Characters who are treated poorly by the majority in Video Games.
- Arcanum has several character backgrounds to determine statistics implying a rough childhood.
- "Troll Offspring": While not literally spawned by trolls, it means the character is so ugly (and has the manners to match) that they take penalties to Beauty and Charisma and are routinely attacked by mobs, holy men, monster hunters etc. and therefore have improved physical stats.
- "Beat with an Ugly Stick" is similar, getting better physical and combat stats in exchange for a major Beauty penalty to represent a lifetime of getting into fights.
- Arc the Lad has Darc who's not merely bullied but ''reduced to slavery'? by the Deimos race (intelligent humanoid monsters) thanks to his obvious human lineage. He reacts by deciding that any Deimos who will not submit to him and acknowledge him as king is better dead. And proceed to kill all those who fits the descriptions.
- Avalon Code has a moment that neighbors Phantom Brave proportions. The Big Bad dupes one of your friends into jacking the Book of Prophecy and uses it to begin his own plot for omnicide — thankfully, it stops midway through, as he doesn't have the power in his current body to wholly destroy the world. Your love interest (Fana will be your substitute if you don't have one) gets pulled INTO THE BOOK and their page entry is ruined thoroughly during the fiasco, however, and you are buried as well. Once you're unearthed, what does the "Holy" King do? Why, he accuses you of destroying the town, brings together a bunch of civilians who equally use you as a scapegoat, and throws both you and the only guy who has even half an idea what just happened in jail to rot for all eternity! Thankfully, you manage to get out of there with help from a fellow con who uses the basement of the castle to store his ill-gotten goods, and from there the two of you begin your plot to get the book back and set things right.
- The NPCs of Breath of Fire IV love to torment Ryu (and the player) with pointless Fetch Quests and genre-change mini-games. In the end, the player decides whether to "put up with it silently".
- In Bully, Petey is more than a bit feminine, and though Gary is constantly a prick to him Petey keeps going back. Probably because that was the only 'friend' he had (until Jimmy).
- Castlevania: The Belmont clan at one point suffers this, as their immense magical power caused them to be feared by the locals. Trevor Belmont, however, manages to set things straight by saving these people from Dracula's wrath (and kicked his butt), only then do they start accepting the family.
- Yoshiki from Corpse Party was revealed to have been a sort of lone wolf before his second year in high school.
- A key factor in Ayane's backstory in Dead or Alive. Due to her "cursed birth," she was shunned and looked down upon by most people in the Mugen Tenshin village, with Kasumi and Hayate essentially being the only friends she really had.
- The Elder Scrolls:
- This is the case for the Ideal Masters, who rule over a dimension of Oblivion known as the Soul Cairn. Despite this, they are not Daedric Princes like the other rulers of Oblivion and are not counted among their ranks. In fact, no one, not even the Demiprince son one of the Daedric Princes, is quite sure what they are anymore, though it is known that they were once mortal sorcerers.
- Malacath, the Daedric Prince of Pariahs, the Spurned, and the Ostracized, is not considered a "true" Daedra by the other Princes. (Given his sphere, this is rather appropriate.)
- Jyggalag, the Daedric Prince of Order, is feared and despised by the other Daedric Princes both for his immense power and for his basis in "order", compared to the basis in "chaos" most of the other Princes have. Even Malacath, not considered a "true" Daedra by the other Princes, is more highly regarded than Jyggalag. As Sheogorath puts it:
"Malacath is more popular at parties! And Malacath is not popular at parties!"- Meridia is a Daedric Prince whose sphere is obscured to mortals, but is associated with Life Energy, Light, and Beauty. Meridia was originally one of the Magna-Ge, the "star orphans" who who fled Mundus (the mortal realm) part way through its creation, following their "father", Magnus. However, Merida was banished from Aetherius for "consorting with illicit spectra", implied to be the Daedra. Considered a "trespasser" in Oblivion by the Daedra, she, through sheer force of will, "bent and shaped" the rays of Magnus to create her own Daedric realm in Oblivion, known as the Colored Rooms, while she became a Daedric Prince.
- The protagonist from Endeavor is ridiculed for his small size (even among dwarfs) by the other dwarves in his neighborhood.
- In Fallout: the player character spends the majority of the game going through hell to find a water chip to save the Vault s/he hails from, only to be kicked out in the end for having become too different in the process. At least, that's the reason that s/he is given. In fact, the Overseer fears that he will break the Vault Experiment by encouraging people to leave before the experiment's set date. People left in protest of that decision anyway, caught up with the Vault Dweller, and helped found the tribal village of Arroyo.
- Also played straight in Fallout 3 where everyone hates you upon your return to Vault 101, assuming you go back upon hearing the distress call that is. They hate you because all hell broke loose when your father left the vault rad roaches killed a few residents, and his leaving stirred up a rebellion and blame you due to proxy.
- Final Fantasy:
- In Final Fantasy VII, Cloud had a lonely and alienated childhood in Nibelheim. He was apparently shunned and ostracized by many of the children, especially Tifa's close friends, as well as being viewed as a troublemaker by the adults. This makes it easy for Tifa's father to blame Cloud for causing Tifa's near-fatal accident when she was eight years old when it actually wasn't his fault — running off into the Nibel Mountains was entirely Tifa's idea, not Cloud's. The years of social isolation led to deep emotional insecurities which drive Cloud to leave Nibelheim in an attempt to become a famous hero and thereby prove to everyone that he's not a loser. Unfortunately, those same insecurities prevent Cloud from getting into SOLDIER and also contribute to his mental breakdown during Hojo's experiments.
- Final Fantasy XIV applies to trope to an entire nation. The nation of Garlemald is composed of people who are physically and intellectually superior to the other races. However, the Garleans have a genetic makeup that prevents them from using magic. According to the supplementary material in the lore book, all the other nations either ignored, bullied, or mocked the Garleans for their inferiority with magic. Once the Garleans discover ceruleum, they harvest it to make huge advancements in technology and weapons that are miles above what the rest of Eorzea uses. With the power of magitek, the Garleans form their empire and aim for the complete subjugation of Eorzea.
- Final Fantasy Tactics Advance: Marche, Mewt, and Ritz receive this treatment from their classmates in St. Ivalice for different reasons: Marche because he's the new kid, Mewt because he's painfully shy and quiet and carries his teddy bear everywhere, and Ritz because of her white hair, quick temper, and outspoken attitude. As a result, the three end up befriending each other pretty quickly. Marche's brother Doned also considers himself to be subject to this, since all the other kids can walk and he requires a wheelchair, feeling left behind because of this. It's revealed that it's just his self-defeatist attitude about his illness that's causing him to shut himself off from others.
- Class Zero from Final Fantasy Type-0 is marginalized by most of the faculty and fellow students of the Peristylium, Class Zero, in turn, isolates Rem and Machina as outsiders and keeps them Locked Out of the Loop.
- Fire Emblem:
- Ricken in Fire Emblem: Awakening was bullied as a child, even more so after his family lost most of their wealth and their noble status.
- Princess Azura from Fire Emblem Fates notes that she has been ostracized and bullied no matter which kingdom she lived in.
- Eula Lawrence from Genshin Impact is ostracized by most of Mondstadt for being part of a once-tyrannical clan which fell a long time ago. It used to be so bad that she couldn't even go out to buy groceries and Amber was her only friend. Even in the present others who aren't aware of how reliable she is are afraid of her.
- The Happyhills Homicide: John Wade, when he was a janitor at Westpine High, was an outcast among his coworkers and the students. The teachers would call him disgusting and tell him not to go into the teacher lounge labeling him a freak. His fellow janitor called him an idiot and told him to clean the toilets. The students considered him creepy and would make fun of him. The only person that was kind to him was a female student named Madison Carpenter, who he developed an obsession with, leaving the gifts that she accepted and thanked him for, something that both teachers and students criticize him for doing.
- Horizon Zero Dawn has Aloy who is considered an outcast by the Nora tribe because she is a motherless child. It's considered a crime for anyone to even TALK to her lest they risk being outcast as well.
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess has a very minor subplot based on this, which only takes place in cutscenes. Link is shown to have a strong friendship with Colin, a child in his village, who is routinely picked on by the other children for being shy and pacifistic. But when Colin saves one of the village girls from being trampled by a rampaging villain, he turns into an instant hero and everyone wants to be his friend.
- In Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis, most of the school life of one Vayne Aurelius seems relatively normal, save for the numerous hijinks that his friends drag him into. Then comes a teacher attempting to take his life (and his fighting said teacher in self-defense), and The Reveal that he was an artificial, and very powerful, Mana, and the entire school turned on him. Luckily, his friends are still there for him.
- Mass Effect has no less than five examples:
- Kaidan Alenko is one of humanity's very first biotics, and while he prefers to avoid discussing the matter, there are occasional references to people giving him a wide berth both because of his powers and his dangerously outdated implants.
- Ashley Williams is the granddaughter of the human commander at Shanxi — the only battle where an Alliance force surrendered to an alien one. Since then, the military has had it in for her family, which is a bad thing when military service is In the Blood. Despite her competence, Ashley is constantly stuck with minor and degrading posts.
- Grunt is considered an abomination by the krogan for being genetically-engineered. They are, however, willing to give him a chance to prove himself. In the end, krogan care more about how well you can fight than how you were born.
- Cora Harper frequently found herself as an outsider due to her biotics. She joined the Andromeda initiative in hope of finding a place to belong as more than just "a useful freak".
- The asari are a species able to mate with anyone, and pride themselves on their population of half asari hybrids. When two asari mate and have a child, the "pureblood" is considered an outcast since they don't contribute anything new to the gene pool. It also doesn't help that purebloods have a (admittedly pretty small, but still greater than zero) chance of becoming Ardat-Yakshi, which are essentially mass-murdering Succubi and Incubi in a sci-fi setting.
- This trope was at the origin of all the events in Miitopia: there was once a regular Mii that was royally ignored by everybody else and felt horribly lonely as a result. They came to think their face was too dull for the other people and shed it as a result, becoming the vengeful Dark Curse, who would steal the faces of lots and lots of Mii from the island of Miitopia.
- In Misao, this ends up being a driving force of the plot on all counts. It's mentioned early on that Misao didn't have many friends and the class bullies harassed her constantly. In the "Truth" ending it is revealed that Mr. Sohta was also generally disliked by classmates.
- In My Child Lebensborn, the child is ostracized for being half-German in a country that is still recovering from the Nazi Germany. Part of the player's role is to help the child deal with the situation as they see fit. The community doesn't seem to like the Player Character much either, some of its members being shown to outright assume that they are a Nazi sympathizer because they adopted the child.
- Mild example: In the Nancy Drew games, even the non-Jerkass suspects tend to pick on Nancy's clothes, hair, or looks in general.
- In NieR, Kainé was bullied and ostracized by the other children for being intersexed.
- In NieR: Automata, Devola and Popola (and all the remaining android models of their line) are treated with disdain by everyone else due to the actions of the Devola and Popola from the first game completely messing up Project Gestalt.
- Oswald from Odin Sphere is loathed by virtually every being on the planet because of his cursed nature as a shadow knight — at best, he is tolerated by whoever is employing him because of his fearsome combat skills, much to the disgust of the ruler's other underlings. Oswald is well-aware of the fact that the universe itself despises him, but puts up with it because the only other alternative would be to give up and go die in some corner. Which he does when he is spurned by the only person in the world he cared for. It happens twice, point of fact.
- Both Jun and Eda from OPUS: Echo of Starsong had suffered pretty severely from bullying by their peers in their youths which ended up having some pretty detrimental effects on their mental health as they grew up. Jun cause he was such a pushover while Eda due to her having gained the attention of her elders' thanks to her Lumen sensitivity. And even when they turn into grownups are still mostly treated as outcasts.
- The Witch Boy from Overlord II was treated this way by... everyone in Nordberg save for childhood friend Kelda, because he was generally creepy-looking and disruptive- the latter partly as revenge for shoddy treatment. This led him to be tossed out of the town when the Glorious Empire arrived to conquer the town and purge the region of magical beings. Given that he's an Enfant Terrible in a series revolving around Villain Protagonists, this quite naturally results in the entire village being either enslaved or eradicated when the adult Witch Boy returns to conquer the world.
- Persona:
- Persona 3 has all of them have something that isolated them from the rest of their peers, be it lousy parents (Yukari, Junpei, Fuuka), personal tragedy (Akihiko, Shinjiro, Ken, Yukari), bullying (Fuuka), or a plain lack of social skills (Akihiko, Mitsuru, Aigis).
- Persona 4: A pretty common theme with most of them is how they pretty much didn't have much if any friends for one reason or another and felt isolated from others:
- The Playable Character moved around a lot and never really had the chance to form solid and long-lasting friendships.
- Yosuke is the new kid town before yours, having moved 6 months prior. His dad is the manager of the new Junes, which has been hurting local businesses. Yosuke is thus treated with a bit of scorn by proxy or as a complaints' box. He didn't really have friends outside of Chie and his crush on Saki.
- Chie meanwhile is a tomboy who keeps the other guys from hounding her popular best friend. Her lack of traditional femininity and nature harmed her self-esteem as a woman and she had no friends besides Yukiko (and more recently, Yosuke.)
- Yukiko is the heir of the local inn (considered a pride of the town) and her beauty gives her a lot of unwanted attention she's pretty isolated from her peers because of this and the aloof reputation she was given. Her Only Friend thus far was really Chie.
- Kanji cultivated a "delinquent" image to protect himself from ridicule due to being teased in the past for his love of adorable and cute things by girls and boys, though the former was especially biting.
- Rise became an idol because of her friendless childhood, but now has become consumed by life and has begun losing her passion for the job.
- Naoto is Married to the Job and her own aloof nature and desire to be seen as an adult leads to her neglecting her social skills and interacting with others.
- Eri implies that she's not very popular among the other mothers of children at daycare, partly because of her being a second wife and from the city, and she even blames Yuuta for this.
- Persona 5: Part of what draws the protagonists together is that they're all more or fewer outcasts.
- The Protagonist, Ryuji, and Ann all have negative reputations at their school and are viewed as Delinquents by both the staff and the student body.
- Yusuke is abused and exploited by his guardian, Madarame.
- Makoto is pressured by both her principal and older sister Sae to "be useful." Associating with the former gets her the Teacher's Pet treatment and further alienates her from her peers.
- Futaba suffers from a severe case of Survivor's Guilt and social anxiety when she was blamed for driving her mother to suicide by her other relatives to the point of being a Hikikomori.
- Haru is forced into an engagement that she does not want and has nobody to support her through it.
- Goro seems like a bright young Great Detective but grew up in an abusive household and has been alone his entire life.
- Kasumi is also treated this way by students from Shujin who don't put her on a pedestal are usually jealous of her for getting preferential treatment by virtue of being an honor student. Unknown to Kasumi or rather Sumire, other people sees her as a delusional insane girl who tries to act as her sister.
- Phantom Brave takes this to rather disturbing lengths.
- Quake IV had Matthew Kane, the main character, who ends up being Stroggified (in every way except for the fact that he still retains his mind, due to being rescued before having his mind control chip activated). At first, most of his comrades (aside from his Squad members) reject him for this, but after learning that he's the best and only hope for humanity, everyone wants to be his best friend.
- In Roots of Pacha, Jag was kicked out of his old tribe because he was believed to be weak for his pacifism.
- Kiyoko Lin from Raid on Taihoku, being the sole Taiwanese-Japanese half-breed in an all-Japanese school during the Second World War, was an outcast bullied and ostracized by her peers. Her Only Friend is Makoto, a Japanese budding artist from a poor family who sympathizes with her.
- In RuneScape, the Wizard's Tower is founded on the belief that anybody can learn to use magic, and it should not be unique to anybody. Consequently, most faculty and students resented Ariane since she was both genuinely talented at magic and a hereditary Seer, traits which contradicted the Tower's philosophy. The one professor who did like her turned out to be a Treacherous Advisor planning to use her to suicide-bomb the Tower, and points out that her social isolation made her vulnerable and trusting enough for his purposes.
- The backstory of Sonic the Hedgehog's Tails state that other kids mocked him for his twin tails, but he overcame this after he met his idol Sonic and received his encouragement. Similarly, Blaze was shunned for the fire powers that she initially had trouble controlling, which, along with her role as guardian of the resident Cosmic Keystones, led to her becoming withdrawn, antisocial, and insistent on working alone.
- Spyro the Dragon: While the rest of the dragons accept her, Cynder faces this from the Cheetahs, particularly Chief Prowlus and the Hermit, for her actions under Malefor, despite the fact she was Brainwashed and Crazy at the time and is now trying to help Spyro save the world. While the Hermit doesn't change, Prowlus and the rest of the village come around after they help them out. Sparx also has the same habit, typically not letting Cynder live down what she's done, but ultimately asks her to keep watch over Spyro as they go through the Burned Lands to confront the Big Bad and he can't go with them.
- Tales of Rebirth:
- Halves, children born of the union between a Huma and a Gajuma are viewed as outsiders and consistently discriminated against by both races. This social rejection is a key point in both Hilda and Militsa's characters.
- Ninon, the young girl with the Force of Feather was ostracised from her village because she could not control her Force that made everything float. She is found living alone in the mountains during the game.
- Twisted Wonderland:
- Azul Ashengrotto suffered this when he was a child, as was often bullied by other merchildren for being a physically slow, chubby octopus who emitted ink uncontrollably when he cried. This drove him to hone his magic skills so that he could make his bullies pay tenfold, developing and perfecting his unique magic, "It's a Deal" as a form of revenge on them.
- Epel states he was looked down on for being small and delicate, which is why he desires to become traditionally masculine.
- Vil has been a famous, widely acclaimed actor since a young age, but is frustrated for always being typecast as villains. This also got him bullied by young kids who couldn't separate him from his roles.
- Warframe:
- This is the origin of the Tenno twice over. The warframes were humans infested by the Technocyte Plague, becoming a meld of man and machine but driven insane in the process. The Orokin tried to use them as weapons, but failed because they were impossible to control. In another incident, a ship full of children was lost in the Void; the children came out broken, but with incredible Void powers. The Orokin also tried to use them as weapons, but failed because incredible powers aside, they were still just children with no other enhancements or combat experience. However, the children were able to pilot the warframes, as they were the only people capable of showing them basic empathy and compassion. The children became the Operators, and with the warframes they were the Tenno.
- Separately, there is the story of Rell. An autistic child, he was ignored and pushed aside by the other children. He was on the ship and exposed to the Void along with all the others, but was forgotten and never had a chance to become a Tenno. Instead he was left out in the Void, where he found an Eldritch Abomination that lived in the Void. He gave up his humanity to inhabit a warframe permanently and gain immortality in order to hold back this entity. He founded the Red Veil to watch over his tomb and guided them from beyond, but eventually came to see the entity as his only friend, drove much of the Red Veil insane, and tried to destroy the Tenno. The Tenno had to destroy his warframe and finally allow him to rest.
- Every other "person" the player meets in When The Darkness Comes shuns and insults them, standing around in groups to stare at them as they pass and whisper rude things about them.
- 15-year-old Rudy from the first Wild ARMs suffers from this. His unusual strength and his ability to use ARMs (magic guns said to have been used by Demons) freaks people out, making him an outcast from society (the fact that no one knows where he came from does not help matters). Best shown at the beginning of the game when he's driven out of the village he just saved because the villagers (who , up till that point, had been nice to him) found out he carried, and wielded, an ARM.
