Characters that are bat-shit insane tend to be the most interesting these days, and there’s certainly no shortage of them in such games that appropriately have the archetypes of mental-illness, like the Fallout series or even Grand Theft Auto. These characters have a great impact on our experiences with these games in a hilarious (or otherwise terrifying) fashion, so it’s only fair to give a few the spotlight here. Possible Spoilers ahead for Final Fantasy 6, Batman Arkham City, Silent Hill 2, and Metal Gear Solid, so if you haven’t played those games, you’re crazy for not playing them already and even crazier for wanting to spoil them for yourself.

Gary – Fallout 3

Gary? Gary. Gary Gary Gary. GARY! GAAAAAry. Probably the best NPC in all of Fallout 3, you find Gary in Vault 108 just not really doing anything and upon conversing with this man he just says his name over and over again like he’s an abused Pokemon. It sounds like nothing at all but through talking with Gary you find that he’s the most fleshed out character in the entirety of the Fallout series.

If you really think that you’re just about as out of your mind as Gary. Gary. Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaary.

Kefka Polazzo – Final Fantasy VI/Dissidia Final Fantasy

Kefka is essentially the Joker of the Final Fantasy series with no real reason for the incredibly terrible things he does other than he loves to watch everything suffer and perish. In the midst of literally destroying the entire world he just laughs maniacally and dances around in praise of all the murder and destruction around him cementing him as probably the best villain in the series (Sephiroth just grows a wing and attempts to destroy the universe to hit players with like 5000 damage, meh).

He gets even better in Dissidia Final Fantasy by simply trolling everyone in the game with character-specific dialogue and some of the most hilarious cut-scenes ever.

Tom Nook – Animal Crossing

Tom Nook, is a dick.

The only thing that ever matters to this chubby Rocket Raccoon looking bastard is rent and he is very vocal about his love for money and stealing everything from you if you don’t pay up.

Definitely not the craziest character on this list but holy hell is he awful.

Eddie Gluskin – Outlast: The Whistleblower

This guy is not a fun time. He’s a cannibal and has a horribly mutilated face and has a huge shit-eating grin on his face while you dance around in the dark with him before he murders you like a creepier version of Michael Myers. Night-vision only makes things worse as it turns him into the embodiment of the scariest enemies in the Siren games. He even constantly taunts you about how and where he’s going to mutilate you, making most players want to retreat back into their old copies of Nintendogs to try and alleviate the amount of trauma Mr. Gluskin induces.

HK-47 – Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Imagine Bender from Futurama, only monotone and twice as hilarious and you get HK-47, whose name is oddly a play on the popular assault rifle. With the tamed murderous intent of IG-88, HK-47 only ever refers to humans and other creatures as meatbags and never hesitates to let you know how much he loves killing them. His solution to most problems is killing meatbags, he probably dreams of electric sheep, and he’s one of the coolest party members in any RPG ever, besides of course being demented and bonkers.

Psycho Mantis – Metal Gear Solid

Not much to say about Psycho Mantis that hasn’t already been said, but this boss was the de facto moment that MGS was defined as one of the best series of all time. Psycho Mantis read your memory card and told you everything on it without you even expecting it (nooooo how could you have possibly known about my Bible Black save?!), and the only way to beat him was to plug your controller into the second controller port while he possessed Maryl to bone and murder Snake. Mantis would even pop up in later MGS games like 4 and 5 with even more absurd psychic powers and more really strange backstories.

The Happy Mask Salesman – The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask

This guy sends out Link, a child, to find an incredibly powerful, destruction mask and when he fails, gets so pissed he just strangles Link in the air and flips out. Then about 2 seconds later, he flips back and forth between rational and irrational in front of our clueless main character and sends him on another journey with even more dire consequences.

He also has a Mario mask for whatever reason. Perhaps he stole his face.

Anyway, he’s simply shady and unpredictable and flips emotions (and animations) on a dime.

Tiny Tina – Borderlands 2

She’s addled with caffeine and possibly narcotics and is a bomb expert, combined to make the most cartoonishly crazy character in all of Borderlands 2’s cartoonishly crazy characters. Sort of like a pre-pubescent female Mad Hatter (complete with a tea party), she even gets her own expansion where Dungeons and Dragons is violated in the best ways possible.

An even greater plus is she’s not old enough for those peculiar Deviant Artists to get too peculiar with her design, at least I hope not.

Sweet Tooth – Twisted Metal Series

He’s a serial killer with a creepy as hell mask and his head is on fire.

He also likes running over people in an ice cream truck.

That’s about it.

Harry Mason and James Sunderland – Silent Hill 1 & 2

Silent Hill’s themes only make it appropriate that these two are crazy.

Harry wakes up randomly and walks around asking people where his daughter is, from human to smog monster, and doesn’t have much reaction to giant demon creatures wandering around town making people wonder if he’s really badass or just really indifferent to everything around him for whatever reason.

Then we have good ol’ James, who puts himself in awkward denial about the fate of his wife and is also very indifferent to most of the creatures he comes across.

Both of these characters are pretty well fleshed out but it doesn’t change the fact that their determination is ridiculous considering everything Silent Hill puts them through. There’s also the weird awkward white guy tone of voice these two have but that’s another story.

Seth Briars – Red Dead Redemption

Seth really wants his treasure, and sends John Marston on many fruitless ventures to get what he wants while also demonstrating how far gone he is by digging through graves with his bare hands and even playing cards and dancing with zombies in the Undead Nightmare expansion. It’s never even really clear what he intends to do with his treasure but I hope it goes toward dental care and many showers.

The Joker – Batman Arkham Series

He’s THE JOKER, of course he’s one of the craziest characters ever created. He also happened to get voiced by Luke Skywalker with a blood-curdling laugh and a personality that flips almost constantly between playful insanity and menacing malice towards Batman. His desperation to succeed and troll Batman is written incredibly (the ending of Arkham City is one of the best things since The Killing Joke to happen between Batman and Joker).

Even Troy Baker succeeded in doing justice to Joker in Arkham Origins, which shows just how timeless the character is as a force of undeniable craziness.

Vaas – Farcry 3

I personally find the emphasis on insanity a bit pretentious in Farcry 3 but Ubisoft at least managed to provide more show than tell with Vaas. He constantly puts his life in danger because he knows how futile an effort his victims provide in killing him (until that really dumb QTE boss fight), and he’s so unpredictable that he’s both unsettling and hilarious.

If only Vaas had a special DLC or something, sigh, to dream.

What were your favourite crazy characters, did we miss any out? Let us know below and don’t forget to like us on Facebook.