20 Smartest Video Game Villains Who Deserved To Win

16. Master Li - Jade Empire

Sometimes you've just gotta hand it to a villain for so perfectly playing you like a damn fiddle, and that's absolutely true of Jade Empire's Master Li.

For much of the game, we're led to believe that Master Li is the Spirit Monk's wise mentor who will teach them so, so many things, and so once Li is captured by the vicious Emperor Sun Hai, of course we're heading off to fell the Emperor and rescue our good bud.

But once we've defeated the Emperor, we learn that this was all part of Li's plan, so he could kill us, receive the Water Dragon's power for himself, and become the new Emperor. Oh, and Sun Hai was his brother, by the way.

And in case that's not conniving enough, Li even trained the Spirit Monk to have a fatal flaw built into his martial arts skillset - one which Li of course knew how to exploit.

While Li technically can win in one of the game's endings, that's obviously not the "good" and implied canon ending where he's defeated. 

All the same, the man put immense amounts of leg-work into his plan and probably deserved the W, honestly.