True evil - how can it be done well?

[whitesphere]

Personally, I consider Evil in its purest form to be "the ends justify the means."  Pretty much every time people do horrible things to each other, it comes down to this.  The lust for power/control/etc in the mind of the villain is justified, at the very least, by "It's what I want, so it doesn't matter how it effects anyone else."    And, well, Stalin, Hitler, the Khmer Rouge.  You get the idea.

Now, in a game context, Pure Evil characters really never work together, per se.   They would all be jostling for control over each other/etc.

But, if you want a sudden switch with the protagonist suddenly being shown to be Pure Evil, show the entire game and world from HIS perspective.   Anyone the protagonist talks to, you can have their dialog seem to make no sense, or even twist their words around, if they disagree with the Pure Evil motives of the protagonist.  

Maybe they're saying "Please, stop killing our people" but he HEARS "Please, end our suffering."  After he kills several of them, one begs "No! Please stop!" and the protagonist looks confused and says "But you asked me to.  Your suffering will soon pass."  And the Reveal at the end might be he finally sees what he has truly wrought --- a landscape of utter ruin, destruction and death.

Maybe he thinks he is doing what is Truly Best for everyone.  The millions who had to die for that end?  Unfortunate.  The atrocities he committed?  Necessary for the ends.  You see, Ends Justify the Means can work quite well here.

I think, in 2-D RPGs, there is an implicit assumption the "narrator" (i.e. what we see/hear) is a neutral, disinterested party.

So, you can get a LOT of mileage with the unreliable narrator trope (i.e. The Telltale Heart).

 

[Ksi]

If it's a force of evil, make it evil without intent. It just is. It just does and it screws over allies and enemies alike. It won't care, it won't change and it won't stop. That is pure evil.

If, however, you're going for something a bit more characteristic, evil will have a story, a reason. It may be that their life was destroyed so they feel the need to destroy others. It may be that they suffered a childhood trauma that, unknown to them, scarred them for life. Two interesting ways of portraying evil that I have yet to explore but will eventually (they're on my list) is naturally evil and evil because of fear.

Fear is often what evil boils down to when it comes to humans in any case. Fear of loss (so take all that isn't theirs), fear of death (voldemort), fear of knowledge (destroy it all), fear of others (xenophobia), fear of self (self-destructive evil that takes everything down with it).

Naturally evil is what I feel demons and the like are. They just :are:. There's no reason behind it, it's just they way they are. They're alien, immune to the human condition. They don't fear, don't hate, don't love, don't dream. They just do because it's in their nature - like a hurricane destroys, they destroy, indiscriminate and everything. They are whimsical in what they leave alive, not because they care but because they don't care. They don't want to destroy everything, because they don't care about that. They just do what they do.

An interesting character would be this kind of demon suddenly given a heart and learning how not to be evil. But that's a story for another game. ;p

One that I use on occassion if I'm using 'evil' characters, is insanity. Like the female mage who destroys the world because her favourite cat died and sacrifices her son to engage the spell that will see that destruction occur. Or the child who saw too much in her youth and broke, wanting to kill the main character because he looks a bit like her father - the man who she relied on to protect her and who left her behind.

Personally, I don't do evil often. I prefer shades of grey - people just trying to get by and not die and still come out of everything with at least some of their lives in tact. They aren't evil, they're human. ;p

 

[Mon Dez]

Ahhh...the concept of evil is very definitive on its terms.

My perfect ideal of evil is this:

1. No clear goal of his/her objective. Kills innocents to allies with no rhyme or reason. No emotions shown including enjoyment nor ecstasy or pleasure to killing.
2. No concept of good and evil because the antagonist has no clear understanding of the values of right and wrong.
3. The inability to express any emotion or feeling of any sort with sadness, happiness, even to express sadness or pain. A emotionless husk that can think for itself.

A serial killer would fit this description, but a person like Vlad the Impaler is close to my desired evil, but the feeling of human desires is still there which still makes him human.

 

[CWells]

I'm very anal about things making sense. If I cannot figure out in any way why a certain creature behaves as it does, I shrug it off as, "it was just thrown in just for flavor". And that's ok for a while. But then it becomes really easy to not care. And if I can't care about the supposedly vicious monster. I wont feel the effect this creature is meant to have in the story, or in my gaming experience at all If it cant creep me out weird me out, or make me disagree with whatever it is, or hell, even make me pity  it, then it either has no purpose or I'm just being too damn picky. And I know I can be picky sometimes..

I'm probably not being very helpful.

 

[SLEEP]

It's all in the laugh: let's hear their best MWA HA HA HA HA HA

 

[CWells]

You got it!

 

[wallacethepig]

May I point you towards a certain Mr. Snidely Whiplash?

Never trust the ones with twirly mustaches and top hats.

-Wallace

 

[TheRiotInside]

It's all in the laugh: let's hear their best MWA HA HA HA HA HA

This is exactly what made Albedo from the Xenosaga series one of the best villains!

 

[MMO]

Lol, there really isn't a "true evil". Every evil in games is different, which is why it's nice. If we would of saw the "true evil" in every game, it would get boring, right? But I recommend the Cthulhu Myth creatures, they aren't your cliche everyday monsters.

 

[whitesphere]

I think a good RPG can have many shades of grey when it comes to evil.  For example:

- Is it evil to kill a king, in cold blood, if the king is putting huge burdens on his people?

- What if the king is doing this to keep a powerful enemy at bay?

- Is it more evil to free slaves by killing the slave master?  What if the slave master offers you a non-combat oriented way to free the slaves?

The best way to explore these is to have in-plot consequences for these choices...

And, the concept of "good" also varies dramatically, especially if we put in different cultures.  In Imperial-era Japan, for example, a "good" wife would throw herself on her husband's funeral pyre, but we would consider this to be evil (suicide) in Western civilization.

 

[gvduck10]

"Evil" when used in jargon usually implies intentionality. This would disqualify "evil for evil sake" - killing and destruction "just cuz" is far more chaotic, anarchistic, (think Joker in the Dark Knight movies) than "evil". That's not to say chaotic beings don't do evil deeds, but they lack rational motive, they are doing it merely for the joy/rush/thrill of watching things burn.

"Evil" on the other hand are vile acts that go against our sense of human compassion, kindness, love and reason. Like a mother drowning her own child, or a man beating his wife to death, or, ya know, rounding up 6 million people and systematically killing them all off. Chaos exists simply because it does, evil does not. Evil exists for a reason and with a purpose. Lucifer (the father of evil) opposed the Heavenly Father because of Pride. Sloth, Envy, Greed, Lust, Wrath, Gluttony are other motives for why people do the evil they do: many would argue Greed is the greatest of these among mankind.

 

[Needle]

I really like the above distinction between evil and chaos. Good can be chaotic as well.

Trying to define evil is not easy, but you'd definitely want to stick to one underlying theme and go with it. For instance, to me, evil is conceived within a shell of deception. In Saga Frontier, if you make it to the final act of Blue's scenario, Hell is shown as a flowery wonderland amongst the clouds, with angels fluttering around. Get too close to an angel, however, and they attack, showing their true form as a grotesque demon. I would personally imagine any evil to take on this form of deception, whereas the guard of the protagonist is lowered just enough for pain suffering to make their way in uncontested.

But then I think everyone's description of evil is slightly different, and also quite personal, as evidenced by the number of great responses in this thread! It will eventually be to the original poster to determine how he or she truly defines evil in its purest form, and then define what shape it will take. It could be a flaming demon, a dark aura, or heck, a giant kitty cat!

 

[gvduck10]

In Saga Frontier...

Kudos to you for mentioning this game!

Similarly, in Xenogears, the entire Ethos religion was formed around worshipping a creator god that was, in reality, a bionic parasite (kind of like an alien computer virus) that created mankind because it needed living flesh to survive.