10 Greatest Video Game Betrayals

First on our list of 10 Greatest Video Game Betrayals is Al Mualim. In Assassin’s Creed two forces have warred against each other for ages, the Templars and the Assassin’s. Al Mualim was a mentor to all Assassins, so when you found out that he was secretly working for the Templars the whole time, it wrecked you. It also didn’t help that you had to kill him at the end of the game.

Scott Shelby started as nothing more than a private investigator. He was kind of old, slightly portly, and was the only character in Heavy Rain to speak without a silly accent. You really got attached to him as he tried to hunt down the Origami Killer by visiting families of his former victims. Then you found out that he was the Origami Killer all along and he was just trying to hide the evidence. It was really hard to bring him to justice after you walked a mile in his shoes.

Dimitri was a trusted ally in Grand Theft Auto IV, but then he betrays you and in a big way. He kidnaps your brother, be blackmails your friend, and he even lights your house on fire. He doesn’t just stab you in the back, he twists the knife around while dancing on it.

Jowy was the main character's best friend in Suikoden 2, a young commoner who eventually was brought into a noble family through the marriage of his mother. For over half of the game, Jowy helps you take on the evil forces of Highland, until he eventually abandons you to become a Highland general. After you defeat the person you thought was the main antagonist of the game, Jowy still stays in opposition to you. Little more than a perfect game with all characters recruited and secrets uncovered could keep Jowy from dying in front of your eyes.

Absolute power corrupts and A.I.s are not immune. Wheatley starts the game as a polite British personality core, but after you take out Glad0s, he decides to keep you and torture you rather than set you free. Only you and potato Glad0s can battle your way up from the ancient Aperture Science vaults and take him on.

“Atlas is Fontaine” is like the gaming world’s “Snape Kills Dumbledore.” Even though you were helped through the the entire game by Atlas, it turns out that he was Fontaine’s “longest con.” Everything he did was a ploy to bring himself more power, even if it meant the ruin of Rapture. Also, you ended up being a clone and junk which wasn’t really a betrayal, but didn’t exactly make things better. Atlas’s actions doomed an entire underwater city, not just you, and that’s why it’s on our list of the 10 Greatest Video Game Betrayals.

Jesus… sorry… Joshua (no, really, he’s just Jesus), helps you navigate through the world of Shibuya’s dead through a third of the game. He seems to be very, very, interested in Neku, the main character, if you know what we mean. However, it turns out that Joshuesus is an all-powerful creator of all things and to prove that humans have the right to continue existing he shoots you in the face and gives you amnesia. Yeah, we didn’t particularly understand it either, but the point is you are just a pawn in his grand plot to make dead people play games with rules that no one particularly understands.

Another childhood friend, another dark betrayal. Delita was a commoner while you, Ramza, were the son of a noble house. When border skirmishes eventually turned into religious conspiracy, Delita went rogue and captured the princess, forcefully marrying her. Delita did not only betray you, he completely erased your name from the history books. The world will never know that a fallen angel attempted to destroy the world through the use of zodiac themes artifacts, and that you put a stop to it by beating up your possessed sister. Maybe they are better off not knowing.

Billy and Jimmy are bros to the end. In fact, Jimmy is willing to risk life and limb in order to save his bro’s girlfriend, Marian. Then, when the bros finally defeat the black warriors and reclaim Marian, they suddenly turn on each other! Both players have to fight each other to get the girl. Honestly, is Marian ok with this? If Jimmy kills Billy in front of her would she just start a new relationship with him? Well, they are twins after all. Maybe she couldn’t tell them apart in the first place.

Finally, we have the Greatest Video Game Betrayal, Kain from Final Fantasy IV. In a way, this is a double betrayal. Kain is your best friend and ally in the country of Baron. Then Baron betrays you, and Kain goes along with it. So you have to become a paladin and fight Kain only to realize that Kain is being controlled by Golbez, your brother. Then it turned out that Kain wanted to get into your girlfriend Rosa’s pants. Then Golbez turns out to be on the good side, because he was being controlled by Zeromus. Then you defeat Zeromus but Cecil becomes evil in Final Fantasy IV the After Years, so Kain has to betray him again, along with Golbez. Man, that is a lot of betrayal!