The 10 Most Annoying Video Game Enemies

What makes a video game enemy annoying? The endless amount of them, of course. Or maybe they're durable, irritating bullet sponges or maybe their hitboxes are super finnicky. They can easily turn a great game into a tedious experience and severely affect your overall opinion of the game. It isn't worth the time invested if you're just going to be rewarded with more annoying as hell creatures to kill.

So, let's count down the 10 most annoying video game enemies and air our grievances, shall we?

10. Zubat (Pokémon: Fire Red/Leaf Green)

Cave areas in Pokémon games are met with exasperated sighs. You just know there's going to be loads of encounters with the same one or two Pokémon and if you didn't have the intuition to stock up on repels and escape ropes, you're going to be in for a bad time. Even grinding with zubats becomes a chore after a while. The experience gained is hardly worth exhausting your team and using up your health supplies, especially when this game absolutely loves ambushing you with Pokémon trainer battles out of the blue. Sometimes I like going back to Mt. Moon with my Lvl 50+ Pokémon and flaming the shit out of the little bastards with my Charizard. No, I don't need therapy, why do you ask?

9. Silverfish (Minecraft)

I have an irrational fear of silverfish. The things in real life and the things in Minecraft. Though I think my fear is slightly more rational in real life because SILVERFISH ARE GROSS. EW. I hate them in this game because I had a horrible first experience with them many years ago when they were first introduced into the game.

I was playing Minecraft 1.6.2, you know the days where you had to tediously unzip the .jar file to add mods to the game? I was hunting for the modded gems in the branch mining system I'd dug and all the sudden one of these motherfuckers burst out of a block of cobblestone. It scared the absolute shit out of me. I am not ashamed to admit that I turn the game to Peaceful mode when raiding Strongholds, because FUCK the portal room with its stupid Silverfish spawner!

Why do I not have a problem with spiders in the game, but freak out over these???? Probably because in addition of being hideous, they also scurry to hide into other blocks, meaning that you'll have to play "find the fucker" in the adjacent stone blocks. Seriously, was a game developer pissed off that day and decided to create this awful creature to take out their frustration?

8. Cliff Racers (The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind)

If you will excuse my infuriatingly spoiled millennial self, I found the actual Morrowind quite difficult and not fun to play. I wasn't allowed to play M-rated games until I was, well, mature (18+) and had already fallen in love with Oblivion and Skyrim. To me, Morrowind's controls were confusing and the character's walking speed was so slow, it's no wonder I kept getting gangbanged by cliff racers.

So my experience with Morrowind's story would actually be from an Oblivion mod, Morroblivion, in which a modder integrated the scenery, locations, and quests from Morrowind into the Oblivion engine. That being said, the mod did not make the cliff racers any less annoying. They still flap on top of you, just conveniently out of range so you can't land your attacks on their finnicky hitboxes and they rarely hunt alone. Elder Scrolls Online's expansion of Morrowind nerfed the creatures considerably because battering players with cliff racers would distract from the microtransaction shops gameplay. In fact, this creature's infamy would inspire Bethesda to create lore in which a pissed off adventurer completely annihilated the species in the time between Oblivion and Skyrim. Oh, Jiub. You magnificent bastard.

Rather fight dragons, not flying dinosaurs with attachment issues, thanks.

7. Wheely Bois Skeleton Wheels (Dark Souls)

First look at these things and you might think, "Aww, that's kind of adorably cute, it got itself stuck in a wheel, the dumbass." And then you think no more because this motherfucker game over'd your ass for your mockery. Honestly, I haven't played this far into the game myself because I'm awful at Souls games, but every Let's Play I've watched has had the player getting ticked off at these things.

Normally, a Dark Souls enemy has a pattern in which you need to anticipate to be able to block their hits and dodge appropriately. However, this is a skeleton going "Sonic Mode" in a goddamn wheel, logic does not apply to this asshole. If you're not wearing heavy armor, you'd best just stay the hell out of these things' way. They might not have bodies, but they have no problem destroying yours.

6. Tunnelers (Fallout: New Vegas, The Divide DLC)

Did you know the Courier has a backstory? That alarmed me as well. I thought we were just some poor shmuck mailman that took the wrong package and got caught up in a turf war. Apparently, the Courier unknowingly delivered a dangerous item that would be used to set off the nukes below, which resulted in devastating earthquakes ripping the land open and destroying the Divide, the once peaceful trading route now reduced to a hellhole full of insane survivors and horrendous creatures.

The Divide is a like a punishment to the Courier (and the player), throwing some of the toughest enemies in the game at you. I'm not just talking about the Deathclaws and Marked Men. The Tunnelers are spiteful little ground-dwelling pests that may very well pose a threat to the towns around New Vegas if they ever were to escape the Divide. Fortunately, they seem to be weak to fire and sunlight, creating tunnels in the ground for their habitats hence their name.

Fighting them will be a test of your armor's damage resistance and your Courier's poison resistance. Even the most skilled Couriers may find that running away is the best method for dealing with them and the game doesn't even blame you, not bothering to block off the next areas. When the game recommends running from creatures, you know it's gonna be a bad time.

During the mine section, your cart will be inundated with these little bastards and it will be a test of how many Stimpacks and food items you can scarf down to stay alive. Screw this, I'll take on three Deathclaws and a nest of Cazadors rather than deal with this bullshit.

5. Clickers (The Last of Us and The Last of Us: Part II)

The Last of Us enemies make it really hard for me to feel sorry for them. Yeah, they didn't ask to be infected, but I didn't ask to have my larynx torn out of my throat! The Clickers are particularly annoying because their attacks are almost always a one-hit kill, especially if you don't have shivs. It's not just that, the sounds they make grate on you after a while. It's like being bombarded by the freaky demon children in The Grudge constantly, the same rasping throat gargle noise grating on your nerves after a while.

What's a group of Clickers called? A deadend? A clusterfuck of Clickers? A motherfuck of Clickers are swarming an airport and Joel and the gang have to sneak around them in order to pass through. They're blind, so they use echolocation to locate their prey. Always carry a bottle or brick to distract them, otherwise they'll be having a Joel or Ellie sandwich. Needless to say, I will not be looking forward to their return in Part III.

4. Slurpers (Silent Hill 3)

The Slurper from Silent Hill 3 is, by far, the most annoying creature ever devised for Silent Hill games. Period. They're loud scuttling jackasses that look the child of an armadillo and a chicken that were conceived in a Satanic church. Melee weapons do not phase them at all. They also have the annoying habit of playing dead, so that when you go to do the final stomp, they grab Heather's foot and knock her down to crawl all over her.

I would not advise going to the Silent Hill Wiki/Fandom for explanations of the monsters symbolism. They are really, uh, out there.

There is a theme of maternity and femininity in Silent Hill 3 and its monsters due to the central conflict of the game centering on impregnation in the Order's attempts to force Heather to birth their god. The Slurper may adhere to this theme by representing the suction aspiration method of extracting a miscarried or aborted fetus. The creature's name and snout allude to this, as well as its passive actions in sucking up bodily fluids. The way it knocks Heather on her back when it attacks may be a reference to a woman on her back about to be given suction aspiration treatment.

I...what???? It's just a dorky looking demonic anteater thing that sucks up shit off the ground. Are all these descriptions for monsters bizarre and slightly misogynistic?

The Closer may symbolize ideas of one of the seven deadly sins; in this case, greed. Greed can extend to consumerism and materialism; their feminine form may symbolize women who go to shopping malls and relentlessly shop. They are encountered in a women's clothing store feeding on a woman, which may symbolize how "greed/consumerism/materialism feeds on women".

Short answer: yes.

And here I was thinking that it's at least better than the days of the Silent Hill Wiki Circumcision controversy (yes, that's a thing that happened). Apparently not!

3. Big Sister (Bioshock 2)

Bioshock 2 could have done without the ADAM harvesting sections. What possessed the creators of the game to think that the "protect the Little Sister" quests needed to come back? Wave after wave of annoying splicers draining my health and resources all just so the little brat can suck out some red koolaid out of a corpse. But the second game added a new feature! If you save the Little Sisters, a Big Sister screeches from the distance, signaling your imminent sulking disappointment at this awful gameplay mechanic. Why the hell am I being punished for doing something good game? Or this is some stupid "good is hard, evil is easy" lesson, because I might just descend to the dark side!

I never even finished Bioshock 2 because I don't have the patience to be dicked around like this. I don't want to be annoyed and angry while playing video games, you know, my hobby. Usually, a person prefers to enjoy their hobbies. And if I may just point this out, "good is hard, evil is easy" moral conundrums don't work in the context of video games. There's no real life consequences to ripping apart the Little Sisters and that means we can move along with the plot. So what if I get the bad ending? You gonna put me in time-out and put it in my permanent record?

2. Roaches (The Sims 2)

Sims are stupid. It doesn't matter how much the AI has been tuned, Sims will absolutely find a way to end their own existence. The Sims 2 had quite an annoying feature. If a Sim leaves a pile of trash or dirty dishes for too long, roaches will form on the ground. And because Sims are stupid and are drawn to roaches in this game like moths are to flame, they will immediately go to stomp on them. Doing so has a chance to give them the flu, which can spread to other sims in the household.

Yes, I know stomping on roaches isn't exactly a well-known form of disease transmission, but this is a game where you can own giant bovine/plant hybrids that eat Sims and produce youth potion milk. Thankfully, there are mods that remove the roaches, the chances of getting the flu, or the ravenous anonymous Sim craving to stomp on bugs. Otherwise, keep your houses clean and call the exterminator if necessary.

1. Lakitu and their Spiny Turtles (many, many Mario games)

Nintendo have no right making this character cute. In the 32-bit Mario days, these things were the bane of my gaming existence. I wasn't very good at platform games to begin with, so when there was this little shit literally throwing spiked turtle dudes at me, the entire level was a lost cause. Like do they not have hobbies other than fucking up Mario's attempt to save Princess Peach for the 293,392nd time? I know they had a brief appearance in the cart-racing games and Mario 64. What, are you not being paid enough coins for your miserable life? Maybe you could actually make yourself useful and direct airplane traffic or save people trapped in flyaway air balloons.

And that's it for my list! Thank you so much for reading and I hope you tune in next time for whatever I write next.