The Final Fantasy X character Yuna has always believed that the fayth want her to die, and spends quite some time arranging her death and making sure it will happen in a way that benefits Spira. She's correct that the fayth want her to learn about tragedy, but it's not for the purpose she thinks: she's not supposed to join the dead, just to listen to them, and use the knowledge gained to lead Spira into a brighter future. Yuna takes this realization badly for two reasons; one, because her capacity to deal with negative feelings relied solely on the hope that she would someday be able to commit suicide, and two, because it happened during the untimely death of yet another of her loved ones.
In Fire Emblem: Awakening, Lucina's B support with her siblingnote Either Male Morgan, Cynthia, Kjelle, Brady or Inigo has her realize that the latter may be able to wield Falchion, a weapon that only a handful in Ylisse's bloodline can wield, such as Lucina and her father Chrom, and insists on putting it to the test should it become necessary. The sibling asks if this is in case Lucina is busy, prompting Lucina to clarify that she means that it's in case she dies. It's played with a bit in that the sibling isn't necessarily dense, per se- s/he is understandably disturbed by the idea of his/her older sister dying and how willing Lucina is to discuss the possibility.
God of War has Atreus, the son of Kratos in the Norse saga. He's a young boy/young man in the two Norse games, and naturally misreads the more complex motivations of his elders because he's too young to understand them. Even so, Atreus being reckless and impulsive leads him to dramatically miss the reasons behind the motivations of other characters, which can lead to trouble.
God of War (PS4): When Atreus overhears his father claiming that he's cursed, Atreus believes that Kratos is saying that Atreus is weak for not being like him. Kratos considers his son not being like him to be a good thing; he was talking about Atreus having inherited Kratos's own divinity, something that Kratos considers to be a curse because of how all the gods he'd previously met had behaved. But Kratos's stern demeanor and inability to have a straight talk with his son convinced Atreus that his dad was looking down on him.
In God of War Ragnarök, once Atreus realizes that Kratos is prophesized to die in Ragnarok, he becomes desperate to stop it, to the point of willingly going to visit Odin despite that being part of the prophecy because Odin might have answers. As the Norns later reveal, Atreus is running on a serious misconception about how fate works. Namely, thinking that it's a force outside people's control that forces them to do things, instead of the logical consequences of their choices and flaws. The correct way to Screw Destiny is to get yourself some Character Development so you don't make the stupid decisions that would lead you to ruin... and Atreus's decision to run off on his own was based on his Fatal Flaw of recklessness, so it only furthered the prophecy. Once Atreus finally realizes that this is what's going on, he finally starts making decisions that allow him to properly Screw Destiny and stop the plans of Big Bad Odin in his own way.
In Horizon Zero Dawn, two merchants- an Oseram and a Carja- decided to merge their businesses as a "symbolic gesture" of racial unity that would attract them more customers. But they didn't stop disagreeing with each other, all the time, about everything, making it impossible for any buyers to get a word in edgewise. The lesson being that no amount of representation will save a business if the people behind it just suck at selling things.
When Batman points out that Superman was beginning to have his Face–Heel Turn and are scaring people, Superman justifies himself by saying that the bad guys should be afraid, not understanding that Batman was referring to people in general.
He repeatedly justifies that everything he is doing was for Lois's sake, including wanting to bring an alternate Lois to his universe. When Prime!Superman confronts him and says how horrified and disgusted Lois would be of him, he instead claims that she would be alive.
Late in Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, when you return to Dantooine for the final time to start the endgame, somebody refuses to see the truth no matter your alignment.
If you are dark-sided, Kreia finally gives up on you and verbally rips you apart because you have refused to heed any lessons taught by either her or your experiences, instead content to be a childishbully who is content to do nothing but spread chaos, misery, and destruction everywhere you go for your own amusement or for short-sighted revenge.
Big Boss/Naked Snakewas like a son to her and alongside her actual son Revolver Ocelot sought to realize The Boss's Will through liberty from nations, bounds, oppressions, political domination, and forced exploitation of soldiers, thus creating the terrorist organization Outer Heaven with his son Liquid Snake following in his footsteps. Through his desires, these ideas become forced and sacrificed the principles of peace and harmony, to the point that there's little care for soldiers that differ, or disapprove, like his other son Solid Snake.
Senator Armstrong had similar motivations to Zero, except he was The Social Darwinist who sought to socially engineer American evolution through violence rather than manipulation in order to undo the damage the Patriots caused and make America great again.
In the Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye DLC, the aliens who built the Stranger first came to your solar system after receiving a signal from the Eye of the Universe, and were so dedicated to the journey that they destroyed their home moon to build the ringworld they used for the interstellar voyage. Unfortunately, once they arrived, they received a vision from the Eye that seemingly showed it destroying the universe and reducing their race to grass-covered bone piles. The aliens decided the Eye was Evil All Along and blocked its signal so that no one else could find it and trigger an apocalypse. Only one of them had a different interpretation, that the Eye could be used to create a new universe after the previous one died, as symbolized by the grass growing over the bones of their species. This alien briefly unblocked the Eye's signal, setting into motion the main story's events, but was imprisoned for their efforts.
In Chie's Social Link, one of Chie's old friends, Takeshi, is infatuated with Yukiko. At Rank 8, he complains to her about how Yukiko had a "funky laugh" the last time he saw her, and points out that he thinks she "was better off gloomy." Chie points out that's how Yukiko naturally is, and it's subtly indicated that she gradually gains the confidence to be herself around people other than Chie. Contrasting this earlier was after saving Yukiko and seeing her open more to the others, Yosuke notes he wants to know more of her like this as a person.
Kanji says that a great deal of his efforts to be a man at first, such as beating up biker gangs and hiding his interest in handicrafts, were a result of trying to follow his late father's advice to "become strong," out of the belief that his father didn't think he was strong enough (to be fair, he was a kid when he lost his father.) Kanji ultimately realizes that he had the wrong idea of what it means to be strong, and so decides to be true to himself.
Early on in the game, if you talk to two girls at Shujin, they will remark about how Ann's best friend Shiho often meets with Kamoshida, her volleyball coach, for one-on-one sessions, and leaves feeling depressed. Rather than realize that Kamoshida is physically abusing Shiho and later rapes her, the girls are offended that Shiho is sad after monopolizing Kamoshida's time.
On Christmas Day in the base game (and in Royal if the bonus content hasn't been triggered), Ryuji enthusiastically greets Makoto, Futaba and Sojiro in LeBlanc and wonders why the three of them seem saddened, clearly unable to read the mood. Ryuji did not realize the protagonist had turned himself in to the police.
In Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, during The Teal Mask DLC, Kieran idolizes the ogre that the rest of his village shuns, partly because he views it as strong and independent. He's also awed by and slightly jealous of the player character's battling skills. Therefore, when Ogerpon eventually chooses the player over him, and he loses one last battle with them, Kieran concludes that he simply wasn't strong enough to be Ogerpon's trainer, and he becomes obsessed with beating the player character. In reality, Ogerpon chose the player over him because they spent more time with her than he did, and she's actually very lonely (to the point that she's locked into a Lonely nature).
Kieran does this again during The Indigo Disk. He's still bitter over the player character beating him and is obsessed with getting stronger to the point of becoming his school's Champion. Therefore, when the player beats him one more time and he hears about Area Zero and Terapagos, Kieran decides to go along on the trip solely for the chance to catch a Legendary Pokémon to beat the player character with. This shows he hasn't learned why he keeps losing to the player, nor has he started considering the feelings of the Legendary he's currently fixated on. Kieran goes a step further than he did with Ogerpon by actively catching Terapagos as soon as it wakes up, even though he saw it walking towards the player in curiosity.
Street Fighter veteran E. Honda claims that his motivation is to show people that Sumo Wrestling is a legitimate martial art, and sumos are the best fighters on Earth. However, no less than Dan Hibiki pointed out a problem with this: Honda modified his wrestling style to compete with other martial artists, including adding various moves that would generally be illegal in sumo (sumo doesn't allow you to kick, for instance). Therefore, his own actions prove the opposite: traditional sumo wrestling has no place in an actual fight, since otherwise, Honda wouldn't need to change anything.
In World of Warcraft, during the fight with Murozond, leader of the Infinite Dragonflight, the party can use the Hourglass of Time to reverse time, resetting all their health and cooldowns to their state at the start of the battle, and causing Murozond to arrogantly say that the Hourglass does nothing to him. He's right, but fails to notice that his health isn't being reset- by using the Hourglass to repeatedly use your strongest abilities and clear the voidzones left by Distortion Bombs, it's possible to defeat Murozond.
