Joel kills to protect a young girl, and himself in a world that is dying, and killing each other brutally in a world truly fractured. Joel kills out of necessity and infected. Not because, hey...you look killable, unless you want to play that way.
Snake kills because IT IS HIS job, and he prevents actual bad stuff from happening...or tries. To prevent crazy wars from being worse.
Master Chief is fighting a war against fundamentalist Aliens, and a long gone insane Didact. To protect Earth.
Sam Fisher can kill because IT IS HIS job to protect his country. You can also play the games without killing anyone.
Adam Jensen can go the entire game without killing an innocent. He can just kill the triad of evil, and evil lady of doom. To save the world.
Nathan Drake goes around killing "mystical" monsters or Scooby Doo Villains, and anyonw else in his way, IN THE NAME OF TREASURE! Oh and to kill anyone non-white for the most part unless they have breasts.
Yep. An opinion article just like mine is an opinion.
I don't think he is a psychopath, but I think he is one of more pointless "killers" in gaming. Treasure...k. Sure he fights and kills people who would use it for evil, but he isn't there to stop them, not really. their death is merely an obstacle to his original motive. Treasure hunting.
Ok and if you were shot at first? You wouldn't even dare defend yourself? I dont recall Drake ever thinking he would need more than a pistol on his treasure hunt.
Stopping Lazarevic is a feat for Drake. Why? If Lazarevic was immortal he would have committed mass genocide on the world.
For someone not exactly built for militant measures of kill counts he seems well adjusted with taking lives. If he isn't a psychopath then the devs could of adjusted the game in the same vein of Deus Ex, and Splinter Cell where nonlethal take downs are an option. Even in games such as Uncharted Abyss where you can do sections "silently" you kill the person in the silent takedown still.
It is a feat, but it wasn't an initial goal. Drake is merely going through the motions from his original goal which is treasure. All the other killers pretty much killed because either they were trained and it was their job due to a threat long standing or because the threat was a crumbling society itself that was filled with already more violent people and spiraling government.