Villains of the Neutral Evil alignment, also known as the "Malefactor" or “True/Selfish Evil” alignment, are primarily concerned with their own schemes and will employ whatever means are necessary to succeed in them. They do not care much about whether they have to work with or against law in order to do so and will often switch sides if it benefits them.

Neutral Evil is often seen as representing a character who is purely out for themselves and does not feel tied to rules or authority like a Lawful Evil character nor is needlessly violent like a Chaotic Evil character. These villains are basically a shifting, but specifically self-oriented mix of the two. Also, these characters are the complete opposite of Neutral Good who are heroes that are mostly neutral, but on the good side.

A good way to determine Neutral versus Lawful or Chaotic Evil is to understand the ultimate end-goal or motives of a character. A Lawful Evil character's ultimate goals and motives are to enforce either social or personal code of conduct, often at the expense of others; they may do so because they value tyrannical systems, or they simply hate others' freedom. A Chaotic Evil character simply does what they find amusing at the time and values their own freedom, with no care for how they may harm others, often times instead being sadistic. A Neutral Evil character, on the other hand, is basically summed up as being "extremely selfish"; they only truly do things if it benefits them in the long run and thus are seen as the most treacherous and cunning of the alignments (though not nearly as reckless as chaotic).

Many tend to be Egotists, as they are only out for themselves. However, they can also be Nihilists just as long as their value of nothing doesn't interfere with their self-benefiting goals. Neutral Evil can also apply to animalistic villains who by virtue of being animals do not care about law nor chaos, simply self-survival and spreading of influence (good examples as monstrous animals from many natural horror films and some animal-like aliens in sci-fi).

By the character alignment name, one should not be fooled. Neutral Evil characters are not neutral on the moral scale, as such as shown in a grey area or a "good" manner. These villains are purely out for themselves and will do anything to get their way. Their secondary names of "Malefactor" and "True/Selfish Evil" perfectly show their unfiltered selfishness in comparison to Lawful Evils (Dominators) and Chaotic Evils (Destroyer/Demonic).