the posse of ill-behaved micropeople. The insolence of the Little Lamplight kids knows no limit. They do not allow adults into their settlement. They live in some opaque system of high-grade anarchy. They are functionally immortal, and cannot be killed with bombs or knives. That may have something to do with videogame studios traditionally being somewhat squeamish about casual child murder, but it doesn’t change the facts. These kids are invincible, and they are in the way.
The Polyhedron kids -Pathologic 2
These hideous orphans and runaways have all the haughty airs you’d expect from someone living in annon-Newtonian physical impossibility, safe from the ravages of the streets. They’re like the Little Lamplight gang, but smug.
The Catalyst -Mass Effect 3
Eli -Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Inexplicably livid warchild and talisman for Hideo Kojima’s career. It’snot over yet, but maybe it should be.
Hope Estheim -Final Fantasy XIII
Hope is a central character and a weeTiduslookalike. He witnesses his ma kick the bucket after ill-advisedly following fellow melodramatist Snow into battle, and spends the rest of the game throwing charged elipses at the man he deems responsible. This subplot feels like it’s trying to recapture the character of Vivi fromFinal Fantasy IX, a kid swept up in events beyond his control, levelled with a curse, and trying to make sense of his own mortality. It didn’t work. Everyone hates Hope. He spends an unimaginably long time mumbling vengeance under his breath, while failing to do anything about his low-burning anger, like a tiny, furious Hamlet. The only reason his equally irksome co-annoyer Vanille does not get an entry in this list herself, is that she is 190 years old due to a technicality. The technicality is crystals.
Your third-eldest son - Crusader Kings 2
Carlos!? Didn’t I send you to Lithuania? What are you doing here with that company of mercenaries? Carlos, listen to me. No, stop. Listen.
One Off The List from… the most peaceful gardens
Last week we took a stroll throughthe 8 most peaceful gardens in PC games. Ah, how pleasant. But some of you came armed with concrete and indifference, seeking to pave over one of these charmed idylls. It’s…Stardew Valley.
The tomato and truffle farming simulator is to be struck from the record because it seems peaceful but is in fact the “ultimate capitalist fever dream”, according to list-trimmer “Ethalis”, who lampoons the managerial spirit of Big Cauliflower. “Nice, relaxing flowers?” they say. “No way, can’t monetize that! Sub-optimal crops? Nope, sorry radishes but gardening is a cruel world, get productive or get out you lazy non-berry! A nice little fence? No time for that!”
