It’s too close to murdering CEOs.

They don’t want peasants getting ideas.

It's even stupider when the game railroads you into it. If I left a trail of bodies in my wake then obviously I intend to kill the main baddie too.

Fuck games that make you let the baddie go.

The term I see used for this is "ludonarrative dissonance". Basically, your experience playing the game doesn't match what the story is trying to tell you.

The opposite would be "ludonarrative synchronicity". Like in Doom the protagonist is an overpowered entity feared by all enemies, both in gameplay and in the story.

Edit: specifically applied to games, I'm not sure if there's a term for movies or other media.

The protagonist and the villain are both top 1%ers with class consciousness.

Far cry 4 was unbelievably frustrating with this "mechanic" a rocket launcher of 50cal round to the face means you don't get to fuck me in a cutscene... The game disagreed.

Yup i hate this stupid trope so fucking much. It's just being so obnoxiously hypocritical in order to deliver that another over generalized stupid notion: revenge bad

Not just the henchmen, but the henchwomen, and the henchchildren.

Someone has been watching CW's Arrow.

Like, Oliver, those henchem you shot with arrows, and your sidekicks shot with bullets are dead. Your friends are actively begging you to kill their leader who has threatened the entire city like 6 times now. Just kill him too, no one cares, they will probably build you a statue.

Related: Leaving the bad guy injured or "probably dead"

Cut the head off and make sure they're for-real dead.

Well, the henchmen usually wears masks or helmets so we and the protagonist don't humanize them.

Aang be like:

The color of this kid's clothes makes me hear the text in Winnie the Pooh's voice and I can't stop laughing.

What measure is a mook?

Fr, I was always thinking, " NO, MC You DUMBASS, HE'S THE EVIL ONE." No but the one henchmen, yah Fuck him an all his hommies. That's what y'all get for not being 'important' I guess, smh

Protags who do this would normally also spare henchmen who were incapacitated or surrendered, right? Those 7,455 henchmen who died all went down swinging. Accepting the villain's surrender is only notable because for some reason all of their underlings were fanatics who fought to the death.

I remember waiting for a twist when wonder woman was plowing through all those allied forces just to spare the nazi at the end??

[New Vegas] I know it's how Joshua Grahm heals in the end, but it always felt weird sparing that one guy at the end of Honest Hearts after actually genociding his whole tribe. (Joshua's words, not mine)

Each of those 7,455 henchman approached the protagonist ONE AT A TIME as well. That is why there's only 21 seconds of dialog total in the 2 hr 28 minute movie.

This is why Hong Kong '97 is the greatest video game of all time.

Chin gives zero fucks when he blows up the head of Tong Shau Ping.