Villains/antagonists or otherwise.
I’ve been watching some Fable 3 lets plays and was reminded of how much I absolutely hated Reaver. You can tell Lionhead was really going for someone that you would “love to hate,” but every scene with him in it is miserable. Absolutely ridiculous that you can’t kill him.
For a character from an actually well written video game, Eric in Tony Hawk’s Underground. Hitting the last line in the game and watching your character punch him out in a cutscene afterwards is extremely cathartic.
I tend not to hate characters that the writers want me to hate. The qualities that they try to use to do that generally just kind of make me hate the writing.
My dislike generally tends to go to characters who I’m expected to have positive attachments to without any events transpiring that would prompt that.
But Morrigan from Dragon Age got to me. Maybe there’s just something unique about how one autistic nihilist can inspire rage in another nihilistic autist.