End-Game Discussion (MASSIVE SPOILERS, obvs)

[Dat Matt]

Also, can we talk about one more thing? Am I the only one who saw the Ringabel reveal from miles away?

I was looking through Ringabel's diary/ journal thing and saw a picture of Dim holding a young boy's hand. So had to assume that Dim/ Ringabel, or that they were brothers, related, or something.

I opened the forum up this morning while half asleep, thought I was in the Lightning Returns forum, checked out an ending thread, and was spoiled before I realized my mistake (when NeoCracker basically opened the thread with the line "Airy is the villain"). The damage is done.

Sorry ;A;

Should of waited a bit longer to do this, but was just so annoyed with how good the game was, and then dropped everything to basically try and make the game longer.

(SPOILER)That was my main Grievance with the game. It was really good fun and then chapter 5 rolls round and I ust wanted it to end. Getting true ending gave this secret video though was was pretty cool [youtube]geDEHHMZ7No[youtube]. Shame I'd already knew of the existance of the sequel before starting the game xD

[NeoCracker]

In regards the that ending video, I hated it.

It looked cool, but I was actually really impressed they had the balls to kill their lead character at the end. I haven't seen a move like that since Lufia.

And then you find out he's okay a minute or two later.

[Fynn]

I actually didn't like how they hinted he was dead. First of all, it wasn't clear he was dead. Second of all, it was not foreshadowed in any way, came out of the blue and seemingly for no reason and without explanation. I don't care about the creators balls, I want a well-crafted story, and Tiz just dying there did not make any sense within the narrative.

[NeoCracker]

It was established prety early that it wasn't the knight who saved him, it was actually the celestial inside him. It was also pretty clear that was the only reason he stayed alive. Makes perfect sense to me that with the spirit gone, so would he.

So no, it didn't come from no where, there was some kind of set up to this.

[Fynn]

It was not clear and the celestial within him thing really seemed to come out of the blue in the final battle and no one reacted to it, which was pretty stupid. It was kind of a stretch to think, based on the fact that it wasn't Owen who saved Tiz, that he would die once it was all over. That was a cheap shot, IMO, at forced drama, which would have made me dive into Darkness Induced Audience Apathy, I'm glad they shook things up in the secret video. Compare this to how it was done in Persona 3, where it was handled much better, without feeling forced. There, reviving the hero would have really cheapened the impact, because him sacrificing himself was built up from the beginning and was very profound. Here, there was really no reason for Tiz to die. He did not use up all his life force to win the final battle. If Airy's sister really abandoned him after all that knowing he would die, she's as much a dick as her sister.

[NeoCracker]

Owen not saving him was a pretty big indicater he otherwise would have died at the crater, and there had been a couple referances to their being another Soul inside of him, the first being Mephilia sensing it.

And Airy's sister was the only reason Tiz was alive. In addition, Tiz is the one who 'returned what he borrowed' as it were. This was pretty obviously going to happen at some point I felt, and something very in-character for Tiz to do. Now, I hadn't considered what would happen, so the death caught me by surprise.

Comparing to Persona isn't entirely fair because a) Persona 3 is simply one of the best games ever written, so I'm not going to hold it to that standard. Lo and b) Tiz was never a heroic sacrifice. He was just some guy who was there and who was willing to do what he could, though he was never really suppose to survive the opening of the crater, so he's more a guy going forward on borrowed time to begin with. The game just never tells you this directly, at least not until the credits.

[Fynn]

I compared this to Persona mainly because I felt they tried to pull that off and failed, so they added the retcon. The similarity is there. Don't get me wrong, I love Persona 3 and agree it's one of the best games ever made, but it's not some holy object that's gonna get defiled when compared to this which is a flawed but still very good game. Just wanted to compare how Persona did it better, is all.

The very main problem I have with the story is that it could have been so much more. I was not bothered by the loop, because it had more character development for the asterisk holders, but that created a lot of plotholes. I know this writer can do a terrific job because Steins;Gate, but this did kind of feel it was rushed. The characters are great and their interactions awesome, the atmosphere gets intense, but then when the loop starts, they start getting inexplicable memory lapses. Remember guys? Ringabel told us Airy was evil and her wings were a countdown. I know we had to keep up appearances, but we had a suspicion as to how many worlds are left and Airy's reveal should have been less "huh?!" And more "huh, so THAT's what it meant."

[NeoCracker]

My comment about Persona just being better over all was just me being silly. Nothing I thought you'd take seriously.

THough I do think it's not an apt comparison for the death in Bravely Default wasn't a sacrfice like it was in Persona. I think if you take it on it's own, with the build that was there, it stands on it's own pretty well. (Up until two minutes later you find out he lives. )

But yeah, I agree there could have been more and the lack of it is the biggest drawback. I don't know if it's because it was rushed though. All the different worlds being almost Identical seems like it was something in place since they started, and so many problems came from that fact. It feels more like they introduced a plot point ealry on in production, and later on it was either too late to change it considering how much of the story was built around it, or the just didn't realize how many issues they'd created for themselves. That's another discussion entirely though.

[Fynn]

Well, some people can get very defensive about their favorite things, so I just wanted to make it clear that I did not mean to offend anyone

By rushed I did not mean that the loops were tacked on. I agree that it must have been something they established at the beginning of development. It's the amount of inconsistencies that makes me think they didn't have enough time to think this through. So yeah, you pretty much nailed it.

[NeoCracker]

Still though, regardless of the mass amount of bitching I've done in regards to this game thus far (Both here and my dislike on Streetpass functionality, as well as my un-announced complaints of Norende operating on an out of game timer, as well as never getting to actually see the town grow, or the fact you can still order it's growth when you are no longer in your home dimension making no sense), I still really enjoyed this game, and will be getting the second one when it's out without question.

[Fynn]

Ditto. It has its flaws, some of them glaring, but overall it's the best FF to come out in many years, and one of the best written SE games period. I love the return of the job system and I hope any potential sequels will at least be as good

EDIT: I just noticed something really smart about the title. The FF here stands for "fairy flies", and for the first four chapters this game is the typical old-school FF waking up crystals business. The moment when Ringabel's memory returns and the game goes in it's own unique direction is when the "FF" is gone from the title. So basically, this shows that this game is supposed to act as a deconstruction of Final Fantasy

[Skyblade]

Ok, I still haven't finished the game. But I just got the Blue Mage Vampire Asterisk, and I found myself having to ask this question.

Why is Braev such a psychotic jerk? There is no reason for almost any of his actions.

Assaulting the temple to prevent the Grand Ritual. Ok, that at least had some justification (even if it wasn't necessarily the only or the best thing to do there).

But the entire point of the Grand Ritual was that the Orthodoxy's power had been shattered. The people had moved on without the central authority, and apparently had grown up that way for hundreds of years. Sage Yulyana had been guiding and teaching the vestals, leading them away from the corruption since Eternia had been sealed off.

So why does Braev start his mass-murder spree across the world? What does he hope to accomplish? The corrupt of the Orthodoxy were dead, and had been since he slaughtered the main temple. What was the reason for the rest of it? It wasn't exactly an ideal course of action, ensuring that the vestals would have a perfect person to point a finger at when everything started to go wrong with the Crystals. Heck, according to "the angel", the weakening prayers of the faithful let the crystals fall into darkness. So, if he hadn't spent years slaughtering and persecuting anyone who stayed true to the Orthodoxy, the entire Awakening quest might never have happened in the first place. There was no reason to do anything after the initial purge. It was bloodshed for the sake of bloodshed.

[Fynn]

'Cuz he's a butthurt son of a bitch.

[NeoCracker]

The Ritual, from what I recall, is what caused the Crystals to go dark. That is why he went after the other temples as well, so while there is still some justification for going after the Crystals, he went to a pointless extreme.

[Skyblade]

The Ritual, from what I recall, is what caused the Crystals to go dark. That is why he went after the other temples as well, so while there is still some justification for going after the Crystals, he went to a pointless extreme.

Nope. The Ritual occurred fifteen years prior to the darkening of the Crystals, and, according to the game's information, resulted in the Earth Crystal running wild with power, overflowing to excess (much like the Awakening rite). This is part of why the magic cables were attached to it, to drain the power off before it caused a catastrophe. It wasn't mentioned as affecting the other crystals at all.

It's more likely that the arrival of the Great Chasm (which was Airy tearing through from the previous world, I believe), the sundering of the walls between worlds, and the resulting surge of darkness and monsters was what caused the crystals to darken. But Braev's activities certainly didn't help.

I'm also not sure how much of the documentation of the events of the attack on the Orthodoxy headquarters can be trusted. Braev's documents write him up to be a great hero, yet directly contradict almost everything that we know to be true. He apparently accepted the surrender of every Orthodoxy official and ordered no slaughter or mistreatment of prisoners. Yet his most trusted and honorable officer killed a defenseless opponent (the Earth Vestal) in a fit of rage. Further, we know that Braev was directly responsible for acts of violent slaughter against innocent Crystalists (let the corrupt leaders survive, but slaughter the others?) across multiple realms (which started around three years before the Crystals darkened), attempted to hide his atrocities (he covered up the death of the Fire Vestal, and had the Eternian First Division acting undercover as a "mercenary group"), and refused to explain his motives or plans to anyone until the world was all but destroyed.

Further, according to the documentation of the assault, both Erutus and Qada were under investigation for misconduct fifteen years ago. Yet both apparently came out just fine, being promoted and with no checks in place to prevent further atrocities at their hands. He has also promoted people like DeRosa and Victoria, who are clearly amoral and don't behave in ways in keeping with his supposed "ideals". Having Victoria as a living weapon is one thing, but putting her on the ruling council of a country? Why? Because she is one of the few people who absolutely share's Braev's beliefs that all Crystalists must die, with no quarter given and no care what else may occur because of it.

Braev may have stopped the Grand Ritual, but as far as I can tell, that's the only even halfway decent thing he's done. He has mercilessly attacked and slaughtered anyone who disagrees with him, or holds a contrary viewpoint, and does his best to make sure that any official documentation writes him up as a heroic martyr (make sure you write that I'm a "usurper") doing his best to help people. I really don't know why the game even attempts to portray him sympathetically. Yes, he has a tragic backstory, but even knowing the whole thing, it only makes me more eager to stop him.