Whether it's the fault of starry-eyed art departments or marketing overseers with an eye for sexy box art, most playable character rosters could double for fashion model listings. Seriously, whether you can play as a guy or a girl in any given game, chances are your character is going to be really, really, ridiculously good looking - in anything from Altered Beast to Zelda. It's gotten pretty old.

Fortunately, through dedication to a non-standard aesthetic (or perhaps a basic misunderstanding of human faces), some less-than-perfect specimens slip into the final product. And I'm here to celebrate the least perfect of them all. Come with me for a look at some of the ugliest characters ever to surface in your video game, and let's hope to see more of their kind in the future!

It's cool that Nier is a JRPG character who doesn't look like he's cutting PE class to save the world, but he didn't have to swing quite so far in the other direction. Speaking of PE class, his wrinkly face is particularly weird on top of that smooth and muscular frame. For real, though, just bush up his eyebrows a little bit and he's the bodybuilder version of Andy Rooney.

Take away the eczema sores, the patchy male-pattern balding, the huge bags under his eyes, whatever is going on with those eyebrows, and the last dozen years of speed addiction, and Trevor Philips could actually be a pretty handsome guy. But you and I both know he'd rather be ugly as hell than give up that sweet, sweet meth.

I'm not calling Remedy's Sam Lake (the original face model for Max Payne) ugly. He's actually pretty good-looking, in that hardcover-dust-jacket way. But Sam Lake with his face permanently pinched into a bizarre sneer with eyebrows arched, nose wrinkled, and mouth smirked? Yeah, that's ugly. Fortunately for Mr. Lake, Max got a new face for both of his sequels.

The other Whispering Rock campers are cute in a demented way, but Raz's little overripe tangerine of a face is just too much for me to stomach. Not to mention his facial features are all so squished down that he looks like his parents bound his head as an infant - wait, maybe that's why he developed psychic powers?

Motherfucker looks like Brock Lesnar forgot his sunscreen and got stung by a bee.

Perhaps in other cultures, a high, wrinkly dome atop your head is a sign of power and nobility. To me, it just looks like a potato. Though it's more of a baked potato that's been left in the oven too long for Heihachi, with steam shooting out from either side. I'm pretty sure his brows are permanently furrowed at this point, too. I'd never say any of this to his weird face, of course, lest I get mine rearranged.

Does including Wario on this list seem a little too on-the-bulbous-pink-nose to you? I can see where you're coming from, but I must disagree. It would actually be an insult to leave off that baggy-eyed, crooked-stached, Chiclet-toothed visage. Wario basks in his propensity to inspire physical revulsion, and I ain't gonna hate on him for it.

The security guards in Half-Life are clearly modelled after Barney Fife from The Andy Griffith Show. That said, Valve probably would've been better off using a picture of Don Knotts for reference, instead of travelling some eight years into the future and exhuming his desiccated corpse. Fortunately, Barney clearly got some sun/nutrition between then and his starring role in Blue Shift.

Before I saw Steve, I never would've thought it possible to pack that much dishevelment in an eight-by-eight pixel area. But there he is, squares expertly stacked to suggest a cruddy little goatee and uneven, ruddy skin. Do you think if Notch knew Minecraft was going to be a worldwide phenomenon, he would've spruced Steve up a bit? I hope not.

This isn't even a weight thing. Big guys can look classy, too. But not with a bizarre handlebar mustache and bulging, veiny half circles for eyes. And oh my god, what is going on with that braided top knot? It makes his bulbous head look like a bell on a chain. Let's just try to pretend that nobody noticed the trail of body hair poking out of his unzipped jumpsuit...

There are pretty much two paths to walk in The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion's character creator. Either embrace the madness, as seen above, or create a character who looks roughly like a human being… who was found floating face down in a bog. Actually, there's one more path: just make a damn Argonian and avoid the whole issue.

Her giant face-eating maw is terrifying, but the way it kinda shoves all the rest of her features aside is maybe even scarier. Also, your eyes don't deceive you, Mileena is the only lady on this list - and you barely even see the ugly half of her face, since she usually wears a mask. C'mon, game developers! Not every playable woman has to be pageant material!

Meth, man. Not even once.

Nobody's looking too hot in the CD-i Zelda games, but the rubbery faced monstrosity that is Link might have gotten the worst of it. There is literally not a single scene where Link doesn't look like a self-satisfied dick, though his overall appearance does at least vary from "smug chipmunk" to "smarmy cadaver".

Mega Man is wincing in agony. There appears to be a tear emerging from the corner of his eye. But it's not because of his pelvic-breaking stance, or his freakishly swollen shoulders, or the pain of trying to wield a cubist handgun in naturalist fingers. No. It's the lament of a simple little robot soul trapped inside a freakishly repugnant human body.

I know that some polygons and texture details had to bow out to bring one of the Wii's most visually impressive games to 3DS, but I fail to see how making Shulk into a gawping fishman could improve performance. To use an equestrian term, the poor bastard looks like he was rode hard and put away wet. Wait, am I saying he's a seahorse? Sure, he's an ugly seahorse.

AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

What, you thought Sega was going for some kind of style thing by leaving Greendog's face blank? Nope. Just look at the guy in the background. He's clearly wracked with abject horror. Sega simply couldn't render Greendog's ghastly visage without destroying your Genesis, so it made his head appear to be a featureless orb instead. A bit Lovecraftian, if you ask me.

Boogerman's raison d'etre is being generally unpleasant, but that doesn't forgive whatever's going on with that chin of his. You'd think his nose would be his most exaggerated feature, being Boogerman, right? But no - his chin-neck region is front and center, extending down roughly to his bellybutton. More like Tonsil-stoneman.

Marcus Fenix was never meant to be a good-looking guy, but Epic Games may have done its job a little too well. Seriously though, look at all those scars - both physical and emotional. He's lost so much in these endless wars. Hopefully he loses that awful soul patch next.

Woo! I could keep going all day. But I won't - because I want you folks to have something to talk about in the comments! It's definitely not because I ran out of ideas and was kind of stretching on that Greendog one. Definitely not. Anyway, who are some of your favorite ugly characters?

Want more freaky faces? Check out .

Whether it's the fault of starry-eyed art departments or marketing overseers with an eye for sexy box art, most playable character rosters could double for fashion model listings. Seriously, whether you can play as a guy or a girl in any given game, chances are your character is going to be really, really, ridiculously good looking - in anything from Altered Beast to Zelda. It's gotten pretty old.

Fortunately, through dedication to a non-standard aesthetic (or perhaps a basic misunderstanding of human faces), some less-than-perfect specimens slip into the final product. And I'm here to celebrate the least perfect of them all. Come with me for a look at some of the ugliest characters ever to surface in your video game, and let's hope to see more of their kind in the future!

It's cool that Nier is a JRPG character who doesn't look like he's cutting PE class to save the world, but he didn't have to swing quite so far in the other direction. Speaking of PE class, his wrinkly face is particularly weird on top of that smooth and muscular frame. For real, though, just bush up his eyebrows a little bit and he's the bodybuilder version of Andy Rooney.

Take away the eczema sores, the patchy male-pattern balding, the huge bags under his eyes, whatever is going on with those eyebrows, and the last dozen years of speed addiction, and Trevor Philips could actually be a pretty handsome guy. But you and I both know he'd rather be ugly as hell than give up that sweet, sweet meth.

I'm not calling Remedy's Sam Lake (the original face model for Max Payne) ugly. He's actually pretty good-looking, in that hardcover-dust-jacket way. But Sam Lake with his face permanently pinched into a bizarre sneer with eyebrows arched, nose wrinkled, and mouth smirked? Yeah, that's ugly. Fortunately for Mr. Lake, Max got a new face for both of his sequels.

The other Whispering Rock campers are cute in a demented way, but Raz's little overripe tangerine of a face is just too much for me to stomach. Not to mention his facial features are all so squished down that he looks like his parents bound his head as an infant - wait, maybe that's why he developed psychic powers?

Motherfucker looks like Brock Lesnar forgot his sunscreen and got stung by a bee.

Perhaps in other cultures, a high, wrinkly dome atop your head is a sign of power and nobility. To me, it just looks like a potato. Though it's more of a baked potato that's been left in the oven too long for Heihachi, with steam shooting out from either side. I'm pretty sure his brows are permanently furrowed at this point, too. I'd never say any of this to his weird face, of course, lest I get mine rearranged.

Does including Wario on this list seem a little too on-the-bulbous-pink-nose to you? I can see where you're coming from, but I must disagree. It would actually be an insult to leave off that baggy-eyed, crooked-stached, Chiclet-toothed visage. Wario basks in his propensity to inspire physical revulsion, and I ain't gonna hate on him for it.

The security guards in Half-Life are clearly modelled after Barney Fife from The Andy Griffith Show. That said, Valve probably would've been better off using a picture of Don Knotts for reference, instead of travelling some eight years into the future and exhuming his desiccated corpse. Fortunately, Barney clearly got some sun/nutrition between then and his starring role in Blue Shift.

Before I saw Steve, I never would've thought it possible to pack that much dishevelment in an eight-by-eight pixel area. But there he is, squares expertly stacked to suggest a cruddy little goatee and uneven, ruddy skin. Do you think if Notch knew Minecraft was going to be a worldwide phenomenon, he would've spruced Steve up a bit? I hope not.

This isn't even a weight thing. Big guys can look classy, too. But not with a bizarre handlebar mustache and bulging, veiny half circles for eyes. And oh my god, what is going on with that braided top knot? It makes his bulbous head look like a bell on a chain. Let's just try to pretend that nobody noticed the trail of body hair poking out of his unzipped jumpsuit...

There are pretty much two paths to walk in The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion's character creator. Either embrace the madness, as seen above, or create a character who looks roughly like a human being… who was found floating face down in a bog. Actually, there's one more path: just make a damn Argonian and avoid the whole issue.

Her giant face-eating maw is terrifying, but the way it kinda shoves all the rest of her features aside is maybe even scarier. Also, your eyes don't deceive you, Mileena is the only lady on this list - and you barely even see the ugly half of her face, since she usually wears a mask. C'mon, game developers! Not every playable woman has to be pageant material!

Meth, man. Not even once.

Nobody's looking too hot in the CD-i Zelda games, but the rubbery faced monstrosity that is Link might have gotten the worst of it. There is literally not a single scene where Link doesn't look like a self-satisfied dick, though his overall appearance does at least vary from "smug chipmunk" to "smarmy cadaver".

Mega Man is wincing in agony. There appears to be a tear emerging from the corner of his eye. But it's not because of his pelvic-breaking stance, or his freakishly swollen shoulders, or the pain of trying to wield a cubist handgun in naturalist fingers. No. It's the lament of a simple little robot soul trapped inside a freakishly repugnant human body.

I know that some polygons and texture details had to bow out to bring one of the Wii's most visually impressive games to 3DS, but I fail to see how making Shulk into a gawping fishman could improve performance. To use an equestrian term, the poor bastard looks like he was rode hard and put away wet. Wait, am I saying he's a seahorse? Sure, he's an ugly seahorse.

AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

What, you thought Sega was going for some kind of style thing by leaving Greendog's face blank? Nope. Just look at the guy in the background. He's clearly wracked with abject horror. Sega simply couldn't render Greendog's ghastly visage without destroying your Genesis, so it made his head appear to be a featureless orb instead. A bit Lovecraftian, if you ask me.

Boogerman's raison d'etre is being generally unpleasant, but that doesn't forgive whatever's going on with that chin of his. You'd think his nose would be his most exaggerated feature, being Boogerman, right? But no - his chin-neck region is front and center, extending down roughly to his bellybutton. More like Tonsil-stoneman.

Marcus Fenix was never meant to be a good-looking guy, but Epic Games may have done its job a little too well. Seriously though, look at all those scars - both physical and emotional. He's lost so much in these endless wars. Hopefully he loses that awful soul patch next.

Woo! I could keep going all day. But I won't - because I want you folks to have something to talk about in the comments! It's definitely not because I ran out of ideas and was kind of stretching on that Greendog one. Definitely not. Anyway, who are some of your favorite ugly characters?

Want more freaky faces? Check out .