Quote Originally Posted by NeoCracker View Post
Yes, there are a lot of internal dialogue scenes like that. A lot of them. And on all of them my point remains the same, they are all the same thing.
His internal dialogue does change. He tries to justify it and eventually see's there is no basis for his logic, rather its his own fears that cause him to be this way. Its all there in the dialogue, even his real dialogue if you just pay attention. He's an ass, gets thrown into circumstances that force him to realize the values of others and recognize that his own attitude is the direct result of his personal fears of abandonment. Once he recognizes that, he tries to better himself and become open and actually winds up being a decent human being at the end of it all. How is that not gradual growth, especially when I feel the dialogue supports this.

And I don't even remember the moments he tries to reach out to anybody to be honest, and I've played up through disc 3 of this game twice, the second time was me trying to force myself to finish it years later. Perhaps these scenes do exist, but if so then they basically get completely overshadows by everything else squall does.
They are there and if you just didn't set in stone your feelings for Squall and the game, you might be able to notice them. I'm playing through the game right now and I see lots of progress and lots of times he opens up and begins to trust people. From talking to Zell after getting Balamb in trouble, to letting Selphie undergo the Missile Base missions, to actually sighing a relief and being friendly with the party when they reunite in FH. I'm not even past the second disc and I can see the growth already so I find it hard to understand where you're coming from with this "No growth" argument.

And its not that I felt it's not how it should have been done, it's that they did it horribly regardless. The moments of development with his party members you mentioned get completely overshadows by his complete and total one sided personality, and after his change of heart, he doesn't even seem like the same character anymore.
You're suppose to take both of them and see the difference. His moments of opening up along with his cold defenses. Squall's character development is a lesson in character studies. You can't just ignore one cause you feel his self defense mechanism is how he really feels. Frankly, Squall's personality is a contradiction in itself. I just get the feeling you hated Squall's asshole side and basically stereotyped him being like that.

I would have been just as pissed with a gradual change, if he started the same and ended up a colorful circus clown obsessed with Lemon pudding. The fact is, he wasn't the same character at that point, at all. Nothing outside of his appearance felt like it was still squall.

Admittedly I might have missed out on some things as you mentioned, but it was still so horribly done and overshadowed, it doesn't really matter if he has character development or not, it was still terribly done.
God, Squall doesn't change that much and he does actually go back to being his usual aloof self to some degree, he just actually talks more often and tends to actually say what he's thinking. This coincides with the fact that Squall thinks one way and does another. He just finally starts doing what he's thinking. To me that is sign of growth and good change that doesn't really conflict with his attitude, cause for the first time he's actually being himself.

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree cause obviously we are not going to be convincing each other of anything.