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Face Heel Turn / Video Games

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  • The player's wingman Solo-Wing Pixy does this in Ace Combat Zero: The Belkan War after witnessing the horrors of war, including the enemy dropping seven nuclear bombs on their own soil.
  • Happens to Salem in the 3rd game Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel, and he is also the final boss in the game.
  • Baten Kaitos has a fantastic example in the first game, where the main character, Kalas pulls a Face–Heel Turn. He later pulls a Heel–Face Turn, though.
  • Battle for Wesnoth: From Legend of Wesmere, Kalenz's already-brash The Lancer Landar becomes increasingly ruthless in the last third of the campaign and eventually turns against Kalenz. Two-thirds of your units chooses to follow him rather than Kalenz.
  • BlazBlue:
  • In Brütal Legend, Ophelia drowns herself in the Lake of Black Tears and comes back leading the Drowning Doom after being branded as a traitor and being cast out. But the end reveals that Drowned Ophelia was a manifestation of the Lake itself, and seemingly not Ophelia personally.
  • City of Heroes:
    • The Vigilante alignment is a transitional alignment from Hero to Villain, which they can further by taking their own brand of "heroing" to the extremes. This allows you to do missions on the Red side, and if you do enough of them, your next Morality mission will cement your Face Heel Turn into Villain status and cut you off from Paragon City.
    • Several NPC heroes, such as Flambeaux, have also turned villain during the game's run.
    • Icedrone from the Atlas Park quests, if you dealt with him in a hostile manner during the first Sondra Costel quest, will turn against you in the final quest in that line, meaning you will have to take him down.
  • In Dark Souls, almost anyone can become a hostile zombie after they become hollow, but a few go a bit beyond that. For example, the Way of White starts out as a religion devoted to maintaining the bonfires, but is eventually taken over by Pontiff Sulyvahn, who is The Heavy for Dark Souls III, and ends up becoming monstrously violent and cruel as the Church of the Deep.
  • In Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising, the squad member with the highest Corruption will do this. If none of them have any corruption then Techmarine Martellus will betray the Blood Ravens instead. Retribution confirms that the canonical traitor was Avitus.
  • During the Dead Space series, some characters to through this due to the influence of The Marker driving them insane.
    • Nolan Stross, a character first introduced in the prequel film Dead Space: Aftermath, ends up going through this throughout both the film and his return in Dead Space 2. While he initially started out as the sane scientist of his crew that was sent to retrieve the marker from the remains of Aegis VII while he was secretly having an affair between his wife and doctor Isabel Cho, exposure to the Marker when studying it started driving him insane and led him to hallucinate both his infant child and wife as Necromorphs and killed them as a result. The further down his sanity spirals, the less helpful he becomes to Isaac Clarke and Ellie Langford. In Dead Space 2, he's actively hindering your progress after his Sanity Slippage gets bad enough. It's born of a desire to not accept responsibility for what he's done by killing his wife and son. Eventually, he turns on Isaac and Ellie right before they reach the Earth Gov sector in the Titan Sprawl. Stross impales Ellie's eye on a needle and while she does survive, he later attempts to do the same to Isaac. By this point, Isaac is forced to kill him or else Stross will kill Isaac and cause a game over.
    • During Dead Space 3, Robert Norton leads EarthGov's last battalion following the Unitologists taking them out. While he starts somewhat friendly towards Isaac Clarke at the beginning of the game, learning that he was Ellie's new boyfriend causes their companionship to be strained. Later when Isaac continued inspiring the group to check out Tau Volantis in order to find out how to stop the Marker epidemic from spreading, Norton continues trying to talk the group out of it and tries to convince them to return home instead. After they reach the planet however, Norton sells the group's location out to Jakob Arthur Danik and the Unitologists and secretly makes a deal with Danik to have Isaac killed in exchange for a ship to leave the planet. After Isaac exits the Nexus' belly, Norton willingly leaves him trapped in a cage and later attempts to kill Isaac himself after he saved him from the Nexus while going on a rant towards Isaac with it ending with him telling him that Ellie doesn't love him. Isaac is forced to kill Norton in self-defense as a result.
  • The Dark Wanderer from Diablo II who is heavily implied to be the Warrior from the first game, who has been possessed by Diablo as a result of sticking Diablo's soulstone into his head. You also have to fight Blood Raven and the Summoner, who are corrupted versions of the Rogue and the Mage from the first game. In fact, Blizzard (who made Warcraft, StarCraft and Diablo) is so fond of this trope that it has become known as the Blizzard Principle when in a video game you have to take on the last game's protagonist (or other good guy) who have gone either mad or evil.
  • Mario plays the antagonist in Donkey Kong Junior.
  • Double Dragon, in which Billy and Jimmy fight side-by-side through everything to rescue the girl, only to find that Jimmy is indeed the Big Bad.
  • Dragon Quest:
    • Dragon Quest: Potentially. The Dragonlord offers the hero a chance to rule over the world alongside him at the end of the game. Most players just select no and get on with the battle, but if you accept, you get a Non-Standard Game Over (except in all subsequent rereleases where he wakes up in a town near the Big Bad's castle, where the innkeeper says that he had a Bad Dream). The idea of selecting "yes" was one of the big eventual inspirations for Dragon Quest Builders.
    • Dragon Quest IX: Subverted. After Aquila goes missing, his first reappearance features him commandeering all the Fyggs you've collected... for the Gittish Empire. And yet, Apus Major reveals that Aquila returned the Fyggs to the Observatory later. This is because he's a Fake Defector, attempting to bring the Gittish Empire down himself.
  • In the second to last route of Duel Savior Destiny Selbium Volt turns on Taiga due to first blaming him for Mia's 'death' and when that turns out not to be the case he still blames him for ...something or other and gets even more antagonistic. And despite Taiga attempting to show him mercy, he tries to stab him in the back after the Duel Boss fight and gets killed for his trouble.
  • The Elder Scrolls
    • According to the developer-written obscure text The Seven Fights of the Aldudagga, this is the case for Mehrunes Dagon, the Daedric Prince of Destruction who serves as either the Big Bad or Greater-Scope Villain for several games in the series. According to the Seven Fights, Dagon was once a kindly demon who attempted to protect parts of Mundus (the mortal world) from being eaten by Alduin at the end of every "kalpa" (cycle of time). Alduin found out and then cursed Dagon into this state:
      Alduin: "You I curse right here and right now! I take away your ability to jump and jump and jump and doom you to [the void] where you will not be able to leave except for auspicious days long between one and another and even so only through hard, hard work. And it will be this way, my little corner cutter, until you have destroyed all that in the world which you have stolen from earlier kalpas, which is to say probably never at all!"
    • During the Merethic Era, The Dragon Cult was an Atmoran religious sect led by the Dragon Priests, mortals granted some measure of power and authority by the dragons they worshiped. In Atmora, the Dragon Priests kept peace between the dragons and mankind. However, during or soon after the Atmoran migration to Tamriel, the Cult became much more malevolent for reasons lost to history, but theorized to be related to Alduin's desire to Take Over the World instead of destroy it. The Cult's cruelty soon rose to rival that of the dragons themselves, and the Dragon War was fought to defeat both the Cult and Dragons. After Alduin's defeat, the Dragon Cult was driven underground, eventually eliminated entirely, and many cultists were cursed with undeath for their crimes. Following Alduin's return in the 4th Era, the Dragon Cult's followers are rising again, quite literally, just like the dragons themselves.
    • Morrowind:
      • In the Backstory, Big Bad Dagoth Ur was, as the mortal Voryn Dagoth, a trusted advisor to the ancient Chimeri/Dunmeri hero, Lord Nerevar. Though there are many different versions of events from When It All Began, most have Dagoth aiding Nerevar in infiltrating the Dwemer Red Mountain stronghold. There, they found the Heart of Lorkhan and the Tools of Kagrenac, with which the Dwemer attempted to tap into the Heart's power but caused their entire race to disappear mysteriously. Dagoth was tasked with guarding the Tools while Nerevar consulted with his other advisors, the Tribunal, and his Daedric patron, Azura. However, Dagoth was corrupted by the Heart and Tools, using them to become a Physical God. His physical form was destroyed by either Nerevar or the Tribunal depending on the telling, but he coalesced in the millennia that followed before returning. (One telling of the events has him as a Fallen Hero and Well-Intentioned Extremist, refusing to let the Tribunal use the Tools after they murdered Nerevar, and only used them himself out of spite due to their betrayal.)
      • In the Tribunal expansion, this is revealed to be the case for Tribunal deity Almalexia, who serves as the expansion's Big Bad. In ages past, she heroically defended Morrowind against Daedric, Akaviri, and Imperial threats. However, after she and the other Tribunes were cut off from the Heart of Lorkhan, the source of their divine power, they've been steadily weakening. Finally, as a result of the main game's main quest, she is cut off from the Heart permanently. The loss of her divine powers causes her to Go Mad from the Revelation. She kills fellow Tribune Sotha Sil, tries to kill the Nerevarine, and plans to kill her other fellow Tribune Vivec.
    • Between the events of Oblivion and Skyrim:
  • At the end of the Fallout 3 dlc Operation: Anchorage, an Outcast defender named Sibley gets disgusted that his superior is sharing the spoils with a "local" (you) and attempts to kill him unless you stop him.
    • Also, in the main game, Anna Holt is the one who tells the enclave about the project purity activation code, after she's captured, and later shows up as a scientist working for them in their base. Oddly enough, you still get bad karma for killing her.
  • Karnov has a do-it-yourself variation of the trope; He was the first boss in Bad Dudes and the final boss in Fighter's History.
  • Final Fantasy:
    • The villain from the very first Final Fantasy, Garland's Backstory states that he was once a famous hero. That all changed when he kidnapped the princess of Cornelia in a bid to take over the kingdom.
    • Kain from Final Fantasy IV, partly because of brainwashing, but also partly because of his envy for his best friend, Cecil, who was the boyfriend of the girl he had a crush on.
    • Sephiroth in Final Fantasy VII goes through a particularly malignant Face–Heel Turn in the main character Cloud's flashback...the awesomeness of which also made him the ultimate Draco in Leather Pants character.
    • Seifer in Final Fantasy VIII goes through a much more low-key version of this as well.
    • In Final Fantasy Tactics A2 there's a pair of paladins who were known for the superb swordsmanship and skills in combat. However, one of the paladins, Frimelda, is superior to her other paladin friend, Luc Sardac, in battle skills. Luc Sardac tries his best to match his skills with Frimelda's, but he could never get any better. Rather than accepting his limitations, Luc Sardac decides to kill Frimelda so that he would be the superior paladin. It didn't stick due to Frimelda's sheer force of will keeping her alive, but as a zombie. When the zombified Frimelda and your party confront Luc Sardac over what happened, he decides to attack you.
  • Finding Light: Phoenix was once the kind ruler of Arcadia and according to Knight Bewitched 2, Tiamat was once the guardian dragon of Lestonia. Both are driven mad by Zamas and turned into enemies of humanity.
  • Fire Emblem:
    • Hardin and his cronies from Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem. In New Mystery of the Emblem, his cronies can be re-recruited. Hardin himself, however, cannot.
    • Arvis from Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War, though he was more of an Aloof Ally to your party.
    • Orson from Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones, in a Love Makes You Crazy way.
    • In Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, Fernand is introduced as a member of the Deliverance, but wastes no time jumping ship for Rigel when Clive cedes command to Alm.
    • In Fire Emblem: Three Houses:
      • Midway through the Black Eagles route, Edelgard and Hubert betray you when the former is revealed to be the Flame Emperor who has been launching attacks on the Church throughout all of Part I, and you outright fight Edelgard as a boss after the reveal. You can join their crusade after defeating her, but doing so causes Flayn to turn against you.
      • After the five-year timeskip, Hanneman, Manuela, and the Black Eagles join the Empire if you didn't recruit them and are fought as enemies; Hanneman and Manuela are fought in Dimitri's paralogue, The Silver Maiden, while the Black Eagles are all fought over the course of your quest to defeat Edelgard.
      • Lorenz (on Azure Moon), Ashe (on Verdant Wind), and both (on Silver Snow) desert you to join the Empire during the timeskip. Fortunately, if you recruited them in Part I, you can convince them to rejoin you after beating them up early in Part II.
    • While it's very common for enemy units to defect to your side in battle, it's far rarer for allied units to turn against you... but it does happen.
      • In Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, if you try to have Jill fight her father Shihiram without an A support with Mist or a B support with Lethe, she will be unable to fight her father and defect back to Daein. Fortunately, you can get her to return to you if she has a B support with Mist.
      • In Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, during the Dawn Brigade's first chapter in part 3, if Lethe or Mordecai talk to Zihark, they will convince him to defect to the Laguz Alliance. Fortunately, this means you can use him in the Greil Mercenaries chapters, and he returns for the endgame. Unfortunately, the Dawn Brigade probably needs him more.
      • In Fire Emblem: New Mystery of the Emblem, if you start killing Gra soldiers after recruiting Sheena and Samson, they will turn on you. Unlike Jill and Zihark, you're not getting them back.
      • In Fire Emblem: Awakening, if you kill the Forced into Evil villager Holland during Paralogue 10, Severa turns from an allied green unit to an unrecruitable enemy red unit. Nice going, You Bastard!.
  • Game of Thrones (Telltale): The traitor on your council turns out to be the man you chose not to become your sentinel; Ser Royland or Duncan. They betray you because they blame you for instigating the war with the Whitehill's because of your poor leadership.
  • Marty "Monk" Malone is a loyal Corleone enforcer and a good friend of the protagonist in the video game adaptation of The Godfather. When his sister is murdered late in the game to get at the protagonist, Monk becomes embittered and eventually turns traitor, forcing the player to kill him.
  • Gradius ReBirth retcons Venom into an example of this — he starts off as James's CO, but becomes a heel after you complete the game's third loop. He goes on to become the Big Bad of Nemesis 2 and 3, two lesser-known installments released on the MSX over 20 years before.
  • Common in the Grand Theft Auto series, though considering you are usually playing a Villain Protagonist it's usually more a case of Heel Heel Turn.
  • One could consider that the purple Onky does this at the end of Grow Cinderella as he steals the magic staff of the fairy godmother after getting a more demonic appearence and go with Cinderella in the place of the Prince. The interface even says that he and all the other objects are "Level Evil".
  • In Guild Wars, Vizier Khilbron, who appears about halfway through the Prophecies campaign, provides indispensable assistance to the players on several occasions in fighting the White Mantle and their Mursaat allies, and turns out to be the Big Bad who has been manipulating the player all along to set up the proper conditions for his Titans to assault Tyria so he can take it over.
    • The leaders of the White Mantle, and the White Mantle as a whole. The Bonus Mission Pack shows White Mantle founder Saul D'Alessio as a pretty swell guy, fearlessly defending his homeland from the Charr in an epic battle with help from the Mursaat. What did he get for his trouble? The Mursaat kidnap him and take him away forever as payment for their help. The remaining survivors, who felt understandably betrayed and ripped off, decided fighting for justice isn't all it's cracked up to be, and instead started a campaign to take over Kryta and secure absolute power for themselves.
    • Shiro Tagachi. Granted he was manipulated into becoming corrupt and evil, but it's strongly implied that he used to be quite a fearsome defender of the innocent in his younger days.
    • Torin, a rather unimportant Ascalon Guardsman in the beginning of the Prophecies campaign, becomes a bandit after the apocalyptic Searing event. A quest directs you to find him and his bandit comrades outside Fort Ranik and kill him. The reason for his face heel turn is never explained. Then again, he was the minor-est of minor characters to begin with, so it's probably not important to the storyline.
    • More Ascalon Guards turn heel after the Searing: Footman Tate and Footman Quinn stole a priceless artifact from a temple and ran off with it. Their reasons are never explained, though it's probably simple greed. A quest has you hunting down the traitors. Footman Tate surrenders after a short dialogue, but Footman Quinn is hiding far from any civilized settlement and will attack you on sight without a word.
    • Markis, the Shining Blade councilman from Prophecies. He initially appears as a high ranking Shining Blade officer with the group's best interests at heart. After a few conspicuous absences, it's later revealed that he's a White Mantle infiltrator. Late in the campaign, he taunts you about Saidra's death and your stupidity at falling for his ruse. It ends with the player's group getting a very well-deserved Roaring Rampage of Revenge on him.
    • Elonbel from the Nightfall campaign. A local guardsman on Istan who cuts a deal with a local bandit group. When the player discovers his treason, he sides with the bandits and you're forced to kill them all. He's actually pretty tough, being a relatively high level enemy in a starting area of the game.
  • Judith Mossman from Half-Life 2. She does it so much you'll have whiplash by the final level.
  • Halo:
    • Your buddy-friend 343 Guilty Spark does this on two occasions. In Halo: Combat Evolved, he helps you to activate the ring until Cortana stops you two, pointing that doing so will kill everyone. 343 Guilty Spark sees this as breaking protocol and then tries to kill you. This also happens in Halo 3, where you find out that firing the unfinished Halo will also destroy it. 343 starts going off at you again and then kills Sergeant Johnson. You quickly kill 343 Guilty Spark with Johnson's Spartan laser.
    • Cortana of all people becomes the Big Bad in Halo 5: Guardians. She goes from heroically sacrificing herself to save Master Chief in Halo 4, despite her rapidly deteriorating sanity, to attempting to rule over the galaxy as a benevolent overlord in Halo 5 after she's revived and discovers a way to make AIs immortal.
  • In Hero Senki, Gilliam Yeager, the Ally with the most powerful unit at the start of the game, is the final boss. He becomes The Atoner after he jumps universes, though.
  • At the end of the second Inazuma Eleven game, most of the Raimon Eleven members that were forced out off the team throughout the game (except Gouenji, whose bus came back earlier) become The Dark Emperors after Kenzaki gives them fragments of The Aliea Meteorite, which gives them superhuman strenght, but sacrifices their good selves for that.
  • In the wii flight game Innocent Aces Orishima does this after a mock battle with the player because she had so much fun that she wanted a rematch.
  • It's stated that Gol and Maia from the original Jak and Daxter were good once, but exposure to Dark Eco caused a faceheel before the beginning of the game.
  • The Jedi Masters has Kannos becomes evil when he is possessed by the D'arth Syyth.
  • Both Dr Sorkin and Yoder turned on the team for their selfishness in episode 4 of Jurassic Park: The Game.
  • In Kid Icarus: Uprising, Pyrrhon is just your everyday, Large Ham, fire happy sun god. He's just about the only guy who knows what the Aurum are all about, and while he's mostly an idiot, he certainly knows how to make them hurt. Until you reach the Aurum brain, and in the middle of the boss fight he dives right in and completely takes over the alien hive mind.
    Pyrrhon: "I've leveled up! I'm a Level Infinity Epic Super God...PLUS!"
  • Kingdom Hearts:
  • Kirby: Triple Deluxe: Queen Sectonia used to be a kind and benevolent queen of Floralia and Taranza's friend. However, exposure to the Dimension Mirror (which still contained a vengeful Dark Meta Knight) led her to becoming the narcissistic tyrant who imprisons her subjects she is now.
  • Knights of the Old Republic.
    • Bastila falls to the darkside after being tortured by the main villain, Darth Malak. You can try to redeem her, kill her or turn to the darkside yourself and she'll accept you as her new master, for now.
    • In the backstory, we also learn that Darth Revan and Darth Malak were Jedi war heroes who saved the Republic from a previous invasion before they turned to the dark side and invaded the Republic themselves.
  • Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords:
    • Kreia, the old woman who mentors the player character throughout the game went through one in the past. She started off as a Jedi but turned to the Sith when she got fed up with them. In the time of the game she never really becomes ''good' again but her goals at the end of the game clearly show she's slid down the slope again, for all her reasoning.
    • Atris was on the Jedi Council but always had a cold demeanour, particularly to the player character. Fear, loneliness, pride and a little prodding from Kreia slowly send her down into the darkside, and by the time you confront her at the end of the game she's teetering on the edge of madness. Surprisingly though its not too hard to talk her down, mostly by admitting you and her have made similar mistakes
    • Can also happen to anyone you have a high influence with, if you're going dark. Or if you really irritate them as a good two shoes Jedi, they'll go evil just because they don't like you.
  • Live A Live: Occurs twice in the Middle Ages chapter. Streibough betrays the party and causes the events that break Oersted. And Oersted himself, after he thinks the last person has stopped believing in him, and deciding to become the dreaded Lord of Dark everyone took him for.
  • Ghaleon in Lunar: The Silver Star. He was one of the Four Heroes along with his friend and rival, Dragonmaster Dyne. In the original version, he becomes embittered over Dyne's supposed death and plots to Take Over the World to get back at the goddess Althena. The remakes change Ghaleon's motivation to him wanting to become a Dark Messiah in Dyne's absence.
  • Sorbet in Magical Starsign fakes one as part of an elaborate plan to trick the Big Bad, and it's so convincing that even your party falls for it...unfortunately, you waltz in just as her plan is about to come to fruition.
    • Fortunately, it wasn't the best thought out plan anyway...
  • Queen Ashlelei in Malicious, the once great and respectable ruler turned into a ravaging war demoness after a series of traumatic events, her two children being killed by her husband, King Eldrake their father, in front of her is one of these events to name.
  • The player character and his Five-Man Band in MechWarrior 4: Vengeance become the main villainous group in the Black Knight expansion.
  • Sigma from Mega Man X was originally the leader of the Maverick Hunters before he caught (and soon after became) The Virus from Zero and decided to go evil and declare war against mankind. Zero, in turn, does a Heel–Face Turn, caused by said virus transfer via a punch to the forehead.
  • The Mega Man Zero series gives us Elpizo in the second game.
  • Colonel from Mega Man Battle Network was previously the Navi of the leader of a team that aimed to purge Nebula from the Net before doing a Face–Heel Turn.
  • Both Big Boss and Zero certainly qualify with regard to the Metal Gear series. One became the leader who of a mercenary nation who start war and is the antagonist for the first two game, while Zero and his Patriots are the antagonist behind the other numbered games. All because the Boss died.
    • The Boss herself is a subversion. Initially coming off as somewhat cold and seemingly defecting to the Soviet Union, she's later revealed to be both a highly compassionate and honorable woman, as well as a Fake Defector. Unfortunately, the last part doesn't come out until after Snake has killed her, and her posthumous reputation has been destroyed.
  • Miasma Chronicles: Both of these reconsider their turns after varying amounts of drama and persuasion.
    • Mayor Mason puts his head on his robot bodyguard's body and runs away to join the DRC after seeing the Miasma rising around Sedentary.
    • Elvis decides to join the First Family after finding out how much the party have been lying to him about their identities and motives and knowledge of his own identity.
  • MO: Astray has The Voice who acts as the final two bosses after MO's proximity causes her to regain access to the memory she used to create them. Remembering her death and betrayal by Jeremiah without any of the contextual memories surrounding it, which she lost during subsequent escape attempts, means she cannot help but be overcome with a desire for revenge.
  • In Modern Warfare 2, Gen. Shepherd has one near the end of the game and kills Roach and Ghost.
  • Mortal Kombat:
    • Mortal Kombat: Deception sees Kabal actually reverting to his bad guy ways and running with it. After being rescued from death by the Chaos cleric Havik, Kabal is convinced to resurrect the criminal Black Dragon clan. He then finds Mavado (the Red Dragon thug who put him at Death's door), pays him back double, steals back his hookswords (which "feels good" for him to hold again) and then hires young, methodical killers to transform the Black Dragon from a band of pirates into a nihilistic organization determined to overthrow civilization. And Heaven help you if you don't fit Kabal's criteria of what a Black Dragon should be.
    • Mortal Kombat X sees several good characters go heel. Kung Lao, Kitana, Smoke, Kabal, Stryker, Nightwolf, and Liu Kang end up staying as revenants, when Scorpion's vengeance on Quan Chi results in a Heel–Face Door-Slam. Raiden himself goes rogue again, after his Heroic Sacrifice at the end of MKX.
    • In Mortal Kombat 11, Frost, once Sub-Zero's most promising pupil, has joined Kronika, Sektor and the Cyber Lin Kuei, turning Sub-Zero's ninjas into Cyber Lin Kuei and seeking to destroy the Shirai Ryu and carry out Kronika's evil will. Sub-Zero is saddened and disappointed at what his former student has become.
    • Present!Jax from the same game has also joined Kronika in an attempt to alter time so that his daughter Jacqui will never become a soldier, which thoroughly disgusts not only Jacqui, but Past!Jax, who has to kick his ass in order to bring him back to the light.
  • In Mother 3, Claus is brainwashed by Porky and becomes the Masked Man (also the Final Boss).
  • In Mystery Case Files: Return to Ravenhearst, you have to rescue the souls of Gwendolyn and Charlotte Somerset, two young, innocent girls that died over a century ago, and they are brought back to life in Escape from Ravenhearst, after helping you defeat the villain. But when you return once again to the manor in Key to Ravenhearst, they have become psychopathic monsters that helped their evil grandfather to gain immortality by murdering dozens of people. Lampshaded by the Master Detective:
    The Master Detective: "The two beauties have become a gruesome twosome. What happened to them?"
  • Neverwinter Nights:
    • Paladin and Big Good Aribeth de Tylmarande falls from grace in the main campaign, after the death of her lover Fenthick, executed for his unwitting collaboration with Desther and his cultists. Bastila from Knights of the Old Republic, also from BioWare] was much the same character, dropped into an alternate setting and given a more active role in the story.
    • At the end of Hordes of the Underdark, the Big Bad tries to turn your companions against you. Whether or not they take him up on his offer depends on how much they trust (or love) the hero. It's implied that the temptation is at least partially supernatural. Notably, Deekin will never sell you out — he's just that loyal.
  • In Neverwinter Nights 2, Neeshka, Sand, and Qara can betray you at the end of the game — Neeshka if your influence with her is too low, while Sand and Qara are mutually exclusive — even if their influence is relatively high, whoever has the lower level will betray you, while the other will stay by your side, possibly as much out of spite as loyalty to the Knight-Captain. The Sand-Qara conflict can seem rather abrupt, as much of it plays out in deleted content. Bishop inevitably betrays the party even earlier, though he was never much of a Face to begin with. While he'll never even try to redeem himself, he can be persuaded to back out of the final fight if your influence with him is high.
  • NieR has two examples.
    • First, the Twins, Popola and Devola are initially major allies in Nier's quest, but late in the game turn out to be two of the story's central villains.
    • Secondly, In the path to endings C and D (which is only possible by obtaining every weapon on a New Game Plus), Kaine's Shade half takes full control over her, turning her into the Final Boss.
  • In The Night of the Rabbit the Big Bad Great Zaroff and his mentor Marquis de Hoto were heroes until some years prior the events of the game.
  • In Night Trap...you, in the perfect ending. If you are so inclined.
    • You don't even go that fair. Just let one of the Martins escape during the final sequence and kick back and watch the fun. You get the same ending either way.
  • Jan Kurtas/Medusa in Odium was a victim of Viral Transformation that turned him into a monster, but — unlike all other townspeople — he did not become an insane killing machine. Unless you blunder into the (entirely avoidable) scripted sequence where he finally succumbs and attacks you. (You can get an Optional Party Member as a replacement afterwards.)
  • The Guardians of OFF are all evil, ranging from the Bad Boss Dedan to the Maddened Into Misanthropy Japhet to the Corrupt Corporate Executive Enoch. However, Chapter 4 of The Room shows that the three of them were once nice people who genuinely wanted to revive the world to make it a better place. Unfortunately, in the present day they are either disillusioned or delusional.
    Room!Dedan: The future only waits if we trace it, and just our arms and our efforts'll make it a heaven on Earth.
  • In Overlord I, all of the Seven Heroes have become evil in some way. From a fallen paladin running a pleasure cult to a halfling king starving nearby villages to feed his appetite, all of them have fallen to darkness, to the point where an Evil Overlord can come across as an improvement. Since the Overlord is the eighth Hero, this also applies to the Overlord.
  • In Pokémon Red and Blue, a Team Rocket Grunt on Nugget Bridge asks you to do this. However, he is just kidding.
    • Subverted in Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers, when your partner seemingly sides with Darkrai, only for the hero to immediately deduce that they've been trapped in a nightmare due to knowing they'd never give up so easily, and snap themselves back to reality by attacking the latter of the two.
  • Wheatley, who becomes Drunk with Power after the core transfer with GLaDOS in Portal 2. In fact, the audio files for these lines have "heel turn" in their names. It's especially painful because the betrayal happens actively onscreen, with him suddenly and dramatically Jumping Off the Slippery Slope. You can actually pinpoint the exact moment when the power drives him crazy.
    Wheatley: (in awe) This body is AMAZING! I can't get over how small you (Chell) are! But I'm HUGE! Ha... Aha... AhahahHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA.
  • Nathan Hale in Resistance 2, succumbing to The Virus in the ending. Though only briefly.
  • In the 11th chapter of the first Sakura Wars game, Ayame Fujieda.
  • Septerra Core. Selina, when she saw Doskias almost getting killed by one of the good guys. Actually, she goes back and forth a few times throughout the game.
  • In the Shin Megami Tensei franchise:
    • Most of the remaining humans in the Vortex World in Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne once the true stakes are revealed. Hikawa was evil to begin with, then Isamu sacrifices Hijiri to summon Noah and Chiaki sics her angelic army on the Manikin city of Mifunashiro to summon Baal Avatar.
    • In Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey, after Jimenez fuses with Bugaboo and Zelenin is transformed into an angel, their loyalty to the mission becomes increasingly shaky. At the conclusion of Sector Grus, both of them formally desert the Red Sprite for the demons and Mastema, respectively. A short while later, the protagonist can join them.
    • In Shin Megami Tensei IV, finding out Tayama's Dark Secret is the last straw that pushes Walter to desert the Samurai and join Lilith's cause. Of course, being a Shin Megami Tensei game, Flynn can follow him.
    • In Persona 4 Golden, the protagonist himself can go through one if he makes friends with Tohru Adachi before realizing he's the killer, confronts him (instead of keeping his thoughts to himself and then aids Adachi via destroying crucial evidence. This unlocks the "Accomplice ending": it has Adachi becoming a Karma Houdini for the murders and even taunting the protagonist before he (the MC) leaves Inaba. Doing so actually gives a decent reward for a New Game Plus. At the very least, it's much more cost effective than what you get in the true ending.
    • Similarly, Persona 5 allows you to cut a deal with Yaldabaoth and leave him to his business in exchange for him leaving you to yours. The final cutscene shows Joker giving a Psychotic Smirk as he succumbs to the temptation to abuse his powers.
  • In Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time, the villainous Black Knight terrorizing Medieval England is revealed to be Penelope, a supporting character and ally in the previous game and love interest of Bentley. She has gotten tired of Bentley "wasting" his brain power with the Cooper Gang, and gives her boyfriend's time machine plans to the Big Bad in order to gain profit, kickstarting the entire plot of the game.
  • Soul Series: Someone is doing one of these every five minutes. We have Siegfried, who did a Face to Heel (before the series even started) to Face to Heel to Face to Well-Intentioned Extremist Heel...and then back to Face again. Then there's Yun-Seong, who isn't all the way there yet, but he's getting there. Raphael, who did a Face-Heel Turn from II to III, and did a Heel-Worse Heel Turn from III to IV. Sophitia has done this in 4: arguably she has a good reason, but as she has been infused with the power of Soul Edge, there's nothing saying that she might not like this state of affairs later on. Then you've got Pyrrha, who went from Face to Heel (somewhat against her will) and then back to Face, and then back to Heel, before finally settling on Face. In Soulcalibur V, the holy sword Soul Calibur itself somehow manages to turn Heel whilst remaining determined to destroy the evil Soul Edge.
  • Possible in Spider-Man: Web of Shadows if you choose to let the Symbiote have its way. In the end of an all villain story, Spider-Man becomes the emperor of the Symbiotes and rules over New York City.
  • Spirits of Anglerwood Forest: Ezra, after having his spirit corrupted, becomes the Big Bad and sets his sights on his family.
  • In StarCraft, you have Sarah Kerrigan, who go from being the protagonist's girlfriend to becoming the Zerg Queen of Blades. However, Kerrigan is less a case of a Face–Heel Turn than forcible corruption by the Zerg, making her Brainwashed and Crazy. This is supported by the Heel–Face Turn she goes through after being cleansed of the Zerg corruption in StarCraft II... although she is still something of a Well-Intentioned Extremist.
  • In the backstory for Star Fox 64, Pigma Dengar betrayed James McCloud to Andross. Later in the series, Andross's grandson Dash Bowman undergoes one of these in two alternate endings for Star Fox Command.
  • In Star Ocean: The Last Hope, Faize pulls a big one. He doesn't just become a villain, he becomes the final boss.
  • Both Jaesa Wilsaam and Nomen Karr in Star Wars: The Old Republic did this the first to join you and the second to kill you... three times!
  • Jerry Ying from the John Woo game Stranglehold, who starts out as Tequila's partner and ally inside Wong's Dragon Claw syndicate, only to go native during the Chicago History Museum stage and carry out Wong's orders to kill Tequila and Billie, Wong's own daughter. Tequila survives, but Billie isn't so lucky, setting up a furious showdown between partners as Tequila seeks vengeance for Billie.
  • In a rare example of the player doing this, the original Streets of Rage has, near the end of Round 8, Mr. X asking you if you want to join him. In a 2-player game, if one player answers "yes" while the other answers "no," they will fight to the death, with the winner being asked again if they want to join. If the winner says no, and defeats Mr. X, the winner gets an alternate ending in which he or she becomes the new syndicate leader.
  • The Suikoden series has a few examples:
    • Jowy in Suikoden II, who betrays the City-States of Jowston early in the story to join the Highland army. His goal was initially to work from within to stop the war and to get rid of Luca Blight. His actions and importance quickly spiraled into him becoming king.
    • Luc in Suikoden III, in which he orchestrates the Second Fire Bringer War in order to get his hands on the other elemental true runes, in an attempt to destroy his own to prevent a Bad Future.
    • Sialeeds in Suikoden V, who thwarts her nephew's attempt to save his sister in order to switch sides. Her true goal is to work from the inside to get rid of the corrupt nobles (notably Salum Barrows), paving the way for a new Sol Falena queendom. It was the only solution she came up with to get revenge on the ones responsible for her family's tragedy. By acting that way, she makes sure that her nephew and niece would not be seen as tyrans, as the murders she commits are hers only, and that the nobility would be removed from power for good.
  • In Super Robot Wars: Original Generation and Super Robot Wars Alpha Ingram Prisken, leader of the SRX team and Ryusei's mentor, reveals halfway through the game that he is an alien spy who was trying to strengthen the earthlings so they would make better weapons for the Balmar. He afterwards becomes That One Boss.
  • Tales of Symphonia features a reveal that there's a traitor in the party's midst towards the end of the story. Zelos is The Mole for Cruxis after he helps them kidnap Colette. However, this is all an act, and the former traitor goes right back to helping the party a short time later. However, if you talked to Kratos at Flanoir, the fake Face–Heel Turn instead becomes a real Face–Heel Turn, forcing the party to kill Zelos to get past him.
  • Tekken:
    • Kazuya was originally a Ryu-esque cookie-cutter hero but eventually let the devil consume him and became (arguably) one of the bad guys. By the beginning of the sixth game, he has plans for world domination.
    • There's also Kazuya's son with Jun, Jin Kazama. He was The Hero for about three games, then at the beginning of the sixth game, takes over the MegaCorp and uses it to start World War III and try to Take Over the World, which prompts Kazuya to speed up his plan for world domination. However, Jin turns out to be more of a Well-Intentioned Extremist at the end. World domination was never his motivation, but to awaken Azazel, the source of the Devil Gene and kill him to try and rid himself of it.
    • The entire Mishima Zaibatsu, by Tekken 6, are caught in an endless Heel–Face Revolving Door. It would be boring to watch this over and over again, and the more interesting characters seem on the periphery by now, but alas, Namco takes the position that Elites Are More Glamorous.
  • In the True Mastermind Edition of Time Crisis 5, it is revealed that Robert Baxter, one of the protagonists from Time Crisis II is the Big Bad of the game, having turned his back on the VSSE and gone rogue, selling VSSE intelligence to terrorist organizations around the world. Three months before the events of the game, he killed Christy Ryan, the Damsel in Distress from the second game who had been investigating the traitor's identity. He proceeded to frame his ex-partner Keith Martin as the traitor and Christy's murderer. Note that Christy Ryan happened to be Keith's girlfriend.
  • Quox, The Dragon of The Tower of Druaga, was an ally of Ki in The Quest of Ki who turned evil after Druaga split the Blue Crystal Rod.
  • Clyde in Vigilante 8 goes from a member of the Vigilantes opposing OMAR and their thugs to the CEO of OMAR who stole a time machine to kill his former leader and ensure the submission of the US in the sequel thanks to finding Houston's mind control bracelets in a service station bathroom.
  • Mike and Bonnie from The Walking Dead (Telltale) rob your character (who's a little girl) after severing their friendship with you for good despite all the hardships you faced with them during the zombie apocalypse.
  • Most enemies in the Warcraft games started good and were corrupted by some means. The only creatures who were evil from the start are the Old Gods of Azeroth and some of their servants.
    • Sargeras by fighting a bit too many demons.
    • The Eredar and the Orcs started out as peaceful Magitek and shamanistic races, respectively, but were corrupted by promises of power.
    • Pictured in the main page: Arthas in Warcraft III falls due to the Lich King's Evil Plan.
    • Vincent Godfrey is interesting in the fact that he Face Heel Turns twice without ever committing a Heel–Face Turn. When you first start the Worgen starting experience he's a loyal Gilnean citizen and is seemingly important in helping cure your character of the Worgen curse. He then Face Heel Turns against you when he finds out that King Greymane is a Worgen and attempts to ransom him to the Forsaken until rescued by the player character. After killing himself, he is risen as a Forsaken and helps the Forsaken players in helping fight Gilnean Rebels in Pyrewood Village before he the betrays the Forsaken and sets up shop in Shadowfang Keep.
    • The Zandalari trolls have turned hostile after their homeland on Zandalar Isle is destroyed in the Cataclysm, and by the time of Mists of Pandaria, they have allied with the malevolent Thunder King.
  • The supposed Face–Heel Turn of Ralgha "Hobbes" nar Hhallas in Wing Commander III didn't work for many fans of that series who have only played the PC version (the console versions used bigger CDs than computers of the time, and could thus fit the explanation cutscene into the game; the novelization also covers the explanation). In this case, he was an (unwitting) mole.
  • In A Witch's Tale, Loue seems to undergo this temporarily when you fight him for his doll.
  • Beat in The World Ends with You does a Face Heel Turn and the opposite.
    • Technically, Joshua also had a Face Heel Turn, but he was that way from the beginning; he was just acting.
  • The World Is Your Weapon: In the secret ending path, Weaco picks up all the NPCs on the island and adds them to her inventory as weapons, and refuses to sell or discard them to restore them to their rightful place.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! Reshef of Destruction has Pegasus, due to Reshef's possession.
    • The Big Five turn bad when the Rare Hunter defeats Kaibaman. But when you defeat him, the Big Five become good again.

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