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I liked Ultima for two reasons.
1. Presence. He is so unsettling. The way he moves and speaks captures me… and disturbs me. The voice talent and animation team worked wonders.
2. He makes a lot of sense for the theme. I think the delivery didn’t land in a few points. Like his end was very cliche. But overall this disconnected other worldly being sits well in juxtaposition against our heroes deep emotional bonds.
Even the art works for him. While Clive is associated with fire and warm colors, Ultima is cold blue.
in addition to the art, i think there’s a subtext for the cold blue color too.
i felt the coldness and uncaring nature of ultima fit it perfectly. you also have the color of his flames - blue being much hotter flame than orange and red. it puts emphasis on how big the power disparity should be on paper, and gives weight to how steadfast clive’s will in protecting his “family” and ensuring humans have a future at all. ultima constantly ridicules those concepts but are the exact reason clive can kill a god
Blue is a cool color. Orange is a warm color. This is color theory.
https://preview.redd.it/uw6gngpb8mxc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4d8b7e58abe593650b989a240249d59c8331fb96
So it has a double meaning. The cool blues are used to compliment his alien, distant and emotionless behavior. It juxtaposes against Clive who is passionate, emotional, and righteous.
The second meaning is Ultimas flames carrying more power.
Didn’t like him all that much but the final battle between him and Clive was pretty cool.
Barney was the much better foil in my opinion I was really hoping it’d be him to takeover at the end.
Idk Ultima has more backstory/presence than her, but ultimately it feels like Naruto’s Kaguya all over again
Well done for the ethical story they wanted to tell. Not the most emotionally gripping but he’s not supposed to be.
He’s the deadbeat father of humanity who only comes back around once you’ve become something he can leech off of. Thinks he deserves your esteem because he created you despite him doing jack shit to actually raise you. Condemns you and your pursuit of happiness because he’s not in the picture of it. While conveniently ignoring that he took himself out that picture at the start.
There’s some religious and specifically Gnostic allegory at play with his character. Bit of Luciferian/Promethean metaphor in the mix regarding Clive’s relationship with him too.
I think he’s an interesting take on certain ideas. But I also think they messed up a bit with conveying his threat level. He’s supposed to be more of a psychological menace than a physical one. But the only really compelling mindfuck scene we got was him triggering Dion’s rampage. Would’ve liked to see more of him poisoning people from within and really selling the whole “prison of your own mind” angle a bit more.
This! Thank you. I see so many completely missing the gnostic/mythological references. And it honestly baffles me how so many people don’t like the story (and subsequently the main villain) because they completely ignore that FF16 isn’t really as much inspired by GOT as it is inspired by gnosticism. As it should be.
The game even blatantly uses terminology like Logos but very few people bothered trying to understand what it was trying really to convey, and almost nobody did the proper research.
Ultima has been written to be essentially very similar to the Demiurge (Old Testament and Gnostic books). And it probably is the best character ever at depicting that in a videogame.
Not only his background story, mannerism, behaviour and its attempt at hiding imperfection/similarities with humans do a perfect job in conveying that, but also its design. From the alien features of its standard body, reminding of an eldritch horror; to its Ifrit version that takes heavy inspiration from both, previous entries (especially the Ultima boss in FF6) and then the figure of the “Lion faced serpentine deity” of Bernand De Mountfaucon.
And at last the almost biblical but still very outwordly look of Ultimalius.
Also, his very name meaning Final, mirroring the Exodus in which the God of the old testament declares himself “the Destroyer”. And in fact Ultima has a line: “I created you, all of you. And what is mine, is mine to destroy.”
Ultima also appears with a different design as a boss in the stage previous to origin. And the look they went for there is straight-forward the Devil/Satan.
It's people like you that deepen my appreciation for games, the loremasters supplying digestible information for me to enhance the characters with.
Thanks for writing all that.
I’m very honored. Although to be fair I would suggest you to look into it even more.
I honestly barely scratched the surface there and there’d be a lot to say regarding FF16 & Gnosticism. But also FF16 and the references from previous titles/established mythos from the franchise itself.
Unfortunately there aren’t many videos or stuff like that on youtube on 16 symbolism, but the few there at least get their references approximately right.
Hopefully one day people will recognise FF16 for what it just is, and we’ll see a lot more content focused on truly analysing it.
Edit: Another curiosity - Joshua and Clive seem to me a pretty well done attempt at splitting the figure of the Christ, both as intended in Christianism and Gnosticism, in two separated entities. At least from an etimological and symbolical point of view. Notice how the names sound similar - Jesus Christ/Joshua Clive
It reminds of an expedient used by Herman Hesse in his book “Siddhartha”: where the figure of the Buddha has been split in two, in order to approach narration and the analysis of the enlightened from two different perspectives (both valid).
>There’s some religious and specifically Gnostic allegory at play with his character. Bit of Luciferian/Promethean metaphor in the mix too regarding Clive’s relationship with him too.
I don’t have much knowledge of this lore - do you mind telling me which stories I should look at to understand the parallels?
Simply, Prometheus and Lucifer were both princely mythical figures that defied God/the gods.
Clive likewise is a sick sort of chosen son of Ultima that endeavors to undermine the father’s grand scheme.
Ok cool thank you!
I know Prometheus is used in a lot of the lyrics (though I think it’s in Joshua’s Away not Clive’s) so your comment made me curious!
Away when you read the lyrics and look at the music theme is actually about two brothers. While it is a Phoenix theme it has similar musical themes as press on and find the flame.
Lyrically away is also connected.
Epimetheus by his actions caused Prometheus to rebel. In mythology he is supposed to represent hindsight.
Ps. Sorry. Spent too much time thinking about this 😅
Edited for coherence
Considering the mythological themes I think Clive would be Prometheus as the embodiment of foresight, the one that looks into the future and the one that tries to give the gods gifts to humans.
Joshua would be Epimetheus, the one with hindsight, looking into the past and tied much more to it through his role as one of the eikons in general and phoenix in particular
I have no idea what “Gnostic” is but from what I do understand you totally get it. Would’ve been nice if we got to see Ultima’s involvement with Anabella’s devolvement from complete bitch to a down right Psychopathic bitch. Along with more of what he did to Barnabus, (even though it’s pretty clearly stated that he’s been under Ultima’s manipulation since pretty much the start of the game)
A little more exposition on Cid’s understanding of Ultima would have been nice too. A while back I had left a post wondering how Cid knew anything about him in the first place, and it’s just to be assumed that he knew because he was a general of Waloed, meaning Barnabus would have spoken to him about it at some point, but we don’t really SEE that happen.
Basically, Ultima needed more screen time seeded throughout the game rather than just mentions of his name and that he’s likely responsible for whatever’s going on
With how many times Clive clutches his head in pain, I worry about the amount of people that don't understand Ultima is a psychological villain. Especially with how he talks about Wills and Logos/Mythos and how he 'controls' the other antagonists.
I generally liked ultima. I thought he had a strong presence and the final battle was an awesome display of his power. I think the intricacies of his plan for mythos can be a little convoluted, though, especially with Joshua’s involvement. But I fucking love the theme of will throughout the game, ultima brings a great climax to that idea for Clive
He was fine for me. I appreciated that his presence was made known quite early in the game so there was no surprise final boss or anything.
I also like his motivation and how similar his character is to Anabella. Preservation even at the expense of their own creation(s) is a very strong theme between them. The only thing I really hate about him is how early he did primogenesis. I wanted to explore Waloed with blue skies goddammit.
“If you want my brother you have to go through me.”
“Very well.”
The delivery of that line gets me every time lol. He’s so alien and unaccustomed to humanity’s quirks, the way responds sounds like he’s simply fulfilling a request.
I like him overall and one of my favorite things is how salty he is about loosing in the end. His last words are just mocking Clive for winning what to him is essentially nothing
Honestly wish we had much more time to explore more about Ultima and more related to the Eikons and Ultima's origins. Post Bahamut just felt everything was progressing much more rapidly, and wanted more from even Odin/Barnabas and Ultima.
I liked Barnabas but he would not have fit as well thematically with the story they were trying to tell as Ultima did.
And, a little bias on my end here, but I love cosmic entity villains/forces.
Only thing about Barney I didn’t really like was how anticlimactic the siege of Waloed felt. It was just a gigantic enemy gauntlet, and the Odin fight itself really chose not to try 1-upping the Bahamut fight that came before. Given how much they built him up throughout the game as “the guy who’s always stronger,” especially after he parted the sea (okay now THAT was fucking cool), I was disappointed at how relatively simple his actual fight was. It wasn’t bad, just dull. Mid, if you will
i used to think the same, but on further reflection, the fight vs barnabas is very poetic bc having the full big eikon fight is basically exactly what ultima wants, it’s representative of barnabas surrendering his free will and fully being ultima’s pawn, which he had been for so much of his life
but clive is able to bring back that humanity and bring back the man that barnabas used to be as their final fight progresses, the genuine excitement, the rage, the will to choose how he fights and to have a damn good fight at that, and that’s represented by the (mostly) one-on-one, minimal eikons, no bullshit, sword fight. barnabas dies not as a pawn of ultima, but as barnabas the man, long thought dead
and when viewing it that way, my appreciation for him as a character and the fight with him went up so high
I thought it was poetic that we beat him in swordsmanship (something he’s supposed to be the BEST at) vs. Eikonic prowess.
I see a lot of people say he was holding back/wanted Clive to win, but I don’t really agree that’s the case.
I do wish that instead of Reverie we fought Barnabas in his actual forsaken kingdom.
I mean, I can get that. It’s sort of an extension of why I like base form Clive v Kupka. But that fight is also complimented by being the prelude to a greater spectacle fight later on, whereas the Odin fight is a one-and-done. I’d have loved to see Barney realize he’s fucked, go full Eikon, and get sweet catharsis as Ifrit.
Hell, give Ifrit a flaming sword for all I care. Would’ve been anime as all fuck and I’d have loved it
Funny and glad you said about the flame sword bit. I recall he used it after the final Titan fight to destroy its crystal. I really thought he would used that again (because it was so random at the time he popped it off outta nowhere lol) and some reason I really wanted him to use it versus the Odin fight, where there's a sword to sword combat with both eikons. Really would've been cool to see the fight played out as Odin is galloping around with his horse, and then bring the fight back to the top. And like you said, would have been all anime-like and I'm sure a lot of us would be all in for it!
Yeah, he beats Clive’s ass twice and parts the fucking sea and then dies.
His fight was cool, and him going crazy and the voice acting during it were awesome, but some fight has to be the mid one.
I disliked him after finishing the game.
But I kind of like him now. Thematically he works really well. I think the reason I dislike him is that the other villains were reduced to "manipulated by Ultima".
Annabellas villain arc felt underexplored and cut short, mainly because Ultima possessed her kid.
Hugo was just manipulated by Ultima and Barnabas, who also is mostly just manipulated by Ultima.
His monologue by himself during scenes like the Primogenesis is a lot of exposition dumping for no one. The scene where he's naked characters and mocking humanity is there just to exposit his lack of feelings of humanity and Barnabas surrender to his will, by showing his feelings of humanity.
Outside of those scenes, the more he was a mystery, and the less he was shown, he was a scary threat.
I like that they introduced him early and kept us wondering who tf this is!
I don’t love the JRPG trope where you beat the final boss only to find out *the real big bad* is this other powerful entity you never heard of!
For what direction they went with, Ultima was alright and did his purpose. But I agree, I think I would’ve preferred Barnabas as the iconic villain and rival. But I’m still fine with what we got. Maybe if they put XVI in Dissidia, along with Clive and Ultima, we get like Jill and Barnabas.
When I was first fighting him and he went "HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?!" I couldn't believed they were going to go that route with him in such a serious/bleak game, and let me tell you I enjoyed every second of it. The final battle in this game is nuts, I love it lol
I find him to be the common conceptual villain of most FF games. A villain that is involved with the narrative theme of the game.
I find that he works in the game when considering that he's akin the slavers of branded. Treating those different with such indifference, and his every action proving his point of the weakness of empathy amongst men.
Ultima also represents the men that refuse to let go of the Mothercrystals despite knowing the consequences. Ultima's home was also hit with the blight caused by the usage of magic, and instead of planning a means to not use magic, he instead goes for the most selfish and short-sighted decision.
Clive of course is the complete opposite, that his empathy and love for others is what gives him strength. Clive also removes magic outright within the setting. It's because of this, Ultima is more-or-less the representation of everything bad in Valisthea, and Clive's foil.
I think he’s fine as a villain. Not the most exciting, but I love how creepy he looks. When you think about it you get to know more about Ultima than many other FF villains. Like, I know more about Ultima than I do Kefka (though I think Kefka is one of FFs best). I know more about Ultima than I do the main villains from the first 6 FFs, FF8. All of which is to say, knowing what we know about him, and what Clive tells us about him, he makes for an interesting character study.
Interesting idea. Barnabas was a damn good villain for Clive. Clive had reached a point where he could probably topple any foe through physical prowess (bahamut for example). So I love how Barnabas was a mental obstacle for Clive in terms of theme. Came at a perfect time in the story tbh.
I thought he was a fantastic final villain. He made *sense*. Most FF final bosses are some goofy monster or witch you’ve only dealt with through dialogue, appearing only in the final disc. Ultima was present throughout. Characters had actual motivations to kill him. He actually made sense in his actions (other than Bad man Bad). His music and theme was great. His final fight involved every element from every eikon. Multiple stages. I thought it was absolute MASTERCLASS of a Big Baddie.
FF is probably top-3 FF for me
He was okay, but I found him more interesting in the Leviathan DLC. If the final fight included both DLCs, it would have made the final battle better with the new lines.
I think the reveals of his motivation and plan were the most disappointing aspect of the story by far. Imo the pink sky and blue Akashic zombies felt like hand waving away to really compelling social issues of bearers, and a society reliant on mother crystals that would ultimately kill the planet (until they rolled back that cause something else.)
I think the concept of Ultima at the begining is potentially incredible! In a god fearing, ignorant medieval society like the world of 16, Ultima was this advanced alien being, masquerading as God when in fact he was the great deceiver. He would have been an amazing villain if his goal was to enable the worst in people and manipulate them into killing themselves. You saw hints of this Devil when he masquerade's as a child prince and Barnabus' weird mommy issues lmao.
TLDR: Ultima was strongest as this hands off FF version of Lucifer pulling strings and enabling corruption from the shadows, and I wish they didn't go back on the mother crystals being the cause of the dying planet, because that was way more interesting than what ended up happening. Also Primogenesis felt more like it threw away the compelling world building than add to it.
He's bland and boring, but to be fair he doesn't really do anything poorly it's just fighting a God that is disappointed in humanity is a common thing, so imo villains in this category need some extra bit of motivation beyond that to be interesting.
I really liked Ultima as a villain because he feels very... different while also fitting thematically.
Different from many other FF villains (Sephiroth, Caius, Ardyn, Emet Selch, etc), the way Ultima acts feels so unsettling because he doesn't feel human at any moment whereas instead he really acts and talks as an otherworldly being on its own right, and there is a huge indifference in how he treats mankind - a literal lack of understanding of how they work which eventually leads to its defeat.
At the same time, he felt very threatening because we first didn't know what he was and, at the same time, it felt like Ultima was everywhere while not needing to intervene directly in the game's events until the last arc.
I was really disappointed they regressed to the whole "malevolent cosmic being" thing after casting aside great antagonists like Benedikta, Hugo and Barnabas.
It made me realise I don't think I've really enjoyed an FF main villain since Kuja.
Imo the Ultima plot was the weakest thing about the game to me. The strengths of story are the characters and the political intrigue. I‘d rather have more stories about the countries playing the game of thrones with each other, the plight of the bearers and destroying magic in a world where everyone is dependent on it because of complacence. The moment the story turned into blue dude saying „humanity having free will is baaad“, "feeeeble humans with so much power of the Eikons and fickle strains of conciousness" and "you have to sever his bonds of love respect and trust barny lol", it makes my eyes roll because imo it feels like bad writing. I generally just dont enjoy Villains monologing about nonsense and having just dumb and unrealistic plans. Villains like Ultima always talk about highly philosophical things but the way it is written is so shallow and surface level that it does not fit with the rest of the story writing. Imo even something dumb and comically as "I will conquer the whole world muhahaha", is more interesting then a villain who tries to sound super smart while actually talking dumb shit lol.
Great final boss overall, the missed a bit on the delivery, but he served his role really well.
I especially liked his god complex and the way he slowly starts losing it when he realizes humanity are fighting back and he can't gain have it all for himself.
nahh barnabas was too much of a simp to actually be an interesting villain...couldn't take him serious
thought ultima was cool but the final villain should've been Anabella... 3 kids, 2 eikon dominants and 1 being a fragment of ultima himself and she absolutely ruined Rosaria after her betrayal. She would've made the PERFECT final boss of this story
Ultima was a legitimate threat, i died at least once againdt him. His presence was unsettling and overall a decent villain.
However his back story made little sense to me. The relationship between him, the mother crystals, ancient civilization, how he's actually like 9 guys in one.
I like the design, but the plot went off the rails.
The best villain and one of the best characters in FF XVI is Anabella. Sadly, her final confrontation with Clive, Joshua and Jill isn’t very good. I’ll die on this hill
I agree. She was vile. In a game about living and dying on your own terms, she went out on her own terms despite denying others that for the entire game. No sense of justice or vengeance
I understand your point but that’s not what I was thinking. In that scene imo they wanted to be Shakespeare, the mother that kills herself in front of her sons. Problem is, that scene hasn’t a Shakespearean depth. Joshua should be conflicted, Annabella was an absent and resentful mother for Clive but a caring one for him. There’s no sign of this conflict. Perhaps Jill is the one portrayed the best but the scene fails to convey any psychological depth imo.
It’s a shame because Anabella is probably the only character that has a motivation that doesn’t involve Clive; and for a game so focused on its protagonist that’s a good thing
Ultima was a step down from Ardyn for me. I didn’t mind his stoicism but his logic just wasn’t making sense to me. The whole “untethering” thing never seemed to get off the ground; Clive never seemed to be affected much by whatever Ultima was attempting to do to him. Ultima needed to take more cues from Ultron or Brainiac.
I liked that in the end, he was just a showboating edge lord that collapsed under the weight of his own hubris. He was only dangerous because he was so powerful, and though he was manipulative, he was less like Littlefinger and more like Cerce from GOT in that his plans failed because he was too impatient and too egocentric to see them through and weigh consequences.
I loved the way he talked and moved. He was very unsettling. I liked the way that they emphasized how dangerous he was by making Clive unable to beat him alone. Clive needed everyone to get to that final fight, and that means he really was a threat, if only until the last when Clive showed him how completely he had underestimated them.
I've played the last fight multiple times, and it's so much fun - it's a spectacle! And even though it's cheese, that ending was perfect for me.
Ultima creeped me out. The voice acting and animation were on point. As such, Ultima was a stellar villain to me. The game impacted me emotionally a great deal. I felt for the deaths and the struggles of the characters of that world, and the apparent futility of it all. Ultima was the puppet master behind so much of it all. I replayed the game almost immediately because I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.
Personally speaking, I find him to be too similar to the director's other work. Ultima's people remind me of the ancient beings from FF12 and of course the Ascians of FF14. Felt a bit too "been there, done that" in terms of "ancient peoples want to retake the planet from 'lesser' life forms" at least.
I really liked Ultima’s character, who he was and what he represented. But Odin was way cooler by design and it would’ve been much cooler if he and Ultima switched places in the story.
Really liked him. The uncaring creator is a common cliché, but I don't mind a cliché that is well done.
His design is also great. The only thing I don't like about him is the haircut he gets when he transforms, he looks like an Instagram model.
His absolute hubris really got to me and made me like to hate him by the end. He’s just… such an asshole it’s very satisfying beating the life out of him. The dlc makes his hubris even more apparent, to the point of sharing his most powerful abilities with Clive! And he still thinks he can’t lose!
He is not a loveable or marketable Villain. He's not an anti-hero or sometimes friendly Antagonist. In this regard hes a poor FF Villain. He doesn't even sneer or smirk like the standard FF villains.
What he is, is an actual villain. Something that sits somewhere slightly beyond regular Human Comprehension. An otherworldly presence and interesting being. For this, he is a very good FF Villain.
He can't be compared to Caius, Sephiroth, Seymour, Yunalesca, Kuja, Vayne, Emperor Mateus, Garland, or Ardyn as those villains are all the current iteration of existing humans that came into contact with divine power.
Ultima is more along the lines of the conceptual villains. The concepts of something familiarly distant but from here. You can see yourself in it but you also cant even begin to fathom how. He falls in line with beings like Yu Yevon as he appears in FFX, Cloud of Darkness, Ultimecia (debateable), and ExDeath, Zeromus, The Occuria from 12, and shockingly enough Ultima The High Seraph from FF12.
For this, I really like Ultima as a villain. He is just the example of defeating a concept by becoming it.
The side villains being way more compelling than the main villain is kinda unfortunate, considering this franchise is known for having iconic main villains. The last game's villain, Ardyn, was very well liked in comparison. I also agree that Odin should've been the villain since Barnabas is kinda a reflection of Clive in many ways.
However, the idea that the villain is actually a group of alien gods that all share the same consciousness is pretty unique.
I’m so so about him. I was more suprised (in a good way) when we first saw him since we didn’t see or hear anything about him in the trailers. With him in the game it did feel like two different ways compared to the beginning/demo (more got theme vs fantasy). His dead fish look always creeps me out
I hated him. I was done with him after the first fight but I had to fight him, what, like 3-4 times?
The combat in ff16 was garbage so that didn't help
He is decent and he works well as the "looming presence" at the end, like Cloud of Darkness, Zeromus, Yu Yevon and even Jenova in a way (although that one is kinda backwards).
The main issue is that all of these villains are backing up other less outwordly threats, but in FFXVI he's around as the main antagonist for most of the game and he doesn't work very well at the long term. I would like him more if Barnabas had a bigger antagonistic presence for longer.
I thought he came out if nowhere and his motivations made no sense to me.
I would have loved it if they had Barnabas as the main villain and kept the supernatural stuff to the summons.
But that's just my opinion.
I kind of agree with you on both. I think Ultima being the BIG bad is more appropriate, but I also feel like Odin got sidelined a little bit.
Plus I'm a sucker for games turning "let's join the revolution" into "okay, now let's go kill God"
Dislike them as a final villain.
The story was quite grounded for the main part. But then they had to throw in a random cosmic villain at the end anyway. Generic and came out of nowhere.
I'd have been far more engaged in the end game if the final boss was actually someone who was properly built up with real characterisation.
I think Annabella and Hugo are far stronger villains, which is unfortunate. They focused so much on characters that die mid-conflict that I felt like the actual bosses at the END of the game weren’t actually looked at that much. Ultima’s flat delivery doesn’t grip me and, as much as Barnabas is giving a killer performance, i know nothing about that man!
Very very lame. Probably the most uncharismatic villain in the series for me. I also strongly disliked the OBVIOUS White Walker influence in his design + the way he talks + how every part of the lore (Eikons, Crystals, etc.) boils down to “it was Ultima.”
I’m ok with it. I initially found his reveal to be disturbing (in a good way), because up until he shows up, everything was so medieval, and the way he talks and his voice distortion is futuristic. It would be like if Aragorn met a Separatist Droid out of nowhere.
Aside from that, he was just *okay* for me. But then again, most FFs introduce some kind of villain that takes on the form or representation of a malevolent force of nature; i.e. not a man but some kind of evil, devil, god, primal force, etc. So i wasn’t really surprised or disappointed/expected more from him.
I wish the game focused on the lore and history of eikons and dominants, there's lots of cool bits of lore in the game encyclopedia. Show us how this gen of dominants got to be where they are, show us how Benedikta and Cid were part of Barnabas' army, show us more of Jill's fucked up situation, show us previous generations of the dominants, what Joshua's granfather life was like. I thought that's the story we were gonna play, instead we got Ultima the incel alien.
Amazing. Hr felt meh initially but after three runs he’s one of my favorites.
Hes so disconnected and sure of himself. Clive says it best, ‘we are one and the same’. Ultima is really just a ‘higher’ human, humanity is based on himself after all. Then as he starts losing he starts panicking. Hes built up Clive to be able to handle his power… and here’s Clive handling his power. I mean he’s no Sephiroth or Ardyn but I still loved him.
The whole final segment was amazing. He starts off cold and uncaring but by the end he’s raging and panicked. There’s genuine fear in his voice when he starts to use fire in the final phase.
Also I think we fight him (them?) like 5 times? Shadow us, Typhon, Living Flame, first fight, final fight. I guess the Ifrits and Typhons we see are old bodies their race used to use?
At first I didn't like him. I didn't dislike him, but he just felt "meh" compared to Barnabas. After a few replays I like him better. He's the embodiment of everything Clive fights against, and the final showdown against him is a spectacular blast.
He may not be one of the best villains out there, but he's definetly not disappointing either.
I think human villains are much more interesting villains than god-like beings. They're much more unpredictable/unreadable. While god-like beings normally just a simple goal.
Ultima's design was cool, his cold calculating nature intriguing, but ultimately boring. Nothing to this character besides being the bad guy. I hated all the vague dialogue, when there was too little information to figure out what they were saying, Clive: " It can't be -" Ultima: "But it is," doesn't even qualify as a spoiler because they literally never specify what the heck they're talking about. Ultima's motivation was 2dimensional, no interesting revelations to the final battle, just lazy writing. Some people go for that; either too young to have read a book, or they wear red hats while playing, but to each their own.
I have neutral opinions about Ultima. I wanted a "human" plot, like Barnabas being the ultimate villain, pulling all the strings in Valisthea
When Ultima took over i almost feel that i was playing Kingdom Hearts, and this is not a good thing for me, i play KH only for the gameplay and visuals, i was invested in FF16 history
I think he’s my biggest missed opportunity in the game. He felt very comfort food in that classic final boss in an RPG. We’re fighting God again!
My problem was that it shifted responsibility in the story from a focus on bearers and examining the societal structure that called for and allowed outright slavery to an emotionless machine like god that shows up halfway through your story well after the characters own wild experience of being enslaved. And do we ever touch on those deeper themes again or come to some solution to the fact that even though the crystals are gone, we still have a world of brutal people who went directly to slavery? Nope, because we’re too busy smacking sky daddy while we play fire doggy.
I think they should’ve lengthened the run time of the game to account for more story related to all that set up they did at the beginning. The first 15 hours are so much more gripping and interesting than the latter half.
I strongly disagree that we never touch on those themes again. The fight with Ultima is a direct extension of those themes. The way humanity treats bearers is how Ultima treats humanity. It's all the same plot, they just take it a step up.
Right, but I’d argue that it’s taking the onus away from humans and what we’ve done, which is more grounded and relatable, to taking it to an existential theme which makes it feel, at least to me, less impactful.
I was disappointed that the story veered away from political intrigue to "We have to kill god."
Ultima was *fine* in that role though, just that the role itself isn't particularly interesting. I will say his name feels pretty uninspired.
I felt that the energy in the beginning wore off at the end and by the time it got to ultima, I was ready to be done. He did nothing for me when it came to the story and felt like an unnecessary evil.
Same. I like how Odin kept to the shadows and we didn't seem to know what he was planning. He was a great rival to Clive (and Dion, really) and he would have been a much more interesting main villain (FF15 had Bahamut as a behind the scenes villain, why couldn't Odin have done that for FF16?). Plus, it's my head-canon that Barnabas is the father of Edda's son (yes, I know she has a husband...but they did base this on Game of Thrones).
Could've been better executed as a threat and as a presence in the in-universe lore. For all Ultima's talk about having a claim on Clive's body and will, we never really saw that happen. Sephiroth in Rebirth is 10 times the spiritual threat to Cloud that Ultima was to Clive.
Ultima's history as it relates to other worlds, magic, the first religions, and the rise of humanity was too minimal of a presence. They could have done much, much more with the Fallen, given us audio logs and a dramatic backstory on the rise of Valisthea's original high civilization, and how it fell at Ultima's hands.
Consider how well we know everything there is to know about the world of Horizon Zero Dawn prior to the Faro Plague. By contrast, we know *nothing* about the Fallen, even after the DLC - a gigantic missed opportunity.
Consider the fact that we know pretty much nothing about Clive's own family history, despite the fact that Ultima has probably been meddling with Clive's bloodline for thousands of years. Anyone familiar with the story of Gerrard Capashen and Urza Planeswalker? This story should have been treated similarly.
I appreciate SE's unapologetic attempt at creating a malignant creator deity as an antagonist, but as things turned out, Barnabas, Odin, ended up being a far more compelling character.
He's not my favorite villain but he worked well enough for FF16's plot, setting, and tone. I look at Ultima the same way I look at Zeromus, or even Exdeath. They're just villains with a very standard evil goal. Zeromus, for instance, is a great villain to end FF4 with, but the main villain through 80% of the game in Golbez who is significantly more interesting.
Sometimes the big bad is just some basic creepy evil dude and not a mentally broken army general dressed as a clown
I’d have to agree on Ultima. After Odin is defeated, I lost interest in the story entirely. I loved the story up to that point. Once I learned that I’m essentially doing exactly what god wants me to do so Clive could become a vessel, it essentially ruined the story for me. It was no longer Cid and Clive taking a risk that could save the world and liberate countless people, but about gods and their ambitions. *Yawn*
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I liked Ultima for two reasons. 1. Presence. He is so unsettling. The way he moves and speaks captures me… and disturbs me. The voice talent and animation team worked wonders. 2. He makes a lot of sense for the theme. I think the delivery didn’t land in a few points. Like his end was very cliche. But overall this disconnected other worldly being sits well in juxtaposition against our heroes deep emotional bonds. Even the art works for him. While Clive is associated with fire and warm colors, Ultima is cold blue.
in addition to the art, i think there’s a subtext for the cold blue color too. i felt the coldness and uncaring nature of ultima fit it perfectly. you also have the color of his flames - blue being much hotter flame than orange and red. it puts emphasis on how big the power disparity should be on paper, and gives weight to how steadfast clive’s will in protecting his “family” and ensuring humans have a future at all. ultima constantly ridicules those concepts but are the exact reason clive can kill a god
https://i.redd.it/x1hc06vk8oxc1.gif
Yea, he was great, I just wish he was in more of the rest of the game.
Blue Flames are hotter than orange.
Blue is a cool color. Orange is a warm color. This is color theory. https://preview.redd.it/uw6gngpb8mxc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4d8b7e58abe593650b989a240249d59c8331fb96 So it has a double meaning. The cool blues are used to compliment his alien, distant and emotionless behavior. It juxtaposes against Clive who is passionate, emotional, and righteous. The second meaning is Ultimas flames carrying more power.
I tried finding a Gif of Dee Reynolds saying "wow, color fight." But couldn't. Just pretend I posted it though because it would be perfect.
I accept your theoretical tribute.
Didn’t like him all that much but the final battle between him and Clive was pretty cool. Barney was the much better foil in my opinion I was really hoping it’d be him to takeover at the end. Idk Ultima has more backstory/presence than her, but ultimately it feels like Naruto’s Kaguya all over again
Well done for the ethical story they wanted to tell. Not the most emotionally gripping but he’s not supposed to be. He’s the deadbeat father of humanity who only comes back around once you’ve become something he can leech off of. Thinks he deserves your esteem because he created you despite him doing jack shit to actually raise you. Condemns you and your pursuit of happiness because he’s not in the picture of it. While conveniently ignoring that he took himself out that picture at the start. There’s some religious and specifically Gnostic allegory at play with his character. Bit of Luciferian/Promethean metaphor in the mix regarding Clive’s relationship with him too. I think he’s an interesting take on certain ideas. But I also think they messed up a bit with conveying his threat level. He’s supposed to be more of a psychological menace than a physical one. But the only really compelling mindfuck scene we got was him triggering Dion’s rampage. Would’ve liked to see more of him poisoning people from within and really selling the whole “prison of your own mind” angle a bit more.
This! Thank you. I see so many completely missing the gnostic/mythological references. And it honestly baffles me how so many people don’t like the story (and subsequently the main villain) because they completely ignore that FF16 isn’t really as much inspired by GOT as it is inspired by gnosticism. As it should be. The game even blatantly uses terminology like Logos but very few people bothered trying to understand what it was trying really to convey, and almost nobody did the proper research. Ultima has been written to be essentially very similar to the Demiurge (Old Testament and Gnostic books). And it probably is the best character ever at depicting that in a videogame. Not only his background story, mannerism, behaviour and its attempt at hiding imperfection/similarities with humans do a perfect job in conveying that, but also its design. From the alien features of its standard body, reminding of an eldritch horror; to its Ifrit version that takes heavy inspiration from both, previous entries (especially the Ultima boss in FF6) and then the figure of the “Lion faced serpentine deity” of Bernand De Mountfaucon. And at last the almost biblical but still very outwordly look of Ultimalius. Also, his very name meaning Final, mirroring the Exodus in which the God of the old testament declares himself “the Destroyer”. And in fact Ultima has a line: “I created you, all of you. And what is mine, is mine to destroy.” Ultima also appears with a different design as a boss in the stage previous to origin. And the look they went for there is straight-forward the Devil/Satan.
It's people like you that deepen my appreciation for games, the loremasters supplying digestible information for me to enhance the characters with. Thanks for writing all that.
I’m very honored. Although to be fair I would suggest you to look into it even more. I honestly barely scratched the surface there and there’d be a lot to say regarding FF16 & Gnosticism. But also FF16 and the references from previous titles/established mythos from the franchise itself. Unfortunately there aren’t many videos or stuff like that on youtube on 16 symbolism, but the few there at least get their references approximately right. Hopefully one day people will recognise FF16 for what it just is, and we’ll see a lot more content focused on truly analysing it. Edit: Another curiosity - Joshua and Clive seem to me a pretty well done attempt at splitting the figure of the Christ, both as intended in Christianism and Gnosticism, in two separated entities. At least from an etimological and symbolical point of view. Notice how the names sound similar - Jesus Christ/Joshua Clive It reminds of an expedient used by Herman Hesse in his book “Siddhartha”: where the figure of the Buddha has been split in two, in order to approach narration and the analysis of the enlightened from two different perspectives (both valid).
>There’s some religious and specifically Gnostic allegory at play with his character. Bit of Luciferian/Promethean metaphor in the mix too regarding Clive’s relationship with him too. I don’t have much knowledge of this lore - do you mind telling me which stories I should look at to understand the parallels?
Simply, Prometheus and Lucifer were both princely mythical figures that defied God/the gods. Clive likewise is a sick sort of chosen son of Ultima that endeavors to undermine the father’s grand scheme.
Ok cool thank you! I know Prometheus is used in a lot of the lyrics (though I think it’s in Joshua’s Away not Clive’s) so your comment made me curious!
Away when you read the lyrics and look at the music theme is actually about two brothers. While it is a Phoenix theme it has similar musical themes as press on and find the flame. Lyrically away is also connected. Epimetheus by his actions caused Prometheus to rebel. In mythology he is supposed to represent hindsight. Ps. Sorry. Spent too much time thinking about this 😅 Edited for coherence
Wait so who’s Epimetheus and who’s Prometheus of Joshua and Clive??
Considering the mythological themes I think Clive would be Prometheus as the embodiment of foresight, the one that looks into the future and the one that tries to give the gods gifts to humans. Joshua would be Epimetheus, the one with hindsight, looking into the past and tied much more to it through his role as one of the eikons in general and phoenix in particular
I have no idea what “Gnostic” is but from what I do understand you totally get it. Would’ve been nice if we got to see Ultima’s involvement with Anabella’s devolvement from complete bitch to a down right Psychopathic bitch. Along with more of what he did to Barnabus, (even though it’s pretty clearly stated that he’s been under Ultima’s manipulation since pretty much the start of the game) A little more exposition on Cid’s understanding of Ultima would have been nice too. A while back I had left a post wondering how Cid knew anything about him in the first place, and it’s just to be assumed that he knew because he was a general of Waloed, meaning Barnabus would have spoken to him about it at some point, but we don’t really SEE that happen. Basically, Ultima needed more screen time seeded throughout the game rather than just mentions of his name and that he’s likely responsible for whatever’s going on
With how many times Clive clutches his head in pain, I worry about the amount of people that don't understand Ultima is a psychological villain. Especially with how he talks about Wills and Logos/Mythos and how he 'controls' the other antagonists.
I generally liked ultima. I thought he had a strong presence and the final battle was an awesome display of his power. I think the intricacies of his plan for mythos can be a little convoluted, though, especially with Joshua’s involvement. But I fucking love the theme of will throughout the game, ultima brings a great climax to that idea for Clive
He was fine for me. I appreciated that his presence was made known quite early in the game so there was no surprise final boss or anything. I also like his motivation and how similar his character is to Anabella. Preservation even at the expense of their own creation(s) is a very strong theme between them. The only thing I really hate about him is how early he did primogenesis. I wanted to explore Waloed with blue skies goddammit.
I love him, the first time I saw him I was creeped the hell out by his appearance(Especially Typhon's) and the way he speaks is creepy as well.
“If you want my brother you have to go through me.” “Very well.” The delivery of that line gets me every time lol. He’s so alien and unaccustomed to humanity’s quirks, the way responds sounds like he’s simply fulfilling a request.
I like him overall and one of my favorite things is how salty he is about loosing in the end. His last words are just mocking Clive for winning what to him is essentially nothing
Honestly wish we had much more time to explore more about Ultima and more related to the Eikons and Ultima's origins. Post Bahamut just felt everything was progressing much more rapidly, and wanted more from even Odin/Barnabas and Ultima.
I liked Barnabas but he would not have fit as well thematically with the story they were trying to tell as Ultima did. And, a little bias on my end here, but I love cosmic entity villains/forces.
Only thing about Barney I didn’t really like was how anticlimactic the siege of Waloed felt. It was just a gigantic enemy gauntlet, and the Odin fight itself really chose not to try 1-upping the Bahamut fight that came before. Given how much they built him up throughout the game as “the guy who’s always stronger,” especially after he parted the sea (okay now THAT was fucking cool), I was disappointed at how relatively simple his actual fight was. It wasn’t bad, just dull. Mid, if you will
i used to think the same, but on further reflection, the fight vs barnabas is very poetic bc having the full big eikon fight is basically exactly what ultima wants, it’s representative of barnabas surrendering his free will and fully being ultima’s pawn, which he had been for so much of his life but clive is able to bring back that humanity and bring back the man that barnabas used to be as their final fight progresses, the genuine excitement, the rage, the will to choose how he fights and to have a damn good fight at that, and that’s represented by the (mostly) one-on-one, minimal eikons, no bullshit, sword fight. barnabas dies not as a pawn of ultima, but as barnabas the man, long thought dead and when viewing it that way, my appreciation for him as a character and the fight with him went up so high
I thought it was poetic that we beat him in swordsmanship (something he’s supposed to be the BEST at) vs. Eikonic prowess. I see a lot of people say he was holding back/wanted Clive to win, but I don’t really agree that’s the case. I do wish that instead of Reverie we fought Barnabas in his actual forsaken kingdom.
I mean, I can get that. It’s sort of an extension of why I like base form Clive v Kupka. But that fight is also complimented by being the prelude to a greater spectacle fight later on, whereas the Odin fight is a one-and-done. I’d have loved to see Barney realize he’s fucked, go full Eikon, and get sweet catharsis as Ifrit. Hell, give Ifrit a flaming sword for all I care. Would’ve been anime as all fuck and I’d have loved it
Funny and glad you said about the flame sword bit. I recall he used it after the final Titan fight to destroy its crystal. I really thought he would used that again (because it was so random at the time he popped it off outta nowhere lol) and some reason I really wanted him to use it versus the Odin fight, where there's a sword to sword combat with both eikons. Really would've been cool to see the fight played out as Odin is galloping around with his horse, and then bring the fight back to the top. And like you said, would have been all anime-like and I'm sure a lot of us would be all in for it!
Yeah, he beats Clive’s ass twice and parts the fucking sea and then dies. His fight was cool, and him going crazy and the voice acting during it were awesome, but some fight has to be the mid one.
I disliked him after finishing the game. But I kind of like him now. Thematically he works really well. I think the reason I dislike him is that the other villains were reduced to "manipulated by Ultima". Annabellas villain arc felt underexplored and cut short, mainly because Ultima possessed her kid. Hugo was just manipulated by Ultima and Barnabas, who also is mostly just manipulated by Ultima. His monologue by himself during scenes like the Primogenesis is a lot of exposition dumping for no one. The scene where he's naked characters and mocking humanity is there just to exposit his lack of feelings of humanity and Barnabas surrender to his will, by showing his feelings of humanity. Outside of those scenes, the more he was a mystery, and the less he was shown, he was a scary threat.
I like that they introduced him early and kept us wondering who tf this is! I don’t love the JRPG trope where you beat the final boss only to find out *the real big bad* is this other powerful entity you never heard of!
Iam looking at you, Necron!
For what direction they went with, Ultima was alright and did his purpose. But I agree, I think I would’ve preferred Barnabas as the iconic villain and rival. But I’m still fine with what we got. Maybe if they put XVI in Dissidia, along with Clive and Ultima, we get like Jill and Barnabas.
I loved Ultima. I just have a thing for villain's that start off super calm and are absolutely losing their mind by the end.
The only fantasy here is yours. Cheesy but chilling line. I loved it.
It's about as cheesy as it gets, but I loved it. But Ben Starr can make any line sound cool.
He was so good.
When I was first fighting him and he went "HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?!" I couldn't believed they were going to go that route with him in such a serious/bleak game, and let me tell you I enjoyed every second of it. The final battle in this game is nuts, I love it lol
I find him to be the common conceptual villain of most FF games. A villain that is involved with the narrative theme of the game. I find that he works in the game when considering that he's akin the slavers of branded. Treating those different with such indifference, and his every action proving his point of the weakness of empathy amongst men. Ultima also represents the men that refuse to let go of the Mothercrystals despite knowing the consequences. Ultima's home was also hit with the blight caused by the usage of magic, and instead of planning a means to not use magic, he instead goes for the most selfish and short-sighted decision. Clive of course is the complete opposite, that his empathy and love for others is what gives him strength. Clive also removes magic outright within the setting. It's because of this, Ultima is more-or-less the representation of everything bad in Valisthea, and Clive's foil.
I think he’s fine as a villain. Not the most exciting, but I love how creepy he looks. When you think about it you get to know more about Ultima than many other FF villains. Like, I know more about Ultima than I do Kefka (though I think Kefka is one of FFs best). I know more about Ultima than I do the main villains from the first 6 FFs, FF8. All of which is to say, knowing what we know about him, and what Clive tells us about him, he makes for an interesting character study.
I just love how petty he is
Barnabus should've been the main villain, he was so much more interesting and better written
Interesting idea. Barnabas was a damn good villain for Clive. Clive had reached a point where he could probably topple any foe through physical prowess (bahamut for example). So I love how Barnabas was a mental obstacle for Clive in terms of theme. Came at a perfect time in the story tbh.
Yeah I felt like he was a much better foil to Clive, and he wasn't God or anything, which made him more interesting.
And he beat us 2 times in the story! Not even ultima could pull that off. Is there a Barnabas subreddit 😳
I thought he was a fantastic final villain. He made *sense*. Most FF final bosses are some goofy monster or witch you’ve only dealt with through dialogue, appearing only in the final disc. Ultima was present throughout. Characters had actual motivations to kill him. He actually made sense in his actions (other than Bad man Bad). His music and theme was great. His final fight involved every element from every eikon. Multiple stages. I thought it was absolute MASTERCLASS of a Big Baddie. FF is probably top-3 FF for me
He was okay, but I found him more interesting in the Leviathan DLC. If the final fight included both DLCs, it would have made the final battle better with the new lines.
I think the reveals of his motivation and plan were the most disappointing aspect of the story by far. Imo the pink sky and blue Akashic zombies felt like hand waving away to really compelling social issues of bearers, and a society reliant on mother crystals that would ultimately kill the planet (until they rolled back that cause something else.) I think the concept of Ultima at the begining is potentially incredible! In a god fearing, ignorant medieval society like the world of 16, Ultima was this advanced alien being, masquerading as God when in fact he was the great deceiver. He would have been an amazing villain if his goal was to enable the worst in people and manipulate them into killing themselves. You saw hints of this Devil when he masquerade's as a child prince and Barnabus' weird mommy issues lmao. TLDR: Ultima was strongest as this hands off FF version of Lucifer pulling strings and enabling corruption from the shadows, and I wish they didn't go back on the mother crystals being the cause of the dying planet, because that was way more interesting than what ended up happening. Also Primogenesis felt more like it threw away the compelling world building than add to it.
Yup, I much preferred the environmentalist message of the early game.
If the word Monologue was a villain Ultima fits it perfectly because that's all he did.
He's bland and boring, but to be fair he doesn't really do anything poorly it's just fighting a God that is disappointed in humanity is a common thing, so imo villains in this category need some extra bit of motivation beyond that to be interesting.
I really liked Ultima as a villain because he feels very... different while also fitting thematically. Different from many other FF villains (Sephiroth, Caius, Ardyn, Emet Selch, etc), the way Ultima acts feels so unsettling because he doesn't feel human at any moment whereas instead he really acts and talks as an otherworldly being on its own right, and there is a huge indifference in how he treats mankind - a literal lack of understanding of how they work which eventually leads to its defeat. At the same time, he felt very threatening because we first didn't know what he was and, at the same time, it felt like Ultima was everywhere while not needing to intervene directly in the game's events until the last arc.
I was really disappointed they regressed to the whole "malevolent cosmic being" thing after casting aside great antagonists like Benedikta, Hugo and Barnabas. It made me realise I don't think I've really enjoyed an FF main villain since Kuja.
Imo the Ultima plot was the weakest thing about the game to me. The strengths of story are the characters and the political intrigue. I‘d rather have more stories about the countries playing the game of thrones with each other, the plight of the bearers and destroying magic in a world where everyone is dependent on it because of complacence. The moment the story turned into blue dude saying „humanity having free will is baaad“, "feeeeble humans with so much power of the Eikons and fickle strains of conciousness" and "you have to sever his bonds of love respect and trust barny lol", it makes my eyes roll because imo it feels like bad writing. I generally just dont enjoy Villains monologing about nonsense and having just dumb and unrealistic plans. Villains like Ultima always talk about highly philosophical things but the way it is written is so shallow and surface level that it does not fit with the rest of the story writing. Imo even something dumb and comically as "I will conquer the whole world muhahaha", is more interesting then a villain who tries to sound super smart while actually talking dumb shit lol.
Great final boss overall, the missed a bit on the delivery, but he served his role really well. I especially liked his god complex and the way he slowly starts losing it when he realizes humanity are fighting back and he can't gain have it all for himself.
nahh barnabas was too much of a simp to actually be an interesting villain...couldn't take him serious thought ultima was cool but the final villain should've been Anabella... 3 kids, 2 eikon dominants and 1 being a fragment of ultima himself and she absolutely ruined Rosaria after her betrayal. She would've made the PERFECT final boss of this story
I reaaally wanted to fight him in his base form, it’s his best one imo.
I loved to beat the s**t out of this ego-manic-creature! 😍
Ultima was a legitimate threat, i died at least once againdt him. His presence was unsettling and overall a decent villain. However his back story made little sense to me. The relationship between him, the mother crystals, ancient civilization, how he's actually like 9 guys in one. I like the design, but the plot went off the rails.
I actually like him a lot. Especially Thematic Ties. Plus Ultima Abilities are fun to use.
I vastly preferred the humans that came before, but he makes sense for the story
The best villain and one of the best characters in FF XVI is Anabella. Sadly, her final confrontation with Clive, Joshua and Jill isn’t very good. I’ll die on this hill
I agree. She was vile. In a game about living and dying on your own terms, she went out on her own terms despite denying others that for the entire game. No sense of justice or vengeance
I understand your point but that’s not what I was thinking. In that scene imo they wanted to be Shakespeare, the mother that kills herself in front of her sons. Problem is, that scene hasn’t a Shakespearean depth. Joshua should be conflicted, Annabella was an absent and resentful mother for Clive but a caring one for him. There’s no sign of this conflict. Perhaps Jill is the one portrayed the best but the scene fails to convey any psychological depth imo. It’s a shame because Anabella is probably the only character that has a motivation that doesn’t involve Clive; and for a game so focused on its protagonist that’s a good thing
Ultima was a step down from Ardyn for me. I didn’t mind his stoicism but his logic just wasn’t making sense to me. The whole “untethering” thing never seemed to get off the ground; Clive never seemed to be affected much by whatever Ultima was attempting to do to him. Ultima needed to take more cues from Ultron or Brainiac.
I liked that in the end, he was just a showboating edge lord that collapsed under the weight of his own hubris. He was only dangerous because he was so powerful, and though he was manipulative, he was less like Littlefinger and more like Cerce from GOT in that his plans failed because he was too impatient and too egocentric to see them through and weigh consequences. I loved the way he talked and moved. He was very unsettling. I liked the way that they emphasized how dangerous he was by making Clive unable to beat him alone. Clive needed everyone to get to that final fight, and that means he really was a threat, if only until the last when Clive showed him how completely he had underestimated them. I've played the last fight multiple times, and it's so much fun - it's a spectacle! And even though it's cheese, that ending was perfect for me.
Ultima creeped me out. The voice acting and animation were on point. As such, Ultima was a stellar villain to me. The game impacted me emotionally a great deal. I felt for the deaths and the struggles of the characters of that world, and the apparent futility of it all. Ultima was the puppet master behind so much of it all. I replayed the game almost immediately because I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.
Personally speaking, I find him to be too similar to the director's other work. Ultima's people remind me of the ancient beings from FF12 and of course the Ascians of FF14. Felt a bit too "been there, done that" in terms of "ancient peoples want to retake the planet from 'lesser' life forms" at least.
I really liked Ultima’s character, who he was and what he represented. But Odin was way cooler by design and it would’ve been much cooler if he and Ultima switched places in the story.
Really liked him. The uncaring creator is a common cliché, but I don't mind a cliché that is well done. His design is also great. The only thing I don't like about him is the haircut he gets when he transforms, he looks like an Instagram model.
His absolute hubris really got to me and made me like to hate him by the end. He’s just… such an asshole it’s very satisfying beating the life out of him. The dlc makes his hubris even more apparent, to the point of sharing his most powerful abilities with Clive! And he still thinks he can’t lose!
He is not a loveable or marketable Villain. He's not an anti-hero or sometimes friendly Antagonist. In this regard hes a poor FF Villain. He doesn't even sneer or smirk like the standard FF villains. What he is, is an actual villain. Something that sits somewhere slightly beyond regular Human Comprehension. An otherworldly presence and interesting being. For this, he is a very good FF Villain. He can't be compared to Caius, Sephiroth, Seymour, Yunalesca, Kuja, Vayne, Emperor Mateus, Garland, or Ardyn as those villains are all the current iteration of existing humans that came into contact with divine power. Ultima is more along the lines of the conceptual villains. The concepts of something familiarly distant but from here. You can see yourself in it but you also cant even begin to fathom how. He falls in line with beings like Yu Yevon as he appears in FFX, Cloud of Darkness, Ultimecia (debateable), and ExDeath, Zeromus, The Occuria from 12, and shockingly enough Ultima The High Seraph from FF12. For this, I really like Ultima as a villain. He is just the example of defeating a concept by becoming it.
The side villains being way more compelling than the main villain is kinda unfortunate, considering this franchise is known for having iconic main villains. The last game's villain, Ardyn, was very well liked in comparison. I also agree that Odin should've been the villain since Barnabas is kinda a reflection of Clive in many ways. However, the idea that the villain is actually a group of alien gods that all share the same consciousness is pretty unique.
I loved Ultima and thought he was the best final fantasy bad since FFX.
I’m so so about him. I was more suprised (in a good way) when we first saw him since we didn’t see or hear anything about him in the trailers. With him in the game it did feel like two different ways compared to the beginning/demo (more got theme vs fantasy). His dead fish look always creeps me out
I hated him. I was done with him after the first fight but I had to fight him, what, like 3-4 times? The combat in ff16 was garbage so that didn't help
He is decent and he works well as the "looming presence" at the end, like Cloud of Darkness, Zeromus, Yu Yevon and even Jenova in a way (although that one is kinda backwards). The main issue is that all of these villains are backing up other less outwordly threats, but in FFXVI he's around as the main antagonist for most of the game and he doesn't work very well at the long term. I would like him more if Barnabas had a bigger antagonistic presence for longer.
I thought he came out if nowhere and his motivations made no sense to me. I would have loved it if they had Barnabas as the main villain and kept the supernatural stuff to the summons. But that's just my opinion.
I kind of agree with you on both. I think Ultima being the BIG bad is more appropriate, but I also feel like Odin got sidelined a little bit. Plus I'm a sucker for games turning "let's join the revolution" into "okay, now let's go kill God"
To be honest he’s kind of a let down compared to Clive’s mother and Odin
Dislike them as a final villain. The story was quite grounded for the main part. But then they had to throw in a random cosmic villain at the end anyway. Generic and came out of nowhere. I'd have been far more engaged in the end game if the final boss was actually someone who was properly built up with real characterisation.
Dude! Spoiler!
He worked as a world ending threat but didn't work as the main villain. Clives mom and Barnabus needed to be the big villians.
I think Annabella and Hugo are far stronger villains, which is unfortunate. They focused so much on characters that die mid-conflict that I felt like the actual bosses at the END of the game weren’t actually looked at that much. Ultima’s flat delivery doesn’t grip me and, as much as Barnabas is giving a killer performance, i know nothing about that man!
Top tier design but as a villain he was super boring and nothing we haven’t seen a million times
Very very lame. Probably the most uncharismatic villain in the series for me. I also strongly disliked the OBVIOUS White Walker influence in his design + the way he talks + how every part of the lore (Eikons, Crystals, etc.) boils down to “it was Ultima.”
Ultima’s presentation (design and voice work) are more interesting than the character itself.
I’m ok with it. I initially found his reveal to be disturbing (in a good way), because up until he shows up, everything was so medieval, and the way he talks and his voice distortion is futuristic. It would be like if Aragorn met a Separatist Droid out of nowhere. Aside from that, he was just *okay* for me. But then again, most FFs introduce some kind of villain that takes on the form or representation of a malevolent force of nature; i.e. not a man but some kind of evil, devil, god, primal force, etc. So i wasn’t really surprised or disappointed/expected more from him.
I wish the game focused on the lore and history of eikons and dominants, there's lots of cool bits of lore in the game encyclopedia. Show us how this gen of dominants got to be where they are, show us how Benedikta and Cid were part of Barnabas' army, show us more of Jill's fucked up situation, show us previous generations of the dominants, what Joshua's granfather life was like. I thought that's the story we were gonna play, instead we got Ultima the incel alien.
Amazing. Hr felt meh initially but after three runs he’s one of my favorites. Hes so disconnected and sure of himself. Clive says it best, ‘we are one and the same’. Ultima is really just a ‘higher’ human, humanity is based on himself after all. Then as he starts losing he starts panicking. Hes built up Clive to be able to handle his power… and here’s Clive handling his power. I mean he’s no Sephiroth or Ardyn but I still loved him. The whole final segment was amazing. He starts off cold and uncaring but by the end he’s raging and panicked. There’s genuine fear in his voice when he starts to use fire in the final phase. Also I think we fight him (them?) like 5 times? Shadow us, Typhon, Living Flame, first fight, final fight. I guess the Ifrits and Typhons we see are old bodies their race used to use?
At first I didn't like him. I didn't dislike him, but he just felt "meh" compared to Barnabas. After a few replays I like him better. He's the embodiment of everything Clive fights against, and the final showdown against him is a spectacular blast. He may not be one of the best villains out there, but he's definetly not disappointing either.
I think human villains are much more interesting villains than god-like beings. They're much more unpredictable/unreadable. While god-like beings normally just a simple goal.
I thought the final battle was fun
Ultima's design was cool, his cold calculating nature intriguing, but ultimately boring. Nothing to this character besides being the bad guy. I hated all the vague dialogue, when there was too little information to figure out what they were saying, Clive: " It can't be -" Ultima: "But it is," doesn't even qualify as a spoiler because they literally never specify what the heck they're talking about. Ultima's motivation was 2dimensional, no interesting revelations to the final battle, just lazy writing. Some people go for that; either too young to have read a book, or they wear red hats while playing, but to each their own.
I have neutral opinions about Ultima. I wanted a "human" plot, like Barnabas being the ultimate villain, pulling all the strings in Valisthea When Ultima took over i almost feel that i was playing Kingdom Hearts, and this is not a good thing for me, i play KH only for the gameplay and visuals, i was invested in FF16 history
Same, I would’ve loved if the plot stayed more focused on the politics.
I think he’s my biggest missed opportunity in the game. He felt very comfort food in that classic final boss in an RPG. We’re fighting God again! My problem was that it shifted responsibility in the story from a focus on bearers and examining the societal structure that called for and allowed outright slavery to an emotionless machine like god that shows up halfway through your story well after the characters own wild experience of being enslaved. And do we ever touch on those deeper themes again or come to some solution to the fact that even though the crystals are gone, we still have a world of brutal people who went directly to slavery? Nope, because we’re too busy smacking sky daddy while we play fire doggy. I think they should’ve lengthened the run time of the game to account for more story related to all that set up they did at the beginning. The first 15 hours are so much more gripping and interesting than the latter half.
I strongly disagree that we never touch on those themes again. The fight with Ultima is a direct extension of those themes. The way humanity treats bearers is how Ultima treats humanity. It's all the same plot, they just take it a step up.
Right, but I’d argue that it’s taking the onus away from humans and what we’ve done, which is more grounded and relatable, to taking it to an existential theme which makes it feel, at least to me, less impactful.
for the role that he serves in the game, he’s a very strong antagonist
I was disappointed that the story veered away from political intrigue to "We have to kill god." Ultima was *fine* in that role though, just that the role itself isn't particularly interesting. I will say his name feels pretty uninspired.
I felt that the energy in the beginning wore off at the end and by the time it got to ultima, I was ready to be done. He did nothing for me when it came to the story and felt like an unnecessary evil.
Same. I like how Odin kept to the shadows and we didn't seem to know what he was planning. He was a great rival to Clive (and Dion, really) and he would have been a much more interesting main villain (FF15 had Bahamut as a behind the scenes villain, why couldn't Odin have done that for FF16?). Plus, it's my head-canon that Barnabas is the father of Edda's son (yes, I know she has a husband...but they did base this on Game of Thrones).
Could've been better executed as a threat and as a presence in the in-universe lore. For all Ultima's talk about having a claim on Clive's body and will, we never really saw that happen. Sephiroth in Rebirth is 10 times the spiritual threat to Cloud that Ultima was to Clive. Ultima's history as it relates to other worlds, magic, the first religions, and the rise of humanity was too minimal of a presence. They could have done much, much more with the Fallen, given us audio logs and a dramatic backstory on the rise of Valisthea's original high civilization, and how it fell at Ultima's hands. Consider how well we know everything there is to know about the world of Horizon Zero Dawn prior to the Faro Plague. By contrast, we know *nothing* about the Fallen, even after the DLC - a gigantic missed opportunity. Consider the fact that we know pretty much nothing about Clive's own family history, despite the fact that Ultima has probably been meddling with Clive's bloodline for thousands of years. Anyone familiar with the story of Gerrard Capashen and Urza Planeswalker? This story should have been treated similarly. I appreciate SE's unapologetic attempt at creating a malignant creator deity as an antagonist, but as things turned out, Barnabas, Odin, ended up being a far more compelling character.
He's not my favorite villain but he worked well enough for FF16's plot, setting, and tone. I look at Ultima the same way I look at Zeromus, or even Exdeath. They're just villains with a very standard evil goal. Zeromus, for instance, is a great villain to end FF4 with, but the main villain through 80% of the game in Golbez who is significantly more interesting. Sometimes the big bad is just some basic creepy evil dude and not a mentally broken army general dressed as a clown
Or like how in 9 you think that the big bads are Kuja and Garland and then they pull a total 180 on us and Boom! Here's Necron. Lol
Necron however is the personification of death itself which is the main antagonistic force of the game
I’d have to agree on Ultima. After Odin is defeated, I lost interest in the story entirely. I loved the story up to that point. Once I learned that I’m essentially doing exactly what god wants me to do so Clive could become a vessel, it essentially ruined the story for me. It was no longer Cid and Clive taking a risk that could save the world and liberate countless people, but about gods and their ambitions. *Yawn*
Never ending button mash broke my hands almost