10 Beloved Video Game Characters You Hated In The Sequel
6. Cortana - Halo
Cortana is as famous as the Halo series itself. She's such a popular character, in fact, that Microsoft even named their Windows assistant after her!
Her main appeal lies in her charming and lifelike personality, which is perfectly juxtaposed with her incorporeal, artificial nature. Cortana always finds a way to show her human side during her conversations with Master Chief, which bring out the humanity in her heavy-duty companion as well.
Unfortunately, later iterations of Cortana don't really like to show empathy that much.
You see, in Halo 4, the funny and compassionate Cortana gets infected with a virus that turns her into a maniacal and rampant AI. The corrupted Cortana becomes a force of evil that seeks to dominate the galaxy, and all of her previous traits that made her a fan favorite become a distant and heartbreaking past.
The writers tried to redeem her character by justifying her actions and even giving her the cliché moment of sacrifice, but this not only didn't bring back the old Cortana, it also undermined the new Cortana's potential for being an intimidating force of evil.
As they say, you either die a hero... or get rewritten across enough games to become a mediocre villain.