Ivalice, History, and Morality. The World of Matsuo

[Wolf Kanno]

Ivalice, has truly proven to be a powerful and recurring world within the FF mythos. Started off as a world born from the the very mythology of the FF worlds created before it. Over time is has become it's own mythology and has begun to slowly cut itself way from being an amalgam of all things FF. The Zodiac, Age of Sky Pirates, the Occurians, the Gran Grimorie, and the battle of politics and religion. Ivalice has shown a wide range of diversity and tackled many serious topics and themes way before the main series it was spin-offed from.

The games of Matsuno's design are always subtly told and feature a more ambiguous moral character to them. From the scandal of the Glabados Church as well as the political tactics of Delita, to the journey of Marche to save his friend by destroying the world, to Lady Ashe's personal struggle to choose between saving her kingdom or getting revenge. The human element is never black and white in these games, and though people may not agree with the choices made, I feel most would say at least agree that they can understand them.

So much has gone into making the player feel that Ivalice is alive, this game has had a much greater extent of history to it than other game in the FF series. Golden ages, diverse races, fallen civilization, the fall of the gods, and rise of the Lucavi. Ivalice is more than a world your character live in, it feels so much more like a real place than other RPG worlds.

Now I'll admit this is a rather long winded opening but I truly love Ivalice and the stories of Matsuo, this is a thread to discuss this world of Ivalice, a retrospect of where it has come from and the more intriguing question of where it is going. We'll we be seeing Ivalice 10 years down the road or will it end here with the Ivalice Alliance?