If there’s one trait that’s uncommon among the lead characters of video games, it’s just quietly getting on with it. These are a showy bunch, just as likely to save the world as they are to pause and kiss their bicep before doing so. So when it comes to picking a trademark mode of transport, their purchase decisions leave a lot of questions unanswered.
For example, if Mario owns a go-kart, why does he choose to undertake his vast rescue mission to save Princess Peach on foot? The guy’s just not thinking about practicality.
And neither are this lot. Preening about in Porsche SUVs, giant birds, or weaponized ice cream vans when a low-mileage second-hand Nissan Leaf would have done absolutely fine.
7) Leon Kennedy’s Porsche Cayenne Turbo GT (Resident Evil Requiem)
Here’s the least practical vehicle of all on this list. For context, the second-least practical is simply a bunch of stuff smashed together like a Katamari ball, so when we say that a specced-out Cayenne Turbo GT is not appropriate for weathering Resident Evil Requiem‘s zombie apocalypse, we really, really mean it.
For reasons never made explicitly clear, in a series which has never historically featured licensed vehicles, the latest Resi features an utterly true-to-life driveable Porsche SUV which Leon uses to drive between horrific massacres and near-death scrapes.
Regardless of what Porsche’s brand partnerships team wrote on their deck slides before meeting Capcom, driving about in a massive luxury SUV among the undead is like turning up at an abattoir in some Balenciaga sliders. It’s not just the wrong tool for the job, it’s that you really shouldn’t be making the headroom to be noticing luxury right now, you consumerist monster.
6) Link’s jumble of random objects (Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom)
Next up is a less aggressively capitalist option, and one, admittedly, which offers some real ecological and sustainability benefits: it’s the tangled mass of random things Link cobbles together using his Ultrahand ability in the latest Zelda adventure.
On one hand, these creations tend to be packed with innovations and creative thinking, like a Noughties Toyota build from woodland spare parts. On the other, they tend to literally fall to bits while you’re driving along in them, for no other reason than you hit a large stone at speed, or failed to properly connect two panels many hours ago.
Keeping in mind that Link is, as always, saving the world, rescuing princess Zelda and stopping the evil Ganon here, we think a modest SUV from a reputable manufacturer would have been a much better choice.
5) Commander Shepard’s Mako (Mass Effect)
Nobody supposed that driving on alien planets would be easy. But it was not until we found ourselves performing a succession of nineteen-point turns in Mass Effect’s Mako that we truly took on how challenging the task is.
An all-round armored personnel carrier designed specifically for the purpose of navigating long distances across harsh extra-planetary terrain, the Mako is a wet flannel of a car. It simply can’t be bothered to absorb shocks, or translate your inputs into consistent behavior. It conveys the sense that it’d much rather have nobody driving it and would be sitting and reading a book about a Scandi murder detective instead. Utterly useless.
Commander Shepard deserves better than this. Their brash tone, assertive leadership and frequent ill-advised flings with colleagues and random strangers in bars suggests they’d be much better suited to a Range Rover Evoque on a crippling finance deal instead.
4) Cloud Strife’s Chocobo (Final Fantasy 7)
We’re entering the soft, gooey middle of the rankings. A place of indifferent shrugs and basically fine modes of transport, which is quite a thing to say about a grown man riding on a fantastical ostrich.
Smouldering young soldier Cloud Strife is by no means the first in the Final Fantasy universe to have thought of domesticating the Chocobo and using them to get around, but he is undoubtedly the one with the most extensive haircare routine. That’s by the by. What’s pertinent here is that an eco-terrorist on a mission to topple an evil megacorp has chosen the most adorable mode of transport possible. Points deducted for impracticality, then added back on for poetic irony.
3) Sweet Tooth’s ice cream van (Twisted Metal)
To stare directly at Twisted Metal lore is to go mad. There is no rhyme or reason as to why these characters have weaponized their vehicles and spend eternity ramming them into each other, but the simple fact is that Sweet Tooth the killer clown has done a stand-up job of weaponising his ice cream van.
It’s withstood numerous games now, has a compact design that also boasts plenty of storage space, and he’s keeping a vintage machine on the road with some aftermarket tuning. It’s basically a restomod. Hats off, sweetie.
2) Master Chief’s Warthog jeep (Halo series)
Were he not an emotionless AI construct—basically Claude in a big green bodysuit—the Master Chief would be gutted to miss out on top spot here to his Y2K shooter rival. But he is. So he cares not one cubic ounce for this, or anything else.
The Warthog is the video-game vehicle. It’s a relic of a time in gaming when driveable cars in a shooter were an unthinkable luxury, and the fact you could hop into this one in both campaign missions and multiplayer was absolutely impossible to comprehend in 2001.
That’s meaningless on this list, though. All that matters is that the Warthog provides solid traction, a turret-mounted machine gun, and room for two passengers. Its flip function has saved many a careless stunt-driver, too.
1) Gordon Freeman’s 1969 Dodge Charger (Half-Life series)
This guy gets it. Gordon Freeman is practicality personified. He’s carried a crowbar with him every day of his life since 1998, hasn’t indulged in a bar of small talk since the Clinton administration, and he’s saved the world with a bare minimum of fuss at least twice. There will be no Lamborghinis in retina-detaching shades in his garage, then.
Instead, when the events of Half-Life 2: Episode 2 require that he make it to White Forest beyond City 17’s crumbling ruins, he elects for a barebones 1969 Dodge Charger build with room for Alyx Vance to ride as a passenger, and ample bootspace to carry any gnomes you’re schlepping around to unlock an achievement.
It’s throaty, powerful, agile, and features almost no exterior bodywork panels so you don’t need to worry about scuffing it against the Combine. Utterly minimalist, beautifully effective.
NOTE: This article first appeared on TopGear.com. Minor edits have been made.
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