Video game protagonists are all very talented in their own way. Many of them can pilot spaceships, occasionally even into black holes. Others can make excellent home-cooked meals, while some can build entire societies out of just a few tools.

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However, have you ever asked yourself the all-important question: would my favourite protagonist be able to care for a houseplant? It's harder than it looks. These are a few protagonists that we know would fail, without a doubt.

The Dragonborn (Skyrim)

Skyrim - Cherry Blossom in the Dragonborn's house in Whiterun

The Dragonborn's a busy person. They're part of Skyrim's Imperial Army, the Companions, the Thieves' Guild, the College of Winterhold, the Dark Brotherhood, and someone on the street just asked them to find a lost kitten. Needless to say, they're not at home very much.

Now, technically, the Dragonborn's plant might live... but only because their spouse is watering it. The Dragonborn's soulmate, the love of their life, is at home raising adopted children, making home-cooked meals every day, running a fairly profitable shop out of the house, and probably polishing the Dragonborn's weapons and armor on top of it all! Talos forbid that they tell you to water your own damn mountain flowers.

Shepard (Mass Effect)

Shepard in Mass Effect pointing gun at a Terrarium

The Mass Effect games are RPGs which are riveting in part because you make actual choices that affect the gameplay and the outcome of the story. Who will you take with you on the most dangerous mission? Which allies will you recruit for your intergalactic war? Will you prioritize your spaceship's offensive or defensive upgrades? How will you deal with the unhinged parent of one of your companions (which, believe it or not, happens more than once, somehow)?

And, there's the most intense choice of them all: how often will you feed your fish?

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Yup. In Mass Effect 2 and 3, you can adopt a little fish from various planets to decorate your personal cabin, and you can actually feed them! You'd probably assume this was a cute little gimmick, right? A way to emotionally bond with creatures that are effectively just strands of code?

Wrong.

Shepard has to feed their fish exactly the right amount, or they die. Feed them more than once between main missions, no matter how many side-quests you do? They're dead. Forget to feed them when you do two interconnected story missions back to back? They're dead.

No one let this monster around a houseplant.

Chef (Overcooked)

Overcooked chef with a knife raised above some cacti

Overcooked works on Vegas rules: what happens while playing Overcooked stays while playing Overcooked. You can't be held responsible for anything you said to a loved one while playing this multiplayer cooking game. The stakes are high, the environment is moving, and the hamburger orders are rolling in! There's no room for consequences.

While we won't be charging the chefs for manslaughter after they push one another into pools of lava or out of a truck onto a highway, we also won't be trusting them with a houseplant. Odds are, they'd just mistake it for their cabbage and wind up serving a very unusual salad to the Onion King.

Max Caulfield (Life Is Strange)

Life Is Strange - plants in Max's room

Max Caulfield from Life Is Strange has an exceedingly busy life. She spends most of her time in a will they-won't they romantic relationship with her best friend, and when she's not dealing with her love life she's talking young girls down from ledges and unmasking perverts. All in a day's work.

"Why wouldn't you trust her with a houseplant?" you might be wondering. "Max sounds like a perfectly responsible young woman. It just sounds like she lives in the television show Riverdale."

That's where you would be wrong.

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See, Max Caulfield accomplishes all this extraordinary teenage sleuthing and saving lives with her incredible time travel powers! Inevitably, Max would skip backwards or forwards in time and lose track of the last time she watered her plant. She can't risk going back or forwards to water it again, or not water it, in case she were to undo all the good she's done! Max would decide her houseplant was a worthy sacrifice for whatever scheme she was undoing.

Leave the plant care to someone who's not messing with the laws of time and space.

You (Plants Vs Zombies)

Plants VS Zombies - game board with a bunch of houseplants on it

What are your plans for the zombie apocalypse? When it comes, we'd all better be prepared. Some people would move somewhere uninhabited, where zombies would have no brains to live off of. Others might arm themselves to the teeth with machine guns and explosives, happy to go out in a blaze of glory. People could even band together in groups to survive, sharing resources and survival tips.

The protagonist in Plants Vs Zombies decides that the best plan is to bunker down in their house and defend it by becoming the general of an army of sentient plants.

Listen, we don't know what kind of crazy magic you did on your plants to bring them to life, and, frankly, we don't want to know! We just definitely aren't going to sell you a potted ivy that we carefully nurtured from a cutting if we know that you're just going to take it home and send it to fight wave after wave of zombies.

Mario (Mario)

Super Mario Odyssey - Mario and a piranha plant

Mario has been murdering plants since the first Super Mario Bros. game. No sensible person with a thought to their name would give Mario a plant to care for as his own.

"But Mario's friends are all mushrooms!" I hear you saying. Mushrooms are fungi. Not plants. Get a hold of yourself.

Though... There's perhaps one parallel universe out there where the stars align, and Mario is able to raise one for himself.

After mercilessly slaughtering Piranha Plants on the battlefield, Mario is jumping over their pipe homes when a wailing cry catches his ear. Those Piranha Plants must have captured an innocent baby, Mario thinks to himself, and stoops over the pipe to get a closer look. Inside, he finds something he wasn't ready to face: a baby Piranha Plant, wailing for its mother.

What does Mario do? He's sworn to fight Bowser's minions, and he hesitantly slides down into the pipe. At the bottom, the Piranha Plant is still sobbing - there are big, watery droplets rolling down its face. Can he really do this? Mario asks himself. Something firm and solid inside him springs inside his throat, and he shakes his head. He has no choice. Mario lifts a foot over the child's head and shuts his eyes.

He's about to lower his foot when the crying begins to slow down, a few hiccups interspersed in it until the noise dies all together. His foot feels wet. Mario opens one eye and peaks down at the baby.

The child's gaping mouth, so well-equipped for murder in their maturity, is sucking on Mario's shoe. That firm and solid thing inside Mario melts. He picks up the little pot and looks at the baby with fresh eyes - softer eyes. After gathering a few supplies, Mario makes the careful walk back home with the plant cradled in his arms. He tries not to think about the day when he'll have to tell this child the truth.

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