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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/37993
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

As someone who is more of a consumer than a creator of writing (in the sense of storytelling), I'd like to offer an example of a piece of media that did just that.

I'd like to preface that this answer contains some spoilers!

In the video game Metal Gear Solid 2, the game revolves around the character Solid Snake, the definitive main character of the series. He is an unstoppable hero with incredible cleverness, near superhuman abilities, and more or less a "power fantasy" character. When the game was coming out, of course, everyone was excited to return to the life of Snake and his story.

However, in Metal Gear Solid 2, you only play as Snake for a very short time before you end up playing as a different character who, in short, does not encapsulate many of these qualities; in fact, he is more or less a wimp! Although the rest of the game is told through his eyes, it is revealed that all major story points actually revolve around Snake and his actions that are occurring in the same setting. You, the main character, often tend to just get in the way or cause more problems that he cleans up, but at the end of the game it is all revealed that he was the real protagonist as far as the story is concerned.

Of course, not many people who played the game came out feeling cheated; many consider it to be an amazing example of post-modernity in the video game industry. This is because playing through the eyes of the second character did not hamper the story; it gave a fresh viewpoint to experience the story, and it gave the player/consumer **agency.**

Now, obviously, a novel has different ways to achieve this, but I think they both revolve around the same idea: character viewpoints other than the main character are possible, and when done well, exceptional! One just needs to make the narrative beyond that character engaging, and make the consumer care about the other character enough to establish agency and immersion.

In short, it won't necessarily be disappointing to tell the story through the eyes of non-protagonist characters, but it will be challenging to build a narrative strong enough that it persists through the actions of the protagonist and establishes a connection with the reader through the supporting characters.

Original score: 2