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Most complex antagonists ?

samoilaaa

Member
Which games have complex antagonists ? Villains that can actually make you think " what if this guy is right ? what if his motives are valid and hes not the bad guy " , im sick of games with typical "i want to destroy this world " , the good guy comes and defeats him , end of story
 

German Hops

GAF's Nicest Lunch Thief
Krelian from Xenogears, by far.

He finished his study on nanomachines and went on to join Solaris. There he won Emperor Cain's attention. He also won Miang's and the Gazel Ministry's. Cain was manipulated all along, he thought that Krelian was an ally in freeing humanity from "the bounds of the system" (from Deus), but Krelian was doing whatever he wanted. Cain offered to him his body for experiments so he could investigate on him to free humans from Deus, but Krelian took the oportunity to take Cain's DNA to clone him. He also altered Cain's flesh, and he weakened. Krelian was able to create a life support nanomachine system for him.

Not only did Krelian manipulate Cain, who was a god, but also kept him around as a puppet to control the masses. He was raised to the possition of Ministry of Defense of Solaris, but he was governing the whole country behind the shadows. Better said, he was governing the country that controlled the whole planet behind the shadows, behind the shadows. Cain was more a public face, and the Gazel Ministry more or less payed attention to him, and so did Miang (who was actually the closest to a true ally he had and not a puppet). He put nanomachine Limiter in all people on the planet using food to distribute them in an effective way. The Limiters limited their physical and psychological prowess. The people wouldn't be able to unleash their whole potential, and the psychological Limiter made them feel awe and fear of Cain and the Gazel, paralyzing them and making them follow all their orders (basically creating a "god effect").

He also controlled the whole world via Solaris, the kingdom of Aveh was controlled using Gebler's militrary enforcement (and later Shakhan, who was secretly a bishop of the Church, but he was a traitor) and Kislev using a remnant faction of the Church that remained very influential in politics. To resurrect Deus, he engineered a war between this massive countries to collect data on human abilities. He used Gebler's military support of Aveh, and Miang's (as the Executioner) contact with Kaiser Sigmund to provide Kislev with weapons. That way, the war was kept stable and long-going. Also, he could manipulate information and worldy affairs through the Church, control food suplies and have an ever growing slave supply flowing to Solaris. Uppon Solaris' destruction he engineered a nano-virus that spread around the planet and turned many people into Wels, just to increase Wel number.

His manipulation of Ramsus was always magnificent. Ramsus was the Cain clone he created, manipulated from childbirth after Krelian's calculated psychological torture. Basically, he engineered for everyone to call him a piece of shit and create a competent rival in Fei, so he could grow stronger. And after Fei had surpassed him even with his own Omnigear, Krelian decided to take out Cain by telling Ramsus to kill him (he was the only one who could do it). Ramsus did it, and after that was nearly thrown into the trash. Miang was always the biggest fish along with Krelian and was with him all along, posing as Ramsus' girlfriend only to add to the psychological manipulation. All of Ramsus' social healthy attributes and his whole psyche had been conditioned by Krelian and Miang, Ramsus was a puppet, his whole life and purpose was furthering the plan.

After the Gazel Ministry used the Goetia Key and Krelian recovered Deus' organic body, Krelian utterly crushed the Gazel's hopes of being gods and deleted them. Krelian manipulated the protagonists into going to Merkabah so he could take the Vessels of Anima and add them to Deus. After this and Miang's awakening in Elly's body, Krelian and Miang fused with Deus and began to assimilate the global population. After Deus' destruction, Krelian ascended to Wave Existence state, basically a god beyond even Deus.

Krelian's jest is the complexity and how well calculated is it all, and how he uses people to further his own ends, he uses their own character flaws. He manipulated the world for a number of purposes, and I haven't listed them all.
 
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Nankatsu

Gold Member
jin-kuwana-lost-judgmnet.gif


This guy. So damn good and well written you start to wonder what really is justice in today's world. It's phenomenal to watch both his and the main protagonist's perspective.

Name is Jin Kuwana from Lost Judgment.
 
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Robb

Gold Member
Ganondorf (WW)
Fireflies (TLoU)
Hades (Hades)

, were the first that came to my mind.
 

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
Shadowlord in Nier Replicant, his actually want to save his sister and his the only hope saving humanity and Nier (his Replicant) end up killing him and thanks to that all human race died.

The tragedy is NO ONE is at fault here, it just Gestalt program went horribly wrong.
 
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ungalo

Member
im sick of games with typical "i want to destroy this world"
i'm not going to say that i don't like nuanced villains but to me it almost seems more stereotypical nowadays than what you're describing, every postmodern story dislikes the concept of evil (when it's not downright "there is no villains" or even "perhaps you were actually the villain")
 
But who is it?
jin-kuwana-lost-judgmnet.gif


This guy. So damn good and well written you start to wonder what really is justice in today's world. It's phenomenal to watch both his and the main protagonist's perspective.
Game is 'Lost Judgment' for those who have never played and don't know.

Deadly Premonition York GIF by White Owls Inc

FK in the coffee...
Name of game: Deadly Premonition

I liked Maruki a lot

persona-5-royal-maruki-confidant.jpg
Game name: Persona 5 Royal
 
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jin-kuwana-lost-judgmnet.gif


This guy. So damn good and well written you start to wonder what really is justice in today's world. It's phenomenal to watch both his and the main protagonist's perspective.

Name is Jin Kuwana from Lost Judgment.
imo, the only reason to play this game & made the whole thing worth it (really enjoyed the first one, btw)...
 
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I nominate this game, but I won't say the antagonist's name:

maxresdefault.jpg


I know it looks like a regular military shooter but it ends up being more, narratively.

Edit: Also quite a few of you probably already own this game since it was a monthly offer at one point on PS Plus and maybe(?) XBL(back when they had high quality monthlies).
 
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Go_Ly_Dow

Member
Shadowlord in Nier Replicant, his actually want to save his sister and his the only hope saving humanity and Nier (his Replicant) end up killing him and thanks to that all human race died.

The tragedy is NO ONE is at fault here, it just Gestalt program went horribly wrong.
Terrific game and story. So glad it went from total flop to become a massive success with Automata and Replicant.
 

SenkiDala

Member
Krelian from Xenogears, by far.

He finished his study on nanomachines and went on to join Solaris. There he won Emperor Cain's attention. He also won Miang's and the Gazel Ministry's. Cain was manipulated all along, he thought that Krelian was an ally in freeing humanity from "the bounds of the system" (from Deus), but Krelian was doing whatever he wanted. Cain offered to him his body for experiments so he could investigate on him to free humans from Deus, but Krelian took the oportunity to take Cain's DNA to clone him. He also altered Cain's flesh, and he weakened. Krelian was able to create a life support nanomachine system for him.

Not only did Krelian manipulate Cain, who was a god, but also kept him around as a puppet to control the masses. He was raised to the possition of Ministry of Defense of Solaris, but he was governing the whole country behind the shadows. Better said, he was governing the country that controlled the whole planet behind the shadows, behind the shadows. Cain was more a public face, and the Gazel Ministry more or less payed attention to him, and so did Miang (who was actually the closest to a true ally he had and not a puppet). He put nanomachine Limiter in all people on the planet using food to distribute them in an effective way. The Limiters limited their physical and psychological prowess. The people wouldn't be able to unleash their whole potential, and the psychological Limiter made them feel awe and fear of Cain and the Gazel, paralyzing them and making them follow all their orders (basically creating a "god effect").

He also controlled the whole world via Solaris, the kingdom of Aveh was controlled using Gebler's militrary enforcement (and later Shakhan, who was secretly a bishop of the Church, but he was a traitor) and Kislev using a remnant faction of the Church that remained very influential in politics. To resurrect Deus, he engineered a war between this massive countries to collect data on human abilities. He used Gebler's military support of Aveh, and Miang's (as the Executioner) contact with Kaiser Sigmund to provide Kislev with weapons. That way, the war was kept stable and long-going. Also, he could manipulate information and worldy affairs through the Church, control food suplies and have an ever growing slave supply flowing to Solaris. Uppon Solaris' destruction he engineered a nano-virus that spread around the planet and turned many people into Wels, just to increase Wel number.

His manipulation of Ramsus was always magnificent. Ramsus was the Cain clone he created, manipulated from childbirth after Krelian's calculated psychological torture. Basically, he engineered for everyone to call him a piece of shit and create a competent rival in Fei, so he could grow stronger. And after Fei had surpassed him even with his own Omnigear, Krelian decided to take out Cain by telling Ramsus to kill him (he was the only one who could do it). Ramsus did it, and after that was nearly thrown into the trash. Miang was always the biggest fish along with Krelian and was with him all along, posing as Ramsus' girlfriend only to add to the psychological manipulation. All of Ramsus' social healthy attributes and his whole psyche had been conditioned by Krelian and Miang, Ramsus was a puppet, his whole life and purpose was furthering the plan.

After the Gazel Ministry used the Goetia Key and Krelian recovered Deus' organic body, Krelian utterly crushed the Gazel's hopes of being gods and deleted them. Krelian manipulated the protagonists into going to Merkabah so he could take the Vessels of Anima and add them to Deus. After this and Miang's awakening in Elly's body, Krelian and Miang fused with Deus and began to assimilate the global population. After Deus' destruction, Krelian ascended to Wave Existence state, basically a god beyond even Deus.

Krelian's jest is the complexity and how well calculated is it all, and how he uses people to further his own ends, he uses their own character flaws. He manipulated the world for a number of purposes, and I haven't listed them all.
You remind me to play that game, I finished it I was like 16yo and I understood like 20% of the story.
 

Kurotri

Member
imo, the only reason to play this game & made the whole thing worth it (really enjoyed the first one, btw)...
Unfortunately gotta agree with this, though I think I'm in the minority. Imo, the original is better in every way. Jin and the high school stuff were the best additions in Lost Judgment.
 

Danjin44

The nicest person on this forum
Genichiro from Sekiro
6Ev4Tls.png


Sekiro take place in Sengoku period, a time entire Japan was in civil war, and this game Ashina clan was losing. Even tho Genichiro was adobted he loved Ashina so much that he was willing sacrifice his humanity in order to save it.
 

StueyDuck

Banned
I just don't know if writing in gaming is truly strong enough to pick any real standout complex villains, most of the time complexity in gaming either comes from a plot twist or the sympathetic victim villain and both aren't really all that interesting.

I think cartoony over the top villains just work better in gaming, Kefka is one of the all times greats because of just how pure evil and maniacal he is.
 

Drizzlehell

Banned
Comstock and Kreia.

Kreia especially is such a fascinating, complex character, I legit think that no other video game villain comes even close to her. You can probably put her on the same level as Ravel Puzzlewell from Planescape: Torment since they're essentially very similar characters but I played KOTOR II first so that makes it more memorable for me.
 
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I just don't know if writing in gaming is truly strong enough to pick any real standout complex villains, most of the time complexity in gaming either comes from a plot twist or the sympathetic victim villain and both aren't really all that interesting.
I find that the problem is always screen time. Comparing things length-wise with video games, in the greatest TV shows, villains are always given their own good amount of screen time so that you can understand their perspective and/or motivations.

It's much more of a movie thing to use twists or not focus on the villain too much because of limited runtime...or in the case of something like modern James Bond, you hope that the general audiences remember who the hell that one villain guy's name was from 3 movies ago.

There are very few games that would rip you away from the protagonist to be in the antagonist's shoes for a bit, and very few of those very few games do it well.
 
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