Why is Sephiroth praised as one of the best villians?

[Chisato]

Kefka is the ultimate villain. He actually succeeds in blowing up the world, has a cult formed around him, and a huge badass tower. He's completely psychotic and the embodiment of chaotic evil. What more could you want in an awesome villain?

FF games aside, I also love Jon Irenicus from Baldurs Gate 2. He's an extremely complex, intricate villain with a self-mutilated body infused with magic. He performs torture and grotesque experiments on creatures, including your main character hero. I don't want to spoil anymore about him but he's an awesome villain and character in general. If you're into RPGs but haven't played Baldurs Gate 2 I highly recommend it.

[Itisamuh]

A touchy subject for me. I was young when I played the game, and I got so confused at the Jenova/Sephiroth thing that I hated them both.

[OrcsRLame]

Kefka is the ultimate villain. He actually succeeds in blowing up the world, has a cult formed around him, and a huge badass tower. He's completely psychotic and the embodiment of chaotic evil. What more could you want in an awesome villain?

FF games aside, I also love Jon Irenicus from Baldurs Gate 2. He's an extremely complex, intricate villain with a self-mutilated body infused with magic. He performs torture and grotesque experiments on creatures, including your main character hero. I don't want to spoil anymore about him but he's an awesome villain and character in general. If you're into RPGs but haven't played Baldurs Gate 2 I highly recommend it.

The only reason Kefka succeeds in the short term is that the heroes are all retarded.

[Sj]

The only reason Kefka succeeds in the short time is that the heroes are all retarded.

Sure, I will open the doorway to the land of Espers to deliver your apology.


Legit.

[OrcsRLame]

Sure, I will open the doorway to the land of Espers to deliver your apology.


Legit.

Exactly my point. Also there's the time when the heroes just let Kefka go after beating him at the Battle for the Frozen Esper. They literally just let him walk away after killing all his men and beating his ass.

[Pony Soldier]

I think it's just because of how big SE made it. I mean if you look at how many stories it had it's no wonder Sephiroth is the most popular of villains and FF7 one of the most popular games ever. It does have pretty much the best and deepest Final Fantasy story of them all, at least I think so, resulting in people getting more attached to the characters so that's probably why. I still think FF4 is still my favorite one though. I still haven't beat it yet but I just liked the characters and the story a bit more than the other FF games.

[Deleted]

He might be a bit lame now in hindsight, but, if you were 10 in the late 90s, Cloud's flashback in Kalm (ithink?) was the most mindblowing piece of game storyline ever. Even better than Kefka, or the Octupus crashing the opera in FFVI (yeah I went there).

As a character out of context, he might not be much, but his introduction into the story, and how he wasn't even a part of the story until the end of Shinra HQ, when his part in the character's pasts was revealed in a melancholy 30 min flashback with awesome music, was really really cool.

Plus FFVII was a massive part of a lot of people's childhoods, and saying Sephiroth is not a great villain is like saying your family don't love you or Jesus was just some guy.

[NewOrleansTrolley]

Just throwing it out there... there's no such thing as a "best villain." What matters most is the one you grew up with. It's pure opinion, nothing objective. I still laugh when people saying final fantasy X was good. But it's their opinion so I can't say it's wrong. lol

[MetalMessiah]

Sephiroth would have been the best villain if his plan would have worked. If he had been able to use Meteor to hurt the planet and absorb the Lifestream when it came down to heal the planet, he could have easily destroyed anyone. But I think people like him so much because of his character development. Sure, they could have made a generic villain that was just evil because that's how they made him, but the game(s) really showed the progression of his evil and allowed people to connect with it more, instead of having the average super-powerful villain who seems impossible to defeat.

But I think that if he were put in a fight against Kefka (he seems to be the one people compare Sephiroth to the most) he would win.

[mistahwilshire]

Because 1997.

[KrazyK923]

Nostalgia.

[zephid]

Because he is Sephiroth and Sephiroth is awesome incarnate?

[Deleted]

I think it's pretty simple. It was a very satisfying moment to kill him. You've chased him all across the world, seen him kill one of your friends and witnessed how he planned to destroy the world to become a god. And for Cloud it was also a personal matter. This guy set his hometown on fire, killed everyone in there, including his mother, almost killed Tifa and played mindgames on Cloud, making him doubt his own identity. When you get down to that crater, you want nothing more than to put an end to him. In that sense, he was the perfect villain.

[Shinzai]

I am, Thread-raaaa! And after 300 days, I live again! Mwahahaha!

Even though I still think Sephiroth was a neat bad-guy, he was such a generation X ideal it hurts.

[Pendulous]

I think it's pretty simple. It was a very satisfying moment to kill him. You've chased him all across the world, seen him kill one of your friends and witnessed how he planned to destroy the world to become a god. And for Cloud it was also a personal matter. This guy set his hometown on fire, killed everyone in there, including his mother, almost killed Tifa and played mindgames on Cloud, making him doubt his own identity. When you get down to that crater, you want nothing more than to put an end to him. In that sense, he was the perfect villain.

I like the idea of a present villain throughout the whole game. It doesn't happen often enough. Final Fantasy 9 did it as well with Kuja.

[Ferocity]

I like the idea of a present villain throughout the whole game. It doesn't happen often enough. Final Fantasy 9 did it as well with Kuja.

Kuja appeared only at the very end of first disc. And final villain was some being with name Necron...
Sephiroth's first appearance was also quite late in the game, and his role as villain was only shown in second half of the game.

FF series didn't have always present main villain with exception of FF VI (Kefka).

Sephiroth was simply very charming and cute. Also many people got too much attached to Aeris for some reason, and got upset when Sephiroth killed her, calling this scene as most sad scene in FF series. Though I'd argue and say that FF VI (story about Esper World), FF IX (Brahne's death) and X (it was tragic all around starting from first death of Seymour) had more sad scenes. FF XII also made me sad with scenes in Viera Village and with realizing that Ashe was so dirty manipulated by Occuria, who used image of her love, Rasler, to make her think he'd approve her.

[Zython]

Honestly, I think a lot of it has to do it with FFVII being a lot of people's first exposure to a narrative-heavy game. There were many before it, sure, but not a whole lot got the same level of mainstream success that FFVII got.

[Deleted]

He did? Nope. If you paid attention, that was just another part of JENOVA, the TRUE Vilain of FFVII. Seph didn't do shit but be the final boss. To even put him in the same level as say, Kefka or Kuja, even Vayne which I am not a big fan off, is just mindboggling.

I have played FF7 like 3-5 times or so. Now the last time I played it must have been 10-12 years ago. Can someone explain to me why it was Jenova at these parts and not sephiroth? I have no memory of that at all that it would indicate its Jenova.

I do remember that if you faught him at some places he left behind a pice of his mother/Jenova which is kinda strange but ye. I still dont see why this would mean its Jenova & not sephiroth? Do they actually say its Jenova & not sephiroth? But as Sephiroth is an experiment from Jenova or something along the line you could say he is Jenova. I dont really remember the game that much.

My first was also FF7 though I hold FF9 & FFX higher.

Why its seen as one of the best ever, it was the first FF game for a lot of ppl and did a lot of new things no other game had (lol my music player started a FF7 song while I wrote this).

[Ferocity]

I have played FF7 like 3-5 times or so. Now the last time I played it must have been 10-12 years ago. Can someone explain to me why it was Jenova at these parts and not sephiroth? I have no memory of that at all that it would indicate its Jenova.

Actual Sephiroth was somewhat dead. Jenova, his "mother", was an ancient organism which could multiply and take various forms (including Sephiroth). Actual Sephiroth appears on summit, where all separated "pieces" of Jenova go to reunite (and characters follow them whole disc 1 and start of disc 2) and he gets "revived" (awoken) by "assimilating" with Jenova, and summons Meteor, which awakens Weapons. It is also one of the longest scenes in FF (which follows shortly after defeating Jenova*DEATH). That's shortly from what I remember.

[Deleted]

He had cool hair. Yes, good look > anything else.

That is actually very accurate, the rule of cool. Altair from the original Assassin's Creed was considered way cooler than Ezio for quite a while, even though Altair had almost no characterization.
Same with Revan from Knights of the Old Republic, he has no characterization besides how you act during the game, even during the flashbacks he doesn't ever say a word, he's just the boss and has a cool looking mask and armor on him.