10 Video Games That RUINED Amazing Villains
9. Skull Face - Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Skull Face was first introduced in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain's bite-sized prologue Ground Zeroes, which quickly established him as an imposing antagonist who fans naturally couldn't wait to take down in The Phantom Pain itself.
And yet, despite Skull Face's excellent character design, James Horan's terrific vocal performance, and his enticingly mysterious past, he ends up being a total damp squib of a villain.
For starters, per the game's scaled-back cinematic approach compared to its predecessors, we don't actually get to see a whole lot of Skull Face throughout The Phantom Pain, which massively dings his impact compared to prior Metal Gear Solid villains.
On top of this, his primary confrontation with Venom Snake isn't a boss fight but an infamous, unintentionally comical exposition dump in the back of a jeep near the end of the game, before Skull Face gets unceremoniously crushed to death by Metal Gear Sahelanthropus as piloted by Psycho Mantis.
Skull Face had all the makings of an all-timer Metal Gear villain, but as is a rarity for Hideo Kojima, he skimps on both the backstory and the creative boss fight fans understandably expected, before having him die a highly underwhelming death.