9 Video Games Heroes Who Completely Failed At Their Quest

2. Cole Phelps - L.A. Noire

Cole Phelps is one of the few video game characters who keeps secrets from the player. Though you can control him during investigations, you can't stop him from having an affair behind your back or calling a suspect a pedophile for having size-nine shoes.

This lack of control the player has over Cole also serves to reflect the lack of control Cole has over his own cases, though. While he's a great detective, as is the genre way, he's tied up by red tape, politics and corruption at every step. The man he's fingered for a crime might not have 100% done it, but the station has their man, and the people in power are happy that attention has been diverted away from them, so it's taken off his hands and he's labelled a hero.

Of course, this doesn't sit well with the moralistic policeman, and he attempts to bring down the shady puppet masters pulling the strings in the city, and prove nobody is bigger than the law. This gets him disgraced and sent to the dead-end arson desk where he can't cause any trouble. However, with the help of former soldier Jack Kelso, he uncovers a conspiracy plot to defraud the US government... and then drowns in a sewer.

Some of the men behind the conspiracy do end up facing jail time thanks to Kelso, but the wider ramifications of corruption both in the city and law enforcement continue as normal, with mortal enemy Roy Earle even giving a feigned emotional speech at Cole's funeral.

In the end, he was just one man, and one man can't solve all of LA's problems. Not even a man like Phelps.