10 Annoying Side-Kicks Who Almost Spoiled Great Games

7. Omochao - Sonic Series

Let's be perfectly honest here - for a fairly cool guy, Sonic doesn't really surround himself with the coolest of friends, and almost all of that particular cast of characters could have made this list rather than just the two who did. This robotic, propeller-headed side-kick has been a regular feature - in one way or another - since Sonic Adventure, serving as an in-game tutorial, and teaching players how to play as they go along. The thing talks incessantly, ensuring its advice becomes incredibly annoying very quickly, despite a nice character design, and a reasonably helpful central premise - it also doesn't help that the assistance offered is usually painfully obvious.

Perhaps Omochao is just reflective of a modern trend in gaming that annoys the life out of me at the best of time - over-zealous tutorials. Too many modern games believe the player needs to be held by the hand and lead through levels for their own good - taking away any sense of adventure and the joy of self-discovery. It's spoon-feeding gone mad, and when that function is included as a personified character, the annoyance is ten-fold.

At least Sega seem to have realised how annoying Omochao is - turning the chao into a gun in Shadow the Hedgehog that fired little Omochao heads in some perverse reference to how fond fans were of abusing it.