| (Image property of Capcom) Thankfully, we don’t have to imagine it because, thanks to the Resident Evil series’ Umbrella Corporation, all we have to do is point to them and say, ‘Pretty much the opposite of that.’ Umbrella is an incompetent corporation with some pedigree to it, making ethically dubious and highly questionable decisions since 1996. And yet, if they kept one of those signs that tracks the number of days since their last major disaster, it probably wouldn’t have passed three digits at any point during that almost 30 year time period. Every time we see the Umbrella Corporation throughout the Resident Evil timeline, they’re always creating new catastrophic biohazards, infecting well-meaning first responders and firing automatic weapons in enclosed spaces full of yet more incredibly dangerous pathogens. At one point, things got so bad that Umbrella resorted to releasing cannibalising zombie viruses in order to cover up their responsibility for releasing the previous cannibalising zombie virus. When a company like Umbrella takes inspiration for how to cover up their war crimes from Russian dolls, you know there is a major issue in upper management.  | | (Image property of Capcom) Umbrella’s incompetence is such that, by the time Resident Evil 7 rolled around and Chris Redfield hopped out of an Umbrella Corporation helicopter at the end, I’m not sure what was meant to be more surprising; his re-appearance or the fact that the Umbrella Corporation has somehow still not been burned to the ground by the US government because it definitely should have been. Gotham’s Arkham Division - Batman: Arkham series Batman’s Arkham Asylum sounds like such a good idea on paper. Why try to separate and ship all of Batman’s most dangerous and unstable villains around the United States to stop them from plotting an escape when you could simply shovel them all into the same building less than a mile off the coast from mainland Gotham? Oh wait, now that I write it down, that’s a stupid idea.  | | (Image property of Rocksteady Studios and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) Thankfully, nothing’s too stupid for the Arkham Division of Gotham City’s governing body because not only did they decide that this was a perfect solution prior to the events of Batman: Arkham Asylum, they also decided that the scheme hadn’t taken its ideas far enough. By the time of Batman: Arkham City, they had decided to expand the policy to cover an entire district of Gotham City itself, a plan that was both a slap in the face to the concept of affordable housing projects but also a stupid, expensive safety hazard for all involved.  | | (Image property of Rocksteady Studios and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment) |
One small consolation for both the people of Gotham and those on the Arkham team who didn’t want to end up in the unemployment office is that they happen to live in a city partly occupied by Batman who, after both of these ideas ended in total bloody disaster, was able to swoop in and pick up the pieces. Tojo Clan - Like a Dragon series When it comes to organised crime, there’s usually a couple of prerequisites for success that can be expected. One is committing crimes. The other is being organised. Unfortunately for the Yakuza organisation, the Tojo Clan, from the Like a Dragon series, that second one doesn’t come so easily.  | | (Image property of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and Sega) Credit where it’s due, the Tojo Clan usually succeeds at committing crimes. Their staple activity of shirtless fist fights usually racks up a few counts of both grievous bodily harm and public nudity per bout. However, when it comes to organisation, the Tojo are about as well put together as the bloody pulps those shirtless fist fights leave behind. Throughout the series, the Tojo has been dissolved, thrown into civil war, invaded from the West and experienced more back stabbing than a serial bacon impaler. As a result, the Tojo is in a constant state of flux throughout the series, always bemoaning too many or too few men and leadership that is either woefully behind or bafflingly ten steps ahead. This perpetual state of incompetence means that the clan spends more of its time trying to hold itself together and plug the various holes in the sinking ship than actually committing any Yakuza crimes.  | | (Image property of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and Sega) The silver lining of this at least is that the Tojo always gives series mainstay Kazuma Kiryu a reason to come back into the world of the Yakuza, to highly entertaining results. However, it does also mean that the Tojo Clan actually spends very little time committing the organised crimes that they were ostensibly made for, making you wonder why they even bother anymore. Oscorp - Marvel’s Spider-Man What is it about comic book universes and horribly incompetent management structures? Perhaps there’s something about the security of knowing a masked vigilante can always swoop in the clean up your mistakes that makes businesspeople do stupid stuff. That being said, if the Arkham team were professionals at poor decision making then Oscorp is the Leonardo Da Vinci of corporate screw ups. Not only are they an industry leader in the area of horrible choices, they’re an innovator, always finding new ways to turn even the most minor problems into world-ending disasters.  | | (Image property of Insomniac Games and Sony Interactive Entertainment) Take the example of Marvel’s Spider-Man in which Oscorp is challenged with the problem of curing their founder’s son, Harry Osborn, of his deadly neurological disease. While this may be no mean feat on paper, Oscorp still managed to spectacularly screw the pooch on it by not only not creating a cure to his disease but instead managing to make a deadly, pathological bioweapon in the process. They didn’t just fail to understand the assignment, they set fire to the paper it was printed on and then choked themselves unconscious trying to swallow the remains.  | | (Image property of Insomniac Games and Sony Interactive Entertainment) Unfortunately for the good people of New York, Oscorp extends this can’t-do attitude to all of its scientific endeavours by successfully allowing its scientists to pursue new areas of complete disaster including attaching alien goop to humans just to see what happens as well as turning themselves into giant lizards and potential punching bags for two Spider-Men. In a way, it’s almost impressive that Oscorp manages to not only match but outdo the Arkham team for incompetence so that, if given the choice, some people might unironically consider living in Gotham just to get away from them. Abstergo Industries - Assassins’ Creed One might assume that global mega-corporations run by a shadow cabal that secretly controls the world might be somewhat immune to outright incompetence. Alas, on the contrary, Abstergo Industries from the Assassins’ Creed series just goes to show that, even with every advantage on their side, some evil organisations still can’t get their act together.  | | (Image property of Ubisoft) Primarily, Abstergo are known throughout the series for the Animus technology, allowing people to relive the experiences of their ancestors. The purpose of this is to get someone to retrace their steps to find the location of ancient god-like technology called pieces of Eden. However, for some baffling reason, Abstergo choose Desmond Miles for this project, a descendant of the Assassins Order, their arch nemeses instead of someone with less incentive to stab them in the throat. To make matters worse, by reliving his ancestors’ experiences, Desmond gains yet more training and even more reasons to rebel against his captors, eventually leading to the implosion of the whole program. Oh well, you might think at this point, plenty of shadowy evil organisations make mistakes right? It’s about how they recover and get back on their feet that matters. Very true. Unfortunately, Abstergo still fails in this regard too because, after the whole Desmond incident, they respond by creating Abstergo Entertainment, shady video game company and paper thin analogy for the state of modern day Ubisoft. For an all powerful evil corporation, it seems like a remarkably pathetic response to the greatest failure in their company’s history. Sure, they still have the plan to exploit people for information carried by their ancestors but even then, setting up a whole video game outlet and publishing multiple titles to feign legitimacy feels like a painfully roundabout way to do it.  | | (Image property of Ubisoft) What’s most frustrating about Abstergo though is that this is all so unnecessary. The company was founded by the Templars, they already alter the flow of the free market and control the world’s governments, why is any of this necessary? Do you really need a piece of Eden to control the world that is already entirely dependent on you? Was a video game publisher really the missing jigsaw piece for global domination? As far as evil corporations go, Abstergo feels less like a deep state shadow government and more like an unpaid intern constantly finding new and pointless ways to look busy. I hope you have enjoyed this breakdown of just some of video games’ most dangerously stupid organisations. Let me know if there are any obvious examples that I’ve missed and keep your eyes peeled, after all, life imitates art and who knows when companies might start imitating any of the above examples. Although, if anyone tries to imitate Umbrella, you probably won’t have to pay too much attention to figure that out. All images and properties belong to their respective rights holders and are deployed here for the purposes of criticism and review.
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