Mephiles The Dark

What more is there to say then dark, badass guy that actually succeeded in genuinely killing Sonic and almost destroyed the world and all of time with his master plan basically succeeding?

He's one of the most adored villains of the franchise, that's one way to put it. But there are people that also dislike him.

Remember to respect opinions, but I'd love to see what people think of this guy.

Personally I think he's a cool villain. A good concept. He plays everyone into his hands, and manipulates really well. He never directly engages in a fight that often, and he even is called a coward by some people because he killed Sonic from behind. But in the end... he did what he set out to do. And he got stuff done. In my eyes, that makes him a successful villain. Moreso than Eggman himself.

Thoughts?

I will say for a start, being a 'succesful' villain I don't feel neccesitates a 'good' villain. If it came down to success, most generic OC villains you see in the fandom would be considered well-written just because they're really powerful and can take on loads of people or whatever. A threatening villain does not automatically make a good villain (even if it can situationally help), because a threatening villain is easy. An INTERESTING villain is harder.

Despite that point, I will say, I do like Mephiles, primarily due to the point above of him being a manipulator. He isn't here to just go around and prove himself best - he never fights or kills unneccesarily. He has a goal, and he works towards that, and doesn't take extra actions 'for the evulz'. Some might say he's a coward, but he doesn't NEED to be brave, because he has no real need or want to prove himself in any way.
He uses charisma and the resources he has around him - through the majority of the game he's barely using abilities or anything, he's just setting up the pieces and letting them fall into place. It's nice to see that sort of villain in a game series so focus on the grandiose of it's other villains.

Admittedly, I don't know much about him. I've not seen a full LP of Sonic 06 before, and I really should but never got round to it. All I know is that he kills Sonic and is also part of Solaris? And takes his form from Shadow I think?
He has a damned kicking design tho.

From what I know, he takes his form from Shadow, which is why he's sometimes known as Shadow's shadow. It's pretty obvious, right? He's also part of Solaris, helped Silver try to find the Iblis trigger, and killed Sonic. Apart from being a manipulator, he's a bit of a coward, but he does have a goal.

I will say this, though: I like Mephiles, though this has proven the point of him being an interesting character despite having his flaws.

Mephiles the Dark wrote:I will say this, though: I like Mephiles, though this has proven the point of him being an interesting character despite having his flaws.

I'd be worried if you didn't - you have him as your username and avatar. XP

Spekkal wrote:

Mephiles the Dark wrote:I will say this, though: I like Mephiles, though this has proven the point of him being an interesting character despite having his flaws.

I'd be worried if you didn't - you have him as your username and avatar. XP

Obviously... ^^;

"I hate Mephiles. Let's go around literally AS him for the lulz."

Seems legit.

-

Eitherway, I didn't mean like - blegh, YOU KNOW WHAT I MEANT I HOPE. I'm not saying being successful immediately means good writing, I mean being successful just makes him all the more awesome. Because of HOW he did it. And HOW things went.

His manipulation is the key thing I like eitherway. And I agree with you 100%, Dregan.

I don't know about the high praise Mephiles gets as a villain. Sure he manipulates the characters and events, but everything he does in the game is pointless up until he finally goes out and kills Sonic.

He tries to get Silver to kill Sonic. It doesn't happen.

He tries to get Shadow to join him. It doesn't happen.

Mephiles just spends most of the game in a holding pattern waiting for the chance to score a hit on Sonic while Elise is around. And really... if you want to make a person cry, there are many easier ways to accomplish it I'm sure.

I have even seen the question asked about why Mephiles doesn't just merge with Iblis in the future since they are both there at several points in the game, other than for plot convenience.

Unfortunately, I think Mephiles ends up being another potentially good idea that's poorly executed.

C.S.O. wrote: And really... if you want to make a person cry, there are many easier ways to accomplish it I'm sure.

Y'know, why didn't he just... consider garlic?

I mean... I mean I guess?
Or onions.

Ironic that the future Mephiles is from is when the world is devastated and destroyed. Just like Sonic.


At the end of the day, yeah, Mephiles COULD'VE been a bit better. But at the end of the day as well, he ALSO succeeded where the other villains had ALL failed, at actually getting Sonic out of the picture. He came closer than any other to winning, I'm sure of that much.

Yep. Mephiles did succeed in killing Sonic. He was then foiled by the sidekick army, and then his punishment was removal from storyline canon.

But in terms of coming closest to winning... I'm not sure about that. If not for a completely lucky break, Eggman would have won in Sonic Colours. No one was in any position to stop him there.

Eggman in Sonic Colors is actually surprisingly cool at that ONE MOMENT. Everything else about him in that game is stupid.

SA2 Eggman still remains my favourite though. If it wasn't for Sonic being extremely lucky with the emeralds power, which by the way, WAS FAKE (he was wiped the hell out after just using it) he'd be dead. For good. Boom, gone. And so would the Earth because the Last Story would've happened without him.

Alas though this is about Mephiles, and I still consider that he got closer than anyone else ever did. Because guess what, he actually succeeded. ...Before being declared non-canon. Cri.

Well, technically, if we're talking about heroes who are succesful until the last hurdle... well, Metal Sonic in Sonic Heroes fits that aptly. He spends most of the game pretending to be Robotnik - he loses a lot of battles, but has no intention to win most of them. He was simply absorbing information and data to combine and take him to final boss status. Up until losing in the end... Metal Sonic succeeds everything he sets out to do in Heroes.

Still, I feel we're rather moving away from the subject of Mephiles. I'll be honest, he does have his failings, and points where he fails to succeed as a villain. Not all that is neccesarily down to the character though... the 'merging with Iblis in the future' is more a plot hole than anything.
He's a good villain... though admittedly one which in his appearance wasn't neccesarily written to the best ability of the writing staff. ...Unless that was the best ability of the writing staff. In which case... oh dear.

C.S.O. wrote:Mephiles just spends most of the game in a holding pattern waiting for the chance to score a hit on Sonic while Elise is around. And really... if you want to make a person cry, there are many easier ways to accomplish it I'm sure.

You would think that he only did it to make Elise cry, huh? Well what if we look at it like this. What if Mephiles KNEW that Sonic was one of the people that would destroy him next to Shadow and Silver? This way, if he killed Sonic he: 1. Could merge with Solaris and 2. already had one enemy vanquished, so that they wouldn't have a chance of defeating Mephiles after the merging. This is smart peoples. Hopefully I'm right.

Now you could ask "Why wouldn't he kill Shadow and Silver too then?" Well, they were needed to actually free Mephiles. I know it's still not a completely solid theory but now you can understand why killing Sonic was also still profit for Mephiles. And I know the killing of Sonic happened after the unleashement of Mephiles, but come on! I've thought hard about this okay?!

Anyway my opinion about Mephiles!
I have never played '06 but I think I know the story good enough by watching cutscenes. Mephiles is awesome, but I'm relieved that he never returns again, because he's just too smart. It's really hard to explain. Still a cool character though. I also like the way he looks. CRYSTALLSSS

CyanFoxboy wrote:You would think that he only did it to make Elise cry, huh? Well what if we look at it like this. What if Mephiles KNEW that Sonic was one of the people that would destroy him next to Shadow and Silver? This way, if he killed Sonic he: 1. Could merge with Solaris and 2. already had one enemy vanquished, so that they wouldn't have a chance of defeating Mephiles after the merging. This is smart peoples. Hopefully I'm right.

Now you could ask "Why wouldn't he kill Shadow and Silver too then?" Well, they were needed to actually free Mephiles. I know it's still not a completely solid theory but now you can understand why killing Sonic was also still profit for Mephiles. And I know the killing of Sonic happened after the unleashement of Mephiles, but come on! I've thought hard about this okay?!

Kinda smart. But he makes the required villain blunders after his initial success. He leaves all the heroes alive and discards the chaos emeralds after using them himself. He was undone by his own arrogance, thinking he couldn't lose once he became Solaris again. And actually, Shadow and Silver were responsible for making sure Mephiles and Iblis were contained initially, and neither had a hand in freeing either of them.

Again, this is the fault of the story and writing. If it wasn't so convoluted Mephiles would come out much better.

I think the issue, as you say, is required villain blunders. An unfortunate issue in writing today, is that we have difficulty writing truly threatening villains who don't blunder. The issue is, oftentimes you'll have a villain who in a base state is either too powerful or too good at being a villain to be defeated straight up. Now you can counter this by just upping the power of the hero or whatever, but in the end if the hero is just straight-up better than the villain in the end, the villain suddenly stops being threatening.
Now, there are various clever approaches one can take to get around this. Unfortunately, there are also two very easy approaches that can be taken instead, and oftentimes will;
1. There's some sort of mcguffin which the heroes get that is the one thing that can stop the villain in this situation.
or
2. The villain has to make some sort of key blunders along the way that can be taken advantage of so he doesn't quite win overall.

You'll find both of these basic approaches used time and time again in various medias where the villain needs to be a threat and the hero needs to win. It's especially common in series like Sonic, where the win is expected to be a pretty much out-right victory, with no want for hesitance or bittersweetness in victory.
It's a shame, but it's often the downfall of many of the greatest villains. That in the end, they need to make arbitary mistakes, just to allow the heroes to win the story.

Well put Dregan. That touches on many important points.

I think Mephiles might have been more satisfying as a villain if he had been the final boss an an epic encounter. Clearly he hadn't used all his tricks. Imagine if he'd used his copies (for something other than a stepping stone up to him) and his energy beam in a boss battle. Alas, that sort of stuff only got serious use in cutscenes.

Instead, you fight Solaris in a battle that's almost impossible to lose.

I will admit that I find him rather... forgetful. He doesn't really do anything spectacular, say anything amazing or has a super epic battle. And honestly that if any is my main complain with him? (And his design but shh)

Like I would be able to more properly join in the discussion if I actually remembered /anything/ about the character. Yes I watched LPs and what not of Sonic '06 but even with that, he is just so easily forgotten about. Like legit the only thing I can remember about him is that he looked like a recolored Shadow without a mouth and he has a weird second form.

I feel like there could've been done more with him to make him more memorable.

Oh, absolutely. More could've DEFINITELY been done to make Mephiles a better character. His design is a bit... stupid for the most part either way. I mean... it doesn't stand out all that much. Though the second form he takes is cooler, at least. Still not too memorable, but it does stand out a lot among the other hedgehogs.

If he had more spotlight, is what you're basically saying, I think. If so? Well, I agree. More spotlight would've made him that much more impacting and cooler.

I personally don't think he even stands out that much against the other hogedges. He is just one of those characters that feels like they could've done so much more with dangit. Alas I doubt we will ever see him regardless though.

I don't get that with sega... they make great characters and then put them in garbage...

Well I mean, I don't think Sega INTENTIONALLY produces garbage games. I imagine in creating Sonic 06 they didn't set out with the game plan of making it a complete disaster.
Though I will say, I'd like to see them do SOMETHING with Mephiles again. It feels a shame to've lost out on good villain material, especially when the games these days just seem so eager to throw in arbitary single-game villains, and keep the only consistent as Robotnik - whilst still having him overshadowed by whatever other final hour villain shows up.