Gaming's Most Dysfunctional Families

All families bicker and fight. All families have disagreements. All are dysfunctional in their own way. Videogames are no different, housing families that display a level of dysfunction and peculiarity that is beyond any comprehension. Here are my picks for gaming’s most dysfunctional families.

#5 Every Pokémon Family - Literally Every Pokémon Game

There's always been something not quite right about Pokémon. In every game, within about ten minutes of moving into your new home, an old man who you've never met tells you to choose one of his three balls. You're then, without having any say in the matter, swiftly released into a world filled with monsters and terrorists.

Your mother, (except for Ruby/Sapphire the father is always non-existent), puts up little resistance to your departure. I'm not quite sure why mothers in Pokémon games lack any semblance of maternal instincts, but their apparent lack of concern for the mental and physical well-being of their children points to a long running and deep-rooted neglect that undermines the buoyant atmosphere that permeates the series.

Their only offer of help comes by way of running shoes, presumably to run away from the plethora of shit that can kill you, and occasionally spending your money on berries that can easily be found for free.

                             Not at the age of ten they don’t.

#4 Jack's Family - BioShock

(Spoiler Warning)

Being an unwanted, illegitimate son is enough to cause some serious psychological issues. Being a pawn in the middle of a war serves only to compound those issues. Stolen from his father, genetically modified and trained to be an obedient assassin, Jack is forced into the hijacking and crashing of a passenger airline.

If committing unwanted mass homicide isn't bad enough, Jack is helpless when his own father commands him to kill him, serving only to strengthen the position of Atlus, the man that kidnapped and trained Jack in the first place.

                                                               "Would you kindly..."

#3 Samara And Her Daughters - Mass Effect 2

(Spoiler Warning)

Samara always came across as a fairly stoic and laconic character; when digging into her family history it's clear to see why. Samara's role in the creation of this twisted family is fairly innocent, all she did was give birth. Unfortunately, her offspring were born with a genetic disease: her three daughters were given incalculable powers of seduction, allowing them to attract anyone they so desired, with the process of mating resulting in death for the victim.

Two of her three daughters agreed to live in isolation, a bittersweet victory, but the third, Morinth, ran off, using this genetic defect to her advantage. Morinth became a mass murderer of a different nature, but a mass murderer nonetheless. Samara's loyalty mission in Mass Effect 2 culminates in a confrontation with Morinth, with Samara forced to end the life of her own child.

                                                                           Motherly love.

#2 Big Boss' Family - Metal Gear Solid

(Spoiler Warning)

I don't even know where to begin.

Liquid requests the corpse of Big Boss in exchange for cancelling the launch of a nuclear bomb, delivered via a robotic dinosaur, before revealing to Snake that they are both clones of said corpse. Snake at no point shows remorse upon discovering that the man he had been fighting for 15 years was his father, but by the end nobody really gives a shit about the abandoned dead father that's buried somewhere in the Middle East anyway.

Snake and Liquid fight until FOXDie, a virus injected into Snake without his knowledge, somehow affects everyone around him and conveniently kills Liquid right as he's about to exact revenge.

And that concludes Metal Gear Solid....one.

The remaining games in the series reveal a third clone, who had never been mentioned previously despite being the President of the United States, the resurrection of Liquid, Big Boss faking his own death, only to reappear at the moment his son was about to kill himself to then knowingly die in his arms, and a sibling rivalry involving nuclear weapons and nanomachines.

The Snake lineage covers deceit, murder, world domination and more; no words can do justice to the madness that takes place. There was really only one family who could keep them from top spot.

                                                                Les Enfants Terribles.

#1 The Mishima Clan - Tekken

Some families talk through their problems. Some families seek counselling. Some families assault their kin on live television and toss them into a volcano. No prizes for guessing which category the Mishima Clan falls under. The Mishimas are unopposed when it comes to dysfunction; this is a family that holds an international fighting tournament, with the sole intention of publicising the domestic abuse that takes place.

There's one man that's at the root of the Mishima's problems: Heihachi. Sealing his father away, pushing his ten year old, Kazuya, off a mountain as a test, adopting another son purely to make Kazuya jealous, fathering, and subsequently abandoning, an illegitimate child, then attempting to murder his grandson. Heihachi is a fairly twisted individual.

Add in a genetic defect that grants Jin and Kazuya the ability to transform into satanic angels of death, and Jinpachi, a man that can shoot fire from a gigantic mouth where his stomach should be, and you complete the recipe; decades of trained martial artists and devil spawns who want nothing more than the destruction of their own flesh and blood.

                                                      A family that's beyond therapy.