6. Sonic The Hedgehog 2/3 - Tails
SegaPoor Tails. Not only does the two-tailed fox have to keep up with the eye-watering speeds that Sonic can reach, he also has to simultaneously stay out of the blue blur's way due to his habit of making things harder for the hedgehog. It's a paradoxical sentence for sure, but it makes complete sense because for every one thing that Tails does right as second fiddle to Sonic, he does ten wrong. You see, Tails isn't very blessed when it comes to intelligence in the earlier Sonic games. It seems when Sega coded his behavioural patterns, the only action they were concerned with was that Tails must always follow Sonic. For this very reason, if you were to ever dodge an enemy's attack, attempt a difficult platforming section or take on an end-of-stage boss, Tails would try to mimic your exact movements with awful results. For every attack you would dodge, he would take a hit. For every tricky jump you made above a bottomless pit, he would miss and plummet to his death. Eventually, the tragedy of Tails' incompetence became a running joke to Sonic fans - his presence almost like watching a clone of yourself fail every obstacle that you had managed to clear. A lesson in how not to play the game, if you will. Tails wasn't without his uses though. One particular stage in Sonic 3; Marble Garden Zone required that Tails kept you airborne while you took on Robotnik. Fortunately, the fight was scripted to have Tails automatically pick you up after every jump from his cute little paws. It's a good job too, because the screams of frequent frustration if Tails remained an imbecile would have been too much for Sega to bear.