So I just finished and I am a little confused... (WHOLE THREAD IS SPOILER)

[Adam 77]

ok i just finished this game and i must say how dissapointed i was. The story in my opinion is the worst its ever been, there is no real reason why vayne does what he does. I am a huge fan of the series and since after Final Fantasy X they have lost it in mky opinion, they are focusing on more gameplay than actual story!!!! which is a real let down what's the point in going through a game when the story is lacking this is just my opinion and i know you all have your own thoughts bout this game so feel free to share your thoughts.

so yeh on subject didnt like XII

[Elpizo]

I think everybody exagerates a LOT when it comes to XII.

"WORST STORY IT TEH SERIES! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!"
Right. Worse than FF I? Don't think so. As nice that time-loop thing and crystals were, the story itself was pretty much non-existant. I greatly prefer FF XII's story to this one. I like characters with personality and story events, thank you.

"WORST CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT IN TEH SERIES! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!"
Worse character development than the Lightwarriors, Firion and co, the 4 Onion kids? Right... And I'm Yazmat.

When people say stuff like that, I can only laugh. When making such claims, please think twice. If you like it or not, the series includes FF I, II and III. NES games or not, they are part of the series. When making great claims like "worst in the series!!!", FF I, II and III have to be taken in mind as well. Otherwise, it is not "worst in the series!" but "worst in teh series without the first 3 FF games!".

Anyway, carry on the complaining and confusion and all the stuff. I've seen stuff like this so many times that I can only think 'again?'. Square Enix, bring FF XIII and silence them, please...

[Adam 77]

its just my opinion yea ok i admit it had a better story than FF1 with the whole crystal thing! but compared from 4 to 10 X12 is like when it comes to story!

[Renmiri]

ive noticed that some people say they left too much to guessing and some say people would say things to be blatantly obvious. which kinda proves that there will never be a game that everyone loves.

but as for leaveing too mcuh for guessing all FF's do this it is a flaw in writeing and yet i still think they are the best games out there.

XII has actually both. Seriously.

The little background info we get is pretty much "shoved in your face", i.e. Vaan tells you he wants to be a sky pirate to run away from the pain of losing Reks. Well, duh! I compare this kind of writing to bad acting:
An actor can't make a convincing angry face so he just says "I'm furious!" while his face and body show "I wonder what the heck is on TV?". Same thing here: Ondorre, Vayne's father, Vaan, Basch, Ashe tell you things that are pretty obvious without them telling you, if the writers had any storytelling skills. (ok, there's a small exaggeration here, but it's to convey my point: Specific words aren't necessary if you can write).

At the same time, the truly important motivations, like what drove Vayne to kill two brothers and his father are left pretty loose and you have to just chose which motivation you like best. Only to have that choice blow up on your face. Here was I thinking Vayne was noble and wanted to save all man from Occuria when he goes to Rabanastre with the Bahamut to obliterate all in his path. I felt cheated!

So yeah, the plot is both too obvious and too sketchy. Good thing gameplay rocks!!!

[Wolf Kanno]

I love how Skyblade writes this beautiful post that makes perfect logical sense and everyone seems to ignore it and continue on bashing FFXII:rolleyes2

The motivations of the antagonists are pretty poorly explained. Specifically, the game never really delves into why Venat would betray the other Occurians or why there was any need to relinquish Occurian control to begin with. I mean, they where obviously pretty manipulative but we’re given no evidence within the game that their rule was particularly detrimental, nor that humes could do a better job. If we were given a genuine reason as to why it was necessary, I might have been able to consider the whole “Wrestling Ivalice back into the hands of man” jazz more than convenient idealistic nonsense.

Precisely!! All the game says is that they intervened - once - 1,400 years ago to give power to Raithwal, who - gasp - brought peace and prosperity to Ivalice.

We should have such meddling Gods here on Earth!!!

You seem to forget that the Occurians gave Raithwall a weapon on par with our nuclear weapons which means he subjegated all these nations under his own rule. You also forget that "history is written by the winners" so the descendants may remember Raithwall as a compassionate ruler and fair ruler but chances were that several civilizations and cultures were annihalted and forced to assimilate to Raithwall's ideals.

It's almost like President Bush talking about how "Gods on his side" and he uses this in a roundabout way to justify his wars on other cultures.

It seems we agree. Actually the main game writer said so in an interview: It was his aim that good guys had flaws and bad guys showed kindness and specifically that he did not take sides on the conflict, leaving it for the player.

An interesting idea that fell flat on it's face: In the end the game needed a villain and all the ambiguity and "kindness" evaporated from Vayne, making him mad and evil as any villain on a cheesy James Bond rerun. You find hard to believe Larsa was so fond of THAT jerk of a brother. Or that Vayne fooled his dad, Ondorre and others for so long

Read Skyblades post please

Which brings me to the point of this thread. I am very confused as to the nature of the antognist characters are they good/evil? I know that you are going to say that its a war and both sides are neither good nor evil but here is my problem. Ok so Vayne seemed like a good guy at the beginning of the game. His speech in Rabanastre seemed convincing which leads me to believe that origanally he was a good character and also the fact that Larsa supported him through much of his BS also leads me to think that he is a good hearted individual. So I guess my question is... Was he a good character who was just corrupted by Venat? because thats what the story makes it seems like... same goes for Cid. I know he was controlled by Venat but was he origanally such an evil character?

Which brings me to my next point... (sorry people try and follow along) So if indeed they were just being controlled by Venat then why were their evil morals supported by the Archadian empire (such as the judges and their army) unless indeed they were evil too. I mean I know they have to follow their orders but they have to understand that Vayne was slowly losing it and reguardless of him being a leader why would they do the things they did, because as soon as you dispose of Vayne it seems like everyone is on the same side. So are all the antagonists in the game just blindly following orders or do you think that had the same beliefs as Vayne... I am so confused

Once again I feel that Skyblades post beautifully answers this question.

Venat didn't really corrupt anyone. Cid was an individual who placed knowledge and science above family and people. He's unscrupulous in his pursuit for knowledge, but I don't believe he's really evil as much as he just thinks radically different from most people.

Vayne was always power hungry, like a true politician he manipulates people with his words. He wants power, the fact that he thinks of himself as a new Dynast-King at the end of the game just proves this more. Of anything, Vayne wasn't taking out the Occurians cause he wanted to "liberate humanity" (though I feel he used that speech to convince people to join his side) but rather they served as a roadblock to his personal glory. I somehow don't think they would have allowed Archadia to just conquer the world...

The motivations of the antagonists are pretty poorly explained. Specifically, the game never really delves into why Venat would betray the other Occurians or why there was any need to relinquish Occurian control to begin with. I mean, they where obviously pretty manipulative but we’re given no evidence within the game that their rule was particularly detrimental, nor that humes could do a better job. If we were given a genuine reason as to why it was necessary, I might have been able to consider the whole “Wrestling Ivalice back into the hands of man” jazz more than convenient idealistic nonsense.

If you read all the tomes in the Pharos, you get a pretty good idea of what the Occurians are like and how they really feel about life in Ivalice. For those of you who were too busy trying to find their way through the dungeon in hopes of finding a love story that you should have given up on 60 hours ago, I'll paraphrase it for you... They're jerks and they think people are "toys".

They manipulate our history every time they feel like it, we are only told of Raithwall but the game gives you the impression it happens more than we think. Basically, we are birds unaware that we are trapped in a cage. The history of Ivalice is controlled on the whims of a few beings that think of themselves as gods. It's enough reason for me but then again I hate authority.

but i do see your point this is a story and we would like to have things explained. instead of working off of assumptions.

That is the second writing flaw. The little they tell us is so blatant that it is like "look here idiot!", not subtle at all. For example:

1) Vaan wants to be a sky pirate because he wants to run away from the pain of Reks dying. He flat out tells us. No subtlety or mistery implied. And then he fogets it!!! No more pain for Reks, no more "I wanna be a sky pirate" until the very last scene.

2) The Senate puts Emperor Grammis in a bind: Chose between reigning in Vayne or disobeying his country's law. Pretty obvious scene but the writer finds the need to make Grammis say it out aloud.

So many more examples of "telegraphing the plot" I can barely count. Yet what is real interesting, i.e. where each character is coming from, remains completely hidden and you have to chose your preferred answer. Setzer chose a noble motive for Vayne, most of us saw a petty dictator wanabe. But none of us has any inkling of what the writer aimed for. Because he said it himself, he aimed for nothing.

You say there are a lot of scenes but you only bring up these two whenever you mention this.

The Vaan scene in question, I feel Vaan is telling Ashe (who of course knows nothing about him) not the player. I'm sorry you interpreted as the game "telegraphing the plot" but I feel you missed the point of it being a conversation between two people who obviously are unaware of them being watched by an objective third party

I prefer some ambiguity to my storytelling and I don't really feel that FFXII did it in a bad way. The fact is, as we have seen, we can choose how to interpret it from our own personal views and I feel XII tells quite a compelling story of human drama. I think people need to stop trying to figure out what the writer was gunning for and just come to your own conclusions. It's the way the story is written and I prefer it over "cut and dry" storytelling cause most of it is bull that never puts into account how people really think.

ok i just finished this game and i must say how dissapointed i was. The story in my opinion is the worst its ever been, there is no real reason why vayne does what he does. I am a huge fan of the series and since after Final Fantasy X they have lost it in mky opinion, they are focusing on more gameplay than actual story!!!! which is a real let down what's the point in going through a game when the story is lacking this is just my opinion and i know you all have your own thoughts bout this game so feel free to share your thoughts.

so yeh on subject didnt like XII

Heaven forbid a video game focuses on gameplay :rolleyes2

If you want a motive read Skyblades post. If you want a story, read a book or watch a movie. (going off on a tangent) I love how people seem to forget that video games are a form of interactive entertainment. And I'm sorry if I seem mean but I've heard this complaint too many times for me to sit idly by and not say the obvious.

ive noticed that some people say they left too much to guessing and some say people would say things to be blatantly obvious. which kinda proves that there will never be a game that everyone loves.

but as for leaveing too mcuh for guessing all FF's do this it is a flaw in writeing and yet i still think they are the best games out there.

XII has actually both. Seriously.

The little background info we get is pretty much "shoved in your face", i.e. Vaan tells you he wants to be a sky pirate to run away from the pain of losing Reks. Well, duh! I compare this kind of writing to bad acting:
An actor can't make a convincing angry face so he just says "I'm furious!" while his face and body show "I wonder what the heck is on TV?". Same thing here: Ondorre, Vayne's father, Vaan, Basch, Ashe tell you things that are pretty obvious without them telling you, if the writers had any storytelling skills. (ok, there's a small exaggeration here, but it's to convey my point: Specific words aren't necessary if you can write).

At the same time, the truly important motivations, like what drove Vayne to kill two brothers and his father are left pretty loose and you have to just chose which motivation you like best. Only to have that choice blow up on your face. Here was I thinking Vayne was noble and wanted to save all man from Occuria when he goes to Rabanastre with the Bahamut to obliterate all in his path. I felt cheated!

So yeah, the plot is both too obvious and too sketchy. Good thing gameplay rocks!!!

Once again I feel you missed the point of several scenes. If Vayne convinced you he was a nice guy, it proves how well the writer wrote a truly calculating and manipulative character. I think once they mentioned he killed his brothers as well using the Ifrit to kill resistance fighters within the city, one should have figured he was pretty two faced.

I don't know what the other characters said that was so blatanly obvious for you to feel they are being "bad actors" but I feel this comes from you missing how the story is being told. I'm starting to realize that you like certain types of storytelling and expect it from everything. I've said it before but FFXII is only as good as the amount of effort you are willing to put in it.

Btw Renmiri, I don't mean to be mean or condensending. (So please forgive me if I'm offending you ) I'm just trying to figure out the heart of the problem here cause I still feel your argument (most people's actually) is pretty vague and based more on a personal bias and unrealistic expectations rather than actual merit.

[Hazzard]

I can't wait to read this whole thread, once I complete the game.

[Elpizo]

I want to add on the subject of the so called "In the end Vayne just goes all Hulk and Mechanic to destroy all, like every FF villain", in my opinion, Vayne didn't want to destroy everything as The Undying. He just wanted to die. How would a guy like Vayne want to die? Right, in battle. This can pretty much be concluded from his words "Won't Cid be eager to learn what has happened here". Meaning, he wants to go to Cid, by dying, not destroy everything. I think Vayne realized he was going to loose anyway, so he just wanted to die in the way he deems worthy for him, leaving the future to his brother, Larsa.

Most villains that want the world go 'Poof', say so. Kuja, Kefka, Zeromus, NeoExDeath, Necron, Cloud of Darkness, Ultimecia, in the end they all said they would make the world/whatever end. Vayne never did. All he said was that he was going to go to Cid. So the "Vayne goes mad and becomes the cliché destroy-all Final Boss" statement is pretty much false I think.

And Venat. Well, Venat... I think he wanted to die too. But he was an Undying. So perhaps that's why he merged with Vayne, to become mortal and thus go to Cid together with Vayne. These three seemed to be pretty close, anyway.

Just my thoughts on the Final Battles, which are complained about a lot as well. So what if Vayne goes Hulk and then super-mechanical-winged-monster? Tree of Sephira was pwnage, the Undying's attacks owned as well and 'Battle for Freedom' is a very good track. At least it's better than Yu Yevon, I mean, yeah...

[Renmiri]

Meh... We jousted so often about the story WK that I think it's a waste of time for me to repeat my reasons. I did like all this jousting with you, skyblade and others because you guys made me see a lot of things on XII that I saw nowhere in the game.

If you guys haven't noticed yet, I love the game, just for different reasons than you do.

Being an amateur writer, the storytelling is very important for me and I didn't like what I saw in XII. It obviously has some problems with it. 3 continents have played and 3 continents had people feeling like me.

Maybe that's just me being being "subjective" or me "missing the story" who knows ? I always thought of myself as being good in text interpretation, I never had problems with it before and got good grades in my writing classes. But there's a first time for everything, right ?

[Wolf Kanno]

Meh... We jousted so often about the story WK that I think it's a waste of time for me to repeat my reasons. I did like all this jousting with you, skyblade and others because you guys made me see a lot of things on XII that I saw nowhere in the game.

If you guys haven't noticed yet, I love the game, just for different reasons than you do.

Being an amateur writer, the storytelling is very important for me and I didn't like what I saw in XII. It obviously has some problems with it. 3 continents have played and 3 continents had people feeling like me.

Maybe that's just me being being "subjective" or me "missing the story" who knows ? I always thought of myself as being good in text interpretation, I never had problems with it before and got good grades in my writing classes. But there's a first time for everything, right ?

Yeah I know we've done this routine several times but someone has to stand up to you

I know you like the game for different reasons but I will vehemetly defend the storyline cause I personally liked it.

Also, I'm sorry if my post sounded like I was questioning your ability to write and understand proper story structure, it wasn't. Of anything I feel you just have an ideal set of criteria for proper story writing (which is natural for writers) and FFXII just didn't measure up to this criteria in your eyes. god knows I'm a lousy writer and I have my own bias' which prevent me from ever liking FFX in terms of writing and character work. I still believe that Yuna is incredibly two dimensional and flat as a character, as well as the sole problem with the FFX storyline. I just try to show you how I interpret the story based on my personal criteria.

Sorry if I seemed like an ass but I did write it around 3:30 in the morning where I am so I may have been pretty cranky :laughing:

As for your post Elpizo. I don't necessary agree with Vayne wanting to die cause he was immortal but I do feel you bring up some interesting points on Venat who will always be a figure of specualtion on these forums. Honestly, I'm waiting for the "Venat theory" threads to start in another year after the fresh car smell of FFXII wears off.

[Elpizo]

As for your post Elpizo. I don't necessary agree with Vayne wanting to die cause he was immortal but I do feel you bring up some interesting points on Venat who will always be a figure of specualtion on these forums. Honestly, I'm waiting for the "Venat theory" threads to start in another year after the fresh car smell of FFXII wears off.

As far as I remember, Vayne wasn't immortal, Venat was. Vayne's final form may have been 'The Undying', but in the end he still went 'Poof'. And maybe he didn't want to die, but I do believe Vayne knew he was going to die. But, it's just my view on this, feel free to believe differently.

[Avarice-ness]

I think everybody exagerates a LOT when it comes to XII.

"WORST STORY IT TEH SERIES! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!"
Right. Worse than FF I? Don't think so. As nice that time-loop thing and crystals were, the story itself was pretty much non-existant. I greatly prefer FF XII's story to this one. I like characters with personality and story events, thank you.

"WORST CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT IN TEH SERIES! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!"
Worse character development than the Lightwarriors, Firion and co, the 4 Onion kids? Right... And I'm Yazmat.

When people say stuff like that, I can only laugh. When making such claims, please think twice. If you like it or not, the series includes FF I, II and III. NES games or not, they are part of the series. When making great claims like "worst in the series!!!", FF I, II and III have to be taken in mind as well. Otherwise, it is not "worst in the series!" but "worst in teh series without the first 3 FF games!".

Anyway, carry on the complaining and confusion and all the stuff. I've seen stuff like this so many times that I can only think 'again?'. Square Enix, bring FF XIII and silence them, please...

Actally I agree with him. o o
I consider this the worst in the -entire- series. FF1 to FFXII, I guess I could add Mystic Quest into the equation just to make it beat something, and it's not by much either.

I was able to bear through FFI and beat it, I couldn't stand 12 hours of this game. This is honestly the -only- Final fantasy I regret buying or ever deciding to buy.

Yeah I all I did was get to the dreadnaught leviathan, but I was so burnt out from drabness and running around like it was an MMO, that it was either I turn the game off or I break the cd in half.

No one mind me though, this game just made me loose all hope for the future of final fantasy, I'll prolly rent the next one when it comes out. I don't want to be disappointed again..

[Renmiri]

No prob WK. I was cranky too

I don't think we will ever agree on X and XII but we can at least try to keep the debates fun, right ?

[Bolivar]

Actally I agree with him. o o
I consider this the worst in the -entire- series. FF1 to FFXII, I guess I could add Mystic Quest into the equation just to make it beat something, and it's not by much either.

I was able to bear through FFI and beat it, I couldn't stand 12 hours of this game. This is honestly the -only- Final fantasy I regret buying or ever deciding to buy.

Yeah I all I did was get to the dreadnaught leviathan, but I was so burnt out from drabness and running around like it was an MMO, that it was either I turn the game off or I break the cd in half.

No one mind me though, this game just made me loose all hope for the future of final fantasy, I'll prolly rent the next one when it comes out. I don't want to be disappointed again..

its a good thing you did, because if you didn't like the first 12 hours you definately wouldn't have liked the rest. coincidentally, the leviathan is the same place where i first really started questioning whether or not i would like this game.

and as sad as it sounds, i also gotta agree, FF1 (DoS) may be a little better than this game. i have to give XII another playthrough to give it a really fair analysis, but as of right now, i don't think it holds up well to the rest of the series.

ill probably do that after beating TA2 + revenant wings when they come out, although im definately not doing any sidequests, so i can actually get a decent story to gameplay ratio

[FFI Fan]

Hello all,
I have enjoyed everyone's posts here and have been greatly entertained by everyone's posts so far.
But my main question is to Renmiri, it seems you have had a problem with Vayne going cliche destroy the world bad guy. Well my question is how would you have finished FF XII? how would you have written it out?

[Renmiri]

I think I'd make Vayne a bit more nuanced at the end, i.e. more bent on helping humanity - including Dalmasca - get rid of the Occuria and less the mass murderer wannabe. It just got too cheesy.

The entire "freeing men from Occuria" plot was a very interesting twist and very creative IMHO but it got mishandled on the execution. Vayne was made - particularly in the end - as the cheesy 2 dimensional "I want power" clichee bad guy and Cid was made into a loony bin.

Judging by Cid's son the Doctor had been a smart wise guy once, and he was a scientist. Hard to believe he would turn into that lunatic from Pharos tower.

Gabranth was the only convincing, non cheesy villain IMHO.

Ashe's turning her back on people who risked their lives for her was the height of bitchiness to me, that is another thing I'd change