The most irredeemably evil bastard in any videogame

[Not Lord Atkin]

See, with most of these characters, you learn to like them at some level. They might be evil but they are the fun, interesting kind of evil.

Then there are characters like this guy:

Spoiler: The Last of Us spoilers

David. The guy attempts to rape, murder and cannibalise a 14-year-old girl. What a dick.

 

[Ryallen]

I find it humorous this thread got hijacked into a Handsome Jack debate.

Yeah...sorry about that. I didn't think so many people would jump on him for discussion like this. My bad.

[

If you're talking about the mission where Mordecai asks you to find 5 ECHO logs, then I have no idea what you were listening to, but he never killed anyone's kid. He might have done it in another log, but not in the logs that Mordecai asks you to find in Get to Know Jack. Those just explain how he got to where he is at that time.

Found it! It's in Opportunity, not that other place. My fault. It's the third audio log in the video. Starts at 1:09. The only other way I could read this would be him saying, "Never mention, or go see, your sons again," which is still pretty vile, but I'm betting he's planning to have them killed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLGbwxi9KgY

Personally, I don't really know what to make of that. You were right, I will admit, but it doesn't prove that he's irredeemable. Did you hear what he was saying when you were fighting over the Vault Key in Angel's Sanctuary? It really makes him sound like a loving father, if not terrible misguided. Not to mention that if you were in his place, while you wouldn't have done that specifically, I can guarantee you that you would do the exact same thing. Pandora, despite popular belief, is actually incredibly chaotic and violent. You shoot through bandit after bandit without a second thought, not even realizing that you are killing hundreds upon hundreds of people, something that everyone else does as well. Jack, while he does that as well, still wants to put a stop to it. He wants to bring order to Pandora, and I don't know if you know about this, but there is a saying: "If you want peace, prepare for war." He killed thousands of people that he saw as bandits and didn't give a second thought to because he knew that if he was to take over the planet and make it peaceful, or at least not as violent as it was at that moment, then he needed to kill everyone that threatened that.

 

[Lord Garnaat]

Blake Dexter from Hitman Absolution. He's evil and he loves it.

Hoh boy, I can agree with that. I'm playing through Absolution again and it's incredible just how much they can make me despise Dexter. It's not just that he has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, but that he so gleeful and smug about every horrible thing he does, regardless of whether it even benefits him at all, that sets me off.

I know a lot of people didn't think Absolution was a good Hitman game (something I disagree with), but even they can't deny that it probably had the best villains of the series.

 

[HellbirdIV]

It's hard not to just say "The Player", because no matter what evil, despicable thing the writers can make a character in the game do, if they give The Player the option to do it, invariably they will do it out of their own free will, just to satisfy morbid curiosity or momentary amusement.

 

[tangoprime]

Kefka. Definitely "Let's un-make the world by moving these stones just for shits-n-giggles" Kefka. Most definitely that maniacally laughing, dancing-madly asshole. Someone else here said it better, basically the Joker + Magic = Kefka, but let's not forget he also started the game as the right hand to the Emperor. So it's more like Joker + Magic + Immunity from prosecution + an actual army at his command = Kefka.

 

[Fox12]

Nyarlathotep from Persona 2.

Nyra is the embodiment of all mankind's evil after all... so lets recap his shenanigans in P2:

Spoiler

Nyra killed the entire world except one city, killed the sanity of 4 teenagers, killed the loved one of a guy, he still wants to destroy everything (possibly to return in our soon to be Persona 5... oh shit...), and the guys in P3 and P4 aren't living in the real world... because Nyarlathotep killed the real one with the power of rumors! RUMORS!
Also he was an Adolf Hitler wielding the Lance of Longinus.

And he just yuks it up...

In a world where god does not exist... what an amazing villain... f**k him!

So, can you elaborate on this, since I haven't played 2 yet? What does this mean for Persona 3/4? How are they not in the real world, and what is Nyars significance? I'm just curious before Persona 5 come out. Obviously I'm not worried about spoilers, though others might be.

 

[TP Potatosalad]

General Korbut, from Metro: Last Light. I can't really talk about why he's evil without involving spoilers so SPOILER WARNING. Aside from the super evil look, he wants the Red Line to have total control of the Metro via a super gruesome/painful biological weapon that lasts just long enough to kill every last man/woman/child in the area, then dissipates so the Red Line can move in and set up shop. There's no tragic backstory, there's no gray area where you can maybe see where he's coming from, it's just evil.

 

[Michael Tabbut]

Nyarlathotep from Persona 2.

Nyra is the embodiment of all mankind's evil after all... so lets recap his shenanigans in P2:

Spoiler

Nyra killed the entire world except one city, killed the sanity of 4 teenagers, killed the loved one of a guy, he still wants to destroy everything (possibly to return in our soon to be Persona 5... oh shit...), and the guys in P3 and P4 aren't living in the real world... because Nyarlathotep killed the real one with the power of rumors! RUMORS!
Also he was an Adolf Hitler wielding the Lance of Longinus.

And he just yuks it up...

In a world where god does not exist... what an amazing villain... f**k him!

So, can you elaborate on this, since I haven't played 2 yet? What does this mean for Persona 3/4? How are they not in the real world, and what is Nyars significance? I'm just curious before Persona 5 come out. Obviously I'm not worried about spoilers, though others might be.

It doesn't mean much for Persona 3 & 4. At the end of the Persona 2 games the bastard loses big time and leaves alongside his good counterpart Philemon...or so it seems. Persona 4 Arena hinted toward him being back in the franchise.
OT Relius Clover from Blazblue Continuum Shift Extend. When you turn your wife and daughter into weaponized marionette puppets in an attempt to create the "Perfect Doll" in front of your little boy and leaving him to finish up his daughter for an innumerable amount of time loops. Also what he does to Makoto Nanaya in her Bad End; did the same to her as he did to his wife and daughter but you hear it happen...it was like rape.

 

[JagermanXcell]

Nyarlathotep from Persona 2.

Nyra is the embodiment of all mankind's evil after all... so lets recap his shenanigans in P2:

Spoiler

Nyra killed the entire world except one city, killed the sanity of 4 teenagers, killed the loved one of a guy, he still wants to destroy everything (possibly to return in our soon to be Persona 5... oh shit...), and the guys in P3 and P4 aren't living in the real world... because Nyarlathotep killed the real one with the power of rumors! RUMORS!
Also he was an Adolf Hitler wielding the Lance of Longinus.

And he just yuks it up...

In a world where god does not exist... what an amazing villain... f**k him!

So, can you elaborate on this, since I haven't played 2 yet? What does this mean for Persona 3/4? How are they not in the real world, and what is Nyars significance? I'm just curious before Persona 5 come out. Obviously I'm not worried about spoilers, though others might be.

Oh boy, I have not been up on my SMT/Persona lore so bare with me cause this is all on the fly...

Spoiler

Nyra basically won and lost. He won in that he killed everyone but lost in that he didn't conquer afterwards. Philemon (his polar opposite aka "the goodness of all humanity" god) made it so that he and Nyra are forced to leave the now rebooted Persona world, in which P3 and P4 take place in. Because Nyra and Philemon are not there, there is no one left to govern deities like Nyx and Izanami from just roaming around messing with people. So Philemon's apprentice, you know him as Igor, is left behind to keep things more or less under control. Meanwhile Nyra and Philemon are basically just watching the new world: Philemon in the form of that blue butterfly you see often/that neat save station, and Nyra basically watching through the Shadows. Literally in the form of all of the antagonists.

I say it's possible for him to return in P5 because it's so easy to rebuild the hype around him. But we won't really know until the game comes out, for all we know it could be a new deity. That, and Atlus has been more or less noted to never want to touch P1/P2s lore out of respect of the original team and director. Still it's fun to theorize a possible return.

It doesn't mean much for Persona 3 & 4. At the end of the Persona 2 games the bastard loses big time and leaves alongside his good counterpart Philemon...or so it seems. Persona 4 Arena hinted toward him being back in the franchise.

Man that would have been cool, but unfortunately P4Ultimx debunked that possibility. I don't know who the "real" villain is, but it's confirmed to not be Nyra.

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

Seth, in Street Fighter IV's arcade mode - before I good pretty good at the game, he broke two of my rather pricey wireless 360 pads. Yup, it was HIM. His fault. Not mine. Nope. And speaking of displacing blame for the things you've done...

Captain Martin Walker, from Spec Ops The Line - I'd say by the end his irredeemable 'evil' (which isn't something I believe in, but I'll use the E word 'cause of the thread title) is all too clear.

...those two are fairly nasty pieces of work for different reasons, but the real winner?

The Player - I'd say the most irredeemably evil bastard in gaming is us.

edit

Ah, I missed this post... Definitely QFT:

It's hard not to just say "The Player", because no matter what evil, despicable thing the writers can make a character in the game do, if they give The Player the option to do it, invariably they will do it out of their own free will, just to satisfy morbid curiosity or momentary amusement.

 

[ObserverStatus]

Ah yes, now I remember, she's no Catalyst, but I believe that she deserves recognition for what she did to make second place.

Samus Aran, because whenever she's not slaughtering alien mega fauna by the herd and shooting missiles at priceless cultural artifacts, she is destroying entire planets and species of intelligent beings.

Metroid Prime 2:

Murdered every single Ing and destroyed Dark Aether without even taking a day to consider their side in the war with the Luminoth.

Metroid Prime 3:

Murdered a living planet.

Metroid 2:

Murdered every living Metroid save one.

Super Metroid:

Betrayed the trust of the infant metroid, allowing the Federation to try to turn it into a living battery.
Drove the Space Pirates to extinction or near extinction.
Destroyed Zebes.

Metroid Fusion:

Continuously opened new security levels on the research station throughout her mission, even though it was obvious that doing so was killing the survivors.
Murdered every single X after deciding that they were all irredeemably evil during a ride on an elevator.
Destroyed SR 388.

 

[Artemicion]

Probably Kefka. There's not even a real reason for him to do what he does beyond it just being fun. There really isn't even any easily pushed aside personal desire or belief.

Pretty much this. Failing that, I'd say Exdeath, because he is quite literally evil incarnate.

 

[MerlinCross]

Yeah Kefka is kinda one of the go to answers for this kind of topic.

So lemme throw down a name of another bastard in gaming; Luca Blight from Suikoden 2.

Kills a Youth Corp in his own army in order to reignite a war that was about to be done.
Massacres several towns, man woman child, doesn't matter. All are animals or Maggots to him
Sacrificed an entire city to gain even more power.
Even facing death(Do I really need a spoiler for a 15 year old game) he refuses to change. "It took hundreds to kill me but I killed humans by the thousands. I am sublime!!! I am the true face of evil!!!!" - Luca Blight.

 

[Almgandi]

Since Kefka has already been taken I am going to cheat a little and take a character who has appeared in video games but originates from manga / anime : Dio Brando

Besides acting like the embodiment of Satan's dick since he was in his teens like a lot of characters that have been already mentioned (not really putting any emphasize on the teen part but rather the Satan's dick thing) he also has a lot of charisma meaning that he can easily persuade people to join his cause and in general to influence people , which actually inspires the antagonist of a later part of JJBA to act out his plan.

To give you a quick overview of Dio's character and his actions:

Killed his father
Attempts to ruin the lives of his foster father and his son Jonathan so that he can become rich/powerful
Drives away everyone close to Jonathan
Burns Jonathan's dog while he (the dog) is still alive
Kills people on multiple occasions for the joy of it (respects the wish of somebody he is about to kill by not killing her child just so she can kill it after he turns her into a brainless vampire)
Poisons his foster father
Forces somebody to drive on the pavement killing dozen of people in the process, because he was stuck in traffic
Sadisticly toys with most of his enemies
Literally steals the body of Jonathan from the neck down

 

[Auron225]

I vote the lone wanderer from fallout 3 becuase he can

* Blow up a whole entire town with a nuclear warhead
* Blow up the HQ for the one hope for the Capital Wasteland, Brotherhood of Steel
* Fire a death ray at earth, vaporizing god knows what
* Sell children, escaped slaves, and pretty much almost anyone into slavery
* Brutally decapitate almost everyone for shits and giggles
* Poison the water supply with a virus, harming all ghouls and 90% of people in the wastes

I find it hard to agree. Sure, you can do that stuff - but it's more a testament to the amount of free will you have in-game as opposed to how evil the LW is. If the plot was fixed and you had to do all that stuff then by all means the LW would be a worthy candidate.

OT: I scrolled down as I was still thinking and saw Kefka pop up numerous times. I'm having a hard time thinking of someone worse so I may have to echo him. I mean, there have been plenty of other villains who go to similar lengths for destruction sake, but Kefka wins by a mile for being such a sadist about it.

See, with most of these characters, you learn to like them at some level. They might be evil but they are the fun, interesting kind of evil.

Then there are characters like this guy:

Spoiler: The Last of Us spoilers

David. The guy attempts to rape, murder and cannibalise a 14-year-old girl. What a dick.

Since Kefka has already been named, I can't think of anyone worse than him, but similar to your named choice I can think of a few more characters who made themselves easy to hate.

Comstock from Bioshock Infinite
That Krogan villain from Mass Effect 2, in the loyalty mission of Mordin Solus
Maximillian from Valkyria Chronicles. He just tries so hard to be a bastard

 

[Happiness Assassin]

I've been on a Dragon Age: Origins kick recently, so I have got 2 examples of completely irredeemable bastards:

-Arl Howe: Pure, unadulterated, almost cartoonish levels of evil. Hoping to ride the waves of the Blight and the ensuing chaos to gain more power, he amasses so many titles that it is difficult to keep track of all the people he has screwed over. His list of crimes include slaughtering the Human Noble's family and claiming that it was a riot, selling elves into slavery under the guise of medical aid, and general villain dick-baggery. And what does he say at the end? "I... deserved... MORE!" Rest in peace you sonofabitch.

-Paragon Branka: This one I find more interesting. She is just so obsessed over her goals, she sees everything and everyone as tool to be used. She allows truly horrendous acts to occur in order to get to the Anvil of the Void, that there could never be proper justification for her actions. The only time I have ever stood against Caradin, I made sure that she killed herself, just so at least she could see how horrible she had become.

 

[Gergar12_v1legacy]

The head of Argon Secret service.

Kills billions of fellow humans via space station blowing because of some conspiracy theory of Earth dominating, and controlling his Argon Federation and proving the terran's fear of the aliens, and after blowing up three destroyers the terrains had.

Think what is population of Earth now, when you check the population of Earth in Albion preclude it's like less than half of what it is now, and that is after hundreds of years of population growth.


Handsome Jack, and the main character of every GTA, and Saints Row game is small fries to this guy.

 

[minkus_draconus]

Well, you are about to see why in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.

I think it has to do with the fact that the people he tortures might actually BE bandits. Albeit bandits that might not be attacking him, but where you see a penal colony, he sees exactly what you are shooting through: Camp after camp of murderous psychotic bandits trying to murder you for shits, giggles, and loot. He just can't tell the difference. The daughter thing I believe has something to do with the possibility of Angel being the one to kill her mother, and the device being used to control her powers, while he uses her powers for his own ends. I don't think I've ever seen or heard of him killing children of his employees. Bandit kids, maybe, but kids of Hyperion employees?

OT: My answer to this question is not one based from love or hatred of this character, but of pure fact: M. Bison, specifically because to gain his power, he literally ripped out any good he had in his body and embraced the mad evil left in his soul. He is irredeemable because he literally has no good left in his entire body through his own machinations.

I cant think of a single thing that could possibly make me feel anything for Jack.

He was written as too much of everything I dislike in humanity.

It was impressive how much I wanted to totally find him and end him after discovering the Echocasts where he murdered Helena Pierce. This was amplified when he described how he blinded a man who tried to defend himself from Jack in front of his children. Actually pretty much everything in BL2 involving him makes me see red (figuratively).

Seriously his fictional actions are the only ones any villain (I would put Kefka up next) I can think of has performed that actually make me mad just thinking about.

 

[minkus_draconus]

Actually I've talked about this a few times, but Handsome Jack is a representation of the average player character from most RPGs, as seen from the perspective of the average bandit.

You see in Borderlands, you, the player character, are a bandit. Sure, you're a vault hunter, but you're also a bandit just like the rest of the denizens of Pandora. Hell, you can play as a Psycho in the game. The entire game is spent with you looting and killing, and fighting little land wars against various other bandit clans, and that's all you do when you're not fighting Handsome Jack. You're one of the reasons that Pandora is so dangerous. Why are you on Pandora? Because you're a vault hunter and you're all about getting more money and bigger guns. You're not a hero you're there for your own self interest.

The reason Handsome Jack thinks that he's the hero is because he is. He's bringing peace and order to Pandora. He's capturing, studying, and eradicating dangerous wildlife and exterminating the bandit populations that make Pandora dangerous for normal people. He created the city of Opportunity, which allows people a safe haven to live in for free.

I mean, what are the evil things that Handsome Jack has done?

Destroy the environment? Pandora was already kind of a shit-hole, and while he did pollute a few areas he did so in the name of progress. He created real cities on Pandora, rather than just the shanty towns that were there before.

Murder people? Pretty much everyone he "murdered" were murderous psychotic bandits who attack everyone the moment they see them. He killed the same kind of people that you spend the entire game killing. Did he kill them brutally? Sure, but the average player rather enjoys finding gruesome ways to kill their enemies. I bet you enjoyed shooting people in the face and watching their heads fly off. Of course you did you sick bastard, we all did.

Imprisoned his daughter? You could see it that way, but you can also see it as protecting everyone from a person who has incredible powers that she can't control.

Handsome Jack lives by the idea that the ends justify the means. The reason you see him as evil though is because everything he does is counter to what your player characters are trying to achieve, and because the other characters in the game, who are bandits, tell you that he's evil. The game is about bandits and anarchists fighting against a government which seeks to eradicate them in the name of peace and safety and your character is put on the wrong side.

That's what makes the game so interesting and well written to me. Handsome Jack is written as an evil bastard but at the same time I see everything he does as the actions that an immature player would take when playing an open world RPG while role-playing the hero. It's kind of brilliant.

Sorry but the people from New Haven were not as far as I can tell murdering psychopaths. Nor are the people in Sanctuary (listen to them). Helena Pierce was not; nor the guy he blinded who was protecting his family.
It's a cute theory but IMO falls apart.

EDIT: To fix quote attribution.

 

[Ryallen]

Well, you are about to see why in Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel.

I think it has to do with the fact that the people he tortures might actually BE bandits. Albeit bandits that might not be attacking him, but where you see a penal colony, he sees exactly what you are shooting through: Camp after camp of murderous psychotic bandits trying to murder you for shits, giggles, and loot. He just can't tell the difference. The daughter thing I believe has something to do with the possibility of Angel being the one to kill her mother, and the device being used to control her powers, while he uses her powers for his own ends. I don't think I've ever seen or heard of him killing children of his employees. Bandit kids, maybe, but kids of Hyperion employees?

OT: My answer to this question is not one based from love or hatred of this character, but of pure fact: M. Bison, specifically because to gain his power, he literally ripped out any good he had in his body and embraced the mad evil left in his soul. He is irredeemable because he literally has no good left in his entire body through his own machinations.

I cant think of a single thing that could possibly make me feel anything for Jack.

He was written as too much of everything I dislike in humanity.

It was impressive how much I wanted to totally find him and end him after discovering the Echocasts where he murdered Helena Pierce. This was amplified when he described how he blinded a man who tried to defend himself from Jack in front of his children. Actually pretty much everything in BL2 involving him makes me see red (figuratively).

Seriously his fictional actions are the only ones any villain (I would put Kefka up next) I can think of has performed that actually make me mad just thinking about.

Really? Those things made you hate him that much? A story he tells you for luls and an Echocast to establish him as a sarcastic murderer? Not the torturing Tiny Tina's family, or the threatening of his employees, or anything like that?