Oh lol. Fail on my part. The Witcher 2 is on my list of games I still desperately need to play.MacNille said:
Bad guy motivations
- Thread starter Saregon
- Start date
I share the sentiments of most other posters what makes a bad villain motivation- 'evil just because, gonna blow up or take over the world 'cause I was mistreated as a kid'. Not that it necessarily makes a villain bad, just shallower than some. There is a certain majesty to facing a legendary evil such as Ganondorf or Dracula that lets you excuse them.
As for the rest however, two motivations stand out as interesting in my memory. Janus Cascade in Wild Arms 3 starts out frantically trying to pay back some kind of debt to a far greater evil (not unlike Dr. Facilier in Princess and the Frog if anyone liked that, a debt to the devil is a powerful yet semi-sympathetic motivator), but eventually that debt does get called in and he ends up an unwilling servant to the main baddies. Emphasis on unwilling- when he can get away with it he gives you hints and helps you to banish one of their other extremely powerful servants. However, the true core of it goes all the way back to the kind of notorious bandit he originally appeared as- he actually wants to pull a crime so infamous that everyone will remember his name forever (a crime to top all crimes, a crime that will live in infamy!... sorry). As he admits, he doesn't believe in the afterlife, so this is the closest thing to immortality he can find.
Secondly Elpizo from Mega Man Zero 2. While without context he might seem like nothing more than a retread of Sigma from the X series, he's lived and grown up in a different age where Reploids, his people, are second-class citizens, easily declared Maverick due to an energy crisis and terminated. He is one of those ones who starts out with pure motivations, even becoming the leader of the rebel group you are in, but gradually becomes corrupted by his resentment of humans, resorting to progressively more and more ruthless means to get the power to make his goals come true, such as sacrificing his own troops. Certainly the most sympathetic Mega Man villain ever.
As for the rest however, two motivations stand out as interesting in my memory. Janus Cascade in Wild Arms 3 starts out frantically trying to pay back some kind of debt to a far greater evil (not unlike Dr. Facilier in Princess and the Frog if anyone liked that, a debt to the devil is a powerful yet semi-sympathetic motivator), but eventually that debt does get called in and he ends up an unwilling servant to the main baddies. Emphasis on unwilling- when he can get away with it he gives you hints and helps you to banish one of their other extremely powerful servants. However, the true core of it goes all the way back to the kind of notorious bandit he originally appeared as- he actually wants to pull a crime so infamous that everyone will remember his name forever (a crime to top all crimes, a crime that will live in infamy!... sorry). As he admits, he doesn't believe in the afterlife, so this is the closest thing to immortality he can find.
Secondly Elpizo from Mega Man Zero 2. While without context he might seem like nothing more than a retread of Sigma from the X series, he's lived and grown up in a different age where Reploids, his people, are second-class citizens, easily declared Maverick due to an energy crisis and terminated. He is one of those ones who starts out with pure motivations, even becoming the leader of the rebel group you are in, but gradually becomes corrupted by his resentment of humans, resorting to progressively more and more ruthless means to get the power to make his goals come true, such as sacrificing his own troops. Certainly the most sympathetic Mega Man villain ever.
0_0...not even one?...Okay, how about a very special BBEG:Saregon said:
Me, I like a villain with a sense of domestic pragmatism:
Deus Ex: Human revolution, despite being my favorite game of all time, had just about the worst main villain group I've ever seen.
It's the freaking Illuminati. And guess what? They want to take over the world.
Now, they are surprisingly vague on just how they plan to do this. Yes, they do manage to implant everyone with a chip that allows them to disable everyone's augs(mechanical devices implanted on humans that enhance their senses and abilites). However, that doesn't mean that they can control people, just disable them (which would plunge humanity into the dark days of 20whatever before augs were invented and people went around in wheelchairs if they were handicapped)
Hugh Darrow proved that they far more sinister uses when he drove everyone batsh*t insane with a single radio broadcast, but the Illuminati seem to be ignorant of this possiblity. How do we know? Because if they knew how to do it themselves, Adam Jensen (the protagonist) would have been drooling on the floor of the Omega Ranch basement before he could even point a gun at the final boss.
The second phase of their plan? To hook one of themselves up to a supercomputer. While this is nice and all, you have to remember that this supercomputer is at the bottom of the ocean near the north pole. And it is basically a glorified repairman that exists only to monitor water pressure and prevent Panchaea (the facility it's at the bottom of) from cracking like an egg. How does this allow the Illuminati to take over the world? Who knows! But, at least they're keeping up with their evil quotas by harnessing a machine that, quite literally, tortures innocent women just to function.
It's the freaking Illuminati. And guess what? They want to take over the world.
Now, they are surprisingly vague on just how they plan to do this. Yes, they do manage to implant everyone with a chip that allows them to disable everyone's augs(mechanical devices implanted on humans that enhance their senses and abilites). However, that doesn't mean that they can control people, just disable them (which would plunge humanity into the dark days of 20whatever before augs were invented and people went around in wheelchairs if they were handicapped)
Hugh Darrow proved that they far more sinister uses when he drove everyone batsh*t insane with a single radio broadcast, but the Illuminati seem to be ignorant of this possiblity. How do we know? Because if they knew how to do it themselves, Adam Jensen (the protagonist) would have been drooling on the floor of the Omega Ranch basement before he could even point a gun at the final boss.
The second phase of their plan? To hook one of themselves up to a supercomputer. While this is nice and all, you have to remember that this supercomputer is at the bottom of the ocean near the north pole. And it is basically a glorified repairman that exists only to monitor water pressure and prevent Panchaea (the facility it's at the bottom of) from cracking like an egg. How does this allow the Illuminati to take over the world? Who knows! But, at least they're keeping up with their evil quotas by harnessing a machine that, quite literally, tortures innocent women just to function.
I know it's not a video game or a movie, but by far the best villian I can think of, in series I've seen was Amon from the legend of Korra, because his motivation and goal were both beleivable and could actually have made the otherwise bland storyline interesting. Though it was all wasted, he's still one of the best villians I've ever seen.
Incidently, was I the only one who knew from the start that they were going to seriously screw up the ending.
Incidently, was I the only one who knew from the start that they were going to seriously screw up the ending.
Being Norwegian, I don't know much about those two shows, as they were never really a thing here. Although Flash Gordon was awesome in Ted.IndianaJonny said:
Well, there are a bunch of people in the Warcraft lore that have revenge as a motive for evil, i.e. the Defias Brotherhood, having been denied their rightful rewards after rebuilding Stormwind. And then there's the whole "I'm not the bad guy, I'm trying to fix stuff and you guys are bad guys for trying to stop me, i.e. The Scarlet Crusade, they're trying to stop the Scourge, and no one, not the Horde (especially with the Forsaken), and not the Alliance, are going to stop them from doing so.SecretNegative said:
I also like the gentleman bad guys, the ones who still value etiquette and manners, no matter what is going on around them and what they're doing, such as Alistair Tenpenny in Fallout 3. I kinda like that old guy, despite his tendencies towards blowing shit up with nukes. Any other examples of those?
Also, are there any games/movies where the bad guy should win, and actually does? As in, he has the vastly superior force/strategy, and the good guys don't find some dumbass MacGuffin to win the day, as in, it's realistic?
And are you guys as sick as me of the whole "I've won, so might as well put the hero in an elaborate deathmachine and tell him my entire plan" thing? Bullet between the eyes, bad guy wins, the end, why is that so hard?
