So Cracked.com wrote an interesting article...

[Fynn]

Wolf, saying Vanille "moans like a whore" is completely uncalled for.

And I really don't want to get into the hypocrisy of male and femael sexualization in video games.... Suffice it to say, Squall is every bit as fetishized as Yuna in her hot pants. It's just that a sexy guy is in tight leather pants, a sexy girl is in hot pants. I notice you didn't cover either Vaan or Basch when criticizing XII's characters. From what I hear, the Ivalice artist always piles on the gay fanservice. No assless chaps in this one, though or whatever the dude from Vagrant Story wore.

And since you already admitted that the problem with XIII was not its terminology but its execution, there's really nothing to address there. JRR Tolkien also threw a lot of WORDS at people in his novels, too. (he might be a professor and linguist with a lot of thought put into these Words but 99% of the readership don't know it. To them, there'd be no difference between fal'Cie and Istari) WORDS is just something you see in a lot of fantasy works. XIII's only failure was its pacing, not the new terms. A game like Xenogears makes FFXIII's Proper Nouns look positively simplistic and easily understandable.

Except Xenogears based all its terminology on actual things in Gnosticism and it all made perfect sense both in the textual and metatextual sense.

And please, Squall and Yuna really don't compare. Squall's leather outfit may be considered sexy, but it's also a power fantasy to men, much like you could say Batman's outfit with its exaggerated muscles may be alluring to women, but it's main function is for you, the male, to project yourself into this rich crime-fighting playboy who has the perfect body with which he can dominate stuff and have all the ladies. Likewise, Squall has the perfect model face and cool leather clothes because that's the beauty ideal in Japan, so that you can relate be that super cool guy that kills things with a gunblade abd get the hot chick. Female sexualization like Yuna's or Lightning's doesn't make them power icons for women. They're stripped down to look more accessible, so to speak, in some outfits even submissive, all with the Male Gaze in mind. They're really not there for the women to feel better about themselves. Compare that to another controversial example in Bayonetta where the main character is, indeed, very sexualized, and yet that's the whole point of her character and she totally owns it with her personality. Bayonetta is perfectly aware of how sexy she is and she likes it, and it gives her power and control. So here's your power fantasy element that is not present in sexualized FF females. And yes, Vanille's moans are definitely evocative of an orgasm.

All I'm saying is there's a difference between being portrayed as sexy than being portrayed as a sex object which has happened to female characters but not the male ones. Even the Yoshida examples don't really make things better. True, he sexualizes both the male and female form, but no attention in-game is brought to Ashley Riot's ass cheeks writhin the game - the camera doesn't focus on them, he doesn't like to stretch and show it off seductively to the camera, and yet we still get close-ups of Melrose's ass. Similar things can be said about FFXII - Basch is wearing assess chaps during his prison escape sequence, but you wouldn't know it without looking for it, but you know all about Ashe's skirt and Fran's uh... attire.

Now coming back to Mevius - if you remember the initial announcement of the game, the main protagonist was first seen not only in an outfit completely exposing his entire side, butt cheek included, but also in very submissive poses. It did seem like for once the series wasn't pandering to the Male Gaze, but the Female or Gay one. And notice that no one got angry about Ashley Riot, but the backlash towards this dude was so huge that they actually changed his outfit. There is definitely a double standard.

Thankfully, it looks like they've fixed Cindy's fanservicey nature in XV. In those 50 minutes of gameplay it looks like, while she still dresses the same, the camera no longer fixated on her assets, so she's more the energetic character they intended her to be than a pair of boobs for the audience to ogle.

That's kind of the thing - FF isn't particularly bad at the sexualization thing. This is a gaming problem in general. FF has actually given us consistently good female characters, with only some recent excursions (LR) really going into that shameless pandering area that's usually reserved for creepy otaku games. Nevertheless, it seems Tabata once again is a very reasonable man that does remember that women are people who may like their games too and decided to let Cindy retain her last shred of dignity. So while FF may have a general problem with sexualization, it isn't larger than in most games, and they atcleast try to sometimes make it equal opportunity. Yoshida is just too good for this world, I guess. Bare ass cheeks for everyone!

[Wolf Kanno]

Fynn mostly addressed what needed to be said about the double standard and "sexy vs sex object" debate. As for Tolkein, it should also be pointed out that LotR is an amalgamation of folklore and mythology from all over Europe, so much of his terminology was somewhat understood by its contemporaries and in today's age, said information has been milked dry by every fantasy author who came after Tolkein. He did write a new language for the elves and other higher races, but I would point out that said Elven language is not a huge plot point, I mean the Istair is their term for Gandalf and his kind, but it's not like that's what he's called for the whole story, he begins with the lay men term of Wizard all the way back in the Hobbit. So the new language deal is more flavor text and world building in this case than relevant information that will be brought up with no context for a hundred pages in the book. Secondly, he does a decent job of translating said language to the reader rather quickly, usually within the story itself. So again, the terminology issue here is a moot point cause Tolkein would explain relevant stuff to you quickly, not to mention his Elvish language follows a cohesive understanding.

The issue with XIII's terms is not that their incomprehensible (that just makes them stupid) but rather the unknown nature of what they mean is lost on the player, especially since it takes the game what feels like forever to fill in the blanks and most of the time it's in the glossary, which forces you to stop playing the game so you catch up on all of the important lingo to make sense of the plot. Whereas FFVII and VIII stuck mostly to terminology that made bloody sense even without exact context. Hell the real issue with both games is why would anyone name badass super soldiers/mercenaries SOLDIER and SeeD in the first place since one is redundant and the other sounds way too "flowery" to be an elite military force, even if it is trying to be cool with the capitalized D. Yet, you can still see the parallel and symbolism without Cloud or Quistis trying to sit you down and explain it to you, and even better, neither game waited to really talk about it until hours into the game, nor force you to stop playing the game to read the glossary in case the first explanation didn't pan out.

As for Xenogears, there are a few differences with its use of terminology over the previous titles we've talked about. Firstly, as Fynn pointed out, all of the terminology is rooted in Greek Gnosticim or Jewish lore, so the only people screwed in this regard would be any country that didn't have to deal with European or U.S. powers meddling in their affairs at some point in the last 3000 years. Secondly, much like Evangleion, a lot of the name dropping is is more flavor text than relevant. The names of Gears, Towns, major locations, and doomsday buzzwords by the Gazel Ministry are either irrelevant, symbolic but not important to the plot, or the context of the term being used is enough to get the gist of it. The rest of the terminology follows the VII and VIII route where it easily makes sense with a just a little context given in the scene the term is used in. Thirdly, the terminology dropping and cryptic dialogue are intentional to confuse the player, Xenogears is a mystery concerning its world and the character of Fei; and the roundabout plot choir that is most of the villains are meant to confuse and confound you enough to keep you playing; Xenosaga did the same thing.

[Forsaken Lover]

Except Xenogears based all its terminology on actual things in Gnosticism and it all made perfect sense both in the textual and metatextual sense.

Emperor:Yes, the -Gospel-. We are the people expelled from paradise and forced to live on the cruel surface of the earth. We who fill this land will once again return to the presence of God in paradice and live there eternally. That is the -Time- of the -Gospel-. That -Time- is at hand. We, the Gazel, must find God's resting place by then and resurrect him. That is our final prayer.

Citan:Our final prayer?

Emporer:Our final prayer to escape from the -Fate- that was determined at our genesis.


Gazel Red 1:If only 'he' did not exist, the Lambs would not have been turned into the 'Animus'. It has been 500 years since our fall in the 'Days of Destruction' that 'he' caused... We would not have to do this in such a troublesome manner as we do now.



You literally have to play through Xenogears more than once to understand half the conversations between anyone outside the party. This is "better" than fal'Cie and l'Cie how?

And please, Squall and Yuna really don't compare. Squall's leather outfit may be considered sexy, but it's also a power fantasy to men, much like you could say Batman's outfit with its exaggerated muscles may be alluring to women, but it's main function is for you, the male, to project yourself into this rich crime-fighting playboy who has the perfect body with which he can dominate stuff and have all the ladies. Likewise, Squall has the perfect model face and cool leather clothes because that's the beauty ideal in Japan, so that you can relate be that super cool guy that kills things with a gunblade abd get the hot chick. Female sexualization like Yuna's or Lightning's doesn't make them power icons for women. They're stripped down to look more accessible, so to speak, in some outfits even submissive, all with the Male Gaze in mind. They're really not there for the women to feel better about themselves. Compare that to another controversial example in Bayonetta where the main character is, indeed, very sexualized, and yet that's the whole point of her character and she totally owns it with her personality. Bayonetta is perfectly aware of how sexy she is and she likes it, and it gives her power and control. So here's your power fantasy element that is not present in sexualized FF females. And yes, Vanille's moans are definitely evocative of an orgasm.

Ah, the Bayonetta hypocrisy. A game literally marketed on stripping her naked is not objectifying women? I don't get it, I never will get it. It's every bit as damning as DOA game.

And I didn't realize only "whores" has orgasms.

Yuna is a beautiful women who smurfing saved the world and can summon giant monsters or later on shoot/stab/set things on fire. I don't see why you are calling her submissive when she is every bit as much a power fantasy as Squall. You're just determined to let Squall off because he's a guy and Yuna is from FFX. Well, hate to break it to you, but Yuna is possibly the most popular FF female, among both men and women.

And really, Squall is a prettyboy clad in leather who has "issues." He's so MISUNDERSTOOD. HE JUST NEEDS A HUG AND THE LOVE OF A GOOD WOMAN! That's literally the plot of FFVIII.

As for Xenogears, there are a few differences with its use of terminology over the previous titles we've talked about. Firstly, as Fynn pointed out, all of the terminology is rooted in Greek Gnosticim or Jewish lore, so the only people screwed in this regard would be any country that didn't have to deal with European or U.S. powers meddling in their affairs at some point in the last 3000 years. Secondly, much like Evangleion, a lot of the name dropping is is more flavor text than relevant. The names of Gears, Towns, major locations, and doomsday buzzwords by the Gazel Ministry are either irrelevant, symbolic but not important to the plot, or the context of the term being used is enough to get the gist of it. The rest of the terminology follows the VII and VIII route where it easily makes sense with a just a little context given in the scene the term is used in. Thirdly, the terminology dropping and cryptic dialogue are intentional to confuse the player, Xenogears is a mystery concerning its world and the character of Fei; and the roundabout plot choir that is most of the villains are meant to confuse and confound you enough to keep you playing; Xenosaga did the same thing.

So your excuse is that it's intentionally terrible? Having cutscenes that bombard you with meaningless gibberish is better than cutscenes where they bombard you with meaningless gibberish? At least Sazh stops to explain stuff about a half hour into the game. Who the smurf will be explaining Time of the Gospel, Days of Destruction or Anima in XenogearS? Nobody for a long, long time. In fact, to understand any of it, you have to read Perfect Works.

I love Xenogears but it's hardly flawless and it's really no dbetter than XIII in this regard. But that's the thing is, what XIII did was not bad. It merely went about it in a bad way but that's to do with pacing, not writing.

[Fynn]

You see the words Gospel and Day of Destruction and you can kinda sorta -infer- (hehe) what they mean by that. l'Cie and fal'Cie, by contrast, are completely meaningless in isolation where if you show it someone on the street and ask what they think that means they'll probably just shrug.

[Elly]

funny how i figured Fal'Cie were demi-gods of a sort and l'Cie were the agents of said demi-gods... it's honestly not as hard to figure out as the detractors exaggerate it to be... it does not take the datalog to figure it out, it's all there in story context as long as you pay attention... i got it all on my first playthrough... as for that paragraph he wanted explained, here goes:

XIII begins in Cocoon (an artificial satellite), where citizens of Bodhum (a seaside town within Cocoon)​ are being murdered by PSICOM, soldiers of the world government, for coming in contact with a demi-god from Pulse (the Planet they orbit). The demi-gods are turning people into their reluctant agents, who have an Unclear Mission, but if the agents fail to complete their unclear mission they're turned into horrible monsters. Our hero, Lightning, teams up with members of NORA (a local resistance group) to rescue her reluctant agent sister from the demi-god Anima, and the story continues naturally from there.

it's really that easy to get, and i honestly believe if they worded it that way they would have been panned for making the story over-simplified...