Meet my top 11 video game villains of all time. (11 instead of 10 because I thought of someone I'd forgotten at the last minute and I didn't feel like trimming down what I'd already written.) Complete with pictures...

Hmmm. For some odd reason there seem to be a lot of bishounen men on this list. Funny that.

But anyway...

11) Lynx (Chrono Cross - PS)
Haven't played this game enough to have a really good impression, but from what I've seen it appears that in terms of personality Lynx has the worst of human and feline in one. Also has plenty of tricks up his sleeve, an elaborate master plan and an entertaining minion who takes the form of a female jester with a French accent. (She's not too brutally incompentant as far as minions go either.) Wondering what this bastard is up to does occasionally remind me that I ought to go back and complete the game at some point. I also think he's a pretty sharp dresser, which is more or less what I'd expect of a cat-man.


10) Sinistar (Sinistar - Arcade)
Speaking of feline villains who no one understands.... well, okay, so I think it looks like an evil cat's head and you may not, but whatever. In any case, many quarters were wasted on this game in an effort to figure out if there is any possible way of beating this thing before it growls "I am Sinistar **roar**" in its 80s-arcade-computer-voice and blows up your ship. No one I knew understood what to do, so in my mind at least it's remained invincible to this day. And that's worthy of at least a little bit of respect.


9) Seymour (Final Fantasy X - PS2)
I don't know jack shit about this guy. I just think his hair is cool.



8) Lezard Valeth (Valkyrie Profile - PS)
Creepy necromancer guy whose interests include creating horrible monsters, growing naked women in glass chambers, and setting up his female elven captives with his golem. Weirdo. I get the impression he wants to sleep with the Valkyrie, which could be a bit of a problem what with her being put into the world for the express purpose of getting rid of people like him. Would be a lot cooler if he didn't have such a brutally nerdy nasal voice.


7) Saro/Necrosaro (Dragon Warrior IV - NES)
Pretty cool transformation sequence for such an old game, as you can see. That aside, this villain has a more interesting history than many of the oldskool video game villains did. Rather than being just randomly insane or whatever half-ass villain motivation one may care to come up with, I seem to recall that what started this guy down the road to evil was the fact that he had an elven girlfriend who cried ruby tears, and he got really fucking sick of greedy humans picking on her. I thought that was a much finer reason to want to destroy the human race than one often sees in video game villains, of that time especially.


6) Satan (Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne - PS2)
What you see here is his creepy-little-boy form. He also comes in a creepy-old-man-in-a-wheelchair form. Not to mention a giant-ass-kicking-demon form. I haven't seen a whole lot from this game, but from what I've gathered he's about the kind of strong, willful, vengeful bastard that you'd expect Satan to be. Furthermore, he certainly has a score to settle with his maker - and you can even help him out if you want to! I did a whole lot of philosophizing about this game awhile back: Read my assessment of the merits of the various endings here.


5) General Palpaleos (Bahamut Lagoon - SNES)
One of those villains who stands out from the rest on his team in the fact that he's honorable and actually has something resembling a code of ethics. Adds some intrigue in the game, in that the princess who you spend a large portion of the game guarding and/or rescuing is a whole lot more interested in him than she is in your hero-character. But then, Palpaleos is the only man who a) doesn't turn into a nervous twit in front of the princess and b) treats her as if she actually has a brain in her head. If I was the princess, I'd be after him too - not that that's much of a surprise to anyone who knows me.


4) Magus (Chrono Trigger - SNES)
Let's see now... poncey elven-looking bastard. Scythe as a hand-to-hand combat weapon. Flies with his cloak like a superhero. Stupidly powerful with magic. Architecturally-awesome castle. Minions named after rock stars (Slash, Flea and Ozzy). Damn fine family-power-struggle-intrigue-vengeance-type reasons for being a villain. And the best boss music of any SNES villain, with the possible exception of one who I'll get to in a minute. All that and you can get him to join you later in the game if you play your cards right. At which point you have the option of having him go back to his minions to kick the crap out of them for being incompetant. How cool is all of that??


3) Albedo (Xenosaga - PS2)
This guy is seriously fucked-up. And that's coming from me. Aspiring to godhood is one thing. Having a fetish that involves beating, torturing and psychically raping artificial humans who look like 12-year-old girls is something else. Seriously. On top of that, it seems the guy has super-regenerative powers and a masochistic streak (i.e. in addition to the self-evident sadistic one), with the result that he cuts his limbs and/or head off just for giggles. And he has a very disturbing laugh. Quote: "I am not an anti-existence! I am the perfect chain!" (You fucking what?) Perhaps the scariest bit is that I heard the Japanese toned him down a bit for the American release...


2) Kefka (Final Fantasy VI - SNES)
Another complete psychopath. Megalomania + total lack of ethics + utterly unpredictable moods + ridiculous magical powers = bad, bad news. A proper insane villain, with a properly insane laugh. Also seems to have a taste for flamboyant fashion that matches his taste for flamboyant atrocities. Very much a sense with this guy of: "If you can't stop me from ending the world, you sure as fuck can't stop me from wearing makeup and a feather in my hair."

Kefka's fallen angel form (and the multi-stage abomination preceding it) had music to rival Magus'. As for his 'regular' theme music, I wouldn't say it's my favorite but it is some of the most distinct villain music I've ever heard on the SNES. Or anywhere, really. Title of this entry is based on a quote from him.


1) Sephiroth (Final Fantasy VII - PS)
Suppose I ought to pick him as my favorite since I have a model of him sitting on my altar right now. Sephiroth is like some kind of totally inhuman force of nature, in terms of destruction incarnate. I love how large portions of FF7 seem to involve following Sephiroth's train of victims' corpses around. I also like how he keeps fucking with Cloud's head - the way the game portrays it, it's almost like Sephiroth is not only a ridiculously over-powerful man who aspires toward godhood, but also some insidious personal demon of Cloud's. Especially what with him impaling Aeris on that giant sword of his.

Sephiroth also made a rather impressive appearance in Kingdom Hearts (PS2), complete with an awesome qabalistic fallen-angel style entrance. (The picture I have of him here is from the coming CG movie Final Fantasy: Advent Children - I badly want to see this but I think it won't be out for at least a month or two yet.) Talk about getting all my goth and occult interests in one wonderfully effective, manipulative and sadistic villain. Sure there's enough of a human element in his story to round out the character and make him pitiable in a way, but why ruin things by focusing on that? In short, the only video game character I've ever been tempted to write highly questionable fan fiction about... and I think I'll leave things at that.