The Dord of Darien

Sidebar: Runners-up

There were a fair few villains I considered for this list but ultimately decided against for one reason or another. They’re all excellent, but they don’t quite qualify as Best Villains Ever. Here’s a sampling of them, in no particular order. Note that this list won’t include pictures because a) I had a hard time finding pictures for some of them, and 2) formatting the Worst Villains Ever sidebar was a giant pain in the ass.

Geldoblame (Baten Kaitos series): We first encounter Geldoblame as Emperor Geldoblame, the evil tyrant of the Alfard Empire. In the prequel Baten Kaitos Origins, however, we’ll meet him in an earlier incarnation, as a sort of all-purpose advisor and confidant for the Quaestor in Mintaka. This is where he really begins to shine; we spend all of Origins questioning every statement and every move made by Geldoblame, suspicious of all the help he gives us, waiting for a double-cross we just know is coming. And he stays cagey, albeit mysterious and a bit creepy. And the game keeps us waiting. What keeps Geldoblame off this list is that, frankly, he wasn’t very interesting in the first Baten Kaitos, but his character in Origins doesn’t stand up on its own.

The G-Man (Half-life series): The G-Man is Gordon Freeman’s overseer of sorts. Who (or what) he is and who he represents are a complete mystery, but he appears to be something of a "secret master," operating behind the scenes and orchestrating events toward his desired outcome. We first encounter the G-Man in the original Half-life, wandering around the ravaged Black Mesa complex, seemingly oblivious (and impervious) to its dangers. Through the rest of the series, the G-Man is always around somewhere in the background, watching Gordon but never letting on what he’s all about. What keeps him off this list is that, plain and simple, we’re not sure he’s a villain. He’s sinister at the very least, sure, and creepy and inexplicable, but not actually necessarily a bad guy. And I don’t think I’m being too much of a stickler by insisting that all the entries on a Best Villains Ever list actually are villains.

Gruntilda (Banjo-Kazooie): Grunty is the evil witch who lives near Spiral Mountain and kidnaps Banjo’s sister as part of her sinister plan to make herself beautiful. She speaks only in rhyming couplets, and has a habit of breaking in to make a snarky comment at random intervals while Banjo and Kazooie are wandering around her lair. Eventually the heroes fight their way through to her and end up having to play a bizarre board game over a giant lake of lava to reach Grunty; this part of the game really shines, but even better is what happens when you get through it. The fight with Gruntilda is truly exceptional, going through many phases and requiring proficiency with all the game’s different moves and abilities, as well as good strategic thinking. She doesn’t make the list because this battle, while excellent, is almost completely inappropriate for the game it’s in; Banjo-Kazooie is a very easy game for most of its run, and the Gruntilda encounter is too severe a difficulty spike which many players find offputting. If the difficulty had been matched better to the rest of the game, the quality of this fight might have been enough to pull her up onto the list.

Onyxia (World of Warcraft): For an Alliance player in World of Warcraft, Onyxia represents the culmination of about half of what you do the whole time leveling to 60. She’s behind or involved in most of the turmoil and mischief taking place in the human lands, and the event that reveals this easily ranks as one of the coolest moments in the entire game. Facing Onyxia, the first thing a player is likely to notice is how huge she is; there are lots and lots of drakes and whelps and dragonkin and younger dragons in World of Warcraft, but, for most players facing Onyxia, she’s liable to be the first fully-mature dragon they’ve seen. And it’s impressive. The mechanics of the fight are also engaging; Ragnaros is probably more visually exciting (especially given the way he makes his entrance), but Onyxia’s a better fight. What holds her back is the lack of any feeling of closure after she’s beaten; there’s a small amount of fanfare in Stormwind City, and then that’s it. No follow-up quests, no changes in the way NPCs interact with the player — nothing. And that combined with the fact that you’ll probably now end up fighting her every week to get gear for people leaves the experience seeming a bit anti-climactic.

May 8th, 2008 Posted by Darien | Best Villains Ever | one comment