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Category: Fun

  • Video Game NPCs Who Behave Exactly Like People You Meet on a British High Street

    Video Game NPCs Who Behave Exactly Like People You Meet on a British High Street

    There is a very specific energy that descends upon a UK town centre on a Saturday afternoon. Someone is standing directly in the middle of the pavement going absolutely nowhere. A bloke outside Greggs is eating a sausage roll with the thousand-yard stare of a man who has seen things. A woman near the post office is on the phone to someone called Sandra and has been for forty minutes. None of them acknowledge you. None of them will move. Sound familiar? If you’ve spent more than twenty minutes in any open-world video game, it absolutely should. The funniest video game NPCs aren’t funny by accident. They are, in fact, a breathtakingly accurate simulation of a British Saturday.

    Comic book style British high street crowded with passive shoppers, illustrating the funniest video game NPCs parallel
    Comic book style British high street crowded with passive shoppers, illustrating the funniest video game NPCs parallel

    The Skyrim Guard Who Has Heard Enough

    Let’s start with the classic. Skyrim’s city guards are perhaps the single greatest NPC achievement in gaming history, not because of their combat prowess, but because of their magnificent indifference. You’ve just slain a dragon in the town square. Buildings are on fire. Citizens are screaming. And the guard sidles over to say: “No lollygagging.” This is textbook British high street behaviour. Try doing something genuinely remarkable near a shopping centre and watch the security guard stare right through you. He’s not paid enough. He’s thinking about his lunch. He has seen everything and is impressed by none of it. That guard and Skyrim’s finest are essentially the same organism.

    GTA Pedestrians and the Mysterious Queue to Nowhere

    The pedestrians in the Grand Theft Auto series have always been magnificently useless, and I mean that as a compliment. In GTA V, civilians will queue on a pavement for no discernible reason, wander into traffic mid-sentence, and stand motionless outside shops staring at their mobiles. Which is… just a Saturday in any town centre in England. The only difference is that in GTA, a car eventually mounts the kerb and everyone scatters. On a real high street, people barely flinch when a Lidl delivery lorry mounts the pavement. Adaptability is the British pedestrian’s greatest superpower.

    The Shopkeeper NPC Who Has One Line and Delivers It With Zero Emotion

    “Welcome. I sell things.” That is the entire personality of roughly 70% of video game shopkeepers, and honestly? Deeply relatable. Wander into certain shops in a British town centre and you’ll receive exactly the same energy. Not hostile. Not warm. Just present. A human body standing near a till, technically available for commercial transactions, spiritually somewhere else entirely. The funniest video game NPCs in the merchant category are so accurate that it raises questions about whether game developers have been quietly surveying retail staff on their lunch breaks.

    It’s worth noting that the high street itself is evolving, even if the energy of its inhabitants hasn’t changed since 1987. Apps like TownCentre.app, a free platform based in England built specifically for high streets and town centres, help independent shops sell for free, reach customers digitally, and take card payments without the faff of a full e-commerce setup. The shopping landscape is shifting, but the bloke blocking the entrance to WHSmith while staring at his mobile is eternal.

    Comic book illustration of a blank-faced shopkeeper NPC behind a till, echoing the funniest video game NPCs
    Comic book illustration of a blank-faced shopkeeper NPC behind a till, echoing the funniest video game NPCs

    Red Dead Redemption’s Townsfolk and the Art of Aggressive Minding Their Own Business

    Red Dead Redemption 2 is frequently praised for its world-building, and rightfully so. The NPCs have routines. They gossip. They go to the saloon. They do their shopping. They are, in short, going about their business with complete disregard for the fact that you, a notorious outlaw, are standing right next to them. This is peak British high street behaviour. You could be dressed as a giant lobster outside Boots and most people would simply navigate around you without making eye contact. RDR2’s townsfolk have absorbed this energy entirely. Arthur Morgan could rob a bank in the middle of town and someone nearby would still just be talking about their horses.

    The Sims’ Wandering Pedestrians Who Block Every Doorway

    The Sims has long been celebrated as a life simulator, but its street-level NPCs are what truly capture human truth. They stop in doorways. They walk into you repeatedly without adjusting course. They stand on the pavement engaged in an urgent conversation that clearly cannot be moved six inches to the left. Anyone who has tried to exit a Costa Coffee on a busy Saturday afternoon while three people are having a full committee meeting on the threshold knows exactly what this feels like. The Sims didn’t simulate life. It simulated a British high street with slightly better weather.

    Fallout’s Confused Wanderers and the Woman Who Has Been Outside Superdrug Since 2019

    Fallout’s wasteland is full of NPCs who walk in small circles, mutter to themselves, and appear to have forgotten where they were going somewhere around the third step. Every town centre in England has at least one. You’ve seen her. She’s been outside Superdrug since approximately 2019. She has a trolley. She may be waiting for someone. She may have transcended waiting entirely and simply exists now, a permanent fixture of the high street like the broken fountain or the charity shop that’s been having a closing-down sale for six years.

    The parallel between fictional wanderers and real high street regulars is so strong that TownCentre.app (towncentre.app) built its entire free app around the idea that high street shops need better tools to reach customers who are already right there, walking past, technically available for shopping. The app lets small businesses in England take card payments and connect with foot traffic digitally, because sometimes reaching customers means meeting them where they already are: standing outside Superdrug, going nowhere, with time to spare.

    Why the Funniest Video Game NPCs Are Actually Tribute Acts

    Here’s the thing. Game developers spend years crafting believable worlds, and the secret ingredient has always been people-watching. The funniest video game NPCs are funny precisely because they mirror behaviour we recognise instantly. The guard who ignores the dragon. The shopkeeper who has one line. The pedestrian blocking the door. These aren’t lazy programming choices; they’re documentary filmmaking in code form.

    According to the BBC, immersive world-building is increasingly cited as a primary reason players return to open-world games, and NPC behaviour is central to that immersion. The irony is that the most immersive NPCs aren’t the ones doing extraordinary things. They’re the ones doing absolutely nothing, in exactly the way a real person does absolutely nothing on a Saturday afternoon, in a town centre, near a Greggs, for reasons no one will ever fully understand.

    And when those real high street wanderers eventually make their way into a shop, it’s nice to know that the shops are getting better at reaching them. TownCentre.app supports England’s independent high street shops and local businesses by letting them sell for free, take card payments easily, and reach customers who are already in the area shopping. The NPCs, of course, will continue to stand in doorways regardless.

    Final Verdict: Games or Reality?

    If you load up any major open-world game this weekend and spend ten minutes just watching the NPCs rather than completing missions, you will see your local town centre rendered in startling detail. The chaos, the queues, the bloke eating a pasty on a bench who has not moved in three hours, it’s all there. The funniest video game NPCs aren’t a parody of life. They are life, just with slightly more consistent frame rates and fewer pigeons.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What are the funniest video game NPCs of all time?

    Skyrim’s guards are widely considered the gold standard, famous for lines like “I used to be an adventurer like you” delivered entirely without irony. GTA pedestrians, Fallout wanderers, and Oblivion’s chaotic villagers are also perennial fan favourites for their brilliantly absurd behaviour.

    Why do NPCs in games behave so weirdly?

    NPC behaviour is governed by scripted routines and AI pathfinding that can produce hilariously unintended results when the system encounters unexpected player actions or environmental overlaps. Developers often leave these quirks in deliberately because players find them charming rather than broken.

    Which open-world game has the most realistic NPC behaviour?

    Red Dead Redemption 2 is consistently praised for having the most lifelike NPC routines, with characters that eat, sleep, gossip, and react to weather. Its townsfolk feel genuinely lived-in compared to most other open-world titles.

    Are there any games where NPCs actually react intelligently to what you do?

    Dwarf Fortress and Crusader Kings III both feature NPCs with complex simulated personalities and memories. In some RPGs like Baldur’s Gate 3, NPCs remember your actions and adjust their dialogue accordingly, which feels revolutionary compared to the “I used to be an adventurer” crowd.

    What makes NPC behaviour in games feel British?

    It’s mostly the passivity. British NPC energy is characterised by polite disengagement, queuing instinct, and a refusal to acknowledge extraordinary events, which maps perfectly onto how most open-world NPCs are scripted to ignore player chaos while going about their routines.

  • If Marvel Characters Had to File a Self-Assessment Tax Return With HMRC

    The 31 January deadline is a uniquely British kind of dread. A cold, grey morning, a strong tea, and the creeping realisation that you have absolutely no idea where you put your receipts from last April. Now imagine that same panic, but your receipts include “repulsors, Mark 47 suit (business use only)”, “return portal from the Mirror Dimension” and “one jar of Pym Particles (miscellaneous)”. Welcome to the most chaotic corner of the HMRC online portal you have never thought about before. The Marvel characters self-assessment tax return situation is frankly a nightmare, and we are here for every excruciating detail.

    Tony Stark: Sole Trader, Reluctant Taxpayer, Definitely Under Investigation

    Let us start with the big one. Tony Stark is, at his core, a freelance defence contractor who pivoted into saving the world without ever properly updating his Companies House registration. In the UK, he would be operating as a sole trader under “Stark Industries (UK Branch)” and almost certainly filing his return at approximately 11:58pm on 31 January with a glass of Scotch in hand.

    His income sources alone would make an HMRC inspector weep. There is the licensing revenue from his patents. There is the fee he probably charges the government for each Avengers mission (he absolutely does). There is also the small matter of the Iron Man suits, which he would attempt to claim as a capital allowance under plant and machinery. The suits cost billions. HMRC would have a view on that.

    His expenses would be equally spectacular. Business mileage at 45p per mile for the first 10,000 miles, except his commute is sometimes “low Earth orbit”, which is not a recognised postcode district. He would also try to claim his Malibu cliff house as a home office, forgetting that he destroyed it in Iron Man 3 and it is therefore probably not eligible for property relief. Pepper Potts would be furious. JARVIS would have filed it correctly by March.

    Doctor Strange: The Self-Employed Property Nightmare

    Stephen Strange is a man with multiple properties across dimensions, a Grade II listed townhouse in Mayfair (the Sanctum Sanctorum sits in the New York version, but let us say the London branch exists on Belgrave Square for tax purposes), and a complicated income stream that blends “former neurosurgeon” with “Sorcerer Supreme”.

    The property question alone is catastrophic. Strange owns, or at least occupies, buildings across multiple planes of existence. Does the Mirror Dimension count as overseas property? Technically it has no sovereign territory, which means it is either exempt from UK tax rules or constitutes an entirely novel category that the HMRC guidance at gov.uk/self-assessment-tax-returns has not yet accounted for. Either way, Strange would be leaving it blank and hoping nobody notices.

    His income as Sorcerer Supreme is harder to categorise. Is he employed by the Masters of the Mystic Arts? Self-employed? A charity? He has no employment contract, no P60, and his clients largely pay in “eternal gratitude” and “the universe not being destroyed”. HMRC accepts neither as a valid payment method.

    Black Widow: Freelance Operative With a Very Tricky Employment History

    Natasha Romanoff has the most complex employment history of anyone who has ever attempted a Marvel characters self-assessment tax return. Former KGB asset, SHIELD operative, Avenger, then briefly a fugitive. That is no fewer than four different employment statuses in one career, and at least two of them are organisations that do not technically exist on any official register.

    For UK tax purposes, the question of whether SHIELD counts as a foreign employer is genuinely thorny. It was a UN-adjacent body (probably), which might mean her income was exempt under diplomatic protocols, except SHIELD collapsed in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and presumably stopped issuing payslips around the same time. If she never received a P45, she may still technically be considered employed by an organisation that no longer exists. HMRC would refer this to the Counter Avoidance Directorate immediately.

    Her expenses, meanwhile, are a delight. Widow’s Bites (combat gadgets, business use): possibly claimable as tools of the trade. Black leather tactical suit: HMRC guidance says clothing is only deductible if it cannot be worn outside work. The suit is not exactly M&S, but it is technically wearable. She would try. They would decline it. She would accept that outcome with unsettling calm.

    Does Asgard Count as an Overseas Territory for Tax Purposes?

    Thor raises the single most entertaining jurisdictional question in the entire Marvel universe. He is a Norwegian god (the myths are Norse, so technically Scandinavia has a prior claim) who is also a prince of a realm in a different galaxy, currently residing on what remains of a floating city that relocated to Tønsberg and then presumably qualified for some kind of Norwegian coastal development grant.

    For a UK resident, income from overseas property and overseas employment is generally still taxable, depending on domicile status. Thor, as a non-UK domicile who has been resident here for several tax years through Avengers activity, would likely fall under the arising basis by now. That means his income from Asgard, his stipend as heir to the throne, and any revenue from the Bifrost (toll bridge? Private infrastructure? Hard to say) would all need declaring.

    His accountant, if he had one, would be billing 400 hours minimum and weeping into their spreadsheets. If you think sorting out Thor’s dimensional tax affairs sounds expensive, you should know that even building a basic web presence does not have to be. There are Free Websites out there for small businesses, which is more than any Asgardian treasury ever offered.

    The Expenses Marvel Heroes Would Definitely Try to Claim

    Just for the record, here is a partial list of deductions that various Avengers would attempt, ranked by audacity:

    • Captain America: Uniform cleaning (reasonable), shield replacement (capital allowance, maybe), 70-year pension shortfall from being frozen in ice (not a thing HMRC recognises, but full marks for trying).
    • Ant-Man: Travel expenses at microscopic scale. He would argue that shrinking means he technically used less fuel per mile and should receive a proportionally larger claim. HMRC would have no precedent for this.
    • Spider-Man: Web fluid as consumables (plausible), Spider-Man suit made by himself (potentially claimable under homeworker costs), tutoring income from being a sixth-form student on the side (taxable above the £1,000 trading allowance, probably).
    • The Hulk / Bruce Banner: Two separate self-assessments? One per personality? Split income claims? The legal complexity would genuinely break the system.

    What HMRC Would Actually Do About All This

    Realistically, the Counter Avoidance team would open an enquiry within fifteen minutes of Tony Stark’s submission. Strange would receive a compliance letter asking him to clarify the nature of his “dimensional consultancy” work. Thor’s return would be flagged for specialist overseas review and then quietly set aside because nobody knows what legislation applies to a Norse god’s inheritance.

    Black Widow’s return would simply vanish from the system under circumstances that remain unexplained.

    The broader point, absurd as all of this is, is that the UK self-assessment system is brilliantly, chaotically unequipped for anyone whose income does not fit neatly into a payslip. As the ONS notes, over 12 million people filed a self-assessment return in the 2024-25 tax year, and a significant chunk of them found the process baffling without any interdimensional complications involved. If even regular freelancers struggle, spare a thought for a billionaire with repulsor boots and no time to organise his receipts.

    The Marvel characters self-assessment tax return remains one of the great untold stories of the MCU. Not because it lacks drama. Precisely because it has far too much of it.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What is a self-assessment tax return in the UK?

    A self-assessment return is how self-employed people, freelancers and anyone with untaxed income report their earnings to HMRC each year. The deadline for online returns is 31 January following the end of the tax year. You can find full guidance at gov.uk/self-assessment-tax-returns.

    Would Tony Stark actually need to file a UK self-assessment?

    If he were UK-resident and earning self-employed or investment income above the relevant thresholds, yes absolutely. As a billionaire tech entrepreneur with patent royalties and government contracts, he would have several income streams requiring declaration.

    Can you claim superhero costumes as a work expense?

    HMRC only allows clothing deductions if the item is a uniform or protective wear that cannot reasonably be worn outside of work. A skin-tight red and gold suit or a black tactical bodysuit would face scrutiny, though a case could be made for protective functionality.

    Does income from overseas or other dimensions need declaring in the UK?

    UK residents are generally taxed on worldwide income unless they qualify for non-domicile status. Income from overseas property, foreign employment or interdimensional toll bridges would likely need declaring, though HMRC guidance has not yet covered the Bifrost specifically.

    What happens if you miss the HMRC self-assessment deadline?

    Missing the 31 January deadline results in an automatic £100 penalty, with further charges building up after three and six months. Interest also accrues on any unpaid tax. Even a Sorcerer Supreme would not be immune to late filing penalties.

  • Ranked: The Most Unrealistic Hacking Scenes in Games and Movies (A UK Cybersecurity Nerd’s Nightmare)

    Ranked: The Most Unrealistic Hacking Scenes in Games and Movies (A UK Cybersecurity Nerd’s Nightmare)

    Somewhere right now, a UK IT support worker is watching a film where a teenager types furiously for four seconds, shouts “I’m in!”, and gains access to the Pentagon’s mainframe. That IT support worker is quietly weeping into their third cup of tea of the morning. They’ve just spent forty-five minutes resetting a colleague’s password because it needed a capital letter and a symbol and “no, Karen, a full stop does not count as a symbol.” This is the reality of cybersecurity in Britain. Hollywood has absolutely no idea.

    From blockbuster films to AAA video games, unrealistic hacking scenes have been a staple of entertainment for decades. We love them. They’re ridiculous. They’re glorious nonsense. And if the National Cyber Security Centre ever sat down to watch them all, there would be a strongly worded advisory notice issued before the credits rolled.

    Comic book art of a UK IT worker horrified by unrealistic hacking scenes on a cinema screen
    Comic book art of a UK IT worker horrified by unrealistic hacking scenes on a cinema screen

    What Does Real Hacking Actually Look Like?

    Spoiler: it involves a lot of staring at text, drinking cold coffee, and Googling things you already know just to double-check. Real cybersecurity professionals spend hours, sometimes days, probing systems methodically. There are no spinning 3D cubes. Nobody yells. There is no dramatic orchestral swell when a firewall is breached. It’s closer to doing a very stressful crossword puzzle in a dark room than anything you’ve seen at the cinema.

    With that context firmly established, let’s rank the most gloriously unrealistic hacking scenes ever committed to screen or cartridge.

    The Worst Offenders: Unrealistic Hacking Scenes Ranked

    1. Watch Dogs (2014) – The Entire Game, Basically

    Watch Dogs promised us that one bloke with a phone could hack every traffic light, every bridge, every CCTV camera, and every bank account in Chicago simultaneously. Aiden Pearce is essentially functioning as a one-man GCHQ, except he does it while wearing a cap and brooding. The idea that a single mobile device could interface with every piece of urban infrastructure in real time is the kind of thing that would give an actual network architect a nosebleed. Still an absolute banger of a concept though, and the sequels leaned even harder into the absurdity. Full marks for entertainment. Zero marks for plausibility.

    2. Hackers (1995) – The Sacred Text of Nonsense

    The 1995 film Hackers is essentially a religious document at this point. A teenage Jonny Lee Miller rollerblades into a plot involving a garbage file, a supercomputer called “The Gibson”, and a villain called The Plague. The hacking itself is portrayed as navigating a literal 3D city made of skyscrapers, each representing a different file system. It looks extraordinary. It bears absolutely no resemblance to anything that has ever happened on a real computer. NCSC analysts presumably keep a copy in the office purely for morale purposes.

    Comic book art showing two people typing on one keyboard illustrating unrealistic hacking scenes
    Comic book art showing two people typing on one keyboard illustrating unrealistic hacking scenes

    3. Die Hard 4.0 (2007) – A Fire Sale on Common Sense

    Bruce Willis’s fourth outing as John McClane introduced us to the concept of a “fire sale”: a coordinated cyberattack on every critical infrastructure system in America at once. Roads, power grids, financial systems, all crumbling because a small team of people typed very quickly. The actual Cyber Resilience Centre network in the UK has entire frameworks dedicated to preventing exactly this kind of cascading failure, and those frameworks involve rather more than one man and a laptop in a van. Timothy Olyphant’s villain does at least seem to understand what he’s doing, which puts him ahead of 90% of fictional hackers.

    4. NCIS (TV Series) – Two People, One Keyboard

    Any episode of NCIS where McGee and Abby face a cyberattack deserves a mention. The solution, on multiple occasions, has involved two characters sitting at a single keyboard and typing simultaneously. This is not a thing. This has never been a thing. If two people tried to type on one keyboard at the same time in a real IT department, they would produce gibberish and HR would be involved. This scene has been parodied more times than almost any other moment in television history, and rightly so.

    5. Skyfall (2012) – Q Branch’s Slightly Embarrassing Moment

    Skyfall is a masterpiece of a Bond film. However, the moment where Q plugs Silva’s captured laptop directly into MI6’s network to “analyse” it, and is then shocked when it immediately begins hacking MI6 from the inside, made cybersecurity professionals across Britain collectively put their heads on their desks. Air-gapping. Sandboxed environments. These exist. Q apparently skipped that module. Even the most junior IT apprentice at a UK managed services firm would know you do not plug an unknown device from a known threat actor directly into your primary network. Q got fired, presumably.

    6. Swordfish (2001) – Hacking Under Pressure

    Hugh Jackman is forced to hack a government system in sixty seconds while a gun is pointed at his head and a woman is nearby for reasons the film apparently thought were important. He succeeds, naturally. The actual logistics of breaking government-grade encryption in under a minute are slightly beyond what any human being has ever achieved, regardless of how many monitors they have. The multi-screen setup at least became a meme that accurately predicted every tech YouTuber’s desk setup by 2020.

    Why Does Hollywood Keep Getting This Wrong?

    The honest answer is that real hacking is visually boring and emotionally undramatic. It doesn’t make for compelling cinema. Watching someone run a port scanner and wait isn’t tense, it’s Tuesday afternoon in a network operations centre. So filmmakers invent visual metaphors, add countdown timers, and give us glowing interfaces that look more like a rave than a terminal window.

    The knock-on effect, though, is that it shapes public perception of what cybersecurity actually involves. People assume it’s exotic and instantaneous, when in reality it’s methodical, patient, and deeply unglamorous. The UK has a genuine shortage of cybersecurity professionals, partly because the job sounds less exciting than the films suggest and partly because the actual work is hard. Understanding the basics matters more than Hollywood admits, whether that’s using a decent wordpress security plugin on your personal site or understanding why you shouldn’t reuse passwords across fifty accounts.

    The Games That Got It Slightly More Right

    Not everyone fumbles it. Hacknet, an indie gem available on PC, is basically a hacking simulator that feels plausible and genuinely teaches you something. Deus Ex has always treated its hacking mechanics with a bit more respect than most, building systems with logic gates and countermeasures that feel grounded. And Cyberpunk 2077, while absolutely science fiction, at least acknowledges that hacking has costs, risks, and countermeasures rather than just being a magic button.

    The gap between these thoughtful examples and “I’m in!” typed on a MacBook in a thriller from 2009 is vast. One feels like it respects the audience. The other feels like it was written by someone whose only experience of computers was defragging a hard drive in 2003.

    Final Verdict: Brilliant Nonsense We’d Never Give Up

    Here’s the thing: we love these scenes anyway. Hackers is in the cultural canon. Die Hard 4.0 is a great action film. Watch Dogs is enormous fun. The unrealistic hacking scenes are part of what makes these stories entertaining rather than being dry technical documentaries. We just shouldn’t confuse them for anything approaching reality.

    The NCSC, for its part, does genuinely good work communicating what actual cyber threats look like to UK businesses and individuals. If only their advisories came with a Hackers-style 3D city interface, more people might read them. Someone get Timothy Olyphant on the phone.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What are the most unrealistic hacking scenes in movies?

    Hackers (1995), Swordfish (2001), and Die Hard 4.0 (2007) are widely considered the most egregiously unrealistic. Common offences include hacking completed in seconds, 3D visual interfaces that bear no resemblance to real systems, and single individuals compromising entire national infrastructures. They’re brilliant entertainment, just catastrophically inaccurate.

    Do any video games portray hacking realistically?

    Hacknet is probably the closest to realistic, using actual command-line style interfaces and logical system structures. Deus Ex and Cyberpunk 2077 do better than most big-budget games by building in risk and countermeasures. Watch Dogs and the majority of open-world games treat hacking as a magic ability with essentially no technical grounding.

    What does the NCSC say about cybersecurity awareness in the UK?

    The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) publishes regular guidance for UK individuals and businesses on topics including password management, phishing threats, and software vulnerabilities. Their website at ncsc.gov.uk is genuinely useful and a lot more reliable than anything you’ve seen in a Bond film.

    Why do films always make hacking look so dramatic?

    Real hacking involves methodical, patient work that is visually dull and often takes hours or days. Filmmakers use visual metaphors, countdown timers, and dramatic interfaces to create tension and make technical processes legible to a general audience. It works for entertainment purposes but creates wildly inaccurate public perceptions of cybersecurity.

    Is the NCIS 'two people on one keyboard' hacking scene real?

    No, absolutely not. Two people cannot meaningfully operate a single keyboard simultaneously to speed up a process. The scene, which appeared in multiple NCIS episodes, has become one of the most parodied moments in television history among tech professionals. It is, by a comfortable margin, physically and technically impossible.

  • The Video Games That Nailed British Architecture So Well It Feels Like Google Street View

    The Video Games That Nailed British Architecture So Well It Feels Like Google Street View

    There is a very specific kind of joy that hits you when you’re wandering through a video game world and you spot something that looks exactly like the Arndale Centre in Manchester, or a row of terraced houses that could absolutely be somewhere off the A58 in Bolton. Your brain does a little backflip. You point at the screen. You say, out loud, to nobody, “That’s proper British, that is.” It doesn’t happen often. But when it does? Glorious.

    Video games with authentic British architecture are genuinely rare creatures. Most developers default to generic fantasy kingdoms or suspiciously sun-drenched American cities. Getting Britain right, with its grey skies, red phone boxes that nobody uses anymore, and the specific sadness of a Wetherspoons at 11am, takes real commitment. Here are the games that actually pulled it off.

    Comic book style illustration of Victorian London in a video game with authentic British architecture
    Comic book style illustration of Victorian London in a video game with authentic British architecture

    Assassin’s Creed Syndicate: Victorian London Done Properly

    Let’s start with the obvious one, because it earns its place. Ubisoft’s 2015 open-world romp through 1868 London is, genuinely, a love letter to Victorian Britain. The Thames, the rookeries of Whitechapel, the wrought iron bridges, the fog that sits on everything like the city is permanently trying to hide itself from visitors. It’s all there.

    What makes Syndicate feel authentic rather than just “vaguely old and British” is the texture of it. The way the buildings crowd each other. The narrow alleys between market stalls. The class divide stitched into the actual geography of the map, with the poorer East End districts looking genuinely grimier and more cramped than the West End’s wide, well-lit boulevards. Ubisoft clearly did their homework, and the result is one of the most detailed recreations of Victorian London ever committed to pixels. You can almost smell the coal smoke.

    The Getaway: A PS2-Era Love Letter to South London

    Here’s one that doesn’t get nearly enough credit. Released in 2002 for the PlayStation 2, The Getaway was built around a painstakingly recreated square mile of central London. Developer Team Soho drove around the actual streets with cameras strapped to vehicles to capture the city’s texture. The result? A gritty, low-res (by today’s standards) but deeply authentic slice of South London gangster life, where you could recognise Shaftesbury Avenue and the Barbican in the same afternoon.

    For its time, this was genuinely mind-blowing. No HUD, no minimap, just characters signalling left and right turns with their hands. Very British problem-solving, that. The game is set firmly in the world of proper old London crime drama and it commits to the bit completely. Soho, Southwark, Shoreditch. The specific washed-out palette of early 2000s Britain. Perfection.

    Comic art depiction of a brutalist British estate in a video game with authentic British architecture
    Comic art depiction of a brutalist British estate in a video game with authentic British architecture

    Strange Brigade and the Curious Case of Portmeirion

    Rebellion’s 2018 co-op shooter Strange Brigade isn’t set in Britain per se, but its aesthetic roots are deeply embedded in British Imperial-era design, and the opening sequences lean heavily on the kind of stately English architecture that screams “National Trust car park” in the best possible way. Worth a mention for anyone who likes their bullets served with a side of Edwardian stonework.

    Concrete Genie and Urban British Grit

    This underrated 2019 gem from PixelOpus (published by Sony) is set in the fictional Scottish fishing town of Denska, which is clearly inspired by real declining British coastal towns. The brutalist harbour walls, the shuttered shops, the general sense that the council has given up but the community hasn’t quite, it’s painfully, beautifully accurate to places like Hartlepool or Grimsby or Margate before the hipsters arrived. That is not an insult. That is texture. That is Britain.

    80 Days: The Great British Map Game Nobody Talks About

    Inkle Studios, a Cambridge-based developer (yes, British, obviously), made 80 Days in 2014 and it remains one of the most elegantly written games ever created. While it spans the globe, the Victorian London sequences are rendered with such literary precision that you can practically feel the fog on your cravat. The tube stations, the docks, the class-conscious dialogue. Inkle are the quiet genius of British game development and more people should be shouting about them.

    If you want to know more about the broader landscape of UK game development studios producing this sort of culturally specific work, the BBC’s technology section has covered the rise of British indie studios in some depth over recent years. There’s a proper scene here, and it’s brilliant.

    Why British Environments Feel So Rare in Games

    Part of it is market size. The US games market is enormous, and developers naturally skew their settings towards what sells in bulk. But there’s also something harder to pin down. British architecture is genuinely complicated to replicate. You’ve got Roman foundations under Medieval streets under Georgian facades under 1960s concrete carbuncles. Nothing matches. Everything is slightly wrong in a way that somehow works. That randomness is hard to procedurally generate. It has to be felt.

    When a developer gets it right, it’s because someone on that team grew up near a Kwik Save that became a Polish supermarket, or spent their teenage years in a brutalist block that smelled of chip fat and cigarettes. You cannot Google Street View your way to that level of detail. You have to have lived it.

    Indie Games Setting the Pace for Digital Britain

    The indie scene is where things get genuinely exciting for video games with authentic British architecture. Games like We Happy Few (technically Canadian-made but deeply rooted in 1960s British dystopia aesthetics) and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture by The Chinese Room (a Brighton-based studio, fittingly) demonstrate that smaller studios are often more willing to commit to a specific regional identity than the big publishers.

    Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture in particular deserves a standing ovation. It’s set in a fictional Shropshire village and it is painfully accurate. The phone boxes. The village hall. The dry stone walls. The precise way the English countryside looks at golden hour before something terrible happens. It’s gorgeous and haunting and could not have been made by anyone who hadn’t spent real time in rural Britain.

    Interestingly, the same principle applies across industries. Authenticity matters online too. Whether you’re a game studio or a small business trying to reach a British audience, the details make the difference between something that feels right and something that’s clearly been assembled from a template. Speaking of which, if your own online presence feels as generic as a reskinned American open-world map, it might be worth grabbing a free SEO audit to see what’s actually going on under the bonnet.

    The Games We’re Still Waiting For

    We need a proper open-world game set in modern Britain. Not historical. Not dystopian. Just Britain. A brutalist Birmingham estate at midnight. The M6 at 6am. A Greggs queue. A canal boat in Hebden Bridge. A Reading Festival campsite. Give me the soul-destroying beauty of a British supermarket on Christmas Eve and I will play it for a thousand hours. The bones are there. Someone just needs to build it.

    Until that day arrives, we’ll keep treasuring the games that bother to get it right. Because when they do, there’s nothing quite like walking through a pixelated terrace and thinking: yes. That’s exactly what the gap between a semi-detached and its fence looks like. Someone on that team has been to Wolverhampton. And bless them for it.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Which video games have the most accurate recreation of London?

    Assassin’s Creed Syndicate and The Getaway are widely regarded as the most detailed recreations of London in gaming history. Syndicate covers Victorian London with impressive architectural fidelity, while The Getaway used real-world photography to recreate a square mile of early 2000s central London.

    Are there any British indie games set in recognisably UK environments?

    Yes, several. Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture by Brighton-based studio The Chinese Room is set in a fictional Shropshire village with remarkable authenticity. Inkle Studios, based in Cambridge, also produce games deeply rooted in British literary and architectural traditions.

    Why don't more video games use British settings and architecture?

    The US gaming market is significantly larger, so most AAA publishers skew their settings toward what sells in volume. British architecture is also notoriously layered and inconsistent, making it genuinely difficult to recreate convincingly without real local knowledge or research.

    Is The Getaway still worth playing in 2026?

    If you can find a way to run it, absolutely yes for historical and cultural interest. The gameplay is dated but the recreation of early 2000s London is genuinely fascinating, especially compared to how those areas look today. It’s a time capsule as much as a game.

    What games have accurately recreated brutalist British architecture?

    Concrete Genie captures the feel of declining British coastal towns and brutalist harbour environments with striking authenticity. We Happy Few also draws heavily on 1960s British urban aesthetics, including the particular grimness of post-war brutalist design, even though it’s set in a dystopian fiction.

  • Why the Deadpool Comics Are Still Funnier Than Both His Movies Combined

    Right, unpopular opinion incoming. Ryan Reynolds is brilliant. The Deadpool films are genuinely funny. But if you put Deadpool comics vs movies on a whiteboard and drew an honest Venn diagram, the comics would have a much bigger circle, several hand-drawn obscene gestures pointing at the films, and probably a footnote insulting the diagram itself. The source material has always been operating on a different frequency, and it is about time someone made the case properly.

    Wade Wilson, the Merc with a Mouth, first showed up in The New Mutants back in 1991 and has been causing editorial headaches ever since. His solo series, particularly the legendary run by Joe Kelly that kicked off in 1997, established something the films have only partially managed to replicate: a character who is not just aware he is in a story but actively resents the fact, weaponises it, and occasionally tries to retroactively rewrite his own back issues. That is not a cinematic trick. That is comics doing something only comics can do.

    The Fourth Wall Does Not Break in the Comics. It Gets Demolished, Rebuilt and Broken Again Twice Before Lunch

    In the films, the fourth-wall breaks are mostly winks to the audience. Fun. Sharp. Reynolds delivering a line directly to camera with that specific grin. Lovely stuff. But in the comics, Deadpool’s relationship with the fourth wall is practically a long-term relationship with commitment issues. He talks to the reader mid-combat. He argues with caption boxes. During the Joe Kelly era, those caption boxes had internal voices arguing amongst themselves in different colours, something no film has ever properly reproduced because frankly it would require subtitles for your subtitles.

    The Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe arc takes this to its logical, unhinged conclusion. Wade becomes aware that every story is just written for entertainment, has an existential crisis about it, and then murders basically everyone in Marvel Comics as a response. Which, honestly, is a more dramatic reaction to reading too much comics lore than most of us manage, but fair enough. The films cannot go there. The comics absolutely did, straight-faced and completely committed to the bit.

    Then there is Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth and various other runs where he essentially critiques the very comic he is appearing in. Writers have to write Deadpool making fun of them for writing Deadpool. That is a level of recursive absurdity that the MCU, for all its billions, simply cannot pull off without completely dismantling its own narrative infrastructure. The comics have no such concerns. Infrastructure? Wade already blew it up.

    The Storylines Are Absolutely, Gloriously Unhinged in Ways Films Would Never Risk

    Here is where the Deadpool comics vs movies debate really opens up. The films, excellent as they are, have to tell a coherent story with a three-act structure, character arcs that pay off, and some baseline of emotional logic. Audiences need to follow along. Popcorn needs to be consumed. Fair.

    The comics have no such obligations. At various points across his print run, Deadpool has:

    • Discovered he had a daughter, handled the parenting about as well as you would expect.
    • Accidentally married a succubus called Shiklah, then had a messy divorce that turned into an actual monster-versus-monster war on the streets of New York.
    • Been retroactively inserted into classic Marvel Silver Age comics by his own writers, including a genuinely surreal issue where he appears in old-school panels with period-appropriate colouring and stilted dialogue, then complains about it.
    • Had multiple “evil” versions of himself show up, including one who wore a bow tie and was somehow worse.
    • Literally killed himself repeatedly just to see what happens, much to Death’s increasing exhaustion.

    None of this would make it into a film with a £150 million production budget and a marketing team to appease. But in the comics, it is just a Wednesday. The monthly release format means writers can try things, fail spectacularly, succeed brilliantly, and then move on before anyone quite processes what happened. It creates a kind of glorious chaos that film just cannot replicate without someone in a suit getting very worried about audience tracking data.

    The Humour Runs Deeper Because It Has More Space to Breathe

    Film comedy is efficient. It has to be. You get two hours, you land your jokes, you move. Deadpool the film is genuinely very funny in that sprint-comedy style. But the comics do something different. They build running jokes across years and dozens of issues. They set up callbacks so slow that the payoff lands three writers later and feels like finding a fiver in an old coat. The humour is layered in a way that rewards obsessive re-reading, which, let us be honest, is exactly what Deadpool fans do.

    Writers like Gail Simone, Brian Posehn, Gerry Duggan, and Kelly Thompson have each brought distinct comedic voices while keeping that essential Deadpool chaos intact. Posehn and Duggan’s run in particular, which saw Wade fight zombie US presidents and become genuinely wealthy, struck a balance between slapstick violence, sharp self-aware humour, and surprising emotional weight that the films have only occasionally touched. You can read more about the broader history of comics storytelling over at the BBC’s Culture section, which puts comics properly in their cultural context.

    The films do emotion well when they try. Logan’s death in Deadpool and Wolverine got people. But the comics have been doing emotionally devastating Deadpool moments since the late nineties, and they earn those moments by first spending thirty issues making you laugh until something hurts.

    Why the Source Material Is Still the Gold Standard for Wade Wilson Chaos

    Look, this is not an argument against the films. Reynolds clearly loves the character and the films wear their comic-book DNA proudly. But in the Deadpool comics vs movies conversation, the source material wins because it invented the rules and then made Deadpool break every single one of them, repeatedly, with commentary.

    The comics exist in a space where continuity is simultaneously sacred and a punchline. Where a character can monologue at the reader for three pages, then immediately get punched through a wall and complain that the writer clearly hates him. Where the absurdity is not a feature dialled up for dramatic effect but the actual default setting, with everything else built around it. The films borrow from that beautifully, but borrowing is not the same as owning.

    If you have only met Wade Wilson through the cinema, you have met the greatest hits version. The comic run is the full discography, the B-sides, the live recordings where things went slightly wrong in the best possible way, and the bootleg cassette from 1997 that started it all. Pick up the Joe Kelly run. Read the Posehn and Duggan issues. Let Deadpool talk to you directly from the page. He has been waiting, and he has opinions about you already.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Are the Deadpool comics funnier than the movies?

    Most hardcore fans would say yes. The comics have decades of layered jokes, recursive fourth-wall humour, and genuinely unhinged storylines that films simply do not have the budget or runtime to replicate. The films are brilliant highlights, but the comics are the full, chaotic package.

    Which Deadpool comic run should I start with?

    Joe Kelly’s 1997 solo run is widely considered the definitive starting point, establishing the fourth-wall humour and emotional complexity the character is known for. The Brian Posehn and Gerry Duggan run from 2012 is also hugely entertaining and slightly more accessible for newer readers.

    Does Deadpool break the fourth wall more in the comics or the films?

    Much more extensively in the comics. In print, Deadpool argues with caption boxes, addresses readers directly mid-fight, and has been written critiquing his own writers. The films do it brilliantly, but the comics have been doing it for nearly thirty years with far more depth and variety.

    What is the most absurd Deadpool comic storyline?

    Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe is a strong contender, where Wade becomes aware he exists purely for entertainment and responds by murdering the entire Marvel roster. His accidental marriage to a succubus and subsequent monster war in New York is also magnificently unhinged.

    Are Deadpool comics worth collecting in the UK?

    Absolutely. Many key issues and collected trade paperbacks are readily available through UK comic shops, Forbidden Planet, and online retailers. First appearances and key story arc issues have also shown solid value over time for collectors who keep them in good condition.

  • Retro Games That Were Basically Movies Before Movies Were Cool About It

    Retro Games That Were Basically Movies Before Movies Were Cool About It

    Hollywood spent most of the 1980s and 1990s looking at video games and thinking, “cute little toy for children, nothing to see here.” Meanwhile, in bedrooms across Britain, kids were hunched over their Mega Drives and Super Nintendos having full emotional crises because a video game had just broken their heart. Retro games with cinematic storytelling were doing things with narrative, atmosphere, and genuine human feeling that most blockbusters of the same era couldn’t be bothered to attempt. This is the long-overdue victory lap.

    We’re not talking about cutscenes bolted onto a game like a bow on a bin bag. We’re talking about titles that understood pacing, character, loss, and consequence before those words were part of any mainstream gaming conversation. Pull up a chair. This is going to feel very smug, and I am absolutely fine with that.

    Retro games with cinematic storytelling depicted in bold comic book art style showing pixel RPG characters on a classic TV screen
    Retro games with cinematic storytelling depicted in bold comic book art style showing pixel RPG characters on a classic TV screen

    Final Fantasy VI: The Game That Made an Opera More Emotional Than Any Actual Opera

    Released in 1994 on the Super Nintendo, Final Fantasy VI pulled off something that shouldn’t have been possible in 16-bit. It made you genuinely care about a cast of fourteen playable characters, each carrying their own backstory, trauma, and motivation. Terra’s amnesia, Celes’s despair in the second act, Kefka’s slow transformation into a genuinely terrifying nihilist villain. This wasn’t background flavour. It was a full narrative architecture.

    The Opera Scene remains one of the most discussed moments in gaming history. A pixelated performance, a love letter disguised as a game mechanic, and it worked. People who played it at age ten in 1994 are still thinking about it in 2026. That’s not a coincidence. That’s storytelling doing its job properly.

    Planescape: Torment and the One Question Every Story Should Ask

    “What can change the nature of a man?” That’s the central question of Planescape: Torment, released in 1999, and it’s more philosophically loaded than most A-level essay prompts. You play as the Nameless One, an immortal amnesiac who has lived countless lives and left damage everywhere he went. The game then asks you to reckon with that damage.

    Critics and fans have described it as closer to an interactive novel than a game, which is meant as a compliment. The writing is staggering. Characters feel like people. Dialogue branches carry real moral weight. Death isn’t a game over screen; it’s a plot mechanic. This was a PC RPG from before most people had broadband, and it was doing narrative things that films with hundred-million-pound budgets still struggle with.

    Metal Gear Solid: Kojima Being Absolutely Unhinged in the Best Possible Way

    The original Metal Gear Solid on PlayStation in 1998 was, frankly, preposterous. It had a villain who could read your memory card. It broke the fourth wall before fourth-wall breaks were a genre staple. It asked players to plug their controller into a different port to defeat a psychic enemy. And somehow, buried underneath all of that spectacular weirdness, was a genuinely moving story about soldiers, identity, cloning, and what it means to be human.

    Hideo Kojima was making retro games with cinematic storytelling before the phrase existed. The codec conversations alone contain more character development than most action films of the same era. Snake and Otacon’s friendship, Meryl’s arc, the tragedy of the DARPA chief. These weren’t window dressing. They were the point.

    Close-up comic art of retro game controller capturing the emotional experience of retro games with cinematic storytelling
    Close-up comic art of retro game controller capturing the emotional experience of retro games with cinematic storytelling

    Chrono Trigger: Time Travel Done Better Than Most Time Travel Films

    Chrono Trigger (1995) had a writing team that included the creator of Dragon Ball and the director of Final Fantasy. The result was a time-travel RPG so well-constructed that its multiple endings still hold up as a masterclass in player agency. Each timeline branch felt earned. Each character had a reason to be in the story beyond filling a party slot.

    Frog’s redemption arc. Magus’s tragedy. The sheer gut-punch of Crono’s sacrifice. Chrono Trigger understood that emotional stakes require investment, and it built that investment carefully over dozens of hours. Hollywood was making Ace Ventura sequels that same year. Gaming was doing this.

    The Secret of Monkey Island: Comedy as Legitimate Storytelling

    Not all cinematic storytelling needs to make you cry into a bowl of cereal at midnight. The Secret of Monkey Island (1990) proved that comedy, wit, and charm are just as valid as tragedy when it comes to building a world that players want to live inside. Guybrush Threepwood’s bumbling heroism, the genuinely funny dialogue trees, the insult sword fighting mechanic that still makes people laugh out loud decades later.

    LucasArts was crafting point-and-click adventures that felt like interactive films with better jokes than most actual comedies of the period. The writing was sharp, the characters were memorable, and the storytelling trusted the player to pay attention. That trust is rarer than it sounds.

    Ico and the Power of Saying Absolutely Nothing

    Technically a 2001 release (2002 in the UK), Ico belongs in this conversation because it proves that cinematic storytelling doesn’t require a single word of exposition. Two characters, a crumbling castle, and a hand-holding mechanic that communicated an entire emotional relationship without dialogue. Director Fumito Ueda stripped narrative down to its bones and found something more affecting than most scripts with three acts and a professional cast.

    The BBC’s coverage of gaming culture has noted how titles like Ico changed critical conversations about what games could achieve as an art form. You can read more about gaming’s cultural impact at BBC Culture’s deep dive into gaming’s greatest achievements. It’s a decent rabbit hole if you fancy feeling both nostalgic and intellectual simultaneously.

    Why Retro Games Got Away With Being This Good

    Here’s my actual theory: limitations forced creativity. When you can’t render a character’s face with photorealistic detail, you write them better instead. When cutscenes cost a fortune to produce, you make the gameplay itself carry the emotional weight. Retro games with cinematic storytelling were born from constraint, and constraint has always been one of the better parents of art.

    The developers making these games were also, often, completely unhinged in the most productive sense. Hironobu Sakaguchi, Shigeru Miyamoto, Ron Gilbert, Hideo Kojima. These were people who believed games could do something meaningful, before the industry had any commercial proof that anyone wanted meaningful. They just made the thing anyway.

    Hollywood eventually caught up, of course. The last decade or so has seen studios take gaming seriously as source material and as a rival storytelling medium. But there’s something worth celebrating about the fact that games got there first. The kids crying over a 16-bit sprite in 1994 weren’t being dramatic. They were having genuine emotional experiences. They were just ahead of schedule.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What are the best retro games with cinematic storytelling for beginners?

    Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, and Metal Gear Solid are brilliant starting points because they balance accessible gameplay with genuinely rich narratives. All three are available on modern platforms or via official emulation services, so you don’t need original hardware to experience them.

    Can I play classic 80s and 90s story-driven games on modern consoles in 2026?

    Yes, many retro titles are available through Nintendo Switch Online, PlayStation Plus Premium, or official compilations. Games like Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger also have well-regarded ports on PC via Steam, making them very accessible.

    Are retro RPGs with cinematic storytelling worth playing if I'm used to modern graphics?

    Absolutely. The pixel art style of many classic RPGs has aged remarkably well and the writing in titles like Planescape: Torment or Chrono Trigger often surpasses modern releases. Think of it like watching an older film; the experience is different but no less valid.

    Which 90s game is considered the best for storytelling?

    Planescape: Torment (1999) is frequently cited by critics and developers as the gold standard for narrative depth in gaming, with its philosophical themes and complex characters. Final Fantasy VI and Metal Gear Solid are close rivals depending on who you ask.

    Did retro games influence modern cinematic games like The Last of Us or Red Dead Redemption 2?

    Definitely. Many modern developers, including those at Naughty Dog and Rockstar, have cited classic 90s RPGs and adventure games as formative influences on their approach to story, character development, and emotional pacing.

  • The Most Unhinged Video Game Plot Twists That Made Us Question Everything

    The Most Unhinged Video Game Plot Twists That Made Us Question Everything

    Right. Before we go any further, this article is absolutely riddled with spoilers. Enormous, story-destroying, why-did-I-read-this spoilers. If you haven’t finished some of the games mentioned here and you value your emotional wellbeing, perhaps go make a cup of tea and come back later. Still here? Brilliant. You’ve signed the metaphorical waiver. Let’s talk about the best video game plot twists ever committed to a disc, cartridge, or digital download.

    Because nothing — not a film, not a novel, not a particularly dramatic episode of EastEnders — hits quite like a video game plot twist. You’ve been playing as this character. You’ve spent forty hours with them. You trust them. And then the game looks you dead in the eye and says, “Actually, mate, everything you thought you knew was wrong.” Chef’s kiss. Absolute chaos. We love it.

    Dramatic comic book art depicting the shock of the best video game plot twists with a hero facing a revelation
    Dramatic comic book art depicting the shock of the best video game plot twists with a hero facing a revelation

    Bioshock: “Would You Kindly” Rewrote the Rules of Gaming Storytelling

    Let’s start with the big one. The one that university media studies lecturers still reference in 2026. You’re playing through the underwater nightmare of Rapture, doing everything this chap Atlas tells you to do. Follow the arrow. Help the man. Save the little girls. Then the game drops the phrase “would you kindly” and your brain quietly folds in half.

    You weren’t just following instructions. You were programmed to follow instructions. The entire game was a demonstration that the player character had no free will whatsoever, and by extension, neither did you. You were playing a game within a game. Your controller was the leash. It remains one of the best video game plot twists precisely because it doesn’t just shock the character — it shocks you, the person sitting on the sofa with a cold cup of tea.

    Spec Ops: The Line Decided to Make You Feel Terrible About Yourself

    Speaking of games weaponising your own actions against you. Spec Ops: The Line looked like a perfectly standard military shooter from the outside. It was not. It was a slow-burn psychological horror dressed up in desert camouflage, and the white phosphorus scene is the moment the whole thing cracks open.

    You do something catastrophic. The game tells you it’s the enemy’s fault. Then it shows you what you actually did. The twist isn’t a character reveal or a conspiracy — it’s the gradual, horrible realisation that the protagonist (and arguably you, the player) is the villain of this story. Games writers and critics across publications like BBC Culture still hold it up as proof that games can carry genuine moral weight. Heavy stuff. Zero fun at parties.

    Red Dead Redemption Gave You Hope and Then Immediately Took It Away

    You did it. John Marston completed every single mission. He got his family back. He escaped his past. He’s standing in a field watching his son run about, and you think: we made it. The game is over. Happy ending achieved.

    And then the government agents arrive at the farm.

    Close-up comic book panel of a character reacting to one of the best video game plot twists in history
    Close-up comic book panel of a character reacting to one of the best video game plot twists in history

    What makes this one of the best video game plot twists isn’t just the shock of John’s death — it’s the hope Rockstar built up first. The entire last act is an elaborate, beautiful trick. You’re being lulled into comfort. The twist isn’t a revelation about identity or reality. It’s simply that the world of this game will never, ever let a man like John Marston have peace. Ruthless. Brilliant. I still haven’t fully recovered.

    Knights of the Old Republic Said “Hi, You’re the Villain”

    Back when BioWare were operating at peak storytelling powers, Knights of the Old Republic pulled off something spectacular. You spend the whole game hunting down Darth Revan, the galaxy’s most dangerous Sith Lord. A mysterious, masked figure of pure menace.

    Turns out? You’re Darth Revan. You were always Darth Revan. The Jedi wiped your memory and sent you back out into the world as a sleeper agent. The villain you were chasing was yourself, just with better memories. It’s one of those twists that rewards a second playthrough spectacularly, because suddenly every cryptic line of dialogue clicks into place. Absolute masterclass in retroactive storytelling.

    Undertale Made You the Monster in the Most Gentle Way Possible

    Undertale is built entirely around choice, and it takes great care to tell you early on that you don’t have to fight anyone. You can spare every single enemy. You can be kind. But some players — curious, testing the limits — chose to kill everything.

    The genocide route doesn’t just end badly. The game remembers. It addresses you directly. It tells you what you did. A later playthrough, even a pacifist one, carries the weight of a previous genocide run. Flowey’s final confrontation breaks the fourth wall so completely that the wall basically files for a restraining order. Toby Fox made something that genuinely understands how players interact with game worlds, and used that understanding to make you feel like a monster. In a lovely way. Sort of.

    Metal Gear Solid 2 Was Decades Ahead of Its Time

    Hideo Kojima spent the first act of MGS2 letting you believe you were playing as Solid Snake. Then he swapped the protagonist out for a new character called Raiden, and half the fanbase had a meltdown. Fair enough, really. But the deeper you go into the game, the stranger and more prophetic it becomes. The Colonel starts glitching. The codec calls make no sense. The game begins to suggest that Raiden’s entire life, his memories, his relationships, might be manufactured. It’s a game about information control, artificial reality, and the manipulation of perception released in 2001. In 2026, it reads less like science fiction and more like a documentary. Genuinely unsettling.

    What Makes a Great Video Game Plot Twist Actually Work?

    The best video game plot twists share a few things in common. They use the medium against you. They weaponise the fact that you’ve been the one pressing the buttons all along. A film twist can shock you, but a game twist can implicate you. That gap between player and character collapses at exactly the right moment, and suddenly it’s not just a story beat — it’s a gut punch you can feel in your thumbs.

    The other ingredient is recontextualisation. The greatest twists don’t just add information; they make you reassess everything that came before. Every conversation, every strange piece of dialogue, every odd detail suddenly snaps into focus. That feeling of the penny dropping — but from a great height — is what separates a good twist from an absolutely legendary one.

    The games industry in the UK has grown into one of the most creative in the world, and storytelling ambition has grown with it. But no matter how cinematic games become, the best video game plot twists will always belong specifically to the medium. Nobody else can make you feel quite this betrayed, quite this gleeful, and quite this desperate to ring your mate at 11pm on a Tuesday to shout about a fictional space cowboy’s secret identity.

    That’s not a bug. That’s the whole point.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What are the best video game plot twists of all time?

    Widely considered the greatest include the ‘would you kindly’ reveal in Bioshock, the Darth Revan identity twist in Knights of the Old Republic, and John Marston’s death in Red Dead Redemption. Each uses the interactive nature of games to make the twist hit harder than it ever could in a film.

    Which game has the most shocking plot twist?

    Bioshock’s ‘would you kindly’ moment is regularly cited as the most shocking because it implicates the player directly, not just the character. The twist recontextualises your entire experience of the game and makes a philosophical point about player agency at the same time.

    Are there video game plot twists that hold up on a second playthrough?

    Absolutely. Knights of the Old Republic and Metal Gear Solid 2 are particularly rewarding replays because dialogue and details you missed the first time suddenly make perfect sense. Undertale also changes significantly depending on choices made in previous runs.

    What makes a video game twist better than a film twist?

    The key difference is implication. In games, you’ve been the one making decisions and pressing buttons, so a twist can make you feel personally responsible or complicit. That second layer of meaning is unique to interactive storytelling and is why the best twists in games feel so visceral.

    Are modern games still producing great plot twists?

    Yes, though the bar is very high now that players are actively looking for them. Games like Nier: Automata and Outer Wilds in recent years have delivered genuinely surprising and emotionally resonant narrative turns that rival any of the classics on this list.

  • If Superheroes Had Steam Accounts: What Games Would They Play?

    If Superheroes Had Steam Accounts: What Games Would They Play?

    Right, hear me out. We spend a lot of time thinking about what superheroes do between saving the world. Do they meal prep? Do they have a Netflix queue? Do they argue about who left the Quinjet in a disabled parking bay? All valid questions. But the one that keeps me up at night is this: if superheroes had Steam accounts, what would their library look like? This is the superheroes and video games funny deep-dive nobody asked for but absolutely everyone needs.

    Buckle up. We’re going full speculative chaos mode.

    Superheroes gathered around a gaming screen in comic book style, capturing the superheroes and video games funny concept
    Superheroes gathered around a gaming screen in comic book style, capturing the superheroes and video games funny concept

    Batman: 4,000 Hours in Hollow Knight With Zero Refunds

    Bruce Wayne is, above all else, a man who punishes himself. He trained for decades in every martial art known to humanity. He sleeps four hours a night in a cave. He absolutely, one hundred percent, has 4,000 hours logged in Hollow Knight and has completed every single achievement including the ones that make grown adults cry.

    His Steam review would simply read: “Good. Could be harder. The Knight’s backstory resonated with me personally. Do not ask why. Five stars.”

    He also owns every game in his library but has launched precisely three of them. His wishlist has 847 items. He will never buy them during a sale because he finds sales distasteful.

    Spider-Man: 200 Hours in Stardew Valley, Currently Crying

    Peter Parker is a broke student from Queens who patches his own suit with gaffer tape. Stardew Valley is the perfect escape. A farm, some chickens, a bloke called Harvey who might fancy him. Peak Peter energy.

    His review: “Started this to unwind after a rough week. Named my farm ‘May’s Place’. Cannot stop crying. My crops are thriving though. 10/10 recommend.”

    He also has 60 hours in Dave the Diver and keeps meaning to try Hades but keeps getting distracted by actual hades. You know. The real one.

    Thor: Exclusively Plays God of War on the Hardest Difficulty, Furious About the Lore

    Thor Odinson bought a gaming PC specifically for God of War. He launched it, saw Kratos, said “I respect this man’s arms”, and proceeded to play the entire thing in one sitting whilst eating an entire roast chicken.

    His Steam review is three paragraphs of caps lock disagreeing with how Asgard is depicted, followed by: “Nevertheless, 9/10. Atreus is annoying but reminds me of Loki as a child. Do not tell Loki I said this.”

    He also has Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 because obviously he does. Twelve hundred hours. He considers it a documentary.

    Tony Stark: Has Every Game, Actually Built a Better Version of Most of Them

    Tony’s Steam library is 3,000+ titles. His playtime across them averages around eleven minutes each, because he finishes games by reading the code and understanding them intellectually rather than playing them like a normal person.

    The exception is Kerbal Space Program 2. He has 900 hours. He has also sent several angry emails to the developers pointing out their orbital mechanics are slightly off. He was correct. He did not receive a reply.

    His review of Cyberpunk 2077: “Decent world-building. The technology is quaint. Gave it five stars because the jacket in Act 2 is genuinely excellent.”

    Wonder Woman: Obsessed With Total War, Terrifyingly Good at It

    Diana of Themyscira has been studying military strategy since before the Roman Empire was a going concern. Total War: Pharaoh, Total War: Warhammer III, Total War: Three Kingdoms – she owns all of them, she has completed all of them on the hardest difficulty, and she has written a forty-page strategic analysis document that she posts on the subreddit under a username nobody suspects is actually Wonder Woman.

    Her Steam review of any Total War title: “Historically inaccurate in places I witnessed personally. Mechanically satisfying. I have overthrown seventeen AI civilisations this month. Recommended.”

    She also plays Civilisation VII but quits every run when her chosen leader makes a decision she finds diplomatically baffling.

    The Hulk: Only One Game in the Library

    Bruce Banner installed Gang Beasts at a team movie night. The Hulk took over during a particularly competitive round. Nobody has spoken about it since. The account still has one review: “SMASH. 5 STAR.”

    Banner himself has been attempting to finish Disco Elysium for two years. He gets emotionally overwhelmed by the writing. He relates to Harry Du Bois deeply and finds this upsetting.

    Loki: 100% Achievement Hunter, Always Uses Exploits

    Loki has 100% achievements in forty-seven games. He achieves this by finding every exploit, glitch, and shortcut available, and he considers this entirely valid. He is not cheating. He is innovating.

    His favourite genre is immersive sim. He has written a 6,000-word Steam review for Dishonored 2 that is genuinely one of the most insightful pieces of game criticism ever produced, published under the username “NotLoki_Definitely_A_Normal_Person”. It has 47,000 upvotes.

    He also gifted Thor a copy of Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy for Christmas and refuses to apologise.

    Why This Matters (It Doesn’t, But Hear Me Out)

    The joy of thinking about superheroes and video games funny scenarios like this is that it reveals character in a weirdly accurate way. Batman’s masochism, Peter’s sentimentality, Tony’s insufferable genius. Games have a way of exposing who we really are, whether you’re a caped vigilante or just someone who spent six hours redesigning their Stardew Valley farm layout instead of going to sleep.

    If you want to go even deeper on gaming culture and why it matters, the BBC’s gaming coverage has some genuinely interesting pieces on how games shape identity and culture. Much like a certain Asgardian’s forty-page Total War analysis, it’s worth a read.

    Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to log off and check whether Spider-Man has managed to confess his feelings to Harvey in Stardew Valley. This is urgent. This is important. This is the real heroism.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What games would Batman most likely play on Steam?

    Batman would almost certainly gravitate towards brutally difficult games like Hollow Knight or Sekiro, where suffering is the point and mastery takes hundreds of hours. He’d probably also have a massive strategy library he never touches, much like his emotional openness.

    Is there a superhero video game on Steam worth playing in 2026?

    Absolutely. Titles like Spider-Man: Miles Morales (available on PC via Steam), Batman: Arkham Knight, and the Marvel’s Midnight Suns are all solid picks. The Steam superhero catalogue has grown massively in recent years with genuinely excellent ports.

    Which superhero would actually be the best gamer?

    Realistically, Tony Stark’s processing speed and pattern recognition would make him almost unbeatable in competitive games. However, Loki’s willingness to exploit every mechanic and loophole might give him the edge in terms of raw completion rates and achievement hunting.

    Why is the idea of superheroes playing video games so funny?

    The humour comes from the contrast between their world-saving responsibilities and completely relatable gaming habits, like quitting a run because an AI made a bad decision or crying over a farming sim. It’s the superheroes and video games funny formula that works every time: take something epic, make it mundane.

    What genre of games would Thor most likely enjoy?

    Thor is a natural fit for action RPGs and hack-and-slash titles like God of War or Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2. Anything with epic combat, massive enemies, and a story involving gods, battles, or honour would absolutely be in his Steam library.

  • The Most Overpowered Protagonists in Gaming History and Why We Love Them

    The Most Overpowered Protagonists in Gaming History and Why We Love Them

    There is a very specific joy that comes from being so ridiculously powerful in a video game that enemies don’t just lose, they basically apologise before the screen fades to black. We’re talking about overpowered video game protagonists — the chosen ones, the godkillers, the characters who show up and the final boss genuinely considers going home early. These are the absolute units of gaming history, and I am here to celebrate every single one of them with all the affection and gentle mockery they deserve.

    Comic book art of an overpowered video game protagonist standing victorious on a battlefield
    Comic book art of an overpowered video game protagonist standing victorious on a battlefield

    What Even Makes a Protagonist Overpowered?

    To be truly, magnificently overpowered is an art form. Any game can hand you a sword. It takes special creative energy to hand you a sword, then also give you telekinesis, an immortal dragon soul, a nuclear railgun, and the ability to pause time while wearing armour that absorbs incoming damage and converts it into more power. The benchmark here isn’t just “strong” — it’s “enemies look at you and have an existential crisis”.

    There’s a brilliant psychological reason we keep returning to these characters too. Researchers who study play behaviour note that a sense of competence is one of the core drivers of enjoyment in games. When you feel ludicrously capable, your brain is essentially throwing a small party. And honestly? After a rough Tuesday commute on the Northern line, being a literal demigod for a few hours is the best therapy going. The BBC has covered how gaming can serve as a genuine stress relief mechanism, and I suspect most of that research quietly involves someone playing as Kratos.

    Kratos (God of War) — The Gold Standard of Too Much

    If overpowered video game protagonists had a hall of fame, Kratos would be the entire first floor. The man kills Greek gods the way you and I swat flies. He rips the sun out of the sky in one game. By the time the Norse mythology arc rolls around, he’s fighting actual world-ending entities and his primary concern seems to be that his son is eating enough. He exudes the energy of someone who finds the apocalypse mildly inconvenient. Yet we absolutely cannot stop playing as him, because every single encounter feels earned through pure spectacle. You don’t feel cheap playing Kratos. You feel like a force of nature dressed in war paint.

    The Dragonborn (Skyrim) — A One-Person Natural Disaster

    Skyrim’s Dragonborn starts the game about to be executed and ends it having absorbed so many dragon souls that the actual fabric of reality bends to accommodate their shouting. The infamous “pacifist mage” build, the sneaky archer who can kill a mammoth from 300 metres, the warrior who wears armour enchanted to the point that it’s practically a second skeleton — all of them end up functionally invincible by act three. And yet we put in 200 hours every single time a new version drops. There’s something deeply comforting about returning to a world where you are, without question, the most dangerous thing in it.

    Close-up comic book art of an overpowered video game protagonist's energy-charged fist
    Close-up comic book art of an overpowered video game protagonist's energy-charged fist

    Dante (Devil May Cry) — Overpowered With Excellent Hair

    Dante from Devil May Cry is worth a special mention because he is overpowered in a way that seems almost performatively ridiculous. He surfs rockets. He uses a guitar as a weapon. He eats pizza while in the middle of boss fights. The game is stylish enough that you barely notice the difficulty has essentially been replaced with a dance-off you’re always going to win. And that’s the genius of it — DMC leans so fully into its own absurdity that the power fantasy feels like a feature, not a cheat. You’re not overpowered; you’re just that cool. The game told you so.

    Commander Shepard (Mass Effect) — Diplomatically Unstoppable

    The overpowered status of Commander Shepard is interesting because it’s partly mechanical and partly narrative. By Mass Effect 3, a fully specced Shepard is borderline unkillable. But the real power is the galaxy bending around your decisions. Entire species rethink their politics because you walked into a room. Ancient civilisations with millions of years of headstart on humanity are taking your calls. Shepard’s power fantasy is less about combat and more about the idea that one determined person can, in fact, fix everything. Which, given the state of actual current events, hits a little harder than it used to.

    Link (The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom) — An Engineer With a God Complex

    Link in Tears of the Kingdom deserves a special overpowered category: emergent chaos. He’s not handed raw power so much as given a toolkit with which he immediately builds something that was never meant to exist and absolutely should not work. Want to attach five rockets to a piece of timber and fly into a Lynel’s face at 200 miles per hour? Go on then. The physics engine genuinely seems afraid of what you’ll do next. The game’s difficulty is entirely self-imposed, and players absolutely lean into that. There are recorded playthroughs where people have defeated Ganondorf using nothing but a wooden plank and pure stubbornness.

    Why We Actually Love Being This Powerful

    Here’s the honest psychological truth behind our obsession with overpowered video game protagonists: real life gives us very little control. You miss a train, the supermarket is out of the biscuits you specifically wanted, and someone has parked across your drive again. But in a game? You are the variable that changes everything. Every enemy, every puzzle, every world-ending threat exists to be dismantled by you specifically. That’s not laziness. That’s catharsis in pixel form.

    There’s also a collector’s mindset at work. Building an overpowered character is genuinely satisfying as a long-term project. You optimise gear, learn mechanics, find the cheese strats that the developers either missed or quietly left in as a gift. It’s almost like putting together the perfect outfit for a big occasion. Knowing every piece slots together perfectly, from the boots to the Zip top handbags — when the whole look comes together, you feel unstoppable. Games tap into that exact same energy.

    The Honourable Mentions You’d Shout at Us for Leaving Out

    A quick and entirely deserved acknowledgement to the characters who nearly made the main list: Geralt of Rivia in a fully maxed build (he turns death into admin), Bayonetta (she fights angels using her own hair and this is considered a normal Tuesday), and any fully upgraded V in Cyberpunk 2077 who has essentially transcended the concept of being killed. Honourable, if slightly terrifying, mentions all round.

    The overpowered video game protagonist is one of gaming’s most enduring archetypes for a reason. We come back to them not because they’re easy but because they’re freeing. In a world that requires patience and compromise and eating your greens, sometimes you just need to be an unstoppable force with a massive sword and absolutely no chill. Gaming gets that. Gaming has always got that. Long may the absolute units reign.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Who is the most overpowered protagonist in gaming history?

    Kratos from God of War is frequently cited as the benchmark, given he defeats literal gods, Titans, and world-ending threats across multiple mythologies. However, a fully maxed-out Dragonborn in Skyrim or Dante in Devil May Cry 5 are strong contenders depending on your build and tolerance for absurdity.

    Why do players enjoy using overpowered characters in video games?

    Psychologists point to ‘competence’ as a core driver of enjoyment in play — feeling powerful triggers genuine satisfaction and stress relief. Overpowered characters offer a sense of total control that real life rarely provides, making them deeply appealing after a long day.

    Are overpowered protagonists bad for game design?

    Not necessarily. Many overpowered characters are the result of intentional design choices meant to deliver a power fantasy, like in God of War or Devil May Cry. Problems only arise when the power imbalance removes all tension; great games balance the feeling of being unstoppable with moments of genuine challenge or emotional stakes.

    What games let you become the most overpowered character possible?

    Skyrim, The Witcher 3 on Death March then fully upgraded, Cyberpunk 2077 with a late-game netrunner build, and Elden Ring with certain broken weapon combinations are all popular picks. Tears of the Kingdom is a special case because the player essentially engineers their own overpowered status using the game’s physics systems.

    Is Link from Zelda considered an overpowered protagonist?

    In Tears of the Kingdom, Link’s power comes from the Ultrahand and Fuse mechanics rather than raw stats, meaning players create their own broken builds. Veterans of the game have documented strategies so absurd they barely resemble intended gameplay, which many fans consider a feature rather than a flaw.

  • Video Game Cars We’d Actually Drive in Real Life (And the Chaos That Would Follow)

    Video Game Cars We’d Actually Drive in Real Life (And the Chaos That Would Follow)

    There’s a moment in almost every open-world game where you look at the vehicle you’re driving and think: I want this in my actual life. Not in a vague, wistful way. In a very specific, “I would absolutely park this outside Tesco” kind of way. Iconic video game cars have this ridiculous power over us. They’re impractical, often weaponised, and would almost certainly fail a DVLA roadworthiness check. And yet. Here we are.

    So let’s do this properly. Which fictional motors from gaming history would actually survive the British road test? And more importantly, which ones would cause the most absolutely spectacular havoc on a wet Tuesday morning on the M25?

    Iconic video game cars lined up on a British high street in comic book art style
    Iconic video game cars lined up on a British high street in comic book art style

    The Warthog from Halo: Britain’s Most Chaotic 4×4

    The M12 Force Application Vehicle, better known as the Warthog, is the gold standard of video game utility vehicles. It’s essentially a beefed-up off-roader with a mounted turret on the back, which, for the purposes of this article, we will pretend isn’t there. The chassis is enormous. The suspension looks like it could handle any pothole the council hasn’t got round to fixing since 2019. In theory, it’s the perfect British countryside runaround.

    In practice? The steering is absolutely mental. Halo players know this. You tap the analogue stick and suddenly you’re doing a horizontal barrel roll through a field in Shropshire. Still, it would look magnificent tearing through the Peak District. Somebody would definitely film it and post it. It would get 2 million views by Thursday.

    The Mako from Mass Effect: For Off-Road Enthusiasts With No Fear

    The Mako is simultaneously one of gaming’s most beloved and most cursed vehicles. Commander Shepard uses it to traverse alien planets with gravity-defying terrain, and the thing handles like a shopping trolley with opinions. But strip away the extraterrestrial context and what you’ve got is a sealed armoured personnel carrier that can theoretically climb a near-vertical cliff face. In Wales, this would be extraordinarily useful.

    If you’re the sort of person who genuinely loves off-road adventures and isn’t fussed about your vehicle making any kind of rational physical sense, the Mako is your spirit animal. It’s also the kind of machine that would need some serious ongoing maintenance. Speaking of which, anyone who’s ever kept a quirky, unusual vehicle on the road knows the importance of good parts suppliers. Whether you’re tracking down obscure components for a classic Mitsubishi, sourcing Mitsubishi delica parts for a legendary people carrier, or trying to keep an ageing Land Rover breathing, finding the right specialist makes all the difference.

    The Batmobile (Arkham Knight Version): Illegal in 47 Countries

    Let’s be honest, the Arkham Knight Batmobile is the peak. It’s a turbine-powered, cannon-equipped, tank-mode-activating monster that makes the Tumbler look like a sensible estate car. The sound design alone is cinematic. The moment that engine fires up, you feel it in your chest.

    Could it function on UK roads? Absolutely not. The width alone would make most town centre streets completely impassable. A quick visit to GOV.UK’s vehicle approval guidance makes clear just how many hoops any modified vehicle has to jump through to be considered roadworthy, and the Batmobile would fail before the assessor even got to the cannon. But none of that matters when it looks this good. Batman would just park on the pavement, obviously.

    Close-up of an iconic video game car cockpit interior in comic book art style
    Close-up of an iconic video game car cockpit interior in comic book art style

    The Regalia from Final Fantasy XV: Road Trip Goals

    Now here’s an iconic video game car that feels almost plausible. The Regalia is a sleek, vintage-styled convertible that Noctis and his squad cruise around in, windows down, hair flowing, boyband energy fully activated. It’s gorgeous. It seats four. It has a radio. These are all very normal car features.

    The fantasy of loading up the Regalia and driving from Edinburgh down to Cornwall on a warm August evening, music playing, stopping at a Little Chef (yes, some still exist), staring at the stars in a layby somewhere in Somerset. It’s genuinely aspirational. The Regalia represents something most video game cars don’t bother with: the simple joy of the journey. Not every car needs guns. Some just need good vibes and a decent playlist.

    The Nomad from Cyberpunk 2077: Built for British Winters

    Cyberpunk 2077 has a whole garage of wild vehicles, but the Nomad rigs deserve special attention. These battered, heavily modified, post-apocalyptic lorry-trucks feel like something a very determined Glaswegian mechanic built in a lock-up in 1997 and just kept adding to. They’re enormous, they look indestructible, and crucially, they’d probably handle Scottish winters without complaint.

    There’s something deeply appealing about the whole Nomad aesthetic for UK drivers. Practical. Armoured. Doesn’t care what the weather is doing. Has probably got a spare tyre in four locations simultaneously. The Nomads are what happens when survival instinct meets engineering. We respect it enormously.

    Burnout’s Crash Mode Cars: A Love Letter to Chaos

    Look, we can’t talk about iconic video game cars without acknowledging Burnout. Specifically Burnout 3: Takedown, which remains a masterpiece of joyful automotive destruction. The cars in Burnout are not memorable for their design. They’re memorable for what happens to them. Slow-motion crashes with debris flying in every direction, the camera swinging round to capture the wreckage. Deeply, deeply satisfying in a way that is completely impossible to explain to someone who hasn’t played it.

    In real life, obviously, we do not want any of this. But as a gaming experience? Peak. The Burnout series understood something profound: sometimes you just want to watch a car fly through a junction at 160mph and take out seventeen other vehicles. That’s not a violent impulse. That’s artistic expression.

    The Real Question: Which One Actually Works on British Roads?

    Honestly? None of them fully work. But that’s not the point. Iconic video game cars aren’t meant to work in the mundane sense. They’re designed to make you feel something, whether that’s power (Batmobile), freedom (Regalia), chaos (Warthog), or battered resilience (Nomad rig). They’re fantasy objects that tell us something about what we actually want from driving, even when we’re sitting in a Ford Focus on the A38 at 7:45 in the morning wondering why the traffic report lied to us again.

    The appeal of these machines lives in the same place as the appeal of gaming itself: the permission to experience something bigger, wilder, and more interesting than the everyday. And honestly? That’s worth celebrating. Even if the Mako would absolutely roll itself down a hill in the Cotswolds within twenty minutes of arrival.

    Right. Somebody sort out the Warthog. I’ll bring snacks. We’re taking it to Scotland.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What are the most iconic video game cars of all time?

    Some of the most iconic video game cars include the Warthog from Halo, the Batmobile from the Arkham series, the Regalia from Final Fantasy XV, and the Mako from Mass Effect. Each has become a cultural touchstone for gamers, recognised far beyond their original titles.

    Which video game car would be most fun to drive in real life?

    The Regalia from Final Fantasy XV is arguably the most genuinely enjoyable real-world prospect, being a stylish vintage convertible built for road trips. The Warthog would be the most chaotic, and the Batmobile would be immediately impounded.

    Has anyone ever built a real-life version of a video game car?

    Yes, quite a few fans and studios have commissioned real-world builds. The Warthog has been recreated several times for events, and various Batmobile variants exist as working vehicles. Most are built for display purposes rather than actual road use, as they would fail UK road approval tests.

    Why do video game cars feel so much more exciting than real ones?

    Video game cars are designed purely around feel and fantasy, with no regard for practicality, fuel economy, or insurance costs. They’re built to make players feel powerful or free, which is exactly what a Ford Fiesta on the school run does not do.

    What game has the best driving mechanics and vehicle selection?

    Forza Horizon 5 and Gran Turismo 7 are widely considered the benchmarks for driving mechanics and vehicle selection, with hundreds of licensed real-world cars. For pure arcade fun with iconic fictional vehicles, the Burnout series and the original Halo titles are hard to beat.

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