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Writing great villains

Matthew Birdzell · 2018-08-05T15:11:53

There's a lot of conventional villains out in games, even from highly reputable writers and studios. And you have your bad guys that are well done, intriguing, maybe even redeemable, have actual depth, or are just plain fun to play against. However, I don't think writers are doing enough to make a villain more than someone who is selfish and wants to kill a bunch of innocent people. Disagree if you will, and I'm just fine with that. What I'm getting at is why aren't more villains breaking conventions, or being infused with more depth? Sure they're fun to beat up, shoot at, blow up, or chase down at the end of a game. Perhaps I've not played games that have those types of characters. That's on me. I also could be really nitpicky, because I enjoy a well thought out character in the more "serious" games that I normally play. I want to see writers create bad guys that are more than what we usually see. Although not every game needs that to be fun, as fun is the biggest value for a game, I personally want to write bad guys with more dimensions and depth, when I see it can work well. For others that don't need to be all that, I suppose them being on the simpler side of the spectrum is fine. As long as they're fun to play and beat! Kinda in conflict about this as you can see haha.