3. Gordon Freeman The Half-Life Series
I am convinced that the reason we never see Gordon Freeman take his armour off is because its the only thing holding him together. Now, we know hes got a fully able body because he spends both Half-Life and Half-Life 2s intros out of the suit, but what he undergoes during his pleasant sojourn through Black Mesa and his less-pleasant foray into City 17 is nothing compared to what happens later, in-suit. In both games (and in the case of Half-Life 2, its expansions) Freeman is subjected to all sorts of terrible ordeals. Hes thumped by headcrab zombies, shot by the military and Combine, as well as exposed to toxic waste and nuclear fire. Essentially, if a voodoo doll of Freeman existed, it would be ash thats how much punishment our hero goes through. Now, if this happened to a regular person, youd half-expect them to be in a wheelchair at best, and at worst dead. But heres Gordon, giddily running about with a crowbar in hand despite the pain. I mean, the man can sprint with one point of health left such things shouldnt be possible. If we look at this logically, this means that Gordon is constantly on deaths door but can still be compelled to sprint, jump and crawl. That can't be right. Now, we already know the suit gives Gordon anaesthetics when he gets badly hurt it tells you so so we have to assume that Gordons HEV suit is the only thing keeping him upright. Quite frankly, its an incredible achievement Gordon is effectively a corpse being dragged about by state-of-the-art body armour, which brings me to ask the question why arent more people wearing them? Even Barney Calhoun, who was established in Blue Shift as an effective and integral operator, doesnt get the luxury of auto-anaesthesia hes left to tough out the pain in his security vest. Somehow, I never felt quite as safe when I was Barney, as awesome as he is. Frankly, you could probably walk through a wall as Gordon itd definitely hurt him a lot but who cares? The suit will always patch him up, and if it gets too much, he can go find some first aid (how do those wall packs even work?) and some batteries.