Who Do You Consider The Greatest Nintendo Villain?

Nintendo, in its long career from 1889 to the present day, has made interesting products. In fact, they have made an insane number of Video Game franchises starting back in 1974, when most companies are lucky if they have one franchise!

In my opinion, a villain can make or break a franchise, simply because The Villain Makes the Plot. Clearly, Nintendo has come up with a number of compelling villains for the many franchises they have. So, if you compared every Nintendo villain you can think of to each other, which one would you consider the greatest?

Okay, so "greatest" is probably a broad term, but that's okay, because there are a number of factors that go into a villain.

To start, let me point out Giygas/Gyiyg/Giegue (are you sure it can't simply be spelled out as "Gig"?) from the Earthbound game. I think we can all agree that G has the most raw power out of all the Nintendo villains. It has been labelled across You Tube as the most disturbing boss in a video game (note: "disturbing" and "scary" are not as interchangeable as you might think). However, it is an Eldritch Abomination that is Nintendo's equivalent of Azathoth. It has no intelligence, plot, or much of anything, and is just a blob of mindless raw power.

My conclusion is that G is not really the greatest Nintendo villain. I personally think the title should go to Ghirahim of Skyward Sword. Why? Because the beginning and end of the game were kick-started by him, he demonstrates Faux Affably Evil quite well, he creeped out the normally unflappable Link, he generated some memorable lines (FURIOUS! OUTRAGED! SICK WITH ANGER!), he was a tough boss to fight (especially if you don't know what you're doing) and he turns out to be the Big Bad's sword, literally and figuratively!

Tom Nook. He always springs his plans successfully on unsuspecting, and even fully suspecting, players and you can't do anything but play along to the end. The best you can do is concede and pay him until he decides he's extorted enough money from you.

edited 27th Apr '12 6:00:15 PM by burnpsy

Smithy

Giygas can be defeated by everyone praying. Which, if a giant eldritch abomination appears in the sky, everyone is liable to do. Kind of a Weaksauce Weakness.

The answer is obvious.

Bowser. Bowser is awesome. The awesomest.

What are we counting as Nintendo here, anything listed on their page?

I'll assume that and say Ashnard from Fire Emblem Path of Radiance.

To be fair, the prayers stopped working after a while; it took literal playerdivine intervention to finish it off.

Back on topic: Bowser got my vote, as far as Nintendo villains are concerned. Otherwise...

WALUIGI

Gotta give it to Giygas for being the most dangerous. He only lost because he was a videogame character, if he wasn't we'd all be fucked.

edited 27th Apr '12 6:36:36 PM by rmctagg09

I'm partial to Ganon(dorf) myself (Bowser, too, but he's runs the table from "actually threatening" to "comic relief" depending on the game). I'd also have to second Kostya's mention of Ashnard; for an Ax-Crazy, Darwinistic emperor who doesn't give a flying fig about anyone besides himself, he's pretty competent. Ghirahim also ranks high.

I thought Zant was awesome right up until his actual boss fight.

Then he went all loopy...

Ganon. Though Mario is my favorite series ever, it's a bit hard to take teh villain seriously. Ganon is a menacing pig man Arabian black ginger villain , and he manages to be persistent, without turning into a joke

Ganondorf

Fun fact: Ganondorf was only in 6 Zelda games. Every other time it is Ganon, the god of the Gerudo. And 2 of those 6 appearances are in Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages, where he appears as a bonus boss only playable by switching codes between the two games.

edited 27th Apr '12 7:18:59 PM by OdieEsty

Ganon/Ganondorf
He's the only Nintendo villain that has ever actually won, hence the three way timeline split.

Cyrus from Pokemon and Dimentio from Mario

edited 27th Apr '12 7:28:08 PM by vanishingreality

Tom Nook always wins.

edited 27th Apr '12 7:36:05 PM by burnpsy

Tom Nook is secretly Mr.House.

Tom Nook isn't a villain. He's a victim. His compulsive gambling and addiction to nine different premium, imported drugs keeps him locked in a cycle of debt that makes your own look like a mere pittance. He has to manage countless nearly identical stores in several nearly identical villages just to pay off his own ridiculous loans.

...
I'm sleepy. Shut up.

edited 27th Apr '12 7:42:01 PM by Zeromaeus

Best Tom Nook theory I have ever seen.

Tom Nook is an Eldritch abomination who exists off of human greed, and has created a pocket dimension where he leads unsuspecting victims to gorge himself.

This.

Otherwise, though... I like Bowser most of the time - I love the appearances that sort of mix both general portrayals of him: he's legitimately villainous and menacing, but also has an air of goofiness about him. There's elements of that in the earlier Mario RP Gs and very small shades of it in some of the more recent platformers, but in any case it's one of the many reasons I like Super Mario Bros Z so much.

I've always kind of liked Dedede, but that's specifically because he's not really a villain... really.

Marx, on the other hand, is awesome because he's such a villain. Gotta love that nutso little jester.

Dimentio was pretty cool, my favorite Mario spinoff villain in fact, though that kind of dropped once the final battle came around.

I remember really liking Shadow Mario as a kid before I found out he was Bowser Jr. It's not that I don't like Bowser Jr, cause I do, but there was just something about Shadow Mario's look that was so... I dunno. So glad they brought him back as Cosmic Mario.

However, my favorite Mario villain, and probably my favorite Nintendo villain of them all as well, is and always will be Kamek. I've never even played the game he's from, but I love his character any way. The concept behind him is just so good.

Ridley. Whenever you hear this music, you know shit is about to get real.

My favorite thing about Shadow Mario is his disguise. It's not magic or technology, it's just a mask and it works so well you see him as a blue mario.

HEYA SAMUS!

edited 27th Apr '12 7:54:13 PM by OdieEsty