Dude Wheres My Respect / Video Games

Times where characters are left questioning Dude, Where's My Respect? in Video Games.

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• Pick nearly any online game with a support class, and they'll likely be treated like they're taking up space, especially if they're a healer. Two great examples are Mercy and The Medic, despite being poster children (and one the unwanted trope namer) for Shoot the Medic First, due to being healers in games all about killing people. One noticeable subversion are The Eniripsa, who are known to use their own teammates as explosives, or turn people into zombies, earning them a bit of fear and/or hatred by others.
• The Ace Combat series generally averts this, though there are some instances where it's played straight:
  • Ace Combat X: Skies of Deception has this played straight in one special mission, when they player has to transport and deploy a load of volatile gas, that reacts badly to high acceleration. Two enemy planes quickly get on your tail, mocking your weak flying and deriding your reputation as a supposed ace — until your mission is complete, at which point you dump your load and proceed to kick their asses. Similarly the Alect Squadron are skeptical of your 'tall tales' before they're swiftly shot down — overall the military is extremely wary of you, a Meson Cannon gunner is told to look for the AAF's best pilot to ID you. Meanwhile, your wingmates are practically gushing over you, with Falco 1 saying his son is 'a big fan of yours' before admitting that he is, too. Given the entire war pivoted when the front line reached your base, and that Leasath has no qualms bombing and gassing civilian cities, this is no surprise. In Griswals's Christmas market, his emblem is even put on merchandise.
  • In Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War, the player's squadron quickly becomes renowned by the enemy for their skill, even being nicknamed the "Demons of Razgriz" after destroying both of the enemy's superweapon submarines. The actual soldiers you interact with and defend from enemy attack likewise show the reverence you'd expect for the player character's skill; at one point, a group of tired and disheartened soldiers that have failed twice to take over an enemy fortress are quickly motivated into a third, ultimately successful attempt simply because one of them mentions that you'll be flying support for them. The higher-ups, however, hold next to no respect for you, especially after another squadron frames yours for an attack on civilian structures in enemy territory; immediately after the above fortress mission the player and his squad are labelled as traitors based on their superior's poor reputation and their mentor being an enemy defector. This is, however, justified by said higher-ups having been compromised by Belkan infiltrators, including the base commander's assistant.
  • The series also provides the grand champion of subverting this trope with Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War, wherein the protagonist, Cipher, quickly goes From Nobody to Nightmare, receiving the title of "Demon Lord of the Round Table" and being accredited as the reason several battles are won for the Allied Forces. By late game, merely identifying Galm Team in the IFF is enough to turn around an entire battle and lifting morale from the ground all the way to the top. In contrast with the above example, your superiors in this game consider you an indispensable asset in the war and a briefing tells you as much flat out.
• Air Force Delta Strike plays this straight. Lilia treats the pilots with the same condescending tone all the way to the last mission.
• Assassin's Creed:
  • Early in Brotherhood just after Ezio returns to Monteriggioni he meets a young woman who asks him to carry her things up to the mansion for her. During the walk she is very flirtatious and talks at length about Ezio's faults, not realizing that the handsome young man carrying her things is Ezio. This is especially odd because A) Ezio is essentially the Lord of Monteriggioni, and B) the young woman is best friends with Ezio's sister Claudia. It might be explained by the fact that during the events of the previous game (which ended minutes before the start of this one), Ezio apparently spent months or even years at a stretch in Florence, Venice, or Rome, not in Monteriggioni. If there wasn't a family portrait on the wall somewhere, it's entirely possible that the woman in question has never seen Ezio's face before — though many other NPCs in the town appear to recognize him on sight.
  • In Assassin's Creed III James Barrett calls Connor a boy and initially asks him to get out of the way of the fighting. And when talking about going after Pitcairn, Sam Adams doubts Connor's ability, saying that a thousand troops stand in the way. You should have cut down hundreds by now...
• In Asura's Wrath, the Generals knows for a fact that Asura is innocent of the Emperor's murder (having committed the crime themselves), yet every single one of them repeatedly and, seemingly, with absolute sincerity calls him a traitor.
• Both played straight and averted in Baldur's Gate. During the first game, much of what you do is (presumably) actively kept secret by the Iron Throne, as it would do their plans no good for your actions to come to light, so it's understandable that people haven't often heard of you. Averted by the Big Bad, who does give you 'respect' by sending ever stronger assassins, and by circles who have access to first-hand information. In the second game, you're in a different country, so your actions in the first game are obviously not as widely known, although the quests you actually do in Athkatla don't have much effect on people's responses to you. Even after becoming known as the killer of a whole nest of vampires, you will still be asked to find a missing gong. Hilariously lampshaded in the original; at one point, you will get the option to say this:
  Main Character: OK, I've just about had my fill of riddle asking, quest assigning, insult throwing, pun hurling, hostage taking, iron mongering, smart arsed fools, freaks, and felons that continually test my will, mettle, strength, intelligence, and most of all, patience! If you've got a straight answer anywhere in that bent little head of yours, I want to hear it pretty damn quick or I'm going to take a large blunt object roughly the size of Elminster and his hat, and stuff it lengthwise into a crevice of your being so seldom seen that even the denizens of the Nine Hells themselves wouldn't touch it with a twenty-foot rusty halberd! Have I made myself perfectly clear?!
• Very much present in Black & White, where, despite being a god, you must perform fairly menial tasks like finding someone's sheep or throwing rocks — which stands to reason, as an agrarian society probably would mutter a quick prayer for aid over even the tiniest of things.
• Blazblue: Ragna the Bloodedge is a man who has destroyed entire NOL installations all by himself and become The Dreaded to a government that practically rules the planet. He really doesn't get the kind of respect that his reputation implies from the rest of the cast, with practically everyone who isn't Taokaka having something snarky and derisive to say to him. Justified due to the fact that a) most of these characters are perfectly capable of kicking his own ass, and b) he himself is nothing but confrontational and snarky to these people besides.
  • Averted in Blazblue Cross Tag Battle. Ragna has lived with be treated like a Butt-Monkey for so long that he is surprised any time the fighters from the other universes treat him with respect.
• In Blazing Angels 1 and two, over time, your service record indicates hundreds of aircraft destroyed, thousands of vehicles blown up, and dozens of ships sent to Davy Jones Locker, and stopping entire enemy offensives single-handedly, and in the endgame, your final objective, destroying an elite German jet squadron, has them taunting you. You've destroyed a twentieth of the Axis air force, a Panzer army, and a quarter of the Japanese Navy, and they STILL INSULT YOU? Granted, in the sequel, the game makes up the excuse that you are in a top secret elite squadron who has experimental equipment, and you get all of the nation's top awards, but that doesn't cover up the fact that you destroyed enough enemy units to make up the campaign record of an air force.
• Gaige in Borderlands 2 built a bionic arm and quickly-digistructable robot for a high school science fair, and came third because the school Alpha Bitch's family bribed the judges. In play, Hyperion engineers will mock her robot, Deathtrap... right up until Deathtrap butchers them, anyway.
  • Really, the Vault Hunters tend to fall into a downplayed version of this in general: they’re regarded as certified badasses just based on their career choice, but they get saddled with tons of menial side quests and the lowliest of enemies will still throw themselves at them with glee. Downplayed in that they are mercenaries with a nearly memetic attraction to any and all loot, and one of the most common enemies in this series is literally called a “psycho.” Both the second and third games do offer a side quest each where the big bad will literally reward you for offing yourself though...
• This kind of treatment gets parodied in BoxxyQuest: The Gathering Storm. When we first meet Shift, he’s living in a filthy, cluttered warren down in the sewers. Later, in the epilogue, after he’s joined the party and helped save the world from certain annihilation at the hands of STORM… he’s still living there, and he's still on the run from the law.
  Shift: Turns out that saving the world isn't enough to make city guards respect you. Who knew, huh?
• Rand's mother in Breath of Fire II has no problem with setting you with the duty of cleaning up her fields. Of course, the obstacles are really monsters, but come on...
• In Chrono Trigger, most of what you do goes unnoticed because... well, you did it centuries ago. That's the drawback of Time Travel. Thing is, in the individual time periods where you did the incredible thing (particularly 65 Million BC and 600 AD), certain townspeople do recognize you and praise your accomplishments.
• City of Heroes. "Oh, what's that? You just saved the entire city from a devastating plague? Wow, you're a hero! Now go deliver my mail. And defeat a few cultists. Just think, in five more levels we'll let you wear a cape!" Though at least the citizenry start to sing your praises as they pass by.
• In the Gamecube Custom Robo title, after defeating an Eldritch Abomination intent on destroying the remainder of life on the planet everyone treats you the same because the government covers your involvement up. Allegedly to allow you to live peacefully.
• Dark Reign 2, in the JDA mission you have spent the last 10 missions fighting the Sprawlers, and evacuating civilians. Then you are ordered to stay behind to destroy the artifacts, which will destroy Earth itself, while the JDA go on to become the Imperium.
• In Dead Rising 4 this is Frank's reason for having given up on trying to cover outbreaks and expose the government for their involvement in them, and why he's now teaching a night photography class under an assumed name instead of being "two steps ahead" of the new outbreak in Willamette:
  Frank: I quit. You know how many outbreaks I've been a part of? How many I've covered? And what thanks have I gotten? Huh? Nothing! No thank yous. No flowers. Just a contact book full of dead people.
  Brad: National Headliner award, 2006. You exposed the first zombie outbreak on US soil, photographed the whole thing, you got some medals, a few letters behind your name. All honorary, of course.
  Frank: Yeah but let's get to the point! Three weeks later I tried to expose the Pentagon and the entire US government for their involvement with it AND THEY BURIED ME!!!
• In Diablo II: Lord Of Destruction, the expansion pack for Diablo II, this is how you are treated by the Barbarians (and especially by the corrupt Elder Nihlithak) in the fifth and final Act of the game. You have just defeated the Lord of Terror himself, Diablo, and previously defeating his brother Mephisto, and what do you get? Qual-Kehk says, "You have the look of a warrior. An extra soldier would be useful, but don't expect anyone to mourn if you get yourself killed." Nihlithak is a lot nastier. "After so many have died, who are you to think you can accomplish what our warriors could not?" And, "Ending the siege [will] not earn immediate respect, outsider. Respect only comes with sacrifice — something I'm sure you know nothing of." The worst from Nihlithak? "What are you still doing here? I thought you were going off to die. Go...Be quick about it."
• Disgaea:
  • Overlapping with being an Unpopular Popular Character, Laharl from Disgaea: Hour of Darkness is treated as a joke in every cameo appearance he makes. Granted, he heavily suffers from Aesop Amnesia and Flanderization, but, he always appears as a Superboss, i.e, threats faced during the main game that are played seriously are nowhere near as strong as he is, but he's always treated as a joke. The exception is Disgaea 2, where he serves as a Hopeless Boss Fight that's generally impossible unless playing on a New Game Plus, but despite easily defeating the game's entire cast when he first appears, he's still treated as a a joke in the game's sidequests. This continues even into Disgaea Dimension 2, a direct sequel to the original game, where half the Netherworld seems to be unaware of his status as Overlord, and the group trying to instate their own Overlord doesn't consider him to be a threat.
    • Not even in his game is he respected by his father's vassals, constantly getting on his nerves. When Laharl issues a challenge to all the demons wanting to become the next Overlord, his father's vassals immediately desert the castle so that they can kill him off during the challenge, much to his chagrin. Even after they attempted to ambush him but were kind enough to save him from a Hopeless Boss Fight, they still give him no respect.
  • Standard fare for demons and particularly overlords who, for all their power and ability, are incredibly childish, petty and stupid. In Makai Kingdom, practically everyone made fun of Zetta even before he's crippled by being bound to the Sacred Tome, and it gets worse after that. This is the guy who claimed the title of Most Powerful Overlord In The Entire Cosmos, and whose foot soldiers can, with a bit of creative leveling and tactics, beat the snot out of other overlords and draft them into service.
  • Emizel from Disgaea 4 is the son of Hades' President Hugo, and expects to be treated respectfully. In truth he's regarded as an annoyance by everyone, with it being heavily implied Nepotism was involved in him becoming the head of the Abaddon Task Squad. After his death was printed in the local newspaper largely to keep him off the radar of the real Big Bad he's left despondent, until Valvatorez issues him a Dare to Be Badass, telling him to move out of his father's shadow and earn his respect, a task that Emizel more than passes by the story's end. Later cameos show he has not lost this Character Development.
• Intentionally used in Divine Divinity, after you've poisoned the orc army/discover the origin of ravaging disease/discover the former king's death (or any combinations), you are then taken into the court as Lord Protector to the current king, who gives you all sorts of stupid, menial task that should have been given to a servant Which is intentional in order to eventually frame you for trying to kill Duke Janus and lock you up, preventing you from stopping the Big Bad, Duke Janus who actually is the Demon of Lies. Also averted because quite a few characters will also mention on your reputation after you do certain main quests. Also? You DO get hero discounts from merchants.
• Alternately played straight and averted in Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening. If you imported your character, you can have a nine-foot list of achievements including ending the Blight, slaying multiple dragons and dragon-shaped entities, helping to recover the Chantry's single most sacred artifact, resolving two different succession crises, saving more or less the entire population of Ferelden, being the effective Arl of Aramanthine, and (depending on your choice of character origin) being the Prince-Consort or Queen of Ferelden. While many people will at least pay lip service to your being possibly the worst person to piss off in the entirety of Thedas, you still get quests like random nobody smugglers asking you to scare the local innkeeper into opening his end of the secret passage again. Pleasantly enough, you can at least tell the smuggler in question to go and stick it up his jumper.
• During the ending sequence in Dragon Quest VIII Prince Charmles does not allow the protagonist to attend his royal wedding, despite having saved the world, being close friends with the bride, being captain of his father-in-law to be's royal guard and having personally helped the prince in an earlier part of the story, on account of the hero and his friends being "commoners." Weirdly this is averted most of the time, as people acknowledge that you and your friends have helped them in the past. This behavior also bites him in the ass, as no matter which ending you get Medea runs off and marries the main character. It's worse in the ending for completing the New Game Plus dungeon, where not only does he lose his bride, but also the throne to the person who he just banned from his wedding. Guess the lesson is 'treat people with respect when they help you'.
• Drawn to Life. Holy cow the villagers are selfish for so much stuff. In the beginning of the game, the town is in ruins and covered in shadows, and everything that ever existed is disappearing due to damage to the book of creation. After the hero brings back the sun, food, weather, time, and other necessities, the hero is told to get things like beach toys to make the beach more lively.
• The Elder Scrolls:
  • Morrowind:
    • If you complete the main quest and then join one of the factions, you'll still need to do that faction's beginner level quests while being treated like "new meat" by your new superiors and comrades even though you're a world-saving hero who defeated a foe three other gods couldn't defeat. At least you can use the "Nerevarine" dialogue option to increase their disposition a bit so they'll be more pleasant. In other words, they do not give you the respect you deserve, but they do, at least, tend to react to you as a friend rather than as scum.
    • A big offender is being the head of the Imperial Legion. Imperial soldiers, who now technically report to you, will still treat you like you're a new recruit. You do at least get to get away with being out of uniform if you outrank them.
    • Likewise for Great House Telvanni, though at least it's Justified as completely in-character for them, seeing as how they're a group of magical Mad Scientists with Insufferable Genius and For Science! traits.
  • In Oblivion:
    • You can be the freakin' Archmage and everyone in town will still treat you like J. Random Peasant. And even if you helped the emperor's heir save the world or something, you still have to start as an Apprentice in the Mage's Guild or an Amateur in the Fighter's Guild with others treating you like crap. Later averted, though; when you complete the main story, people will shower you with praise when they see you. And if you are the Arch-Mage, the mages at the Arcane University show proper respect.
    • Played with in Knights of the Nine, the expanded content mission, where you require the approval of a prophet before going on a crusade for the gods. Boast of doing good deeds and he'll just mock you and refuse to help you; you have to either be humble, or confess to (i.e. boast about) evil you've done to gain his help.
    • Doubly subverted in the Shivering Isles expansion pack. After taking the mantle of the Madgod, most of the realm's populace, including the haughty guards, will express their respect/reverence to you, and you cannot be arrested for crime (though you still have to pay the fine or be booted out of the city until you do). Unfortunately, you are still forbidden from entering the Saint/Seducer sanctuaries, Zealots will remain hostile toward you 9of course, they are insane), and do not expect anyone in Cyrodiil to believe you.
    • After closing the Oblivion Gate outside a city and completing a minor side quest for the countess (which she delegates to you because "you seem like the trustworthy type"), you approach her to buy a house in a city, only to be told, "I don't trust you enough to talk about that." And a nobleman in Cheydinhal throws weekly parties for the city's up-and-comers, which never includes you, because "If you were somebody, I'd know. But I don't, so you aren't." That some of his guests are low-level members of guilds you might command, plus the Count whose son you rescue from Oblivion while saving his city, makes this a bit jarring.
    • A flaw in the game's AI can cause this to happen unintentionally. As mentioned above, new dialogues involving what a wonderful savior you are appear after beat the main quest. You can even hear bandits literally singing your praises to each other. However, it won't stop them from trying to kill you the moment they see you.
  • Skyrim:
    • The biggest offender is quite possibly Vilkas of the Companions. If you first attempt to join the Companions after successfully defeating Alduin (legendary Beast of the Apocalypse), becoming The Archmage, Listener of the Dark Brotherhood, Master Thief of the Thieves' Guild, Thane of every city, single-handedly winning the Civil War, and completing countless other side quests, you'll walk into Jorrvaskr with the intention of becoming a Companion, only to be refused by him, with him telling the Harbinger, "I've never even heard of this outsider".
    • The Companions can lead to a lot of humorous instances of this trope. Like the second-newest member (after you) boasts about killing a bear yesterday, asking what you killed lately. Unfortunately, there is no way to respond with "two dragons, a draugr deathlord, and an entire bandit encampment." And some of the more senior members will still openly tell you that they think you're a wimp, even if you're now the Harbinger.
    • This can be quite jarring if you're a Legate in the Imperial Legion, just happen to encounter a few Imperial soldiers escorting a prisoner (Stormcloak) along the road, and will tell you to get the hell away from them and not interfere with "Imperial business." Bonus points for, following that line, they warn you to get the hell away from them before they draw their swords and attack you.
    • Dirge, a member of the Thieves' Guild, definitely takes the cake. He's the guild's muscle and spends the entirety of the game hanging around in their hideout. Practically every time you pass him by (and he's conveniently placed right in your path, too) he'll mutter that even if you're one of them, you better not try anything or you'll have to deal with him. He'll say this even when you're the guild grandmaster who's the greatest thief in the land and has done more for the guild than all of its other members for the last fifteen years. Respect, nothing; how about not hassling your boss?
    • The randomized guard dialogue can get schizophrenic about this — various achievements do add suitably respectful comments. The problem is that it doesn't remove the comments that were for achievements that were overridden later, so a guard can speak insultingly about you being the newbie Companion and immediately afterward praise you as the Companions' Harbinger.
    • This is one reason Delphine is The Scrappy- you might be the Dragonborn her order is sworn to obey, you might have done everything she asks, you might have helped her reform the Blades... and after all that, she demands you kill Paarthurnax and withdraws all the Blades' support until you do, and she cannot be talked down. Don't want to kill the only nice dragon in Skyrim who's done nothing but help you? No Praetorian Guard for you!
    • In the Dragonborn DLC, Master Neloth (of the aforementioned House Telvanni) returns as a major player in the DLC storyline. Being the world-saving Dragonborn doesn't get you an iota of respect from him. Archmage of the College of Winterhold? Still condescending, although he's marginally interested that you were the one who found the Eye of Magnus. One way the Dragonborn can impress him is to have read the Oghma Infinium before meeting him, due to having done something that Neloth himself tried to do for years without success.
• Else Heart Break suffers from this due to the complexity of its underlying system. If you already know some programming (or if you are just curious and learn about it yourself in sandbox play) you can become ridiculously powerful and bypass many obstacles, but the Lodge will never acknowledge this and will send you on simple missions and even make plot points of hazards you have already disabled. No matter how well you do, it's always implied that the Lodge are better hackers than you, even though if that's the case they should literally be able to do anything they want utterly unopposed — because you can.
• Fable is built around averting this trope, with people praising you if you're good and cowering if you're evil. Then you meet Briar Rose, an experienced heroine who mocks the Player Character early in the game. It's a scripted event, so even though it's possible to go through a large chunk of the game's world thanks to its open-endedness and gather much experience and fame along the way, she'll still call you out for being a greenhorn. There's also the fact that people will, no matter what, call you a chicken chaser (after the Hero's initial title) and laugh at you until you buy another title. Thunder, another hero in Bowerstone, shows even more contempt towards you, although some of that is due to kicking his little sister's ass during hero training beforehand. His sister, Whisper, is even worse; sure, when you first arrive at the Hero's Guild a bit of arrogance on her part is understandable (though ironically, that's when she's at her nicest), but she will then spend the rest of the game mocking you and telling you just how much better than you she is, regardless of how many times you beat her in a fight, completely outmatch her in a quest where you directly compete against her, or otherwise demonstrate that she is literally nowhere near in your league. She will eventually admit that its only because she's jealous of you for being so much better than her.
• Fallout:
  • Nowhere is it more obvious than in Fallout 3. A DJ will constantly tell tales of your exploits, along with giving you a nickname or title based on your level and karma. Now, if you have good karma, it makes perfect sense for people to bother you with whatever problem they have: They know you've helped others, why wouldn't you help them? The joke comes when you have bad karma, no reason is given why people will come to you for help, or why the guards don't simply SHOOT YOU on sight, knowing all too well that whatever business you have in town, it's not going to be good. And of course, 90% of the people will treat you like a bag of shit, no matter if you are the best thing that has happened to them or a dangerous, homicidal nutso who could snap from the slightest insult and bash the insulter's head in without a bit of remorse (at least with the Brotherhood of Steel, this is perfectly in character). Finally, with the Broken Steel DLC, after the final story quest, you become an honored member of the BoS after the activation of Project Purity and, a few hours later, they celebrate you as a hero after blowing up the Adams Air Force base, where the remaining forces of the Enclave were stationed. There's also the fact that the ending narration will basically call you a coward if you have Fawkes, Sergeant RL-3, or Charon turn on the water purifier at the end of the game, even though that's the smartest thing to do since they're immune to radiation.
  • While Fallout: New Vegas downplays this (the major factions are willing to go as far as pardoning all your crimes against them just for the opportunity to offer you a job), this is played to the hilt for minor factions and independent NPCs until you do their quests, with the exception of the Powder Gangers (a gang of ex-cons turned raiders), who will alternatively send a messenger offering a ceasefire between you and their gang if you kill enough of them.
  • Once again played straight in Fallout 4. You might be named General of the Minutemen, but that won't stop your alleged second-in-command from telling you to go kill a nest of ghouls every five minutes. The Brotherhood of Steel and Institute aren't any better. At least in the case of the Railroad it's justified in that you end up as one of their few remaining senior operatives, so they have to keep leaning on you for support. And then there's Marcy Long, a civilian who does nothing but bitch at you about how terrible everything is no matter how hard you've worked turning Sanctuary into the best settlement in the entire Commonwealth.
• Rather strange case in Final Fantasy X. Auron is supposed to be 'The best guardian there ever was' and 'The Legendary Guardian', but guess how many characters except the party acknowledge his pure Badassery and reputation? Two! Canon says he is one of the men guardians look upon in respect, but does he get any of said respect or has he influence to any of the events? Little or completely none. Damn, being famous in Spira must suck! Granted, most people presumed him to be dead, and Auron is not the type to take advantage of fame.
• Final Fantasy XI has players build up their reputation in cities to staggering amounts, and be lauded as a hero... and go to an NPC in said town to discover that they have no damn clue who you are. Could you stir up any trouble... like everyone who didn't do this quest in the first place.
• In Final Fantasy X-2, your exploits in the previous game are well-known throughout the entire world, and you even get a cool title to go with it. But that doesn't mean you can expect any actual respect for bringing about a global renaissance. In one particularly egregious case, you can get run out of your own birthplace for being on friendly terms with a rival faction.
• Final Fantasy XIV has many people sending you on quests doing menial and tedious tasks, such as fetching wine for someone or slaying some monsters, even though your character tells them that he/she defeated Ifrit already and needs to find the group of people that defeated a god so that you can learn how to beat it yourself. You eventually find out the trope is subverted when all the people you been doing the boring side quests for are actually the group that defeated the god you're trying to defeat yourself and they tell you that they were testing you to make sure you were just not another adventurer trying to make a name for himself. The trope is played with and explored further in the Dark Knight quests in Heavensward where you get to see how ungrateful the people of Eorzea can be when you do menial tasks for them. As a Heroic Mime, you naturally can't express how you really feel. With Fray, your job trainer, s/he eventually vents out their anger and annoyance at everyone who seemingly takes advantage of you and offers nothing in return. However, you find out that Fray is actually a part of your psyche that represents all of your negative emotions that were building up since the end of the 2.5 story, so it was actually you expressing your disgust towards everyone.
  • At one point during one of the many, many filler quests, as the Warrior of Light is running around doing menial chores, Rowena of all people says the WoL needs to learn how to say no to people, before they end up mucking out Chocobo stables.
• Played a little too straight in the Wii game Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King. Once you've set your minions (ahem, "adventurers") their tasks, the only thing you can do all day is run around the city, talking to the citizens or building buildings to allow even MORE citizens in. Talking to them allows you to stay up later in the day (extends the game clock), so that your minions can actually complete their tasks. To add insult to injury, once your city gets to a certain point, some of your citizens will begin offering fetch quests. Doing these quests involves issuing a "bequest" — tasking your minions to find something in the town — which costs you money. Only reward is a morale gain — which lets you stay up late at night.
• In Freelancer you actually get an example of this from yourself. Your journal speaks in awe of Herr von Claussen, a Rheinlander ace who's scored over 500 kills and never lost a wingman. By the point that entry is written, a typical player's kill count is in the mid-400s, and thanks to Gameplay Ally Immortality you've never lost a wingman either!
• Gaia Online can invoke this. Once your level reaches a certain point, the NPCs who give you the repeatable quests say "I should stop wasting your time here, you probably have better things to do. I'll handle the rest myself." But then you can suppress your level and they'll get right back to bossing you around.
• In The Game of the Ages, you'd think your status would change after lifting the town's curse. Not particularly.
• Thoroughly averted in Ghost of Tsushima. All peasantry recognize Jin as their feudal lord and pay him with the proper respect. His exploits are heard of and people will leave gifts for him at shrines. Only fellow samurai, being socially equal in rank to him, and certain anti-establishment NPCs, won't defer to him. And even then, almost all who don't respect Lord Sakai come to respect the Ghost's actions.
• While the first The Godfather subverted this by causing you to become increasingly respected as you advanced through the plot and ranks, the sequel plays this particularly straight. Both Michael and others belittle you even when you've proven yourself capable of mowing down whole enemy Families.
• Golden Sun: The Lost Age has this trope in the beginning. In the Tower of the Sea God next to the first town, a boy is trapped on a high ledge and his friend cannot get him down. Even though you save the kid with the Lash Psynergy, both boys coldly thank you and are more concerned about eating something instead of being grateful you didn't leave the kid to starve to death.
  • In Dark Dawn, TLA's hero Felix is a Hero with Bad Publicity, if he's mentioned at all, while Isaac is a celebrity for triggering the Golden Sun event and saving the world... which was Felix's mission alongside the Mars Clan. Who are likewise never mentioned. It's clearly an in-universe case of Unreliable Narrator.
  • Meanwhile, Matthew and his friends apparently invoke this trope by being low-key about being the children of the famous Warriors of Vale (and Kalay and Imil). Amiti only finds out who they are after he's been traveling with them for a while, and his reaction is rather amusing (especially since he's no stranger to celebrity himself).
• In Grand Theft Auto III, by the time you reach the third section of Liberty Island, you've assassinated the heads of The Mafia and the Yakuza, you've completely obliterated the Triads, and you've severely damaged the drug smuggling operation of the Colombian drug cartel. You've also probably killed hundreds to thousands of people and caused millions of dollars' worth of damage to the city. In Real Life, you'd be the most notorious criminal ever to set foot in the country, but that doesn't seem to hold much sway with the Red Jacks street gang, who want you to join them in drive-bys and street brawls.
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas:
  • You can increase your respect (which, in game play terms amounts to how many fellow gang members you can take to assist you in a mission) by working out, dressing nice, doing missions and driving out the gangs from the city. However, after a certain mission, you are suddenly dumped without warning into the countryside and the gangs retake the entire damn city, including your home street.
  • Played straight with CJ's brother Sweet. No matter what he does, CJ is nothing more than the family black sheep to him even though he's actually more "put together" than Sweet. What's worse is that Sweet tends to lord the fact that Brian (CJ's other brother) died on CJ's watch and knows he feels extremely guilty about it. Their sister Kendl even stays away from that topic but at one point outright tells CJ she knows it's not his fault. Even when CJ is leading a successful life with his True Companions (Woozie, Truth, Kendl, Cesar), Sweet still calls him a "buster".
• Grand Theft Auto V goes back and forth with this. Each of the major characters has someone in their life that treats them this way, be they spoiled brat kids that don't understand the realities of dad's life, chronically inept best friends that keep making deals with people who have actively tried to get them killed, or a mother that still treats them like a worthless, snot-nosed toddler. That's to say nothing of Steve Haines who actually knows how much of a psychotic killer each of the three playable characters are, but also knows full well that he's got each of them by the balls and can blackmail them to do whatever he wants. He suffers from this himself, though, as he completely snaps if he feels he's not being paid enough respect. Despite all of this, anyone who ISN'T an explicit asshole just using you for their grungiest of work shows you the amount of respect you rightfully deserve, and some of the biggest violators actually get over themselves by the end of the game, notably Micheal's family (mostly.)
• In the Eye of the North expansion to Guild Wars, 'faction' mechanics toyed with in previous installments reach the point where some items are only possible to acquire through earning a reputation-based title with that faction, with characters lacking that title being rudely informed that the items in question aren't available to just anyone. Never mind that for three of these factions, it is perfectly possible to have single-handedly rescued the organisation from their greatest enemies or to have destroyed the entity that serves as their greatest nemesis without having achieved sufficient reputation to "earn" these services.
• The case for majority of protagonists in Harvest Moon; despite their great actions, nobody seems to care. Hilariously noticeable in Harvest Moon: A New Beginning, where you arrive in Echo Village and kickstart the village that has been stagnant for likely decades, get more people to move in by building their houses for free despite the time and money you spend on materials, cause their economy to boom by buying from shops and shipping produce, fulfill increasingly difficult goals to aide the town's restoration and while doing all of this, you also run a pretty successful farm on the side! But woe betide you if you dare to lose a festival and those townspeople who should be grateful that you gave them a roof over their head will berate you.
• Played for Laughs in Helltaker when Lucifer complains about the other demons never listening to her despite being "the goddamn Queen of Hell". The Taker himself suffers from this a bit as well, as even after he successfully obtains his harem barely any of them seem to consider him a romantic partner, although he enjoys their company regardless.
• Lampshaded in Jak II: Renegade when Daxter asks Torn why they get all the crummy missions:
  Torn: Because I. Don't. Like. You!
• There's a rather annoying, if minor, example in Kingdom Hearts II. On the prologue, you have to battle Seifer as a tutorial. Even though he's supposedly the town's bully and is also supposed to be pretty good in combat you'll probably kick his ass once you're given the chance to (you don't get to battle him on the semi Tournament Arc so that you can see him at his best). He also has the habit of mocking you every time you talk to him. After the end of the prologue, you discover that the whole Twilight Town was just a virtual simulation made for keeping Roxas away from Organization XIII and you take control of Sora. You may think that Seifer may get a chance to really show his worth after knowing that little fact. However, it only gets worse from there. As with Roxas' story, he also tries to mock you every time he can, but this time it doesn't help the fact that the Struggle host thinks he's the hot shit on the matter, preventing you from fighting him unless you defeat Heiner and Setzer 20 times in a row. After finally doing all of this, you'll find out that he's actually weaker than the time you fought him as Roxas. Even then the Struggle host still treats you like a retard by saying that you're finally ready to fight him and Seifer won't even change his NPC dialog.
• Sora got hit hard with this in Kingdom Hearts III. Despite being a very competent hero who has saved countless people and defeated some of the multiverse's most dangerous villains like Ansem, Xemnas, and Sephiroth, Sora's treated like dead weight by the others after Xehanort sabotaged his exam in Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance] and prevented him from being officially recognized as a Keyblade Master.
• Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords:
  • The Exile, despite being a Jedi and a war veteran, a surprisingly large amount of people you encounter think you're puny and incompetent next to them, such as when you spar with the handmaidens or the Mandalorians. Admittedly, you do get to gradually build up their respect with your accomplishments, but there are still a few who look down their noses at you.
  • Jedi in general. While a Jedi Knight certainly isn't invincible, and they've been getting thrashed by the Sith for years, only an idiot wouldn't respect their power (we are talking about a group of people who can lift heavy object with their minds, heal wounds instantly, possess lightning quick reflexes and swords that can cut through almost anything), yet most people you encounter in the game will think of Jedi as absolute pushovers. You encounter a pair of women on Dantooine who look like nothing more than simple farmers, who seem to seriously consider taking on a Jedi to collect on the bounty.
• In L.A. Noire, it doesn't matter how much goodwill Cole Phelps builds up over the first few sections of the game. As soon as he's caught visiting Elsa Lichtmann at the end of his time on Ad-Vice, he gets suspended and is forced to completely rebuild his reputation.
• Played with in Last Dream. Through most of the game, the various quest-givers and NPC's either disregard the main characters or treat them with contempt, even after they've done things like rescue the King of Doria or defeat the Kraken using the normal method (using Medusa's head to turn it to stone). However, doing certain sidequests or taking alternate paths result in NPC's throughout the game world treating you with awe or respect. Notably, during the Hunter's Guild quests, the guild leader(s) become so impressed with your skills that they dispatch you to start fighting urban legends, and if you beat all four of them, the Guild Correspondents and guild leader admit that you are the greatest warrior to ever live.
• Being a Support or Jungler in League of Legends (and, by extension, the same or similar role in most MOBAS) is likely to tug on your nerve strings as you set up kill after kill for your team and very often don't get a simple "thank you" for your play. However, your team will be all praise for the ADC, Toplaner and Midlaner (again, the roles might have different names in other MOBAS) while you sit behind your screen getting no praise at all. In recent times, at least in League, it got better and many people watching others play (on Twitch for example) pay their respects to well-played supports/junglers, but it was a hard way there.
• The Legend of Zelda:
  • In Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, the protagonist is the SAME Link from the first game. You can understand that people might ask him to save a kidnapped child or help the citizenry; after all, that's what he is supposed to do. But to refuse to let him cross a bridge, or to ask him to fetch some water? Not only did this guy save the country from the local Evil Overlord, but he is the envoy of the ruler of said country.
  • In Majora's Mask, if you bring the Couple's Mask to the Happy Mask Salesman, he acknowledges that while he didn't see it, you probably did a lot of frustration-inducing stuff to get it, and even says he wishes he was looking for that mask so your efforts would be for a little more than (as far as he knew) nothing. For the rest of the game, however, you spend countless hours helping people out, slaying monsters, and reliving the same three days over and over via "Groundhog Day" Loop until the Big Bad is put down, but no one even acknowledges that you saved the world. Even the Happy Mask Salesman doesn't really acknowledge that you stopped the moon from crashing and is only happy that you managed to recover the titular mask.
  • Skyward Sword can get pretty bad with this sometimes. Granted, virtually none of Skyloft's denizens know Link is risking life and limb to save the entire world each time he heads off on his Loftwing, but quite possibly the only people in the entire game that show Link anything approaching proper respect for a good portion of the play time are Fi, who acknowledges you as her master from the get-go, and Zelda's father. Everyone else gives Link no end of crap; Faron the dragon doesn't care that you killed a scorpion the size of a school bus and crossed swords with a demon lord, she still questions what the goddess was thinking choosing you, while Scrapper contrives to be a condescending Jerkass to you at any available opportunity, even though you're the reason he's operational at all. Faron is particularly bad; it's not enough that you have the Scale that's supposed to be obtainable only by the chosen hero of the Goddess, you have to prove yourself by fetching magic water for her before she'll let you into the temple containing one of the Sacred Flames. And later on, you have to learn part of a song from her; despite having gotten her scale, proving yourself worthy of entering the temple, AND getting the Flame from said temple, you have to prove yourself AGAIN before she's convinced that you're the real deal.
  • Breath of the Wild has many of the usual "demand inane things from the legendary hero who awoke from a 100-year slumber to take down the living embodiment of evil" situations, but probably the most ridiculous example is Gerudo Town. Even after saving them from a rampaging ancient super-robot and returning it to their control, as well as completing all the sidequests in the village to convince their queen to let you borrow her Thunder Helm, the guards will still kick you out if you walk into town without the special outfit that makes them think you're a woman. Men aren't allowed in Gerudo Town, you see; but given that the queen knows you're a man and that you've personally solved all their problems, you'd think they could make an exception.
• In Little Big Adventure II, you have a museum dedicated to you and your heroic deeds from the original game... which you are forced to pay for entering, because the ticket vendor is an idiot who doesn't recognize you (he does note that you "look like the guy in the picture" after you don the Ancestral Tunic — and that's it). If you talk to the museum owner, Twinsen will complain about that. Subverted with the School of Magic: they know that you have saved the world, but it just doesn't give you the right not to pass the exams.
• Mass Effect handles this far better than most. Yes, Shepard can do a lot of menial, unethical and even sometimes illegal tasks for little reward, but most of the time they just ask, with the player able to tell them to go away at any point, or Shepard approaches them offering their assistance. The only people who actually order Shepard around are either Shepard's superior (e.g. Hackett in the first game), Shepard's close friends (e.g. Anderson) or a famous powerful badass on Shepard's level (e.g. Aria, who still obviously respects Shepard). Still, the Citadel Council falls into this headfirst, as no matter how often you are proven right they still refuse to believe anything you say; it takes you saving them from certain death for the second time for them to finally take you seriously.
• Mega Man Battle Network: Each game ends with Lan saving the world from criminal organizations that have made everyone paranoid and scared and as such is heralded as a hero... until the next game, when everyone seems to have forgotten everything and suddenly he's just another kid. The only game where Lan's past accomplishments comes up is Battle Network 5, where Chaud and Baryl cite Lan's abundance of previous exploits as the reason to make him the operator of their anti-Nebula task force.
• While some stories may differ, there is plenty of this dumped on poor Samus Aran due to her so-called "illegal/unwanted actions", one huge offender is in Metroid Fusion when the Galactic Federation wanted to not only capture/study the X Parasites, but also capture/study a freakin' SA-X specimen, something that Samus knows full well the GF cannot do and will fail completely if they attempt to do something so stupid, as it would simply escape the BSL station, multiply and eventually assimilate and conquer the entire galaxy in time. One small saving grace is that, while it's unlikely, there's a chance that a small honest few out there will understand why she decided to not only destroy the BSL station, but send it into a crash course with the Metroid homeworld of SR388 in order to end the X Parasites once and for all. However, much of this is also due to a bad translation - in the Japanese original, the Federation is said to be made up of many factions, and the plot to use the X Parasites / The SA-X as weapons is a conspiracy by one of these factions. Meanwhile, the English translation implies that the Federation is one monolithic block.
  "Do not worry. One of them will understand. One of them must."
• In all of the Monkey Island sequels, no one is inclined to believe Guybrush's claims that he is the Mighty Pirate who defeated LeChuck (four times!). Most of the time, he can't even convince people he's over twenty-one. In Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge this is particularly ironic, as he tells everyone about his exploits enough that people who know him are sick of hearing about them. He's also penned a trilogy of books about his killing of LeChuck.
• Monster Girl Quest: Much like her Greek counterpart, Prometheus, Promestein, who used to be such a gentle, kind soul, after giving the gift of fire/knowledge to mankind during the early years to ease their utterly miserable way of living, and does she get praised for it? Nope. The angels imprison her for the "act of kindness" she did, for countless years, and while said imprisonment isn't as hardcore as the original Greek tale, it is still a truly unjust act just to satiate their self-centered Ilias' own ego/fame, whereas the humans were suffering a tremendous deal due to their inability to take creative ways of living due to their agonizing "devotion" to said deity, even though it's her fault that a LOT of pain and suffering occurs over the years thanks to her shameless "devotion/commandments", Promestein was merely seeking the actual truth of things, not just some preconceived lies concocted by Ilias and supported by her boneheaded followers. Needless to say, this result is the primary reason she became a bitter, heavily-immoral scientist.
• In the Ravenhearst Story Arc of Mystery Case Files, you play the Master Detective, a sleuth who has extensive experience in dealing with the paranormal and supernatural in order to solve mysteries and crimes. In 13th Skull, you travel to Louisiana to investigate a disappearance, and run into a slew of characters who have chunks of information you need to solve the case. In spite of your badge and authority, almost none of them will tell you much of anything until you've performed a Fetch Quest for them. (The lone exception requires you to beat him at checkers before he'll help you, but after that he's perfectly friendly and useful.)
• My World, My Way features the princess of the land moonlighting as a hero. She averts this because everyone immediately recognizes her as a hero (because the king's agent is paying them to, against her knowledge), but they still play it straight and give her meaningless Fetch Quest and With A Herring jobs, because "That's what heroes do!" Lampshaded particularly well in Oasis Town, where the heroine directly asks what quest this town is going to give her, and the response is to 1. Collect 5 cough grass to make cold medicine, 2. gather 5 mountain grapes in a forest you have to plant, 3. kill 10 venombugs eating the mayor's garden, 4. Go pick 10 birthday flowers, 5. Light bonfires to attract firepigs, which are a nuisance, so kill 10 of them after you bring them here, and 6. collect 10 Magic Fellworts. This is just the stuff the mayor spat out at you before the princess interrupted him screaming that she's not his maid.
• In Neverwinter Nights 2, random City Watch will still be all "I'm busy. Find another people to chat up." Wonderful thing to say to a Knight and member of Nine, you bastard. It's worse if you sided with the City Watch instead of the Shadow Thieves in Act I since Captain Brelaina promotes you to the rank of Lieutenant to replace the late Lieutenant Kyton (who was the ranking City Watch Officer in the Docks District).
• Deconstructed in OFF: Japhet, guardian, creator and sovereign of zone 2, only wanted his citizens to acknowledge him and be thankful for making them and their abodes. They, in response, proceeded to forget who he even was. The result? One very pissed off phoenix trying to raze the entire area with an army of ghosts.
• In Ōkami most people only view you as a wolf, a lovely white wolf that brings good luck, but a wolf all the same. Up until halfway through the game you won't get much if any respect for the deeds you've done by most of characters in the game. And there still is a rather long side quest where you have to prove to a Flat-Earth Atheist that you're god. Ultimately the game subverts this during the Final Boss: with Issun's help, every character in the game realizes that you're really a deity and prays for your success and to thank you for all you've done. And since respect equals power, their prayers give you the power to defeat the Big Bad.
• In the Overlord games, especially the 2nd one, most people don't show you the respect an Evil Overlord deserves. In the first game you can try to earn their respect or slaughter them. In the second game you don't even pretend to be nice; you can either brainwash them or again slaughter them.
• Pajama Sam 2: Thunder And Lightning Aren't So Frightening: When Sam and SID find the Snowflake Inspector, he refuses to go back with them to his station because they don't appreciate him there. When Sam gives him a blue ribbon and claims he has been named employee of the month, he is convinced that they like him and appreciate him after all and agrees to go back to work.
• Perfect Dark. Despite being the trusted Golden Girl of the paramilitary outfit, the lackeys and scientists still treat Joanna like garbage in the training areas. Of course, once you get to the level where they are hostages, they are happy to see you, and at least once you've beaten that level they'll stop insulting you whenever they see you. Apart from that guy in the basement, anyway.
• Played various ways in the Persona series. For example, in Persona 4, your uncle (the police chief) is very suspicious of your seeming involvement with the murders and kidnappings, whereas your friends frequently praise you for your work in saving the victims. You get very little respect outside that, but for a good reason; no-one else knows that you're saving people's lives. Your protagonist also tends to get praise for helping others in social links, and their gratitude turns into energy for Personas.
• Double Subverted by Captain Furrante in Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire. His first meeting with the player consists of him unexpectedly complimenting the player on something awesome they did in the first game. The first play-through, it's a welcome change from the rest of the Deadfire not caring who the player was back in the Dyrwood. In further play-throughs, when Furrante's true colors are known, it's clear he takes the Watcher for a backwoods sucker as much as, if not more than, anyone else in the Deadfire, and is just using honeyed words to make them do his dirty work.
• Pokémon:
  • Somehow, the fact that the player eventually becomes the League Champion, the hero who liberated the region from a criminal syndicate and saved the world does not impress many of the game's NPCs, who treat you the same as any other eleven-year-old Trainer. Made worse by how your own mother has absolutely nothing to say, ever, about you beating the best Trainers in the entire region (though that's not to imply she's not proud of you). Some people will recognise you, but for the most part you're still often treated like the average trainer. Starting with Gen 5 there is more of an effort to make you Famed In-Story but there are still numerous points where the protagonist is treated like anyone else. Gen 8 got much better about it, with the Pokémon center lady and the Pokè mart person addressing your character as the champion and you can overhear it from some NPCs, but it’s still not fully averted.
  • None of the in-game trainers even bat an eye when you send out Pokémon thought to be long extinct or urban legend, legendary Olympus Mons Pokémon that are the only one of their kind in existence, or even Pokémon that are believed to be God. They have no qualms about attacking these wonders either.
  • In Heart Gold and Soul Silver your lead Pokemon will follow you around. Wild Pokémon will still attack you even if they're a level 3 Rattata and you have a level 100 Legendary following you.
• In Quest for Glory IV the character is magically teleported halfway across the planet to a small, isolated village that's highly distrustful of strangers and has no way of knowing all the amazing stuff you've done (like, oh, saving the entire world from total destruction twice over). Only three characters in the entire game respect your abilities, two of whom are returning Big Bads (Baba Yaga and Ad Avis) and the other being this game's Big Bad, who is the master of the latter. The people do greatly warm up to you once you do some notable good deeds. It gets downright heartwarming with comments like "I never believed true heroes existed until now."
• The Ring Genie from ‘’Revolve8: Episodic Dueling’’ is a prime example of this, constantly overshadowed by his more famous older brother, the Genie of the Lamp. This is especially exemplified in his own storyline where he not only saved an entire village from being flooded (which his brother was given credit for), but he also helped Aladdin escape from the cave and helped him free the Lamp Genie from the clutches of an evil wizard, yet hardly anyone knows who he is (let alone that Aladdin has two genies).
• The main character of Rhodan: Myth of the Illochim is a 3,000-year-old immortal hero and the head of government for Terra (Earth) and its colonies. He spends the entire first level of the game trying to escape his own home after being confined there by his best friend (his own security minister) for unexplained reasons. At a later point in the game he's arrested on suspicion of murder and thrown straight into a filthy cell, with no opportunity to try and explain what happened — even though he was found unconscious after being attacked at the crime scene.
• In RuneScape, your character is verbally trodden upon regularly by computer characters. Many of the quests involve menial tasks with lots of time-consuming running around, to the point that the game develepors (Jagex) treat it as an in-joke. In some of the quests, your character will say things along the lines of "Let me guess, you want me to run around all over Runescape to get some easily-obtainable item?" And some of the computer characters inspire true hatred with their constant refusal to recognise your contributions/good work/single-handed saving of everyone.
  • In-universe, this is why the Wise Old Man turned to bank robbery, despite being a celebrated adventurer: Nobody wanted to pay him for his heroism.
• Subverted in Scarface: The World Is Yours. Initially, Tony will be unrecognized by the citizens, but as he rebuilds his reputation they will recognize and respect him; at high levels it is possible to talk people into giving him their cars.
• The Sims 4 has a fame mechanic, which determines how much of a celebrity your Sim is. You can also become President, but unlike The Sims 3 where you're rewarded with the "Aura of Leadership" perk that makes bystanders react to you, in 4 you can be President and have nobody know who you are.
• Sonic The Hedgehog: Usually averted, as the title character is stated to be a world-renown hero, and his fame is usually acknowledged by people upon first meeting him. However, in Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), he's still forced to do a number of random tasks for the Soleanna citizens in order advance in his quest to save Elise, the nation's ruler, from Dr. Eggman. It gets particularly bad when the royal guards' captain refuses to let him continue unless he plays and wins a mind game. Upon solving it, he reveals that he specifically did it in order to stop civilians (i.e. Sonic) from getting involved in the matter. Never mind that Sonic had a far better track record at dealing with Eggman and saving the world than authorities, or that, again, he was a world-famous hero.
• Roger Wilco in Space Quest saves the universe not one, but several times, thwarting alien invasions and evil corporations, but he often gets some minimal praise at the end of each episode, only to find himself again as a humble space janitor, still treated as crap, in the next one. Space Quest 6 starts with Roger getting demoted from Captain back to Janitor Second Class. Why? Because, in the course of saving the universe from "pukoid" monsters, he was forced to destroy a StarCon ship, commandeer the StarCon flagship, and get together with a StarCon ambassador (who's destined to be his wife anyway). The only reason he's not Thrown Out the Airlock is because he's a very good janitor. Even the Interactive Narrator doesn't like him, constantly making rather mean jokes at his expense.
• A Running Gag in The Spellcasting Series, as hero Ernie Eaglebeak saves the world on a yearly basis and gets nothing but a trophy for his troubles. With his name misspelled on it.
• Star Trek Online ties Character Level to your player character's military rank in Starfleet, the Klingon Defense Force, or the Romulan Republican Force. This is tolerable up to level 39 (Captain or equivalent and below), but after that, not only are you an admiral running around in a ship, but by the time you hit the level cap at 60 (Fleet Admiral), you actually outrank every mission giver in the entire game giver except Fleet Admiral Quinn, Chancellor J'mpok, and Admiral Kererek, and have probably seen more combat in the last year than some of them have in their entire careers. And yet O-7s and below still love to order you around like you're a totally green ensign and in some cases force you to personally complete tasks more suited to junior enlisted personnel. (One major exception is Captain Harry Kim in the Delta Rising expansion, who makes a point of treating the PC with the respect due his superior officer.)
• Star Wars: The Old Republic class storylines play this straight first and slowly avert it later. For instance, when playing as a Sith Inquisitor (who starts off as a recently-freed slave), you get treated like crap by everyone except your Affably Evil future master until about the time you finish the Prologue. Throughout Act I, you receive more and more recognition (especially from the Imperial Intelligence, who know everything about everyone) and most quest givers approach you primarily because of your reputation as an unstoppable, lightning-flinging death machine. By Act II, you are already firmly entrenched in the Imperial noble caste, with all due benefits.
• Luigi in the Super Mario Bros. games tends to be hit with this on numerous occasions. In Super Mario 64 DS, he gets told by numerous Toads that he's neither as brave nor as charismatic as his more famous brother (though some Toads on the upper floors do praise him) and in the Mario & Luigi games, it's a Running Gag that his name is forgotten or he's trying to copy Mario somehow. The worst offender is probably Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time. Once the bros have defeated the main villain and get back to the present-day Peach's Castle, Peach, in front of all the Toads, thanks Mario and their baby selves but not Luigi. Yes, the princess, who was helping them out in the final battle up to a point and has known them her whole life, thanks Adult Mario, Baby Mario and Baby Luigi but not Adult Luigi! Mario & Luigi: Dream Team has this as the central focus of the plot, with Luigi finally getting some proper respect and his name remembered.
• In Tales of Vesperia, no matter how much crap Yuri Lowell goes through, people will always treat him as a dangerous outlaw and attribute his guild's good deeds to the Imperial Knights. Amusingly inverted, as Yuri is perfectly happy with not being celebrated, but it really frustrates his knight friend Flynn who gets all the credit for Yuri's heroics.
• In Tales of Eternia, no one in Inferia gives the heroes trying to stop the Grand Fall any credit (trying to execute them several times instead!) until they absolutely must acknowledge them (begrudgingly, because there's absolutely nothing else that can be done but to trust them) because the very idea of the Grand Fall is heretical. People in Celestia are much more helpful and grateful.
• Terranigma has got to be one of the most extreme examples of this trope. Thanks for reviving the world, defeating all the villains and monsters who were threatening it, and sealing away the very spirit of darkness, Ark! Now go ahead and die, we're done with you.
• Played straight then averted in turns in Titanfall 2. When Jack Cooper and BT-7274 finally return to an allied base, after already taking out several members of the Apex Predators, the commanding officer tries to replace Cooper with a qualified pilot, and only agrees to Beetee's appeal not to because they're short on time. After Jack and Beetee pull their weight assaulting an enemy stronghold, the CO takes a moment to admit she's impressed and tell Jack as far as she's concerned, he's a fully certified Pilot now.
• Reimu Hakurei of Touhou Project has saved Gensokyo from everything from minor annoyances to potentially apocalyptic destruction multiple times, yet the humans ignore her (at best), the youkai mooch off of her (at best) and she has no worshippers whatsoever at the Hakurei shrine. Indeed, most residents genuinely don't know that Reimu has stopped most of the regular incidents, and those that do are either too stupid to recognise they should give her respect or too powerful too even bother. This is most apparent in Forbidden Scrollery, where despite being Gensokyo's top youkai hunter none of the humans know who she is and have no confidence in her solving the current youkai problem (expect for Kosuzu who is a blatant Reimu fangirl, with Reimu having no idea how to react to someone genuinely praising her). In many of these cases, Reimu's biggest obstacle in earning that respect is Reimu herself, as she tends to be somewhere between grouchy and distant with people and does the bare minimum in upkeep on the Hakurei Shrine, which tends to drive people away.
• This kicks off the plot of Transistor. Lack of respect for Royce Bracket's avant-garde, static architectural designs in a society based around change is what causes him to seek out the Transistor, ultimately leading to The End of the World as We Know It via Grey Goo when he loses control of it.
• Ultima:
  • In a meta-example, Ultima V. Called to Brittania in response to a major crisis, the Avatar defeats the Shadowlords, subverts Blackthorne's regime, journeys deep into the depths of the underworld to free Lord British, and paves the way for his return to the throne. His reward? He returns home to earth to find that his house has been robbed while he was out. Being the Avatar apparently makes you the universe's Chew Toy.
  • In Ultima VI you are the Avatar, most likely Britannia's most legendary hero ever, and some people who recognize you do sing your praises. And your first order of business is to reclaim the shrines and purify them, for which you'll need the eight runes. The runes which you spent the fourth game tracking down everywhere, and which should now be locked up as national treasures. Except people apparently pass them around everywhere, and has lost or hidden or dropped some of them. The Rune of Sacrifice in particular is held by the guild leader of Minoc, and he'll give it to you... when you become a member. Which you can only become by performing "Stones" on a set of pipes. Which you need to have someone make for you. Who will need you to provide the wood. And so on. Yes, you're a legendary hero who is busy trying to stop an invasion and save the world for the sixth time now, but this guy still expects you to jump through hoops for no reason beyond propriety.
  • In Ultima Underworld you are suspected of kidnapping a baron's daughter. Though you claim you are the Avatar the baron doesn't recognize or believe you with the only explanation being that several years had passed since you were last in Britannia. Again, you are the Avatar, the man who not only saved the world six times by this point but is also the Messiah of the only organized religion in the world. You'd think that everyone in the entire planet would know what the Avatar looks like. The baron then sends you to the Abyss on a mission to rescue his daughter. He notes that if you are really the Avatar, this is your thing, and not only should you be able to get her back, you should feel obligated to do it. If you're lying, you'll get what you deserve.
• Justified and then averted in Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines. At the start of the game, you play a fledgling vampire who's just been introduced to undead society and is sitting firmly on the bottom rung. A fair number of your quests involve trying to curry favor with various political leaders and sects, and some of the older vampires actually have freaky powers that force you to obey them. The aversion comes later in the game — as you get stronger, carving through hoards of enemy vampires and even vampire hunters, the elders of the city start treating you as someone they want on their side, or else as someone they want to dust before you become a threat. Lampshaded (sort of) at one point where the player has the option to tell some uncooperative NPCs "I've got to get a publicist. You two obviously aren't aware of my reputation."
• In The Witcher games and books, the titular witchers are often treated with mistrust and fear by the populace, if not outright scorn and hatred, due to a combination of superstition, genuine fear of things that aren't human, religious fanaticism, and a reputation tarnished by an ugly history. That being said, witchers are also viewed as heroes by many where they've saved lives and villages by slaying monsters. Geralt of Rivia himself is a paradox of loathing and respect; in one town he'll be hailed as a hero and dine with a king for helping reverse a curse on his family, and in the next he'll be openly threatened by the guards and denounced by the priests for being an inhuman mutant.
• Wonderland Adventures. More so in the first game than in the second, but NPCs in both games will ask you to take a break from saving the world for a bit in order to help them do stuff. Somewhat averted overall in that very few NPCs actually demand the player's help, instead requesting it if they're not busy. Zig-Zagged in PoTZ –- while everyone in-game is more or less aware of what the player's busy with, they'll sometimes recommend taking a moment to relax (in the form of either playing games in the arcade or solving puzzles that have been put together for them). Only one NPC in the game actually asks the player for help that's unrelated to the main quest.
• In the Pine Valley level of World in Conflict, Captain Bannon begs for your help in repairing one of his damaged vehicles. When you do so, he berates you for taking too long, no matter how fast you do it, thanks to his Jerkass personality.
• World of Warcraft:
  • This is especially prevalent in the second expansion, where by level 80 your character has probably slain multiple dragons, Eldritch Abominations, demon lords, and more monsters than should logically exist, but will still be treated like dirt by NPCs, rarely acknowledging your exploits, and if they do, its just to say "I don't care about them, go kill some animals and bring me their meat. I'm hungry". Admittedly if you do enough notable things NPCs will start to sing your praises, and once you've helped somebody their dialogue will generally be friendly to you, but that won't stop everybody else demanding you fetch them 20 Bear Asses.
  • Not as bad in the Cataclysm zones from the third expansion. Characters will generally recognise you as a great hero and faction leaders frequently show up and make it clear that they know who you are and what you're capable of. They still want you to collect bear asses, but they have more flattering ways of justifying it. The rewritten early quests also tend to try to make you feel less anonymous.
  • John J. Keeshan in Burning Steppes will treat you like an ordinary soldier unless you finished the Redridge zone. Then he'll greet you as an old friend.
  • This is invoked again heavily in 'Mists of Pandaria', where the native Pandaren are often invited to join the Horde or Alliance — sometimes boasting of their exploits in the process, only for the Pandaren to immediately rebuke them, often reasoning that the factions messed with their once peaceful lives by bringing their ensuring warfare into the Pandaren's homelands. Meaning, you often end up either cleaning the mess your faction has made and/or you go around doing menial chores once again. And that big, black dragon from the last expansion that you narrowly defeated when it tried to destroy the world? Never heard of it.
    • A fairly amusing case happens with one Shrine of Seven Stars draenei NPC who's in an argument with a pandaren. If you try to convince him of what the pandaren is arguing, he will say "What do you know? You act like you're the savior of Azeroth!" even if you have the "Savior Of Azeroth" title (from defeating Madness of Deathwing on Heroic).
  • During Escalation, players are given a quest to help an old seer retrace the steps of Emperor Shao Hao, who appreciates that despite being a powerful warrior, you are willing to help an old man climb a mountain. When it's done, the seer commends you for your humility, then reveals that he is the ghost of Emperor Shao Pao, and tells you how Pride was his one great vice.
  • Warlords of Draenor puts your character in charge of a military garrison for your faction; this is specifically because of your past deeds. You still end up doing some rather menial tasks for quests, but these are generally to establish relations with the locals who don't know you as well, or else because you've gained a reputation for "getting things done". An amusing sidenote: Your job as a commander comes with the duty of dishing out missions for your followers, among whom you'll find a mix of new characters, famed badasses and their AU counterparts. While some missions are tuned for geared followers and definitely count as respectful, there's nothing stopping you from sending the restless ghost of Admiral Taylor to collect Twenty Bear Asses or clean the latrine. Putting battle-eager characters like Lantresor on permanent mining duty also counts.
• It's lampshaded in Ys SEVEN, when a man asks you to go find some earrings for him after the village elder already told him (and everyone else in the village) about you and how important you are: "Strange men with weapons are the best at finding lost earrings, right?" It's typically justify Adol getting no respect, with him usually getting stranded in the middle of nowhere and being saved by people from a small village that may not have gotten any news for decades. Consequently, the few people you meet that are actually well-traveled will either hold you in the highest regard or... give you no respect, because you couldn't possibly be the legendary Adol the Red!
• People should learn that messing or inconveniencing Kazuma Kiryu, protagonist of the Yakuza series, is a bad idea, but they still do it anyway. It takes a measure of suspension of disbelief to swallow that so many gangsters are willing to pick a fight with him considering his reputation. The only gangster to admit how badass Kazuma is is Nagahama in Yakuza: Dead Souls, who freely admits that he may be a gangster and he may be tough... but he's no Kazuma Kiryu.
  • Yakuza 6 Posits that the reason so many gangster and Yakuza thugs pick a fight with Kiryu is that gangs and clans send their fresh meat at him as a form of hazing; they believe they're being sent to rough up some random dude or a small-time Yakuza at best, only to pick a fight and promptly get ground into the pavement by The Dragon of Dojima.
  • One of the many reasons Nishiki had his Face–Heel Turn was because he was constantly disrespected by everyone from his superiors, underlings and even friends by comparing him unfavorably to his sworn brother Kiryu. The one person who didn't and could have kept him grounded against the face of all this, Kiryu himself, unfortunately could not help him as he took the heat for the murder Sohei Dojima and was in prison the whole time.

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