The 10 Darkest Backstories in Video Games

Backstories help gamers understand where characters come from, but those backstories show just how bad their past really is.

Video games are filled with multiple complex characters to advance their plot and engage the player. Whether it's a strong-willed superhero like Batman or a fiery warrior like Kratos in God of War: Ragnarok, well-crafted characters are critical to making a game stand out.

However, some of these characters lead rough lives, and their backstories are filled with tragedy and despair. These characters have been through so much, both in terms of harm to themselves and others, creating some of the darkest character backstories in all of video game history.

Kratos (God of War)

Kratos has experienced so much pain and hurt throughout the God of War games that his tragic and dark backstory adds another layer of tragedy to him.

Years before the game, when Kratos and his crew had lost all hope, he turned to Ares, who gave him the Chaos Blade and sent him into a killing rage - This anger also led the gods to trick him into killing his wife and daughter in the temple of Athena. It's one thing to slaughter hundreds of people in the name of Ares, but it's another thing to be tricked into killing people All he cared about was darkening Kratos' backstory and setting him on a path of vengeance and the death of the Greek pantheon.

Jack (Mass Effect 2)

Jack is the most fan-favorite character in the Mass Effect series, and one of the most important characters to save. But as she tells Shepard in Mass Effect 2, her backstory is filled with pain and death.

As a child, Jack was taken by Cerberus and subjected to years of experiments that transformed her into a rage-filled killing machine known as Subject Zero. Even after she escaped, she fell into even more difficult times, hopping from gang to gang until she was captured and imprisoned by Blue Sun. Before Shepard recruits her to Normandy, Jack rarely sees anyone's kindness, and long after she has found personal happiness, her past still haunts her.

Rin Yamaoka "The Spirit" (Dead by Daylight)

Many of Dead by Daylight's best killers have dark, tragic backstories, and this is evident when looking back at Rin Yamaoka's (aka The Spirit) past.

Rin's family faced financial difficulties, which forced her to work part-time. Her father eventually went berserk and murdered Rin's mother, and later, Rin Herself. But as Rin lay dying, she swore to make him pay, prompting the evil spirit to take her and transform her into a spirit. It's tragic, especially since Rin did nothing wrong and was a good guy beforehand. Now, due to these events, she is forced to wander the mist and kill any survivors she comes across.

James Sunderland (Silent Hill 2)

Silent Hill is full of terrifying monsters and memorable characters, such as James Sunderland. But James also has one of the most tragic and darkest backstories.

James' wife Mary was terminally ill, causing her to experience violent mood swings, driving James to such despair that he eventually smothered her with a pillow. It's a tragic end to a loving marriage, made darker when he suppresses his memory of killing her, allowing the player to discover it all at the same time as James. Either way, James' backstory is tragic, dark, and one that no one would want to experience personally in real life.

Aerith Gainsborough (Final Fantasy VII)

Many Final Fantasy characters have dark backstories, but in Aerith's story nearly every bad thing that could happen to her happens, Make it harder to hear.

In the course of her pre-race life, Aerith was experimented on, hunted like an animal for entertainment, and watched her mother die in front of her eyes. Everything about her backstory is tragic and dark, and it's hard to see how she can keep going after so much she's been through. It's also a story that's unexpected just by looking at her, making her tragic death at the end of the game all the more heartbreaking to experience again and again.

Master Chief (Halo: Combat Evolved)

The Master Chief is one of the greatest video game characters of all time, but not much of his backstory is revealed in the game. However, later Halo lore shows just how dark his backstory really is.

To fight the insurgents, Dr. Halsey basically kidnaps kids and trains them to be super soldiers. John, aka The Master Chief, was one of those kids. What he and other children experienced was brutal and often life-threatening. Even the process of turning a candidate into a Spartan is extremely painful and potentially fatal. Here's the backstory the people who play the game can't have Never guessing, but the more people read into the Master Chief lore, the more they realize just how messed up his childhood really was.

Angel (Borderlands)

In the first two Borderlands games, not much is known about Angel, other than that she is the daughter of Siren and Handsome Jack. However, her past is soon revealed in Borderlands 3 side quests.

After gaining the power of the Siren, Angel is captured by bandits. When Jack tries to save her, Angel uses her powers to kill the robber - and inadvertently kills her mother. This leads Jack to force Angel into seclusion and use her to further his plans. It's a heartbreaking story because Angel didn't want to kill her mother. It was an accident, and it was that moment that crushed Handsome Jack and set him on the path to becoming one of Pandora's greatest threats.

Junko Enoshima (Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc)

Junko Enoshima's life before Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc is full of despair - usually due to her own actions.

Throughout her life, Junko grew weary of the predictability of the world and became fascinated by what she saw as the unpredictability of despair. Due to this, She decides to spread despair to the entire world, orchestrating a tragedy and a killing game involving Hope's Peak students. Yes, most of the darkness in her backstory is of her own making so she can spread desperation and experience it firsthand, but it's still a dark backstory - especially when all she does is because she's bored .

Alma Wade (F.E.A.R.)

Children with great powers often seem to have extremely dark backstories, especially Alma Wade.

Alma was born with extraordinary psychic abilities, which had been brutally experimented on for years by the Armacham Technology Corporation.

When she began to lash out, she was placed in an induced coma and locked up, even being impregnated twice before her life support was cut off. Based on how horrific the abuse she received during all this, it's no wonder that, as a psychic force, she viciously murders everyone and everything she encounters or tries to stop her.

Nautilus (League of Legends)

League of Legends has multiple tragic characters and horrific backstories, but Nautilus' story is definitely one of the darkest in the game.

Once upon a time, Nautilus was an ordinary salvage diver. but between him and His crew was bought out, and he was placed in a giant metal suit to go to the deeper sea depths. Suddenly pulled deeper by an unknown force, Nautilus wakes up fused with the new captain's long-gone suit. It's a sad story because Nautilus was just doing his job and got caught between another person and his obsession and paid for it, and now he takes his anger out on more non-payment of tithes Aboard the ship that came to soothe oceans.