Am I the only one who likes final fantasy 7 IN SPITE of Sephiroth?????

[reinward]

dont get me wrong i liked ff 7 a lot (its actually my 3rd favorite behind 9 and 10) but i HATE Spehiroth!

his motives were unclear, he had hardly NO character development, he was hiding a freaking cave for over half the cave!

i thought the Shinra were the true villians! I always looked forward to the Shinra scenes. I was always bored by the Sephiroth scenes

i mean yeah, he killed Aeris but for some reason i just didnt care. he just wasntevil enough!

i never had the hatred (in a good way) for him that i had for the likes of Seymour or Kuja

idk.... out of all of the FFs i'd play i think Sephiroth is probablly the worst villian (exception may be Vayne, but even thats questionable)

anyone else feel the same?

[Rostum]

I wouldn't say FFVII is my favourite in the series, but I do like it. I've never really had a problem with Sephiroth; for most of the game I always found him so mysterious and terrifying, especially when you see the blood trail leading up to the dead Shinra and also when you find the Midgardsormr impaled on that tree.

I wouldn't say he's the best villain I've come across either, but never had a problem with him.

[the AJman]

I wouldn't say Sephiroth is my favorite villian (that would be Vayne ironically enough), but I personally don't think hes a bad villian either.

Sephiroth's motives were simply to cause an injury on the planet large enough to make the planet use a large amount of the lifestream to heal itself. Then as its doing that he would have absorbed the energy to become a god. That was his plan in a nut shell.

I myself don't mind villians that have no real character development, infact some of my favorite villians from books and movies don't. One of my all time favorite villians (if not all time fav. in pop culture) is Sauron from the Lord of the Rings and he gets almost no development all through Tolkien's mythology. I just realized a reference Lord of the Rings way to damn much.

Anyways my point is in my humble opinion sometimes a villian works better when their simple. When there isn't much behind their motives, we know Sephiroth went nuts after finding out his origins, but thats about it. He's a fairly simple villian, he is the typical evil bad guy out to get power because hes evil, and sometimes that works better than a villian with a tragic past and a lot of development through the story.

It's true that he doesn't do much himself in the game, and he doesn't make a lot of appearances. The most of the appearance he does make were actually the Jenova pieces. I think what they were going for with this was the less is more concept. He doesn't show up much and that helps with that eerie and ever forboding presence that seems to aways be looming over your shoulder. When he does show up its usually a big deal, especially at the end, when hes on the screen you know something bad is going to happen.


The Shinra company was a great antagonist (is that count as plural or singular, screw I've had enough english in college this semester). They definitaly were more involved with the main cast; they had some pretty mean, nasty, bada$$ characters in Shinra.

[Raistlin]

Sephiroth had a decent enough backstory to be a solid villain (and even a way to make him sympathetic), but he suffered from terrible writing and development. The game's writers really didn't do justice to what they had. And Sephiroth was just one way that FF7's writing was lacking.

[line_genrou]

The only huge thing he does that actually made me sad was killing Aerith.
But he's strong,and that's another reason to kick his ass...HARD.

[ANGRYWOLF]

I thought he was better than Kuja, although not as diabolical as Kefka.
Just my opinion.

Sephiroth helps make FFVII what it is.

[G13]

Sephiroth had a decent enough backstory to be a solid villain (and even a way to make him sympathetic), but he suffered from terrible writing and development. The game's writers really didn't do justice to what they had. And Sephiroth was just one way that FF7's writing was lacking.

Agreed.

When I first played it I enjoyed the delicious terror that was instilled in me during Seph's scenes. Just seeing made me think "Man, do I have to fight him now?". Now that I'm older I realize how overrated he was but I still enjoy him. His background is easy enough to figure out if you do a little more digging and attention paying. I don't usually let minor things in a video game bother me (unless it's Marcus Fenix's over-dramatic way of talking). Seph's second best villain (Kefka's first) imo.

[Moon Rabbits]

Uh, I always thought his motives were pretty clear:

"My momma was an Ancient, I'm special, lookit how powerful I am" -> "My momma wasn't an Ancient, but a planet killing alien from space and I was a failed experiment" -> "I'm gon smurfin' kill all y'all."

[Skyblade]

I myself don't mind villians that have no real character development, infact some of my favorite villians from books and movies don't. One of my all time favorite villians (if not all time fav. in pop culture) is Sauron from the Lord of the Rings and he gets almost no development all through Tolkien's mythology. I just realized a reference Lord of the Rings way to damn much.

There is no such thing as referencing LotR too much.

And you're wrong, Sauron gets quite a bit of development throughout Tolkien's mythology. His story is a long and extremely involved one, that last throughout the first three ages of Middle Earth. His character is described in detail, and goes through several large changes over the course of The Simarillion, as he turns from the friend of the Valar, to the fair-faced corrupter and traitor, to the Dark Lord who attempts to control the world.

[the AJman]

You're right, his character is featured quite a bit in Tolkien's mythology; there are hardly any characters that are featured as much as much as him. Sauron also lasted quite a bit longer than three ages of middle earth. Tolkien does go into some pretty good detail on who and what he is. However, Sauron doesn't really change over the course of the mythology; he's essentially evil from the first time hes mentioned. The only thing that really changes is his role, he starts out as Melkor's right hand man, and than becomes a Dark Lord himself at the start of the second age. It's mentioned that Sauron wasn't always evil, but Tolkien never really tells the story about how he turns to the evil side; All we get is that at one point early in the mythology Melkor seduced Sauron to his side, that and Sauron used to be a maiar serving under Aule.

So I'd say that Sauron is described in good detail, and that he takes on a few different roles over the course of history. However he doesn't really get any character development; if character development is defined as personal growth or change over time.

Oh, and you're probably right, there is no such thing as referencing LofR to much. It's nice to see another Tolkien enthusiast here on the EoFF boards.

[Skyblade]

I disagree. While he may have been evil from the first time we get to directly see his activities (his friendship with Aule being told secondhand, as it were), we do get to witness changes in his persona while he is evil. Some of it natural development, some of it forced upon him by others.

Sauron's role in the first age and early in the second was that of a manipulator. He was able to guide the elf-smiths of Eregion into working towards his aim with the ring project, and even after his capture at the hands of the Numenorians he was able to corrupt that noble race into attacking the Valar.

Contrast that to his actions at the end of the second age, where he utilized a much more brute-force tactic in attempting to simply overwhelm what was left of Gondor, Arnor, and the elves.

Then, with the loss of the ring, his tactics are forced to change once more. He begins to focus more on power consolidation than anything else. However, once he regains enough of his power to reclaim his fortress of Barad-dur (despite still having no physical form), he does not relinquish this tactic. He tries a few attempts at the manipulation he used in the first and second age, but it fails rather miserably, as he has, quite simply, lost his knack for it as he became more and more corrupted.

He becomes obsessed with the acquisition of more and more power, calling in allies from beyond Middle Earth (the Easterlings and Southrens) to aid him in his quest for domination. These are hard learned lessons from the past and seem to instill in him a sort of paranoia that drives his activities. He martials as many forces as he can to overwhelm his opponents, and begins hunting even more desperately for the Ring. The final battle at the Black Gate displays this more than anything. With Aragorn's success at overthrowing Sauron's hold over the Palantiri, Sauron knows that he faces a will stronger than his own, and one which could succeed in wielding the Ring against him (it would have corrupted Aragorn completely to do so, but Sauron would have been undone), and throws absolutely everything he has at the paltry force facing him because of it, much to his doom.

His character does change and evolve, as reflected in his strategies. Personally, I also believe that the minions of the villains reflect a lot about the villain's personalities. For example, you can tell that Saruman is not as corrupt as Sauron by comparing their respective forces, the Uruk-hai and the orcs. While both are evil, the Uruk-hai have a great sense of duty, and even a form of esprit-de-corps, that is notably lacking from the orcs, as both orcs and Uruk-hai are reflective of the ones shaping them, Saruman and Sauron. By viewing the forces Sauron uses throughout the stories, you can see a couple notable changes even in just LotR. But that's a tale for another time.



On topic, Sephiroth may not have been the best villain, but he was a notable one. At least he had a personality, which gave him a one-up on Seymour,

[Flying Arrow]

I don't really have a problem with Sephiroth. In terms of being an antagonist, I think the Shinra Co. were more interesting in context of the story. Still, though, the slow chase across the continents for Sephiroth is one of the most memorable moments of my gaming experience. But I'll readily admit the Sephiroth plot is probably the shakiest out of the entire thing.

As far as favourite villains go, Kefka probably occupied a better place in FFVI's story, and Sin was an unbelievable "villain" during the first half of FFX (the revelations about Sin are still pretty interesting, but I feel they are really too convoluted to add anything to FFX's story whatsoever.)

[black orb]

>>> The guy summoned a friggin giant-ass meteor to crush the planet, that makes him a great villain in my book..

[Christmas]

I prefer Shinra over Sephiroth though.

Cause Shinra have Heidegger and other wacky characters!

[the AJman]

I disagree. While he may have been evil from the first time we get to directly see his activities (his friendship with Aule being told secondhand, as it were), we do get to witness changes in his persona while he is evil. Some of it natural development, some of it forced upon him by others.

Sauron's role in the first age and early in the second was that of a manipulator. He was able to guide the elf-smiths of Eregion into working towards his aim with the ring project, and even after his capture at the hands of the Numenorians he was able to corrupt that noble race into attacking the Valar.

Contrast that to his actions at the end of the second age, where he utilized a much more brute-force tactic in attempting to simply overwhelm what was left of Gondor, Arnor, and the elves.

Then, with the loss of the ring, his tactics are forced to change once more. He begins to focus more on power consolidation than anything else. However, once he regains enough of his power to reclaim his fortress of Barad-dur (despite still having no physical form), he does not relinquish this tactic. He tries a few attempts at the manipulation he used in the first and second age, but it fails rather miserably, as he has, quite simply, lost his knack for it as he became more and more corrupted.

He becomes obsessed with the acquisition of more and more power, calling in allies from beyond Middle Earth (the Easterlings and Southrens) to aid him in his quest for domination. These are hard learned lessons from the past and seem to instill in him a sort of paranoia that drives his activities. He martials as many forces as he can to overwhelm his opponents, and begins hunting even more desperately for the Ring. The final battle at the Black Gate displays this more than anything. With Aragorn's success at overthrowing Sauron's hold over the Palantiri, Sauron knows that he faces a will stronger than his own, and one which could succeed in wielding the Ring against him (it would have corrupted Aragorn completely to do so, but Sauron would have been undone), and throws absolutely everything he has at the paltry force facing him because of it, much to his doom.

His character does change and evolve, as reflected in his strategies. Personally, I also believe that the minions of the villains reflect a lot about the villain's personalities. For example, you can tell that Saruman is not as corrupt as Sauron by comparing their respective forces, the Uruk-hai and the orcs. While both are evil, the Uruk-hai have a great sense of duty, and even a form of esprit-de-corps, that is notably lacking from the orcs, as both orcs and Uruk-hai are reflective of the ones shaping them, Saruman and Sauron. By viewing the forces Sauron uses throughout the stories, you can see a couple notable changes even in just LotR. But that's a tale for another time.



On topic, Sephiroth may not have been the best villain, but he was a notable one. At least he had a personality, which gave him a one-up on Seymour,

Last post about this subject, I swear. Any further discussion not related to FFVII and Sephiroth I'll pm.

I'd call that a change in policy more than a change in character. Sauron used all those tools all through his career; Sauron is a utilitarian and an opportunist. He will use anything he can to achieve his goals.

Sauron was alway a manipulator, in the first age he used manipulation and deciet to catch Barahir. He used it in the second age to convince the elves to create the rings of power, and again to destroy Numeanor. He also used it on Saruman and Denethor. Sauron also toyed with the armies of the west in the third age at the black gate with deciet and manipulation

As for power consolidation, he had to build up his forces during the second age just as he had to in the third age. This is more of a neccessity more than a choice if he wanted to conquer middle earth. He's built up his forces to overwhelm his enemies before, this is why the last alliance was formed.

Brute force is something he's used almost as much as manipulation and deciet. He used brute force against the elves in second age after they descovered his true intentions with the rings; it took Numunorean interventio to save the elves. Sauron used it again in his war against the last alliance. He unleashed almost his full military might against the free people of middle earth at the end of the third age. Using brute force was nothing new to Sauron.

The only thing that changed in his policies is the hunt for the ring, and that was because he needed back. As for Aragorn having a stronger will than Sauron, I have to disagree with that. Aragorn only managed to wrestle control away for Sauron because the Palantiri rightfully belong to Aragron. That gives him more control over them than it would if it didn't by right belong to him.

Ok, thats all I'll say on the matter on this thread, any further discussion I'll do through pm skyblade.