So a short thought when playing through Lunar Legend, the GBA remake of Lunar 1. It’s a fairly typical adventure-themed JRPG, with predictable plot twists and whatnot. Early on you’re introduced to Ghaleon, one of the four heroes of the past generation that everyone idolizes, especially the main character. Ghaleon looks like this:
…and is really, really obviously the bad guy. I mean, seriously, just look at him. This is before you even get to hear his internal monologues about how humans are evil. BBEG, written all over this guy.
Early on in the game, he ends up traveling with you for a while. While you’re heading through a forest, you meet a forest man with a crazy accent capturing faeries and intending to sell them. Ghaleon offers to pay this man anything he wants for a fairy, and upon learning Ghaleon’s identity, the man runs away, leaving the fairy behind. Ghaleon then shoos the fairy off, and makes an internal comment about how humans are horrible creatures. About this time, you also start to get hints that Ghaleon’s is mad at his close friend, and the main character’s hero, Dyne, who sacrificed himself.
And there you go – there’s your villainous backstory. When Ghaleon turns evil five minutes later, it’s not really shocking, but it’s easy to believe he WAS a hero. Hearing how people like him isn’t enough – I’ve seen too many tabletop games where the DM tried to communicate “this guy is (good/evil/strong/important)” without actually showing it. By having Ghaleon show that he actually has a heart, and giving us an insight as to why he’s become corrupted – namely, he’s a cynical bastard who doesn’t think humans are worthwhile – we can feel for him. Hell, we can almost agree with him; that jerk capturing fairies was just a dick, but still so very human, right? So next time you want a villain who has some redeeming traits (and those are always the best kinds of villains) try showing off those traits before hand.
I played Lunar Silver Star Story on the PS1, and I enjoyed Ghaleon as the villain as well. Lunar is a fairly simple story in a lot of ways, but it's simple in a well built way. Like you said, Ghaleon has enough in him that you understand that he was a hero, and also why he changes. And it doesn't stop once he's revealed as the villain to, for instance in the fairy garden onboard the Grindery. His subcommanders as well also had good reasons for being the bad guys, and really weren't all that bad considering where they started.
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