Not So Stoic / Video Games

Not So Stoic characters in Video Games.

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• ALTER EGO (2018): Es seems stoic on the surface, but begins to express more and more emotions as you advance in the story and get each of the three endings. She begins to express rage and violence in the "impulse" ending, depression in the "conformity" ending, and is truly happy in the "Alter Ego" ending.
• Jon Irenicus in Baldur's Gate II remains stoic for most of the plot, at most displaying a kind of icy annoyance... Until a scene right before the end when he finally cracks.
  Jon Irenicus: Once my lust for power was everything but now I hunger ONLY for revenge! AND I. SHALL. HAVE IT!
• In Bendy and the Ink Machine, Henry's normally calm voice becomes distraught when discovering that Boris got Reforged into a Minion.
• BlazBlue:
  • Jin Kisaragi is mostly a stoic asshole. However... if he ever comes across Noel Vermillion, his stoicism kinda fades and he becomes a screaming lunatic hell-bent to kill Noel. And if he meets Ragna The Bloodedge, the stoicism transforms into something... uh... more questionable.
  • Likewise with Nu-13, a Robot Girl who speaks in a mechanical monotone...except when she's squaring off against Ragna. Then she goes full Yandere.
• Dance Central: Oblio tends to show little emotion, keeping his face in a neutral expression and voice an even monotone, so it's a surprise when, upon meeting him in Dance Central (2019), he's so upset that he's actually raised his voice and throws his phone to the ground.
• The Bounty Hunter in Darkest Dungeon is usually either silent or offers little more than a short sentence. If he becomes afflicted and gets fearful, however, he gives in to panic and starts begging to leave.
• Notable with the Chosen Undead in Dark Souls. Their personality is up to the player, but one of the few times an NPC reacts to them is with the Fair Lady, who's mistaking them for her sister whom you just murdered. Her dialogue implies that the Chosen Undead is crying.
• JC Denton from Deus Ex isn't completely emotionless, but certainly very stoic. There are a few times his voice breaks, however, such as when he meets his brother Paul after the latter had defected from UNATCO and who was dying. Unfortunately, his most emotional outburst is a very narmy cry of "A BOMB!" when Jock discovers a bomb on his helicopter.
• Devil May Cry: Vergil has several moments when his stoic persona is broken:
  • Vergil is pretty cold for most of the time in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, but has a brief Villainous Breakdown when his attempt to fully open Temen-ni-gru doesn't work (Arkham deliberately left out a few steps). Then he gets pissy: "Why isn't this working?!", indeed. He cracks a few more times later on, especially as Dante starts beating him in the final boss fight. Vergil's fighting style starts off as calm and collected as ever. By the halfway point, as he uses his souped-up Devil Trigger, he starts spamming Helm Breakers, roaring with rage as he struggles to kill Dante.
  • Devil May Cry 5 has quite a few moments where Vergil lets down his stoic facade.
    • After Vergil returns following V and Urizen's Split-Personality Merge, he turns to Nero and gives him a "thank you" in a tone that's almost appreciative.
    • The ending to Mission 19 has him briefly reminiscing about the one-night stand he had in Fortuna during the events of Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition.
    • His appearances in Nico's van post-game paint him as something of a socially awkward person, especially around Nero. His EX Provocation taunt in 5:SE cements this further, which features his doppelganger dancing a jig in circles around him to the tune of "Dies Irae", much to his embarrassment.
• In Disgaea 4, Fenrich usually serves as the calculating, Tall, Dark, and Snarky Chessmaster who's usually one step ahead of his enemies and even his own allies. However, slighting his master Valvatorez proves to be an effective Berserk Button, and when Judge Nemo reveals that he's taken steps to blow up the moon, both a source of power for werewolves and a symbol for the oath Fenrich swore to Valvatorez, Fenrich loses any semblance of composure and spends the entire chapter in a frothing rage.
• Morrigan of Dragon Age: Origins is one of the calmest and most collected individuals you will ever meet, except for a few scenes during her romance arc.
  • Sten: calm, stoic, sarcastic...then complete his personal mission, and you get to see him crack a smile.
• Dragon Age II:
  • The Arishok. In most of his appearances, he is The Stoic, but it's pretty obvious that being stuck in Kirkwall is getting on his nerves. In the aftermath of "Blackpowder Courtesy" when confronted by Hawke about why he doesn't just leave the city, he reveals, with barely contained fury, that it's because someone stole a Qunari relic and was last seen in Kirkwall. He calms down after this rant, but as Varric notes, he's like an ox waiting to charge. And at the end of Act II, he does.
    Arishok: Let them rot. Filth stole from us. Not now, not the saar qamek. Years ago. A simple act of greed has bound me. We are all denied Par Vollen until I alone recover what was lost under my command! That is why this elf and her shadows are unimportant. That is why I don't simply walk away from this pustule of a city! Fixing your mess is not the demand of the Qun! AND YOU SHOULD ALL BE GRATEFUL!
  • Fenris, whose stoicism is usually accompanied by a tranquil fury, will absolutely lose it if he is touched or if a romanced Hawke falls in battle.
• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind: The Big Bad Dagoth Ur is an immortal god in the seat of his own power, so he's quite affable about chatting with the PC and reminding them that they literally cannot kill him. Then the PC starts to do the one thing he couldn't imagine: destroy the magic that sustains his divinity rather than try to become a god themself.
  Dagoth Ur: What are you doing? WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!
• In Fallout 4, Preston Garvey is a strict but kind soldier type who almost never raises his voice. This changes only once, notably, in the Nuka-World DLC, where he furiously shouts at you if you side with one of the raider gangs and enslave one of the Minutemen's settlements.
  • X6-88 likes to advertise himself as a merciless Courser, unflinching and ruthless in his mission to hunt down rogue synths and bringing them back to The Institute, but if you get him in a vertibird or on top of a tall building, his fear of heights kicks in — his voice gets small, he starts cursing, and he emphatically makes it clear that he does not appreciate the current setting.
• Final Fantasy
  • In Final Fantasy VIII, Squall Leonhart starts out as The Stoic, but his stoicism breaks down spectacularly as his coping mechanisms prove increasingly inadequate, starting with the short meltdown he has over the way people talk about Seifer after his supposed death. When Rinoa ends up in a coma, he breaks down completely.
  • Final Fantasy X: Auron, after Kinoc's death, gets very pissed about it, and Lulu's deadpan demeanour cracks badly upon learning the teachings of Yevon were lies.
    • Auron also loses it when he sees a memory preserved by the pyre-flies of the moment he failed to prevent Braska and Jecht from going through with the Final Summoning. He furiously attacks the image of his past self, enraged at his helplessness.
    • More light-heartedly, Auron chuckles and joins the others in playfully ribbing Yuna over her apparent bed-hair, as she is frantically apologizing for oversleeping at the Djose Temple. Much to her surprise.
  • Balthier in Final Fantasy XII is full of snark and wit, even when he has a sword pointed directly at his neck. Nothing ever makes the man flinch and he always keeps his cool. The moment someone brings up nethicite or the laboratory within the empire's home city, Balthier drops the act and becomes more upfront and direct, which surprised everyone when he started to act as such towards Larsa after the kid mentioned the subject. At the Phon Coast, he becomes very open with Ashe and tells her how his father became extremely obsessed with nethicite to the point that it was all the scientist cared about. Balthier quit his job as a Judge and became a sky pirate to run away from his past. He tells Ashe, who was becoming obsessed with using nethicite to fight The Empire, to not follow the same path as his father did. When Balthier does meet his father again, he becomes very serious.
  • The player character in Final Fantasy XIV is pure stoic and pure badass. He/she doesn't express much emotion beyond a simple head nod (which other characters lampshade repeatedly) and they never say anything except for what is chosen by the player in a dialogue prompt. However, the Heavensward 3.0 expansion has the player character slowly showing off more emotions like sadness and anger and is a lot more blunt in their response choices, showing that they may not be as stoic as everyone thought at first.
  • Final Fantasy XVI: Barnabas Tharmr spends most of his screentime calm and collected, giving others the impression that he is unshakeable both mentally and physically. However, when Barnabas is given a beatdown by Clive Rosfield during the first part of their last confrontation, his cool sheds itself to reveal a battle-hungry Blood Knight who had long thought that he would never find a worthy opponent, now eager to pull out all the stops when fighting Clive while Laughing Mad the entire time.
• Gears of War 2 has several moments where Marcus Fenix shows some form of emotion other than seething, barely-contained fury. In particular, when Dom has to euthanize Maria, he looks like he's going to break down into tears — for just a moment.
  • Also exhibited when Ben Carmine dies, as it seemed that he was developing a certain amount of respect and attachment to the rookie.
  • In the third game, he becomes quite frantic when Dom sacrifices himself to save the rest of the squad, before going into a Heroic Safe Mode that lasts until the Stranded leader Griffin refuses to let up on trash-talking the COG, resulting in Marcus totally flipping his shit:
    Marcus: I JUST LOST MY FUCKING BROTHER! YOU HEAR THAT?! MY BROTHER!!! YOU, YOUR TOWER, AND ALL THIS FUCKING IMULSION CAN GO TO HELL!!!"
• Kratos in God of War (PS4). When Atreus falls deathly ill, he rushes to Freya and all but begs her to help heal him, and when he puts on the Blades of Chaos to traverse Helheim to get an ingredient she needs to cure him, he's visibly uneasy with the reminder of his past. Also seen in the sequel, God of War Ragnarök. After he sees a mural left by the giants showing him being worshipped as a God of Peace, he comes close to breaking down in tears.
  Kratos: Freya! Open the door! We need your help! Woman, do you hear me? It is urgent!
• The G-Man in Half-Life 2: Episode One. He's been completely in control of everything so far, but the Vortiguants preventing him from taking Gordon causes him to become very angry. Even so, the only emotion he displays is slightly annoyed, "We'll see about that."
• Halo:
  • The Master Chief is unflappable. Though in the original trilogy, certain things weigh on him (such as Keyes and Johnson's deaths), he generally remains stoic and gets the job done. Come Halo 4, and he stays in denial over the severity of Cortana's rampancy, assuming that it can be fixed, and when she sacrifices herself to get himself off the Didact's ship as he blows it up, he's audibly upset and can't even look her in the eyes. He even sheds a tear afterwards, as seen on his visor. Halo 5: Guardians has him sounding legitimately pissed when he hears Cortana's plans for galaxy domination. He also sounds heartbroken begging her not to do it.
  • Similarly, the Prophet of Truth. In Halo 2 he never showed any form of emotion, even with the facts of Halo 04's destruction and the discovery of Halo 05, but in Halo 3 it's revealed that his stoic personality was just a facade to hide his psychopathic, sadistic personality and extremely high temper.
• Hitman: Blood Money:
  • Agent 47. Diana's apparent betrayal causes him to become visibly angry, and even prompts his first, and so far only, outburst of verbal aggression.
    Agent 47: Bitch!
  • Also in the supplemental material, the young 47, normally just as cold as his adult self, starts crying when a runaway lab rabbit, he adopted as a pet, died and was buried, much to Dr. Ort-Meyer's surprise.
• The titular protagonist of Ib is a Heroic Mime Stoic despite only being nine years old in a horrifying surreal maze of living art. She manages to hold it together pretty well, but there are two occasions where it slips a little; first, when she sees a portrait of her parents, the implications and stress of what has already happened drive her to faint and have nightmares. The second time is if Garry fails the Doll Room event, and is driven insane. Depending on circumstances, it'll either be a heart-warming hug when Ib manages to snap him back to reality, or she'll rocket past the Despair Event Horizon fast enough that her will to live shatters like glass when she realises he's past saving.
• Kingdom Hearts:
  • Saïx is very stoic and unemotional for the most part, not bothering to pretend to have emotions like other Nobodies. When he's fought, however, he becomes boisterous and angry ("BE GONE!" "MOVE ASIDE!" "ALL SHALL BE LOST TO YOU!").
  • Kingdom Hearts II also possesses a unique example of this trope regarding Tron, a program. After the defeat of the Master Control Program, Tron is suddenly all playful and full of emotion. KH3D confirms that programs are not so different from Nobodies, in that they don't possess hearts either, but since the same game confirms that Nobodies can grow hearts over time. Add to this the fact that a computer program of a different origin gained a heart in the previous game, coded, it's quite easy to say that anything can grow a heart if it has friends, so Tron likely gained a heart through his friendship with Sora.
  • Yen Sid, the usually composed Big Good of the series, freaks the hell out late in Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], when he realizes Xehanort is executing a plan set up all the way back in the first game.
• Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords has the Handmaiden, who is calm almost to the point of being icy until you approach her about the possibility of training her as a Jedi.
• Mass Effect:
  • In the first game, Wrex is cynical and almost devoid of emotion the entire playthrough until he nearly suffers his Heroic BSoD when he learns that the villain, Saren, is making a cure for a sterility plague infecting his people and it has to be destroyed.
  • And in Mass Effect 2, should Wrex survive Virmire he greets Commander Shepard with a hearty greeting, some suspicious-sounding throat-clearing noises, and a heartfelt "Shepard! My friend!" before going back to his normal Deadpan Snarker self.
  • In Mass Effect 3, if Shepard sabotages the genophage cure by killing Mordin or Padok, Wrex's response is to storm onto the Citadel and try to blow Shepard's head off with a shotgun. If Shepard tries to talk him down, telling Wrex that no one was killed by the genophage sabotage, Wrex's response is an absolutely furious "No one, EXCEPT FOR MY UNBORN SON!"
  • The Geth teammate Legion also has shades of this. Occasionally, its "We are an emotionless robot" facade cracks, such as when confronted with betrayal or unpleasant revelations, when asked pointed questions about its illogical behavior, or when playing Galaxy of Fantasy.
  • Paragon Shepard in the Overlord DLC. Shepard is absolutely furious upon learning of the experimentation going on inside. You know it's serious when a character that Would Not Shoot a Civilian outright clubs someone... as a paragon interrupt.
  • When you have a drink with Liara at the end of the Lair of the Shadow Broker DLC, she asks you how you're really doing. One of the options is to admit that you're just as worried and afraid as everyone else.
  • Commander Shepard in Mass Effect 3. For the first two games, s/he kept his/her emotions subdued but they are really shown here with dreams showing extreme Survivor Guilt and even becoming a borderline Death Seeker. A FemShep romancing Garrus will literally be on the edge of tears when talking to Garrus right before the final push-this war has beaten her to the bone, and what little left of her is depending on her friends and the Turian she loves to see this through to the end.
  • In the ending of the Tuchanka arc, when Mordin is confronted about trying to cure the Genophage despite having formerly upgraded it, he will loudly exclaim "I made a MISTAKE!". This is doubly poignant because Mordin previously used passive voice and clinical language to downplay his own guilt in the genophage upgrade, so it's a big surprise to hear him take personal responsibility for it. Normally, he would say something like "Mistakes were made", but he doesn't — it was his mistake, he did it, and he knows it.
  • Legion has a much more dramatic Not So Stoic moment in 3 compared to his emotional reactions in 2 if you refuse to risk the lives of the attacking Quarians by letting him upload the Reaper Code to save the Geth. The first refusal has Legion attempt to appeal to Shepard's reason with real desperation in their voice, saying "This is not justice!". If Shepard refuses, however, Legion nearly kills them in a fury equal to Wrex's.
    Legion: NO. We will not let you decide our fate. UPLOADING THE CODE!
• The first two Max Payne games had Max running mostly on Tranquil Fury and stoicism. However, Max Payne 3 features a Max that, after discovering a horrifying organ harvesting ring, completely loses his shit and fully indulges in Unstoppable Rage.
• Victor of Medabots prided himself on his totally professional, detached approach to battling and expressed little save cold distaste for the rest of the world. He managed to keep this up when the family of one of his opponents invited him round for dinner but we get to hear his internal monologue for the first time, and during their actual match, he completely loses it when his opponent refuses to give up. At the end of the series, his Medabot is destroyed protecting him and his mask breaks noticeably, leading to him actually giving the main character a smile at the end.
• The titular character in Mega Man Zero has a reputation for never emoting. Ever. No matter what kind of Badass Boast his opponents give or how insanely tough the godlike robot of the game is, Zero faces it with a calm look and a sword in his hand, even crossing into Deadpan Snarker territory on occasion. At the very end of the series, he knows he's on a suicide mission against the Big Bad Dr. Weil and has no way of saving his own life. When Ciel pleads with him to come back and save himself, Zero breaks his stoic attitude and raises his voice, asking for her to "believe in me" before giving an impassioned speech against Weil. The copious amounts of Ship Tease between Zero and Ciel make his final words to her even more impactful.
• In Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Raiden appears to become very much The Stoic... until his tearjerking breakdown in the latter part of the game, when Raiden declares he has NOTHING left to live for except for following Snake and his vision for freedom for themselves. Snake, knowing he'll die soon tries to discourage Raiden from following him, but the badly injured Raiden drags himself along the floor and desperately clutches Snake's leg, begging him not to leave him alone after having lost his parents, his innocence due to his child soldier days, his love and his child.
• In Miitopia, Miis with the Cool personality are less emotive than their friends and remain rational in the heat of battle... until a good friend of theirs is knocked out by an enemy, in which case, they enter Roaring Rampage of Revenge mode.
• Chika Itou from interactive romance novel Moonrise is infamous for her stoicism. But she has a soft spot for the player character, and the player character can enjoy Defrosting the Ice Queen. If the player joins the Masquerade faction, Chika will break down in public and beg the player to reconsider.
• The Batter in Off is shown to be cold, determined, and unfaltering in his mission to purify the world...but he does rather enjoy roller coasters, as seen in a photo from Zone 2.
• Abe no Seimei of Onmyoji has always been perfectly calm and rational even as he is repeatedly accused of shit he didn't do until he goes absolutely batshit furious just before his duel against his evil Literal Split Personality who is the real person fucking everything up in the first place.
• Persona 4 has Naoto Shirogane, a young genius hired by police to assist in finding Inaba's serial killer. She maintains a cool, confident air most of the time, but once confronted with her Shadow or falsely pointing out Namatame as the killer solely because he kidnapped Nanako, it starts to become extremely difficult for her to remain calm...
• Cyrus, no matter how emotionless he claims to be, gets pretty pissed off in the Distortion World in Pokémon Platinum. And earlier, when he first told you that he'd rid himself of emotions, he does so during a fairly intense rant, complete with many exclaimation points.
  • In Pokémon Black and White, gym leader Elesa acts like an Emotionless Girl, but is overwhelmed by excitement when you beat her, immediately becoming embarrassed over it. In the sequels, Black 2 and White 2, her Memory Link scene with Skyla reveals that she felt she had to act stoic as a model and gym leader, and that she wants people to see her as more sociable by telling puns... which, according to Skyla, still need some work.
  • Oleana in Pokémon Sword and Shield spends the majority of the game with a flat, almost disinterested expression on her face and speaking in a very concise manner until she is personally trying to prevent you from interfering with the plans of Chairman Rose and goes absolutely berserk.
• GLaDOS in Portal is a stoic, if quirky, AI that instructs you on the test chambers. Once you start going off the rails after she tries to dump you in a fire pit, her stoicism starts to crack as she tries to beg you to come back while hurling passive-aggressive remarks at you. She also breaks down further in her boss fight when you rip out her cores one by one. In Portal 2, GLaDOS has a mixture of Deadpan Snarker with passive-aggressiveness towards you throughout your journey by constantly reminding you of what you did to her in the last game. Once you start the program that forcibly removes her from her main body, she completely freaks out and lets out a Big "NO!". Meeting with her again later on has her being much more open and emotional.
• Professor Layton is usually the very definition of Stiff Upper Lip, but in Unwound Future when he discovers that the woman he loved was not killed but rather thrust forward into the future, and has to return and die to preserve their timeline, he breaks into tears and begs her to stay — even going so far as to remove his hat!
  • And earlier in the same game, we saw him get angry for the first time ever.
• Red Dead Redemption II: Arthur Morgan is about as stoic a man as they come, with his more eloquent and articulate side deliberately kept private because he sees himself as just a cruel thug, and any negative emotions usually expressed with brooding or angry griping, only occasionally voicing his inner thoughts to a few people like Karen and Mary Beth. Even in Chapter 6, after receiving a fatal tuberculosis diagnosis, he's refusing to open up to others and focusing on keeping the gang safe over dwelling on the inevitable — until, in an optional conversation with the nun Sister Calderón, he hesitantly murmurs "I'm afraid". In that moment, the quiet terror in his voice, and the sadness in his face◊, show just how scared he really is to die, with a lifetime's worth of sins on his conscience.
• Resident Evil:
  • Leon turns into a Deadpan Snarker stoic after events of RE2, but the few times after surviving Raccoon City that we see Leon genuinely lose his calm are when he thinks Ada is dead, when he discovers and is forced to shoot the zombified President Adam Benford, and (to a lesser extent) when he shouts allies' names if they're killed.
  • Ada plays her cards close to her chest, and it's hard to pinpoint what, if anything, she is feeling at any given moment other than a cool interest in whatever her employer is having her track down. So the two moments where she does lose her facade are all the more prominent.
    • In Resident Evil: Damnation, she was visibly irritated during her fight with Svetlana, given that her opponent actually had the upper hand over her.
    • At the end of her campaign in Resident Evil 6, Ada is furious as she destroys Carla's lab research and experiments, fed up with the horror and the personal anguish Carla caused her. She unloads three clips of SMG ammo into it all, laying waste to it in a hail of gunfire and explosions.
  • Chris is fairly stoic during events of Resident Evil Village, but cracks begin to form in his soldier mind by the final act. After witnessing Ethan's cruel death to Miranda, he's composed, but you can tell his voice is dripping with venom after promising to avenge his friend. By the end of it, after Mia reads him the riot act, he slams his fist into the wall and you can tell he's on the verge of crying.
• Agent Superball in the Sam & Max Telltale Games is an unflappable Secret Service agent who spends the whole series speaking in a flat monotone (except for one impromptu musical number). However, at the end of the series, the death of Max is too much for him.
  Superball: [still deadpan] I'd just like to offer my— I can't do this now. I just can't. *runs off sobbing*
• Sonic the Hedgehog has always been the unflappable hero with a grin and a joke, never letting anything or anyone stop him. However, Sonic Lost World heavily tests that as the Deadly Six's actions lead to a Dwindling Party, the lowest Sonic goes is jabbing one of Tails' devices and shaking his head in defeat when no one answers, knowing no one is going to.
• Strange Flesh: The Bartender may be an unflappable, stone-cold fighter, but he is shown to be quite expressive when he gets drunk.
• Super Robot Wars: Kyosuke Nanbu is generally the mascot for Mr. Grumpy amongst his peers. Even when he's completely mad when his girlfriend Excellen is being threatened with death, all that comes out was a Tranquil Fury. But this man literally broke down to tears when he thought that it was his fault that his other friend (read: OTHER FRIEND, not girlfriend) Lamia is dead (turns out she didn't, quite). Likewise, although he doesn't jump up and down in joy when his rival turn good Axel eventually saved her, he was expressive enough to let out a genuine, grateful smile.
  • And that is not even counting the time when he piloted a Gespenst MkII Type S.
  • Also from Super Robot Wars is Raidese F. Branstein, he usually plays the cool lancer to hothead Ryusei but when he comes across Archibald Grims, the man responsible for the terrorist incident where his adored sister in law was killed, he goes completely berserk and gets shot down (and almost killed) for his trouble.
• Richard of Tales of Graces is usually quite a calm, stoic man, even when he was younger. In the main part of the story though, he has the tendency to go batshit insane over rather minor things. While his sudden violent outbursts could be viewed as rather Narm at times, Asbel is usually left gaping in disbelief at him. It's a result of him being possessed by an Omnicidal Maniac.
  • And then the future arc in Graces f shatters that stoic personality altogether. Keep in mind this is after Lambda releases him and moves on to Asbel. He's more prone to rampant trolling and explosive moments of ham than stoicism. Mask of Barona, anyone?
• In Tales of Symphonia, Kratos Aurion rarely shows anything beyond mild annoyance in the time you spend traveling with him. This makes it rather startling when Kvar starts badmouthing Anna, Lloyd's mother and Kratos' dead wife, and it's Kratos who angrily snaps at him not to speak ill of the dead.
  • And then he stabs Kvar to death after the boss fight later on.
  [stab] "Feel the pain..." [slash] "Of those inferior beings..." [sheathes sword] "As you burn in hell!"
• In Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus, towering Ax-Crazy Nazi-killer B.J Blazkowicz has by this point watched the deaths of many, many friends and comrades-in-arms, the destruction and subjugation of his country and the horror of a world ruled by Nazis and (for the most part) endured it quietly. And then he's reunited with his (by this point long since deceased) mother in an Imagine Spot before his execution and he blubbers and cries like a baby. It's an incredibly powerful scene.
• Konishi the "Iron Maiden" from The World Ends with You hides in Beat's shadow for a week. When she decides he's even more stupid and unpredictable than she already thought, she flips out.
• Xenoblade Chronicles 2: Mórag Ladair maintains an air of professional calm no matter what's going on normally. There are only two instances in which that mask slips: when she sees her nation's navy gearing up for a full-scale attack on the Urayan forces, an action that would certainly lead to a devastating war; and when she witnesses the apparent death of Emperor Niall, whom she loves like a brother.
  Mòrag: What!? Shit! Who gave that damned order!?
• ADA in Zone of the Enders is an emotionless computer, and at one point Leo even calls out her attempts to show emotion as being proof that she doesn't feel anything at all. However, she has a very tender moment with Leo after Celvice gets shot, and, right at the end, her voice cracks as if she is crying while she tells Leo, "This is what we live for — those of us who have no life".
• In Homeworld, both the Mothership and the Fleet Command are very composed individuals, relaying strategic and tactical information to you in a calm, controlled voice. Not so much in the Return to Kharak mission. The Mothership describes the destruction of Kharak with a tone of disbelief in her voice. The Fleet Command, meanwhile, audibly struggles against breaking down. The fact that they both pull themselves together quickly only makes this slip all the more jarring.

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