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 that three of us said basically the same thing immediately in response.the_steve posted:It's not that magic was bad. Magic simply is. humans + magic is bad, I would say. It leads to the extinction of a sentient species as all espers fade after the gods & kefka are killed. Maximum Tomfoolery posted:Fair enough, I haven't played very many of them. The point about tragedy still stands though; it almost feels like parody with how hard they milk it. Tragedy gripping the world is also a theme in basically every game in the series. That tragedy is necessary for the hero's journey.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:03
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:Fair enough, I haven't played very many of them. The point about tragedy still stands though; it almost feels like parody with how hard they milk it. Buddy you'll never guess what parts of 16 share with parts of ff2 4 6 7 8 9 10 etc as well.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:07
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:Fair enough, I haven't played very many of them. The point about tragedy still stands though; it almost feels like parody with how hard they milk it. If you haven't played many I can see that, but "incredible tragic heroic characters" is a series staple. Like even FF9, which is the most 'cartoony' game since the SNES days, has a ton of tragedy.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:08
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FF2 is a game where 80% of the towns on the world map are either under brutal occupation or actively destroyed over the course of the narrative and you're 4th party slot is a rotating cast of young heroes who die in increasingly tragic manner, you fail to stop the evil emperor before his doom fortress scorches large portions of civilization and when you do beat him he comes right back from conquering hell to do it more. Meanwhile ff4 is a rotating cavalcade of murder and personal sacrifice and betrayal. The back half of ff6 is built around doubling down on the personal tragedy of each person they set up in the first half. High melodrama and tragedy is this series. ZenMasterBullshit fucked around with this message at 16:13 on Mar 29, 2024 |
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Mar 29, 2024 16:10
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Ultimately, every final fantasy game is a classic hero's journey. The basic format has been a staple in human storytelling forever. The Epic of Gilgamesh is the oldest we have written record of, and there are oral traditions with older but still very similar hero's journeys. These stories require poo poo to be bad and/or bad things to happen to the hero as a reason for their journey in the first place. No one whose life is swell just up and leaves to go on an adventure to save the world. Tragedy motivates the story.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:14
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Also a big chunk of FF16 is Clive doing bits with the various uncles he collects over the game and his dog with the consistent wry jab/bullying from his girlfriend. It's got jokes and silliness .
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Mar 29, 2024 16:17
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What I'm taking away from this is I probably wouldn't like most FF games.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:18
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:What I'm taking away from this is I probably wouldn't like most FF games. In your opinion, is Jurassic Bark the best Futurama episode or worst? Were you mad that it was retconned in Benders Big Score? In seriousness, I can't say whether XVI is worse or better than the rest. You might have valid complaints. The games are all pretty good. Even the bad ones are still pretty decent games, but they are all going to be in worlds that are in peril of some sort.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:19
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Even the earliest games have the villains abusing powerful magic and overwhelming the natural order. Even if it's not quite as explicit about danger in the magic system itself, you can see ideas later games take further. Also, to no one's surprise, there will be a Live Letter during the 14-hour stream. 
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Mar 29, 2024 16:20
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:What I'm taking away from this is I probably wouldn't like most FF games. I mean it's also true of this game's MSQ so I'm not sure that's true either. I think you just didn't like that specific game and not melodrama in general. But I do know means it's silly to call something 'antithetical to final fantasy' when it's an anthology series with incredibly loose connection outside of naming conventions broadly across the series. Especially when you apparently haven't played a lot of them?
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Mar 29, 2024 16:24
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To be a little more fair, the bleakness of FFII is very pixel-y and thus has a different feel from FFXVI's more "realistic" exploration of oppression and bad stuff happening to people. It's not gonna work for everyone! It sure is a Final Fantasy, though! XVI feels very, very much like the written-by-the-Heavensward-guy story that it is. I like it! It's got a lot of FFXIV's DNA in it, both good points and offputting points (so how do you feel about... quests?) but I think it's worth a pickup for anyone into the series once its out on PC.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:30
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I was wrong about the magic bit. And all I'm saying about the tone is that it felt way too over the top for me to take it seriously, not that it has sad or tragic elements at all. There's a difference between "there's a world-ending threat looming over us" and "These people are being dehumanized, abused, and killed, and that's bad. Let me show you it a couple dozen more times so you get the point."
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Mar 29, 2024 16:31
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:I was wrong about the magic bit. And all I'm saying about the tone is that it felt way too over the top for me to take it seriously, not that it has sad or tragic elements at all. There's a difference between "there's a world-ending threat looming over us" and "These people are being dehumanized, abused, and killed, and that's bad. Let me show you it a couple dozen more times so you get the point." I get what you're saying but people literally criticized FF16 when it came out for not focusing enough on that.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:36
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Kheldarn posted:OK, so Paladin gets to keep Gauge when zoning and even logging out, but the other 3 lose theirs? Orcs and Ostriches posted:Paladin's gauge is just tied to defense cooldowns. There's no reason to compare them. To expand on this, PLD's gauge is exclusively tied to auto-attacks for generation, and exclusively spent on Sheltron, Intervention and Cover, their short CD damage mitigation*, its party member version and a "take party member's damage" skill. Meanwhile, all of the other tanks gain gauge through GCDs and CDs and use it for DPS stuff, and their rotations take that into account. *WAR's Bloodwhetting/Nascent Flash, DRK's TBN and GNB's Heart of Corundum. Putting PLD's gauge at zero when zoning into any Dungeon, Trial or Raid (like it used to do before they changed it in one of the 6.X patches) would be exactly the same as putting those tank's actions on CD until combat started, making them fight for 25 seconds for them to become available. Like those slightly annoying abilities that can only be used in combat? Imagine that but only after 25 seconds of combat, and instead of being a DPS burst CD it's your fundamental Don't Die action when not dying is one of your primary jobs. Having gauge start at zero wasn't a deal breaker, as the change didn't happen until EW's patches, but changing it was a fantastic QoL and minor usability boost that did nothing for increasing their DPS burst, unlike the other tanks if they got it.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:36
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:I was wrong about the magic bit. And all I'm saying about the tone is that it felt way too over the top for me to take it seriously, not that it has sad or tragic elements at all. There's a difference between "there's a world-ending threat looming over us" and "These people are being dehumanized, abused, and killed, and that's bad. Let me show you it a couple dozen more times so you get the point."
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Mar 29, 2024 16:36
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So it's not that it's sad or bleak, it's the melodrama you don't vibe with?
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Mar 29, 2024 16:37
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goblin week posted:Sorry I'll play more of the game I don't like to bring your opinion of me up. I only said that because you quit right before the hypest moment in the game just like how you got that avatar for saying stuff about shadowbringers moments before the crazy stuff happened there. lol.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:39
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I like FF16 but its writing has the subtlety of a sledgehammer. It's not surprising that someone did not enjoy it, god knows my eyes rolled halfway out of their sockets when the third small child in a row started treating their abused slave-wizard like an unruly pet dog.
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Mar 29, 2024 16:40
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FeatherFloat posted:To be a little more fair, the bleakness of FFII is very pixel-y and thus has a different feel from FFXVI's more "realistic" exploration of oppression and bad stuff happening to people. It's not gonna work for everyone! It sure is a Final Fantasy, though! I haven't played FFXVI but this is definitely something true for me. I was watching my friend play an old crpg recently, I think NWN1, and the game just let you kill kids indiscriminately. But when you did it your character awkwardly flailed at the air with a mace and then the child exploded like a cacodemon and it was frankly hilarious. Meanwhile I feel like killing a kid in any high budget rpg now would be horrific and I'd probably turn the game off since it'd probably be really upsetting
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Mar 29, 2024 16:43
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My issue with FF16 was mainly that the beginning and endgame felt disconnected. Those sorts of stories always escalate, and I'm really glad they didn't go for "the obligatory supergod you're going to punch was behind people being nasty to each other", but it felt weird to focus so much on the nastiness complete with calling the protagonist out on the way they're engaging with it, and then that just drops. Wasn't anywhere near as bad as FF15's "we ran out of budget you're taking the plot train now" but it felt similar to me.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:03
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Xerophyte posted:I like FF16 but its writing has the subtlety of a sledgehammer. It's not surprising that someone did not enjoy it, god knows my eyes rolled halfway out of their sockets when the third small child in a row started treating their abused slave-wizard like an unruly pet dog. This is basically my problem. It's not even that the enslaved are being treated as expendable tools; they're being treated as literally valueless. It's just a few notches too much.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:07
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:This is basically my problem. It's not even that the enslaved are being treated as expendable tools; they're being treated as literally valueless. It's just a few notches too much. 
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Mar 29, 2024 17:08
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It did kind of suck that the GoT-y elements kind of get dropped about 2/3 of the way through in favor of a more typical JRPG conflict. Felt like a lot of world building that ultimately went to waste. The game was fun otherwise, though.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:09
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I would’ve liked xvi if the protagonist was Cid and not Clive (no offense to Ben Starr who did good with what he was given). I don’t think I will touch any of the DLC, but I would 100% play a prequel about Cid’s exploits.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:16
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:This is basically my problem. It's not even that the enslaved are being treated as expendable tools; they're being treated as literally valueless. It's just a few notches too much. I mean. I kind of think that's good? would feel very toothless if they didn't actually make their lives seem that bad.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:16
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:This is basically my problem. It's not even that the enslaved are being treated as expendable tools; they're being treated as literally valueless. It's just a few notches too much. Buddy I got bad news about how people treated actual slaves in real life. The game's themes and morals would be incredibly weak handed and toothless if they didn't go as hard as it does. Thundarr posted:It did kind of suck that the GoT-y elements kind of get dropped about 2/3 of the way through in favor of a more typical JRPG conflict. Felt like a lot of world building that ultimately went to waste. The game was fun otherwise, though. This is another one of the weird things 16 gets dinged for that's largely true of any final fantasy that involves international conflict.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:16
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Maximum Tomfoolery posted:This is basically my problem. It's not even that the enslaved are being treated as expendable tools; they're being treated as literally valueless. It's just a few notches too much. How long did you play? The first 6ish hours are like that but it eases up a bit after the timeskip.
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Mar 29, 2024 17:25
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ZenMasterBullshit posted:This is another one of the weird things 16 gets dinged for that's largely true of any final fantasy that involves international conflict. Which ones do you have in mind when you say that? FF4 had Cecil trying to fight back against mistakes he had made as part of the Empire, and when things escalate to Golbez and the moon it's those allies he's made from his efforts that help him continue (emphasis on continue) the fight. FF6 has its Imperial conflict get overturned by one narcissistic god wannabe, but that was diagetic to the plot itself and the characters themselves stay constant FF9... I'll give you this one. Though I'd like to make the point that when the stakes scale up from Brahne to Kuja the conflict scales down from global to personal, despite world destruction being on the line. That's important to the point I think I'm trying to make. FF Tactics I would say holds it the entire way through despite the whole "Ultima corrupting people" thing. It never loses sight of the politics and mundane-level framing of the whole story. FF12, like 6, has the antagonist actively kick over the board of its initial politics. There's this bit in the middle where it kinda forgets to talk about its themes but in my opinion it finishes strong and the magical nukes and Occuria stay linked to the initial conflict and motivations. FF15 is just a mess Haven't played enough 7, 8, or 13 to comment on those, though I'd definitely say they involve international conflict of some sort or another. Well, 8 and 13 do, 7 is so muddy these days I don't know if it counts. I think what I'm trying to say is that in most of those games when the stakes scale up into JRPG bullshit the sense of characters and the place they're in stays constant or gets more focused. Cecil, the FF6 protagonists, Ramza, Ashe... if you look at them at the end of their games the story of why they're there has to include where the game began. FF16 starts very personal -- Clive learns how much people like him suffer when they don't have the protections he was born into -- and that's his initial motivating factor along with survival and revenge, but when the story escalation takes him away from that our connection to that character and motivation goes away as well.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:00
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FF7 is post-international conflict, the Shinra Electric Company basically took over the largest country through economic conquest and then took over the rest of the world through regular conquest. Anyone who resisted was either subverted or killed, the two biggest examples being Corel and Wutai. FF8 has a lot of international conflict but it's pretty simply "well the bad guy nation has a bad guy leader and they're beating up the little guy nations", and then another country that's basically Wakanda.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:10
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Galbadia lmao
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Mar 29, 2024 18:27
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Bruceski posted:Which ones do you have in mind when you say that? 4 ends up on the moon fighting aliens and the physical manifestation of hate. 6 ends up fighting and killing god. One of Tactics's big criticisms is that it throws out most of the succession crisis and faction conflict and ends up you vs. the church and killing god. 7 starts up pro environment and anti corpo revolutionaries, and ends up fighting an alien and a genetic super soldier. The initial, more grounded international or interfactional conflicts breaks away into something more fantastic, often discarding those initial conflicts. While I wouldn't describe any of them as GoT (except maybe Tactics) the tonal and subject shifts are there.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:34
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Bruceski posted:FF16 starts very personal -- Clive learns how much people like him suffer when they don't have the protections he was born into -- and that's his initial motivating factor along with survival and revenge, but when the story escalation takes him away from that our connection to that character and motivation goes away as well. I think you're splitting hairs here because this happens for most of the cast in all the games you listed. They get new motivation or their motivations get subsumed by the ones tied into other characters or the bigger threat and issues override their personal issues which is just as true for Clive as the others. Orcs and Ostriches posted:4 ends up on the moon fighting aliens and the physical manifestation of hate. This basically. 12 starts off geopolitics and subterfuge and ends with you killing the world's connection to the hidden wizard illuminati that make nukes to empower their chosen and also a rogue wizard illuminate who's working with his chosen to take control allegedly for humans by using wizard knowledge and eventually fusing himself with the alleged main antagonist who has been on screen less and interacted with the party less than the secret illuminate. Everyone's personal issues get tied into then overtaken by Dealing With This Nuke Nonsense and the rogue would-be emperor in the same way Clive's personal story of revenge gets him wrapped up into more international conflicts, new rebel groups and kingdoms and eventually the hand behind it all. that's just what happens in all these games and it's silly that people call it out on only this one specifically. ZenMasterBullshit fucked around with this message at 18:38 on Mar 29, 2024 |
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Mar 29, 2024 18:35
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Orcs and Ostriches posted:4 ends up on the moon fighting aliens and the physical manifestation of hate. I feel like it's worth noting that in all of those games, including FF16, the big thing you fight is a manifestation of the game's central themes and ideas.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:37
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People act like the final conflict in FF16 is completely disconnected from the conflicts earlier in the game when it is really taking those earlier themes to their cosmic conclusion.ImpAtom posted:I feel like it's worth noting that in all of those games, including FF16, the big thing you fight is a manifestation of the game's central themes and ideas. Yeah! This!
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Mar 29, 2024 18:38
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ImpAtom posted:I feel like it's worth noting that in all of those games, including FF16, the big thing you fight is a manifestation of the game's central themes and ideas. Mordiceius posted:People act like the final conflict in FF16 is completely disconnected from the conflicts earlier in the game when it is really taking those earlier themes to their cosmic conclusion. Yeah this is my point! It's silly that people call 16 specifically when...no that happens in almost every final fantasy that has enough character writing to have personal stakes for characters.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:39
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I'm finally going to have all of my DOH/DOL jobs at level cap during an expansion (right as Dawntrail is about to drop  ). Any tips for gearing now? Dunno if I should just buy the ilvl 620 gear or try farming purple scrips or whatedit: Would really like better DOL gear so that I can better farm mats for my 81-90 recipes that I haven't crafted yet for my completionist-brain needs biceps crimes fucked around with this message at 18:55 on Mar 29, 2024 |
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Mar 29, 2024 18:51
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the purple scrip gear should be good enough for anything except, like, level 90 expert crafting poo poo. and for the latter you're spending a fortune of gil on materia for pentamelding. just get the scrip gear and decided if you want to spend so much time making HQ Indagator poo poo afterwards.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:58
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biceps crimes posted:I'm finally going to have all of my DOH/DOL jobs at level cap during an expansion (right as Dawntrail is about to drop I would just do custom deliveries for purple scrips and get that gear. At this point there's one crafter set and one gatherer set, so you'll just need those plus tools. There should be plenty of time to get them that way, and it's very easy.
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Mar 29, 2024 18:59
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ZenMasterBullshit posted:This is another one of the weird things 16 gets dinged for that's largely true of any final fantasy that involves international conflict. You're not wrong, but in the case of 16 I was pretty interested in the mundane political wrangling that had been set up and would have liked to see it play out some more before the sand castle got kicked over. Also I just wasn't feeling the main antagonist tbh. In most earlier FF games, the first act antagonists generally don't have much left to say narratively by the time they get swapped out for a lunatic deity. That's probably in part due to more limited writing time devoted to them, to be fair.
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Mar 29, 2024 19:02
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Thundarr posted:It did kind of suck that the GoT-y elements kind of get dropped about 2/3 of the way through in favor of a more typical JRPG conflict. Felt like a lot of world building that ultimately went to waste. The game was fun otherwise, though. The problem with FF16's world and those GoT-esque elements, in my opinion, is that Valisthea is such an utterly cruel, unjust, evil place that nothing about its existing cultures or polities are worth preserving, given as they are all wholly founded upon slavery and murder. FF16 has a really good cast, but its setting needs to be killed with fire, which is why, well, you set out to do exactly that. (Although all the backstory they've since revealed makes me wonder if we aren't set in like, Valisthea's least interesting era, by design, in conventional fantasy terms.) That said, I would disagree with the earlier take that FF14 says magic is evil. FF14 says magic is a resource, and that resource can be employed in safe and unsafe ways, ecologically sustainable ways and non-ecologically sustainable ways. The same is true in FF7, where the Cetra (especially in the Remake) explicitly employed mako and materia in a sustainable fashion as opposed to Shinra's rapacious mako reactors. Final Fantasy says magic is dangerous, because magic is power and power is dangerous. I wouldn't say as a series it says that magic is bad, although some of the beloved entries do say that magic is so dangerous or bad that it's not worth using. (It is worth noting I don't particularly like FF6 compared to 7, X, or 12, for example, but that's a me thing!) FF16 is arguably on the extreme edge of "magic is solely a tool for domination and exploitation, expending human lives to do things that you could honestly do better and safer with mundane technological solutions, and a desire for magic is ultimately shown as explicitly childish." It's fine to not vibe with that, I'm not really vibing with it that much! but it is the logical negative extrapolation of certain themes. I am looking forward to seeing Clive either lose his poo poo or wonder at a world where magic isn't inherently portrayed as unsustainable and life-destroying, though. Jetrauben fucked around with this message at 19:22 on Mar 29, 2024 |
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Mar 29, 2024 19:18
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