78 réponses à ce sujet

[AzureAardvark]

The Star Cabal?  Now that was a good story!

 

IA rules! \m/

[LordOfScorn]

I never really found Irenicus that great of a villian, honestly. He was decent, but definately not Bioware's best.

[Heimdall]

How's that then?
 
You get to know Loghain, you learn if his victory with the old king vs Orlais.
After Ostagar you constantly see him in cutscenes, and he's behind the Arl Eamon poisoning.
He betrayed the king (who showed kindness to you), and is behind your family's demise if you were a Human Noble.

You hear other people talk about him. You see the things he does. But that just makes him a distant impersonal threat, a thing to fight against but not terribly interesting. His motives aren't even clear for most of the game, the things he does seem irrational. (Just to correct you though, Arl Howe betrayed the Couselands but we don't know how or if Loghain was involved)
 

I don't need my antagonist to be popping up every 2 hours and mouthing off on me because... Well, to remind me he's there, and then he (or my toon) escapes every time.
THAT feels unrealistic. THAT feels like writing from the 70s.

Nobody's asking for that, we're asking for a reason to care. A distant threat is just a plot device that moves things along. A villain that actually interacts with the protagonist develops a personal element to the dynamic. My first playthrough, I had no idea you could talk to him at Ostagar. For me, he was just that guy I met for about two seconds and then he was just a faceless menace I had to foil. I only really got the sense of him as a character at the Landsmeet and then it was too little too late.
 

You say you prefer a dark villain with no redeeming qualities? Fine then, Corypheus is your guy.
To me, it feels like a cheap comic book villain.
 
Loghain is human, and believes in what he does - even though a lot of it is through bad/evil/morally twisted actions.
And he is very present in the story, I'm pretty sure you're in the minority in regards to Origins when you say you felt Loghain was absent " for 90% of the game".

A villain doesn't need to be sympathetic to be a good one, but the problem wasn't that Loghain was a bad character. He wasn't. The problem is that his implementation within the plot was terrible.

[Dabrikishaw]

Yeah no. 

 

Different people have different tastes.

 

Stop trying to make your taste the "right" one.

Could not have said it better myself.

[Icinix]

BioWares biggest villain of all time in their games (and possibly all time) is their latest;

 

Click and hold left mouse button to attack.

 

It's the most diabolical, nefarious and cruel villain I've ever come across in any game ever.

 

I doubt it will be soon be beat.

[Chrom72]

Irenicus is probably my favorite Bioware villain, but I never made it far enough in Jade Empire to get to where Sun Li is a villain. That's partially because of not enjoying the gameplay and partially because it runs like crap on modern PC's. I guess I could always dig out my old Xbox and buy a used copy of the game cheap, but there's too many games out there to do that. 
 
Getting back on topic, I like Irenicus' backstory and the personal touch he adds to the game. He's extremely powerful, but not unbeatable.

Spoiler

He gets your sister locked up in jail and steals her soul, then he steals yours. He kills one of your earliest party members from the first game (who is also a possible love interest's husband) and has enslaved another of your party members from the beginning.

His plan is both grand and actually realistic. He and Coryphyfish have been compared, but Irenicus' plan is actually guaranteed to work without the Bhaalspawn's interference. There's really no evidence that Cory's plan will work at all. We just know bad things can happen one way or another if he does go to the Fade physically.

[cronshaw]

Off topic I'm sorry

but doesn't this seem a lot like the synthesis ending from ME3

[lyleoffmyspace]

Irenicus is probably my favorite Bioware villain, but I never made it far enough in Jade Empire to get to where Sun Li is a villain. That's partially because of not enjoying the gameplay and partially because it runs like crap on modern PC's. I guess I could always dig out my old Xbox and buy a used copy of the game cheap, but there's too many games out there to do that. 
 
Getting back on topic, I like Irenicus' backstory and the personal touch he adds to the game. He's extremely powerful, but not unbeatable.

Spoiler

He gets your sister locked up in jail and steals her soul, then he steals yours. He kills one of your earliest party members from the first game (who is also a possible love interest's husband) and has enslaved another of your party members from the beginning.

His plan is both grand and actually realistic. He and Coryphyfish have been compared, but Irenicus' plan is actually guaranteed to work without the Bhaalspawn's interference. There's really no evidence that Cory's plan will work at all. We just know bad things can happen one way or another if he does go to the Fade physically.

 

I felt like Irenicus was proactive and successful. You were both working towards a goal in BG2. However every victory you had, he'd have an even bigger victory. For example, you escape from prison, but he takes Imoen from you and it all plays into his plan. You get Imoen back, but he steals your soul.You are victorious in the Underdark, but he seals out out of the Elven City. You finally defeat him, but he drags you into hell. Irenicus was proactive, he always had a plan and was a resourceful and powerful enemy.

 

Meanwhile Cory has his big victory at Haven and after that he's constantly failing and bumbling, you never feel any threat from him.

 

I wouldn't personally say Irenicus was a villain you could sympathise with. He was a deeply evil guy, caring only for his vengeance and avenging the love he lost. However he was deeply inhuman and monstrous, whilst possessing great humanity. Everyone has lost a love and had their heart broken, and we can feel Irenicus' pain when he says "I held onto the memory of love, then the memory of that memory, and then nothing". That's something we can all relate to. His mysterious backstory being revealed as we progressed through the game and learned more about our Bhaalspawn character was a stroke of genius.

[Tensai]

Kai Leng would wipe the floor with all of them for sheer awesomeness.

 
While i would agree that Kai Leng was a better villain than Cory, i wouldn't agree that he was "awesome". Kai Leng was just TIM's poodle, Saren was better
 
Back to topic. Haven't played BG 2, was before my time...  so i can't judge Irenicus. But  Loghain is prolly the best DA villian so far, so yea, DA villain aren't the most imtimidating ones.
 

Meanwhile Cory has his big victory at Haven and after that he's constantly failing and bumbling, you never feel any threat from him.

 

This! Bioware wasted all their ammo, before you even get to skyhold/before the game actually starts.

[Chrom72]

I felt like Irenicus was proactive and successful. You were both working towards a goal in BG2. However every victory you had, he'd have an even bigger victory. For example, you escape from prison, but he takes Imoen from you and it all plays into his plan. You get Imoen back, but he steals your soul.You are victorious in the Underdark, but he seals out out of the Elven City. You finally defeat him, but he drags you into hell. Irenicus was proactive, he always had a plan and was a resourceful and powerful enemy.

 

Meanwhile Cory has his big victory at Haven and after that he's constantly failing and bumbling, you never feel any threat from him.

 

I wouldn't personally say Irenicus was a villain you could sympathise with. He was a deeply evil guy, caring only for his vengeance and avenging the love he lost. However he was deeply inhuman and monstrous, whilst possessing great humanity. Everyone has lost a love and had their heart broken, and we can feel Irenicus' pain when he says "I held onto the memory of love, then the memory of that memory, and then nothing". That's something we can all relate to. His mysterious backstory being revealed as we progressed through the game and learned more about our Bhaalspawn character was a stroke of genius.

That's one thing I didn't mention: Irenicus was actually competent. Cory doesn't succeed at anything post-Haven. Once you get Skyhold Inquisition is just a long series of the Inquisitor foiling all of Cory's plans. In BG2 Irenicus brings you to the very brink of defeat several times, and it actually feels like you really defied the odds when you finally do beat him in the end. 

[Nyaore]

 

 

This! Bioware wasted all their ammo, before you even get to skyhold/before the game actually starts.

Which is sad because that taste we get of the Elder One if you side with the Mages in Redcliffe was just so damn ominous and well done that his final reveal felt like a let down. I wanted more writing like that, where he wasn't even seen once and still made an impact, over what we received afterwards.

[DeLaatsteGeitenneuker]

I felt like Irenicus was proactive and successful. You were both working towards a goal in BG2. However every victory you had, he'd have an even bigger victory. For example, you escape from prison, but he takes Imoen from you and it all plays into his plan. You get Imoen back, but he steals your soul.You are victorious in the Underdark, but he seals out out of the Elven City. You finally defeat him, but he drags you into hell. Irenicus was proactive, he always had a plan and was a resourceful and powerful enemy.

 

Meanwhile Cory has his big victory at Haven and after that he's constantly failing and bumbling, you never feel any threat from him.

 

I wouldn't personally say Irenicus was a villain you could sympathise with. He was a deeply evil guy, caring only for his vengeance and avenging the love he lost. However he was deeply inhuman and monstrous, whilst possessing great humanity. Everyone has lost a love and had their heart broken, and we can feel Irenicus' pain when he says "I held onto the memory of love, then the memory of that memory, and then nothing". That's something we can all relate to. His mysterious backstory being revealed as we progressed through the game and learned more about our Bhaalspawn character was a stroke of genius.

 

Word, dat be what I be talkin' 'bout!

[DeLaatsteGeitenneuker]

 
While i would agree that Kai Leng was a better villain than Cory, i wouldn't agree that he was "awesome". Kai Leng was just TIM's poodle, Saren was better
 
Back to topic. Haven't played BG 2, was before my time...  so i can't judge Irenicus. But  Loghain is prolly the best DA villian so far, so yea, DA villain aren't the most imtimidating ones.
 

 

 

 

This! Bioware wasted all their ammo, before you even get to skyhold/before the game actually starts.

What do you mean before your time? There is an updated version of the game that has been modernised. You should play it!

[lyleoffmyspace]

That's one thing I didn't mention: Irenicus was actually competent. Cory doesn't succeed at anything post-Haven. Once you get Skyhold Inquisition is just a long series of the Inquisitor foiling all of Cory's plans. In BG2 Irenicus brings you to the very brink of defeat several times, and it actually feels like you really defied the odds when you finally do beat him in the end. 

 

Yeah Irenicus' boss fights were tough as hell too. We got to fight him twice in the game and the first time I fought him he just pulled out all of these 9th level spells that were so powerful we could access, but just weren't levelled up enough yet. Fighting Corypheus once and him only having a limited number of spells and not a huge variety of spells and summons that Irenicus did was a bit of a letdown, especially if he was supposedly one of the most powerful mages at the height of Tevinter power.

[DetcelferVisionary]

I guess I must be alone here.

 

I thought I literally beat the game when I denied Sera from joining my party.   You mean she isn't the final boss?  I thought she was the best villain anyways.  My 2 cents.

[Tensai]

Which is sad because that taste we get of the Elder One if you side with the Mages in Redcliffe was just so damn ominous and well done that his final reveal felt like a let down. I wanted more writing like that, where he wasn't even seen once and still made an impact, over what we received afterwards.

 

Yea, i mean "Doom upon all the world" really sounds like there is something terrible about to happen, but in fact it was rather "Cory will fail (again)". The Story really lacks some kind of "End Game". The Future you saw at Red Cliff showed how this End Game could have looked like.. but well Bioware writers didn't care.

 

What do you mean before your time? There is an updated version of the game that has been modernised. You should play it!

 

Maybe one day, but i haven't even managed to finish NWN2 yet...

[Ashagar]

Except if it got to the part where the end game looked like the dark future of the mage quest only successor game they could be able to do would be survival horror given most people would be dead and the world would be a demon infested waste. 

[Ziegrif]

Vengeance.

The most worthless of all causes.

 

I'm more of a Sovereign/ Harby kinda guy.

[TheImmortalBeaver]

The Glorious Strategist easily wins. BioWare usually has relatively stereotypical central plots surrounded by excellent character writing and interesting worlds, except for the villain. The villain is always kind of just... not there throughout most of the game. Or, if they are, they aren't the real threat (arguably Malek, Kai Lang, Saren, multiple characters in DA2, etc). Sun Li is a genuinely diabolical villain who strikes at the core of who you are, and wins. The struggle against him is personal, lengthy, and quite satisfying.

 

Honestly, I've never played through the Baldur's Gate games in their entirity, so I can't speak to them specifically, but based on BioWare's writing style and what I know of them in general, nothing seemed particularly interesting to me about Irenicus. Maybe that would change if I had played all the way through them, but... meh.

[Vox Draco]

How's that then?

 

*snip*

 

Just my opinion. I think Loghain is not a villain, not even a good antagonist. He is kinda there, an annoyance at best. But I do not count him as a villain per se, though he probably is intended as one. But it doesn't click with me. Maybe I should have read that prequel-novel about him? But with Loghain its the same as with the Archdemon (and with Cory as well, though to a lesser degree): If you have no confrontations with them, who really cares? That's also why Sauron doesn't really work for me as well (but others will totally disagree of course)

 

And I would love if they actually would commit themselves to a good comic-book-villain. I do not see it as an insult by the way, there are good ones..

[garrusfan1]

HOLO BOY. The ultimate evil of any game. As for villians I liked loghain actually. Or saren and TIM in ME2.

[WolfForce99]

Saren was Sovereign's puppet. Sovereign for ruthlessness, being cold as ice, wanting to eliminate all organic life, brainwashing Saren and gaining a geth army.

[Fishy]

Mephistopheles in Horde of the Underdark was pretty sweet.

[Zundar]

I voted for Saren. As for Baldur's Gate I thing Sarrvok was better. He tried to start a war to result in enough deaths to become the new god of murder.

 

Wait, looks like a trend with Bioware villains...

[Vox Draco]

Saren was Sovereign's puppet. Sovereign for ruthlessness, being cold as ice, wanting to eliminate all organic life, brainwashing Saren and gaining a geth army.

 

And sovereign was ... ? Something of a toy-squid for a translucent last-minute attempt in a hoody that tried to be edgy and the 2001 of videogames?

Though if you look at ME1 as a standalone and leave the other two games out (well, very much like Matrix, and not even the last comparison you can make here..),

well then yes, Sovy and Saren are really good villains/antagonists. And look, Saren is there right from the start, is rather present in the game (more towards the end though) and is responsible for killing Ashley! In a way though, yet her death never made me feel sad, but that's another story ^^