Really?
Really. I’ve whined about it here, what, a dozen times over the years? 
(note: I’m talking about Delita and Ovelia stabbing each other, in case you’re confused.)
It didn’t wrap everything up in a nice bow for you.
Which is especially inappropriate for Final Fantasy, since (originally, anyway) each game was supposed to be self-contained and never revisited.
I guess I just don’t like vagueness or pessimism in my entertainment- especially if I have to pay for it!
It is self-contained and never revisited. It’s a tragedic ending. Ever see or read Hamlet? Or King Lear or Macbeth? They never did a sequel to any of them.
I agree to a point that Balthier and Fran arent the type to open up. However, everyone opens up to someone sometime. Baltheir seems to know alot about Fran, and also seems really protective of her feelings. They give eachother too much body language and significant glances for there to not be more than a professional relationship between them.
Not unlike Vaan and Penelo. At first i thought it was the “brother and sister” type relationship that seems to be a common plot among two young people who grew up together. But the more i watch, the more body language and nuance of speech leads me to believe they have really deep feelings for eachother, that go way past the brother/sister childhood. Although, it could be that very much, because i noticed the japanese are very-very weird when it comes to brothers and sisters(particularly twins).
There is one other thing i have learned about the Japanese. They are a very deeply feeling people. (i also learned that the Japanese don’t like to say “no”)
Vaan and Penelo definitely have something between each other; it becomes much more pronounced in Revenant Wings.
And yes, Japanese really do seem to have very deep and powerful emotions. Things which would be dismissed as corny or hackneyed in America are still quite popular and well-loved by them.
You’re not getting my point. If you never plan on revisiting certain characters or worlds, then you should tell your audience as much as you can in the story. Oh, and I don’t care for Shakespearian tragedies either. Nothing wrong with them, just not the stuff I like in my RPGs.
I agree to a point that Balthier and Fran arent the type to open up. However, everyone opens up to someone sometime.
Exactly; again, it may be realistic for their type of character to not open up much, but if they never do, then they never become more than one-dimensional.
They give eachother too much body language and significant glances for there to not be more than a professional relationship between them.
Significant isn’t the same as romantic or tender. Though again, I can’t judge them until I’ve seen the full story personally.
Not unlike Vaan and Penelo. At first i thought it was the “brother and sister” type relationship that seems to be a common plot among two young people who grew up together.
Yeah, they seem to be the same old “Friends who grew up together and love each other but find it awkward to express” types that we’ve seen in many Animes and RPGs; yet, even at the point I’m now, I still can’t tell if they really have romantic feelings for each other. Heck, the only real clue so far is in the Viera Randevous subquest, where a love-seeking Viera tells Vaan she can feel he’s “Spoken For” but doesn’t say by whom.
This game is definitely too slow in its character development, which hurts my attempts to care for the characters.
And yes, Japanese really do seem to have very deep and powerful emotions. Things which would be dismissed as corny or hackneyed in America are still quite popular and well-loved by them.
Depends on the type of story you see. Shojo stories and Romantic comedies are certainly full of “strong emotions” ranging from crippling shyness to desperate embarrassment to rightous anger. But again, loving kisses are rare.
You’re not getting my point. If you never plan on revisiting certain characters or worlds, then you should tell your audience as much as you can in the story. Oh, and I don’t care for Shakespearian tragedies either. Nothing wrong with them, just not the stuff I like in my RPGs.
Then you agree that the story isn’t bad, it’s just not your personal preference. I personally enjoy a bit of mystique. Some of the best stories in the world leave the audience guessing.
Exactly; again, it may be realistic for their type of character to not open up much, but if they never do, then they never become more than one-dimensional.
First you’re railing against characters being too realistic, then you dislike the fact that they’re not realistic enough. Pick your battles.
This game is definitely too slow in its character development, which hurts my attempts to care for the characters.
The truth is that the star of the game’s story isn’t the characters at all. All of the characters have “Vaan syndrome” to some extent - they are observers. The main actors are the countries and factions involved in political intrigues; both the leaders and the everyday citizens play a significant role in it. And in fact, that’s also very realistic. There are few inspiring leaders like Churchill or Gandhi; many revolutions and important events happen all at once. I found it a refreshing change of pace from the “five plucky heroes take on one big bad guy” RPG cliche.
Okay, okay, I mostly agree with a lot of what you’ve said, but I think you’re just pushing your idea of what you’d like the game to be about here. No, it’s not a conflict between nations. Suikoden II, V and even I have conflicts in which the “nation” takes precedence over the characters, and still manage to portray both the general and individual views on the matter. FFXII has three different factions looking at each other ugly WAY off-camera for the whole game while the only six guys you DO see in regular basis take a walking trip through the continent that ends up doing comparatively very little, and the whole thing ends in an interrupted battle between two of them without the third ever showing up. The peasants do the exact same thing they do in every other single game ever: They die like dogs to provide some vague feeling of catastrophe which would have a lot more meaning if you were actually doing something about all that instead of wandering through the world’s arse looking for the goddamn Dragon Balls. Or, say, if it actually happened during the game. You see, massacres are only shocking when they happen in the moment or you see the immediate after-effects. A Rabanastre that’s already essentially getting back on its feet and a Nabudis that’s so ill designed that you wouldn’t be able to tell people were once living in that place don’t do the trick, and Bur Omisace is, at this point, just way too common to have that much impact. Also the leaders of the armies would probably be a lot better characterized if they had actually more than three lines thrown in between every forty hours of dungeon crawling.
You can go on and on about how the matter needs a lot of “reading between the lines” but the fact is, it’s hard to read between the lines when they are separated by three miles worth of blank paper in between each. Shit happens in the game, but you’re never even remotely close enough to be given a reason to care about any of it.
I won’t argue it could have been better presented. But if you take the time to talk to NPCs, read the Clan Primer, and pay attention to the back-and-forth, you can glean an intriguing story out of it.
Whoa, nelly! [SPOILER]Tifa overcame her fear that she could lose Cloud by telling the truth and basically came to understand that no matter what, the truth was more important than misleading the one she loves, although that point isn’t as clear as I thought it would have been after Aeris was out of the way for her.
Barrett stopped blaming himself for Dyne’s misfortune and…er, became a better father because of it? You know what? He was just a blatant black caricature from start to finish so you might have me beat.
Nanaki learned that his father wasn’t a coward (I hated that dungeon by the way, I always had trouble with that boss) and though I’m not doing the scene justice, you can’t say that didn’t change Nanaki’s perspective on himself or what it meant to be a hero. [/SPOILER]
Cid stopped being a jerk based off of his incorrect perception of the shuttle’s launch and I’d even note that beating the Wutai Pagoda sidequest and the Lucretia sidequest shine a different light on Yuffie and Vincent respectively.
As a matter of fact, it seems like every major conflict in FF7 is propelled by a character’s inability to percieve the truth or their denial of it. Or in Tifa’s case, which is even worse in my opinion, their will to prop up a false reality instead of dealing with their problems. What FF7 failed to do that FF9 excelled at was creating a sense of genuine comradarie and friendship between it’s characters. Besides the C-A-T love triangle we had going for a bit, the characters don’t really relate to one another; the longer the game goes on, the less they seem to attempt to do with the secondary characters. I guess those little “events” that would occur when you entered a new town really did build up the characters then, huh?
Funny, I can’t remember many character relationships in FF8 I liked.
Wait, is there a statute of limitations for spoilers? I remember there was that comic about spoiling King Kong on PA about that…and there’s the fact that FF7 came out when I was like, 9 years old.
you agree that the story isn’t bad, it’s just not your personal preference.
Certainly, and I’ve never meant otherwise. Sorry if that wasn’t clear. I’ve never truly sat down to analyze FFT fairly, though some of its flaws, like the way the Lucavi subplot fits in, are apparent.
First you’re railing against characters being too realistic, then you dislike the fact that they’re not realistic enough. Pick your battles.
Ok, you lost me here. I specifically said that realism and plot needs to be balanced in any story, though, if forced to choose, I’d personally favor plot over realism.
Seraphim: You made an excellent point on how the way any story (not just an RPG’s) is presented affects the impact it has on the audience. While Cid may have a point that the story of 12 is bigger than its characters, that isn’t how it’s coming across so far. And I’m starting to fear how the Esper subplot will affect it as well (will it seem as intrusive as in Tactics? Again, I’ll decide after I complete the game.)
You know, one thing I wish this game had, is a “watch the cutscenes again” feature like certain games such as Lunar have; it would be a lot easier to criticize the story if we could see all the scenes next to each other rather than separated by hours of wandering around.
Not only it is not as intrusive, it is simply not there at all. You’ll use Belias once to open a door, and you’ll get one summoned on you as a throwaway boss, and that’s it. There is not another mention of the Espers throughout the entire story, and even the one I just mentioned is only recognizable as an Esper because of the introduction.
They’re just random side-bosses that are scattered across the map whom you fight for no other reason than completion and whose “power beyond measure” as Ashe put it is completely ignored for the rest of the plot. Don’t worry though, you’ll still get another pseudo-fantastical plot quest thrown at you to take you as far away from any relevant political event as it is physically possible.
EDIT: You know what I just realized? “Befriending Larsa”. That’s it. That’s the ONE thing you ever do before the ending battle that has any meaning to the conflict. Even the whole mess with the Occuria only takes value when considering the overal flow of history, but as for the Archadia-Dalmasca-Rozarria mess, making buddies with Larsa is pretty much the only thing Ashe’s quest managed to do that had any sort of meaning in the end.
True, there was some character growth in FF7, but nowhere near as dramatic as that in FF9. Many of the characters in FF9 really end up being entirely different people from who they were when they started. In FF7, Cloud and Cid are the only ones who really have any sort of personality change or growth (and even Cid isn’t any less of a jerk, he’s just nicer to Shera specifically). The others may learn a lesson or two, but they don’t intrinsically change.
Originally Posted by Cidolfas
True, there was some character growth in FF7
Wasn’t that all reconned by FF VII:AC to the point where none of that happened? Or did nobody learn their lesson (or suddenly got better in both the cases of Rufus and Sephroth)?
It wasn’t retconned. In FF7, Cloud may have gotten better, but he relapsed. That’s not the same as claiming it never happened. What’s with Rufus? I don’t think he changed much in FF7.
For that matter, FF4 had tons of character growth. Cecil sheds his dark ways and steps into the light as a Paladin. Kain overcomes the force controlling his mind. Edge feels redemption at stopping the evil that destroyed his kingdom. Rydia starts off as a weak little girl able to only summon a Chocobo and case very weak white and black magic. She eschews her white magic and goes on to be able to summon Bahamut. Palom, Porom, Yang, and Cid all give up their personal goals to keep the rest of the group from destruction. Edward overcomes his brooding Emo depession and Tellah makes peace with his departed daughter.
Dunno how to the the “spoiler” parts as I only see now to change text colour but not background/highlight colours.
Not only it is not as intrusive, it is simply not there at all.
Yeah, that’s what I feared. Why go to the trouble of recreating the Lucavi and giving them an expanded, Fallen-Angel-like background just to stick the majority of them as optional Bosses/Summons? It’s almost like they changed their minds at some point in the game’s production but decided to keep the Espers just to remind us that this a FF game. Too bad, it would’ve been more interesting (in my opinion) if much of the war was caused by the Espers infiltrating society, ala FF Tactics (but done and explained better.)
And I’m aware that the real plot of the game involves the Nethicite Shards and a quest for divine power; but even that seems terribly vague. In particular, do they ever explain WHY the gods felt like dropping these utterly dangerous things on Ivalice, or why they never bothered to interfere again, not even when the fragments started to be used for massive destruction?
And Khalbrae: to spoiler-tag anything, just select the text with your mouse and then click the Spoiler button (the black one with an “S” on it.)
[spoiler] Spoiler: do they ever explain WHY the gods felt like dropping these utterly dangerous things on Ivalice, or why they never bothered to interfere again, not even when the fragments started to be used for massive destruction?[/quote]
They do explain it, but in case you miss the nuances, feel free to read the spoiler text. 8p
The shards of nethicite were used as a tool to control human destiny. They gave it to who they wanted so that that person would shift the balance of power in the world. The Occuria don’t use it all the time, but whenever they deem the time is right. The most recent time was Raithwall; after that, they let things take their course until the current time, when they decide they need to intervene again.
FF7:AC shows us just how little the characters in FF7 changed. Cid is still putting his airship above his woman(no pun intended). Barrest still “isn’t there” for Marlene. I can’t say much for Red VIII, though he never really had much growth to do. His major problem was that he didn’t know about his father, and was a little immature for his species.
Vincent was still eaten up inside over Lucrecia. Him showing up at the end was a minor concession.
Yuffie was still a materia junkie.
Delving into FF7:DoC, Reeve was still a “politician” type. Although, they really changed his character a lot from “spy who begrudgingly drops a plate to kill thousands of people” to, a laughable “If another robotic doll comes along, please remember me” which was confusing as hell. Was Reeve controlling Cait Sith, or did Cait Sith have a programmed mind of his own ? I am still unclear on that even today.
In the end, the characters in FF7 really had little growth.
The problems with Advent Children were that a) it was meant to reinvigorate the FF7 franchise, and b) it was too focused on the Cloud/Sephiroth rivalry. Even the Bahamut battle, as I understand, was added in late into the project to give the rest of the group a chance to show off. So really, there was little room for character development in it.
As for Reeve/Cait Sith… that has always been unclear. For half the game, you think it’s a sentient robot, only to later find that it’s a remotely-controlled spy, only to then find out it’s actually Shinra’s Reeves; and if I remember correctly, at one point both were seen together, with Cait repeating what Reeves was saying! So, whether or not they were the same person or if the robot(s) had some degree of autonomy really needs to be cleared up.
I didn’t mind too much about the focus being between Cloud and Sephiroth. My complaint about it was, “It’s too short”. That’s my complaint about most movies today. I could give you a nice long list of movies that i would like better if they were even 20-30 minutes longer. I really liked the motorcycle battles and the sword fights. How Cloud can take a bullet to the face and get a scratch… i can’t explain, but overall, I liked them.
Watching AC with my brother and father, i had to explain a lot of things to them(since they didn’t play the game). A lot of the details were hard to get across, for example, why Cloud felt responsible for Aeris’, Why this white haired freak shows up at the end out of nowhere and goes Agent Smith on Cloud’s ass. But that was their complaint too, at the end all these guys show up with some really cool moves, but to my family who watched it, they show up out of nowhere and end up disappearing.
My dad even went, "Who in their right mind sees their buddy in a sword fight and goes, ‘this is something he needs to do himself’ ", and then makes a joke about that one episode of Firefly. (you know, when Zoei goes, “this is something the Captain needs to do himself” and then Mal yells out, “no i don’t!”)
In the end, i had to say to my family, “The movie just seems to be for the people who played the game, it really doesn’t make sense if you havn’t”.
They did admit that the fight scenes were interesting, and they HATE CG movies. See, my Dad and Brother are like, “Cartoons are for kids”. Funny thing is, when The Spirits Within was on Sci-Fi a few months ago, my dad actually watched it and commented, “I didn’t know it was like that. It was allright” which “allright” from my dad translates as “frickin awesome”.
For the recrod, and to close my long mostly-pointless post, i always liked The Spirits Within It was really different, not what i expected, but hell, when i first saw the previews for The Matrix, i went “that’s gonna be totally stupid”. three monthers later i got home from the movie theater i says to my dad, “When that comes out, you gotta get it, it was frickin awesome”. My dad then replied, “It can;t be that good, i saw the previews, looked stupid.” It finally comes out and he rents it, “It was allright”.
(end of anecdotal typing)