Has ff gone down hill since Square Enix

[SaveOurSeeker]

I believe so. I came in at ff9. I have played most ff games except 11 and the ff7 prequals. I think after ff10 the stories and charecter personalities have lacked any sort of humanity really. Understandable with 13 as they were made in to 'monsters' but ff12 was terrible in my eyes and 13s gameplay was terrible, I think they spent to much time on other sub standard games like Nier and the other SE game (can't remember) it's name. 13 was beutiful as far graphics are concerned but I felt cheated at how it was walk in a straight line and battle and press x. Any one else agree. versus 13 looks good though, it could be make or brake for me though. What do you think?

[Levian]

Most of my beef with the later installments are the boring battle systems, but then again, they made the best battle system to date in FFX-2, so it can't be that either. :D

What's definitely gone downhill is that they're spending ages getting the games released. Took them 9 years to make FFX-2, XII and XIII. Took them 4 years to make VII, VIII, and IX. Crank em out quicker dammit!

[SaveOurSeeker]

You mean 12 and 13 battle systems. Not the best, X-2 battle system was a highlight to the game, a bit to girly for me, which I think was the point behind it which is fair enough. The old system is and always will be the best in my opinion. Maybe if they revived that system but added a bit of skill into it like Shadow Hearts (did you ever play them) very good rpg, closest any one has got to beating FF. You would think that they would have more games out since 10 which was 8 years ago now:eek: Apparantly verus 13 has World map back which i have missed, I like straight forward games but not mind numbing linerity like ff13. Hopefully SE will realise the potential in the ps3, we can have beutiful graphics as well as depth to the gameplay.

[Saber]

I'm not liking a lot of the new final fantasy titles past IX. Well to say it truthfully, yes, I do think Final Fantasy went downhill after they merged with Enix. They try and make them likable to critics and well 12 got a high score as well as 13. People use to complain that Final Fantasy consists of just pressing attack over and over again... but I think it was more about using spells and skills right to master the games. I miss the world map and battle systems of the old. I don't care what people say. It was famous for it after 10 and then they went to auto-battle and gambits?? I mean come on!! If I wanted to just wanted to walk a little in game and watch cinemas fine... but I like to role play and make my own decisions. 10 even bugged me where you had to kill certain monsters with certain characters.

I have played Shadow Hearts and love them all. Even the Koudelka game that takes place before hand. Covenant is one of my favorite games. Also Legends of Dragoon had a Addition battle thing to spice up the fights.

[SaveOurSeeker]

I never got to far with covenant, I left school and started work either side of buying it and I fell out with computer games for 5 years. It is on my to do list now though. I totally missed out on legend of dragoon. My first rpg was 2001 ff9 and when I completed that I got a ps2 and ff10. Hopefully it is on PSN. FF13 is an X button masher for sure. I actually played a lot of the battles whilst on the net reading about other things and paying no attention to the games. Ok so yeah even in the old games X was the staple button, but you also had to explore places and find you're way there, not follow the arrow on the mini map that is always on screen. As well as mini games and towns to explore just for the sake of it (especially ff9) My 11 year old nephew I love him for this even prefers the ff7-10 which I got him for his birthday over the recent ones. Have you played Dragon Age, it's a good one for the decision making side of things.

[Del Murder]

I haven't liked anything after IX better than IX. So in that regard I agree, but I don't think this has to do with the merger. The company just took the series in a different direction which I liked a lot less. XI was a great game, but it was an online game so it attracted a different crowd. Great application of the job system, though. X-2 was indeed a great battle system, but the story and rest of the gameplay was so meh in that one that it got overshadowed.

[Marshall Banana]

I just want to say that FFXII is amazing! Heh.

[VeloZer0]

I think it has but a lot of the stuff that has me disenfranchised with the series is tied to a general decline in JRPGs in general over the last decade. The advance of technology has been extremely unkind the the genre in the context of allowing it to produce games I like.

[ShinGundam]

Apparantly verus 13 has World map back which i have missed
In HD no less. I heard HD world maps were impossible to make. All Praise Nomura-sama.

[Roogle]

I think it has but a lot of the stuff that has me disenfranchised with the series is tied to a general decline in JRPGs in general over the last decade.

I agree. It appears that Eastern developers are aware that they may have to learn some things about game development from Western developers.

This article discusses the noticeable trend across the board: Japanese Playing a New Video Game: Catch-Up (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/technology/20game.html)

I feel that Square Enix, too, has fallen victim to a trend that has enveloped most of the Japanese game developers.

[Jessweeee♪]

I think they need to end the series, and continue to make Final Fantasy games under unique titles. Without the weird expectations people have for Final Fantasy titles they might be more well received. Personally I've managed to enjoy every game post-FFV, with FFVI being the weakest for me.

[Vyk]

I think it has but a lot of the stuff that has me disenfranchised with the series is tied to a general decline in JRPGs in general over the last decade.

I agree. It appears that Eastern developers are aware that they may have to learn some things about game development from Western developers.

This article discusses the noticeable trend across the board: Japanese Playing a New Video Game: Catch-Up (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/technology/20game.html)

I feel that Square Enix, too, has fallen victim to a trend that has enveloped most of the Japanese game developers.
I would have to say that Squeenix is probably trying harder than most companies. They generally have the wrong idea most of the time, but they're definitely changing things up a lot in an attempt to see what works. They just seem to refuse to take notes from Western ideas. I think they're trying to revolutionize JRPGs rather than evolve them. I never considered 8 to be the next level of 7, or 9 to be the next level of 8. They kept changing as much as they could possibly get away with and I think that eventually deterred me. But as stated, JRPGs in general have stagnated. So change was definitely needed. But I don't think reinventing the wheel was the appropriate way for them to try to go. And for the record I have not enjoyed a Final Fantasy since 7. At all. Even beating the throw-back that was 9 was a chore for me. But then again, I didn't enjoy 5, or 3 or 2 for that matter. So I don't think my opinion really goes for or against any argument here. My JRPG pallet is very odd with high standards. Not a good mix of expectations


I think they need to end the series, and continue to make Final Fantasy games under unique titles. Without the weird expectations people have for Final Fantasy titles they might be more well received. Personally I've managed to enjoy every game post-FFV, with FFVI being the weakest for me.

You speak an alien language. 6 is your least favorite? ;P Ah well..

[Jessweeee♪]

I think they need to end the series, and continue to make Final Fantasy games under unique titles. Without the weird expectations people have for Final Fantasy titles they might be more well received. Personally I've managed to enjoy every game post-FFV, with FFVI being the weakest for me.

You speak an alien language. 6 is your least favorite? ;P Ah well..

My least favorite out of the ones I liked. All of the characters were pretty similar to each other, except for the gimmicky ones like Gau. I enjoyed the dialogue between them and the battle system was fun. The story was entertaining, but not as deep as my favorites. I liked the game, just not as much as the others that I enjoyed and I find it to be one of the most overrated in the series. My least favorite so far is FFIV (I haven't played FFI, II, or V). To me Final Fantasy has always been about the story being told, and as it goes on they improve on their ability to tell it.

[Depression Moon]

I started to see the fall of the FF titles with X-2. Then 11 had followed it. We got KH which I loved and then DQVIII loved KHII and FFXII in the same year. Though I really enjoy XII, the storyline disappointed me and after that Square had begun to put less games that interested me on consoles at least. Now I'm hearing nothing but bad things about XIII. Oh and with the news of Versus possibly not coming out til 2012 and KH III til 2013, I'm not sure how much longer I'll stick with them.

[SaveOurSeeker]

Apparantly verus 13 has World map back which i have missed
In HD no less. I heard HD world maps were impossible to make. All Praise Nomura-sama.
That sounds intense, Gran Pulse was superb in HD.

[Flying Arrow]

It's not really FF going downhill so much as it is that SE has been tumbling down a mudslide since the early 2000s.

[Loony BoB]

I hope they don't end the series, as to me that would mean they would finish off with a lot of things which I adore about the series - not to mention that EoFF would lose out entirely. :p

As for a lacking in personalities since FFIX, I disagree - I think FFXIII has the most fleshed out group of characters to date. Sure, there have been individuals prior to XIII which were fleshed out very well, but as a group of six characters? FFXIII is awesome. I loved it for that so much - it made the game ten times better than it already was for me.

I do wonder what people really want, though, sometimes. I'm sure S-E wonder this a lot, too. I'm fairly confident that they want to make epics, and that's what the're known for doing over the years. For a game to be an epic, it tends to need to be released on the latest console. They can't release an old-school game on the latest console, so they have to work on good graphics. This in turn means longer development times and notably more development time being spent on the graphics than other things. This means less time on the content etc. It is a downhill thing for all games as far as I'm concerned. Sure, FPS games are as good as ever - but that's because they don't need to have masses of content. Hours of storyline is thrown out in favour of online battles. As for Western developers leaving them behind - I disagree again. Oblivion may have had a lot of things to do, but it was no better than FFXII in that area and FFXII had better characters, ones you actually could gain an opinion of. Oblivion for me was just... boring after a while. Same thing, constantly. Even Morrowind was better. So that means other developers are also going downhill. I look forward to the day that the graphics simply can't get any better, and they can start spending more time on the things that matter.

But yeah, overall, I don't think they've gone that far downhill. I enjoyed FFV, VII, VIII and XIII the most out of the series. But that doesn't mean the others are crap. The old school FF's had a good storyline but if they were never released until today they wouldn't do well.

[black orb]

>>> After FF10, everything sucked...:luca:

[ShinGundam]

>>> After FF10, everything sucked...:luca:

Take off the nostalgia goggles :eep:

[black orb]

>>> FF10 is not exactly what i´d call a "nostalgia FF game"..:luca:

[Jessweeee♪]

It's been almost a decade though!

[Bolivar]

I hope they don't end the series, as to me that would mean they would finish off with a lot of things which I adore about the series - not to mention that EoFF would lose out entirely. :p

As for a lacking in personalities since FFIX, I disagree - I think FFXIII has the most fleshed out group of characters to date. Sure, there have been individuals prior to XIII which were fleshed out very well, but as a group of six characters? FFXIII is awesome. I loved it for that so much - it made the game ten times better than it already was for me.

I do wonder what people really want, though, sometimes. I'm sure S-E wonder this a lot, too. I'm fairly confident that they want to make epics, and that's what the're known for doing over the years. For a game to be an epic, it tends to need to be released on the latest console. They can't release an old-school game on the latest console, so they have to work on good graphics. This in turn means longer development times and notably more development time being spent on the graphics than other things. This means less time on the content etc. It is a downhill thing for all games as far as I'm concerned. Sure, FPS games are as good as ever - but that's because they don't need to have masses of content. Hours of storyline is thrown out in favour of online battles. As for Western developers leaving them behind - I disagree again. Oblivion may have had a lot of things to do, but it was no better than FFXII in that area and FFXII had better characters, ones you actually could gain an opinion of. Oblivion for me was just... boring after a while. Same thing, constantly. Even Morrowind was better. So that means other developers are also going downhill. I look forward to the day that the graphics simply can't get any better, and they can start spending more time on the things that matter.

But yeah, overall, I don't think they've gone that far downhill. I enjoyed FFV, VII, VIII and XIII the most out of the series. But that doesn't mean the others are crap. The old school FF's had a good storyline but if they were never released until today they wouldn't do well.

Man I love this post for so many reasons, I've refrained from discussing XIII yet since i haven't beat it, but I do come across a lot of side commentary (like in Depression Moon's thread about what game to buy) and I'm surprised at what extremes people actually hate this game, not to mention the specific things they hate it for, characters being one of them. I don't want to go into crazy detail before I've beaten the game but these are some of the realest and most realized characters to ever come out of a developing studio, let alone Final Fantasy.

ANYWAY

I don't think Square has gone downhill. But the nature of their company has changed. Before the merger, and absolutely in the PSOne era, they were very much a group of artists coming up with interesting ideas and implementing them in very creative ways. There were so many different products to choose from and many of them guaranteed you a long time of enjoyment with a creative artistic expression.

But now they're a business. They need to put out x amount of FF games a year, x amount of handheld games on the DS, PSP, and mobile phones in Japan, they need to represent on the Playstation Store and XBLA in order to have a digital presence and now make sure their studios from Eidos are meeting deadlines.

Is this necessarily a bad thing? No way, there's been tons of great products coming out from there like the Dragon Quest remakes, Dissidia, the World Ends with You, DQ VIII & IX (God VIII was unbelievably amazing). And FFXIII which I think is a great game, even if it's nowhere near what the older games used to stand for.

And now 4 Heroes of Light is coming out which promises to be pretty great and may even shut up all you old school heads running your mouthes about what's happened!

In short, they've made A LOT of fun games over the last few years since the merger, but that artistic quality is gone, and there's nothing wrong with lamenting its absence.

edit: oh crap, the question is has FF gone downhill. Um, yes, arguably considerably, but XII and XIII are in no way, shape or form bad games.

[black orb]

It's been almost a decade though!
>>> Yeah, almost a decade of mediocre FF games..:luca:

I just hope they find a super genius like Sakaguchi soon enough or else the FF games will still suck no matter what..

[Wolf Kanno]

I agree with two different comments made on this thread. The first by VeloZer0 about the idea that the genre of JRPGs is what's truly been weakening in the last decade as many top tier franchises have either disappeared or their quality has diminished significantly. I'm still waiting for a real JRPG experience on the current generation of consoles and I'm feeling a weird sense of irony that I might finally experience it on the Wii of all consoles. Don't get me wrong, there have been some great JRPGs in the last decade but it feels like they are very few and far between. What I'm really seeing a lot of is melding of JRPGs with other genres creating something I really can't say is a JRPG but something else entirely.

To correlate this to SE, I feel I can safely say that SE no longer leads the genre, of anything I feel its trying to find a place for itself cause it is no longer the company that creates games that others follow and is quickly becoming irrelevant beyond the weight of their past efforts. XII was probably the last game that I felt took serious strides to add elements to the genre of JRPGs but with XIII, I feel SE has completely walked backwards and even into a completely different direction that only satisfies a small group of the fanbase. From a game design standpoint, the game is at such a level of reductionism that many reviewers jokingly said it wasn't a real RPG anymore and many angry fans have taken that joke as a serious question about the title.

The other comment I agree on is Bolivar's in concern that I felt 20 years ago and up until 10 years ago, the company was more of a collection of artist trying to create fun games and now has become more of a business. Like Bolivar, I agree its not a terrible change in terms of quantity of content but for me, the lack of artistic direction has made the quality of said quantity, a very mixed bag. I could probably list 4 games SE and Squaresoft have released in the last 10 years that are on par with the quality of content Squaresoft was producing in the 90s. That to me has been a disturbing trend.

Granted they have produced many good games but many of them are mix bags, the content is uneven for me. Many titles like TA2, Dissidia, and the KH2 are excellent in terms of gameplay but their story and characters are flat if not downright awful. I feel only the most hardened and jaded of VII fans appreciate the Compilation and fear for the eventual remake as its going to require the game to be rewritten to make sense with the Compilation. While The After Years is not bad in any significant way, I can't shake the nagging logic in my head that keeps telling me this game isn't necessary. I don't want this sequel cause its unnecessary for its artistic integrity and I was perfectly fine with how the game resolved itself. Its like these major sequels to 20 year old movies, just let sleeping dogs lie; don't even get me started on Revnant Wings. I've witnessed the death of one franchise I love (Mana) and watched the neglect and misguided restart of another (Front Mission) and all this as I watch the main FF series quickly transformed from a series that defined a generation and a genre of gaming, into a brand name whose title really shouldn't grace half the games its slapped onto.

In terms of FF, I feel that all the console games suffer the same problem, prioritizing one element over the others. X and XIII favored story over gameplay and world design (not surprising since its mostly the same team) and XII favored the direct opposite. The neglected elements are adequate at best but its hard not to see how they all come short to their true potential. I've lamented long on my issues with X so I'll save everyone's sanity.

In the case of XII, I feel it was a great game and one that really created a standard for future titles in terms of scale and world building, and I actually loved its story and its characters because it lacked the over the top melodrama that people mistake for real human interaction and emotion. The story is not as heavy handed as most of Matsuno's previous titles and sadly that's what was really missing from the game. XII is in my mind the best game SE had released in six years at that point with the rest either faltering badly or downright being terrible. Still, its hard not to shake the fact the game feels like a watered down Matsuno title. His usual depth and heavy handed philosophy removed for the sake of the targeted FF demographic who SE feels would not appreciate a more mature story that makes the player think. I had that theory but other laugh it off but Kitase proved me right (http://www.next-gen.biz/features/final-fantasy-xiii-the-final-countdown?page=0%2C4). He says SE writes FF for teens to early 20 somethings, and that SE purposely makes choices not to lose the youngest demographic. Which to me sounds silly cause its us old farts that actually have disposable money. :p

In the case of XIII, from a game design standpoint, the title is absolutely terrible as it took everything X did wrong and made it even worse as it was pushed to an extreme. There is really no value in the gameplay beyond some silly visual appeal of watching the game do cool for itself while you sit there and babysit the A.I. you can barely control. In fact the combat system is pretty much a dumbed down and streamlined version of the Gambit system that calls on the player to control A.I. script sets as opposed to crafting an A.I. plan that works best for you. Despite that, I felt the combat is actually the best part of the game.

No, I don't like the cast and I feel that most of them are over dramatic caricatures at best. Sazh is probably the only major exception in the story but everyone else pretty much sticks to one personality trait until the middle of the game when they get their magic epiphany and change to a new one that is a slight variation of the old one with one exception. After these epiphanies the cast become mostly a non-entity while the games plot takes center stage which was mostly ignored from the get go and introduces a villain that was not only predictable but poorly fleshed out and unable to escape being a generic evil. The non playable characters are even more poorly utilized and I would have to say that Cid joins Judge Drace and other interesting FF characters who are so badly used in the story you have to wonder why they were even there to begin with if the writers weren't going to use them.

The pacing of the story is off, forcing the player to deal with 4-6 hours of tedious exposition that could fit onto a note card and does. only to have the main conflict emerge and have to sit through all the worst traits of each of the characters increases ten fold until the 20 hour mark (Chapter 7 and 8) when it all comes together to actually make the player feel like it wasn't all a waste but you know what? It is. Especially when that character growth disappears after wards and the stories terrible plot takes over, which never bothers to take real chances and add more depth to the great character growth we saw a few chapters earlier and is not only plagued with some of the worst writing but terrible execution. The games Datalog tells the story better than the cutscenes and eventually starts giving you important information that wasn't even discussed only so the game can turn around and give you some terrible plot twists. The games plot starts off rocky and eventually pays off after a heavy toll only to go crashing down afterwards. It has two Deus ex Machinas at the end purely cause the writer wanted a specific kind of ending (which most players will see coming) but obviously wrote himself into a corner.

XIII could have gone into so many different directions in its story and many times even gives the player the impression its going that route but always steers away from it and instead chooses to go towards the lowest common denominator of fan expectations. It trades a major story on social commentary about propaganda and group mentality and trades it in for a battle against a menacing evil. A theme of dealing with eventual death and coming to terms with it is instead traded with all the characters sticking to some other personal grudge or issue and mostly ignoring the situation only to cop out later by saying their grudge was just there way of coming to terms and once they realize that, they are all cool with it and its never really brought up again after only taking two minutes to say that cause them fretting over their own issues was suppose to be symbolic when it was really just pretentious. The design of the game makes the player completely apathetic to the characters cause, why should we save Cocoon? The game spends no time to allow the player to grow attached to the world because the world never goes beyond the six characters. I constantly had to ask myself why I gave a damn about what the characters wanted because there goals had no impact for me cause of the games glaring disconnect with the player.

There is almost no value whatsoever in XIII and yes, it is probably the worst game in the series in term of overall bad design and execution. FFI might be boring compared to today's standards but it was solidly design and is more fun because it asks more from the player and doesn't try to be more than it is. XIII is nothing more than the director masturbating to how good he thinks he is by writing a terribly pretentious story with the skill of a high school student and then proceeds to lobotomize the game design so he can force the player to focus on his awful story and then proceeds to throw a hissy fit when people complain they don't like it.

Yes, the FF series has gone down hill but I blame it on the mismanagement of talent, many of the important players are either quitting or working in positions or projects outside of the main series. Daisuke Watanabe is probably one of the best writers working for SE as well as many of the writers for the handheld entries in the KH series and none of them have been tapped to write an FF title? The company lacks a true visionary and while Nomura has been trying to step up to the cause he rubs people the wrong way and tends to put flash over substance though recent years have shown he may be changing his way. Despite that Nomura has already said Versus will be the last FF he will be working on extensively, hell I wouldn't be surprised if he decided to finish KH in the next few years and quit SE to form his own company. Time will tell but I definetly feel the the FF series has truly reached the bottom at this point.

[Del Murder]

I'm not really sure I got your point, WK. Could you please elaborate? ;)

[Wolf Kanno]

I'm sorry Del, I was in a hurry and had to give you the Reader's Digest version of this speech, but don't worry, my book on the topic ad hand will be covered in the novel version titled "Long and Pointless Ramblings by a Jaded Game Snob Vol 3" only $19.95 and will be available in paperback in time for the holidays. ;)

So I don't come off as a total downer. I feel the FF series and the franchise its become has started to go down hill, mostly because it is becoming a franchise... but SE is not completely out of it. I feel SE has been doing rather well with KH even if KH2 was awful, but 358/2 and Birth By Sleep are both excellent titles even as stand alone games. It is also nice to see SE becoming more aggressive about releasing Dragon Quest out here and while I was not nearly as impressed with VIII as Bolivar, I do feel the series as a whole deserves more love outside of Japan.

My issues stem from SE being really flip flop about titles. TA2 and Dissidia are both really great games with hours of customization and several different ways to approach them but they both fall flat in terms of story. Half of Crisis Core is a well written story and he other half is complete :bou::bou::bou::bou:. and you have to deal with both, like watching a movie with a great plot being portrayed by terrible actors. SE has been doing much to promote their new licenses acquired from Eidos and also build up DQ but its sad to see how they utterly bungled the marketing for other series like Mana, Front Mission, and Saga. All three might have stood a chance if SE gave them half the attention they give FF, KH, and DQ. They have talent within the company but most are working on KH or small side projects.

I'd be more excited for Versus XIII if it was not written by Nojima but I have to say Nomura has changed my mind about him through his interviews. He really comes across as one of the few directors at SE who actually understands what a game should be. The difference between his discussions about Versus and Toriyama's on XIII is that for four years Toriyama lamented on the world and the plot and the characters and how everything was going to look so cool when you saw it in motion but never spoke of gameplay until the game was nearly out. In contrast, we know more about Versus' game design and what Nomura is trying for than we know about the plot and characters which hasn't really been expanded on since the very first trailer was released. I feel this comparison is a decent indicator of where their priorities are/were on their projects.

I feel SE still makes great games but they are few and far between and the majority can either be passed or rented for minor enjoyment. They have some good candidates to make great games again but as long as Wada keeps trying to find ways to stifle the creativity by figuring out a way to market the games in a way that makes more money and Kitase is there to make sure the development teams stick to making interactive movies over actual games then SE will stay in decline.

[Bolivar]

I'm not really sure I got your point, WK. Could you please elaborate? ;)

LOLWTF Post of the mothersmurfing year!!!

Not to say I don't take WK's points seriously, I read the whole post and I (kinda) agree with most of it.

I'll post my full thoughts on XIII at a later date, but one of the main things that struck me is how ahead of its time FFXII appears in comparison. Having fully fleshed out towns with near-HD quality (actually i think there's an HD option in the menu for FFXII), filled with hundreds of citizens, many of which you can interact with, and Gran Pulse size areas you can meaningfully explore shows all the excuses Kitase and Toriyama made mean nothing. It really makes you think they hired the wrong team for the (HD) job. Not to mention the Paradigm system is so many steps down from the Gambit system and there isn't even seamless transitions to battles, you can wonder what the hell happened. In a lot of ways it actually took the worst of its PS2 brethren of X and XII yet none of the elements that countered them and made them great games in the end (although i know X's not a great game, Wolf ;) ).

BUT I really can't bring myself to say it's a bad game. It's easy to extrapolate on the faults, but it overall it is a nice entertainment package. Hell, I wanna finish my homework so I can go back to playing it right now. While I'm shaking in restraining myself to fully dive into the prolonged, unnecessary, yet inevitable debate on why FFXIII is actually very good, I'll just say - it wasn't all bad, and much of it is forgivable on SE's part because this was their first game in an incredibly challenging generation of game consoles. While we have the potential for an FF game to really shoot for the stars, and this falls incredibly below that, I would say they made it out of this mess pretty well.

ANYWAY I can't say this is really rock bottom, I think that's a bit of an exaggeration. But the company does need a massive restructuring, and arguably a President or other corporate head with a strong vision for them to lead in interactive entertainment again. And for a new, full, console game to come out these days to really restore their ethos, it would take literally years of production so it seems we're all stuck in a rough spot for the next few years. Which is why I would hope they could maybe make some handheld classics on PSP/DS/3DS until we get there to really wow us again, and even though it's a remake, I think Tactics Ogre is a great way to set that off! 8)

[kotora]

FF12's graphics are far from 'HD" dude. Not that it matters, because the whole "HD towns" thing was a :bou::bou::bou::bou:ty excuse from the beginning. So is saying that it's okay for the game to suck because making games for current consoles is so incredibly hard, because it's not, and even if it was, it wouldn't explain why the storyline sucks.

[Loony BoB]

Which storyline? I enjoyed that of XII and XIII, even if they were patchy in some places the general plot was good enough for me. XII's real issue was that there was so much to do that you forgot the storyline on occasion, while in XIII it was the opposite - everything was story. Perhaps pacing is the real issue, rather than storyline. Storyline itself... that's more just some didn't like it than all didn't like it. Which can be said for a large number of Final Fantasy games.

[Bolivar]

FF12's graphics are far from 'HD" dude. Not that it matters, because the whole "HD towns" thing was a :bou::bou::bou::bou:ty excuse from the beginning. So is saying that it's okay for the game to suck because making games for current consoles is so incredibly hard, because it's not, and even if it was, it wouldn't explain why the storyline sucks.

I still disagree. FFXII was incredibly detailed, I think it wouldn't have taken that much more to build such detailed environments in high def (maybe lighting or whatever would make it harder, I'm not a developer).

And I never said it's ok for a game to suck because making current gen games is hard. If you want to see games that have really crashed and burned this generation, play Damnation or Terminator: Salvation. FFXIII, whether you like the merits of its story or combat, is still a coherent and competent game that looks and runs beautifully.

As for story, I think Loony BoB summed it up nicely.

[Rase]

I blame this guy.

http://www.creativeuncut.com/images/profile-nomura2.jpg

[ShinGundam]

I blame this guy.

http://www.creativeuncut.com/images/profile-nomura2.jpg
WTF ? why ?

Editaga: Well, he run away, I think blaming Nomura for anything that happens with Final Fantasy is nonsensical, Nomura didn't influence/direct/game design FF11, FF12 , FF13, FF14. This is fact. Hell, Nomura did more work on FFVI than FFXIII :eep:.

[Rase]

You seem to be unhappy with my half-serious (since he has become a larger role in games I have found them less enjoyable overall and I find his character designs and stories laughable) and half-to-piss-people-off response. Also, you seem to think I take issue with more recent FF's, when infact it is FFVII-X and Kingdom Hearts that I find ridiculous.


Editaga: Well, he run away.
lol, yep. Ran away to that silly thing called life. I'll skip the exam next time to discuss a Japanese guy on a forum.


I think blaming Nomura for anything that happens with Final Fantasy is nonsensical,
Really? I feel fine blaming him for the direction it has gone since FFVII. We can say crediting instead of blaming if it makes you feel better.


Nomura didn't influence/direct/game design FF11, FF12 , FF13, FF14. This is fact.
Indeed. Never said he did. He was too busy making :bou::bou::bou::bou: like Kingdom Hearts and eight FFVII spin-offs.


Hell, Nomura did more work on FFVI than FFXIII :eep:
As for this, I'd put "Battle & Minor Characters Designer" on par with "Main Character Designer" personally, and him not working on those games because he was stuck trying to squeeze creativity blood from FFVII a stone may be why I enjoyed XII.

[Bolivar]

Well, Rase, you have to admit it's a little unfair to blame Nomura since you admittedly liked XII (which he had nothing to do with) and XI and XIV are essentially online re-imaginings of the first four games by senior Square staff who created the franchise. While the extent of his responsibility for XIII is debatable, I'll admit that's definitely more in his influence.

It seems like you have more of a problem with where the series went as opposed to where it is today.

[ShinGundam]

While the extent of his responsibility for XIII is debatable, I'll admit that's definitely more in his influence.
Like what ? give me examples.

[Bolivar]

While the extent of his responsibility for XIII is debatable, I'll admit that's definitely more in his influence.
Like what ? give me examples.

I'm really not equipped to make the argument (I'm kinda with you on this one) but if I had to guess, I'm sure every basher in this forum will come out the woodwork to point out how spikey hair, androgyny, belt buckles, and melodrama/teen angst are the aesthetics they place the blame on Nomura for.

I think you're right though about him doing more work on FFVI than FFXIII, which I'm sure will really set off the fanboys :D

[Wolf Kanno]

If you really want to nail anyone from the PS1 era, its Nojima cause he wrote most of the offending games. Kitase, cause he's the one who cares more about cinematics and graphics than gameplay, and finally Motomu who is basically their protege. Nomura gets knocked cause he was the one who sorta got thrown into the forefront when Sakeguchi took a backseat from making the games.

XII has its own series of issues we can blame but mostly it was internal bickering much like XIII's staff. Still, I would like to point out that game design in Japan is very different than the West. In the West, everyone has a job to play and that's the extent of their contribution. In Japan its a collaborative process, meaning that people from other departments can have a say in how the story and gameplay function as long as the whole team agrees. This is why its so difficult to discern who did what in Japanese games cause one guy may have actually had a hand in a multitude of factors in a game. In other words don't trust the credits.

Example is that Nomura is credited in VI for creating the sprites and some monster designs for the game. What the credits don't tell you is that he came up with the character design for Setzer and Shadow.

[Bolivar]

Kitase, cause he's the one who cares more about cinematics and graphics than gameplay, but that's the side of the game he was responsible for in FFV and presumably FFVI. I thought Nomura and Itou handled the battles well in VII and VIII, respectively.


and finally Motomu who is basically their protege.

but he was who put in all the little events and mini-games which were a large reason of what made FFVII possibly the best-paced game in the series. Too bad he didn't do that for his newest game... :(


XII has its own series of issues we can blame but mostly it was internal bickering much like XIII's staff. Still, I would like to point out that game design in Japan is very different than the West. In the West, everyone has a job to play and that's the extent of their contribution. In Japan its a collaborative process, meaning that people from other departments can have a say in how the story and gameplay function as long as the whole team agrees. This is why its so difficult to discern who did what in Japanese games cause one guy may have actually had a hand in a multitude of factors in a game. In other words don't trust the credits.

Example is that Nomura is credited in VI for creating the sprites and some monster designs for the game. What the credits don't tell you is that he came up with the character design for Setzer and Shadow.

You know I heard it was the other way around in something Tim Rogers wrote, but I wouldn't really put too much stock in his insight... And your VI example kinda shows what it is.

[Rase]

Well, Rase, you have to admit it's a little unfair to blame Nomura since you admittedly liked XII (which he had nothing to do with) I never claimed to be fair, and admitted that half of my reason for posting that was a dickish one (riling people up). I'm not sure I follow on how liking one of the more recent games he had no involvement in makes blaming him for the overall direction work less though. However, I'm not silly enough to think that one man could have single-handedly "ruined" a franchise, anymore than I think Final Fantasy is "ruined". I do find his style (as seen in the Kingdom Hearts games, which if I'm not mistaken are his babies) to be not for me, and so if I see similarities between KH and FF's that I don't like and he is involved, I tend to shift the blame to him in my mind.


It seems like you have more of a problem with where the series went as opposed to where it is today.
Meh, I see where it is today as just part of where it is going (which includes where it went :p). I fully admit that part of it is my general lack of enthusiasm for JRPG's in general, and I think I would have a more favorable look on FFVII had I only played it once when it came out and not again seven years afterward. Same with VIII, and I never played IX again (I did play X twice and found the game very "meh" both times except for the battle system). I also get that one reason I can probably play through IV so much is it's so tied with nostalgia that I don't care if it's old, it makes me happy. I do think that general pacing, gameplay, and music are better than most stuff today though. :p



and finally Motomu who is basically their protege.

but he was who put in all the little events and mini-games which were a large reason of what made FFVII possibly the best-paced game in the series. Too bad he didn't do that for his newest game... :(
Should this be true, I have another person to not like. :D I really can't stand mini-games in RPG's.

[Loony BoB]

You must adore XIII then ;)

[Wolf Kanno]

but that's the side of the game he was responsible for in FFV and presumably FFVI. I thought Nomura and Itou handled the battles well in VII and VIII, respectively. My main issue with battle systems starting with VI is that series began to take a nose dive into easy street for my taste, for all their customization, the game as a whole can't throw anything at you that you can't curb stomp two seconds flat unless you purposely handicap yourself.

As for Kitase, I feel that bringing a cinematic quality to the series was a right move but I feel that lately the series has been taking it too far, and I find myself more often playing FF games with my controller on the ground while I sit and watch the actions going on. Even in the battle systems of XIII, I sorta felt a major disconnect from my input to what is going on in the screen. Like a press of the button leads to canned awesomness and I don't even need to be strategic anymore, just press a few buttons or hit auto battle and let the visual feast unfold before me.

I don't shell out $60 to play a slightly interactive movie, if I wanted to do that I would watch cable and get my "gameplay" from switching to other shows during commercials and trying to see if I can time it back for film coming back on air. I feel Kitase's titles usually have flat gameplay to them and I partially blame it on more focus being on the story and the visuals used to tell it but sometimes I feel its excessive (VIII, X, and XIII).



but he was who put in all the little events and mini-games which were a large reason of what made FFVII possibly the best-paced game in the series. Too bad he didn't do that for his newest game... :(

I can't find a source anywhere that says he did any of that. Event Planner to me, sounds like a person who helps with translating the scenes from a script into the game format. Someone who is more likely to tell you where the camera is suppose to be for this shot rather than, let's add a racing game here. I feel this is more likely since some sources have said he was the Story Even Planner for VII instead of just Event Planner so I feel its more likely his role had more to do with the story than thinking up game content.



You know I heard it was the other way around in something Tim Rogers wrote, but I wouldn't really put too much stock in his insight... And your VI example kinda shows what it is.

I read it in a few articles back in the day but who knows, things might be changing and the articles could have been on fringe elements rather than the standard, and simply confused the two. It just struck me as being quite amusing.

Reading some background information about what goes on in development for some Japanese games, it sounds like this is usually the case. I feel where the articles I read might be incorrect is in how Western Games are produced cause most of the successful series I know seem to follow the "group development" style as well so who knows.

[Rase]

You must adore XIII then ;)
Dunno, haven't played it for more than an hour. I've mess around some with the later game stuff on a friends file and did enjoy the combat; I dunno if I could stand the 20+ hours to get to that though. :p Busy playing Etrian Odyssey III and League of Legends.

[Jessweeee♪]

FFXIII prioritizes the story before all else. This makes the game awesome for those who enjoy it (myself for example), and not so much for those who don't. I think it's that sort of thing that people are viewing as a "problem."

Games such as Hotel Dusk that present themselves as novels tend to have a very small (but very devoted) fanbase, while games like Sonic the Hedgehog that are like "okay you are a blue hedgehog now run and jump on :bou::bou::bou::bou:" are massively popular. Both are excellent games, but the more story driven something is, the narrower of an audience it will appeal to. A lot of people like running around and jumping like an idiot in a game, but some people would prefer to do that as a flower girl while some would prefer to do that as a warrior of ultimate do-gooding.

[Wolf Kanno]

The problem isn't simply just the lack of game content, its also the fact the story isn't that good. At least for me, I played through the Xenosaga series and I actually like Episode 2 which is designed similar to XIII in the fact its just constant rails and corridors, little customization, and very minor sidequests that don't really open up until the end of the game or usually in small windows of opportunity. The game design is terrible but I still like the game cause I like the story, even if it was the weakest in the bunch.

XIII has been nailed a lot for its terrible game design but it has also been equally nailed for its bad plot, its terrible pacing, cliched cast of characters and terrible plot twists and deus ex machinas, its not just a one sided issue. The games plot is a mess, it has some great moments, don't get me wrong but they are frighteningly few and damn near non-existent after the 8th chapter.

Secondly, its fine for a game like Hotel Dusk or Phoenix Wright or Heavy Rain to sacrifice game play for storytelling, that's their genres. FF is an RPG and for the most part until the recent generation and part of the last console generation, RPGs have tended to have several gameplay options. Transforming FF into a visual novel with a battle system after years as an RPG was not really the best of design choices. I don't think I've ever known a genre of gaming to work better by reducing the amount of options. With the better technology that systems have, you think developers would be doing everything in there power to use it to its fullest by allowing the player to have greater options and depth of game. XIII is an incredibly underwhelming RPG in that regard, hell even FFX was able to to throw out a few new tricks and show off what the PS2 could do back in the day and that should be saying something coming from me.

[Loony BoB]

XIII has been nailed a lot for its terrible game design but it has also been equally nailed for its bad plot, its terrible pacing, cliched cast of characters and terrible plot twists and deus ex machinas, its not just a one sided issue. The games plot is a mess, it has some great moments, don't get me wrong but they are frighteningly few and damn near non-existent after the 8th chapter.
On the contrary, while a number of people didn't like the plot (mostly the ending, it should be noted, rather than the entire plot) and certainly many criticised the lack of things to do in the game, the lack of typical towns, the lack of interaction... the characters were arguably the most praised aspect of the game. Pacing is something that was both good and bad for me in the game. It was good in how they paced the story but it would have been better if there were other things to do besides story/battle. But the way the story moved forward for me was pretty damned good. Although I suppose you could say the pacing of the supposed "tutorial" was pretty horrific. :p

XIII's characters were no more cliché than any of the previous FF's. The only reason they might feel cliché on some level is if someone were to point out that "but we've already seen this before". But the same could be said for characters in every recent FF. That's because of course you've seen them before. Every character can be boxed up into a personality type these days. Tough male, tough female, wussy male, wussy female, intellectual male, intellectual female, etc. So long as there are personalities, they will to some extent be considered cliché by someone who has played a large number of games because by that point you've seen so many characters that it's easy to pigeon-hole them. However, I actually thought XIII's characters broke the mould pretty well. They added far more male characteristics to both Lightning and Fang than they did to any of the males. The characters developed very well, and for the most part were multi-layered, which for me made them, well, much more believable I suppose. They seemed to react to their situation far more realistically than any group of characters had before.

Your criticisms don't seem to be on par with most of the more universal criticisms I noted during the XIII backlash. Perhaps this is due to the sheer number of games you've played making you see things differently to most people - particularly with things that are to do with characters and story. When you "read" video game stories over, more often than not they are the same as something that's been done before. So it's only the first time you play one of those types of stories that they are interesting. Sadly, making completely new storylines with no similarities to previous stories in hundreds of RPGs is something that is very difficult to do, likewise for characters. I think XIII did a decent enough job.

[Jessweeee♪]

The problem isn't simply just the lack of game content, its also the fact the story isn't that good. At least for me, I played through the Xenosaga series and I actually like Episode 2 which is designed similar to XIII in the fact its just constant rails and corridors, little customization, and very minor sidequests that don't really open up until the end of the game or usually in small windows of opportunity. The game design is terrible but I still like the game cause I like the story, even if it was the weakest in the bunch.

Yes, this is what I meant :confused:

The more a game has to offer outside of the plot, the easier it is to enjoy a game with a plot you happen to dislike. It becomes a problem when you do not like the plot and there's not much else to experience. I enjoyed FFXIII's plot, and now it is one of my favorite games. If you do not like the plot of Hotel Dusk, you stop playing. I'm not saying that this in itself means that being purely story driven is a bad thing, what I am saying is that it is simply going to appeal to fewer people.

[Flying Arrow]

The problem isn't simply just the lack of game content, its also the fact the story isn't that good.

Bingo. It's got some solid back story, but other than that it's just awful. I'd go so far as to say it's objectively terrible. That is, that one can't defend how poorly told it is (the Datalog contradicting the cutscenes is damning in and of itself) and how shallow the characters are. The entire endgame was near gibberish.


FF is an RPG and for the most part until the recent generation and part of the last console generation, RPGs have tended to have several gameplay options. Transforming FF into a visual novel with a battle system after years as an RPG was not really the best of design choices. I don't think I've ever known a genre of gaming to work better by reducing the amount of options. With the better technology that systems have, you think developers would be doing everything in there power to use it to its fullest by allowing the player to have greater options and depth of game. XIII is an incredibly underwhelming RPG in that regard, hell even FFX was able to to throw out a few new tricks and show off what the PS2 could do back in the day and that should be saying something coming from me.

This is my big issue, too. I feel as if the vast majority of JRPGs that have come out since the release of the PS2 have actually managed to make themselves feel smaller than their PS1 siblings, FF included (minus XII). XIII tried to be a "Western" game or "FPS" or whatever the excuse was - this is ridiculous. There is a huge market for big games. Oblivion, Fallout, Dragon Age, and GTA should be the competition for FF, not Uncharted and Call of Duty. My experience with RPGs is that, first and foremost, I played them for the sense of high adventure and discovery, and not simply the plot or convoluted battle mechanics. Creating a shallow gameworld with nothing else to see or do outside of what is on the screen at that moment is basically gutting an RPG.

[Jessweeee♪]

FFXIII tried to be FPS? the smurf.

[Depression Moon]

“We are aiming for a vibe while playing that is similar to the experience of an FPS style game, where the player rapidly progresses through a series of dramatic events and experiences one after the other on an imposing and atmospheric battlefield.” (http://www.gamestooge.com/2010/02/22/toriyama-final-fantasy-xii-is-like-an-fps/)

[Jessweeee♪]

Oh, I see. Out of context it sounded weird.

[kotora]

Well they fucking failed at it. Unless they had those retarded on-rails shooters in mind when they said FPS (which are probably more popular in Japan than here).

[VeloZer0]

That was my first impression when I played it. On-rails RPG. New genre :D

[Wolf Kanno]

On the contrary, while a number of people didn't like the plot (mostly the ending, it should be noted, rather than the entire plot) and certainly many criticised the lack of things to do in the game, the lack of typical towns, the lack of interaction... the characters were arguably the most praised aspect of the game.

I'll take the "arguably" aspect of your quote and mention how there are several dedicated "why is this character a putz?" threads in the XIII forums that still have been getting activity lately for four out of the six cast members.

Hope alone has joined the ranks of Squall, Quina, and Cloud as Love/Hate with both sides of the debate being very passionate about how they feel about him and those debates have been going on since before the game even came out. The one thing some people have agreed is that even though the character development is good, the pacing leading up to it was terrible and the focus on the characters is mostly dropped after Chapter 9 in favor of the games cringe worthy plot.

Even in reviews, I've seen the plot and cast have been heavily criticized half of the time by the reviewers. So I would not agree that the cast is common ground for agreement and consensus.


Pacing is something that was both good and bad for me in the game. It was good in how they paced the story but it would have been better if there were other things to do besides story/battle. But the way the story moved forward for me was pretty damned good. Although I suppose you could say the pacing of the supposed "tutorial" was pretty horrific. :p I generally hated the games pacing, despite starting off with some action, I felt the first three Chapters dragged on and took forever to get to the bloody point. This was made more excruciating cause if you've read a short synopsis of the game, the first three chapters can be easily summarized in two paragraphs but instead expanded to several hours of mind numbing time wasters trying to masquerade as character development.

Chapter 4-6 is good for set up but once again I felt the chapters are far too long and the story and events too simple to be stretched out as long as they were. These were also the chapters that made me start to hate Vanille, Lightning, and Hope. 7 and 8 are probably the best chapters in the game but at the same time, that's not saying much cause the previous six chapters I felt were not so great and half of the content was unnecessary for both plot and character development, just characters rambling on about the same stuff from a previous chapter like a damn broken record. The plot begins and dies in Chapter 9 with a terrible plot twist and then the rest of the games story was mostly a waste of time that added nothing for the characters, world, or story.

I'm not even going into the games terrible gameplay pacing which was frankly much worse than the story aspect.



XIII's characters were no more cliché than any of the previous FF's. The only reason they might feel cliché on some level is if someone were to point out that "but we've already seen this before". But the same could be said for characters in every recent FF. That's because of course you've seen them before. Every character can be boxed up into a personality type these days. Tough male, tough female, wussy male, wussy female, intellectual male, intellectual female, etc. So long as there are personalities, they will to some extent be considered cliché by someone who has played a large number of games because by that point you've seen so many characters that it's easy to pigeon-hole them.

However, I actually thought XIII's characters broke the mold pretty well. They added far more male characteristics to both Lightning and Fang than they did to any of the males. The characters developed very well, and for the most part were multi-layered, which for me made them, well, much more believable I suppose. They seemed to react to their situation far more realistically than any group of characters had before.I agree that 99% of all game characters are cliche and because of that its easy to pigeon hole them, but what I would like to point out is that there is a difference between cliche and archetype when I use the words. Archetypes are the mold that all game characters borrow from, the "tough guy, wussy guy" as you put it. They are stock traits created to give a sense of familiarity but the most important thing about them is they are starting points for an author to use and expand upon so he can make the archetypes into more individual beings. The point being that they are suppose to grow beyond the archetype.

A cliche, in the sense of how I use the word to describe characters. (Before the language nazi's drop in and give me the correct Webster definition of Cliche I know what is actually means but its a nice easy word with a good dose of negativity imbued into that its easier to change the meaning of the word rather than to look up a more colorful and accurate word to describe, so smurf you and your Dictionary, I don't give a smurf and this is how language changes in human history so get off you high horse and shut the smurf up) is a character that never moves beyond that archetype and can be interchangeable with anyone who follows said archetype. They lack good development and never become anything more than started. I don't mind archetypes, I can't really stand cliches, because they make the story very predictable and they simply regurgitate what you've already known and experienced.

Vanille starts the game as the kooky girl with a dark secret just like Yuffie and Rikku and she ends the game like that. She never stops in the story and realizes that maybe acting like ditz is not appropriate and thus changes to show maturity, she basically acts like a nutjob, reveals she caused all the problems for the rest of the party, cries a few times and then goes back to being a kooky nutjob. Its hard not feel like her "growth" is shallow at best. Especially since you could swipe her with Yuffie and Rikku and get the same result. The situations are different but the character never diverts.

Lightning is Squall with a vagina, dealing with a similar problem and sadly the extent of her growth is similar in that it involved a very awkward 180 degree turn that sorta steals the characters mojo afterwards. Lightning's revelation that she's been an angry bitch and a bad mentor to Hope, not only comes out of nowhere for her character but her motherly nature afterwards is uneasy and downright creepy. Much like Squall's rather awkward lovey-dovey feelings towards Rinoa in VIII. The only good that came of her growth afterwards is that she was nicer to Snow but looking at the anti-Snow threads I would say some fans feel that would be a negative thing. There is change but I kind feel like there really isn't much to Lightning. She shuts herself off and becomes the soldier type shutting out her sister and then later realizes she's been a bitch

I don't feel Fang really has any character growth, she's basically Paine out of her goth stage and smiles more but unlike Paine, Fang doesn't really change. she's overprotective of Vanille and she hates the l'Cie and that never really changes through the whole story, sure she says she hates Cocoon and puts up a front but I feel its way too obvious that she's putting on a front and the game proved me right. Even seeing her village a wasteland doesn't garner a real emotional response from her and her one major moment in the ending felt more like a desperate ploy to garner sympathy from the player than as a real test of character development.

Hope... well I've made my rants on Hope but I would like to point out that despite him being a rip off of another character, that's not what bothers me about him. Its the fact he's a crappy rip-off of another character that bugs me. He's overly whiny and emotional til chapter 5 and then becomes poster child of optimism. He's got the most extreme emotional changes out of the whole cast which just feels far fetched. Its like the kids being pumped up with uppers and downers between chapters and I haven't seen such a grossly improportioned display of angst since the Real World on MTV. Yes, he has the most extreme circumstances but I don't feel his reaction was accurate to his circumstances. Maybe its just 5 wasted years on a Psychology degree that went no where but I felt half the time he was being too emotional and the other half of the time he wasn't being emotional enough.

I feel only Sahz is the most realistic character but sadly he's mostly background comic relief outside of the two chapter about him. Which is a shame but to be fair the whole cast gets the shaft after Chapter 9 as their personal feelings and struggles are no longer important to the games story. Most of the character development is dropped except for a few terrible and irrelevant ones for Vanille and Fang.

In regards to most of the cast, I felt the Datalog told their story better than they conveyed in the cutscenes and often I would ask myself after reading the Datalog summary for a chapter if it was for the same game, as I felt many of the greater emotional growth the characters reportedly had according to the Datalogs was annoyingly absent and poorly shown in the scenes. The fact the Datalog gave the player information the cutscenes didn't feel were important enough to talk about was a terrible oversight by the author.



However, I actually thought XIII's characters broke the mold pretty well. They added far more male characteristics to both Lightning and Fang than they did to any of the males. The characters developed very well, and for the most part were multi-layered, which for me made them, well, much more believable I suppose. They seemed to react to their situation far more realistically than any group of characters had before.
I would disagree as stated above. ;)



Your criticisms don't seem to be on par with most of the more universal criticisms I noted during the XIII backlash. Perhaps this is due to the sheer number of games you've played making you see things differently to most people - particularly with things that are to do with characters and story. When you "read" video game stories over, more often than not they are the same as something that's been done before. So it's only the first time you play one of those types of stories that they are interesting. Sadly, making completely new storylines with no similarities to previous stories in hundreds of RPGs is something that is very difficult to do, likewise for characters. I think XIII did a decent enough job.As I stated above, I don't feel the story/character situation is not as positive as you think it is.

As for your other point, to get back to my point about archetypes and cliches. I don't mind archetypes, I don't mind stock characters, as long as a I see meaningful and satisfactory growth. Fang and Vanille are cliches but I would agree that Hope, Snow, and Lightning had growth and grew slightly out of their archetpyes but for them I felt it was poor development cause they don't stray too far and I never felt it was satisfactory. Lightning does some badass stunts but I never felt she grew to be a likable character, the same goes for Snow. Hope is sort of an oddity, he's a much more likable character by then end of the game but that's because anything was better than his mopey and whiny attitude in the beginning so anything was going to be an improvement so while obnoxious to less obnoxious is good growth it still doesn't jump the hurtle of making him a a likable and relate able character.

Yet I would point to Persona 3 as a title that borrows heavily from the cliches and archetypes seen in high school themed anime shows and despite every character falling into a very predictable and overused archetype, in the course of the game, they all grow and become something close to human by the end, they all have meaningful growth, and if The Answer was proof of anything its that the events of P3 had a profound effect on their lives. Something I don't feel I can say the same of XIII's cast.

I also felt P3 handled the revelation of impending death and inescapable fate more realistically than XIII's cast. The game structure itself allowed for the player to feel it as well, once again, XIII tried to tackle something that's been done before but where I feel it really fails is not in its lack of novelty but its lack of creating its own spin on the subject and being overshadowed by Persona 3, RG Veda, and X/1999. Its the stories inability execute its point well that is the main problem. I never really felt so bad for their situation nor could I feel the conflict with their Focus. Their personal stories have their moments but I often felt the growth wasn't on par with the fantastic situation they found themselves in. I was expecting some more soul searching and evaluation and less blind optimism.

[P4ine]

no

[Del Murder]

A more appropriate reply to one WK's rants I've never seen. :lol:

[Loony BoB]

Summed up my thoughts pretty well, actually. I just outright disagree with a lot of the assessments being made. Where you see clichés, I see what you call archetypes. Where you see shallow development, I see deep development. I would personally find someone going from one extreme to the other to be annoying - something you associated with Hope, and on him I'll agree. I feel that, despite him being by far the best "wussy character" I've seen in the FF series nearer the start, that at the end he was annoying when he suddenly decided to be all "Hi, I'm that kid who everyone will say is the future President, I make lots of speeches and whatnot". That to me is too much development, and too typical. I prefer the more subtle developments that we see in Vanille. I don't feel she gets too little development. I feel she got it just right. Sure, she goes back to being what she was like at the start - but only in personality traits. To have her be a completely different person would be to betray reality - reality to me says that when a person grows up in a way that she did with regards to running away from everything and hiding everything through to being an open and more courageous person, she doesn't need to change her personality while she's at it. I've grown up a lot over the years and have learned a lot of lessons but I don't think that means I need to be a completely different personality. I can still laugh despite having downtimes, etc. This is good development, this is realistic (unlike Hope). I feel the others have similarly good development going for them (again, exception being Hope from chapter 11 onwards).

But oh well. You see things very differently to me. I'm not sure why that is but everyone will always have an opinion. I will say though that while you point out that there are a few threads criticising characters in the forums, that happens for every game, regardless of how good it is. What I noticed though, particularly after recently finishing the game and therefore being more able to actively discuss it, is that people were constantly posting about how well done the characters were, which is not something I remember happening for X or XII when I was at a similar stage of actively posting in those forums. I feel that people really enjoyed these characters. Sure, something like 50% will dislike them, as is standard - but those that did like them seemed to think it was a significantly better job than most previously liked sets of characters before this game. During my time posting in the forum I guess I felt that it was the most commonly praised area of the game. What area did you feel was praised more?

[Wolf Kanno]

I disagree with Vanille, not so much on the point she needed to have a personality change as I agree its not always necessary to show great strides of maturity but I also felt like she never really learned anything.

After confronting Sazh about her involvement in everything and how she was a coward for running away, she speaks afterwards about how she won't lie to people anymore and won't run away from her fears and problems but just a few chapters later we have her being called out on lying to Fang because of her fears "she wasn't going to run away from anymore" so that to me tells me she didn't grow at all since we're dealing with the same problem as before.Even in the ending when Fang is being tortured, she pretty much just stands there doing nothing when this could have been a moment of meaningful growth which instead is squandered for an 11th hour sympathy ploy by the writers. I just don't see any growth in her, just a kooky girl who occasionally gets melancholic cause she's the source of all of your parties problems. I'm not asking for her to grow up and act mature, I just find it counter productive for her to say she learned her lesson and she turns around and does it again or just blindly sitting there when a great opportunity for her to finally show the party and the player she's no longer going to sit around and let everyone take care of her.

As for what I felt was most praised when the game first came out, I would say its the battle system. Most people really liked it until several hours in when it finally sets in that this is it. I myself would say the battle system is the best part of the game even if I felt it left much to be desired as I found it to be a more streamlined (and generally dumbed down version) of XII's system except with a majority of its customization and player control stripped from it. It was an interesting take on tactical fighting and it was entertaining but I simply wanted more. In a way, I felt like XII and XIII should have changed because XIII's system felt more like the missing link between X and XII rather than being the evolution of XII's system. Course this all should be taken with a grain of salt cause its not like XII's combat was universally loved either.

Overall, I felt XIII's reaction was mostly mixed, some liked the battle system and hated everything else, some liked certain characters while others reviled them, plot is kinda up in the air as their hasn't really been a real thread about the story since it came out but that has more to do with XIII being character driven (or at least th good part of the plot). Most people hated the dungeon/world design except a few who genuinely never care for that part of the game. Really, I felt the fan reaction on the forum was much more mixed than definitive on anything, much the same as the reaction of XII four years ago.

[sharkythesharkdogg]

I'll revive a dead thread, and add my .02 cents from the quiet person.

I think JRPGs have become victims of advancements in technology. What I've realized about myself, and probably some of the other older gamers is that we grew up with less is more. I'm a big reader. I'll almost always enjoy the book more than the movie.

The older rpgs were a perfect blend of a book and a movie to me. An interactive book. There were no voice overs, so the voices were the ones I created in my head. I was never distracted by a voice that I found annoying or one that I wouldn't have used. They didn't really have the ability to create lengthy in game movie sequences, so we created them ourselves. Now if the voices or music or cut scene isn't quite what I would have expected, instead of drawing me in, it pushed me out. I remember I'm only playing a game, and I loose that immersion.

As gaming systems progress, and become more powerful, they're assuming a dominant role in the rpgs. I feel less like I'm helping create the characters and the story in the new games, and more like I'm watching a movie. An interactive movie.

Since they started adopting more automated battle systems, longer cut scenes, and things of that nature, I don't thing it's absolutely a bad thing because they have to keep things fresh. I think it's just taken the games in a direction where I feel less like part of the story and more of an observer. The stories and characters have always been similar from game to game. It's just that we as gamers filled in the story details and fleshed out the characters more with our own personalities and experiences. That made the games more personal. Now that many of those things are being handled by the game itself, if they don't happen to coincide with what we would have done, it's harder to feel as involved with the experience.

I think I enjoyed the older ones more 1) due to nostalgia but, 2) because I felt more involved.

On a side note, I think the music for the games peaked during the snes, ps1 era and has at best maintained. With a few exceptions, the music from the old games seemed to draw me in more.

[Wolf Kanno]

Not to beat a dead horse but this was an amusing article I found...

Square-Enix On RDR: "Oh No, We Can't Compete With That" - PS3 News (http://www.psxextreme.com/ps3-news/8406.html)

Apparently sandbox games intimidate Squenix... isn't that adorable... :love:

[kotora]

Maybe it's just too hard to make an open world in HD??