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Winks posted:Android version to be released in the US coming soon in 2014. If only SE remembered that Android users exist, I wouldn't hate them that much nowadays.
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Dec 20, 2012 10:28
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That just looked jankey. It's like they just don't care anymore (and to be honest, I wouldn't put it past SE to not care anymore). You know what, Just give the next FF to Level-5, I think it's time for a DQ 8 of Final Fantasy.
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Dec 20, 2012 10:34
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As someone who really liked FF XIII and FF XIII-2, and as someone who will end up buying FF Lightning Returns and probably(?) like it, after I watched that trailer, what the hell is going on with Japanese developers? That was atrocious. Does this kind of stuff play better over in Japan and I am just experiencing the cultural rift? edit: And that costume design. How do we go from a pretty cool lowkey soldier uniform, to a pretty bad rear end set of valkyrie armor, to a backless metal corset with count dracula cape, studded leather arm things, and chaps with no pants. a_gelatinous_cube fucked around with this message at 13:40 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 13:34
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Zyklon B Zombie posted:As someone who really liked FF XIII and FF XIII-2, and as someone who will end up buying FF Lightning Returns and probably(?) like it, after I watched that trailer, what the hell is going on with Japanese developers?
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Dec 20, 2012 13:39
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CottonWolf posted:I think that's less Japanese developers generally, and more internal Square Enix. Square's been making incomprehensible decisions for the best part of half a decade. It seems like Square, Capcom, and Konami are in some sort of bizarre race to retroactively destroy my childhood.
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Dec 20, 2012 13:41
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Lightning's got one short cape for her back, and a second, slightly longer cape for her legs. Also she didn't have enough money for two sleeves so instead of just a single right or left sleeve she just went for half of each.
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Dec 20, 2012 14:22
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I actually preferred the hand-holding storytelling of FF13 to FF13-2's PARDOX FETCHQUEST. We really got nothing on the original 6. It was very unsatisfying to play the entire game to try find out very little of what happens with Sahz/Vanille/Fang/ Snow/Lightning. 13-2 could've been smart and had a story with elements like Chrono Trigger. But instead it was just sloppy and dull. Mind you, the monster catching of 13-2 was a brilliant feature. 13-3 - The best I can describe it is an uninspired mess. That outfit, the jerky gameplay, recycled enemies. They really have so much they could do, but SE just can't get their poo poo together. Also, 13-3 outfit is DREADFUL. Edit - Good news, Chocolina is back! 54 Seconds in. Andrew_1985 fucked around with this message at 14:47 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 14:42
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Ugh chocolina really? Between how embarassing it is that they thought that character was a good idea to design and implement and that the battle system was the same, the 13-2 demo sold me on not buying 13-2.
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Dec 20, 2012 15:46
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Dumb costumes are basically a franchise staple at this point, light's outfit is perfectly in line with expectations.
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Dec 20, 2012 16:00
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Winks posted:Android version to be released in the US coming soon in 2014. For gently caress's sake, Square, I'm willing to spend thirty loving dollars on a cell phone game you made in RPGMaker if you'd just loving release it to god drat Android already. 2014? I won't be playing FFV until 2015 most likely, and by that point I'll be busy with FF13-6.
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Dec 20, 2012 16:06
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Fight Club Sandwich posted:Dumb costumes are basically a franchise staple at this point, light's outfit is perfectly in line with expectations.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:10
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CottonWolf posted:On the topic of Lightning, why does Japan love her so much? Is her Japanese voice actress incredible or something? She's fine, but she's not central in the way that, say, Yuna or Aerith was... Her Japanese voice actress is Maaya Sakamoto. Also did Aerith and Aya Brea, married to the voice actor who played Zack, Kenichi Suzumura. (This is also why Zack and Aerith have pretty good voice actor chemistry in the Japanese version. They're voiced by people in a relationship with one another) She has a pretty large following and is pretty good. People will buy products because she is in them, which is why S-E cast her three times in such a short time period. She's the first unambiguous female lead in a main Final Fantasy game since Terra, and more of a central character than Terra due to the way FF6 was structured. Final Fantasy has a fairly large female fanbase which often goes ignored in discussions. FF8's popularity, for example, is almost entirely built upon the female fans. FFX and FF7 compete for the title of "most popular in Japan" but FF8 has been pretty consistently the most popular with female fans despite its female lead (Rinoa) being relatively unpopular. She also hits a lot of the popularity notes for both male and female fans, likely because she was engineered to do so. She meshes elements of a lot of leads while also being a marketable female character. "She's marketable as gently caress" is a pretty big selling point, even if it's marketed primarily to a Japanese audience. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 17:27 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 17:16
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ImpAtom posted:She's the first unambiguous female lead in a main Final Fantasy game since Terra, and more of a central character than Terra. Final Fantasy has a fairly large female fanbase which often goes ignored in discussions. FF8's popularity, for example, is almost entirely built upon the female fans. FFX and FF7 compete for the title of "most popular in Japan" but FF8 has been pretty consistently the most popular with female fans despite its female lead (Rinoa) being relatively unpopular.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:22
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FF8 should be the most popular with everyone. 
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Dec 20, 2012 17:22
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CottonWolf posted:I guess I can understand that on some level. But while Lightning was definitely marketed as the main character, I can't help feeling that XIII was much more of an ensemble production than many of the games (arguably, any since VI)... It really isn't. The cast divides up early on but Lightning is pretty unambiguously cast in a main character role, to the point where the game's reoccurring leitmotif is a variation on her theme song. (In comparison to FF6 where the music choices are pretty varied.) It's focused on the cast as a whole but in a pretty specific way. She isn't the protagonist in the way that, say, Tidus is in that she is the focal point of the story, but she is the 'team leader.' Whereas something like FFIV has no 'team leader' and FFXII has someone like Vaan who is not remotely in a leadership role. She's also given primary focus on marketing and such.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:33
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CottonWolf posted:I guess I can understand that on some level. But while Lightning was definitely marketed as the main character, I can't help feeling that XIII was much more of an ensemble production than many of the games (arguably, any since VI)... That's true to an extent, but the only other characters given any real "leading" roles in 13 are Fang and maybe Sazh. Light calls the shots more or less the entire way through, and she definitely has the clearest "claim" to main character status.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:34
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I find it weird that even with her apparent marketable status, Lightning isn't actually all that important to the plot. The only reason she's special is because Serah's focus was to get the group together for some reason. You'd think they would have her move the plot in some way.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:40
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Momomo posted:I find it weird that even with her apparent marketable status, Lightning isn't actually all that important to the plot. The only reason she's special is because Serah's focus was to get the group together for some reason. You'd think they would have her move the plot in some way. She is the primary mover of the plot, basically. It's easy to forget that she (and to a lesser extent, Snow) are the guys who drag everyone along into the mess. Sazh, Vanille, Fang and Hope all have their own motivations but Lightning and Snow are the ones who actively break the status quo to set things in motion. Snow is denied protagonist status largely due to being a complete chucklefuck. The role of a Final Fantasy main character tends to be "the person who draws the party together." They may end up being half space-alien or whatever but their primary narrative purpose tends to be the person who sparks the events that occur. Sometimes this gets taken to hilarious extremes. ("Squall is responsible for literally everything ever.") Even someone like Cloud serves this purpose by being the person who facilitates the status quo breaking. (The implication being that Avalanche would have failed pretty miserably at the bombing if he hadn't been there.) This is, as a side note, why Vaan is so out of place. Balthier is the guy who does that in FFXII, with Basche and Ashe taking over shortly afterwards. There's no point where Vaan really works as anything but a secondary character despite being the 'main character.'
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Dec 20, 2012 17:53
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I can't think of a time other than the beginning where Lightning's actions directly affect the plot. The party spends most of the time going from one place to another pretty aimlessly. Even at the very end they have no idea what they're doing.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:54
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Momomo posted:I can't think of a time other than the beginning where Lightning's actions directly affect the plot. The party spends most of the time going from one place to another pretty aimlessly. Even at the very end they have no idea what they're doing. They're not wandering aimlessly though. The party split post L'Cie occurs when they disagree over what to do. Vanille and Sazh choose to go hide while Lightning marches right for the seat of Government so she can murder some dudes. She is one of the only characters to remain consistently active and moving towards a goal, even if the goal changes (sometimes incoherently) as the game goes on. Insomuch as FFXIII has a main character, she's about it. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 18:03 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 17:59
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None of those goals are ever met, though. She plans to murder a Fal'cie with Hope and doesn't, she plans on attacking Dysley and they lose, they go to Oerba and find nothing, they fight Bartandelus at the end even though that's literally exactly what he wanted.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:00
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Momomo posted:None of those goals are ever met, though. She plans to murder a Fal'cie with Hope and doesn't, she plans on attacking Dysley and they lose, they go to Oerba and find nothing, they fight Bartandelus at the end even though that's literally exactly what he wanted. And Zidane and pals fail to save like five cities in a row. v  v I'm not arguing FFXIII has a good story, but "well, they failed" doesn't make them any less the main character. Final Fantasy heroes fail on a remarkable basis honestly, probably because stopping the villains just stops the plot.I mean on the long term there aren't many Final Fantasy villains who has't completed like 90% of their plans and were stopped at the last second, often by a miracle. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 18:07 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 18:04
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There's a difference between failing and doing absolutely nothing. XIII has the main characters as nothing but puppets, IX has the characters actively work against the plot.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:06
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Momomo posted:There's a difference between failing and doing absolutely nothing. XIII has the main characters as nothing but puppets, IX has the characters actively work against the plot. That argument doesn't really work when the plot ends with them saving Cocoon and stopping the mass murder the villains wanted. It took 'em a long-rear end time and some frankly incoherent plot twists to get there but they did it. Francois Kofko posted:So, were you arguing about the plot comprehensibility or whether or not Lightning was the main character? Because I'm pretty sure it was the latter and you switched to the former for some reason? Yeah, I want to stress *Final Fantasy XIII's plot makes no sense.* It is not a well-written story. Lightning is the main character of an incoherent-as-hell story. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 18:14 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 18:08
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So, were you arguing about the plot comprehensibility or whether or not Lightning was the main character? Because I'm pretty sure it was the latter and you switched to the former for some reason?
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Dec 20, 2012 18:11
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Momomo posted:There's a difference between failing and doing absolutely nothing. XIII has the main characters as nothing but puppets, IX has the characters actively work against the plot. Isn't that the point, though?
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Dec 20, 2012 18:15
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I still don't get XIII's ending. Was their Focus to save Cocoon or to destroy it? Barthandalus says to destroy, the heroes say to save (I remember one of Vanille's stock quotes was "We have to stop the fal'Cie. That's our real Focus." or something similar) and overall I can't decide if they were idiots who did exactly what the villain wanted intentionally or unintentionally. Either way it looks like everyone would have died if not for the intervention of a god who is mentioned absolutely nowhere in the main game. I still loving hate this cosmology that is only ever suggested at in side stuff and the sequels. In the main story, we're told only of The Maker/God and the fal'Cie. There isn't any mention of higher fal'Cie who made the fal'Cie we deal with. There's just an omnipotent deity who made fal'Cie and humans. Even though the cosmology says fal'Cie and humans were made by separate entities. gently caress that game over-complicated a perfectly serviceable story.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:17
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NikkolasKing posted:I still don't get XIII's ending. No, all that stuff is in the original game, it's just hidden away through stupid datalogs, some of which are only unlockable by doing random hunts. It's the entire point of Fang having a white brand in the first place. Just... still stupid.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:19
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Renoistic posted:Isn't that the point, though? If so, that makes Barthandelus the main character which I can't see anyone trying to argue for some reason.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:21
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That dude could barely be called an "character", by any stretch of the imagination. Even by the standards of usual JRPG writing and characterisation, he's still pretty bland and forgettable. His battle form was cool though, I guess? With the heads.
Pesky Splinter fucked around with this message at 18:25 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 18:23
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Dragonatrix posted:If so, that makes Barthandelus the main character which I can't see anyone trying to argue for some reason. What I mean is that they try their hardest the whole game to break free of their Fal'Cie bounds, especially Fang and Vanille do some spectacular things, but in the end they all still turn into crystal. It took a literal Deus Ex Machina for the story to have a happy ending (which the sequel promptly nullified).
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Dec 20, 2012 18:25
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Yeah, pretty much. The only time our main characters do anything, it makes absolutely no sense and thus doesn't feel like they actually accomplished something. Also it still wasn't Lightning, she did pretty much nothing after they murdered Anima.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:29
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Edit: forget it
Die Sexmonster! fucked around with this message at 18:51 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 18:32
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Pesky Splinter posted:That dude could barely be called an "character". Liked the introduction, hated everything else. (props for killing Jihl like that though. Worst character in the whole goddam game by a mile) It's hard to make your villain menacing when he literally has no intention of killing you and he makes that point clear from the first time you meet him. Speaking of heroes not doing jack though, that is one area I prefer XIII over XII. Hell, it's the only area I prefer 13 over 12. FFXIII gave proper attention to the main cast while XII's heroes always felt superfluous. I always felt like the real action was happening in Archades and the villains were the real stars. FFXIII was the opposite with a hero cast I liked but a villain cast as appalling as VIII's. It's why I really liked the first half of XIII but not the second half because the first half was more about the characters and their journeys while the second half shifted to the silly plot. Also I hated Pulse.
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Dec 20, 2012 18:35
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Being the main character isn't about how much you accomplish, or else most FF villains would be the main characters of their respective games. Of course, defining a "main character" is pretty difficult to do and can vary according to people, but most would probably agree that it's the person whose actions and emotions are most influential to the narrative they're in. Even in something like FF6's ensemble, it's Terra's presence that gets the Returners moving, and the game focuses more on her search to discover love and dealing with her powers, to the point where she has a major presence on the rest of the characters and the ending itself, regardless whether you recruit her or not. In FF13's case, it's Lightning that's pushing the narrative forward. Sazh and Vanille literally do jack poo poo until they get kidnapped, while Lightning's simultaneously trying to fight against her fate while mentoring Hope so that he can effectively harness his rage to successfully murder Snow, something everyone can get behind. She ends up being the one leading the charge to rescue the two non-entities, and then drives everyone to keep going. Of course, you could also argue that Vanille and maybe Fang are the main characters, since it's their actions that lead to everything, with Vanille grappling with her guilt and Fang actually trying to accomplish stuff, but Lightning ends up having a much stronger presence and pushes the plot forward, since her whole line of thinking is pretty much, "Gotta keep going so I don't have time to think about how lovely my life is now between being some god robot's pawn and almost having Snow as a brother-in-law."
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Dec 20, 2012 18:41
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Mega64 posted:but Lightning ends up having a much stronger presence and pushes the plot forward, since her whole line of thinking is pretty much, "Gotta keep going so I don't have time to think about how lovely my life is now between being some god robot's pawn and almost having Snow as a brother-in-law." The game would have been substantially better with a dedicated "punch Snow / annoying party members" button. I'm still disappointed neither Vanille nor Hope got the same treatment as the rest of the group. At least Vanille deserved it the way she screwed over most of the cast. FFXII was kind of refreshing in how dysfunctional the party was for most of the game. EDIT: I mean the game has TWO scenes where a party member is just about ready to outright murder another member, too many fights to count, and quite a lot of punching. Renoistic fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 19:04
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I still think all the FFXIII sequels should of starred Sazh instead. Come on Squeenix, I'm offering to pitch you a ball of money, all you gotta do is swing!
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Dec 20, 2012 19:07
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NikkolasKing posted:I still don't get XIII's ending. The fal'Cie are demigods, while the Creator and the original Gods/Goddesses of the universe (Pulse, Lindzei, Etro) are above them. The group's Focus was to unite and make sure Ragnarok exists once again. Originally, that meant that their Focus was to destroy Cocoon, since Ragnarok had attempted to do so and failed 500 years prior in the War of Transgression. However, at the end of XIII, Fang and Vanille change their Focus (with a little help from Etro) to save Cocoon, thus "fighting fate" and rebelling against the fal'Cie's demands once and for all by destroying Orphan. Except, well, that had a lot more ramifications than they expected (FFXIII-2). While FFXIII's story isn't good or anything, it's certainly not incomprehensible or incoherent. That's about all I can say for it in a positive manner. Oh, and the mythology is interesting. Azure_Horizon fucked around with this message at 19:29 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 19:27
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Except in the end, they all were turned to crystal. So...they fought fate and lost completely. But forget all that. My problem with XIII is this and this alone: Raines Why? To restore the Maker. Hope The Maker? Raines The entity responsible for creating both humans and fal'Cie. Long ago, the Maker departed this world, leaving the two races behind. In a sense, human and fal'Cie are brothers; orphaned by the same parent. As for the humans, they forgot the order imposed by the Maker. They began to war amongst themselves for the first time in history. The fal'Cie focused on recalling their lost deity and returning to its former glory. That. IS. All. Wrong. Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to beat the game, get online, think you know the plot, then someone tells you "no you don't"? And it's not even my fault. Maybe some side stuff mentions Lindzei or whoever but that's akin to the Balamb computer terminal mentioning GF Memory loss or NORG. Actually, it's worse than that because the side stuff directly contradicts and invalidates what the main game tells us. There is no Maker. The fal'Cie are not trying to bring back the Maker. Humans and fal'Cie were not made by the same entity. Now if you're gonna say "well, Cid and Bart are wrong", that's fine. it be really nice if the game had actually even hinted at this in the main narrative. I might have a higher opinion of XIII's plot if I didn't feel like said plot was hiding somewhere else and all I got was BS. NikkolasKing fucked around with this message at 19:46 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 19:44
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I'm probably the only one that actually thought the trailer looked surprisingly-good. It's like someone at SE just went "gently caress it, I don't know what theme to give this series anymore, just go all-out Kingdom Hearts on this poo poo".
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