History TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter / VideoGames

** ''VideoGame/Splatoon3'' includes Callie and Cap'n Cuttlefish as major players in the base game's story mode, and [[spoiler:finally explains what's been going on with Mr. Grizz]], but still struggles to make the most of its increasingly large cast. While Deep Cut ''is'' involved in Return of the Mammalians, they spend most of the campaign [[spoiler:as ''bosses'', which, while [[RuleOfCool cool]], doesn't give them much room for development]]. They do finally get to share the spotlight with Callie and Marie [[spoiler:just before the final gauntlet... which turns them into {{Satellite Character}}s for the Squid Sisters]]. They can't compensate for this in the news dialogue, either, considering the Anarchy Splatcast discussions are much shorter and less varied than the ones for Inkopolis News, and Splatfests aren't frequent enough to fill in the gaps. DJ Octavio [[spoiler:vanishes after the WarmUpBoss battle in the Crater and is not seen again until the final showdown with Mr. Grizz, where he abruptly pulls a BigDamnHeroes to save the new Agent 3 and [[EnemyMine fights alongside them]], with no explanation for what he's been doing in the meantime]]. Off the Hook (again) has it possibly the worst -- their fans had to wait several months for the paid DLC to get anything more than two songs in multiplayer and a scant handful of cameos.

* ''VideoGame/Splatoon2'', despite having a surprising level of backstory and lore concerning its universe, initially suffered from underutilizing several characters badly. The new idols, Pearl and Marina, have no role in the game's story mode and thus lack much needed development. Cap'n Cuttlefish is straight-up not in the game. Callie not appearing [[spoiler:following the FinalBoss fight]] resulted in a months-long in-game hashtag campaign called #[=BringCallieBack=]. All of this does get addressed in later updates and the ''Octo Expansion'' campaign, but some things remained unanswered. The major one being that ''nobody'' knows what Mr. Grizz's deal is, with such information not even being found in [[AllThereInTheManual supplementary material]].

** Classic Sonic is certainly wasted as well, as he has no interactions with anyone and doesn't have any impact on the plot at all compared to Sonic and the Avatar, which gives fans the impression that he was a last minute addition to tie the game into VideoGame/SonicMania, and because of [[WolverinePublicity his relative marketability.]]

* Jason Hudson was one of the few characters in Black Ops II who's fate couldn't be changed by player-choice. Given that he was the previous game's second playable protagonist this left some fans unsatisfied with his much smaller and life-ending role here.
* Ramirez, Dunn and Foley are never heard from again after the events of Modern Warfare 2. Instead the third game's American perspective comes from Frost and his team. This is especially strange as there are many levels where US Army Rangers appear as friendlies during combat where they could've easily appeared as cameos.

* WordOfGod is that their aim with ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaTriggerHappyHavoc'' was to create a game where the entire cast is a fully fleshed out character and has some impact on the plot. ''Danganronpa'' is also a murder mystery game in which those same characters are being pushed towards the DespairEventHorizon by a sadistically evil mascot and pressured to [[DeadlyGraduation kill each other to escape]].

** Ser Gilmore from the Human Noble-origin has a number of fans because of his likability, loyalty, and humour; and there is more than one mod which adds him as a permanent companion.
** Gorim from the Dwarf Noble-Origin is also very well liked, and many players find themselves disappointed when they [[spoiler:encounter him in Denerim]] and can't recruit him.

** Yuffie could be considered this by some. She is the princess of a nation that was invaded and defeated by Shinra. This same nation is again hit by Geostigma, essentially The Black Plague of the VII universe and yet little is said about how it's handling this. It is said that this country was once great and mysterious, and yet Square decided to expand on Cloud's story and make a side-game centered around [[EnsembleDarkhorse Vincent Valentine]] rather than explore a country with its own history and culture that is vastly different from the one already shown in series. Given what history has already given us, Square could've used some real world examples and made a story centered around politics and Yuffie's history growing up in a vastly different setting then Cloud and the rest of the cast.
** The developer explanation for ''VideoGame/DirgeOfCerberus'''s focus on Vincent was that he was the party's gunner, allowing them to make a third-person shooter game. This naturally made some people in the fandom comment that there's ''two'' gunners in ''Final Fantasy VII'', and that it was a waste that they assumed you'd want to play a shooter as an over-serious and shallow {{Goth}} {{Bishounen}} when you could be playing as Barret, a funny badass HotBlooded eco-terrorist with a gun attached to his arm? Barret also suffered the indignity into being pushed into a small cameo in ''Advent Children'', with even his daughter and NotLoveInterest Marlene associated with Tifa instead of with him.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' is a particularly glaring offender. Because [[AnyoneCanDie any party member can die permanently in combat]], the designers didn't bother to write any further material for characters once they join the party permanently. It gets to the point where it's almost disappointing to get a new party member, because it means that the character in question has been reduced to a block of combat statistics and will never do anything interesting in-story again. This is especially galling with characters like [[KnightInShiningArmor Agrias]] and [[GadgeteerGenius Mustadio]], who join early in the game and would likely have gotten a lot of development in any other RPG, or who like Meliadoul (whose father is the BigBad for much of the game) still have an obvious connection to events in the main plotline. The only exception is in a battle soon after you get Agrias that will initiate a unique conversation between her, Ramza, and Gafgarion, but she only gets a single line of it. Additionally there are very few times where the optional characters contribute anything to the game after joining. Mustadio is needed to recruit Worker 8, Cloud, and to get Reis' human form. In the PSP version, you need Mustadio and Agrias to get a super-powerful accessory. The PSP version also adds an optional sidequest for Beowulf and Reis. This is a complete list, leaving the other characters pointless for anything besides combat after joining the party.

** When ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden'' was remade as ''Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia'', all of the generic characters who were little better than PlayerMooks were given vastly more fleshed out personalities and backstories. However, Deen sticks out due to having no backstory and little personality beyond being a {{Jerkass}} [[TheAloner Aloner]]. A character profile for Deen in an artbook released after the game reveals his backstory. [[labelnote:*]] He was a distinguished warrior in service to a nobleman, and was engaged to marry his employer's daughter, which was good because they both loved each other. Deen was all set to live a happy, successful life, until one fateful day when the Duma Faithful attacked the nobleman's mansion and turned Deen's fiancee into a [[EmptyShell witch]], tragically forcing Deen to cut down the woman he loves using her father's prized [[InfinityMinusOneSword Brave Sword]].[[/labelnote]] Why this was excluded from the actual game and not explored at all is baffling.

*** The Taliver Bandits, a group of brigands estsablished as the collective TokenMotivationalNemesis to Lyn, and built up to be [[TheDreaded the most terrifying brigand group in the setting]]. The player [[TheUnfought never actually fights]] or even sees them, as [[spoiler:they're KilledOffscreen by Wallace during the TimeSkip]]. While the game does find a way to tie this into her CharacterDevelopment, it's nonetheless anticlimactic and doesn't help [[DemotedToExtra integrate her into the main story at all]] (despite being a main character).
*** Renault. He has one of the most deep and complex backstories in the entire series... but he joins right before the final chapter, meaning it'll take about 10 playthroughs for you to actually realise this.

* Infinite from ''VideoGame/SonicForces'' is a pretty egregious example. He's the focus of most of the advertising, including having a trailer about him and serves as TheHeavy of the game over BigBad, Dr. Eggman. But in the game itself, he ends up not having all that much presence with his almost comical levels of NotWorthKilling despite having the main characters at his mercy numerous times, to the point where ''Eggman'' is the one who calls him out on it. In the end, he's defeated with little fanfare and shoved aside to make way for Eggman as the FinalBoss, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse with his ultimate fate being completely unknown.]] Even the DLC episode that was supposed to flesh out his origins doesn't really add much, because the only addition it had was that he was an unnamed mercenery who suddenly had a freak out after a failed assassination against Shadow, none of which is ever referenced at all in the main campaign.

* Bowser in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioStickerStar''. After being a hilarious villain in ''VideoGame/PaperMario64'', starring his own playable sections in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'' and being one of the four protagonists in ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'', he's virtually DemotedToExtra, appearing just in three scenes (one of them, admittedly, is the final battle, but still) and having a whooping amount of 0 lines in the entire game. It's especially painful since this is the series where Bowser has pretty much acquired his entire lovable yet evil personality, instead of the mindless brute he is still portrayed as in the platformers. In ''Color Splash'' he has dialogue again, but is still wasted, since he spends the majority of the game [[NotHimself being possessed by the Black Paint]] and clearly has no idea what's going on when it's removed at the very end.

** While Origami Peach is featured prominently in marketing, she only shows up at the beginning and end of the game and is [[spoiler:never battled]], as King Olly [[spoiler:eventually unfolds her into a tapestry]]. As Peach does have some natural magic of her own in various games, and has been [[VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor possessed by a villain before]], it would have been nice to see her as Olly’s main dragon, as well as witness what she could do [[spoiler:with her own abilities against Mario]].

* ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia2'': Alternate Milla, who originates from a fractured dimension in which she managed to successfully complete her mission years ago, all while working alongside Muzét, who ended up being blinded by an attack that she [[TakingTheBullet protected Milla from]]. It already gives potential to figuring out ''how'' this Milla won earlier and it could leave for interesting banter between her and the prime dimension's Muzét. Since she's also stuck in the prime dimension with no way of going home, it could be explored on how she feels about the removal of the shism and whether she could have chosen that route as well, compared to whatever she did in her own dimension. As it is, she only gets one skit worth of minor banter with Muzét and only offhandedly mentions how she hates how Elympios has such wide-spread Spyrix technology. [[spoiler:The only purpose she ends up serving in the game, is to pointlessly die to bring the prime dimension's Milla into your party and leave a minor, quickly-forgotten tense atmosphere between prime Milla and Elle.]]

* ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'' features a rare example of this happening to the main character, Desmond Miles. He is only used as AudienceSurrogate and the modern day story of the games is ignored in favor of the historical portion. [[spoiler:At the end of ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIII'', he is tricked into doing a HeroicSacrifice, which means that everything he did was for nothing.]]

* The Count of Groundsoaking Blood from ''VideoGame/{{Boktai}}'' is easily the most fascinating and well-developed of all the villains. He's the one who killed Django's father, the proxy reason Django himself gained his vampiric powers (as well as reawakens them in the third game), forms an EnemyMine scenario with Django in the third game (Sort of, it's complicated), is the only immortal who can come back ''even'' after being roasted by the Piledriver (not even the series' [[BigBad Big Bads]] can accomplish this), and has a completely under developed romance with Queen Hel. Unfortunately he's the first level boss in every game he appears in, and thus always dies before the plot of the game even kicks off.

** Of the four girls, Natsuki has the least focus. However, what focus she gets is compelling. She's a {{Tsundere}} who's OlderThanSheLooks. Much like the player character, she is a ClosetGeek who keeps her manga in the clubroom and insists that it counts as literature. It's implied the reason why she's so defensive is because she doesn't get along with her classmates [[spoiler:and she has a horrible home life where her father beats her, judges her for her interests, and often doesn't feed her properly.]] Despite her crankiness, once she opens up she shows a sweet, affectionate side that's [[DesperatelyCravesAffection desperate to have someone like her]] and for the club to remain a place where she feels safe. She even has a pleasant FriendshipMoment where she begs the player to [[spoiler:help Yuri overcome her obvious SanitySlippage.]] However, she gets OutOfFocus in Act 2, and only has one major scene exploring her psyche [[spoiler:before she's KilledOffscreen by the end of the Act]]. [[WordOfGod Dan Salvato himself]] has said he wishes he could have added more to her story.

* Kiya the mummy from ''VideoGame/MediEvil2'', a resurrected Egyptian princess and Sir Dan's LoveInterest. She has barely any lines, their romance feels forced at best, and her only role in the story is to die at the hands (or better, claws) of Jack The Ripper, in order to force Dan into a boss fight against said killer. Interestingly, the concept for [[https://www.unseen64.net/2016/04/19/medievil-3-fate-arrow-ps2-cancelled/ the never made third chapter]] would have turned her into half of the BigBadDuumvirate together with Dan's nemesis Zarok.

* Infinite from VideoGame/SonicForces is a pretty egregious example. He's the focus of most of the advertising, including having a trailer about him and serves as TheHeavy of the game over BigBad, Dr. Eggman. But in the game itself, he ends up not having all that much presence with his almost comical levels of NotWorthKilling despite having the main characters at his mercy numerous times, to the point where ''Eggman'' is the one who calls him out on it. In the end, he's defeated with little fanfare and shoved aside to make way for Eggman as the FinalBoss, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse with his ultimate fate being completely unknown.]] Even the DLC episode that was supposed to flesh out his origins doesn't really add much, because the only addition it had was that he was an unnamed mercenery who suddenly had a freak out after a failed assassination against Shadow, none of which is ever referenced at all in the main campaign.

* ''VideoGame/TheKingOfFighters2002'': The UpdatedRerelease ''Unlimited Match'' introduced with a lot of fanfare Nameless, a brand-new character meant to be [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute little more than a less copyright-infringing replacement]] for K9999, yet was met with approval for his backstory (showing how ''utterly fucked up'' NESTS's experiments were) and implications that he would play a big part in [[Franchise/TheKingOfFighters the franchise going forward]]. Unfortunately, Nameless got quickly shafted, only making another playable appearance years later in the mobile spin-off ''VideoGame/KOFAllStars''. And to add insult to injury, K9999 (albeit with a heavy redesign) [[TheBusCameBack returned anyway]] in ''VideoGame/TheKingOfFightersXV''.

** Simeon. Though a BaseBreakingCharacter to begin with, even fans who like Simeon's role in the plot feel there could've been more done with him. In particular, the fact he's introduced in the same chapter he betrays Primrose and reveals himself to be the mastermind of her route is considered wasteful, with some feeling he should've been introduced earlier or his relationship with Primrose more developed before TheReveal.

* Revan himself also suffers in [[VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic the MMO]] and [[Literature/{{Revan}} novel]]. Revan was initially a WellIntentionedExtremist who sought to conquer the Republic in order to use their political infrastructure and the power of the Star Forge to create a powerful rival state to fight the Sith Empire while using the Sith cult built around his personality to erode the moral authority of the actual Sith religion. However, the game retcons it so that [[TheWorfEffect almost everything he did was just the result of brainwashing by the Sith Emperor]], [[CharacterDerailment retroactively removing all agency from him]] and ruining his character before killing him off in a Flashpoint and the subsequent "Shadow of Revan" expansion.

[[folder:Assassin's Creed]]
* ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'' features a rare example of this happening to the main character, Desmond Miles. He is only used as AudienceSurrogate and the modern day story of the games is ignored in favor of the historical portion. [[spoiler:At the end of ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIII'', he is tricked into doing a HeroicSacrifice, which means that everything he did was for nothing.]]

[[folder:Baldur's Gate]]
* The first game suffers from this in two ways. First, the game treats all party members as expendable, and thus doesn't feel the need to flesh any of them out very much, leaving characters having to endear themselves to the player through sheer force of personality (like [[TheBerserker Minsc]] and [[TheEeyore Xan]]) despite some promising character ideas (like Kivan.) Second, many characters are only encountered well into the game, when the player will have already gathered a dedicated party and won't have room to recruit them. Hell, a few characters are only encountered when the titular Baldur's gate becomes accessible in Chapter 5 (out of 7.)
* Imoen is introduced as the player's plucky childhood friend/half-sister, she was added in at the last second when playtesting revealed the beginning of the game to be too difficult to go alone without recruiting two nearby evil-aligned characters, and thus she doesn't even get the minimal amount of inter-party banter that the first game had. Fortunately, the sequels more than made up for her lack of presence in the first game.
* Many recruitable characters from the first game are flat-out killed with little fanfare in the second game (like Ajantis, Xzar, Montaron and Safana,) ruining any chance at developing them altogether, and fan-favorite Xan is relegated to the tutorial section where he doesn't even get to show off his character quirks. Fortunately, there are [[GameMod mods]] that fix this.

[[folder:Call of Duty]]
* Call of Duty 3 despite having a large cast of characters from the four playable factions, doesn't really do much with them. The main focus is clearly on Nichols and his squad, with Guzzo in particular having an arc of going from being a [[SociopathicSoldier self-centered jerkass]] to [[FieldPromotion taking up the role of squad leader when he's needed most.]] The most notable case of a "botched" arc would be with Private Leslie Baron from the Canadian campaign. As the squad's radio operator he attempts to stay out of combat as much as possible which results in Robiechauld essentially bullying him throughout his few appearances and accusing him of being a coward. When he finally attempts to stand up for himself he is quite harshly dismissed before being sent to aid the Polish characters on Hill 262. In the following battle he does not retreat from a position being torn apart by enemy fire, shouting "I'm not a coward, I won't run away!" before being gunned down. The Polish characters dismiss him as an idiot, not knowing his story and we never see a reaction or anything from the rest of the Canadian cast later on when they arrive to help.
* Jason Hudson was one of the few characters in Black Ops II who's fate couldn't be changed by player-choice. Given that he was the previous game's second playable protagonist this left some fans unsatisfied with his much smaller and life-ending role here.
* Ramirez, Dunn and Foley are never heard from again after the events of Modern Warfare 2. Instead the third game's American perspective comes from Frost and his team. This is especially strange as there are many levels where US Army Rangers appear as friendlies during combat where they could've easily appeared as cameos.
* The Ultimis incarnation of Takeo Masaki from the Black Ops Zombies storyline was the first of his group to regain his memories. Several character quotes suggest he was planning on trying to stop Richtofen before he enacted his masterplan. Despite this he not only never stops him, but he is forced to become a jail-cell buddy with Richtofen following the events of Moon. This is double-strange given that his last words in Moon were him angrily vowing to avenge the Earth and kill the remnants of Group 935.

[[folder:Castlevania]]
* Hammer from the ''Franchise/{{Castlevania}} [[VideoGame/CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow Sorrow]]'' games, big time. As a former military member who provides a lot of the games' humor, he sure doesn't get a lot of attention, made worse by the fact that he was DummiedOut of ''Dawn of Sorrow'' from the extra Julius Mode as well as not appearing in ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDespair Harmony of Despair]]'' when voice clips indicated that he was planned. Worse still, according to [[http://news.dengeki.com/elem/000/000/350/350684/index-3.html this]] interview, Koji "IGA" Igarashi also likes the character.

[[folder:Danganronpa]]
* WordOfGod is that their aim with ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaTriggerHappyHavoc'' was to create a game where the entire cast is a fully fleshed out character and has some impact on the plot. ''Danganronpa'' is also a murder mystery game in which those same characters are being pushed towards the DespairEventHorizon by a sadistically evil mascot and pressured to [[DeadlyGraduation kill each other to escape]].
** One of the biggest examples in the first game is [[spoiler:Kiyotaka]], who, after the death of [[spoiler:Mondo]], suffers a HeroicBSOD and only manages to snap out of it by going completely insane and HotBlooded to the Nth degree. [[spoiler:He's then then killed soon after, before anything can be done with this.]]
** [[spoiler:Leon Kuwata]], the first ever person to be executed within the franchise received this treatment as [[spoiler:the two people who died before him (aka Mukuro and Sayaka) ended up getting a lot of emphasis.]] [[AuthorsSavingThrow Possibly because of that]], he's featured prominently in the "Ultra Despair Hagakure" story that comes with ''VideoGame/DanganronpaAnotherEpisodeUltraDespairGirls''.
** Some of the readers believe that [[spoiler:Celeste's]] motive made her too one-dimensional, while others believe that was precisely the point - the motive of the chapter was simple cash and some people in real life ''do'' murder simply for that. Other still point out that either reading is ignoring the fact that [[spoiler:Celeste]] is a [[ConsummateLiar lying liar who lies]], meaning everything about her from her allegedly shallow motive all the way to the ''name'' [[spoiler:"Celestia Ludenburg"]] is not supposed to be taken at face value, with the game providing several hints that [[HiddenDepths there is more to her than she wants others to see]]. The manga capitalizes on this by explaining how her motivation came to be and slightly made her into a JerkassWoobie instead. Unfortunately, the canonity of the manga isn't clear, although the official AU "School Mode" seems to run with this characterization through a DefrostingIceQueen arc, and the canonical ''Another Episode: Ultimate Despair Girls'' also makes a point of showing how lonely her life outside of Hope's Peak Academy was.
** [[spoiler:Hiyoko]] in ''VisualNovel/Danganronpa2GoodbyeDespair'' as right before [[spoiler:she died, she attempted to change [[HeelFaceDoorSlam but Mikan killed her before having any]] CharacterDevelopment. Her attempts to change came across as too little too late because of that.]]
** [[VisualNovel/DanganronpaV3KillingHarmony The third game]] has [[spoiler:Kaede Akamatsu, the initial protagonist]], a colorful character who's a breath of fresh air for the series, [[spoiler:as a playable character who contrasts with the previous protagonists, particularly how she leads the students in an attempt to escape or otherwise end the killing game (and to a lesser degree, being the first female protagonist outside of the GaidenGame ''Ultra Despair Girls'')]]. Said character dies in the first chapter, [[spoiler:and is replaced by Shuichi Saihara, a less interesting and confident character who is in many ways similar to other protagonists. However, Kaede's death being a waste was the entire ''point'', as her death as well as Shuichi's DespairEventHorizon from it and recovery ends up driving the plot]].
** Also, from the third game, [[spoiler:Rantaro Amami]] ended up being the first person to die but that person was extremely OutOfFocus before dying in comparison to the other first victims. It is quite telling that the player learns a lot more about [[spoiler:Rantaro]] in the bonus mode contents [[spoiler:that includes his freetime events with Shuichi]] than in the actual canon game.

[[folder:Dragon Age]]
* Daveth has been seen as this because of his likability, humour, and, despite him being presented as a rather sketchy figure, his [[HiddenDepths bravery and intelligence]].
* Jowan. Many players wished he was added to the party (some even before playing the Mage-Origin), because of his likable personality, his status as TheAtoner, and to round out the mages in the party. This was planned early in development, but later given up on.
* Ser Cauthrien has also been seen as this, since despite a grand total of 3 times throughout the game she appears, she has made an impression because of her fierce loyalty to Teyrn Loghain yet still retaining a sense of honor and justice, and towards the end [[spoiler:she can be made to admit that Loghain is no longer the hero he was and asks the player to stop him]].
* To varying degrees, many of the Origin-specific-characters are seen this way:
** Ser Gilmore from the Human Noble-origin has a number of fans because of his likability, loyalty, and humour; and there is more than one mod which adds him as a permanent companion.
** Gorim from the Dwarf Noble-Origin is also very well liked, and many players find themselves disappointed when they [[spoiler:encounter him in Denerim]] and can't recruit him.
** Merril from the Dalish Elf-Origin had this originally, so much so that her character was expanded upon in [[VideoGame/DragonAgeII the sequel]], to however somewhat [[BrokenBase debatable]] success.
* Mhairi in ''Awakening'' got hit by this ''hard''. Her character trait is that she's a big fan of the Grey Wardens and ''happily'' chooses to become one when given the chance. With the other three initial recruits who become wardens for various reasons, this could surely lead to a lot of potential interaction, as well as the fact that there is a lot more to being a Grey Warden. Unfortunately, Mhairi is, like Daveth and Jory, killed within an hour of gameplay. But ''un''like Daveth and Jory, or even the other Origin-specific characters, early promotional material placed her as one of the companions on equal footing with the other companions who stay for the long run.

[[folder:Final Fantasy]]
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI'' has a lot of these, due to the cast of 14 playable characters. The core cast of Terra, Celes, Locke, Edgar, Sabin, and Kefka all have clear character arcs, and Cyan (despite being secondary in plot relevance) also gets some CharacterDevelopment of his own. The rest of the gang fall into the "colorful but irrelevant" category or "totally undeveloped".
** Seigfried has all the makings of an interesting recurring villain or subplot, but the character and his apparent doppelganger are extremely underused. Apparently, his impostor was going to tie into a (cut) subplot involving Gogo, who, well, is him/herself a victim of this trope.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'':
** Yuffie could be considered this by some. She is the princess of a nation that was invaded and defeated by Shinra. This same nation is again hit by Geostigma, essentially The Black Plague of the VII universe and yet little is said about how it's handling this. It is said that this country was once great and mysterious, and yet Square decided to expand on Cloud's story and make a side-game centered around [[EnsembleDarkhorse Vincent Valentine]] rather than explore a country with its own history and culture that is vastly different from the one already shown in series. Given what history has already given us, Square could've used some real world examples and made a story centered around politics and Yuffie's history growing up in a vastly different setting then Cloud and the rest of the cast.
** The developer explanation for ''VideoGame/DirgeOfCerberus'''s focus on Vincent was that he was the party's gunner, allowing them to make a third-person shooter game. This naturally made some people in the fandom comment that there's ''two'' gunners in ''Final Fantasy VII'', and that it was a waste that they assumed you'd want to play a shooter as an over-serious and shallow {{Goth}} {{Bishounen}} when you could be playing as Barret, a funny badass HotBlooded eco-terrorist with a gun attached to his arm? Barret also suffered the indignity into being pushed into a small cameo in ''Advent Children'', with even his daughter and NotLoveInterest Marlene associated with Tifa instead of with him.
* Selphie and Irvine from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII''. Aside from Rinoa, they are the only two not from Balamb Garden. Selphie's Garden, Trabia, is the victim of an attack by the Galbadian Army, and a lot of focus could have been given to that. Irvine, a Galbadian himself, basically just has the purpose of revealing the [[spoiler:LaserGuidedAmnesia everyone has]] before shifting to the background.
* Freya from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIX''. She has a focus during the Burmecia and Cleyra plotlines, but after that she becomes almost completely irrelevant to the storyline, with her plot around Sir Fratley being left unresolved. Quina, Amarant, Eiko, and to a lesser extent Mikoto and Lani fall victim to this as well.
* Kimahri from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX''. He has little relevance in the story despite being an exile from his people and knowing Yuna the longest out of the rest of the cast.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXII'':
** Fran, the only nonhuman character in the cast and by far the oldest, is a victim of this. Little of her backstory is ever uncovered and she contributes almost nothing to the story. She barely even interacts with anyone besides Balthier and occasionally Vaan.
** Speaking of Vaan, he's an even more prominent example of this. He's undeniably the main character of the story up until Ashe joins the party, the game focusing on him and [[MagneticHero his actions being wholly responsible for bringing the party together in the first place]], but as soon as the full party is assembled he is ''immediately'' DemotedToExtra. There was plenty they could have done with him after this point, even if they wanted to focus on Ashe, but they settle for having him do little more than sit on the sidelines during cutscenes and occasionally get some lines, or having him be involved in a FunnyBackgroundEvent while the other characters talk about more plot-important stuff. There's a plot point about him being a MoralityPet to Ashe, but it is underdeveloped and barely touched upon, when the relationship between the two could have gotten so much more attention and focus, and would have allowed Vaan to stay relevant to the story even if he's not the "main character" anymore. Vaan also could have gotten more interaction with Balthier and Basch, whom he generally stops talking to once he's been DemotedToExtra. [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIIRevenantWings A sequel]] where Vaan is truly the main character this time was made, but it was considered too little too late.
** Penelo is in much the same boat as Vaan. She's fairly prominent early on, being a friend and possible love interest for Vaan, her kidnapping sends the party to Bhujerba where they meet Larsa and rescue Ashe, and her befriending of Larsa [[HeelRealization makes him realize the Empire and especially his brother Vayne aren't as great as he thinks they are]] and motivates him to help Ashe and the party. Once she's reunited with Vaan though, she does practically nothing for the rest of the game and barely interacts with anyone besides Vaan and Larsa during his brief time as a GuestStarPartyMember. [[WhatCouldHaveBeen Supposedly, Penelo had a much bigger role during the planning stages]], [[WordOfGod with one of the writers even citing her as his favorite character during this time]], but for whatever reason, it was all axed in favor of making her little more than a TagalongKid. She does get more attention in the aforementioned sequel, but again, too little too late.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTactics'' is a particularly glaring offender. Because [[AnyoneCanDie any party member can die permanently in combat]], the designers didn't bother to write any further material for characters once they join the party permanently. It gets to the point where it's almost disappointing to get a new party member, because it means that the character in question has been reduced to a block of combat statistics and will never do anything interesting in-story again. This is especially galling with characters like [[KnightInShiningArmor Agrias]] and [[GadgeteerGenius Mustadio]], who join early in the game and would likely have gotten a lot of development in any other RPG, or who like Meliadoul (whose father is the BigBad for much of the game) still have an obvious connection to events in the main plotline. The only exception is in a battle soon after you get Agrias that will initiate a unique conversation between her, Ramza, and Gafgarion, but she only gets a single line of it. Additionally there are very few times where the optional characters contribute anything to the game after joining. Mustadio is needed to recruit Worker 8, Cloud, and to get Reis' human form. In the PSP version, you need Mustadio and Agrias to get a super-powerful accessory. The PSP version also adds an optional sidequest for Beowulf and Reis. This is a complete list, leaving the other characters pointless for anything besides combat after joining the party.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV''
** There were certainly a few qualifiers of this trope, but only one character has reached this point in the minds of fans on this installment. Poor Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, she had an uphill battle, to begin with after replacing Stella Nox Fleuret as many felt she was inferior in both personality and presence compared to the potential with Stella. Things worsened after the game released showing [[spoiler:Luna dying at the beginning of the third act of the game with barely any screentime compared to her role in Kingsglaive]].
** [[FromBadToWorse Then, a new expanded Insomnia revealed her]] [[spoiler:as a ghost to help save Noctis before fading away much like her very short cameo in Episode Ignis]]. Eventually, she would receive a DLC Episode of her own that many felt would '''finally''' give her background and story much-needed development. Sadly that would be left on the cutting room floor leaving her in the shadow of many other heroines in the series.
* In ''VideoGame/DissidiaFinalFantasyOperaOmnia'', Yuna's Gunner incarnation is relegated to an extra costume. This is in spite of the fact that her skillset changes completely between the first game and X-2, and it also represents a change in her personality and worldview--much like Cecil Harvey, whose Dark Knight and Paladin forms ''are'' treated as fully separate "characters" in gameplay and he transitions to only appearing as the Paladin form in-story. Even more glaring, Yda Hext the Monk eventually becomes her true self, Lyse Hext the Monk, and appears as that separate form from then on despite the fact that she uses different abilities from the same original set. Yuna the Summoner, meanwhile, has to stay Yuna the Summoner all throughout the chapter that covers her character development and relationship with Paine from X-2... because the thing that represents her was bundled into expensive bonus content and it can't be undone without upsetting (rightfully) all the people who shelled out for it back when the game started.

[[folder:Fire Emblem]]
* Many ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' characters suffer from this for much the same reason as ''Final Fantasy Tactics'' mentioned above, but they (usually) get [[RelationshipValues Support Conversations]] to make up for it.
** When ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden'' was remade as ''Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia'', all of the generic characters who were little better than PlayerMooks were given vastly more fleshed out personalities and backstories. However, Deen sticks out due to having no backstory and little personality beyond being a {{Jerkass}} [[TheAloner Aloner]]. A character profile for Deen in an artbook released after the game reveals his backstory. [[labelnote:*]] He was a distinguished warrior in service to a nobleman, and was engaged to marry his employer's daughter, which was good because they both loved each other. Deen was all set to live a happy, successful life, until one fateful day when the Duma Faithful attacked the nobleman's mansion and turned Deen's fiancee into a [[EmptyShell witch]], tragically forcing Deen to cut down the woman he loves using her father's prized [[InfinityMinusOneSword Brave Sword]].[[/labelnote]] Why this was excluded from the actual game and not explored at all is baffling.
** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemTheBlazingBlade'':
*** The Taliver Bandits, a group of brigands estsablished as the collective TokenMotivationalNemesis to Lyn, and built up to be [[TheDreaded the most terrifying brigand group in the setting]]. The player [[TheUnfought never actually fights]] or even sees them, as [[spoiler:they're KilledOffscreen by Wallace during the TimeSkip]]. While the game does find a way to tie this into her CharacterDevelopment, it's nonetheless anticlimactic and doesn't help [[DemotedToExtra integrate her into the main story at all]] (despite being a main character).
*** Renault. He has one of the most deep and complex backstories in the entire series... but he joins right before the final chapter, meaning it'll take about 10 playthroughs for you to actually realise this.
*** [[DoesNotLikeMen Florina]] and [[ChivalrousPervert Sain]] ''do'' interact once or twice throughout the game [[note]]by virtue of both appearing in the tutorial and remaining with Lyn at its end, as no characters under the player's control die when defeated until the TimeSkip[[/note]] but generally not for anything more than a gag. What's particularly wasteful about it is that you have a perfect relationship to base Support Conversations on (where the meat of the game's characterisations occur with non-Lord units), and yet it doesn't ever happen.
** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemPathOfRadiance'' and ''VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn'':
*** Stefan is the source of nearly all the information on [[HalfHumanHybrid the Branded]], itself a [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot wasted plot]], and displays some serious hints of a DarkAndTroubledPast. He is also heavily implied to be a direct descendant of one of the three PrecursorHeroes. Everything about him indicates that he should be one of the most important characters in both games, not the most obscure unit in the franchise.
*** The Dawn Brigade fall into this only a few chapters into Part 1 of ''Radiant Dawn''. They're reduced to {{Flat Character}}s because Support conversations were oversimplified into battle chatter, and literally have no dialogue in the main story. Nolan got the worst of it because he ''was'' their actual leader while they were freedom fighters, and is said to be a GeniusBruiser that likes to study and read.
** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemFates'':
*** Shura is very interesting, with an extensive backstory that ties into both Hoshido and Nohr [[spoiler:by way of being the one to kidnap Azura when she was younger]]. Unfortunately, very little of this has any relevance outside of his recruitment chapters, and he can ''only'' [[RelationshipValues support]] with Corrin, instead of some characters the player might expect him to. He doesn't even get any DLC conversations, like some of the other characters with few support options, to make up for it.
*** This trope can arguably apply to any of the [[FanNickName Avatarsexual]] characters[[note]]characters who can only S-Rank support with the Avatar[[/note]]. While their existence is more justified in ''Fates'' than in ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening Awakening]]'', since in ''Fates'', children are linked to the father (the only exceptions being a Female Avatar and Azura), meaning that if the player marries one of the non-Avatarsexuals, and one of the non-Avatarsexual male characters ends up without someone to pair up with, then the child they would have is {{permanently missable|Content}}. While Anna can at least be justified as DownloadableContent (as well as the fact that the Avatar would be the one she talks the most to), one very notable example is Scarlet, who's shown having ShipTease with Ryoma, yet not only is she an Avatarsexual, she's only available on ''Birthright'' and ''Revelation'', and in the case of the latter, [[spoiler:the game [[DroppedABridgeOnHim drops a bridge on her]] two chapters after she joins you]].
*** Reina and Yukimura are two pretty bad examples of this. Reina is one of Mikoto's retainers, so, logically speaking, that would mean she works alongside Orochi and knows Kagero (since Kagero used to work for Mikoto as well), as well as having close ties to the Hoshidan siblings. But, nope, she ''only'' supports with the Avatar; while her supports with them show a decent amount of her backstory, all of those potentially-interesting relationships go to waste. Meanwhile, Yukimura is also important to the Hoshidan court, being one of its main strategists, effectively ''being its leader'' while Ryoma is away in ''Birthright'' and ''Revelation'', and [[spoiler:being the one to plan out Azura's kidnapping]]. He can't support with any of the Hoshidan royals or [[spoiler:Shura]], and he ''only'' joins the team in ''Birthright''.

[[folder:Golden Sun]]
* ''VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn'':
** Himi, introduced maybe an hour before the end of the game. There are ''nameless [=NPCs=]'' with more screen time than she gets.
** Likewise, Eoleo doesn't get ''any'' screen time after joining the party, despite being an AscendedExtra with a background and career perfectly suited to ''VideoGame/GoldenSun'''s traditional GreyAndGrayMorality theme.

[[folder:Grand Theft Auto]]
* ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreas'': Ryder is one of the major characters who is a member of the Grove Street Families gang and one of CJ's friends from childhood with the charisma and attitude to be well liked by many fans of the game in spite of his {{Jerkass}}ness. [[spoiler:When he is revealed to be a traitor along with Big Smoke, CJ shows genuine shock of Smoke betraying him and never once mentions Ryder's name, even when he tells Sweet. In the mission "Pier 69", CJ kills Ryder without much of a dramatic scene between the two and only mentions him once after his betrayal. Since then, Ryder is never brought up again, and Sweet never even asks about Ryder's whereabouts by the time he is released from prison. It made Ryder seem more like a minor character who suddenly became less important half way through the game and his death scene isn't any more different from Kane's death earlier in a Los Santos mission, as if his character didn't even exist in the game to begin with. It certainly isn't helped by the fact that he has the least amount of backstory of the main cast]].

[[folder:Halo]]
* ''VideoGame/Halo5Guardians'':
** [[spoiler:Jul 'Mdama, an Elite antagonist built up throughout ''VideoGame/{{Halo 4}}'''s ''Spartan Ops'', the ''[[Literature/HaloGlasslands Kilo]]-[[Literature/HaloTheThursdayWar Five]]'' [[Literature/HaloMortalDictata trilogy]], and ''ComicBook/HaloEscalation'' as a [[TheChessmaster dead-serious tactician]] who is almost always one step ahead, [[CutsceneBoss gets stabbed in the neck by Locke and killed with pretty much no fanfare]]]] at the end of the ''first mission of the game''.
** The ad campaign boasted that players would be able to play as the legendary Blue Team in the co-op campaign, except the Master Chief and Blue Team are only featured in a paltry three missions and barely given any focus, with the majority of the game focusing on Locke and Fireteam Osiris.
** The ad campaign and ''ARG/HuntTheTruth'' both imply that ONI would be one of the primary villains and that John would rebel against them, forcing Locke to hunt him down. Instead the role goes to [[spoiler:Cortana]], which some have accused of undermining [[spoiler:her sacrifice in ''Halo 4'']].

[[folder:Kingdom Hearts]]
* Many members of the [[StandardEvilOrganizationSquad Organization XIII]] in ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' are unceremoniously killed in ''Chain of Memories'' or ''II'' without doing much in the plot. ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts358DaysOver2'' was ''supposed'' to be a game around them, yet the focus is mostly on Axel, Roxas, [[RememberTheNewGuy Xion]] and a bit Saix. Prime examples include Demyx, a [[AffablyEvil nice guy]] who controls water, and Luxord (Ironically, Nomura's favorite member), who can control time and is surprisingly friendly with Roxas but only appears twice in ''II''. Even their original identities and backstories before they became nobodies are (so far) unknown.
* Kairi, full stop. Prior to ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsIII'', it's constantly hinted that Kairi will learn how to wield a Keyblade and join Sora and co. in the second Keyblade War to fight against Xehanort and his new Organization XIII. Sadly, her training with Lea (Axel's original person) happens mostly offscreen with the most we see being the two conversing with each other, and when the war ''does'' finally happen, not only does she [[spoiler:get kidnapped ''yet again'']], but [[spoiler:she ends up killed by Xehanort as a means to motivate Sora into forging the χ-blade and forcing him to perform a HeroicSacrifice in order to save her]]. She was built up to be a valuable ally; instead, she was [[spoiler:little more than a living plot device]]. Backlash to this was so bad that the ''Re:Mind'' DLC was made [[AuthorsSavingThrow partly to avert this]].
* [[FranchiseOriginalSin While having a Disney world that is a retelling of the movie is nothing new]], Sora barely has any interactions with the ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'' cast in Arendelle compared to other worlds. Elsa doesn't even get the honor of being a party member, despite being one of the movie's main characters and having powers perfectly suited for the role. Even as a supporting character, Sora only talks to her (and most of the supporting cast) once before fading into the background, to the point that he might as well not be there in the first place. Sadly though, the strict rules regarding the ''Frozen'' movie necessitated this and the scrapped Frozen Labyrinth hints of a potentially great storyline before ExecutiveMeddling came in.
* Despite being tauted as a crossover between ''Disney'' and ''Final Fantasy'', the two franchises ended up getting sidelined over time in favor of the OriginalGeneration, especially for the latter, where after ''II'', the ''Final Fantasy'' cast only makes sporadic appearances, culminating in ''III'' having no ''Final Fantasy'' characters at all (the closest being the constellation sidequest, where most of the constellations are based on ''Final Fantasy'' monsters) until the ''Re:Mind'' DLC while leaving the battle between Cloud and Sephiroth unaddressed. Many fans wish that they appear in the Keyblade Graveyard to help them against the Heartless horde as a nice CallBack as to when Sora helped them against the 1000 Heartless invasion back in ''II''.

[[folder:Knights of the Old Republic]]
* Trask Ulgo in ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' is killed off before the end of the tutorial level, and given no character arc, but you get an intriguing hint from a Hutt in-game talking about the "Ulgo" noble family of Alderaan, bitter rivals to House Organa. No confirmation Trask was related at the time, but get to the [[VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic MMO sequel]] and you find out that, yes, he ''was'' [[RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething high-ranking Alderaanian nobility]] in a house whose [[PlanetOfHats hat]] was warfare and military service, and Trask was one of their best.
* Darth Nihilus in ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicIITheSithLords'' is a mysterious HumanoidAbomination who communicates exclusively in [[TheUnintelligible the untranslated language]] used by Atris' Sith Holocrons, can destroy planets using the power of the Force and was featured very prominently on the cover of the game. Judging from cut content [[spoiler:he is also substantially more powerful than undead ImplacableMan Darth Sion]]. However, when you confront him he's easily beaten and turns out to have been a pawn of [[spoiler:Kreia/Darth Traya]] all along and he isn't even named in the game. He gives the impression of being TooPowerfulToLive more than anything. The real problem with Nihilus was more tied to [[ExecutiveMeddling the cut content of the game]] and because much of his character is fleshed out through two characters it is entirely possible to kill instead of conversing with. He isn't really that easy to kill either - again, the player has to interrogate characters and read between the lines to see that [[spoiler:[[HumanoidAbomination the Jedi Exile]] was the only one [[TooSpicyForYogSothoth Nihilus couldn't devour]].]]
* Meetra Surik, the canon version of the PlayerCharacter from ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicIITheSithLords'' suffered from this in ''VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic'' and the ''Literature/{{Revan}}'' novel tie-in. Both the game and the book disregard the events of [=KOTOR2=] almost completely and her character and motivations are basically thrown to the wayside while she's reduced to just being a fangirl of Revan who dies in the end of the novel and briefly appears as a Force ghost in the game.
* Revan himself also suffers in [[VideoGame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic the MMO]] and [[Literature/{{Revan}} novel]]. Revan was initially a WellIntentionedExtremist who sought to conquer the Republic in order to use their political infrastructure and the power of the Star Forge to create a powerful rival state to fight the Sith Empire while using the Sith cult built around his personality to erode the moral authority of the actual Sith religion. However, the game retcons it so that [[TheWorfEffect almost everything he did was just the result of brainwashing by the Sith Emperor]], [[CharacterDerailment retroactively removing all agency from him]] and ruining his character before killing him off in a Flashpoint and the subsequent "Shadow of Revan" expansion.

[[folder:The Legend of Zelda]]
* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaBreathOfTheWild'':
** The Champions have interesting personalities and designs that could easily bounce off one-another and Link, but [[spoiler:they're all dead by the time Link wakes up]], leaving most of their scenes to the Memories, and thus they end up underdeveloped. A lot of people see this as a huge waste of potential, as the Champions could have added to the story in a much more direct way, allowing for fleshing out what is a fairly sparse story by Zelda standards.
** While it's understandable that Ganon would be too far gone from humanity to be any more than a GenericDoomsdayVillain, his backstory is just barely acknowledged, something that would have made its place in the timeline much easier. It's mentioned that he's a continuously reincarnating AncientEvil, but it's left ambiguous whether he's the same as the one originating from ''Ocarina of Time'', the one originating from ''Four Swords Adventures'', or a new Ganon(dorf) entirely (though it's unlikely the one from ''Ocarina of Time'', since he died in both ''Wind Waker'' (in the Adult Timeline) and ''Twilight Princess'' (in the Child Timeline). Not to mention Urbosa mentions that Ganon used to be a Gerudo and she intends to get revenge for the stain his heritage left on her people, but no other Gerudo in the game acknowledges that he used to be one of them.
** The characters that help you board the Divine Beasts: Sidon, Riju, Yunobo and Teba. The main storyline seems to be building them up to be super important aside from the fact they just help you get on board. But after you seize the Divine Beasts, they are just brushed to the side and are never brought back again.
** Epona. The game provides horses based on those of Ganondorf and Zelda, and both provide quests and a bit of lore behind either of them. But due to being an amiibo-locked extra, Epona doesn't get a special quest nor any lore beyond being a "legendary" horse.
** In a gameplay example, unique mounts like Bears, the Lord of the Mountain, or Stalhorses cannot be registered at the stable. Stalhorses have it particularly bad as they die once daytime hits.

[[folder:Mass Effect]]
* Nihlus in ''VideoGame/MassEffect1'' falls victim to DroppedABridgeOnHim five minutes into the game.
* Miranda Lawson's [[DemotedToExtra demotion to extra]] in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', despite being one of the main characters in [[VideoGame/MassEffect2 the second game]]. Many fans lamented that since she was now on Cerberus' hitlist and wanted to track down her kidnapped sister, why on Earth would she turn down the chance to rejoin the ''Normandy'', since with [[OneManArmy Commander Shepard]] and the [[KnowledgeBroker Shadow Broker]] on-board, this would only have ''helped'' her achieve her goals?
* [[IntrepidReporter Emily]] [[EnsembleDarkhorse Wong]] gets unceremoniously [[BusCrash killed off-screen]] in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', seemingly to make way for [[ReplacementScrappy Diana Allers]] to join the ''Normandy'' as the Alliance's official War Correspondent. [[spoiler:Even her DyingMomentOfAwesome by attempting to take down a Reaper by ''{{ramming|AlwaysWorks}}'' it did little to mitigate the blow many fans felt, especially since the character of Diana Allers was included due to corporate whoring out to IGN.]]
* Kelly Chambers qualifies as enough of a love interest in ''3'' that she triggers a Paramour achievement, and Shepard gets a photo of her to display in his/her quarters. However, she lacks any presence at all in the ''Citadel'' DLC to expand upon this. [[spoiler:Nor does Shepard think of her during the ending.]]
* Tela Vasir is one of only six Spectres seen in the entire series [[note]]The others being Shepard, the Virmire Survivor, Saren, aforementioned Nihlus, and Jondum Bau, who is also an example.[[/note]], is a master manipulator, [[ShadowArchetype like Shepard]] [[spoiler:she's working for an unscrupulous organisation for the greater good]], and is easily one of the most powerful individuals Shepard has ever faced that isn't a Reaper creation, but she's limited to the ''Lair of the Shadow Broker'' DLC and [[spoiler:gets killed off in it]]. She did receive some attention in prequel comics.
* Despite being the BigBad of the second game and leader of the [[EldritchAbomination Reapers]], Harbinger only appeared briefly at the end of ''Mass Effect 3'' with one line.
* Nyreen Kandros, who only appeared in the ''Omega'' DLC. The first female turian seen in the games, has a history with Aria T'Loak, discriminated against by her own people because of her [[GravityMaster biotics]], looking out for the civilians in a WretchedHive, [[spoiler:killed near the end of the DLC in a HeroicSacrifice so Aria can go ballistic and get captured]].

[[folder:Medi Evil]]
* Kiya the mummy from ''VideoGame/MediEvil2'', a resurrected Egyptian princess and Sir Dan's LoveInterest. She has barely any lines, their romance feels forced at best, and her only role in the story is to die at the hands (or better, claws) of Jack The Ripper, in order to force Dan into a boss fight against said killer. Interestingly, the concept for [[https://www.unseen64.net/2016/04/19/medievil-3-fate-arrow-ps2-cancelled/ the never made third chapter]] would have turned her into half of the BigBadDuumvirate together with Dan's nemesis Zarok.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Metroid]]
* ''VideoGame/MetroidOtherM'' introduces Anthony Higgs, Samus's best friend from when she was a trainee, first introduced in a trailer with the {{memetic|Mutation}} line "Remember me?" Even those who don't like ''Other M'''s story as a whole often like Anthony, as he is a badass who is also respectful towards Samus and treats her like a good friend. For those who don't like the way Samus's old commander Adam is portrayed as controlling and overly authoritative, Anthony feels like a better version of the friendly old character from Samus's past.
* ''VideoGame/MetroidPrimeHunters'' introduces six new characters. Each has a unique backstory giving them motivations in the plot, special weapons and alternate forms, and minor details that flesh out the universe. But in-game, they serve as nothing more than randomly generated minibosses. Though there is still hope that this trope with cease to be (at least with [[EnsembleDarkhorse Sylux]]), as the creator of the ''Prime'' series has expressed interest in exploring more of the ''Metroid'' universe.
* For a boss-example, there's Draygon, who was introduced in ''VideoGame/SuperMetroid''. Draygon is essentially a prototype for the ''Other M'' incarnation of Mother Brain, using her own species instead of Metroids, and considering that the game had the Federation develop their own version of [[spoiler:Ridley]], Draygon could've been used as a OneWingedAngel form for Mother Brain, who is somewhat of an AntiClimaxBoss (some players defeat her on ''accident''), but she hasn't reappeared at all since her debut in ''Super Metroid'' - considering that you could fight Phantoom as the TrueFinalBoss of ''Other M'', it's especially irritating that Draygon has pretty much been confined to ''Super Metroid''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Mortal Kombat]]
* While the revitalization of the Franchise/MortalKombat franchise that started with 2011's ''[[VideoGame/MortalKombat9 Mortal Kombat]]'' reboot and continued with 2015's ''VideoGame/MortalKombatX'' has been generally successful, these two games have acquired a certain infamy among longtime fans of the series for killing off several classic characters in the name of AnyoneCanDie. While PopularityPower ensured the biggest names would and did return, several low-key fan favorites remain dead. Among them are:
** Shang Tsung, the very first BigBad of the franchise. He appears in the 2011 reboot, in which his story plays out roughly the same as it did in the first and second games (hosts the tournament, gets beaten by Liu Kang, proposes the plan to invade Earthrealm to save his own skin) but is then abruptly cut short when Kahn randomly sacrifices him to Sindel to power her up. Aside from enabling Sindel to go on the killing spree which claims most of the other characters on this list, this move is regarded as a waste as Tsung has historically been a more interesting and compelling villain than Sindel. Despite this, he did not return in ''X'' and all indications were that he was gone from the series for good. ''[[VideoGame/MortalKombat11 11]]'' rectifies this, however. He returns as the host of the Krypt, and was later made playable as a DLC fighter. The ''Aftermath'' story DLC [[spoiler: brings his role in the franchise full circle, as he is once again the BigBad.]]
** Motaro, the [[OurCentaursAreDifferent Centaurian]] warrior who serves as TheDragon of Shao Kahn in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat3'' and its spinoffs, is a case of RealLifeWritesThePlot, as his four-legged Centaurian form proved very difficult for Netherrealm Studios and their Midway predecessors to transition into the 3D era (leading to the notorious "plot twist" in ''VideoGame/MortalKombatArmageddon'' where he was transformed into a biped). While 2011's reboot sees him make a return (and kill off Johnny Cage in a possible BadFuture), he is once again unplayable and is killed off midway through the game by Raiden. At this point one wishes Netherrealm would just hire a programmer that knows how to create a 4-legged playable character, since it's obvious no one currently on their payroll knows how to pull it off.
** Kurtis Stryker, originally of ''VideoGame/MortalKombat3'', is a particularly tragic case of potential wasted. Originally a [[TheScrappy rather]] [[TierInducedScrappy infamous]] character, Netherrealm gave him an overhaul for their 2011 reboot which did something many Mortal Kombat fans didn't think was possible -- it ''made Stryker cool''. On top of his much-needed design overhaul, the reboot gave him a new HeterosexualLifePartners relationship with fellow [=MK3=] character Kabal, giving both characters motivation and making them seem like more natural additions to the Forces of Light. And then, after all that work put into him, he is unceremoniously killed off along with several other characters by Sindel in an AxCrazy rampage.
** As noted just above, another [=MK3=] character that was much improved in the reboot was Kabal. Originally a character with a tumultuous and somewhat confusing backstory (he was an ex-Black Dragon member caught in a HeelFaceRevolvingDoor), the 2011 reboot streamline him by making him a police officer in Stryker's unit who joined the force [[TheAtoner to atone]] for his criminal past. His mutilation, which was never explained originally, was shown onscreen this time around, and his hero cred was further boosted by having him be given an opportunity to rejoin the Black Dragon and rejecting it. Along with his new best friend Stryker, Kabal seemed on the track to a bright future indeed... until he became another casualty of Sindel's rampage.
** And to further cement the theme of "Netherrealm Studios hates every character from [=MK3=]", we have Nightwolf. Originally a very generic MagicalNativeAmerican type, the 2011 reboot introduced him as being among the Forces of Light kombatants who participated in the first tournament, solidifying his link to the rest of the team. While he generally retained his Magical Native American elements, these were downplayed in comparison to past appearances, with his new design cues being taken from the ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'' games instead. Like Stryker and Kabal above, he is thrown away in Sindel's rampage, though unlike them he gets a DyingMomentOfAwesome by sacrificing himself to stop her.
** Sindel was spoken a lot, and she's also a case of this (and another [=MK3=] character, surprise surprise). In the old timeline, she's actually one of the more noble characters in the entire series, able to break away from the brainwashing Shao Kahn gave to her thanks to Kitana and eventually resuming to become TheHighQueen and later on saving Kitana from being brainwashed by Onaga. This actually could have given her a good redemption arc after her brainwashing period in [=MK3=]. In the reboot, as stated so many times, Sindel was turned into a rampaging killing machine by Shao Kahn and killed by Nightwolf. The rampage itself could've been a very strong catalyst for her to restart her atonement arc in the new timeline. But nope, she, like the majority of other Revenants alongside her, were pretty much DemotedToExtra as 'extra revenant punching bag'. She fared a bit better than other Revenants that she had a few speaking lines, but Netherrealm Studios seemed to be uninterested in improving her redemption arc.
** One wasted character ''not'' from [=MK3=] is Hotaru. The Order half of an OrderVersusChaos dichotomy introduced in 2005's ''VideoGame/MortalKombatDeception'', Hotaru was a KnightTemplar whose striking character design was diluted by very generic fatalities and [[LawfulStupidChaoticStupid bad writing]]. While the same held true for his opposite number Havik, the latter was allowed to return in the Creator/DCComics-published ''Mortal Kombat X'' comics and was made a fairly significant villain. Hotaru on the other hand has been almost completely forgotten, even though his home realm of Seido has made (admittedly minor) appearances in both of the Netherrealm games.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Nintendo Wars]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder:No More Heroes]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Pokémon]]
* The Shadow Triad from ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'' are introduced as the most loyal servants of Team Plasma's boss. They have cool teleporting powers unlike anything seen performed by humans in a ''Pokémon'' game before, but are introduced really late into the game, are never fought and their only purpose seems to be passing down messages and items from their boss. In other words, any regular grunt could have filled in their role without any effort whatsoever. Fortunately, they had an expanded role in [[VideoGame/PokemonBlack2AndWhite2 the sequels]].
* Anthea and Concordia, N's foster sisters from the same game. They simply exist to give exposition about N and heal your Pokémon, despite being family to N and Ghetsis, something that isn't even made all that clear in the games. The anime thankfully expands on their relationship with N and shows their stance on humans and their relationship with Pokémon.
* ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'':
** Malva is a Holo Caster news reporter and a member of the Elite Four. She also happens to be a high-ranking member of the game's villainous Team. This had amazing potential to tie your gym badge journey and the villain plot in a manner that hadn't been done in the series since ''Red and Blue'''s Giovanni fight, but it's never actually addressed in the main game. You only learn that she was a Team Flare member when you first meet her at the Elite Four, but even then, this is after that plot has been completed and she just hints at it by mockingly calling you the trainer who beat "big, bad Team Flare" anyway. She only explicitly notes that she was a Team Flare Admin in the post-game when you talk to her during a post-game sidequest. Notably, the anime's incarnation of Malva [[spoiler:is convinced by Ash's hopes and ideals, deciding to pull a HeelFaceTurn to help him and Alain battle against Lysandre to determine the fate of the world]], which was much better-received by fans.
** Tierno, who could have easily battled with a whole team based around "dance" moves, is only fought twice and his other battle appearances are restricted to the Battle Maison (where he can only use 2 Pokémon).
** Some also feel this way about AZ, who does have a well-developed backstory but is introduced a little too late in the plot to make a meaningful impact, and Professor Sycamore, who [[APupilOfMineUntilHeTurnedToEvil has a history with]] [[BigBad Lysandre]] that isn't really expanded on, also appears to be close to the Kalos region's Champion (Diantha is notably the only character to refer to him as [[FirstNameBasis Augustine]]), and is only battled twice despite being the first battleable Professor in the series.
* In general, most Gym Leaders[[note]]bar [[VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite Unova's]], where their careers outside the Gyms are incorporated into said Gyms; and [[VideoGame/PokemonSwordAndShield Galar's]], where they're regional celebrities [[AndZoidberg except Piers]] and so get a lot of screentime[[/note]] and almost all Elite Four members have little focus outside of their roles as obstacles. The Elite Four are especially bad, as they're supposed to be masters of their types and among the best in their given region, but in most games until Gen VII are rarely even commented on as individuals by [=NPCs=], much less have their personalities and backstories explored in much detail. After the aforementioned Malva is her Kalos Elite Four colleague Siebold, who's said to be a famous chef, yet is never mentioned by anyone nor is he seen cooking--even the ''Pokémon Trading Card Game'' elaborates on this further, as some of his cards depict him in a kitchen rather than the Kalos Pokémon League.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' and ''VideoGame/PokemonUltraSunAndUltraMoon'' generally avert this, as their equivalent Trial Captains and Island Kahunas are all encountered multiple times throughout the game as part of the main plot or at least some version-exclusive sidequest. The only significant character who still falls prey to this is Elite Four member Kahili, who is never seen until that point in the game (or, in ''Ultra'', just appears once in a side area), and is only mentioned in passing by a single NPC as being the daughter of the Hano Grand Resort's owner and a former Island Challenge champion.
* Even specific Pokémon can fall into this trope. Genesect is supposedly a genetically-modified cyborg created by Team Plasma, and the project was canceled because it disgusted N. Yet, despite its ''huge'' relationship to the villainous team, it gets exactly zero references in the main game due to being an [[PermanentlyMissableContent event-only]] [[TemporaryOnlineContent Mythical Pokémon]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Project X Zone]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Resident Evil]]
* Special mention goes to Barry Burton. He's quite popular outside of Japan and absolutely ''loved'' by [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff Americans]] because his [[BadBadActing cheesy lines]], [[LargeHam overacting]], love of [[{{BFG}} huge guns]], and his portrayal as a loving family man make him akin to an action star from the 80's, but has vanished completely into the pit of {{Plot Hole}}s along with a lot of other characters. He ''finally'' got his due, a mere [[VideoGame/ResidentEvilRevelations2 19 years later]], where he got to roll up to the party, unleash the [[HamAndCheese Ham, Cheese]], and PapaWolf, and [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome be utterly glorious]].
* Several fans are putting Lady Alcina Dimitrescu from ''VideoGame/ResidentEvilVillage'' in this category. She gained a massive fan following thanks to her creepy yet refined allure, interesting background lore and stylish visual design that combines influences as varied as Countess Bathory, Japanese urban legends and even [[Film/TheAddamsFamily Morticia Addams]]. However, as the first major boss she gets finished off pretty soon, and is but a minor character in the grand scheme of things. Reviewers and fans alike think she's much more interesting than the other enemy characters (including the final boss), and hope for a spin-off or some additional content that will put more focus on her.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Shining Force]]

[[folder:Sonic the Hedgehog]]
* ''VideoGame/SonicGenerations'' includes relatively few of the Classic characters: Sonic, Metal Sonic, Tails, and Eggman. It doesn't include Classic Knuckles or Amy, even though they were prominent characters before the Modern ArtShift.
* Almost every cast member after ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2006''. After the massive outcry of the overabundance of characters, the games were made LighterAndSofter with only Sonic himself in mind, with Tails being the sole major NPC and [[MinimalistCast the bare minimum of supporting characters, usually Knuckles and/or Amy, appearing otherwise.]] [[OutOfFocus Characters that had relevant and engaging roles in previous games have been pushed to the side]], with no mention of their past relationships at all. Even Tails doesn't get to do all that much, and the lack of gameplay variation that results from only Sonic being playable has been noticed, with many fans clamoring for another game where Sonic's friends are playable (ironically, considering what started this trend in the first place!).
* The Deadly Six from ''VideoGame/SonicLostWorld'' are huge examples of this. They could've made very interesting and memorable villains, and while their character interaction is great despite their cliche personalities, everything else is wasted. We know next to nothing about them, why they became the Deadly Six, where they came from, why they were sealed away, why the conch controls them, or what a Zeti even is! [[spoiler:Not to mention their fate is VERY anticlimactic and ambiguous.]] Most we get is some vague little snippets of their relationship to each other and that's about it.
** From the same game, there's Knuckles & Amy, who do absolutely nothing in the story.
* Infinite from VideoGame/SonicForces is a pretty egregious example. He's the focus of most of the advertising, including having a trailer about him and serves as TheHeavy of the game over BigBad, Dr. Eggman. But in the game itself, he ends up not having all that much presence with his almost comical levels of NotWorthKilling despite having the main characters at his mercy numerous times, to the point where ''Eggman'' is the one who calls him out on it. In the end, he's defeated with little fanfare and shoved aside to make way for Eggman as the FinalBoss, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse with his ultimate fate being completely unknown.]] Even the DLC episode that was supposed to flesh out his origins doesn't really add much, because the only addition it had was that he was an unnamed mercenery who suddenly had a freak out after a failed assassination against Shadow, none of which is ever refernced at all in the main campaign.
** Classic Sonic is certainly wasted as well, as he has no interactions with anyone and doesn't have any impact on the plot at all compared to Sonic and the Avatar, which gives fans the impression that he was a last minute addition to tie the game into VideoGame/SonicMania, and because of [[WolverinePublicity his relative marketability.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Super Mario]]
* Princess Daisy. She's Peach's best friend, hinted as love interest of Luigi, and is at a [[TomboyPrincess sharp contrast]] to many of the other female characters yet she's destined to appear in more spinoffs. She even has an entire kingdom, Sarasaland, to explore and from what little we got to see of it in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioLand'' it's a [[ArabianNightsDays desert kingdom]] with [[EenieMeenieMinyMoai Moai]] and [[{{Wutai}} Chinese architecture]].
* Waluigi. A character with little information when it comes to his backstory and origins, a wide arrangement of [[MindScrew strange powers]] [[NewPowersAsThePlotDemands that come and go as they please]], and a surprisingly complex personality. He plays the role of [[StalkerWithoutACrush Luigi's angry rival]], Wario's partner in comedic mischief and the [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} oddball of the cast]], alongside being the [[TheKlutz klutzy]] [[TheChewToy and unlucky]] [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain bad guy]]. Alongside Luigi, he is one of the few characters who underwent actual CharacterDevelopment, going from an angry and narcissistic [[EvilCounterpart rival to Luigi]] who [[GrumpyBear didn't appreciate the joy of the cast]] and [[{{Determinator}} tried very hard]] [[IJustWantToHaveFriends to be popular and liked]], to a [[BewareTheSillyOnes loony and comedic]] {{jerk|ass}} who frustrates himself with his [[ButtMonkey repeated failures]] and [[EvilIsPetty tries to make everyone]] [[TragicVillain as miserable as he]]. He also regularly showcases all sorts of unique powers, including [[GreenThumb growing brambles]], [[NotQuiteFlight swimming in the air]], and [[BlowYouAway summoning tornadoes]], and has an [[GadgeteerGenius inventive streak]], creating things like the giant PinballZone that is [[VideoGame/MarioKart Waluigi Pinball]] and [[VideoGame/MarioSportsMix a backpack with multiple robotic arms that teleports to him on demand]]. Despite all of this making him a well-developed and quirky character, Waluigi, like Daisy, is stuck in spinoffs, where most of his personality only appears in bits and pieces. Furthermore, despite being Wario's sidekick in the sports games, his only appearance between both the ''VideoGame/WarioLand'' and ''VideoGame/WarioWare'' series is a single cameo as a drawing done by Wario in ''[=WarioWare=] Gold''.
* Bowser in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioStickerStar''. After being a hilarious villain in ''VideoGame/PaperMario64'', starring his own playable sections in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'' and being one of the four protagonists in ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'', he's virtually DemotedToExtra, appearing just in three scenes (one of them, admittedly, is the final battle, but still) and having a whooping amount of 0 lines in the entire game. It's especially painful since this is the series where Bowser has pretty much acquired his entire lovable yet evil personality, instead of the mindless brute he is still portrayed as in the platformers. In ''Color Splash'' he has dialogue again, but is still wasted, since he spends the majority of the game [[NotHimself being possessed by the Black Paint]] and clearly has no idea what's going on when it's removed at the very end.
* Of the many characters subject to this in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioColorSplash'', the Koopalings as a whole are most brought up with this trope in mind. Unlike in ''Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam'', the Koopalings don't interact with Mario at all aside from their respective stages and boss fights, whereas in ''Paper Jam'' they appeared throughout the game and some of them were even fought more than once. Not helping any matters is the severe case of DependingOnTheWriter, as some of the personalities in ''Color Splash'' are very different from the ones in ''Paper Jam'' (for example, Morton now speaks in a HulkSpeak manner, which he didn't in Paper Jam, and Roy is suddenly far more intelligent than he was in ''Paper Jam''), which isn't helped by the aforementioned lack of screentime, either.
** In an inversion of this trope where the waste is certain characters not appearing when they would be expected to, a new restriction that popped up with the newer Paper Mario games is they had to be from the main "Super Mario world". Despite this great chance for underused or obscure Mario characters to play a role[[note]]something that only ''Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam'', Sticker Star's sequel of sorts, would fulfill[[/note]], only generic Toads appear as recurring {{Non Player Character}}s. This wouldn't be so jarring, except other level archetypes usually associated with other characters or species also only have Toads[[note]]For example, Surfshine Harbor, a place that brings Piantas to mind by just its name. What's stranger is that Petey Piranha and Gooper Blooper, who debuted in the same game as the Piantas, do appear in this game.[[/note]]. Meanwhile, the bestiary mainly uses enemies or bosses introduced from New Super Mario Bros. 1 and backwards (with the exception of Scaredy Rats and Dry Goombas), when Super Mario Galaxy had been out for 2-3 years by the time Sticker Star started development. For a straighter example of this phenomenon, Yoshis, which are usually portrayed as intelligent beings equal to Toads in other Mario games including the first ''Paper Mario'', only cameo as a sphinx in ''Sticker Star'', and are restricted to two stages in ''Color Splash''. Two of these would be addressed minorly in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing''; Breezy Tunnel is a town of friendly Monty Moles, and more modern enemies are found in the late game such as Stingbies.
* From both the original ''[[VideoGame/PaperMario64 Paper Mario]]'' and ''[[VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor Thousand Year Door]]'', Mario's partner characters. Almost all of them have [[EnsembleDarkhorse large fanbases]], interesting personalities and unique designs. None of them ever appeared in the series barring a [[TheCameo cameo]] past the game they were introduced in.
* ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing'':
** While Origami Peach is featured prominently in marketing, she only shows up at the beginning and end of the game and is [[spoiler:never battled]], as King Olly [[spoiler:eventually unfolds her into a tapestry]]. As Peach does have some natural magic of her own in various games, and has been [[VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor possessed by a villain before]], it would have been nice to see her as Olly’s main dragon, as well as witness what she could do [[spoiler:with her own abilities against Mario]].
** [[spoiler:Captain T. Ode]] is built up as a legendary figure throughout the Yellow Streamer area, and even tags along with you for the Purple Streamer area. Despite this, he has very little involvement outside of providing Mario with the sea chart and manning the Super Marino. He always stays in the boat while Mario and Olivia explore the various islands, does not assist in any battles, and his entire backstory is divulged by a random Toad in the Shangri-Spa who the player isn't even required to talk to. Particularly, there's the reveal that Shangri-Spa still exists, along with Captain T. Ode. Do the people of Shangri-Spa fear him? Does T. Ode try to apologize for stealing the Marino, or use his reputation to manipulate them? T. Ode seems to be the same as in the legends, so has the spa changed in the meantime? None of these plot points are brought up.
** Like Origami Peach, Bowser only appears at the beginning and end of the game. Once he gets unfolded, [[spoiler:he can’t actually take part in normal battles anymore]], shambling a lot of potential in [[spoiler:the coolness of fighting alongside him at full strength]]. Finally, while he [[spoiler:does participate in the final battle]], it’s only for [[spoiler:one gimmick phase]], and is [[spoiler:taken out easily before the next phase]].
** The only new normal enemies in the game are [[spoiler:two sizes of Cutout Soldiers]], created by [[spoiler:Scissors]]. However, they only appear briefly in [[spoiler:Bowser's Castle]], cutting down on their screentime. Considering all the Folded are a result of [[spoiler:Stapler, another Legion member]], and the Folded keep showing up even after [[spoiler:Stapler's demise]], it doesn't make sense why either the [[spoiler:Cutout Soldiers]] don’t appear more or why other Legion members don't have unique minions.
** [[spoiler:The Origami Craftsman]] is revealed to be Olly's creator, first appearing during the lore dump about Olly and Olivia's backstory in the Purple Streamer chapter. [[spoiler:He's just yet another Toad with a slightly different outfit and no proper name, and doesn't end up playing a very big role in the rest of the game despite his importance to the backstory. He shows up once more after the final boss and appears during the credits, but nowhere else. Notably, he also never directly interacts with Olly. It feels like a huge waste of the creative potential that such a character could have had.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tak and the Power of Juju]]
* ''VideoGame/Tak2TheStaffOfDreams'': Fauna wasn't featured or even mentioned in the first game, so how does Tak know her? On that topic, both Flora and Fauna only show up in two stages and Moon Juju only appears in the interlude.
* The Black Mist tribe didn't show up again after ''VideoGame/TakTheGreatJujuChallenge''. Bartog and Crug were charismatic men and are good counterparts to Tak and Lok.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:''Tales'' Series]]
* Cheria in ''VideoGame/TalesOfGraces'' had so much potential! She appears to be just the Token Love Interest character for [[TheHero Asbel]], but her first appearance in the main arc makes it clear that she's supposed to be a deconstruction of that. Tired of Asbel never contacting her over [[TimeSkip the years since childhood]], and knowing that her feelings will never be requited by him, she chose to move on and become her own type of person. This deconstruction doesn't go anywhere as her role diminishes and she's mostly just tagging along after one scene of telling Asbel off. Creator/BandaiNamcoEntertainment does seem to have realized this, as Cheria becomes more developed in ''Tales of Graces f''. Still not nearly as much as she should be though.
* Cheria was lucky compared to many of ''VideoGame/TalesOfDestiny2'' characters. Most of the story focuses so much on Kyle and Reala that there's only a handful scenes for other members, especially so for Loni Dunamis (Kyle's best bud) and Nanaly Fletch (Loni's would-be girlfriend) who, after joining, seemed to exist only to "tag along." At least Judas and Harold got things to do in the past arc, what with [[spoiler:the first being Leon Magnus BackFromTheDead, the other is a historical person.]] And once the past arc is done, it's back to Kyle-Reala getting most focus again, and they're just "tagging along."
* Yeager from ''VideoGame/TalesOfVesperia'' doesn't get a lot of light shed on his motives, despite being a main villain. What little we find out is pieced together through sidequests, and still leaves a lot unsaid.
* Noishe in ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'' is Lloyd's dog-like companion that, by the end of the game, is revealed to be a Protozoan, the first living beings to exist on the planet, and which take many forms throughout their extremely long lifetimes. Of course, other than a handful of times in the beginning, he rarely appears in cutscenes, even though he's tagging along for the whole game, and is used mainly as a way to avoid random battles on the world map until you get the Rheiards. By the time you see the cutscene explaining his origins, you'll probably have forgotten that he even existed.
** Seles, Zelos's younger half-sister, is also an interesting character who doesn't get to do a lot, since she's confined to an Abbey off the coast of Meltokio because [[spoiler:her mother killed Zelos' mother and was executed, while Seles was placed under house-arrest despite doing nothing wrong.]] Zelos greatly cares for his little sister despite this, and it would have been interesting to see her take on the events in their backstory, as well as the fact that her mother was a half-elf means Seles could have been a sympathiser for the plight of the half-elves in Tethe'alla, or fervently against them thanks to her mother's actions, but we only encounter her once in the game and then she's relegated to being a BonusBoss in the Meltokio Coliseum.
* ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheTempest'': Prince Tilkis, fourth in line to the throne of Senishibia (an [[WhatCouldHaveBeen entire other continent you never get to visit]]) who, when his country was attacked by Spots, sailed across the ocean in a ''rowboat'' with only one bodyguard [[RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething to figure out what the hell's going on]]. Sounds like he's pretty important, right? Wrong. He's the only character without an arc (save a little that was tacked on to Arria's and Forest's) and has very little involvement in the plot in general.
* ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia2'': Alternate Milla, who originates from a fractured dimension in which she managed to successfully complete her mission years ago, all while working alongside Muzét, who ended up being blinded by an attack that she [[TakingTheBullet protected Milla from]]. It already gives potential to figuring out ''how'' this Milla won earlier and it could leave for interesting banter between her and the prime dimension's Muzét. Since she's also stuck in the prime dimension with no way of going home, it could be explored on how she feels about the removal of the shism and whether she could have chosen that route as well, compared to whatever she did in her own dimension. As it is, she only gets one skit worth of minor banter with Muzét and only offhandedly mentions how she hates how Elympios has such wide-spread Spyrix technology. [[spoiler:The only purpose she ends up serving in the game, is to pointlessly die to bring the prime dimension's Milla into your party and leave a minor, quickly-forgotten tense atmosphere between prime Milla and Elle.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Undertale]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Undertale}}'':
** Mettaton has a form you can only see in a No Mercy run, [[spoiler:Mettaton NEO]], that comes complete with its own theme tune. [[spoiler:He still dies in a single hit, just like most of the other bosses in a No Mercy run. Even Toriel and Papyrus got memorable PlayerPunch death scenes.]] However, for those who wanted a [[spoiler:real boss fight]], ''VideoGame/{{Deltarune}}'' delivers a very fun counterpart with [[spoiler:Spamton NEO, the BonusBoss of Chapter 2]].
** A lot of fans would have liked to see Muffet's character explored in more detail. More than a few fans have argued that her design and concept alone would have been enough to warrant a larger role in the story. Considering that she's a backer character, her lack of presence is justified, at least.
** [[spoiler:Dr. W. D. Gaster]]. Everything about him (role, fate, relationship with [[spoiler:Sans]]) sounds really fascinating, but you will only get to find about all of this by searching DummiedOut content, via a small random chance in any given playthrough, and in some cases you need to ''hack the game files'' to encounter what might possibly be him. Then again, this seems to be the whole point of his character and a possible SequelHook.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:The Walking Dead]]
* In an AnyoneCanDie story like this, with flawed but mostly sympathetic characters, this was almost inevitable, with Carley as easily the biggest case of this. Other characters, like Doug, Duck, Katjaa and Mark can count as well.
* Every single character from the 400 DLC (besides Bonnie and Tavia) served no purpose in Season 2 besides having a very short cameo. And on top of that, it's possible that they were all KilledOffScreen when Carver's compound was being overrun by the herd of walkers.
* A lot of Sarah and Nick fans feel like their anticlimactic deaths in Episode 4 wasted two of the arguably most complex and well-developed characters in all of Season 2.
* Arvo and by extension the rest of his group can also count for being killed off too early, with many pointing out that Arvo was reduced to a plot device to show how unhinged Kenny had become and that the player was not allowed to interact with him so he would stay paranoid at Clementine and shoot her. His reasoning for hiding the bag of medicine in the first place was never explained either.
* How some players feel regarding Luke. He seemed to be built up as a major character: his personal talk with Clementine in Episode 1, rivalry with Kenny, and coming back to save the group in Episode 3 in a BigDamnHeroes moment had many hoping that he would be (somewhat) a very major character. It didn't exactly help that he was heavily featured in the promotion images of episodes 2 and 4. And unfortunately, he's replaced by Jane in his rivalry in Kenny, and dies halfway through episode 5.
* Some players feel that Christa as of Season 2 have been casually tossed aside immediately after just the first episode when a group of random bandits attack the two and causing them to split up permanently, with Clementine never finding Christa again. The players also seem to raise the issue that Christa's single-handedly raising Clementine on her own for eighteen months after the death of her unborn child and her boyfriend is also [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot casually glossed over in favour of Clementine moving on to a new group as soon as possible]], [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute which just so happens to also contain a no-nonsense pregnant woman]].
* It gets worse in Season 3 as Clementine makes absolutely no mention of her whatsoever in any of her playable flashback sequences in ''A New Frontier''. Kenny and Jane are at least shown on-screen for a few minutes interacting with Clementine, even if they are [[DroppedABridgeOnHim anti-climatically killed off at the end of their scenes]] to help explain why Clementine remains alone in ''A New Frontier''. Christa has no such luck, as her relationship and parenting with Clementine within the eighteen month time-skip is never explored, and Clementine appears to have presumably forgotten about her completely.
* Season 3 has Mariana. Echoing Clem from season 1, she's a goodhearted kid who knows how to listen, knows when to hide, gets along with everyone and is just a general bright person. She's unceremoniously capped near the end of episode 1.
* Joan from ''A New Frontier''. A promising adversary, with a "For the good of the community" motive behind her... until the closing of episode 4, where she devolves from complex villain, to full-on cackling madwoman.
* [[WhatCouldHaveBeen Originally]], Eleanor was supposed to be Joan's daughter. Not only would this somewhat justify her betrayal of Javi and his group, accidental or not (depending on the player's actions), but this would also make Eleanor herself quite a complex character, but sadly this didn't make to the final game.
* A big reason why the cast of ''A New Frontier'' are disliked is because there is absolutely no time for deep CharacterDevelopment for them compared to previous characters like Lee, Kenny, Clementine, or even Michonne. Many complaints about the third installment revolve around how the story isn't as enjoyable than when the game series started is because it has not provided reasons to care for the player's fellow survivors on account of speeding through the conflict and making them all one-note [[FlatCharacter flat characters]] who'll eventually die.
* Lilly re-appears in the second episode of ''The Final Season'' as the leader of the Raiders, determined to kidnap the Ericson kids and use them as soldiers in a war against another group of survivors. Lilly quickly sets herself up as a great threat: kidnapping, torturing, killing, and (in Minnie's case) brainwashing them when they don't comply. But if you tell AJ not to kill her, she simply leaves within the first ten minutes of the final episode, with only one final bitter talk between her and Clem.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Warcraft]]
* Several characters from ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft''. A prime example is Shandris Feathermoon, Tyrande's adopted daughter and leader of the Sentinels when Tyrande decided to focus on leading the priesthood of Elune. She has her own spy network, is one of the best archers in Azeroth (if not the best) and has thousands of years of experience. In ''Mists of Pandaria'', these traits would make her a strong candidate for positon of leader of the Alliance's joint armies (since the faction leaders had their own duties). Despite this she is reduced to being a background character only showing up in a few quests and cameos in the expanded universe. Others include Kael'thas Sunstrider and Malygos (Blizzard even admitted they dropped the ball regarding Kael'thas). On the villains side there's Anub'arak, Tichondrius, and Mannoroth.
* Among the many criticisms of ''Battle for Azeroth'' is its throwaway handling of many long-hyped characters, especially King Rastakhan, Queen Azshara, and the old god N'Zoth. Rastakhan was built up from Vanilla as the ruler of the last holdout of the great ancient troll civilization, only to be killed by the Alliance and replaced by his daughter Talanji in the second patch of the expansion. Queen Azshara, meanwhile, was the empress of the ancient night elf empire that much of the game's lore centers around, and had been built up for almost twenty years since ''Warcraft III'' as one of the game's primary antagonists. Her fate is to be introduced and dumped within a single patch of an expansion that ostensibly had little to do with her, when many fans considered her to be worthy of a whole expansion in her own right. Finally, N'Zoth was the last remaining [[EldritchAbomination old god]] yet to be encountered by players, and, again within a single patch of an expansion that started out having nothing to do with him, is defeated and killed via an incredibly goofy looking CombinedEnergyAttack. Much like Azshara, N'Zoth and the Black Empire was widely considered worthy of its own expansion.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Other Video Games]]
* In VideoGame/{{A3}}, this happens to a lot of the characters in ''Last Planet'' play due to its sheer amount of characters. The countdown illustration drop for Varg caused an uproar because he just oozes with EvilIsCool aura, having an AwesomeMcCoolName, a transparent CoatCape, and a literal [[EnergyBlade lightsaber]] as revealed in his R card. The caption for his illustration? TriggerHappy. Complete with a PsychoticSmirk. As he is affiliated with the Space Police and played by Homare, he is a reminiscence of Homare's AxCrazy [[DirtyCop Dewey]] from the stage shuffle. However, we never actually get to see his TriggerHappy nature, or at least him in action, even in the 5th anniversary spin-offs of the play. At most, he only gets an OffscreenMomentOfAwesome in the second half as he pulls a BigDamnHeroes moment on the treasure hunters; the other time he is Grimm's loyal companion [[spoiler:(though as the spin-off shows, Varg can be quite rebellious as Grimm's assistant)]]. The 5th anniversary trivia also reveals that Varg has CombatClairvoyance ability...which is never shown in the play or the spin-off as Varg never truly gets on-screen action scenes.
* Isabelle in ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossingNewHorizons''. So much fanfare is given to her arrival, and she has basically become the SeriesMascot. Unfortunately, once K.K slider performs for the first time, Isabelle doesn't have anything to say when she [[ScrappyMechanic injects herself into every play session to talk about her TV habits]]. Her role is significantly reduced from her ''New Leaf'' appearance, causing her to become a BaseBreakingCharacter at best or players viewing her as a CreatorsPet at worst.
* In ''VideoGame/ArcanumOfSteamworksAndMagickObscura'', one of the earliest followers you can gain is Jayna Stiles, a half-elf tech healer. Although half-elves have a natural affinity for magic, she uses technology because magic healers failed to save her parents during a plague. She lives in a dying kingdom that shuns technology and joins you so she can learn everything she can to make her kingdom a better place. Once she joins your party, the game treats her like an extra. She never has meaningful conversations with you and has no bearing on the subplots that involve her kingdom. She doesn't even get a voice actor.
* The Count of Groundsoaking Blood from ''VideoGame/{{Boktai}}'' is easily the most fascinating and well-developed of all the villains. He's the one who killed Django's father, the proxy reason Django himself gained his vampiric powers (as well as reawakens them in the third game), forms an EnemyMine scenario with Django in the third game (Sort of, it's complicated), is the only immortal who can come back ''even'' after being roasted by the Piledriver (not even the series' [[BigBad Big Bads]] can accomplish this), and has a completely under developed romance with Queen Hel. Unfortunately he's the first level boss in every game he appears in, and thus always dies before the plot of the game even kicks off.
* ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'' suffers from this. A good quarter of the playable cast is closely tied to the plot and has absolutely fantastic storytelling potential, including one that was [[WhatCouldHaveBeen originally intended to be a returning character from]] [[VideoGame/ChronoTrigger the previous game]] and another intended to be the son of two chracters from the same. Other characters have interesting and engaging introductions that could've gone somewhere. But, to cram in the thirty-odd ''other'' cast members -- including one-note and frankly ridiculous designs like the talking dog or sentient turnip -- any connections to the previous game were dropped and characterization abbreviated. The end result is that barely anyone receives any character development past their introductions or, if they're lucky, a brief sidequest to unlock their Level 7 Tech. Then, with the exception of the male and female protagonists, they effectively cease to exist.
* ''VideoGame/Cyberpunk2077'' has pretty much everyone established in Act 1 offed unceremoniously in the opening of Act 2. PlayfulHacker T-Bug gets offed by the security mid-heist, BigFun BoisterousBruiser Jackie dies from his wounds during the escape, treacherous SmugSnake Dex is shot by Takemura, depriving V of revenge, and the FemmeFatale Evelyn commits suicide after being sold off to the Scavengers.
* ''VideoGame/DeadToRights'' has several characters die after appearing in just a few chapters (if they're lucky), but the clearest example of this trope is Patch, a suave assassin who is introduced in a cutscene getting the drop on Jack Slate, killing the villain he was chasing for most of the chapter, and framing Jack for his murder, leading to the [[PrisonEpisode prison level]]. Making the scene memorable is that he has a distinct design from the other villains (dyed hair, the eponymous {{eyepatch|OfPower}}, and a [[BlingBlingBang gold Luger]]), speaks with a subtle accent (unlike some other characters), and treats his hits as if he were an artist, complete with discussing his hit on the phone as if negotiating an art commission. He does not get ''a single line'' for the rest of the game, and does not appear again until four chapters later, where he dies anticlimactically in a CarChase boss fight.
* In ''VideoGame/DisneyPrincessEnchantedJourney'', Zara is an interesting character with a vaguely defined backstory and an implied history with the heroine, has a cool design, and has the distinction of being Disney's first ''wicked'' princess. She only appears at the final boss fight, and is never mentioned before or after it.
* All the origins characters in ''VideoGame/DivinityOriginalSinII'' were well received, but some feel this trope happened with Beast. Every other origin character either has some kind of destiny to fulfill (Red Prince, Sebille), have [[ItsPersonal a deep-seated revenge motivation]] against the games' [[BigBad big bads]] (Ifan), have a DemonicPossession (Lohse), or played a ''major'' role in the backstory (Fane). Beast's goal overall is pretty mundane, not helped by the fact that he essentially gets all his leads within the first couple hours of Act two - meaning that he'll spend a lot of time following the group around while the other characters are getting leads for their own quests. Unless you romance him, he undergoes very little CharacterDevelopment. Part of the reason with Beast being OutOfFocus is the fact that Justinia's the VillainOfAnotherStory - the politics of the Dwarven Kingdom factor very little into the plot.
* ''VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub'':
** An interesting example is Monika. She's a SchoolIdol who shared a class with the player character, has an interesting character design, and has plenty of lines suggesting she is a love interest. However, she does not have a route, and remains the NotLoveInterest instead. [[spoiler:As it turns out, Monika agrees in-universe. See, she not only knows she's a character in a DatingSim, but resents the fact that her only role is to root for the other girls who are programmed to fall in love with the player. Cue HostileShowTakeover and SurpriseCreepy.]]
** Of the four girls, Natsuki has the least focus. However, what focus she gets is compelling. She's a {{Tsundere}} who's OlderThanSheLooks. Much like the player character, she is a ClosetGeek who keeps her manga in the clubroom and insists that it counts as literature. It's implied the reason why she's so defensive is because she doesn't get along with her classmates [[spoiler:and she has a horrible home life where her father beats her, judges her for her interests, and often doesn't feed her properly.]] Despite her crankiness, once she opens up she shows a sweet, affectionate side that's [[DesperatelyCravesAffection desperate to have someone like her]] and for the club to remain a place where she feels safe. She even has a pleasant FriendshipMoment where she begs the player to [[spoiler:help Yuri overcome her obvious SanitySlippage.]] However, she gets OutOfFocus in Act 2, and only has one major scene exploring her psyche [[spoiler:before she's KilledOffscreen by the end of the Act]]. [[WordOfGod Dan Salvato himself]] has said he wishes he could have added more to her story.
** The MC so far is the least developed due to being intentionally relegated to stock VN protagonist. Some people felt he was wasted as a character and would've loved to learn what inner demon he has, considering his deadpan snarker nature with Sayori and being the only character to never die.
* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestV'': Bishop Ladja in the original game, with his initial Moral Event Horizon -burning [[spoiler:the hero's father to ashes and making the hero a slave]]- when he first appears seem like a great way to set him up as a major villain, but he ends up being nothing more than a flunky for King Korol, whose actions have far less of an emotional impact on the player. Thankfully, his role is expanded in the remakes.
* ''VideoGame/FatalFrame V'' gives Miu Hinasaki interesting concepts, but they end up not being well executed. She's the daughter of Miku, the protagonist of the first game, and also a Shadowborn, meaning that she has a human mother and a ghost father. [[spoiler:Her father is also heavily implied in-game, and confirmed in [[AllThereInTheManual supplementary material]], to be Miku's brother, Mafuyu.]] Her being a Shadowborn is only important in terms of explaining [[DaddyHadAGoodReasonForAbandoningYou why Miku left her daughter years ago]], but otherwise doesn't seem to have any effect on her. The only other aspect her plotline explains is the concept of the Yuukon -- Ghost Marriage -- which gets a much bigger focus in Ren's story. As it is, Miu is mostly there for some ContinuityPorn for older fans.
* ''Everyone'' in ''VideoGame/Injustice2'' that is not the Justice League, Black Adam or Brainiac. Most of them are given extremely short explanations about why their fighting that [[AllThereInTheManual are already explained on the website]] (and sometimes not even ''that''). Special mention goes to [[spoiler:the entire Society (which is disbanded without any rhyme or reason and gives everyone bar Grodd an UncertainDoom), Robin (who never talks to Batman after the intro) and Doctor Fate (who does ''literally nothing'' for the entire story and then dies)]].
* ''VideoGame/KidIcarusUprising'' has Magnus, with a cool design and backstory, with a very fitting voice actor. He appears in a grand total of three chapters. There's also Poseidon, yes, ''[[Myth/GreekMythology that]]'' Poseidon, who only appears in one chapter and the end credits.
* The trailer for ''VideoGame/KnockoutCity'' contains multiple original characters from different genres of games being interviewed. Despite their unique personalities, they have no relation to the game itself, as the interview only serves as a FramingDevice to talk about the game. [[https://twitter.com/Officiallythat2/status/1362896677674319876 Multiple]] [[https://twitter.com/MonkeyDLenny/status/1362204656101916673 people]] have expressed that they'd be more interested in a game where these diverse characters get to meet and interact with each other, rather than the arena sports game they were used to advertise.
* Sarah from ''VideoGame/LostOdyssey'' seems to be the one party member who has little to no character development in the game. Her purpose seems to be to look after the kids and give Kaim an opportunity to show his softer side. She's also the only immortal who doesn't have an entry in the 1000 Years Of Dreams.
* ''VideoGame/OctopathTraveler'':
** Lyblac. Despite The Reveal that she's the Overarching Villain that ties together everyone's stories, she's unceremoniously offed and absorbed into Galdera for the final fight, reduced to one of his Cognizant Limbs in the second phase. Some feel she should've been the final boss, if not her own boss fight. Others wish she'd gotten more development than an info dump final dungeon.
** Esmeralda. One of the common complaints about Tressa's fourth chapter is how underdeveloped the final boss of her story is. Though Esmeralda is revealed in other parts of the story to be a member of Obsidians and implied to have wanted Tressa's diary to track down Graham Crossford, little of this is actually touched on in Tressa's story. Furthermore, the fact she decides to kill Tressa for trying to get the journal back despite admitting it was useless comes across as her existing for the sake of a boss fight and little else.
** Simeon. Though a BaseBreakingCharacter to begin with, even fans who like Simeon's role in the plot feel there could've been more done with him. In particular, the fact he's introduced in the same chapter he betrays Primrose and reveals himself to be the mastermind of her route is considered wasteful, with some feeling he should've been introduced earlier or his relationship with Primrose more developed before TheReveal.
* ''VideoGame/Persona3'': The male members of your party are not Social Links, unlike the female members, who are the Social Links for the Arcanas they represent [[note]]except Aigis, who uses a Chariot Persona, but is the Aeon Social Link[[/note]], because of that, they feel notably underdeveloped despite their focus in the story's actual plot when compared to the female ones, who not only have an arc in the game's main story, but also a more personal arc that explores their characters more in-depth. To some, this is worsened by the fact that the actual Social Links can feel like watered down versions of your male party members, in particular the Magician Social Link, where Kenji feels like a less interesting version of Junpei. This has since been [[AuthorsSavingThrow rectified in the franchise]]; the UpdatedReRelease of the game, ''Persona 3 Portable'', added a different route to play, in which your male party members are Social Links for their respective Arcanas (even [[HeroicDog Koromaru]]); in the subsequent games of the franchise, all your party members are also Social Links.
* Considering the sheer amount of characters ''VideoGame/Persona5'' has to juggle, it's no surprise that some of them come off as underutilized:
** Shiho. The opening hour of the game sets her up as a fairly important, or at least a reoccurring side character, what with her status as Ann's best friend and the conspicuous amount of voiced lines she gets. However, her primary role is to show how terrible Kamoshida's physical and sexual abuse are, and as a motivation to let Ann join the Phantom Thieves. She basically disappeared from the plot afterwards, with Ann only mentioning her in passing a few times. A lot of people wish Shiho was a Confidant outright, but her only role in the plot after [[StarterVillain Kamoshida's]] arc is resolved is a brief appearance in Ann's ninth-rank conversation. To rub salt in the wound, said event where she reappears reveals she's leaving Tokyo for good.
** Many feel ''so much more'' could have been done with [[spoiler:Goro Akechi, especially given he outright disappears from the story after the events of Shido's Palace and is completely absent for the final battle against Yaldabaoth]]. A common example of this is that [[spoiler:many viewed his BolivianArmyEnding scene as being poorly written, leaving those who were expecting Akechi to rejoin the Phantom Thieves and [[RedemptionQuest redeem himself]] disappointed]]. Fortunately, ''Royal'' gives them a lot more screentime and character development.
** To some extent, Haru suffers from LateCharacterSyndrome. While she has a significant role in the plot and receives a fair amount of CharacterDevelopment and characterization, she has less room to develop (especially with how [[ThatOneSidequest steep requirements are to progress in her Confidant)]]. By comparison, [[VideoGame/Persona4 Naoto]] joins in early October (shortly after Haru), but had been a recurring character since May, whereas Haru gets only a scant handful of appearances. Moreover, the rewards her Confidant yields give access to the only other source of free SP curatives in the game (the other being Sojiro's coffee and curry) - but her method is a garden which takes a few days to grow the items. By the point she can be accessed, this potential source of SP restoration will never be able to be used to its fullest potential, especially in a game where MagicIsRareHealthIsCheap. It also pales in comparison to using the coffee and curry made from Sojiro's Confidant, which the player can have Kawakami make for them, freeing them up to do more tasks that night, and improve at a good rate.
** Kaneshiro is largely viewed as a FillerVillain by the game's fandom. He's certainly a scumbag for the Phantom Thieves to take down, and doing so finally puts them on the map. But Kaneshiro has a much less personal connection with Makoto than any other Palace Ruler does with their Phantom Thief. It's less about what Kaneshiro has done to Makoto and more what he threatens to do -- sell her into sex slavery to pay off a manufactured debt. And even then, Makoto quickly figures out that [[NothingPersonal it's not even about Makoto herself]], but Makoto's older sister Sae, who Kaneshiro wants RevengeByProxy on because Sae is a public prosecutor who's breathing down his neck. The only real plot advancements that happen during his arc are Makoto joining and the Thieves becoming more popular; Kaneshiro's change of heart occurs entirely off-screen, and his name barely comes up again after his arc is over.
** For an example of a Persona getting this treatment, [[spoiler:Azathoth. In the Franchise/CthulhuMythos proper, Azathoth is both the father of Nyarlathotep and the Ultimate Chaos, stated to have unlimited power. In the ''VideoGame/Persona2'' duology, Nyarlathotep is established as the [[AnthropomorphicPersonification manifestation]] of [[TheHeartless the negative aspects of humanity]], and throughout the story of those games manipulates reality so that rumors come true and even successfully brings about TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. With all of this in mind, Nyarlathotep's dad could easily become a severely major threat not just for the ''Persona'' series, but ''Shin Megami Tensei'' as a whole (Sure, he already debuted in ''Giten Megami Tensei: Tokyo Mokushiroku'', but 1) That game is extremely obscure, 2) He made no reappearance for years until ''Persona 5 Royal'', and 3) He was only a regular enemy in ''Giten Megami Tensei''). And so here he comes, becoming a major antagonist for ''Persona 5 Royal''...and he's nothing more than a ''decayed'' form for Maruki's persona, and its true form is from Gnosticism instead of Lovecraftian Lore. While something is obviously off since the persona can act up autonomously, he has seemingly nothing to do with Nyarlathotep's deal (and in fact, does exactly the ''reverse'' things as said Nyarlathotep). To say that fans were underwhelmed wouldn't even ''begin'' to describe the reaction.]]
** In ''Royal'', Joker's third-tier persona, Raoul, gets relegated to DLC in contrast to the rest of the Phantom Thieves. Many fans were hoping that Raoul would play an important role in the third semester, [[spoiler:especially in the final battle against Adam Kadmon.]]
** Adding on to the list of underused Personas, the third tier personas for Akechi and [[spoiler:Sumire]] can only be obtained on the date that happens before fighting the FinalBoss. So, unless the player does last minute grinding right before they fought the FinalBoss, those Personas are likely to be only used for fighting the FinalBoss.
** Despite a lot of ''Royal'''s marketing [[AdvertisedExtra focusing on her character]], Kasumi does not join the party until the third semester [[spoiler:in the final dungeon which roughly lasts a month, meaning that you won't have as much time to play with her as compared to the other characters, and at that point the plot is centered around Maruki, leaving her with comparatively little influence on the main story. Worse, even though she had awakened her persona by the time of Shido's palace, she was flat out refused by the Thieves from joining them under the justification that it's too dangerous for her. This comes off as contrived considering that they took no issue with their newest members joining them during their palace heists.]]
* In ''VideoGame/PillarsOfEternityIIDeadfire'', Ydwin is an [[SufficientlyAnalyzedMagic animancer]] MadScientist who was considered as a full character and still has all the plot hooks when you recruit her, but as a sidekick she has very little to say after being recruited. The fandom tends to be strongly pro-animancy despite its ambiguous portrayal in-game, and were hoping to help her out in the [[ProfessorGuineaPig mad experiments on her soul]] hinted at when being recruited.
* ''Videogame/{{Prototype}}'' did this to ''its own main character'', of all people, in its [[VideoGame/{{Prototype2}} second opus]]. Alex Mercer was fairly popular with most fans of the first (though some people found him unlikeable); his look and backstory were fairly unique, he was recognized as badass, and he got character development, going from VillainProtagonist to on his way to become an AntiHero. ''VideoGame/{{Prototype 2}}'' undoes his character development, has him [[RogueProtagonist turning evil]] for unclear reasons and [[spoiler:ending up killed by the new main character, with few character traits being carried from the end of ''Prototype'' to his behavior in ''2''.]] To put it worst, he has a reduced role even as a villain, and his rivalry with new protagonist James Heller isn't explored. Many believe it was because of this decision that caused the game to not sell as well and led to the near bankruptcy of Radical.
* ''VideoGame/{{Psychonauts}}'' develops even the random {{Non Player Character}}s with their own back stories and personalities, so you could say this for just about any of them. [[MadScientist Dr. Loboto]] may be the best example, though--a DepravedDentist, [[RuleOfFunny one of the funniest characters]] and set up as the BigBad (or at least TheDragon to him), he turns out to be TheUnfought.
* ''Franchise/RatchetAndClank'':
** Almost all of the female characters who could've turned out to be Ratchet's love interest are PutOnABus in the next game. Although it's probably because the creators don't want a RomanticPlotTumor.
** One of the biggest complaints in Deadlocked is that you can't use Clank.
* [[InspectorJavert Carmelita]] becomes a fully playable SixthRanger of the Cooper Gang in ''VideoGame/SlyCooperThievesInTime'', something fans have been waiting for since the ''very beginning''. The entire '''three missions''' you get to use her for are a spectacular letdown.
* ''Franchise/StarFox'': Krystal had a much bigger role in the Dinosaur Planet game but got heavily reduced in the final game of Star Fox Adventures, she acts as a damsel in distress and love interest, being imprisoned already at the start of the game and being absend the whole game until the end where she is rescued by Fox. Even in the later games, we don't learn anything new about her past and extinct race nor is she in the focus, just having the role of the hot chick and love interest of Fox.
* ''VideoGame/SniperEliteIII'': Brauer, the British prisoner rescued from Fort Rifugio. He's initially presented as a foil to the ColdSniper PlayerCharacter Karl Fairburne, establishing a strong base for interaction and cooperation between the two for the rest of the game. However, half of his screen time focuses on his [[EscortMission Fairburne-assisted escape from German custody]], and he only gets two [[TheCavalry small]] [[TargetSpotter parts]] in the two following missions before [[DroppedABridgeOnHim very suddenly getting blown up by a tank]].
* ''VideoGame/Splatoon2'', despite having a surprising level of backstory and lore concerning its universe, initially suffered from underutilizing several characters badly. The new idols, Pearl and Marina, have no role in the game's story mode and thus lack much needed development. Cap'n Cuttlefish is straight-up not in the game. Callie not appearing [[spoiler:following the FinalBoss fight]] resulted in a months-long in-game hashtag campaign called #[=BringCallieBack=]. All of this does get addressed in later updates and the ''Octo Expansion'' campaign, but some things remained unanswered. The major one being that ''nobody'' knows what Mr. Grizz's deal is, with such information not even being found in [[AllThereInTheManual supplementary material]].
* ''VideoGame/WolfensteinIITheNewColossus'': The ''Freedom Chronicles'' mission pack introduces three new characters fighting the Nazi occupation in different places across the US: [[IKnowMaddenKombat Joseph Stallion]], an American pro-football player fighting Nazis in Chicago and in space; [[DarkActionGirl Jessica Valiant]], a British ex-OSS assassin tracking a Nazi collaborator across California from charming Tinsel Town to the scorching desert; and [[OldSoldier Captain Gerald Wilkins]], a former US Army Captain dismantling a Nazi superweapon research operation in Alaska. Players were excited for a series of side stories exploring other heroes in different areas of the Nazi-occupied US and even the possibility of them meeting up with Blazko and co., until Episode Zero was released which revealed that the stories are in-universe Resistance propaganda pulp fiction, all three characters are fictional and the stories are non-canon.
* Any playable character in ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}'' who isn't Fei, Citan, Elly, or Bart. Rico, Maria, Emerelda, Billy, and Chu-Chu are mostly giving commentary past their initial scenes. These characters include secret royalty, someone piloting a sentient gear that might be their mother, the world's only nanomachine colony, a member of a false religion's clergy who learns it was a scam, and a member of a dying race. LetsPlay/TheDarkId made fun of this in his LetsPlay of the game:
--> '''Bart:''' Aren't you the one who picked up that Rico Guy?\\
'''Fei:''' ...Who?\\
'''Bart:''' That [[VideoGame/StreetFighter Blanka]] looking guy.\\
'''Fei:''' That guy is STILL around? The hell?
** Part of the reason Emerelda's so OutOfFocus in ''Xenogears'' is that her {{Backstory}} takes place long before the game begins. [[WhatCouldHaveBeen Emerelda was born during what was intended to be episode three of a six-part series]].
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* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI'' has a lot of these, due to the cast of 14 playable characters. Everyone but Terra, Celes, Locke, Edgar, Sabin, Kefka, and arguably Cyan fall victim to this.

* In VideoGame/{{A3}}, this happens to a lot of the characters in ''Last Planet'' play due to its [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters sheer amount of characters]]. The countdown illustration drop for Varg caused an uproar because he just oozes with EvilIsCool aura, having an AwesomeMcCoolName, a transparent CoatCape, and a literal [[EnergyBlade lightsaber]] as revealed in his R card. The caption for his illustration? TriggerHappy. Complete with a PsychoticSmirk. As he is affiliated with the Space Police and played by Homare, he is a reminiscence of Homare's AxCrazy [[DirtyCop Dewey]] from the stage shuffle. However, we never actually get to see his TriggerHappy nature, or at least him in action, even in the 5th anniversary spin-offs of the play. At most, he only gets an OffscreenMomentOfAwesome in the second half as he pulls a BigDamnHeroes moment on the treasure hunters; the other time he is Grimm's loyal companion [[spoiler:(though as the spin-off shows, Varg can be quite rebellious as Grimm's assistant)]]. The 5th anniversary trivia also reveals that Varg has CombatClairvoyance ability...which is never shown in the play or the spin-off as Varg never truly gets on-screen action scenes.

* In VideoGame/{{A3}}, this happens to a lot of the characters in ''Last Planet'' play due to its [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacter sheer amount of characters]]. The countdown illustration drop for Varg caused an uproar because he just oozes with EvilIsCool aura, having an AwesomeMcCoolName, a transparent CoatCape, and a literal [[EnergyBlade lightsaber]] as revealed in his R card. The caption for his illustration? TriggerHappy. Complete with a PsychoticSmirk. As he is affiliated with the Space Police and played by Homare, he is a reminiscence of Homare's AxCrazy [[DirtyCop Dewey]] from the stage shuffle. However, we never actually get to see his TriggerHappy nature, or at least him in action, even in the 5th anniversary spin-offs of the play. At most, he only gets an OffscreenMomentOfAwesome in the second half as he pulls a BigDamnHeroes moment on the treasure hunters; the other time he is Grimm's loyal companion [[spoiler:(though as the spin-off shows, Varg can be quite rebellious as Grimm's assistant)]]. The 5th anniversary trivia also reveals that Varg has CombatClairvoyance ability...which is never shown in the play or the spin-off.

* Considering [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters the sheer amount of characters]] ''VideoGame/Persona5'' has to juggle, it's no surprise that some of them come off as underutilized:

** Motaro, the [[OurCentaursAreDifferent Centaurian]] warrior who serves as TheDragon of Shao Kahn in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat3'' and its spinoffs, is a case of RealLifeWritesThePlot, as his four-legged Centaurian form proved very difficult for Netherrealm Studios and their Midway predecessors to transition into the 3D era (leading to the notorious "plot twist" in ''VideoGame/MortalKombatArmageddon'' where he was transformed into a biped). While 2011's reboot sees him make a return (and kill off Johnny Cage in a possible BadFuture), he is once again unplayable and is killed off midway through the game by Rayden. At this point one wishes Netherrealm would just hire a programmer that knows how to create a 4-legged playable character, since it's obvious no one currently on their payroll knows how to pull it off.

[[folder:Five Nights at Freddy's]]
* ''VideoGame/FiveNightsAtFreddysSisterLocation'': Ballora is one of the few animatronics in the franchise to have a humanoid appearance, and the first to look like an adult. She's a ballerina animatronic programmed to teach kids how to get fit, as well as [[spoiler:distracting the parents while their children get killed/abducted]]. She also has the unique game mechanic of being blind, so you have to move slowly through her gallery. Her voice lines on Night 2 are a song about how lonely she is without anyone to perform for, and, [[UnreliableExpositor according to Baby]] [[spoiler:was against the plan to scoop you, not because she didn't want to hurt you, but because she was "afraid." Despite this, she became part of Ennard anyways.]] Despite all this characterization, as well as having a voice actress, the only time you directly encounter her after Night 2 is on Night 4, when [[spoiler:Baby [[ForcedToWatch forces you to watch]] Ballora get scooped, leaving her out of commission until Ennard is formed.]]
* For the longest time, [[FeatheredFiend Chica]] was the least utilized out of [[VideoGame/FiveNightsAtFreddys1 the original four]]. [[BearsAreBadNews Freddy]] is TheLeader and has his gold variant, [[CunningLikeAFox Foxy]] has unique game mechanics throughout the series, and [[HairRaisingHare Bonnie]] is directly associated with the BigBad. In contrast, Chica is just... there, and is rarely given as much focus. However, later installments have given Chica more attention [[AuthorsSavingThrow in an attempt to rectify this]]: in particular, [[spoiler:the child possessing Chica has been given some extra characterization, as she was a little girl named Susie who was lured to her death by Afton promising to let her see her recently deceased puppy again. She also has ADayInTheLimelight in ''Literature/FiveNightsAtFreddysFazbearFrights'' story "Coming Home", and a voice line in ''VideoGame/UltimateCustomNight'' [[WhamLine reveals]] that Susie was the first of the Missing Children to die.]]
[[/folder]]

* ''Everyone'' in ''VideoGame/Injustice2'' that is not the Justice League, Black Adam or Brainiac. Most of them are given extremely short explanations about why their fighting that [[AllThereInTheManual are already explained on the website]] (and sometimes not even ''that''). Special mention goes to [[spoiler:the entire Society (which is disbanded without any rhyme or reason and gives everyone bar Grodd an AmbiguousFate), Robin (who never talks to Batman after the intro) and Doctor Fate (who does ''literally nothing'' for the entire story and then dies)]].

*** The Taliver Bandits, a group of brigands estsablished as the collective TokenMotivationalNemesis to Lyn, and built up to be [[TheDreaded the most terrifying brigand group in the setting]]. The player [[TheUnfought never actually fights]] or even sees them, as [[spoiler:they're KilledOffscreen by Wallace during the TimeSkip]]. While the story does find a way to tie this into her CharacterDevelopment, it's nonetheless anticlimactic and doesn't help [[DemotedToExtra integrate her into the main story at all]] (despite being a main character).

** There's also FinalBoss Dark Star, a DarthVaderClone voiced by Creator/SteveBlum with a ''lightsaber dragon'', who trolls Travis by claiming to be his father. [[spoiler:The player doesn't even get to fight him, as he's [[BaitAndSwitchBoss killed by Jeane just before the actual final boss fight against her.]]]]

* Waluigi. A character with little information when it comes to his backstory and origins, a wide arrangement of [[MindScrew strange powers]] [[NewPowersAsThePlotDemands that come and go as they please]], and a surprisingly complex personality. He plays the role of [[StalkerWithoutACrush Luigi's angry rival]], [[ThoseTwoBadGuys Wario's partner in comedic mischief]] and the [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} oddball of the cast]], alongside being the [[TheKlutz klutzy]] [[TheChewToy and unlucky]] [[IneffectualSympatheticVillain bad guy]]. Alongside Luigi, he is one of the few characters who underwent actual CharacterDevelopment, going from an angry and narcissistic [[EvilCounterpart rival to Luigi]] who [[GrumpyBear didn't appreciate the joy of the cast]] and [[{{Determinator}} tried very hard]] [[IJustWantToHaveFriends to be popular and liked]], to a [[BewareTheSillyOnes loony and comedic]] {{jerk|ass}} who frustrates himself with his [[ButtMonkey repeated failures]] and [[EvilIsPetty tries to make everyone]] [[TragicVillain as miserable as he]]. He also regularly showcases all sorts of unique powers, including [[GreenThumb growing brambles]], [[NotQuiteFlight swimming in the air]], and [[BlowYouAway summoning tornadoes]], and has an [[GadgeteerGenius inventive streak]], creating things like the giant PinballZone that is [[VideoGame/MarioKart Waluigi Pinball]] and [[VideoGame/MarioSportsMix a backpack with multiple robotic arms that teleports to him on demand]]. Despite all of this making him a well-developed and quirky character, Waluigi, like Daisy, is stuck in spinoffs, where most of his personality only appears in bits and pieces. Furthermore, despite being Wario's sidekick in the sports games, his only appearance between both the ''VideoGame/WarioLand'' and ''VideoGame/WarioWare'' series is a single cameo as a drawing done by Wario in ''[=WarioWare=] Gold''.

* A common complaint with Telltale's ''VideoGame/TheWalkingDead'' due to the AnyoneCanDie nature of the game.
** Every single character from the ''400 Days'' [=DLC=] episode who isn't Bonnie or Tavia appears in Season Two... as a very brief cameo. [[spoiler:And probably was KilledOffscreen when Carver's compound was overrun.]]
** [[AmbiguousDisorder Sarah]] and [[WellDoneSonGuy Nick]] are both [[spoiler:killed off anticlimatically in ''Episode 4 - Amid The Ruins'']] irrespective of the player's choices. Fans of the two argue that they were the most well-written and complex of any of Season Two's cast.
** How many players feel about [[IdealHero Luke]]. Despite being built up as a major character throughout Season Two, [[spoiler:he too gets bumped off in an anticlimactic way in Episode 5, and Jane entirely replaces his role in the story as Kenny's rival.]]
** By far the biggest example of this trope? Christa. Many argue that the potentially amazing story of a PregnantBadass singlehandedly raising Clementine on her own for eighteen months in a ZombieApocalypse spite of [[spoiler:the deaths of her boyfriend and her unborn child]] is wastefully brushed aside over in favour of Clementine [[spoiler:getting separated from Christa during a bandit attack and never seeing Christa ever again]] and moving on to a new group of survivors as soon as possible, [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute a new group which also happens to contain a no-nonsense pregnant woman]].

* ''Franchise/StarFox'': Krystal had a much bigger role in the Dinosaur Planet game but got heavily reduced in the final game of Star Fox Adventures, she acts as a damsel in distress and love interest, being imprisoned already at the start of the game and being absend the whole game until the end where she is rescued by Fox. Even in the later games, we don't learn anything new about her past and extinct race nor is she in the focus, despite just being the hot chick and love interest of Fox.

* ''VideoGame/Star Fox'': Krystal had a much bigger role in the Dinosaur Planet game but got heavily reduced in the final game of Star Fox Adventures, she acts as a damsel in distress and love interest, being imprisoned already at the start of the game and being absend the whole game until the end where she is rescued by Fox. Even in the later games, we don't learn anything new about her past and extinct race nor is she in the focus, despite just being the hot chick and love interest of Fox.

* Kairi, full stop. Prior to ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsIII'', it's constantly hinted that Kairi will learn how to wield a Keyblade and join Sora and co. in the second Keyblade War to fight against Xehanort and his new Organization XIII. Sadly, her training with Lea (Axel's original person) happens mostly offscreen with the most we see being the two conversing with each other, and when the war ''does'' finally happen, not only does she [[spoiler:get kidnapped ''yet again'']], but [[spoiler:she ends up [[StuffedIntoTheFridge killed by Xehanort]] as a means to motivate Sora into forging the χ-blade and forcing him to perform a HeroicSacrifice in order to save her]]. She was built up to be a valuable ally; instead, she was [[spoiler:little more than a living plot device]]. Backlash to this was so bad that the ''Re:Mind'' DLC was made [[AuthorsSavingThrow partly to avert this]].

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter:

** In an inversion of this trope where the waste is certain characters not appearing when they would be expected to, a new restriction that popped up with the newer Paper Mario games is they had to be from the main "Super Mario world". Despite this great chance for underused or obscure Mario characters to play a role[[note]]something that only ''Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam'', Sticker Star's sequel of sorts, would fulfill[[/note]], only generic Toads appear as recurring {{Non Player Character}}s. This wouldn't be so jarring, except other level archetypes usually associated with other characters or species also only have Toads[[note]]For example, Surfshine Harbor, a place that brings Piantas to mind by just its name. What's stranger is that Petey Piranha and Gooper Blooper, who debuted in the same game as the Piantas, do appear in this game.[[/note]]. Meanwhile, the bestiary mainly uses enemies or bosses introduced from New Super Mario Bros. 1 and backwards (with the exception of Scaredy Rats and Dry Goombas), when Super Mario Galaxy had been out for 2-3 years by the time Sticker Star started development. For a straighter example of this phenomenon, Yoshis, which are usually portrayed as intelligent beings equal to Toads in other Mario games including the first ''Paper Mario'', only cameo as a sphinx in ''Sticker Star'', and are restricted to two stages in ''Color Splash''.