EoFF Final Fantasy Census 2010! REVELATIONS!!!!

Yeah yeah... so a few months ago I got bored and made the mistake of doing a giant Census of the FF series using the forum as a guinea pig right around the time of finals. So, I learned my mistake and formed a committee of volunteers who will now also fail pre-chem cause they are too busy trying to decipher the meaning of ballots, and throwing out others cause you people can't follow instructions. :mad:

So long story short, we came up with the first half of a "bi-annual" survey on the FF series and learn what the people of FF want to see more of. It will have more facts and statistics cause luckily my colleagues actually keep track of that stuff more than I would. :p

So thanks to the help of VeloZer0, Vivi22, and Flying Arrow; I now present to you the second EoFF survey!

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First Part
- First FF Played
- Latest FF Played
- Country of Origin
- Longest Played FF
- Age
- Sex
Second Part
- Favorite story
- Favorite plot twist
- Favorite ending
- Best writing
- Favorite character
- Favorite comedic relief
- Favorite villain
- Favorite evil empire
- Favorite world
- Favorite overall cast

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As you can tell, we've dropped the number scheme entirely cause most of you people obviously live in Florida. :p Instead, it is a write in ballot but luckily you are not required to write at length why you made your choice just simply its name. Though we would like a break from monotony occasionally so I strongly suggest writing your reasoning for the sake of our sanity and it gives us more stuff to post. All entries will be anonymous and confidential. ;)

Please send your census entries to me by Mognet. The deadline for the survey will be a month from now. An official deadline will be posted shortly.

The rest of this thread will be used for questions and speculation. Also, please bug other people on the forum about this. We are trying to beat our old record. ;)

EDIT: I can't believe I forgot this, but I wish to also thank Goldenboko, Del Murder, and Levian for their contributions to creating and helping with the Census. ;)

I don't know if I should post my speculation as I should probably be impartial, but since FFXIII will probably sweep every category it doesn't matter anyway.

Also, I just want to put everyone on notice that if they don't complete the census, Thor will be coming for them. Says so in my sig so it must be true. And he's a bit of a moody god, so I don't think anyone really wants that.

Does Final Fantasy Legend count as a Final Fantasy?

No. Cause its actually part of the Saga franchise and was only given the FF moniker in the West to sell units. It's not a real FF title I'm afraid.

What's longest played thing mean like what game have you put the most time into or how long have you been playing FF?

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Originally Posted by Freya

What's longest played thing mean like what game have you put the most time into or how long have you been playing FF?

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Was wondering about that too. I picked the one I did cause I've beat it the most times and clocked more hours in it. But I have a 127 hour save file on FFX which is the longest I've put into a single FF without restarting.

To clarify, longest played FF would be the one you've played the most in total. Also, because I realized that most recent FF played might be a little ambiguous (after re-reading Del Murders comments from a few months back when we were planning this that is), consider it to mean the most recent FF you've played for the first time. So if the last time you played an FF you had never played before was FFXIII, go with that. If it was picking up FFIV for the first time a week ago, that'd be your answer.

Everything else should be fairly straightforward, but if anyone wants more clarification on a category go ahead and ask.

Does this count sequels and spinoffs like The AFter Years and X-2?

Yes.

Also, if you have a specific version in mind other than the original you should indicate that as well.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

- Sex

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Yes, please.

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Originally Posted by Aerith's Knight

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

- Sex

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Yes, please.

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if you'll just bend over please

I've gotten a few entries in so far, but people we need more if we're going to be thorough, so keep them coming. :jess:

Finally did my survey. Now the rest of you do it!

Did mine a few days ago. :monster:

THERE it's done. Hope you're happy WK.

Isn't it too late?

No, we've been too busy with holidays and Ciddies to finalize everything so feel free to bring in your submissions or I will torture you with scantily clad pictures of Raistlin. :mad2:

Sorry I thought this was PM.

Just to let everyone know, we are still accepting submissions for this. So if you haven't already, feel free to reply cause we may end the submission faze in the near future. ;)

It's not really a census of 2010 if you're using results from 2011

And it isn't really a 2011 Car if it is sold in 2010. :p

We're closed. :)

Well, the numbers have been crunched, the alcohol has worn off, and the census committee has awaken from our long drunken celebration of a job well done, up until we realized we started the party a bit early and forgot to post the results. So I'm here to announce that results will finally be posted seeing as how we are not competing with any other event that I'm aware of.

Begin speculation...

Yay!

I reckon the most popular FF will prove to be FF:MQ. I fail to see how it could be anything else.

Results time bitches!

But it wouldn't be any fun to just blurt them out. We need to make you all suffer a bit as we drag this thing out for whole minutes. So before getting to the results of the voting in each category, we've got some tidbits of info here that were pulled from all of the data gathered by our top team of statistician monkeys (aka: Flying Arrow with a modest amount of help from moi):

33 people responded to the census, making voter turnout slightly better than the last Canadian election. Of those, the average age was 23 years old.
-18 (54.5%) were from North America
- 8 (24%) were from the UK
- There's nothing outside of North America and the UK therefore the other 7 people must have forgotten to put their nationality.
- 29 (87.9%) were males; 4 (12.1%) were that other sex created solely to nag the males.
- 63% of users who began playing FF in the SNES era began with FFIV
- 21 (63.6%) young whipper snappers began playing FF on the PSX, 11 starting with FFVII, 6 with FFVIII and 4 with FFIX
- Only one other person was awesome like me and either started, or at least owned up to starting with the series by playing Mystic Quest

Now because I'm not totally evil, I will give a few actual results. Going in reverse order just because I can:
Favourite Overall Cast
The winner here by what I found to be a surprisingly slim margin was FFVI with 10 votes (30.3%). Trailing very closely in second place was the also awesome and very deserving FFIX with 9 votes (27.3%) just barely missing out on a tie for first. Third place was FFVII with 5 votes, proving that 15.2% of respondents have no taste.

Favourite World:
This one resulted in a tie for first between two very deserving competitors, FFIX and Ivalice/XII each with 8 votes (24.2%). There was some controversy here as it's unclear whether those who voted for Ivalice specifically meant Tactics or the world across the entire Ivalice Alliance series of games, with the same confusion arising from the votes for XII. In the end though, we lumped them all together perhaps leaving it's standing at number 1 in question. Will these two duke it out again? Meh, probably not. But if they do it will be the battle of the century damn it. Following these two heavy weights of depth, culture and history was another tie between VII and X with 5 votes (15.2% each). Unless you buy the idea that they're directly connected, in which case VII/X just won!

More to come tomorrow if I'm not home to late. Pray for my swift victory (or defeat, whatever works) in a game of heroclix tomorrow night if you want more results before Thor's day. But to cap it off, here are the full standings for the two categories above:

Favourite Cast:
1) VI: 10 (30.3%)
2) IX: 9 (27.3%)
3) VII: 5 (15.2%)
4) IV: 2 (6.1%)
4) X: 2 (6.1%)
6) V: 1 (3%)
6) Tactics: 1 (3%)
6) VIII: 1 (3%)
6) XII: 1 (3%)
6) XIII: 1 (3%)

Favourite World:
1) IX: 8 (24.2%)
1) Ivalice/XII: 8 (24.2%)
2) VII: 5 (15.2%)
2) X: 5 (15.2%)
3) VI: 3 (9.1%)
3) VIII: 3 (9.1%)
4) XI: 1 (3%)

Glad to see FFIX getting due appreciation!

Also laughed at the FF:MQ thing. That wasn't even me! (SPOILER)I've never even played it

Meant to have more results up by now but a flu has been knocking me on my ass and kicking my teeth in. More to come tomorrow though whether I still feel like sleeping 25 hours a day or not.

I encourage you to destroy the flu with your mighty hammer of justice and return to us well to deliver more results!

I like the unbiased way the results were presented. :p

Let's see more!

I tried to be unbias, but I told Vivi22 he can be an ass if he wants, the man is sick and working, least I could do. :cool:

Well, I clearly didn't get more results up on Sunday like I wanted. I think Thor may have actually sided with the flu because Sunday I felt even worse and then missed the next two days of work. In fact, I still don't feel 100%, but I do feel well enough now to give you guys more results.

Later tonight that is, as I'm at work and don't have the time or the access to all of the info I need right now. But rest assured there will be actual results and plenty more bias tonight.

Who will win favourite evil empire? Will Cloud get the comedic relief award that he so desperately deserves? Will FFXIII win best writing? How should I know, the results are on my home computer. But anything could happen when you let the nut house inmates of this forum have a say in something.

Except for FFXIII getting best writing anyway. Pretty sure that will never happen.

It's late and I'm more tired than I thought I'd be right now so we'll do a quick set of results for now. It actually works out well because I'm a little light on supplementary stats for one of these two questions.

First up is favourite evil empire:
Coming in first by a wide margin was Shinra with 16 votes. A very distant second was FFXII's Arcadian Empire with 5 votes, and the Ghestalian Empire of FFVI pulling a respectable third place with 4 votes. Somewhat unsurprising is that 44% of people who named Shinra as the best evil empire had the misfortune of playing FFVII before any of it's far superior predecessors, while only one person played the even more underwhelming FFVIII as their first exposure to the series, showing they at least had the good sense to trade up in picking a favourite empire and didn't vote for that poopy Galbadian bunch.

Perhaps more surprising is that I agree with those who voted for Shinra though as it was my pick as well. But to explain why it's my pick, we'll look to the entry of the only person on the forum who consistently manages to out wall 'o text me.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

- Favorite evil empire - Shin-Ra, they took everything that made the Gestalhian Empire interesting, took it to the nth degree and was modernized into the modern types of empire we call corporations. Shin-Ra is the reason why I can't get behind Sephiroth as a great villain cause this organization just steals the show from him and before Sephiroth even appears on the screen in the game, Shin-Ra has already performed countless monstrosities that put everything Sephy does later to shame. Hell, we can blame Shin-Ra for Sephiroth so technically every bad thing he does is indirectly Shin-Ra's fault for making the monster in the first place. Even better is that Shin-Ra's Executives are all interesting characters with weird quirks and its a shame that people like Heidegger, Scarlet, and Palmer don't get equal billing as Rufus and Hojo do. The whole group was interesting and the best part of VII if you ask me.

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Next up we have one I'm sure everyone was looking forward to, Favourite Villain:

Here we find some of the best news of the whole census. Not only did Kefka come in first, he came in first with a full 20 votes. Runner up Sephiroth only managed 4. It gets more dismal for the competition after that as Kuja only managed 3 votes to snag third place. Now this is excellent news not only because actual best villain won, but because 20 of the census respondents gave me a reason not to kill them. All those that voted for Kefka can sleep soundly tonight knowing my murderous wrath has been partially abated.

Now for some interesting factoids relating to the favourite villain race:
-Of the people who voted for Kefka, only 1 (5%) had played FFVI as their first FF. The majority, 50%, had started with the series on the PSX, with 15% starting on the NES, 30% on the SNES and 5% on the PS2. It doesn't appear that nostalgia for peoples first FF entry played a large role in his winning, adding further weight to the argument that he is undeniably awesome.
-Of the people who voted for Sephiroth, 3 (75%) had played FFVII as their first FF title. Similarly, Sin, Don Corneo, and Genesis all got one vote from people who played their game or the game they appeared in a spinoff of first (FFX, FFVII, and FFVII CC respectively). Proving once and for all that nostalgia is just about the only thing that could keep people from recognizing the awesomeness of Kefka's badassity.

Here to try and defend their poor judgement in picking Sephiroth is another responders answer. Their name has been changed to protect their identity:

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Originally Posted by Boony LoB

- Favorite villain - Sephiroth. He just just done well in almost every way. I really liked him as a villain as he made you feel like you were actually up against this really powerful guy when you battled him.

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I'll take the guy who actually destroyed the world thanks.

And here are the final standings for each question:

Favourite Evil Empire:
1) Shinra: 16 votes
2) Arcadia: 5 votes
3) Ghestalian: 4 votes
4) Baron: 3 votes
4) Galbadian: 3 votes
6) Cocoon: 1 vote (really? Cocoon is your favourite? Ugh...)

Favourite Villain:
1) Kefka: 20 votes
2) Sephiroth: 4 votes
3) Kuja: 3 votes
4) Gilgamesh: 2 votes
5) Sin: 1 vote
5) Don Corneo: 1 vote
5) Genesis: 1 vote
5) Dr. Cid: 1 vote

Stay tuned for more this weekend.

Don Corneo was an option!? :eek:

This information is fantastic. I'm glad you aren't going to kill me, Kefka is certainly superior to everything else.

I can't even remember what other things we put votes in for, so it'll be exciting to see the results!

EDIT: And then put them on the wiki

Was it me who voted Cocoon for evil empire? I think I was going to, but changed my mind. Or I changed my mind after I already sent in my vote and couldn't be bothered to change it. Because Cocoon inhabitants are the victims of the the evil organization (who I would want to vote), and therefore shouldn't have even been a choice :confused:

But still, Cocoon gets you in a tizzy, but Genesis is fine and dandy? What? xD

To be fair, I was trying not to fall asleep at my keyboard when I typed that. Both suck quite a bit to be honest and I question the mental health of whoever voted for them.

I can't remember if you were the one who voted for Cocoon though, and frankly I can't be arsed to go look.

OH YAY! FFIX getting some attention. And of course Kefka is the most badass of badass villians. Someone should write some of this stuff up for frontsite articles. I'd read em. Can't wait for more :D

That is the worst justification for a villain ever.

Everyone mock BoB relentlessly from this day forward.

Are there any more results incoming? I forget what we looked at :shobon:

Plenty more to come Jiro. You'll know when we're finished because I'll undoubtedly get even more biased/surly/insulting and tell you all that you can go to hell or some such.

Either that or I'll just tell you when it's done. I'm not sure exactly how many answers we have left to go through but I don't think we're quite at the halfway point yet. Sure I could open up the first page of this thread, do some simple first grade arithmetic and figure it out, but that wouldn't be ambiguous enough.

I voted

Hypo, voting has been closed for a while now o.o

Also, wtf vivi22. You aren't still on page 1? 50 post per page or gtfo.

I look forward to seeing more. Your flavour is quite lovely, it makes it far easier to put onto the wiki because I don't have to make stats sound interesting to normal people.

I don't know what it's like to be normal.

Little announcement:

There's a possibility that Portal 2 may be released sooner than it's initial April 19th release date. Given this, I will be doing everything in my power to finish releasing the rest of the results over this weekend before Valve steals my life away. Expect a results release bonanza this weekend if only because I wanted an excuse to say bonanza. But be forewarned that if Portal 2 becomes playable before I finish, you may be waiting until July for whatever's yet to be released at that point.

W-Post of awesomeness time folks. The beginning of the end of the line that separates the men from the boy who cried wolf is here.

To start us off we have a category that I expected to involve a few particular fan favourite characters, but honestly surprised me with how many different entries there were.

Favourite Comedic Relief:
If I were a betting man, and I would be if I weren't so broke 90% of the time, I would have put money this being a clean sweep for perennial favourite Gilgamesh. Well thank the flying spaghetti monster for being broke because although he managed a not so meager second with 4 votes, he was beaten by the narrowest of margins by the also deserving Quina for first place with a mere 5 votes. The real surprise was the sheer number of other nominations though. I won't bother talking about any of the other positions (you can see the full results below) but suffice it to say we had 16 other nominees which resulted in a six way (kinky) tie for 3rd and a 10 way (kinkier) tie for 4th.

A random stat for this category:
-9 votes (29%) went to SNES era characters and 19 votes (a full 61%) went to PSX era characters. The PS2 era and current generation managed a combined vote of only 3 votes (an utterly pathetic 9%) of the vote. The only conclusion to draw from this is that FF is kind of like the Simpsons: the writers forgot how to be funny a decade ago and need to eat their guns already and spare us any further suffering.

And here's TheSpoonyBard to defend his pick of Sazh & Vanille for this category:

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- Favourite comedic relief - Sazh and Vanille

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Clearly there is no defense for voting for these two.

Now we start getting into the real heavy categories.

Favourite Character:
This is another one where we're not going to go into a lot of details about who won each position because holy flying monkey :bou::bou::bou::bou: was this ever a divisive category. Now favourite character garnering a lot of votes for different characters is to be expected. FF is nearly as old as I am, has had 12 single player entries in the main series without even counting the sequels and spinoffs, and features games with exceptionally strong casts like FFVI and FFIX. But no one from any of the games with actual good characters won. In fact, like Stephen Harper in a Canadian election, Squall takes first place with a mere three votes because the characters who actually deserved to win were busy splitting the vote. In fact, to go further with the Stephen Harper comparison, Squall has a lot in common with Canada's favourite cyborg leader. Both have as much personality as a piece of cardboard and are equally reviled by anyone with some sense in their heads. In fact, just to get the bad taste of him winning out of my mouth, I'm going to pretend this vote is a parliamentary democracy for a second so that the second place finishers can form a coalition and install Vivi as the number one pick. And you guys can't do anything about it because I use my Christmas avatar in the Spring.

As for some additional stats:
- Once again the SNES and PSX lead the vote totals proving they are certainly fan favourite eras once again (getting 9 votes and 17 votes respectively).
- FFIX leads the series for most number of votes in a single title, 8 votes, with FFVI and FFVII in second with 5 votes. This runs against the voting for favourite cast where FFVI narrowly beat out FFIX indicating that while people seem to consider the cast of VI stronger as a whole, they aren't strong enough individually to beat out some of the, admittedly amazing, FFIX characters.

And here to explain why he voted for (now ousted) winner Squall is Blues Agent:

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- Favorite character - Not sure if I have an absolute favorite. Sorry. I'll just name Squall Leonhart for your amusement.

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This is what your lulz get us Blues Agent. I hope you're happy.

And last one for now is:
Best writing:

I have to give you guys credit. For once you didn't manage to completely arse one of these categories up. Congratulations. I say this because a very deserving FFIX took first place with 7 votes. Meanwhile there was a three way tie for second between the ever awesome FFVI, the poorly translated but so awesome it didn't matter FF Tactics, and the normally sorely underrated FFXII, all with 6 votes. So all in all, the top spots were taken up by my four favourites. It actually makes me so happy that I'm willing to overlook the fact that FFVII came in next with 4 votes. But not happy enough to forget those of you who didn't vote Kefka as favourite villain. You're still on my list.

And once again we have some responses here from real members (so real I swear I didn't make them up at all, even though I could. But I didn't because that would take more time and posting these results takes long enough as it is you ungrateful monkey bastards):

I wanted to include someone talking about the first and last place finishers. This is the best I could do for one of the games that finished last:

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Originally Posted by Dignified Pauper

- Best writing: XIII - as far as dialogue

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You see what you people give me to work with?

But here's someone who did a bit better when it comes to explaining their choice:

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Originally Posted by Vermachtnis

- Best writing
IX

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Wait that wasn't it. Here we go:

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Originally Posted by Kotora

- Best writing
FF9

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You know what, smurf you guys! Here's the full results:

Favourite Comedic Relief:
1) Quina 5 (16%)
2) Gilgamesh 4 (13%)
3) Kefka 2 (6%)
3) Steiner 2 (6%)
3) Turks 2 (6%)
3) Ultros 2 (6%)
3) Vivi 2 (6%)
3) Zell 2 (6%)
4) Balthier 1 (3%)
4) Biggs & Wedge 1 (3%)
4) Cid VII 1 (3%)
4) Don Corneo 1 (3%)
4) Gogo 1 (3%)
4) Mukki 1 (3%)
4) Sazh 1 (3%)
4) Sazh & Vanille 1 (3%)
4) Selphie 1 (3%)
4) Zorn & Thorn 1 (3%)

Favourite Character:
1) Squall 3 (10%)
2) Edgar 2 (7%)
2) Faris 2 (7%)
2) Freya 2 (7%)
2) Kain 2 (7%)
2) Quina 2 (7%)
2) Sazh 2 (7%)
2) Terra 2 (7%)
2) Vivi 2 (7%)
2) Zidane 2 (7%)
3) Aerith 1 (3%)
3) Balthier 1 (3%)
3) Cloud 1 (3%)
3) Delita 1 (3%)
3) Larsa Solidor 1 (3%)
3) Red XIII 1 (3%)
3) Setzer 1 (3%)
3) Tifa 1 (3%)
3) Vincent 1 (3%)

Best Writing:
1) FFIX 7 21.2%
2) FFVI 6 18.1%
2) FF Tactics 6 18.1%
2) FFXII 6 18.1%
3) FFVII 4 12.1%
4) FFIV 1 3.1%
4) FFVIII 1 3.1%
4) FFXIII 1 3.1%
4) FFX 1 3.1%

More to come soon. We're down to the final three categories.

Oh I love your reveal style. You should be the next Award guy.

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Originally Posted by Freya

Oh I love your reveal style. You should be the next Award guy.

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Bad idea. I'd declare myself the winner of every category and call it a day.

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Originally Posted by Dignified Pauper

- Best writing: XIII - as far as dialogue

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FFXIII would be my second favorite pick after XII for this.

I don't even remember if I partook in this census.

I would have if I had been around.

Man I completely forgot to keep checking up on this. Great job, Vivi.

I swear I justified all my responses, I just must have voted for the wrong ones :shobon:

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Originally Posted by Jiro

I swear I justified all my responses, I just must have voted for the wrong ones :shobon:

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A lot of people justified their responses actually, but whether or not they get quoted is directly related to how I feel at the time and whether or not inspiration strikes when it comes to making fun of the responses. Because it would be really boring if I just posted the explanation, or worse, agreed with it.

I'll try and see if I can make fun of you specifically before this is over, not that I expect that would be too hard. ;)

I am not opposed to completely fabricated quotations.

I'm pleased that Squall won, because I think I voted for him. To say he has "no personality" is a bit biased though - he does.

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Originally Posted by MJN SEIFER

I'm pleased that Squall won, because I think I voted for him. To say he has "no personality" is a bit biased though - he does.

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*holds up megpahone* Step away from the debate and don't touch it with a ten foot pole!

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Originally Posted by charliepanayi

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Originally Posted by MJN SEIFER

I'm pleased that Squall won, because I think I voted for him. To say he has "no personality" is a bit biased though - he does.

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*holds up megpahone* Step away from the debate and don't touch it with a ten foot pole!

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I've already done this elsewhere, so I won't debate further here. I don't want to disrupt the census.

YOU PROMISED US RESULTS BEFORE PORTAL

Yep, clearly I failed to do that. I wanted to get it done last night but I was ready to fall asleep by the time I left work and still had other stuff that needed to get done. I guess that's what happens when you haven't had a decent nights sleep in over a week.

But because I failed to get you results before Portal came out, I will make the promise that I will at the very least get one more question up there tonight with the rest to come tomorrow if I can't get it all up tonight. I am being dragged to a movie by my wife tonight so I may not have time for the final 3 answers but at least you'll get something to hold you over until tomorrow.

As promised, another answer to hold you guys over. I hope you appreciate my not playing Portal 2 for your benefit. Now pay attention because this is one of the big ones.

Best Ending:

Now clearly there's only one real choice, since FFXIII had a terrible ending. Don't get me wrong, I was ecstatic that it was over, even if it was rather sudden, but then I noticed my PS3 had yellow lighted and had to buy a new one so the whole thing was more of a pain in the ass than anything else...

But I digress. The only other choice available since an ending that costs me $300 strikes me as a bad direction to take a story is FFVI. It teased you with a little bit of hope that things would be all right, capped off the development of the characters nicely, and let you decide what you thought would happen next, and all without lingering too long.

So with that being the obvious choice, you lot certainly couldn't get this one wro-, hey wait a second...

1) FFVIII 9 (27.3%)

Ok. Well, can't say I saw that one coming. I mean yeah it was cool that the misery that was playing that game ended, but best ending? Really? It's not like it made any sense or anything, and frankly, this image is the stuff of nightmares and eats at my soul:

http://squallsdead.com/endshot8.jpg

But whatever, let's just go with it. What came in number two...

2) FFX 7 21.2%

Well great. Way to make Wolf Kanno cry guys. I hope you're smurfing happy. You know what, just for that, I don't even care that FFVI is third! It's too late! Screw every last one of you! I'm going to play more Portal 2.

1) FFVIII 9 27.3%
2) FFX 7 21.2%
3) FFVI 5 15.2%
4) FFIX 4 12.1%
5) FFVII 3 9.1%
6) FFI 1 3.1%
6) FFIV 1 3.1%
6) FF Tactics 1 3.1%


PS: I hope you'll join me tomorrow night when the results of the final two questions will be revealed. It's been a long road, but we just have favourite plot twist and the big one, favourite story, left to reveal. I'd promise it was well worth the wait, but frankly you'd all just disappoint me again. Have a nice evening.

You know, oddly enough, I don't hate FFX's ending. The dialogue is cheesy as hell and over dramatic but when its muted, its actually quite nice. ;)

VIII winning is a surprise, while certainly not the worst, its way too cheerful for my taste. I was actually predicting VII would win this so this one was a surprise.

I'm not surprised VII didn't win; not many people like a Gainax ending. I am surprised that VIII won though.

Like everyone else, I'm surprised that FF8 won Best Ending. Good on it, though! It was pretty cute.

It's funny that so many of us find it surprising and yet it won. Who the smurf voted for it then?!

I did, because it's a brilliant ending.

I would have been happy if FFVII or FFVIII's ending won. Also, I understand FFVIII's ending, but that for another article.

Vivi22, I'm getting mixed signals one your view of FFVIII... you're saying you like it right? :jess:

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Originally Posted by MJN SEIFER

Vivi22, I'm getting mixed signals one your view of FFVIII... you're saying you like it right? :jess:

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You weren't supposed to figure that out. :shifty:

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Originally Posted by Vivi22

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MJN SEIFER

Vivi22, I'm getting mixed signals one your view of FFVIII... you're saying you like it right? :jess:

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You weren't supposed to figure that out. :shifty:

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Aww... did I spoil the suprise?

FFVIII had a nice and tidy ending.

Kefka was smurfing brilliant. What he lacked in depth he made up for in maniacal lunacy. Depth isn't everything. The Joker doesn't have any depth but he's still the best Batman villain because he is just so damn crazy. Some people just want to watch the world burn, and Kefka is the only villain who actually succeeded in that goal, which makes him the best in my eyes.

Though I agree with you about FFIX's ending. It was the best for me. I don't even remember VIII's ending. The time compression thing threw me off so much that I didn't even beat the game until a few years after reaching the last disc.

I just don't get it.
Only 3 people voted for Kuja.
3.

Even if I had known this was going on, that only makes 4. Kuja would be 1/5th as popular as Kefka.

I had higher expectations of this forum's posters. I've been on here for quite a while even if I'm not that active and Kuja is usually given the credit and respect he deserves.

Guess those days are at an end.

Well, from your melodramatic posts it is sure clear that you have studied the behavior of FF villains extensively, so perhaps we should retroactively declare Forsaken Lover Kuja the best FF villain.

So there's been discussion of the census results outside of this thread. This pleases me greatly, even if the topic of discussion is inherently wrong. In fact, it pleases me so much that I've decided to keep the anticipation going another day and save the favourite story category for tomorrow.

And as a further reward, we've come to our next result for...

Favourite Plot Twist:
This one's a bit of a funny category since some people voted for different twists in the same game, but for result purposes they needed to be lumped together to keep the vote from being to spread out so they've been lumped together by the most obvious criteria available. No, not percentage of cast members who are androgynous and leave you questioning your sexuality because you're not sure if that cute chick is actually a cute chick. I'm looking at you Kuja. No we lumped them together by title. But anyway, without further ado, the number one pick was:

"You're a horrible person."

Wait a second that isn't right. Let's try this again.

"I'm not making this up. It says so right here: 'you're a horrible person.'"

Damn it, hold on. Computer's been acting a bit funny since Portal 2 was released.

1) FFVII 8

There we go. Yep, FFVII takes it by a hair. Now because the answers were so varied even within the same game at times, you're going to get a lot more quotes than usual which is fine by me since I'm lazy.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Del Murder

Aerith's death - I was so shocked they actually killed off a main character midway through the game!

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Flying Arrow

The reveal of Cloud's relationship to Zack (VII)

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That was largely it for FFVII plot twists in the voting (it's really not, but we have a lot more quotes to get to and I'm sleepy). I was never too shocked by either myself. Cloud was clearly messed up from early on and Bradygames were assholes and ruined Aeris' death. I was more surprised by the stuff in the number two pick:

2) FFX 7

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Levian

Summoner has to sacrifice a guardian in FFX

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Aerith's Knight

I think FFX, where you find out Tidus isn't real.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jiro

Soylet green is people! Tidas is a dream/Summoners die when they kill sin/Auron is an undead badass

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Badass indeed Jiro. Who would've thought a drunken old man with one good arm, a giant sword and stubble would be badas- oh wait. Finally, in third, we have:

3) FFIV 4 12.1%

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Clo

Cecil's from the MOOON?

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Yes. The MOOON. How quaint.

And the full results:
1) FFVII 8 24.2%
2) FFX 7 21.2%
3) FFIV 4 12.1%
3) FFVII 4 12.1%
4)FFVIII 3 9.1%
5)FFI 1 3.1%
5)FFV 1 3.1%
5)FF Tactics 1 3.1%

More to come tomorrow night. But just so you're aware, those of you I didn't quote disappointed me with how uninteresting you are and the hounds have been released. Those that make it through the night, join us for the final reveal. Those that don't, try not to scream too loud. You'll wake the baby.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover

I just don't get it.
Only 3 people voted for Kuja.
3.

Even if I had known this was going on, that only makes 4. Kuja would be 1/5th as popular as Kefka.

I had higher expectations of this forum's posters. I've been on here for quite a while even if I'm not that active and Kuja is usually given the credit and respect he deserves.

Guess those days are at an end.

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dude

it's a contest based around a series of frakking video games

it is not that worth getting that worked up over

This incredible hatred of the excellent VII shows that Vivi22 is nothing more than a hipster with a computer.

Your theory is flawed since I voted shinra best evil empire. I'll give credit where it's due, and that's about all the credit VII deserves. Besides, if anything I'm a cranky old codger by FF standards.

Anyway, unexpected internet trouble kept me from updating last night. It was 12:00 by the time I got it sorted out and I have to work today so the final update should happen later tonight.

It ends tonight!

After much heel dragging, disappointment, and me taking all of the credit when Flying Arrow did most of the hard work, we're finally at the end. It's been a long road filled with tears, dead babies, and sexual satisfaction and although it will probably be months, if not years, until the next census we must press on. So without any further delay since the word adieu is French and offends me as an English Canadian, here it is.

Favourite Story:

I want to do this one a little differently by giving you the full results first.

1) FFVI 9 27.3%
1) FFVII 9 27.3%
2) FFIX 8 24.2%
3) FF Tactics 2 6.2%
3) FFVIII 2 6.2%
4) FFIV 1 3.1%
4) FFX 1 3.1%
4) FFXIII 1 3.1%

Now as you can see there is a tie for first, however, as a result of a quirk of automatic sorting in Openoffice, likely resulting from some priority placed on a VI over a VII, FFVI is higher on the list. Therefore I'm declaring it the winner due to the inherent limitations of a single column list. Yep, a computer program has resulted in the better story winning out and a lot less death and destruction than you'd all suffer if it hadn't happened that way.

Now I didn't really want to use another quote from Wolf on this one, but he does tend to spend way too much time thinking about crap that no one cares about and therefore explains why FFVI deserved to win better than I would. At least I think that's what he did. Frankly I tend to doze off a few sentences into his posts and just assume the wall 'o text is an indicator of his intelligence.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

VI, it's premise was kind of novel for its time but really its the cast and the events of the WoR that make this game standout for me. The fact your party utterly fails to stop the worse case scenario let alone have to topple a world on the brink of death. The game is just epic. :cool:

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And so that FFVII is represented I guess, here we have Roto13:

Quote:

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VII, smurf the haters

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That's the spirit Roto. Keep fighting that battle for the game that has now been scientifically proven (through science!) to be wrong.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Clo

I like the anti-Shin-Ra story of FF7. I keep mentioning FF7. I swear I'm not obsessed, I've played and liked most of them. :greenie:

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You may have played most of them Clo, but you're still wrong.

And here to talk about FFIX, the game that would have been second if we stopped relying on human testing, is Genius Lynx:

Quote:

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In Final Fantasy IX this monkey loves the girl he is hired to steal and then fights his thong-wearing brother

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Well said my friend. Well said.

Now that may be it for the actual results, but we'll cap things off with a few more random facts compiled by Flying Arrow since I'm a lazy smurf:

FFVI:
- FFVI is the favourite story of all users aged 28 or older
- 44.4% who state it's their favourite began playing FF with a PS1-or-later-era entry
- 44.4% who state FFVI as favourite story have another game as favourite ending
-Of the 30% who voted FFVI as having the best cast, >70% of these users began the series in an SNES or earlier game.

FFVII:
- 50% of users who voted it as having their favourite plot twist have a different game as favourite story
- Of users who began with FF7:
- 91% have a favourite story among the PS1 entries
- 72% are (as of voting) 23-years-old or younger – (10-years or younger at original release)
- Only 50% of these users voted it their favourite story
- 27.3% consider it to have the best writing
- Of the 48.5% of users who voted Shinra best evil empire:
- Only 44% of these users have FFVII as favourite story
- 69% of these users have a ‘favourite world’ from another game

FFIX:
- 75% of users who state ‘favourite story’ began the series before FF9

And finally, before we end this completely, I leave you with the comments of the lone voter for FFXIII, Jessweeee♪:

Quote:

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FFXIII! Many complain about the game's linearity, but I think it made the story an even better experience.

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There was a lot wrong with FFXIII, and linearity was the least of it's problems. But kudos to you. Until now I thought only politicians were stubborn enough to keep backing a turd for over a year.

So there we have it. Go forth and discuss. I promise I'll be less of a dick for now. At least until the next census.

Good to see the right game won to be honest :p

I'm impressed with how tight the top three were. I expected a blow out. If we had a bit more participation, I'm sure we could've seen everything including Tactics and all those older games (IV, V et al) up there as contenders.

Poor Jessweeee♪, backing a sinking ship. I'm gonna be honest though, I think the haters are hatin' too much. 13 weren't that bad of a game, though I haven't finished it yet. It might fail harder in the last few hours than I have foreseen.

'grats to Vivi22 and the boys for running a top gig. I'll upload your rants to the wiki after I have a nap.

FF7 is deserving of Best Plot Twist. Aeris's death is commonly known as one of the most emotional and shocking events in FF history (even if some people -- *cough*meandBoB*cough* -- later enjoyed it. It still was shocking the first time, and really well done.

I am also quite amused and pleased that no one voted FFX for Best Story -- not even that crazy Jessweee with her freakish tastes. Then again she probably voted FF8. *gag* Actually why is FFIV listed three times at the end?

My agreement ends there, however. FF7 definitely doesn't deserve Best Story, because the writing was terrible and skimmed over gaping holes that needed to be better filled. It maybe deserves "Best Potential Story," as it is so disappointing to me that the story held so much promise, yet was so poorly executed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raistlin

Actually why is FFIV listed three times at the end?

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Because the auto correct in open office is weird sometimes and I didn't notice when I copy and pasted the results after reformatting them a bit from what Flying Arrow gave us originally. I've fixed it now.

So someone did vote for FFX after all. I know it was you, Jessweee!

EDIT: Also, how the hell did anyone vote for FFXIII? Chapters 9-13 was the worst example of writing I have ever had the misfortune of playing through. Chapter 13 especially was basically the designers saying "ok, let's just do something weird and put a lot of completely random mini-boss fights along the way. That should distract them. And then we'll wrap it up with an entirely incoherent ending, but it'll be ok because it ends happily and people love that corny :bou::bou::bou::bou:."

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raistlin

So someone did vote for FFX after all. I know it was you, Jessweee!

EDIT: Also, how the hell did anyone vote for FFXIII? Chapters 9-13 was the worst example of writing I have ever had the misfortune of playing through. Chapter 13 especially was basically the designers saying "ok, let's just do something weird and put a lot of completely random mini-boss fights along the way. That should distract them. And then we'll wrap it up with an entirely incoherent ending, but it'll be ok because it ends happily and people love that corny :bou::bou::bou::bou:."

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I voted FFXIII. Though FFX, which I think I voted for Favorite Ending, would be my second choice. Also, I suggest you play Star Ocean: Til the End of Time.

The first disc of SO3 was pretty good. The second disc was almost completely nonsensical. At least the music was good though.

I'll take my fourth dimensionwall breaking plot twist over XIII's utter garbage of a plot. At least So3's plot twist was funny, XIII takes itself so seriously it can't even be taken as gnarm and is just awful... :p

That is a point in its favour; while earlier parts of the game are definitely quite serious, it's very difficult to argue that SO3 was attempting to take itself seriously by that point :monster:

I wonder about that :|