If you have not already listened to the podcast of this category, this is the final results, so this will spoil the course of the discussion on that podcast! Be warned!
We intended this category to leave more room for the comedic characters that fill various works we love, and I’m happy to say that the discussion gave us lots of chance to talk about them. But when it comes to winners, the ones with more serious character development won out, because that’s just what we’re like. I have no regrets, I think this is a pretty killer list.
The Winner
Nemesis (Hades II)
It must be hard to be a Greek god or goddess, huh? I mean, kind of not: a lot of them are assholes, flakes, irresponsible creeps and perverts, obsessed with self-satisfaction and sacrificing mortals and their well-being to entertain whims. But also, they’re manifestations of a very particular set of emotions, feelings, and interests. And it’s gotta be hard to have such clear borders drawn around your existence, and what your life can be like.
This is all a bit vague, so let’s get more specific, and talk about our main subject: Nemesis. In her most core form, she is the goddess of retribution for hubris. But her place in culture has shifted over time, and to modern culture, her status as a goddess is overshadowed by the non-proper noun as a part of common language: a term for an enemy, a rival, a force of opposition. A different part of the Greek understanding of Nemesis is there too: from Aristotle, “nemesis” meaning someone who feels pain at seeing another’s undeserved success.
Hades II puts all of these together for its character Nemesis, a woman of barely contained anger and contempt. Her antipathy of protagonist Melinoë drives her to sabotage the hero’s own efforts, spit venomous insults at her, defy the rules of the coven she protects, and in a particularly notable instance, offer Melinoë pocket change in exchange for being allowed to stab her. It’s… a lot.
And when pushed, she doesn’t even really know why she’s like this. There isn’t a lot of reason behind her antagonism. Sure, she’s a bit jealous. Sure, she feels ignored in favor of the prodigal daughter of Hades. But that isn’t all of it. As the two get closer, it becomes clearer and clearer that she’s just… like this. At the core of her being is a spite and contrarian opposition that runs through her thicker than blood.
It’s a captivating portrayal of a character struggling against their darker nature… or, more often, not struggling. Maybe she doesn’t have a great reason to dislike Melinoë, but it feels good to her. We’ll have to see how this thread concludes when Hades II exits Steam Early Access.
The Runners-Up
Eustace Winner (Ace Attorney Investigations 2: Prosecutor’s Gambit)
Introducing your new favorite nepo baby. I realize that’s not much of a compliment, but hear me out on this one. As a character from the Ace Attorney series, the near-homophone of his name is deliberate: despite being celebrated as a rising star, Eustace is quite useless.
Game after game has introduced a new “young genius prosecutor”: Miles Edgeworth, Franziska von Karma, Klavier Gavin, Nahyuta Sahdmahdi, they just keep coming. But the first time Eustace offers a theory of the case, even the sycophantic judge hyping him up is dumbstruck by how stupid it is. No duel of wits here- you beat him by presenting the evidence he just handed you to prove his theory completely impossible and incoherent.
If all Eustace did for the whole game was play Washington Generals to the main character’s Harlem Globetrotters, that would make him one of the series’s more memorable characters. But the real magic trick is how the game convinces you in its last hours that he’s actually a good kid, and before too long, he’ll be a hell of a lawyer.
Well, by the insane standards of Ace Attorney, anyway.
Tsubasa Fukuyama (Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club)
When the two Famicom Detective Club remakes hit Switch, they were a welcome callback to a simpler time. Mystery games are far more plentiful now than in the days of the Famicom, but it’s almost never just a mystery. Perhaps it’s taking place during a time loop. Maybe it’s a death game! Maybe it’s both. Or you’re projecting yourself into other people’s dreams to investigate, or it has stealth mechanics for some reason, and so on, and so on, and so on. Those added layers aren’t inherently bad, but it can make you nostalgic for a more straightforward mystery. FDC was that, without sacrificing writing or style to deliver it.
That they would act as setup for Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club to subvert is a brilliant move. Perhaps “subvert” is even the wrong word: it simply wants to look at this cartoon-y series with somber adult eyes. Emio wants to portray a world that feels like that of its predecessors at first blush, but if you look longer, you see a stress and sadness behind it. You’re relying on the usual investigation techniques of the genre, but the people you’re questioning are, well… people. Sometimes your dogged pursuit of the mystery upsets them, either directly or by a consequence of your methods. And sometimes, by no work of your hand, they’re just upset anyway.
I both don’t want to spoil Emio – The Smiling Man, and can’t say much besides spoilers, because I haven’t played it. But the upbeat, friendly, helpful school teacher Tsubasa Fukuyama is that. Those things about him aren’t a lie, he’s not a wolf in sheep’s clothing. But behind his smile, you’ll learn he’s had his troubles too. And parts of his life he’d like to be purely positive about have caused him a lot of pain. It’s a complicated, sympathetic and gently tragic portrayal of the pain that happens in everyday life.
That’s it for today, but stay tuned for Best Surprise closing out the week on Friday!
Our art is a commission from Sarracenian on Bluesky.
