FFVI Review Post

[Wolf Kanno]

I love the amount of love and care that's gone into VI. I think it's great that a character is permanently lose-able like Shadow. When it comes to obtuse secrets that allow for different playthroughs, I totally get it - I really do (my favourite game from the last half-decade is Dark Souls).

I just watched a clip of how the Floating Continent scene plays out, and it's not as bad as I remember it (I remember it being really obtuse, for some reason). On the one hand, if they drew too much attention to the choice, it would never be a conscious choice at all but a 'do it because it's there'. It also works as a secret because there aren't a bunch of other secrets like it prior to that moment to school the player on 'hey, here's how you're supposed to approach this moment'. The scene is cool, I am going to give it that.

However, say the player does save Shadow the first time through. Then that player will forever miss the content (small though it may be) that comes from not saving him (why would you? Conversely, why would one kill Magus?). To get that content, you have to willingly ignore a secret you know is there. There is no gameplay benefit to losing Shadow - you're giving up a playable character, plain and simple, for obscure game lore later in the game. I guess that might not be an issue for some, but that does kind of gall me in a way that I feel like I'm losing all the change out of my pocket just so I can bend over and pick up a nickel.

Okay so I'm giving some ground on that Shadow argument.

Actually you do get a gameplay benefit. Relm gains Interceptor in battle and he works just like he does with Shadow (blocks melee attacks, high damage counter) considering Relm's equipment options make her weak in this regard it's actually sizable boost for her, so there is a benefit if you plan on using her a lot or if she just happens to be your favorite, then that's all the incentive you need to make that choice again.

I have a friend who loves Frog in Chrono Trigger, and while she like Magus, she loves Frog more and will usually kill Magus just so she can see the ending where Frog turns human. She even keeps Crono dead cause the ending this causes the longest ending where you can see Frog in his human form, so I would say that despite the choices leading only to what many may perceive as minor change, it still may mean the world to some people.

One argument I won't give up on is the customization issue. I get that choosing which spells to give to which character is technically customizing each one. My issue, however, is that none of the customization feels meaningful. Sure you can elect to not give character certain abilities, but with abundant EXP and ABP, you're really just neglecting to fill out the checklist. I said before, I feel like the customization system is entirely dependent on how much time the player has to dedicate to learning spells. My favorite way to play FF is Blue Magic, Blue Magic, Blue Magic - and, with Gau and Strago, grinding is the main vehicle for making them fun to play (or watch).

In VII, customization is a matter of taking, giving, and switching (as opposed to just neglecting to make things stick on certain characters). There are secrets and some grinding involved, but more or less a lot of what you need is made available to you over the critical path of the game. Customization in VII is a matter of giving some things to everyone but not all things. Sure, you can also give all your characters the same things by buying duplicates of the same materia, but, hey - that's the player's choice. If you want to change it up, you still can. On the other hand, once Sabin knows Fire, he knows it for good. There's no reason to not just teach it to Edgar, Setzer, Shadow, etc, because the only downside to it is time spent.

I will simply say we just disagree on this principle, to me, leveling stuff because it's there is for post games or perfect files. To put your opinion into VII terms, you're basically saying you would equip useless materia on your party for the sake of leveling rather than actually customizing and to me that's two different things. I can honestly say it makes a world of difference to play through sections of VI with one character who can actually use healing magic as opposed to having a full party that can do so. Even if you try to play roles and still teach magic to everyone to kill the time, I feel the lack of the temptation to cheat makes for a stronger game.

VI's system was Squenix's second attempt of having both a comprehensive leveling system but also one that wasn't a job class system, which was incredibly rare in the 16-bit era. I don't necessarily disagree that VII's system was more comprehensive than VI's system but I also feel what it traded to do so (character roles) was a bit of a deal breaker for me.

Wolf, you've made these points before. You don't need paragraphs to reiterate them. I have no idea why you're saying that I "couldn't come up with a good argument to show how a game before VI did it better in telling a cinematic scene through mood and action." No one ever made any such assertion in this thread. We're only challenging your statements on VI's importance because you have yet to explain or show how VI's improvements in animation and cinematic storytelling are bigger than the improvements FFV made over FFIV, or that Chrono Trigger made over FFVI.

You came in this thread talking about how FFVI was a "before and after" moment in gaming but all you've done is tell us over and over how it's better than older games, not how it's improvements were more important than past improvements. This database says FFIV's Dark Knight Cecil had only 9 sprites... So how is FFVI's addition of 12 more sprites per character more impressive than FFV's addition of 30 more sprites per character when this is something the series has been doing since its second game?

But I have, you're just ignoring my argument. It wasn't just that VI added more sprites, its also that the sprite are larger, in more human shape and can thus maximize more emotion from it due to this. Yet's its not just this technical leap that's important it's how it was utilized to create a more cinematic experience. I already gave you the example about sprite use in the villains large "let's end the world":

To give another example between FFV and VI, when ExDeath and Kefka cause mass genocide in both games, the scenes are very different in scale in terms of how spites are used. In FFV, you see a Black hole appear above a city, switch to the interior of city, you see the screen shake, everyone makes surprised looks and then they get pulled up and we switch to a new scene. When the Warring Triad go wild in VI, you watch flashes of light, the screen shake, people running around screaming, the earth opens up and people fall in the earth repeatable slams open and shuts, one NPC tries to hold onto a person falling into the chasm and eventually you watch the shaking knock them both into the earth. You cannot tell me, that those scenes are equal in terms of using the games technology to tell a cinematic story. If you did, then I would tell you to check yourself for fever cause you've let your fanboy rage against VI cloud your judgement.

If you need another example take the differences between Tellah fighting Golbez in FFIV, Galuf Fighting ExDeath, and Leo fighting Kefka.

In all three scenes the story takes place in the battle screen, thus all the sprites are equal of height but not in expression. Tella and Guluf's fights are largely told through dialogue boxes in battle, then switch out to the overhead view to witness Tellah falling over and Golbez being acting lamenting his surprise. The character move to each other to show concern but that's largely all.





In Galuf, he gets pumped up, absorbs the power hurting Krile, charges ExDeath, has a regular battle falls over. The extent of ExDeath's animation is him on his face, standing with his head kneeled, and fully erect (oh my ). The party doesn't even react when Krile shouts out that Galuf is dying, they just stay in a portrait view despite the game having a surprise animation. Hell, the best use of the sprites in the whole scene are the Wind Drakes (still impressive) and Krile being slammed around the room, but the rest of the scene is largely dead with the sprites largely using their basic four cardinal directions. V uses very few animation to tell it's story and while the scene is an improvement over IV, it still retains a lot of what IV did.




So you want to know what VI did better? They actually utilized the sprites to their full effect. Just watch this sequence and notice how more lively everything is. Leo beats Kefka, moves through the battle screen, Gestahl appears in a puff of smoke and immediately Leo utilizes his low health sprite to create the sense of bowing to the Emperor, he stands up in protest when the Gestahl's words trouble him and Kefka appears which shocks Leo, Kefka strikes Leo knocking him to the ground, laughs as he monologues, then leaps at Leo and kills him. The scene goes on to watch Kefka react to the Espers re-awakening, the POV shifts to the Espers using Mode 7 to watch them seek out and invade Thamasa. Kefka crushes them while laughing and sprinting about the screen. Scenbe fades, open up to Leo's grave, Terra bows her head in sadness while she places flowers on his grave, intercepter appears and the whole party reacts, Locke kneels down to Interceptor's level shoing he's concerned and then stand up with line of vision fixated on Interceptor before he decides to talk to the rest of the party. Relm now has also moved to kneel down and comfort Interceptor.

So what did VI do despite only adding 13 extra sprites, actually used them for full dramatic effect. This goes back to my Silent Movie argument, without dialogue, you would not really have any sense of who anyone in FFV is, hell even with the dialogue they are mostly caricatures, whereas in VI you would actually have a sense of who everyone is and what their story was. VI doesn't like to stand still and the characters are constantly moving about whereas in FFV you still see whole sequences where the party faces one direction and the whole story is told through the text like all the games before it. V may have used sprites for cinematic impact but the difference between V and VI is that V does it in baby steps whereas VI acts like a seasoned veteran of using the sprites. What VI did was basically used a series of the sprites to create the illusion of animation and movement, looking at the Locke sequence I mentioned it's incredibly clear what's he''s doing and his three simple animations showcase several feelings and intentions. V doesn't do this very much. FFV could have added 60 extra sprites, it wouldn't have changed that the team didn't really utilize them to enhance the story as much as they could. This is really a great example of Kitase's talents as a director.

To bring this back to VI being an an important event, I simply show you DQV, a game that came out before FFVI, hell even FFV.


*Forgive the annoying commentary*

Despite being one of the games more emotional moments, the sprites are flat, their only animation is an arm movement used to simulate walking. Even the kiss is just the sprite sliding forward with it's walking animation. The sprites are also squashed (though this may partly be because of the screen resolution) and look like toddler toys for all their features. Now look at DQVI, a game that came out over a year later from FFVI.




Notice the sprites look anatomically correct and have subtle animations. The MC starts out sprawled on the floor and then sits up. The game increased the amount of sprites so it can utilize a more cinematic feel which is pretty unnatural for a DQ game as they often try to limit the personality of the characters to keep the player feeling like they are the MC. DQ VII's sprites are not even as good as DQVI's sprites, so obviously this wasn't just Enix playing catch up, this was Enix trying to challenge Square in the 16-bit era.

Now here's Chrono Trigger which had probably the most detailed sprites in the 16-bit era for RPGs. and once again, like VI, the game utilizes several sprites to create a sense of movement and animation. Not counting the cape waving, Magus only uses a handful of his animations sprites but he showcases a whole range of movement because of the clever use of it which was pioneered in VI.



VI pretty much wrote the book on how to use sprites to convey action, emotions and create a cinematic experience. While it did not create the idea of it, it took it farther than any game before it and lo and behold several games that came out a year or two after VI are utilizing it like it was the standard. That's because VI raised the bar, and that's what FF does. I mean isn't this mostly your argument about VII's impact by moving to 3D despite the animation of the models being largely crude and by today's standards amateurish?

I still don't think you're discussion of older RPGs obfuscating content explains why Shadow's rescue was so poorly done. I like finding secret passages in walls. But this is worse than the Zodiac Spear!

Now who is being a drama queen?