I had a few ideas for tonight's top five: Best enemy types, best powers, best locations... but I've decided that I'd focus on my favourite part of the InFamous games; the characters, This is spanning BOTH Infamous games, so...
SPOILER WARNING
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NUMBER 5
JOSEPH BERTRAND III
Believing he was sent by God to act as Earth's saviour, Bertrand's belief's were cemented when he finally found out he was, in fact, a conduit. Believing his "Higher Purpose" was to defeat The Beast, he used the Ray Sphere on himself, and became the first "Corrupted".
After becoming a towering monstrosity, Bertrand also gained the power to make more corrupted, and soon believed his higher purpose was to show the world the harm that Conduits were capable of. Bertrand is a perfect example of an antagonist who is trying to do what he thinks is best, even if it is misguided, and somewhat insane.
NUMBER 4
LUCY KUO
Lucy Kuo is an NSA agent who shows up at the start of InFamous 2, offering to take Cole to New Marais to increase his already strong powers. While in New Marais, however, she develops her own powers, and provides more up front aid to Cole, while also suggesting the more lawful, orderly choices in the game.
What's interesting about Kuo is, she is forced to develop her powers against her will. The first time we see the new Kuo, she's quite timid and scared, and clearly overwhelmed by the whole situation. Her normally in-control attitude breaks down and we see a rare glimpse at her more emotional side. What's more is, despite being a conduit, Kuo seems to value human life highly. But her personality is very much like her Ice powers. She is very cold, focused towards the goal (due to her agent training), but she's also somewhat brittle (compromising her own integrity and belief's just to survive).
NUMBER 3
ALDEN TATE
Alden Tate was one of the main antagonists in Infamous, and he makes the list for a number of reasons. First off, he's basically a Mega powerful Psychic Hobo. Video games need more interesting, out there ideas like that. Secondly, he's a somewhat sad, tragic character.
Alden was the heir to the First Sons, a secret society based around the advancement of humanity, including the engineering of special gifts and abilities. But the arrival of the mysterious and extremely powerful Kessler forced him out onto the streets. With no roof over his head and no-one looking out for him, Alden was forced to enhance his powers, and when the time came for Empire City to go into Lockdown, Alden Tate rose up, with his army of "Dustmen" and claimed dominion over an entire burrow of Empire City.
However, he stood between Cole McGrath and the Ray Sphere, the key to Cole's mysterious new powers. So, McGrath took Tate down, and the last we see of him is as he jumps from a bridge to what would have killed a normal man. But Alden isn't a normal man. If there's a sequel, it'd be damn cool to bring back this Telekinetic Psychic Hobo.
NUMBER 2
COLE McGRATH
It seems weird as putting the games protagonist as second on the list, but whatever, it doesn't mean he's a bad character. What's interesting is that there actually two distinct Cole McGraths to talk about.
If players choose the karmically "good" choices, Cole McGrath is a man who, despite being put in a tough position, uses his powers for the good of the many, despite the adversity he faces. He's blamed by the people of Empire City for the destruction caused by the Ray Sphere, but still he puts the good of the people over himself. In InFamous 2, "Good" Cole takes more of a Lawful approach, while still trying to help the masses.
InFamous Cole, on the other hand, is a selfish man, who uses the power he has gained for respect through fear, as well as to put himself above all others. Instead of feeding the masses, he scares survivors away from supplies so he and his friends can have them. In InFamous 2, he takes a more chaotic approach, choosing to use explosions that could harm bystanders to distract guards as he saves Agent Kuo, or tricking Rebels into following him by using Nix as a Militia imposter.
The one thing that would have made Cole Better, was if the final choice of Infamous 2 wasn't labelled Good or Evil. If they were neutral, a more important, heartfelt decision could have been made. Tough decisions are what life is all about, and we could have learnt something, not only about Cole, but ourselves with a little Grey. Not every situation is black and white, and Infamous 2's ending is as grey as they get. In short, whether Cole is good or evil, his final choices (so far) could be good or evil, all depending on the reasons he makes them.
NUMBER 1
ZEKE DUNBAR
Zeke isn't just your usual comic relief pudgy sidekick best friend of the hero character. While his is that to a degree, Zeke is one of the most human characters I've seen in any game. In Infamous, you get the feeling the Zeke is kind of jealous that Cole is the one who got superpowers, and those feelings are confirmed when he steals the Ray Sphere to use on himself. When it doesn't work, Zeke finds himself in Cole's bad books.
Zeke tries really hard to make amends, but Cole still never fully trusts him again until late in InFamous 2, leading to two really touching scenes between the old friends.
Who among us could really blame him for wanting to be like his best friend? Sure, it was kind of a dick move to steal the Ray Sphere, but Zeke had always been a fairly underimpressive person. To then have to stand next to a superhuman, it would have been terrible. So while you can' really condone his actions, you can understand them, and admire his attempts at being forgiven.
Ignoring all that, Zeke is more or less genuinely funny. And funny is a hard thing to pull off in most games. He's like someone I would honestly want to be friends with in real life, so kudos to Sucker Punch for making a character I actually care about, leading to my final decision in the game.
OK, so next monday, looks like a review for BRINK, unless some other people get in on the current Facebook Poll. See you next time!
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