Times where someone is Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves in Video Games.
- In AdventureQuest Worlds, if you make the choice to betray and kill Artix during the finale of the Doomwood saga, Vordred "rewards" you by making you the very first of his new undead minions as he unleashes a Zombie Apocalypse upon Lore.
- Bastion has a version of this. When Zulf betrays the player to the Ura, he returns to the Tazal Terminals with them. Once the Kid arrives to collect their shard, they assume that Zulf betrayed them by leading the Kid there. They respond poorly.
- Boles, the Joker's inside man in Batman: Arkham Asylum, who murdered several of his fellow guards and helped Harley take the Commissioner hostage, is found strapped to a stretcher and apparently gassed to death, either because of this, they had no more need for him, or (considering this is The Joker we are talking about), just For the Evulz.
- BloodStorm kicks off with the High Emperor getting assassinated, and all eight fighters are pointing fingers at each other. If Tempest wins, she accidentally lets slip that she released the Big Bad and ordered her father's execution. She is promptly overrun by an angry mob and beheaded.
- Borderlands:
- Roland in Borderlands 2 was one of the major characters who betrayed Handsome Jack in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel! and dies at his hands. Unfortunately, he was also the most reluctant of the three, while Lilith and Moxxi get away with turning Jack into Handsome Jack and causing his rampage on Pandora.
- Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel!, again, gets a very justifiable one. The Meriff betrays Jack in person after a few seconds the latter outright lets him go, by shooting him in the back with a revolver and missesnote . This concluded in getting shot in the face several times while giving Jack a lesson to never trust anyone.
- In Citizen Sleeper, Ethan the Bounty Hunter ends up having his contract on the Sleeper's bounty cancelled, something which angers him, so he offers to protect the Sleeper from his colleague, Maywick, who now holds the contract on their bounty, in return for them helping him work off his debt to the Kompressor Club. And the Sleeper even helps him steal his confiscated gun back from the club. Even after all this, Ethan still ends up betraying the Sleeper by selling out their location to Maywick for a 50/50 split of the bounty. When he arrives at the location, he is gunned down in cold blood.
- Dexter Deshawn in Cyberpunk 2077 arranged the Arasaka heist that led to V sharing a brain with Johnny Silverhand, and shoots him in the head to cover his own ass when it goes sideways. When he realizes V survived, he hands him over to an Arasaka agent and gets shot in the face himself for his efforts.
- Danganronpa: This is a problem that anyone who decides to aid Monokuma faces, as The Man Behind the Man Junko Enoshima is hedonistic and has poor impulse control. If betraying an ally will help her feel despair, she'll do it immediately. It doesn't matter if you're acting entirely according to their plan, or how useful an asset you are, because the Mastermind is too self-centered to care. In the first game, her sister and co-conspirator Mukuro dies because Junko decided on a whim to execute her, and in Zero, she kills her boyfriend Yasuke Matsuda for the same reason, even though his work is what made her killing game possible.
- Averted by Gwyn in Dark Souls. After Seath the Scaleless betrayed his fellow Dragons, Gwyn rewarded Seath by making him a Duke. This did not sit well with Gwyn's bishop Havel the Rock, who hated Seath and the sorcery that Seath created.
- Dawn of War:
- In Dark Crusade, during the Imperial Guard stronghold assault, the Guard's Fifth Company can be turned rogue and allied to the attackers' faction by killing their Commissar. After the battle, if you were playing as the Space Marines, you see the Marines sending the survivors back to Segmentum Command, with a request to their superiors to not punish the Guardsmen because they followed their orders and fought with honor... except Fifth Company, who the Marines summarily execute for treason. Ironic, isn't it?
- Also occurs in vanilla Dawn of War's campaign. Said traitor (Isiador) steals the MacGuffin from right under the other space marines' noses, only to have the Big Bad immediately take the item for himself and leave the traitor and his marines to guard the rear. Meaning he has to face the very angry Force Commander/former best friend he had just betrayed. Needless to say, he doesn't last long.
- In the NovaLogic game Delta Force: Land Warrior, your first mission takes place on a training course surrounded entirely by friendly soldiers carrying out exercises. If you kill more than one of these soldiers (because one could simply be an accident), every single soldier on the training field will turn on you and try to kill you.Instructor: You, my friend, are a maniac! You have just made yourself a target for every man on this installation! Good luck, sweetheart!
- Dishonored 2:
- Once you return to Dunwall Tower, you can find a note on a dead noblewoman's body. Said note is from Empress Delilah, inviting said noblewoman to dinner after she denounced Emily and pledged fealty to Delilah, and noting that Delilah is "eager to show how I feel toward one who is so quick to change allegiance". Said noblewoman seems to have been drowned in a lavatory.
- Additionally, if you spare and lock up the captain of the Guard who betrayed you early on, you can find him too, turned to stone. Granted, this may be more because he let you escape…
- In Doom Eternal, there is one thing even the demons of Hell itself cannot stand, a traitor. So after they got one of the Night Sentinels to betray his people at the promise to revive his son, they brought his son back as the Icon of Sin, and he forever became known as The Betrayer in Slayer's Testament artifacts.
- Dragon Quest:
- In Dragon Quest, when you confront the Big Bad at the end, he offers to let you rule by his side. Say yes and it's Game Over.
- Dragon Quest V has an Evil Chancellor who betrays the rightful heir when they return, not wanting to give up the cushy position he'd been enjoying in their absence. After selling out the kingdom, he's later found gravely wounded, and frantically attempts to explain himself to the hero, begging forgiveness. His last words get cut off by the sound of a weapon striking home.
- Dragon Wars: It's entirely possible to help the forces of Kingshome overwhelm Byzanople, slaughtering all traces of resistance there. If you do so, your commanding officer rewards you by having you thrown into the dungeon; given how easily you threw your lot in with him, he doubts that you'll prove any more trustworthy for The Empire.
- In the Dark Brotherhood questline of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, after successfully assassinating the Emperor and escaping, you're cornered by Commander Maro of the Penitus Oculatus, who gloats that you just killed a Body Double, and that someone in the Family betrayed you and informed him of the plan in exchange for sparing the rest of the Brotherhood. However, as part of the setup for the Emperor's assassination involved not only killing his son, but framing him for treason as well, Maro doesn't feel inclined to honor his side of the deal and vengefully sends an army to wipe out the rest of the Brotherhood, including the traitor.
- In Elite: Dangerous, after the assassination of Emperor Hengist Duval, the group behind the event, Emperor's Dawn, fled and established a base of operation in Federation space, possibly thinking they would have safe haven. President Hudson sent a fleet to clear them all.President Zachary Hudson: Perhaps the terrorists think our distaste for the Empire is so great, we will tolerate their presence in our space. Perhaps they thought we simply wouldn't notice their incursion. In any case, they are wrong, and they have made a costly mistake. We will mete out such punishment that the very fires of hell will seem but guttering candles in comparison. Emperor's Dawn is about to learn what it means to cross the Federation.
- Fallout 3:
- There's an example that crosses over with You Have Outlived Your Usefulness. You're captured and interrogated by the Enclave. Colonel Autumn demands the code to the purifier. If you actually give it to him, he shoots you. Game over.
- In the Point Lookout DLC, Professor Calvert, a Brain in a Jar: offers you "the greatest gift a human can can be given" to betray your ghoul partner Desmond Lockheart. It is, of course, "Death", and if you do turn and kill Lockheart for him, Calvert will set a small army of robots on you.
- Arriving at Nipton in Fallout: New Vegas, you get your first impression of Caesar's Legion. Nipton offered entertainment to all comers, mostly settlers and troops from the New Californa Republic and the Powder Gangers (escaped NCR prisoners). Considering it a Wretched Hive, Legion figure Vulpes Inculta paid off the town leaders to draw the NCR visitors into a trap so the Legion could kill them. "Too late, they realised they were inside it, too." By the time you arrive, the town is a mass grave: Vulpes arranged a grim version of the town lottery in which the first prize winner goes free, the Second Prize winner lives but has their legs thoroughly broken, the third and fourth place winners get enslaved, and everyone else has been shot, burned, or crucified.
- A subversion of this takes place in the main campaign of Final Fantasy XIV. The first battle with Ifrit is started with a cutscene wherein a pair of traitors who sided with the Amalj'aa end up having their souls scorched by the Primal. Unfortunately, this also includes all the survivors of the previous battle as well, except for your character. Soul scorching cannot be reversed, however,forcing the Immortal Blades to kill both the traitors and their own soldiers.
- Final Fantasy XVI: Benedikta bribes a villager to sell out his people for being Branded, only to murder him once they're done. He claims that Benedikta's master rewards loyalty — Benedikta counters that a man who sells out his own people doesn't deserve to be called loyal, followed by a beheading.
- Subverted in The Final Fantasy Legend. Byak-Ko decides to kill Mireille because he has no more use for her after she betrays the resistance and her sister Jeanne, but Jeanne takes the bullet.
- Fire Emblem:
- In Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, the half-cowardly, half-Apathetic Citizens of a port town inform the Daein soldiers about which boat Ike and his company took. When they ask for their reward, they are told that it was their country's own princess in that company that they just sold out. Just as the realization and guilt really begin to sink in, the captain of the soldiers has the "dastards" taken away to be worked to the bone, a "fitting reward" for people who would sell out their own princess.
- In Fire Emblem: Awakening, the Hierarch of Ylisse, who Chrom had known for years and who had helped Emmeryn run the kingdom during the early years of her rule, sells them out to the Plegians while they're evacuating Emmeryn to safety. Once the ambush begins, the very first thing the enemy leader does is kill the Hierarch, outright telling him that his orders were to protect a man, not a "pig" who sold out his own sovereign.
- Inverted with General Horace in Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon. He was labeled a traitor who defied his knightly oaths towards his country of Archanea, and was hoping to die a knight's death for it. However, it's revealed he only did so to protect the civilians of his lands, so Princess Nyna decides he won't have a knight's death, but a traitor's life.
- Katarina in Fire Emblem: New Mystery of the Emblem was expecting this, even outright begging Marth to execute her so she could atone for her sins. Marth, however, is having none of it, and tells Katarina that death would be no atonement, just running away from her crimes, and she needs to live so she can find the way to make up for them.
- Implied in Grand Theft Auto IV, Playboy X and Dwayne are longtime friends. When Dwayne returns from prison a sullen man, eventually the two butt heads to the point where Niko needs to kill one to continue the plot. If the player kills Dwayne, Playboy calls him up and wires a large amount of money, but tells him that he has to try to kill Niko if they ever see each other again (they don't).
- A more likely explanation is that Playboy X doesn't want anyone else to know of his involvement in Dwayne's death, as it would be really fishy for him to not try to kill the murderer of his "best friend".
- In Grand Theft Auto V, Stretch sells out Franklin and Lamar to the Ballas. When the player comes to kill him in the Golden Ending, the Ballas choose to run away instead of help him.
- inFAMOUS: Second Son: Hank Daughtry makes a deal with Brooke Augustine, luring Delsin and Reggie into a trap in exchange for his freedom, which results in Reggie's death. Afterwards, Hank finds himself dealing with an especially anti-Conduit D.U.P. officer, who has no intention of honoring Hank's deal with Augustine and fully intends to just kill him; of course, it's entirely up to the player whether or not Hank lives.
- In Jade Empire, during the Empire's siege of the spirit monk's monastery of Dirge, a group of younger spirit monks sabotage the defense with the expectation of reward. Instead, after the other spirit monks are killed, the Emperor has them executed as well and binds their spirits to a fountain to prevent anyone from restoring Dirge. Your spirit companion makes this clear this is effectively a Fate Worse than Death.
- In Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, the Exile can choose to spare Atris instead of killing her, and instead of letting her off lightly with such things like imprisoning or exiling her, either of which are literal rewards in her eyes, so it'd be more gifting her instead of punishing her, The Exile can instead choose to have Atris suffer in the very room she is currently inside, in which she has hoarded any artifacts/holocrons of the Sith she has gathered over the years, despite it being incredibly dangerous, with this result being the most satisfactory since, not only is she a hypocritical, ice-hearted bitch that has so many holes in her so-called "ideology" that it'd make swiss cheese look whole in comparison, she is also directly responsible for the start of the fall of the Jedi Order itself since, while the mass of Jedi on Katarr certainly was a beacon to eventually draw Darth Nihilus, she is the one specifically responsible for it.
As such, the aforementioned "punishment" of hearing her beg otherwise to not remain in the very room she stored her artifacts in is a MUCH more satisfying and more appropriate way to deal with her, since she even mentions the other "reward-punishments" that she would rather have instead of the one chosen for her. - In the backstory to Kult: Heretic Kingdoms, a warlord controlling a key rebel fortress sold out to the God-Empress who was trying to suppress the rebellion, but was then executed due to the God-Empress's contempt for traitors.
- In The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks, it's revealed that Byrne is a Lokomo who agreed to leave his tribe for the Demon King Malladus. As soon as Malladus is fully revived, he blasts Byrne away with a magic blast.
- Middle-earth: Shadow of War: There is a traitor in Minas Ithil planning to let the Witch-King of Angmar's forces inside the city. It's none other than General Castamir, who thinks the siege defense is a lost cause and makes an agreement to let the city fall if they spare his daughter. When that happens, the Witch-King says his daughter is free to "die alongside her people" and rewards Castamir's betrayal by smashing him with his mace. If that wasn't bad enough, he is also raised as a Wight by Isildur and forced into And I Must Scream state.
- NEO: The World Ends with You has this happen with Motoi. He spends an entire week feeding information to the Reapers in the hopes of joining them to save his own skin. Too bad for him that the person who offered this to him was Kubo, who tells Motoi after he's been defeated by both Shoka and the Wicked Twisters that he never actually told any of the other Reapers about this offer, which more or less ensures Motoi's death by erasure the following day.
- Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom: When Evan is on the mission to get his previous home of Ding Dong Dell to sign the Declaration of Interdependence, we end up finding out that the real cause of Mausinger's betrayal and assasination of King Leonhard was Chancellor Vermine. Doloran couldn't corrupt Leonhard and couldn't corrupt Mausinger either, so he had to resort to convincing Vermine to slowly corrupt Mausinger and have him kill Leonhard. When Doloran appears and steals Mausinger's kingsbond to Oakenheart, Vermine asks the payment that Doloran promised him: being the new king of Ding Dong Dell. Doloran instead removes his soul so it can be the first one he uses in his big plan. He even outright calls it "Repaying the debt of a traitor" and calls Vermine a "contemptible worm".
- Last Scenario: In the aftermath of the imperial civil war, Tazar comes to Helio for help as he saw the writing on the wall. Helio simply thinks it's "shameless" that Tazar is asking for aid given he betrayed every organization he associated with, including the Kingdom that Helio works for, just to save his sorry hide. Then Helio adds he's joking and that Tazar can be appointed as a guard of a important facility thanks to his position as a former ally. Later, we found out that Tazar was sent to the Biorite Facility where he was used as a guinea pig and transformed into a misshapen horror that fought and was killed by Hilberd and co.
- The Operation Flashpoint expansion, Resistance, has an alternate ending (though it occurs after the 3rd mission) where you betray the Resistance to the Russians. Immediately afterwards, you and the remaining Resistance members who have been captured are taken to the General, who orders the prisoners' execution. As they are being lined up, a officer asks about your character — he orders that you be executed as well, because you are seen as 100% untrustworthy.
- Planescape: Torment has a meta-example in the Fourth Circle of Zerthimon: According to the passage, in the middle of a Githzerai uprising, a Githzerai named Vilquar voluntarily warns the illithids and feeds them as much intelligence as he can. They kill him the instant they feel their victory is assured.
- In Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, the Prince regrets that his father did not give the Vizier this treatment, as he betrays them almost immediately after betraying his former liege and joining them.
- Radiant Historia:
- Twisted in the Standard History route during the escape from Granorg. Resistance member Pierre has crossed the Despair Event Horizon and betrays Princess Eruca. If Stocke has not saved his sister Clair, his team kills Pierre in battle along with the soldiers. If Clair is safe, she convinces Pierre to pick himself back up and Stocke is able to save the group before the soldiers can "reward" him, followed by Eruca forgiving him and sending him and Clair to safety.
- King Garland of Cygnis' Jerkass advisor betrays the country to the enemy after being banished, and is rewarded like this. ("After he spilled his guts he, well, spilled his guts.") Unusually for most examples here, you actually have to go back in time and prevent his death in order to progress, since him selling you out leads to the king being fatally wounded in the next battle. Stocke talks him out of betraying you by convincing him he'll suffer this fate if he does, and he promptly agrees.
- Resident Evil: Revelations 2: Neil Fisher sells several members of Terra Save, including Claire Redfield, out to Alex Wesker as part of a plan to obtain a sample of the Uroboros virus and revive the FBC. When all is said and done, Alex gives Neil the Uroboros sample he wanted… by deliberately infecting him with it, turning him into a monster that Claire has to put down.
- Rise of the Third Power: Emperor Noraskov of Arkadya organized a false flag operation against Cirinthia and had King Horatio assassinated because the latter was about to discover his plans. He claims that Horatio came to him for an alliance despite the latter's previous alliance with Tariq, which shows Horatio isn't a trustworthy ruler. Therefore, Noraskov claims that he's justified in betraying Horatio first. It's ambiguous how much Horatio's treachery factored into Noraskov's actions, since the latter already wanted to conquer all of Rin in the first place, making this come off as a Dog-Kicking Excuse.
- At one point in the PC game Spycraft: The Great Game, the villains approach you with the offer of joining their organization. If you accept, you're tasked with assassinating the President of the United States. Regardless of whether or not you do it, you're then killed by another assassin as payback for arresting his girlfriend earlier.
- Star Wars: The Old Republic: In the Sith Warrior PC's storyline on Belsavis, they start by demanding information on their target from two Imperial soldiers. The officer refuses to tell him anything under legitimate, if misguided, orders from Darth Baras, but her underling is scared enough to give up the goods. The Warrior can then execute him for disobeying his superior (alternatively they can execute the officer and promote him, or just leave them both alive).
- In Temtem, The Rival Max's Inferiority Superiority Complex leads them to join the Belsoto Clan in the hopes of one-upping the Player Character, betraying them, their hometown, and their Dojo. It isn't until General X orders him to kill the player that they see Clan Belsoto for what they really are and tries to leave, only to be shoved off the edge of the World in the Sky by X for their desertion and seemingly fall to their death.
- Tomb Raider (2013): Dr. Whitman makes a deal with Father Mathias and his cult to deliver Sam to them, betraying Lara and the remaining Endurance crew, so that they can complete their sacrificial ritual and escape Yamatai. He is also firmly convinced that he is the one playing Mathias here, planning to slip away and escape as the ritual is being performed, only to return later with the authorities as the Fake Ultimate Hero. Mathias instead uses Whitman as an expendable distraction by convincing him into trying to parley with the Stormguard, then slipping past with Sam as the guards chop him into pieces.
- In Touhou Project, there's a subtle implication that the abuse Reisen endures from the other residents of Eientei is karmic punishment for her going AWOL and fleeing the moon during the Earth-Lunarian Warnote . The other part of it is karma for her being a Space Elf, complete with the requisite arrogance.
- In the Genocide route of Undertale, Flowey enthusiastically supports your massacre of monsterkind throughout the game... all the way up until he realizes he's next. He then rushes off to warn King Asgore of your arrival. Unfortunately, Asgore is still no match for you, and you take him down with ease — and then Flowey hurriedly finishes Asgore off for you to prove he "can be useful" and tries to claim he was never really going to turn against you. It doesn't save him.
- Maximilian does this to Prime Minister Borg in Valkyria Chronicles. It comes across as mostly Pragmatic Villainy, as Borg is almost comically treasonous and untrustworthy.
- In Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, if you choose to betray the Kindred and side with the Kuei-Jin, Ming-Xiao will reward you by chaining you to the Ankaran Sarcophagus and throwing it into the ocean.
- Wizard101 has a weird version of this trope when the player accidentally unleashes Axenos. Axenos is genuinely thankful to the player and his attempt to kill the player is meant as a true reward, since it will spare the player from witnessing the horrors he plans to bring upon the spiral.
- Yakuza 0: The Chinese doctor who works for Wen Hai Lee agrees to help Sagawa's thugs find where Lee and Majima are hiding Makoto Makimura in exchange for money. As soon as they've found her, the thugs stab the doctor in the chest with a tire iron.
