We've discussed the best playable characters and their friends, so there's one more thing to talk about. Everyone loves to hate these guys, and some even use them to define their childhood personalities. Just don't let them dictate your adult life, or you're the weirdo. My friends and I love playing these guys in Super Smash Bros (although only one of them is on this list), and so, without further ado... What makes a great video game villain?
Every good hero needs a greater than or equal villain. Their counterweight makes readers, players, or watchers get invested in a plot. Without them, there is no game, story, or fun. Even playful platformers have basic evil bad guys. The antagonists are where most of the drama stems from, and it's an easy place to start. They often have a simple goal of world destruction or domination, but others have something higher in mind. Either they've been programmed with or a singular nature that drives them. Sometimes they're not even evil, to begin with. The last is a bit rarer than others, and it's usually a bit of a deep thinking exercise to realize it. But they still need to be stopped. They want us dead, enslaved, or worse. Can you imagine Cloud or Cecil's journey being all about catching butterflies? I'm sure that would have sold well. Regardless of if they're internal or external, localized or global, evil or not, every good story needs a bad guy. Hey yo!
But there's a million boss battles in games, so how do I put a limit on what I grade?
1.) You have to have an impact. Whether it's because you have a McGuffin or teach the players something. I don't care how, but you can't be a one off dude guarding a cave exit for no explainable reason. There may be a few exceptions for funzies down the line.
2.) I have to remember who you are. I'm sorry if the above rule works for you, but I don't recall your name, meaning, or face, so...
3.) Optional bosses are not here, even those with story value. Ruby and Emerald Weapon and rad and all, but do they matter?
As of right now, that's all I've got. I like to think it's simple and to the point. So let's the to the meat of our potatoes: the criteria.
All bosses, villains, and antagonists collect points for the following ten factors.
Are you the final boss? This makes sense since you're usually the driving force of the game. Either from the shadows or as public as you can be, it is you who everyone will remember when they finish the game. Even if it isn't deserved. (1)
Should you be the final boss? There are more than a few games where the last fight comes from out of nowhere, and they leave us confused. I'm down for cool concepts of stuff, but I want the connections that I've been making for the last 40+ hours to be there. If you've been the primary bad guy for a while, congrats. (2)
Can you, at any point, be considered the primary antagonist? It's a long game, so it's fine to not be the final boss. You can be the guy working for the guy, and there's nothing wrong with that. If we're chasing after you for a good chunk of the game, you get a point. But should random final fights get it? (3)
Can your actions be justified in some way? Were you bullied, experimented on, programmed, or brainwashed? Is what you did just your nature, and our planet had bad luck? If yes, congrats! I mostly just want to penalize evil for the sake of evil antagonists. They're fine for a basic plot, but I want to reward those who have depth to them. (4)
How relevant are you? If it seems like I hate random bosses, it's because I do. Even if you're not the first bad guy we met, there should be some foreshadowing of your coming. And the flip side, if you're an early game BBG, do people still speak your name after we've killed you? (5)
Do you have connections to a character? Any character: playable, secondary, or other bosses? This should be before the game starts to add backstory to them and our cast; however, flashback scenes will work here. The point of this tally is to connect the playable characters to the villain and not have them disjointed and seemingly random. Why would I find the need to get involved in a gang that I have no connections to? (6)
Do you have a personality? Are you charismatic and bombastic? Colorful, funny, witty, or the center of attention when you're on screen, making people want to like you? Or are you a single note, edgelord teenagers who can't get laid try to emulate? One of those will get the point. (7)
I keep talking about this, but do you participate in an iconic scene? Something that drastically tips the scale in your favor or hits differently than anything else gets you a point. If it's a scene people talk about twenty years later with the same reverence they did the day it was released, it's gotta mean something. {8)
While this seems like the two go hand-in-hand, do you get an advantage over our cast at any point? We spend the whole game chasing you, but what if you chase us for a while? What if you drastically alter our goals at some point and make us rue ever considering you our equal? Even if it's just more of a reason to murder you, you did something good. Well, not good, but you get it. (9)
Did you win? Despite all of our efforts, sometimes our best isn't good enough? It's a rare thing to have the good guys fail, so here's something that you deserve. Sometimes, though, villains change over the course of the game. If your goal does too, and it's accomplished, you get the point. There's no reason to penalize someone strong enough to break free of their mind control. (10)
Ten points across every game that have ever been played (or ones that I've played)! So who's getting judged?
Final Fantasy I is filled with seemingly small fry bosses. A few of them end up being of importance, but I'm not gonna forget some of the smaller ones. Even if I probably should...
Bikke is the second boss in the entire game. He and his pirate crew have taken over Provaka, and we have to keelhaul them. We kill his underlings, so he gives us his ship. He lives, but he doesn't do anything else for the rest of the game, but that ship is super rad!
Astos is a dark elf who cursed the elf prince to sleep forever. He disguises himself as an old man in a ruined keep, and we give him a crown for some reason. This causes him to attack us, and we defeat him. He's never seen again.
The Four Fiends are a series of reoccurring bosses secretly working alongside the true villain. For most of the game, we believe them to be the ones ruining the planet until the shocking surprise of Garland. They make further appearances in later installments of the franchise.
Chaos is the final fight of the game. He's technically the first boss of the game, as well, because of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff.
Final Fantasy II takes the opposite approach. There's one bad guy, and he's our target until the very end. There's a small break for one dungeon, but we never actually fight the new guy.
Borghen is first mentioned pretty early on, and he stays around for a while, even getting one over on us. He's a bit of a reoccurring mob because his zombie guards a chest in the final dungeon, and he's in the Souls of Rebirth story.
The Dark Knight is portrayed as menacing and terrifying. We don't have many interactions with him, though. As I said, he becomes a primary antagonist for a dungeon, but there is no climax.
The Emperor is our unnamed final boss from start to finish. He doesn't get much screen time, though, which puts a damper on what he could do to the story. But we hear and see the fallout of his actions.
Final Fantasy III is the first to have that surprise final boss. Fortunately, it has a callback to the four fiends as a reoccurring battle, all of which work under one guy.
Not called so in the game, the Four Fiends (Djinn, Medusa, Kraken, Hein) all work under Xande and count as one. They seem to be four random mobs who just so happen to be doing the same thing, but each calls out to their master around the time we kill them, foreshadowing Xande.
Xande is the should be final boss of FFIII. He's the one who froze the world years ago, and he commands the guys above. He has connections to Doga, Unei, and their master, Noah. He could have been the final boss, but his actions caused something worse to show up.
The Cloud of Darkness appears because Xande messed everything up. The story could have ended when we beat him up. But the devs wanted one big push to make a connection to a concept, Hope, rather than everything being about beating up an evil person. It works, but she still appears out of nowhere and has nothing to add.
Final Fantasy IV has a lot of the same things III has, except the switch to the SNES made everything bigger and cooler.
We learn of Golbez just as we reach Damncyan and see Anna die. Edward tells us about him, and Golbez ends up being a constant thorn in our side for the rest of the game. It's later revealed that he has a major connection to Cecil.
The Four Fiends are a definite callback to FFI. Scarmigleone, Kraken, Barbreccia, and Rubicante are underlings to Golbez. Only one of them has what I would call a personality, and the rest are a bit more shallow. Regardless, they show up a few times, even have death, and play a big enough part in the world and plot.
Zeromus is the guy behind Golbez. It is he who brainwashes our man in black for the purpose of Lunarian supremacy. Unlike Cloud of Darkness, he has a role in the plot, but he still shows up very late. Zeromus is in one scene and beats everyone up, but thanks to the power of friendship, we're able to defeat him.
Final Fantasy V has the smallest cast on the list. We start the game wandering from crystal to crystal, looking for King Tycoon. There is no singular boss during this time. But once we learn about ExDeath, he becomes the guy, and no one else comes close to him. No one even tries. It is his show.
Gilgamesh, though, is beloved by the fans. He's more of a rival than a villain. He annoys us early on, but we always get the advantage over him. This leads to him helping us out in a boss fight towards the end. He drips personality and keeps appearing in future games in the franchise.
As I said, FFV is Exdeath's game. That allows him to hit most of the points that his ilk are graded on. It seems a bit lame that he's an evil tree, but it's still explained well enough for 1992.
Final Fantasy VI has one main villain, but he isn't The Guy early on. It's a nice twist for the franchise, and I don't think it's been done much better since.
The first part of the game has us chasing around the Geshtal Empire. It is he whom the Returners fight against and brings fear to every nation on the planet. They're set up to something Exdeathesq, but then something happens...
Kefka takes control, and the entire game revolves around him. He gets the accolades of the fans, the memorable scenes, and the final boss fight. He was the experiment by his former boss, but when he's on screen, he has the spotlight. To make him even more memorable, he's the only final boss (thus far) to have a win.
Final Fantasy VII has a similar thing to VI. We met an early candidate for the final boss, but they get outshined for the "true" antagonist. That guy actually causes us to work together for a while.
Shinra Electric Power Company is the enemy we chose. Our relationship starts off with a bang, we have a fallout, but then the true villain shows up and does what we couldn't. There are so many moving parts to them that we experience throughout the rest of the game, and they never feel forced or annoying, except for when they're supposed to be.
Jenova, The Calamity from the Sky, Mother. She's the impetus of an extinction event, the cause of our current problems, and a reoccurring boss from beginning to penultimate end. There's a fan theory that she's the true BBG, controlling everyone infected with her cells, including the next guy.
Sephiroth is why everyone was really into goths in the late '90s. His long hair, sword, and plot relevance makes him the most iconic boss in JRPGs. He's connected to so many things.
Final Fantasy VIII has a straight but not simple ladder of main villains. There's only one reoccurring boss, and he's of utmost value to the plot.
Seifer, the Sorceress' Knight, almost willingly chose to be mind controlled. I'm pretty sure he does break free, actually, just in time for his duel against Odin. He's a rival through and through, from childhood to the end.
Edea is the target for the first half of the game. She ends up being a vital ally once we figure out the truth of this entire game. Longevity is key to a lot of points.
Adel seems to come from nowhere, but she's cleverly foreshadowed in Timber. Her actual screen time is pretty low, though, and is immediately overshadowed.
Ultimecia comes from nowhere and adds weight to the plot, but only through nonsensical time spoofing.
Final Fantasy IX has the most amount of entries on this list. Despite that, there are a few I'm blowing off.
Queen Brahne is the mother of Garnet. We "kidnap" her daughter, and she tries to blow us up. She's then the primary antagonist until the very end of disk two, and another takes her place.
Four Fiends are underlings of Kuja. They're mostly a callback to FFI, but the way they're handled is pretty fun. You split the party, and they all interact in a great way.
Garland is the man behind the scenes. He's the cause of the fall of Maiden Sari, which really kickstarts the engine for one of our characters. The watcher doesn't always watch.
Kuja was supposed to be the angel of death, but his master found him wanting. This led to his replacement and downfall. He's the guy behind Brahne and becomes the primary villain until the very end. Alas, he's screwed out of points by a random concept.
Necron shows up, quotes Yoda, and ignores status defenses. Of all the random final bosses, he's the worst.
Final Fantasy X has one guy, and only one guy, that we're chasing after. However, Sin's got a few fun twists to keep him from being a Mateus.
Birane/Yenke are here for funzies. They're Kimarhi's backstory and only have one fight with no bearing on the rest of the plot.
Sin, the Destroyer, the Cycle. He's the physical embodiment of all that's evil in Spira. Everything revolves around him. He is eternal but has my favorite twist in the franchise.
Yu Yevon is a cockroach who wants us to kill him. He's technically the final boss, but we can't lose, so I'm not giving him the point.
Final Fantasy XII is straightforward with its bosses. There's only the one, a quasi underling, and a side quest.
Ba'gammnon and crew is the side quest. He's got a link to Balthier, somehow, but forgotten once we get out of jail.
Cid seems like a lackey or sidekick to Vayne until we learn why he talks to himself. And then it gets confusing. He's the father of one of our playable cast members, but the whole occuria thing confuses me.
Vayne had so much potential. His first time on screen, where he calms the people of Dalmasca down, is such a cool scene. It makes you think he's not actually the bad guy; however, nothing comes from it. He ends up being evil for the sake of evil, killing his family. But then again, not really. He's not the one who started the final confrontation over Rabinastre, so the game can't even keep his alignment straight.
Final Fantasy XIII has had some lacking characters and sidequests. But maybe the bosses can redeem the compilation?
Fal/I'Cie are a confusing mess. They start the game by branding us with their mark for reasons never explained. If we fail, we become crystal. If we succeed, we become crystal. But we don't know what our mission is... What do they want from us?
Cid Raines is the resident Cid of XIII, and that's the only reason he's here. He's a high ranking grunt of the main villain and doesn't bring much to the table.
Barthandelus has a deep backstory about trying to kill everyone for reasons I don't remember. He's worth his screen time as he's the arbiter of everything.
Orphan is the final boss of game one. He merges with Barthandelus because he wants us to kill him, I think. I don't know why he puts up such a fight, though. Like everything in this series, I'm left wondering why...
Caius is the main boss of XIII-2 and plays a vital role there. He's an immortal being with a deep backstory connected to Noel and Yeol. He then becomes intertwined with the gods and the afterlife. He's a fun and interesting boss with a lot going on.
Bhunivelze is the god of creation. He's Lightning's boss for the final game until she kills him dressed as a catgirl.
Final Fantasy Tactics never really had one clear villain until we go to Hell. There's a number leading up to her, with some even being in the world's backstory. St. Ajora will not be discussed here, though. Many of the ones listed are intertwined, with many characters linked in two or more groups.
The Corpse Brigade is the terrorist group we fight in chapter one. They're led by Wiegraf to bring about equality between the peasants and the nobles. We kill his sister, and then everything starts a path to destruction.
The Temple Knights are also led by Wiegraf. They start by working for the Church of Glabados, but they're actually just another gang with goals higher than their station. It's about bringing a dead god back to life or something.
The Lucavi are demons from aeons past. They fought the creators of mankind before history began, but that story is never really told in the Ivalice Alliance. The people who turn into Luvaci are from all walks of life, and we have to slay them all. Or, at least, as many who misuse the stones.
Ultima is the final boss of the game. She's the reincarnation of the anti occura forces from FFXII's backstory. She also has something to do with St. Ajora. The whole religion of the game is "what if the Antichrist was worshiped unbeknownst to the general populace." It's a story not told often, and I want more Ivalice games!
Wiegraf was a name I left off at first because he's in all of the groups already listed, but he deserves his own judgement. He's the primary antagonist in chapter one and stays around near the top of the list, right up until the very end. He works and commands everyone, including us, from the shadows, but I never felt like he was the top guy. But he's pretty far up there, nonetheless. Because of his longevity, role, and reoccurring fights, Wiegraf deserves his one row.
There are, of course, more games I'll bring up in the findings, but those are the ones I'm pointing out and writing about. I hated writing all of that as is, so I'm not gonna double it with every game I've played, Square or otherwise. And so, let's get to those findings!
There are only four perfect scores this time:
Kefka from VI, Sin from X, Caius Ballad from XIII, and Seraph Lamington from Disgaea. Everyone knows about Kefka and his world destroying actions. But Sin's complicated backstory with being Jecht adds layers to him. Carius was a bit of a shock, but all he wanted to do was to save Yeol. He brings about the end of time in Lightning Returns, so I'm giving him that. Meanwhile, the Seraph wanted to unite demons and angels, which he did with Laharl and Flonne, ending permitting.
We have nine near perfects.
Exdeath (V), Sephiroth (VII), Edea (VIII), Karelian (Xenogears), Wilhelm (Xenosaga), Lavos (Chrono Trigger), Sydney (Vagrant Story), Doll Master (Threads of Fate), and Zeig (Legend of Dragoon) all missed on one point. Most missed the final boss tally, and a few didn't win (four each). Lavos missed it because he's just a space bug with no personality; however, he's not innately evil. He simply is, which I think is a novel idea.
We had six bosses get zero points. Astos from the first Final Fantasy is the only non Dragon Quest down here. He puts a curse on the Elf Prince but is otherwise a nonentity in the game. No one speaks of him after, and they didn't bring him up much before, either. He's just kinda there... From DQV, we have Kon and Slon. Both of them are lackeys for a lackey. From VI, Jamirus, Grecos, and Dhuran get nothing. They, like Mudo, could have been something, but the devs didn't bother to build them up. You don't learn that they actually have links to each other or the final boss until the very end. And by then, you don't care. What's the difference between them and Aps, Don Corneo's sewer pet?
Bikke, Ba'gammnon, Blood and Smokey, and Maderas just got one point. I felt like Maderas could have gotten more, but he's a one note vampire that doesn't bring much to the table once we beat him. Great party member, though.
The lowest final boss is a three way tie. Necton for FFIX, Profound Darkness from Phantasy Star IV, and the Kupier Belt from Wild Arms II all got three points. They're all random bosses with no personality, so my plan to ruin them worked. But, by getting only three points, there a number of reasons they're not well regarded.
In the battle of the Four Fiends, IX and III are the worst, getting only two points. One was a stretch, and the others were just bit players. The ones from Final Fantasy I got four points!
The worst Cid, between the two of them, is Cid Raines. He also got two points, while Cid from XII got four.
The best non primary antagonist was Mid-boss/Vyers from Disgaea, who got seven points. He's linked to Laharl and the Seraph and even has a great fan theory that makes him of utmost importance to the plot.
Ninzo (Dragon Quest V) and Guildenstern (Vagrant Story) are the best of the evil for the sake of evil bosses. They got seven points!
Emperor Geshtal got seven points despite not being relevant in the second half of the game. If only there was a sidequest about him somewhere... No, he isn't Gogo.
From Star Ocean, the Ten Wize men got eight points, despite not having a link to other characters.
Personally, I think the biggest surprise is how high all of the Star Ocean entries ranked. Their playable cast and side characters were a bit wanting, but many of the bosses graded got pretty good scores. Ignoring Star Ocean 1 and bland Grigori for 4, there are three eights out of the four here. Luther got a seven, making him the worst of the three games. And it could be argued he deserves another point or two!
I didn't average out the scores for every game, but Xenogears has the most of the ones I did. Six bosses got a 7.17 score. With that many entries getting that high of a score must mean something. Keep in mind, some games got more than that, but they have fewer entries. It's a very flawed system, which is I didn't do it for all of them.
The grand total of every game ranked (as of pass one on December 16th, 2021) is 5.39 across ~139 entries. The Final Fantasy series got a score of 5.52 from ~59. The final bosses total 6.86 from fifteen entries.
The graph can be found here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qMgayDkUkRJsF7ImSNbqFW51H8ZNCztG/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=103909396598242866758&rtpof=true&sd=true
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