Most people probably do not wake up each morning wondering “Who am I?” Yet from RPGs to Sonic The Hedgehog video games are saturated with characters that suffer from amnesia.  These characters have either no past at all, false memories, or just a fuzzy recollection of critical events.  Does the condition reflect some truth behind the human condition, or is it an easy-to-use plot device?

Warning: Spoilers Ahead.

The Blank Slate Reborn

Sometimes main characters are avatars that only exist to represent the player.  Think of Chrono, whose only motivation for being in Chrono Trigger is that he has an inventor for a friend and it would look awkward if he left Marle to rot in the past.  Chrono doesn't talk for the entire game, and while he doesn't have much personality he isn't going to offend anyone either.

Reason for Special Powers

Gaining the skills necessary to save the world involves hours of practice.  Natural talent is also involved but when the game’s plot involves Armageddon hard work and genetics aren’t romantic enough.  And if the characters are already great, why are they starting off at Level 1? The answer is to make the characters hold a secret power they don’t know about.  They were always great – they just didn't know they were great. 

One example is Noel Vermillion from BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger.  Noel one of the main characters with Ragna and Jin but spends a lot of time as joke fodder. One of her story paths even revolves around other characters ridiculing her chest size.  Naturally Noel is potentially the most powerful character in the game's canon. 

On one hand when people discover a natural talent it's something that signifies what they should do with their lives - a step on the way to growing.  On the other hand it's rare for a person's talent to be the ability to obliterate everything.         

Character Motivation

Amnesia is useful for games where there are multiple motives for the same goal, like RPGs or fighting games.  In Super Street Fighter II Cammy’s goal is to win the tournament and to destroy M.Bison’s empire.  Good for her, but all of the characters want to win the tournament and half of them want to destroy M. Bison’s empire.  There’s also the problem that Cammy is physically a teenager and already the best member of England’s elite special forces unit. 

Amnesia hides Cammy’s age/training paradox and gives her motivation to achieve her goal, even if it’s to find out she’s M.Bison’s DNA clone assassin thing.  Amnesia turned out to be so successful that it was used it again for Abel’s story in Street Fighter IV.    

Truth in Fiction?

 According to the Mayo Clinic amnesia is more likely to affect forming new memories than to make people forget their past.  Video games aren't the first to use memory loss as a plot device, but it pops up a lot in a medium where the player has an active role and depending on the game the story can last over 60 hours.  What do you think about amnesiac characters and how they're used in games?