For the record, I never had the chance to beat the game, but I did get part way through Chapter 11 I believe it was (when you get to Gran Pulse), and yeah, the only times I really died were when the game threw things at me that you couldn't possibly see coming the first time and I was killed by a situation which was essentially unfair (one of the many reasons I despise combat in that game). I don't tend to run from battles when I play RPG's so I had no trouble hitting the cap on the Crystarium each chapter, and frankly, most battles were easily beaten by rotating through three paradigms for much of the game. I had a fourth which included two healers and a commando in case I came across an enemy who could dish out a lot of damage and I would occasionally need more healing, but I can probably count the number of times I switched to it on both of my hands. The number of useful strategies in the game were quite limited which made it easy to make a handful of efficient paradigms. You just had to pay attention and read the flow of battle properly, which only became difficult when they threw instant death attacks in there which you couldn't know about before hand (which was stupid). And for the record, I wasn't getting low ratings on the majority of battles. Maybe the first time I encountered an enemy if it threw something unexpected at me, but once you learn their attacks it's not hard to get a good rating every battle.Originally Posted by Loony BoB
If those are the only times you died in the game then you must be freakishly good. Firstly, you can not be strong enough to take on a boss fight due to dodging too many battles. Secondly, you can use the wrong set of characters, meaning you miss out on vital options that other characters provide. Thirdly, despite how automated you can make the game, you are still in control of what your character is doing and there is every possibility that you can wind up "doing it wrong". And, of course, you can have the wrong paradigm setup or not switch in time or... well, there are a lot of things that can go wrong, let's face it. If you felt the battles were playing themselves then... well, with the amount of times I died in that game, you are a FF God amongst FF men.Some of those battles were incredibly frustrating for me.
Once again, they didn't have a lot of available space on the cartridge to build things up. A lot of concessions had to be made in the script as well when it was originally brought over from Japan because they simply couldn't squeeze all of the english text onto the cartridge. I'm not going to say that the scene couldn't have been done better as a result, but I am saying it did a damn fine job of condensing the scene to the essentials that effectively got the point across.
I also never said that people would have given up because life was meaningless. I said they'd give up because there was no hope of their situation ever improving, or of ever seeing their loved ones again. Again, we're not talking about some ordinary everyday situation here. We're talking about a situation where the people on that island not only saw the world end and lost people they cared about, but the world itself and the plants and animals on it were slowly dying. So not only would it be very difficult for them to survive, it was literally only going to get worse. There was no hope of rescue, of ever seeing home, or of ever building a new life on the island because the world itself was literally dying. Combine that with the fact that suddenly being forced to survive in the wilderness on it's own, even with the shelter of a house, would be extremely difficult to a degree most people can't actually imagine (try going days, or even weeks without a decent meal, trying to scrounge up whatever food and water you can. Even fishing can be far more difficult than the game implies, even with proper equipment).
The most important part of any survival situation, before food, water, shelter, or anything else is actually maintaining the will to keep going. And without hope of things ever getting better that can be extremely difficult, especially for those who have lead relatively comfortable lives. People who've been lost in the wilderness in the real world have given in to the depression that can creep up on you quickly in a situation like that, and easily spread to the rest of the group. And when depression starts to take hold of someone, particularly in situations of high stress, it can quickly spiral out of control. Yes, it's no simple matter to override our natural fear of death and instincts for survival, but then, we override natural instincts all of the time, and when someone has spiraled into a deep depression, they aren't always thinking straight. But even if you are thinking straight, are you going to tell me it isn't rational to end it quickly rather than face the dwindling resources and slow death a ruined world offers?
You may not agree with this take, but it's not only a plausible explanation for a group of people ending their lives, but a realistic one given the circumstances we're talking about here.
Also, to clarify something here which Bastion already mentioned, I'm not arguing that Square should go around making new 16-bit FF entries. I would like to see some 2D entries in a spin-off series or something like that, but I wouldn't want it limited to simply 16-bit graphical stylings. The thing is that with the drastic move to 3D over the years, there's been little improvement in 2D graphics. With the exception of Vanillaware, no one has really done much beyond 2D sprites, and I think that's a real shame. But then, I've always wanted to see an RPG with an accurate representation of Amano's concept art as I think that would be an unbelievably beautiful game to play. And the irony is that now that we have the hardware to start pushing some really creative boundaries with 2D it may never happen.
But I will also state that I do believe that SNES era FF titles, and even FFVII and IX managed to convey a lot more with their simple graphics than an entry like XIII did for me. I'll also gladly defend their art styles for that matter, and do completely believe that they've held up pretty well. Sure the technology may not be there, but they still paid attention to principles of good art design which helps give them a charm that isn't lost because console tech has moved on.
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