Which types of villains do you prefer?

[Interdimensional Observer]

On 3/25/2018 at 3:46 PM, Armagon said:

That's like, one of my favorite parts about the game. From a writing standpoint, it makes Dunban seem kinda stupid because Metal Face and Mumkhar are obviously the same person but honestly, i enjoyed the amount of irony that was going on there.

I wouldn't call Dunban stupid though. The first time he and everyone else meets with him, Black Face is silent, that he uses claws is the only thing that might hint to him there is Mumkhar inside. The next appearance is post-Ether Mines, and here he speaks for the first time- but there is no reason to assume that Mumkhar is in there, the voice might be similar, but the heroes are still mostly in the dark about Mechon leadership. The next meeting is Prison Island, where the big reveal about the Faces happens, and the meeting thereafter is when Dunban states the truth right away before Mummy shows himself.

I do love the drip-feed Mechon reveal the game sets up. Leaderless legion horde of machines in the opening, we get a literal "face" for Mechon leadership in the Colony 9 attack, but the Face is still a personality-free silent monstrosity. Bionis Leg/Ether Mines reveal there are many Faces and they can speak and have personalities. We also get the mysterious Vanea scenes we can't understand at that moment, but which hint at something bigger. Then comes Nemesis and Metal chatting to each other and disagreeing leading up to Prison Island. and then at last the true Mechon leader is revealed at Valak Mountains, and who then through the entire journey across, down, up, and down again through Mechonis is fleshed out. The game gives you new info on your foe throughout the game at a reasonable pace, rather than just use exposition dump reveals about them at one or a couple moments.

Returning to Mumkhar, he did do one thing right, besides being a good jerk (and KI:U Hades was the same), was that he died at the right moment. The plot outgrew Mumkhar as soon as Fiora was revealed, and Yaldabaoth drove the last stake into his importance. Mumkhar might have been better off dying at Valak instead of Sword, and Shulk's naïveté and Dunban's willingness to listen to it was eh, but beyond this, he died a good death. A rule for a villain is that they should not overstay their welcome, I mean that Slayde guy in SoV- why does he live until almost the end of Act 4 when the last you saw of him was in Act 1? He doesn't appear in Act 4 in OG Gaiden. And Valter and Caellach, they died in just the right chapter, but they needed more drama to their deaths I think- which gameplay sadly denies from happening.

Of course, in terms of perfectly executed villains deaths in video games, Luca Blight takes the cake. I would not have changed his passing in the least, even though his passing deprives Suikoden II of its only perfection- his replacement villain just can't match him at all.

 

To actually discuss the question at hand. I do love Sephiran, a very good sympathetic villain, but I admit making a good sympathetic villain is not easy. And when you can't get it to work, like Van in ToA, it makes that character either really blah or dislikable. The Black Knight suffered from RD changing him from evil to sympathetic. Luca Blight does have a note of sympathy in his backstory, which we don't know much of, but he is mostly splendidly evil. Lucifer in SMT is on the whole a good evil villain, cold, logical, selfish, on the surface willing to entertain himself with the potential opposition, but all about business when pushed, questionably an ideologue or just having a vendetta with God, he admits in SJ I think that he will never love humanity- he isn't hiding his support as being wholly conditional on helping defeat God.

[Armagon]

55 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I wouldn't call Dunban stupid though. The first time he and everyone else meets with him, Black Face is silent, that he uses claws is the only thing that might hint to him there is Mumkhar inside. The next appearance is post-Ether Mines, and here he speaks for the first time- but there is no reason to assume that Mumkhar is in there, the voice might be similar, but the heroes are still mostly in the dark about Mechon leadership. The next meeting is Prison Island, where the big reveal about the Faces happens, and the meeting thereafter is when Dunban states the truth right away before Mummy shows himself.

You do make a good point and i take back what i said about Dunban being stupid about it. I just wish that Metal Face=Mumkhar wasn't super obvious to the player. 

[Interdimensional Observer]

7 minutes ago, Armagon said:

You do make a good point and i take back what i said about Dunban being stupid about it. I just wish that Metal Face=Mumkhar wasn't super obvious to the player. 

Well I don't think I picked up on it myself, and I played the game blind. Mums appearing only in the opening, a significant role there yes, but only for ten minutes before he "dies", I sort of forgot about him. Not completely, but enough not to make a instant connection. Being caught up in the intense moment of the opening and the likewise intense Mechon attack on C9 kept me from connecting the dots- distract with tension to deflect suspicions, not exactly an uncommon thing in video games.

[[account inactive]]

Kefka is probably the gold standard for psychopath villains, and Kreia (from KotOR 2) the gold standard for sympathetic villains. Both have their advantages, but I prefer my villains to be sympathetic. Psychopath villains tend to be boring whenever they show up on screen - Kefka is a notable exception, but too many, like that Ramsey guy on Game of Thrones, are one-note forces of destruction and suffering that turn up whenever the author/designer needs something bad to happen. Sympathetic villains can also be done wrong, mind, but I'd prefer the flawed execution of a sympathetic villain to the flawed execution of a psychopathic one.

[Armagon]

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Well I don't think I picked up on it myself, and I played the game blind. Mums appearing only in the opening, a significant role there yes, but only for ten minutes before he "dies", I sort of forgot about him. Not completely, but enough not to make a instant connection. Being caught up in the intense moment of the opening and the likewise intense Mechon attack on C9 kept me from connecting the dots- distract with tension to deflect suspicions, not exactly an uncommon thing in video games.

Well yeah, i was the same way in my first playthrough but whenever i would take breaks, i quickly realized that Metal Face was Mumkhar and the events at Prison Island confirmed my suspicion.

It could just be me though.

[Jotari]

3 hours ago, Armagon said:

You do make a good point and i take back what i said about Dunban being stupid about it. I just wish that Metal Face=Mumkhar wasn't super obvious to the player. 

Haha. I'm just as stupid as Dunban for not realising the Mumkhar twist. I had the whole Faces are Humans thing called from the moment Xord appeared, but for some reason I just didn't connect the dots that the robot with the claw weapons was the same person. Really enhanced the viewing experience that way as I had the exact same look of realisation on my face as Dunban.

[blah the Prussian]

17 hours ago, Cirosan said:

that Ramsey guy on Game of Thrones, are one-note forces of destruction and suffering that turn up whenever the author/designer needs something bad to happen.

*breathes in*

Ramsay, to a greater extent in the books but still kind of in the show, is not one note. He's a man child abused by his father who takes that out on other people. The point of his character isn't to be interesting, it's to have someone Theon thinks is hot shit until Stannis shows him Ramsay isn't actually hot shit. It's a creative thing with viewpoints.

[Jotari]

4 hours ago, blah the Prussian said:

*breathes in*

Ramsay, to a greater extent in the books but still kind of in the show, is not one note. He's a man child abused by his father who takes that out on other people. The point of his character isn't to be interesting, it's to have someone Theon thinks is hot shit until Stannis shows him Ramsay isn't actually hot shit. It's a creative thing with viewpoints.

They kind of ruin it in the series where he inexplicably keeps succeeding despite his monstrosity. In the book his psychotic disregard for human life causes a tonne of people to mistrust him and falter in their loyalties.

[blah the Prussian]

19 minutes ago, Jotari said:

They kind of ruin it in the series where he inexplicably keeps succeeding despite his monstrosity. In the book his psychotic disregard for human life causes a tonne of people to mistrust him and falter in their loyalties.

I feel like it was one of those cases where they really like the actor. They did that with Indira Varma and Lena Heady too. Shame, as Ramsay's pure evil in the books is an integral part of the thematic reversal taking place in Dance and Feast.

[Moblin Major General]

@Cirosan I find many Sith (except Sidious, because he's always been evil according to legends) to have something extremely tragic happen to them to turn them evil. Ventress lost her master, Dooku his apprentice, Maul his childhood, and Anakin everything. Darth Traya isn't the saddest or even most sympathetic of the Sith, as Anakin takes that once you consider the canon Clone Wars series (so glad Filoni and Hidalgo made his turn believable, but also tragic and necessary).

[Frosty]

Choice of villains? Well, Psychopathic Criminals.

Plus points if they're either of the following: A.) Omnicidal Maniac or B.) Demonic Archetype, more extra points if they're doing their evil deeds only "For the Evulz".

There's always this sort of charm that these types of villain hold for me, and I find it appealing in a very dark way. Example? Kefka Palazzo from Final Fantasy VI.

Edited April 14, 2018 by Frosty