Instances of people attempting to take Revenge by Proxy in Video Games.
- Avencast: Rise of the Mage: The demon Kulkurazz was imprisoned by Avencast Academy, so it settles the score by trapping the Player Character, an Avencast student, to die of deprivation — never mind that the PC had nothing to do with its captivity and is in fact the one to release it.
- In a sidequest of the Baldur's Gate series, the red dragon Firkraag will frame the player character for murder. When confronted on why he'd do this (since the player had never even met him before, much less slighted him,) he will explain that he once suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of the player's foster-father Gorion. Since Gorion is already dead and beyond Firkraag's reach, he'll make do with tormenting his foe's child.
- In the first episode of BioShock Infinite DLC "Burial at Sea," Elizabeth subjects Sally, a Little Sister, to a cruel death by immolation to punish that timeline's version of Comstock for what he had done before starting a new life. The second episode is about her subsequent guilt over letting a young child die for her own revenge, and going back to the timeline to save her.
- Viktor Reznov in Call of Duty is on two sides of the trope. In Call of Duty: World at War he is in the "having revenge against someone else than the ones who directly wronged me" one, viewing the Soviets' bloody rampage and destruction of German territories and civilians as vengeance against the ones Russia suffered at the hands of the Nazis, and in Call of Duty: Black Ops, he is on the "use someone else to get revenge because I personally can't" by brainwashing protagonist Alex Mason to send him after Dragovitch, Kravchenko and Steiner, the three men who killed Reznov's friend and ruined his life.
- In Disgaea 3, Mao decides that ravaging the human world would be a better revenge for his father's death than going after Aurum, the one who caused it, reasoning that as a super hero, and one of said world's defenders, it would cause him far more pain than his own death. However, Aurum actually wants him to attack the human world, as it'll give another chance to display his heroics. Whether Mao actually goes through with it or not depends on what ending you get.
- A Human Noble can threaten Howe with this when you finally confront him in Dragon Age: Origins. He laughs at you and taunts you even more.
- Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood reveals that in Hingashi, this is the law. If a criminal cannot be punished, their entire family will be made an example. In the Samurai job questline, Musosai was held responsible for the crimes of his pupil Ugetsu when he used the swordsmanship he learned from Musosai to murder government officials. Later, it is also revealed that Ugetsu's parents were executed for his crimes, and a similar fate would've befallen his younger sister Kagetsu/Makoto if not by a small stroke of luck.
- Discussed in Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade: Jaffar is a fearsome assassin known as the "Angel of Death" with the stats to match, but fellow assassin Legault tells him his affection for Nino makes him vulnerable because people can hurt her to get to him, a la Love Is a Weakness. Jaffar, being more or less an Empty Shell after some conditioning by the Big Bad, is surprisingly okay with this: when this exact situation occurs, he's fine with dying as long as Nino lives (of course, Matthew was bluffing and had never touched her in the first place, but Jaffar had no way of knowing that).
- In Ghost Trick, the Big Bad Yomiel does this to Detective Jowd not once but twice, blaming him for chasing him into the park ten years ago, which resulted in Yomiel being hit by a meteorite shard. This not only killed him but imbued his spirit with certain powers, effectively making him immortal. First, he subtly modifies Kamilia's Rube Goldberg Device to kill Jowd's wife, Alma, instead of setting off party poppers for her birthday. This traumatizes Kamila, and to protect her from the blame, Jowd frames himself for Alma's murder and goes to prison. Second, on the day of Jowd's execution, Yomiel frames Detective Lynne for his own murder by meeting her at a junkyard and then controlling her to shoot him, making sure that the event is caught on camera. This digs at Jowd again because he had rescued her from Yomiel taking Lynne hostage in the park, and it's a second example of revenge by proxy being enacted on Lynne herself.
- God of War II: Zeus utterly annihilates Kratos' home city of Sparta in revenge for the latter's campaign of bloody conquest. It's noted that at this point, Kratos has been stripped of his godhood and no longer represents a threat to Zeus. He still attacks his people for no other reason but to spite the God of War and punishing them for worshiping Kratos.
- No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle:
- Travis is confronted by an Emergency Transformation form of Letz Shake, the well-known Bait-and-Switch Boss of the first game who was killed by Henry before Travis could get to him. Travis points out that it was Henry who killed Shake, but it turns out that he had already gotten to and beaten Henry, and just wants to take down Travis too, just for the hell of it.
- Remember the assassination gigs in the original game? Remember those gigs to kill the CEOs of Bizza Butt? Apparently, Jasper Batt Jr., the youngest child of the family, didn't like it very much. To get back at Travis, he stages the assassination of Bishop Shidux. He even recruits other characters craving revenge against Travis in the game to help him achieve this, like Skelter Helter, brother of Helter Skelter from the original game.
- Persona 5:
- Mr. Kamoshida, an Evil Teacher and Creepy Gym Coach who physically abuses the male students and sexually harasses the female students because the principal is willing to sweep all of his crimes under the rug due to the reputation boost he gives to Shujin Academy, sexually assaults Ann's best friend Shiho after Ann refuses to sleep with him.
- Futaba's uncle always felt like The Un-Favourite compared to his sister Wakaba, and began abusing her daughter as revenge after she died and he got full custody of her because Wakaba's other relatives didn't want anything to do with Futaba after The Conspiracy blamed her for Wakaba's "suicide". He even goes as far as to harass her adoptive father Sojiro and threaten to file a false report to protective services against him in order to extort him for money once he can no longer torment her directly.
- Reality-On-The-Norm: The game Revenge of the Chicken involves the protagonist (a chicken) assassinating the brother of the man who killed his, the Chicken's, brother.
- It is possible to do this in the Playable Epilogue of Red Dead Redemption, in which Jack Marston can choose to kill the family members of Edgar Ross, the man who had his father executed. Of course, the game does not actually tell you to do this and it is all up to the player's choice.
- Done twice in Saints Row 2 as part of an Escalating War between the 3rd Street Saints and The Brotherhood. The Brotherhood leader Maero kidnaps one of the Boss' lieutenants and has him dragged to death in retaliation for the Boss scarring his face, and the Boss hits back by stuffing Maero's girlfriend (who was a willing accomplice to all of his crimes and personally oversaw the aforementioned dragging death) into the trunk of her car and leaving it to be unwittingly crushed by Maero at a monster truck rally.
- Stranglehold: James Wong orders the death of Tequila Yuen's wife Billie as payback for Tequila killing his son Johnny in Hard Boiled. The kicker? Billie was his own daughter.
- This is important in the backstory of Tales of the Abyss. Guy originally came to the Fabre Manor with the plan of killing Duke Fabre's only son in front of him due to him being responsible for the deaths of his entire family. Then Luke got kidnapped and came back a complete amnesiac innocent dependent on him. Cue one Heel–Face Turn and Guy developing Undying Loyalty to Luke; who returns it even during his Spoiled Brat days as he insists repeatedly that Guy isn't his manservant but his "best friend".
- Until Dawn: Janitor loses his job. He attempts to murder his employers' children and their friends in response. At least, that's the best spin story Josh can come up with.
- The Dominion of WildStar declared unconditional sovereignty over the Aurin of Arboria for sheltering and supplying the Exiles. Without so much as offering them a chance to surrender, forsake their friends, and evacuate, planet reapers were sicced onto the poor things. The Exiles tried their best to keep Arboria out of the Dominion's knowledge by making speedy, stealthy runs and never staying on the planet for more than a couple of days, maybe a few weeks, max.
- In Xenosaga, Albedo torments Momo so that he can get to Jr. by proxy.
- Yes, Your Grace: This is a factor in Lorsulia and Dusty's deaths, as their killer holds someone who cares about them as responsible for the murder at the end of the first act.
