Token Heroic Orc / Video Games

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Token Heroic Orcs in Video Games.

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• Arcanum has Gar, "the world's smartest orc". Subverted because he is pure human who has some sort of genetic mutation (orcs, humans and elves in this setting are so close genetically humans can produce fertile offspring with both orcs and elves). He has the mind, education and manners of Quintessential British Gentleman, but the appearance, strength and vitality of an orc.
• Baldur's Gate:
  • Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear has a goblin party member, for the first time in the Baldur's Gate series that a goblin has been on your side. (Of course, whether "your side" counts as "heroic" is ultimately up to you.)
  • Baldur's Gate III has Shadowheart, a Cleric for the Religion of Evil surrounding the God of Darkness Shar. She insists that they're not Always Chaotic Evil despite almost every single one of them being Straw Nihilist psychopaths, and has stricter limits on how far she's willing to go in service to their God of Evil. She approves of selfish behavior, but hesitates to cross the line into malice. Her questline revolves around you helping her decide whether to go Jumping Off the Slippery Slope or not.
  • Also from Baldur's Gate III, we have The Emperor, a mind flayer — a member of the same race of monsters responsible for your illithid infection. Unlike other mind flayers, however, the Emperor managed to free himself from the Elder Brain's control following a chance encounter with Orpheus, an ancient and powerful githyanki who could disrupt hive minds, within the Astral Prism. Realizing the threat the Cult of the Absolute — in particular, its leaders, devotees of the Dead Three who managed to take control of an Elder Brain — posed to the realms, the Emperor remained in the Astral Prism to subdue and control Orpheus, using his powers to help you and your allies stay free from the Absolute's control.
• Attikus from Battleborn is one of the hordes of Jennerit Thralls that commonly swarm against the eponymous Battleborn on the battlefield. Due to opposing the game's villain Rendain and being a Battleborn himself however, he's this.
• In Best Fiends, there is Bo and Splendid, two slugs that have joined the team of the Fiends against the other ones. However, Bo is a dragon slug and Splendid is a sea slug, in comparison to the common black slugs the other ones are.
• Borderlands 2: one of the playable characters is Krieg, who is a Psycho. In gameplay, you will kill hundreds of Psychos — every two-bit bandit gang seems to have a bunch of them to run around throwing axes at you. Krieg is the only one who's semi-consistently portrayed in a relatively positive fashion.
  • This trope is also subverted with the broken Hyperion loaders who promise to change its way if you help it finding a new body, only to betray you, apologize, ask for another body and betray you again.
• Truff from Bravely Default II in the most literal sense: he's a friendly yet cowardly orc capable of human speech who keeps running into the party while searching for the human who saved him.
• Zasp of Bug Fables is a wasp, a race that makes up the main villainous faction, but he left the Wasp Kingdom because he didn't like what was happening there. This ends up being foreshadowing that the Wasp Kingdom is actually dramatically different under the Wasp King than it was previously.
• Robo from Chrono Trigger is one of a very small number of robots that aren't obsessed with killing all humans, and the only one to actively assist the party and be friendly to them. Aside from Johnny and his crew, who are at best neutral irreverent jerks who'd rather just race you for fun, every other machine has one thing in mind. As it turns out it's a single rogue AI that turned on humanity and corrupted and reprogrammed all the rest to do the same, and Robo happened to be derelict and out of commission when this happened.
• Coffee Crisis has the baby Smurgliens, the sole alien who oppose his race's plans to invade planet earth for their rock music, WiFi, and coffee, and will actually help the two player heroes stop the invasion.
• Literally in Divine Divinity with Kroxy, the orc warrior you need to recruit for the Council. He's the only orc in the game who isn't an enemy. Predictably, you find him locked up by his brethren and awaiting execution for disagreeing with their warlike ways.
• Dragon Age: Origins – Awakening:
  • The Architect is a Mook Rebel, being a self-aware Darkspawn who's attempting to try and sever their connection to the Old Gods, thus preventing the outbreak of further Blights. He suffers from a lot of Blue-and-Orange Morality though so is not really a straight hero. There are hints that he's far more than a simple mook.
  • The Messenger, a member of the Architect's faction, seems to be the only Disciple who is a totally straight example of this. During the Darkspawn assault on Amaranthine he warns the Warden that the Mother is also attacking Vigil's Keep. He can be persuaded to join in the defense of the city and if set free afterwards, becomes a mysterious cloaked hero protecting travellers from bandits, although responsible for accidentally spreading the Blight to a few of them.
• Downplayed in the game Dragon Rage with the Orc Galthran Etruk. He's on your side, but only because it's what is best for him right then.
• Elden Ring:
  • Demi-Humans, the ape-like creatures that are the game's equivalent to orcs, are mostly hostile, with the exception of Boc...although, since Boc is also one of the smallest and his one attempt at actually doing anything dramatic gets him beaten within an inch of his life, his heroism mostly extends to doing your tailoring for free. At least he's enjoying himself. He can be reborn as a human in the right circumstances, but it's a flawed rebirth and he loses his identity, then dies.
  • You find a village of non-hostile Living Jars known as Jarburg, but Alexander is the only known one who's genuinely heroic, fighting alongside you against Radahn and then later the Fire Giant. He does try to kill you at the end of his questline... after challenging you to an honorable Duel to the Death which you are free to simply decline. Whether he achieves victory over the greatest warrior he knows or suffers a glorious death by their hand are both satisfactory outcomes for him.
  • Most of the Spirit Ashes are based on hostile creatures, allowing you to summon a Token Heroic Mad Pumpkin Head or Token Heroic Bloodhound Knight. You can even summon a squad of the same demi-humans mentioned above. Of course, they're not so much "heroic" as they are "compelled to obey their summoner". The only exception in Latenna, who joins you as a spirit willingly and is still fully intelligent in that form. Though you likely won't find the enemies she's the token heroic example of until many, many hours after you acquire her.
• The Elder Scrolls:
  • In the series' backstory, the Ayleids (Wild Elves) once ruled all of Cyrodiil and took the Nedes, human ancestors of most of the modern races of Men, as slaves. So vile was their torment of the slaves that, when the slaves revolted, several rebel Ayleid lords sided with the slaves (although some sources imply it was less 'the other lords were just that bad' and more 'there was already a civil war between Aedra and Daedra-favouring Ayleid lords' — everyone involved on the winning side, including the Ayleids on the rebellion's side, had an interest in playing up just how bad the Ayleid rule had been). As a result, they were allowed to keep their lands as vassals to the new empire the slaves would found. (At least for about a century or so until an extremist anti-elven religious sect came to power within the empire and either killed or drove away the remaining Ayleids.)
  • Scamps are the weakest and smallest known form of lesser Daedra, and in almost every game where they've made an appearance, there is typically at least one non-hostile Scamp who can be conversed with. The Scamp merchant Creeper, who appears in Morrowind and Online, is one prominent example.
  • In the Skyrim backstory, Paarthurnax was this among the dragons, having been responsible for Alduin's initial defeat. He now serves as the Big Good during the events of the main storyline. There were other dragons that rebelled against Alduin's rule, but their names are never given and they were all killed by the Blades in the intervening millennia.
  • Similar to Paarthurnax, the series' spin-off Action-Adventure game Redguard includes Nafaalilargus (a.k.a. Nahfahlaar), a dragon who managed to overcome his draconic nature and would ally with worthy mortals. For this reason, he was spared by the Blades in the 1st Era and would eventually find his way into the employ of Tiber Septim.
• EXTRAPOWER: Attack of Darkforce: Gladius, a member of the human-assimilating Eldritch Abomination Bem species, who fight on the side of humanity against the Bem. His primary motivation is to secure medical treatment for Flamerge, who was only partially assimilated, but willingly helps the defense of the Earth even after the Bem threat is destroyed.
• The Fallout series carries a tradition of having a few friendly super mutants per game, with at least one being a recruitable companion:
  • Fallout 2 Marcus the Super Mutant. A former solder from the Master Army, who with a Brotherhood Paladin creates a town where humans, mutants and ghouls can live together. He later joins your party, if you're good.
  • Fallout 3 has Fawkes, who is simply more intelligent, better-natured (and more cultured, thanks to him studying the records in a cell he was trapped in) than his "peers". He helps you retrieve a MacGuffin, helps you escape when you're captured with it and joins you as an ally if you have high enough karma. There's also Uncle Leo, who appears as a Random Encounter and will give you random stuff simply by talking to him, lamenting that he cannot give you more.
  • Fallout: New Vegas has Lily, a Nightkin. Unlike most Nightkin, she's fairly sane (and you can make her even more sane if you wish) and friendly, to the point she regards the Courier as a surrogate grandchild and unlike most West Coast supermutants openly despises The Master. There's also Mean Sonofabitch, a friendly supermutant who protects the community of Westside from raiders. Marcus also returns, and is now the leader of a small isolated community of super mutants who simply want to be left alone.
  • Strong of Fallout 4 is something of a mixed bag. While he is comparatively heroic for a Super Mutant and approves of acts of benevolence and selflessness, he's also the most brutish and savage of the companions and loves acts of violence and killing.
  • The Far Harbor DLC has Erickson, a friendly Super Mutant dog trainer who was altered by the radioactive fog to realize how pointless the lifestyle of a typical Super Mutant was and lives a quiet secluded life. He also sells you dogs to guard your settlements with, and gives you a bandana if you have Dogmeat in your party.
  • Also, files for the first game feature Re, a rebellious super mutant who, with enough speech skill, would have been able to be talked into helping fight The Master. Sadly, he isn't present in the finished game, though there are mods to add him back.
• Final Fantasy XII: The Always Chaotic Evil Urutan Yensas and Baknamies each have a single representative who is amiable to the heroes. The good Urutan Yensa is encountered as part of a sidequest that gives you Eksir Berries, an item you can use for the Garuda boss battle, while the good Baknamy is the vendor of a Secret Shop in the Necrohol of Nabudis.
• In Final Fantasy XIV, the Ascians are a race of immortal energy beings known for possessing mortals, manipulating entire nations, and sowing misery wherever they go in order to resurrect their sealed-away god, Zodiark. The Shadowbringers expansion reveals that one Ascian actually cares about mortals and has been fighting the machinations of their brethren — none other than the player character themself, whose superhuman status as The Ace turns out to be because they've been a reincarnated Ascian the whole time. The Ascian in question spends a long time unaware of this.
• Glamrock Freddy from Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach is notable in that he's the first^note unless you count Helpy animatronic seen in the franchise to actively help the player character, who in this game is a young boy named Gregory. He is only able to kill you under three specific circumstances: running out of power, failing the Simon Says Minigame, and while possessed in the True Ending. Otherwise, he not only serves as Mission Control, a gameplay mechanic, and a father figure to Gregory, but he is essentially the game's Deuteragonist.
• Fuga: Melodies of Steel's main antagonist is The Berman Empire, A Nazi by Any Other Name that suddenly invades the peaceful lands of Gasco, taking in slaves and subjugating the magic-abled Felinekos to inhuman experiments. Britz Strudel is the only Berman who actively opposes his country's invasion by teaming up with the heroes, in part due to his family being mistreated by the Empire for something his father did prior to the events of the game.
• Gooey from the Kirby games is implied to be a piece of usually Always Chaotic Evil Dark Matter that turned good and became one of Kirby's friends.
• Knights of the Old Republic: Mandalorians are not strictly any one race (although the only ones you find in the games are human, or covered in armor that makes it impossible to tell otherwise), but they were the aggressors in the war immediately preceding the one the game takes place during. Canderous Ordo is one of them, and an early recruitment to the player's party, joining up because he's seen many other Mandalorians reduced to brigands preying on farmers and weaker opponents, feeling they've forfeited the honor of wearing their armor, and has been convinced his current mercenary work is no better than that.
• League of Legends has Shyvana the Half-Dragon, a unique offspring of a dragon and a human mage whose mortal allegiance is towards Demacia, a kingdom whose general policy is to reject mages and magic like her. This came about because Shyvana rescued the weakened Warrior Prince Jarvan IV and the two became a quasi-Battle Couple, and Jarvan entrusts her so much that he made her the leader of the Dragonguard, a squad to protect Demacia's borders from other, more dangerous dragons. Her loyalty to the kingdom is sincere, but due to her draconic nature, she's pretty divisive among her subordinates.
• The Legend of Zelda: A recurring tradition in the series is to have one or two members of a common Mook species in each game who are friendly to Link or, at least, passive and peaceful.
  • The Legend of Zelda: A handful of Moblins, common Overworld enemies, serve as merchants or passive NPCs.
  • Zelda II: The Adventure of Link:
    • Aches are batlike monsters that either attack Link directly or transform themselves into seemingly regular humans to spy for Ganon's forces. In Nabooru Town, there is a single red Ache that roosts on the ceiling of a building. It won't attack Link, but can be spoken to if the player jumps up to it. It won't say anything at first, but with persistence it will eventually give a hint towards the location of a heart container in the ocean.
    • In Saria Town, there's a purple Bot — a very common, weak blob enemy — found sleeping in Bagu's house, which doesn't attack. He's unresponsive to begin with, but, if Link keeps trying to talk to him, the Bot tells him where Bagu can be found.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening:
    • Goriyas are normally enemies who attack Link with boomerangs. The only Goriya in the game is instead a peaceful merchant.
    • A friendly Zora lives in Animal Village, where Link can find it after obtaining the Magnifying Lens. Link can even get a picture taken with him in DX, and a Secret Seashell in the Switch remake.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time: While the Gerudo are for the most part hostile followers of Ganondorf, Nabooru is much more personable and, in her role as a Sage, an important in-game ally.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: Kargaroks are mostly just hostile, animalistic monsters. The exception is a single friendly one who carries Wolf Link around during Plumm's flying minigame.
  • The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds:
    • Zoras are for the most part hostile monsters. The most notable exception is their ruler, Queen Oren, who is peaceful, personable, and one of the Seven Sages. To her regret, she's unable to exert much influence on her people outside of her court.
    • Default Hinoxes are hostile monsters that attack Link on sight. One encountered in northern Lorule just wants to be left alone in its hiding spot... as long as you don't try to extort it, at least.
• Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope has the Spark Hunters, who are Cursa's Dragons, and, as the name implies, their job is to hunt for Sparks and bring them to Cursa. Of the four of them, Edge is the heroic one, and actually joins Mario and friends on in their adventure to save the Sparks, thus becoming a regular party member. Edge, as well as the other Spark Hunters, were created by Cursa, and Edge was their leader. Once she worked for Cursa, she started to develop her own free will, and started to realize just how horrible Cursa was, and that she must be stopped. Edge tried to convince the other Spark Hunters what they were doing was wrong, but they wouldn’t listen. That’s why she joined Mario and friends, so that they can stop Cursa together.
• Mario Party:
  • Mario Party 9: While Magikoopa/Kamek and Shy Guy appear as antagonists in Solo mode, the playable Koopa, normally affiliated with Bowser, is firmly on the side of Mario and company.
  • Mario Party 10: While Spikes are usually part of Bowser's evil forces, the Spike that appears as a playable character is on Team Mario's side and helps them escape from Bowser's rampage in Bowser Party, being the only one of Bowser's minions to do so in this game.
• Mass Effect:
  • After spending the first game fighting a machine race called the geth, you can recruit a geth teammate, Legion, in the second. Instead of a Defector from Decadence, they turn out to represent the majority of their species — the ones you've been fighting are fanatical "heretics."
  • Sort of Urdnot Wrex. A definite believer that His Species Doth Protest Too Much and one of the few friendly krogan in Mass Effect (where most of them were criminals, pirates or agents of Saren). If he survives the first game, he returns to the krogan homeworld of Tuchanka and retakes his position as leader of Clan Urdnot in order to drag his species back to something resembling the time when they were respected and glorified for saving the galaxy during the Rachni Wars, before the Krogan Rebellion lead to their defeat and disgrace.
  • If you decide to save her in Mass Effect 1 and again in Mass Effect 3, the last surviving rachni queen becomes this, although she is an ally rather than a party member.
• Metro Exodus has Sam, a US marine who was part of the US embassy security staff and was waiting for the train at a Moscow Metro station when the US dropped the Big One on Russia. He is also (somewhat oddly, given Melnik's paranoia about NATO) part of Melnik's inner circle, and, when pressed, states that he has been one of Melnik's Rangers for so long that it overrides any other loyalties he may or may not have had.
• Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor: Averted with Ratbag. Despite him allying with Talion, it's out of convenience and pragmatism than any benevolence. He's not motivated by any noble cause (stopping the Black Captains, freeing the Outcasts, etc...), he wants to be Warchief because he wants to be the one calling the shots. He decides to aid Talion because the latter is incredibly skilled at killing his competition, which he takes credit for (a popular way amongst Uruk kind to get promotions is to kill whoever is bossing you around). In the sequel however, not only has he formed a genuine friendship with an Olog-hai, it's implied that he actually sees Talion as a friend.
• Middle-earth: Shadow of War:
  • Forthog Orc-Slayer is a mysterious orc ronin who will occasionally save Talion from a deathblow, then say some cryptic words and leave.
  • The Blade of Galadriel DLC features several Orcs who are shockingly friendly that align with Eltariel (who refuses to dominate Orcs since she finds the concept horrifying) out of their own accord.
• The Pathfinder Owlcat games:
  • Pathfinder: Kingmaker has Nok-Nok the Goblin join your party. Though he sticks to his race's Always Chaotic Evil tendencies, he mostly cares about sticking it back to the tribe that tried to execute him. The main character can encourage his silly antics and turn him into a clown, or push him towards becoming somewhat heroic.
  • Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous adds Arueshalae to your party, a succubus who was pushed to repent by the goddess Desna and seeks to help the crusaders destroy the Worldwound and atone for her sinful life as a demon. She can be supported, or tempted into a relapse to become a demonic minion for an evil-aligned character.
• Deekin the kobold bard from the Neverwinter Nights expansions. In Hordes of the Underdark, your other potential companions include a non-evil tiefling (a less-than-half-fiend) and a drow who judging from her actual behavior is only called Lawful Evil because it's required for her to have the assassin class.
• In Persona 4, it turns out Teddie is actually just another one of the Shadows that the Investigation Team has been fighting off for the majority of the game, but he represents mankind's desire to be loved and as such is not malicious at all. He kept telling himself he wasn't a Shadow so he could appeal to regular people, though this denial resulted in his own Shadow.
• In Prey (2017), the rest of the cast is trying to invoke this with your character. You're actually a Typhon organism that has been implanted with Morgan Yu's memories, then placed in a simulation of the Talos I outbreak. Alex Yu and his Operators are trying to make you empathize with humans, in order to make you a Token Heroic Typhon who can make peace between humans and aliens. You're given the choice to either accept this or to stay a monster.
• Sonic the Hedgehog has E-102 Gamma and E-123 Omega, two Badniks created by Dr. Eggman as part of his E-100 series of elite robots. Gamma pulls a genuine Heel–Face Turn triggered by Eggman’s abuse of his brethren, the kindness of Amy Rose, and the realization that he and the other Egg Carrier E-100s contain living animals, and sets out to free both his brethren and their animals by destroying them and himself; Omega initially starts out as a Nominal Hero who joins the rest of Team Dark because he believes Eggman squandered his potential as a walking arsenal and wants revenge, but he eventually becomes more of a traditional hero, though no less violent, through his companionship with Shadow and Rouge.
• Star Wars: The Old Republic:
  • Qyzen Fess, the Consular's first companion, is a Trandoshan. In the Star Wars universe, Trandoshans are depicted as mercenaries, bounty hunters, and mooks for various unsavory factions. Their long-standing war with the Wookiees (and their taking of Wookiee pelts as a trophy) doesn't help matters. A Trandoshan allied with a Jedi is practically unheard of. Qyzen is indifferent to his people's overall loyalties, and follows the consular as he sees them as a prophet of his Goddess.
  • Lord Scourge of the Jedi Knight storyline is a Sith Pureblood, meaning that his race were the original masters of the Dark Side and as such sticks out like a sore thumb among the Knight's crew. He joins the protagonist because he believes them to be the one to finally bring down the Sith Emperor and makes it clear that he considers it purely Enemy Mine. According to the novel Revan, Scourge previously made an alliance with Revan and the Exile against the Sith Emperor, only to betray them and stab the Exile In the Back, after seeing a Force-vision of another Jedi standing over the Emperor's corpse.
    • While Scourge only joined the Knight to kill the Emperor, a more genuine example can be found in Lord Praven, one of the apprentices of Darth Angral. He believes greatly in honor and integrity, expresses displeasure in killing the weak, and after defeating him on Tatooine, you can convince him to join the Jedi Order
• Marina, the dark-skinned Octoling who makes up one half of the idol duo "Off the Hook" in Splatoon 2. She lives in Inkopolis as opposed to underground with the rest of her Octarian brethren, and gets along with the Inklings with no tension. Downplayed by the fact that, according to Word of God, no one except her partner/mentor Pearl is even aware that she's an Octoling despite both characters doing very little to hide that information. The Octo Expansion DLC eventually subverts it by introducing Octolings as a playable race, with the in-universe explanation being that they broke free from DJ Octavio's anti-Inkling propaganda.
• Terraria:
  • Goblins are pretty much universally depicted as barbarians who wage war for no reason, and the player will be fighting off more than one invasion by goblin armies. After the first invasion, however, they can find the Goblin Tinkerer tied up somewhere underground. The Tinkerer explains that he has no ill will towards humans and thinks the goblins are invading and fighting for stupid reasons, so his fellows tied him up and left him for dead. He'll move in to the player's town and is a valuable ally for the items he can provide. He even develops a crush on the Mechanic (which is apparently reciprocated).
  • Thought it's hard to tell under his outfit, the Witch Doctor is actually a Lizarhd. The rest of the Lizarhd tribe are extremely hostile and remain in seclusion in their underground Temple. The Witch Doctor, by contrast, is a friendly and personable guy perfectly happy to live alongside humans.
• Xenoblade Chronicles 3: Consuls/Moebius are manipulative shapeshifters who leech off the Colonies' lifeforce via the Flameclocks. Consul T/Captain Triton, however, is not only an overall decent man (his Sore Loser tendencies notwithstanding), but is so enamored with the idea of freedom he happily lets the Ouroboros destroy his Flameclock and liberate his colony's inhabitants once he's beaten in a treasure hunt and "friendly" scrap, joining the party as well as a selectable Hero. Consul M also counts, as she sacrifices herself to help the Ouroboros and make Consul N realize how far he has fallen.
• Warcraft: Sort of defied and played with in the Warcraft universe, as it was revealed in Warcraft III that the reason the Orcs were so evil in the first two games was that they formed a pact with the Burning Legion and drank the blood of Mannoroth, but by the time of Warcraft III, Thrall helps them rediscover their original shamanic magic and become more peaceful, allying with the humans and Night Elves to stop Archimonde. Then in World of Warcraft, Garrosh Hellscream becomes Warchief and leads the Horde to become a villainous force again... although they still team up with the Alliance sometimes against greater threats, like the Lich King and the Old Gods.
• Wing Commander: Hobbes who mostly was a defector from the evil Kilrathi Empire until it was revealed to be a Memory Gambit.
• Hermann Wolff in Zombie Army Trilogy is a rare human example of this, being a Captain in the Wehrmacht during World War II — after Hitler desperately unleashes "Plan Z", he immediately turns on his former commander in disgust and willingly allies himself with the rest of the Survivor's Brigade, who consist of Americans, Russians, and both a French and a German resistance fighter, in order to survive and stop the zombie outbreak.
  • His Spiritual Successor is the player character Werner Sauer in Zombie Army 4: Dead War, a German soldier from the Afrika Corps who turned on Hitler when he discovered his plans to bolster the Nazi army with Black Magic.