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Originally Posted by Ishin Ookami
While Relm wasnt much use in the final battle, her sketch command can be very fun and useful. and Umaro was actually the guy who landed the killing blow on Kefka first time in, give him a green cherry and he just dominates.
Oh, she was fun. I'm still not much of a fan of Umaro, though.
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physical ability doesnt mean a thing to a person who vaporizes mythical beasts with the wave of his pinky. Even the most well conditioned martial artist is no match for projectile weaponry. The weapons in FFVII had the power to destory, their in game descriptions matches the tone if not content of how the espers were described, yet what were major battles for your party, a party who at that point was already strong enough to take down seph and jenova, Kefka was laughed, and waved his hand. This was BEFORE becoming a god mind you. I dont have to imagine anything or breath anything into the story to know who was the more powerful. as for the whole advanced tech argument, the empire had advanced tech too mind you, and they got smacked down by the espers... who were effortless slaughtered by who again?
Physical ability still does mean quite a bit. Energy is energy, no matter what form it's delivered to a target in. Whether a kilojoule of energy is directed against a target in the form of a fireball or a hammer swing, it's going to have roughly the same effect, except if a person is more vulnerable to one type of damage than the other. Kefka is not that adept physically. He also hardly vaporized them with "a wave of his pinky"; Kefka did expend effort to destroy the Espers. Not that offing them wasn't a mighty accomplishment or anything, but he didn't do it that easily. As for the technology, the Empire's machines are hardly comparable to Shinra's.
The weapons in VII were also far more powerful than Espers, considering that at the stage of Kefka's development where he beats them, a comparatively low-level party can defeat him, and none of VI's party members display anywhere near the level of physical strength that Cloud does, and judging by that, they also lack the magical prowess of Aeris or Red XIII. Kefka's certainly a formidable force after he's stolen the power of the statues, but he doesn't compare to Sephiroth's god-form.
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Under that brainwashing how many people did she kill? We see her as a young adult slaughtering trained soldiers at kefka's whim, not cid's. Cid was responsible for creating Magitek warriors, it was implied that terra's upbringing was left to the emperor, kefka, and various operations she performed with the slave crown. One must wonder how many more died as kefka and the Emperor played with their human toy.
Probably a lot of people died. It's quite tragic, but she was not tortured. Torture trumps everything.
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While clouds hometown getting smoked was tragic, I still feel it lacks the power of cyans debut. Cyan watched his people die before him. One by one. He saw his wife and daughter breathe their last breath while most of the deaths in nibelhelm occurred off camera. Cyan later saw his family again as their souls left for the land of the dead, further driving home the fact that he had failed to protect them and that he would never see them again.
I won't deny that it ached to see Cyan's family getting on the Phantom Train. Cyan was actually there to watch his family die; this is roughly equaled by the fact that Sephiroth was Cloud's hero. Seeing what happened to Cloud would be like if George Lucas took a hacksaw and murdered my entire family.
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He literally came out and said it himself that he wanted to die, that he deserved to die. wrexsoul stated that cyans self loathing was what drew him and that this was what cyan wanted. Destruction for his failure.
I forgot why that was relevant, honestly.
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I disagree, It took a while for feelings to develop between them. Locke really first noticed celes at the opera house when she was all dolled up and even went so far as to play leading man to her leading lady once ultros buggered things up. Its true she did feel gratitude towards him for protecting her initially. But gratitude isnt romance, but can lead to it. Her chilly response to Edgar's assumption that she might have feelings for him shows where her thoughts were at the time. Celes also didnt so much love locke in the world of ruin, but didnt want to be alone. Hence her suicide attempt. After finding that eagle with lockes headband she realized others had survived and that she wasnt as alone as she thought. It wasnt until the end where it was implied that the subtle feelings developing between eachother would be consumated off camera, the way the ending Dramatis Personelle lists their names together, and how locke had found closure with rachael after having used the pheonix magicite and forgiven himself and the somewhat tender moment after he saves her from falling. Like I said, subtle, but touching. Locke's learning to love again, and Celes being torn down from independant soldier to someone who sincerely couldnt stand to be alone complimented eachother, and built very slowly.
I'd like Celes, too. She's a cutie pie. She'd probably kick my ass, but I'd hit on her. But their romance does seem a bit contrived. Given Cloud's history, the love triangle he deals with is not only a realistic expectation, but vital to his development.
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Again, disagree. FFVII did have its moments, I liked yuffie and vincent. RedXIII and CId, but the rest of the main cast had just been done before. like I keep saying, the idea of terra wanting to know love and finding it not in romance but in something more basic and central to her character was very fitting. Cyans tale of self destructive guilt and anger was also very poignant.
Most casts of most stories have been done before, to an extent. Every hero has problems. Cloud's history easily surpasses many in terms of the associated degree of mental agony, but Barret, despite being a gun-toting badass, is just as conscientious as Cyan; he wouldn't be fighting Shinra if he wasn't. He's hardly just a clone of Mr. T, though he has the bling for it. Barret's town was also razed in Shinra's destructive pursuit of power. He lost his best friend in that incident, only to have to lose him to suicide all over again years later.
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Even Setzer, the gambler had a few good moments and his backstory had a very likeable sense of irony, furthered by the hints that the mimic you find on triangle island could very well be Daryl. Edgar and Sabin's backstory was amusing, espescially when you find that Edgar cheated Sabin out of the kingdom, yet became quite the responsible king. Gau's backstory while sweet, touching, and brief also allowed for Terra and Celes to get in some rare and much needed comedic moments, or is the humor of the poster girls of angst and depression in full girlish shopping mode and ready to tear any man who mocks their shopping spree apart lost on you? And the opera scene itself I consider glorious. Perhaps it's just my fascination with the old school opera, but the oil painiting feel and music was nothing less than perfect in setting a mood. Even shadow, managed to get in some actual character development whereas his oppisite number in FFVII, vincent, remains very much the same as he's always been for the past eight years. FFVI is the better story hands down. Its twists are more clever, its characters are more complicated, its villains more loathsome and its plot progression more unpredictable. Also as a game it had more depth, more replay value, harder bosses and more interesting side quests.
Never said they weren't generally good characters. But I'd venture that Cloud is easily more complicated than the lot of them combined. He's hardly filled with "pseudo-angst"; he has very real and very large issues. He isn't Squall, either; he cares about other people without having a gun at his head. However, his story was not fully resolved in FFVII; hence, Advent Children. I'd also hardly say VI's twists were more clever; finding out you were being manipulated never goes over well with a character, but it's hard to see the sheer scale of Cloud's manipulation coming. The twists in most Final Fantasy games can be foreseen to a degree; they have to have an evil plot to foil, they have to have a catastrophe, and they have to have some kind of identity crisis. It was fairly hard not to see that something bad was going to happen to Aeris after she left the party, but she's a lovable and honorable character, so much that people actually refused to believe she had died and spent years trying to resurrect her. None of VI's characters engendered that kind of attachment, not even General Leo.
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where characters like Cyan, Relm, Edgar, Terra, Locke, and most of the cast of FFVI are cut from the heroic model.. I can see a certain audiance being drawn to him rather then the more old school heroic modelled characters of FFVI.
VI's characters are indeed more old-school than VII's cast, but it's hard to argue that Cloud isn't a hero after what he manages to do. It's also possible that this phenomenon occurs simply because VI's environment is more old-school than VII's sci-fi dystopia.
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But part of the appeal of FFVI's cast is despite their pedigree as far as regular characters go, they struggled against some seriously awful issues and saw the end of the world and lived through hell on earth, and embodied the concept of hope and dreams and rebuilding from tradgedy while cloud and co. simply went through the motions of similar drama.
I'm not sure how it's possible to "go through the motions" of a quest to save the world. The end of the world does come after a fashion in the end of VII, as well.
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It could have been, but it was handled effectively. Would you rather her fall hopelessly in love with one of the main characters(note, since when has this NOT happened in a Nomura title)? or have her forge an emotional attatchment with those who have had their families taken away from them just like she did, and protect them in a way that she never was? the former is cliche, the latter actually has some emotional resonnance and leads to some creative character development.
I don't mind love stories, but Terra was handled well with regards to her character. I still think she deserves a d00d, though. Or a chick, if she swings that way. Or maybe both. Green-haired girls are hot.
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Agreed, and thats what bloody well galls me, the plot of a movie is whack yet its given 95%? This isnt a video game where we play to have fun, Ive overlooked weak or lacking plots for the sake of good gameplay. But in a movie, if the plot sucks then the movie sucks, I dont care how cool the action is. Then PSXUK says the story is "SPECTACULAR". Like hell I know sephiroth fangirls who spit on the plot of AC but watch it just to ogle Bishonen. and considering that EGM is releasing a new 100 best games of all time in next weeks release, I fully expect to see FFVI lose its spot as the top ranked FF title (it got ranked #6 five years ago) and also see FFIX lose its spot as the top ranked 32-bit title and see FFVII all over the place considering how since they got restaffed they've been kissing FFVII's ass.
If the magazine was downplaying VII, it can expect to receive a backlash due to the game's massive fanbase. Some of them will have better reasons than others for it. I can certainly understand if someone chooses to rank VI or IX above VII. They're both excellent games. However, if it's done merely to spite the most popular entry, it doesn't fly either logically or with the fanbase. The purpose of the magazine is to sell subscriptions. Unfortunately, I wouldn't know what specifically they were doing, since I don't read EGM regularly.
