In less than a week as of this writing, one of the most highly anticipated sequels of this game generation will be released. And while I’m looking forward to the creative puzzle action gameplay of Portal 2, honestly what I can’t wait to see and hear is the hilarious shenanigans of Portal’s antagonist: the evil computer GlaDOS. GlaDOS quickly became one of my favorite video game villains after playing the first Portal, and that got me to thinking about other great video game bad guys. So in this blog, I’m going to list my favorite video game villains.

Ghost Monsters

This list is not in any particular order, but if I had to pick a number one favorite villain, the ghost monsters from Pac-Man would be it. While you faced opposition in other classics before Pac-Man, be they other players, asteroids, or invaders…possibly from space, the ghosts in Pac-Man were the first bad guys to have PERSONALITY! Each was a different color (originally they were all going to be red), and they had names and characteristics that you could see as you played. Blinky always followed Pac-Man like a Shadow, Pinky was Speedy and would always head off Pac-Man at the pass, Inky was Bashful and would stay away from Pac-Man, and Clyde was Pokey and the slowest of the ghosts. In fact, when you initially turn on a Pac-Man arcade machine, the first thing you see isn’t Pac-Man, but the ghosts! I think I like the ghost monsters just as much, if not more than, Pac-Man himself. And if Namco makes any future Pac-Man games, I hope they focus equally on the ghosts and their personalities just as much as Pac-Man.

Bowser

I think the best bad guys are the ones you really don’t want to defeat for good. These kinds of villains we hope never learn their lesson and come back for more. Such is the case with Bowser, Mario’s main antagonist. We always want Bowser to kidnap the princess again and again so we can have Mario tromp through another fun video game adventure! Bowser’s even got his own game, really, with Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story for DS (very fun game, I highly recommend it). My younger brother Jeff just ADORED Bowser when he was little, and would always pick him in the Mario Party/Kart/Golf games. When Super Mario RPG was popular, we went to the beach and Jeff made a sand castle and stuck a toy sword into it. When our mom came along and said, “Oh, what a nice sand castle,” Jeff yelled, “That’s not a sand castle, that’s BOWSER’S CASTLE!” My two favorite things about Bowser are his clown copter car thing he first rode around in Super Mario World, and his Koopa Kids. I was so glad the Koopa Kids returned in New Super Mario Bros. Wii, and I hope they continue to show up in future Mario titles.

Ganon

Zelda’s main bad guy. No I’m not talking about Ganondorf, as I really don’t like him much. He’s just a green guy with a big nose. But Ganon, his blue pig monster form, is much cooler! Maybe it’s because I grew up on the original Zelda, which had Ganon as the main bad guy. He was so hard because you couldn’t SEE him! The only way to hit him is just swing your sword wildly and hope for the best, then when you do hit him, sling as many silver arrows as you can his way! I always like the Zelda final boss battles where Ganon’s pig monster form shows up, and especially when they use his cloaking powers. Best examples of this are in Link to the Past and Twilight Princess (and I don’t even like Twilight Princess as much as other Zelda titles). But yeah, I’m always happy when Ganon’s pig monster form makes an appearance.

King Dedede

He’s not ALWAYS the main bad guy in the Kirby games. In fact, he’s really more misunderstood and greedy than bad. But I still think he’s cool. His theme song is catchy and he’s fun to fight, and sometimes control. Plus, in the cartoon, whoever chose his voice actor deserves a raise. Ever notice in the cartoon, Meta-Knight’s only job is to tell the audience what powers Kirby just got?

Speaking of which, I know some would say that Meta-Knight would be a better Kirby villain, but I really don’t consider him as such. He’s more of a rival for Kirby than anything. Most of the time he even helps out. Now, the real bad guy in most Kirby games: Dark Matter, is actually kind of scary! Especially in Kirby 64!

Ridley

Whenever you fight Ridley in any of the Metroid games, don’t you just want to tromp around the house like a dinosaur and yell out, “RAAAARRR! I’M RIDLEY!” OK, you probably do but just don’t want to admit it. Anytime you battle Ridley in a Metroid game, you always know you’re in for a tough, but fun fight. Even in Other M, the weakest of the Metroid games, Ridley is still cool. I like it when he picks Samus up and scrapes her along the walls! I guess I should give mention to Mother Brain, too, since she killed the baby Metroid that nearly brought my younger brother Jeff to tears.

Wario

Mario’s evil doppelganger is so popular that he’s had several of his own game series (Wario Land and WarioWare), and I like some of those better than most Mario games! Wario Land 2 and 3 on the GBC were especially cool, as Wario couldn’t die. In fact, touching the bad guys would give Wario various ailments and afflictions that helped you solve puzzles in the game! Definitely cooler than Mario.

Captain Syrup

She’s the main villain in some of the Wario Land games. She’s a pirate and captain of the SS Teacup. She also must have gone to the same school as Dr. Wily, as she has some technical prowess and operates machines to stop Wario, especially in Wario Land 2. I was glad they brought her back in Wario Land: Shake It for Wii. She even tricks Wario in the end of that one! I wish Nintendo would use more of Captain Syrup in the future!

Team Rocket

The Pokemon games have several adversaries, but I think I like Team Rocket the best. Mainly because of Jessie and James from the cartoon. I know that doesn’t make them video game villains, but they did put them in Pokemon Yellow because of the cartoon’s popularity, so they count. I always hoped they would make a game starring those two from Team Rocket, or at least make a cartoon about them since Ash and the other main characters were so annoying. Team Rocket even has their own intro and catch phrase when defeated. But I hope they always come back after “blasting off again.”

Donkey Kong

It may be hard for some of you young’uns to believe, but in Mario’s first few games, Donkey Kong got top billing, not him! Back then, DK was so popular he got his own cereal, board game, and cartoon way before Mario did. DK’s been more of a good guy lately thanks to the Donkey Kong Country games, but he still shows Mario a wild time every once in a while when he kidnaps Pauline in the Mario vs. DK games! And if you think about it, Mario was a villain once, in DK Jr.!

Gruntilda

Not really the best villain as she is just a witch in the Banjo-Kazooie games. But her boss fights are pretty epic and memorable, even in Nuts & Bolts.

Kefka

I bet you thought all my favorite villains were from Nintendo games, but that’s not the case! When you first see Kefka in Final Fantasy 6, he’s just on a lowly mission and orders soldiers to wipe sand from his boots. You’d never guess that by the end of the game, this mad clown gone crazy from too many magical Esper experiments would poison a whole river, overthrow an empire, and cause the end of the world. Yes, Kefka is one of the few villains who actually wins. You just have to defeat him after the fact. His trademark laugh and theme song are truly memorable, and for that, he’s my favorite FF bad guy. Heck even his last boss theme, Dancing Mad, kicks One Winged Angel’s butt! Yup, I’ll go ahead and say that Kefka is way better than Sephiroth. Let the FF6 vs. FF7 flame wars commence! Oh yes, and Kefka’s also great in the Dissidia fighting games, even if he acts a bit too much like The Joker. But hey, if you’re going to imitate another bad guy, at least he picked one of the best to do.

Lavos

My other favorite Square villain, Lavos is the last boss in Chrono Trigger who causes the end of the world in 1999. But in each time period you visit, Lavos is the root of all the problems. Turns out Lavos is a space parasite that crashed into the planet in the prehistoric age, and has been waiting underground for the right time to strike. If you know what he’s been doing the whole time, you’ll realize how scary Lavos really is! Like Kefka, whenever you hear Lavos’ trademark guttural screech and pipe organ theme, you know something bad is going to happen.

You also fight Lavos in the sequel, Chrono Cross, but the storyline in that is so convoluted and hard to follow that it doesn’t even feel climatic. I’m not saying that Chrono Cross was a bad game. It had a fun battle system, graphics, and music. But it lacked the memorable characters and story that Chrono Trigger had. They really should’ve made Chrono Cross be a totally separate game.

Dr. Wily

When others make blogs about their favorite video game villains, Dr. Robotnik/Eggman usually makes the list. But I never liked him that much. His plans always involve stuffing cute little animals into robots to take over the world. Dr. Wily has that same problem, but at least Mega Man games are more fun, so Dr. Wily wins. His plans are ingenious: store a bunch of silly robots in garages and give them weapons and powers that are weak against each other, and let them wait for Mega Man to come. And that’s how Dr. Wily plans to take over the world, each and every time. At least he has a cool theme song in Mega Man 2, and it’s one of my all time favorite video game tunes ever.

Tron Bonne

She’s the villain in the Mega Man Legends series. She is a young sky pirate who lives with her crazy family, and she’s at that ‘awkward age’ and even has a crush on hero Mega Man Volnutt, even though she’s trying to foil his plans. She also commands an army of Servebots, cute little LEGO men robots that are so adorable. I like Tron Bonne because Capcom didn’t rely on fanservice for her character, like they usually do with their female stars. She’s so popular that she got her own game on the PSOne: The Misadventures of Tron Bonne, and it’s my favorite in the Legends series. I’m glad they keep bringing her back in fighters like Marvel vs. Capcom, and I can’t wait to see what she’s up to in the upcoming Mega Man Legends 3 for 3DS!

Miles Edgeworth

Actually I like all the rivals in the Ace Attorney games, I just featured Edgeworth since he’s the most recognizable and even got his own game. But all of Phoenix Wright’s rivals are formidable and sometimes scary. Especially Franizka von Karma, who would be my favorite of the rivals, actually.

M. Bison

Most final bosses in fighters aren’t very memorable to me, plus I suck at fighting games so much that I rarely ever see them, much less beat them. Such is the case with M. Bison. But it’s more of the company that M. Bison keeps that makes him cool, at least to me. In Street Fighter Alpha 3, he had a couple of brainwashed bodyguards, Juni and Juli, and I thought they were really cool. They reminded me of dopey bad guy sidekicks on Saturday morning cartoons, even though they really weren’t like that. If I were a bad guy, I’d like to have Juni and Juli around, too. Also in SFA3, my favorite Street Fighter character Cammy was evil and in cahoots with M. Bison, so that was pretty neat, too.

Queen Fossil

2-D shooters really don’t have memorable bad guys, except for Darius and its undersea creatures motif. I always liked fighting these bosses, and the catchphrase “Warning! A Huge Battleship: ‘Queen Fossil’ is Approaching Fast” became a Taito staple, even in other games! I really wish they would release Darius Burst on PSP in the US.

GlaDOS

Usually it takes a few games for a video game villain to win me over, but Portal’s antagonist got my attention right from the start. Whether it’s her demented quotes like “Take your daughter to work day is the perfect time to have her tested,” to her crazy obsession with cake, I was always glad to hear what she had to say next. Heck, even when fighting her in the final ‘battle,’ she was so funny that I jumped in the incinerator to hear all her hilarious quips during battle again. And when you do defeat her, she taunts you with a now iconic game song! But I was glad to hear it to know that she was “Still Alive.” I think that’s the mark of a truly good video game villain. One who is fun to fight and battle, but one who you know will also be ready to come back for more! Can’t wait to see what GlaDOS is up to in Portal 2! Have any of you heard the bonus commentary in the original Portal? The lady who does GlaDOS’ voice sounds crazy! But still fun.

Anyway, in the comments section, let me know who YOUR favorite video game villains are! –Cary

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