What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

'Tis a hint for our next primal, surely.

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I could go for a good steak burger right about now.

I don't really get the obsession with the expensive mocapped slice of life hamburger scene. But then I don't really get the need for expensive mocapped slice of life scenes in the first place. Actually, was that scene mocapped? I know the Estinien one where he jumps out a window was (they bragged about how expensive it was), but I'm unsure about the hamburger scene.

I'm not one to complain about slice of life moments, either, though I definitely prefer when they have a purpose (ie: It's a vehicle for the characters to talk with each other).

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

'Tis a hint for our next primal, surely.

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The Burger King as a primal would be terrifying and/or hilarious.

As an aside, is anyone here interested in 'story focused' NFT's? :rolleyes:

https://www.siliconera.com/square-en...-focused-nfts/

Granted, the article implies that it is up in the air as to whether or not the Final Fantasy games will be subjected to such a thing though as we no doubt all know, plans change and even a hard no can be reversed on a whim.

It wouldn't surprise me if we're never rid of any prominent characters because of a desire to potentially sell NFT's based around them in the future, though.

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Originally Posted by Rosenstrauch

The Burger King as a primal would be terrifying and/or hilarious.

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The Burger King won't temper anyone, oh nothing so simple. He'll make everyone look like Dulia-Chai instead. Terrifying indeed!

(Heh, a nice mechanic for the fight: Burger King uses "overdose of fat" and you need to sprint and jump around to get back into shape so you can jump high enough to get on a platform to avoid a one-shot)

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Originally Posted by Theodric

As an aside, is anyone here interested in 'story focused' NFT's? :rolleyes:

https://www.siliconera.com/square-en...-focused-nfts/

Granted, the article implies that it is up in the air as to whether or not the Final Fantasy games will be subjected to such a thing though as we no doubt all know, plans change and even a hard no can be reversed on a whim.

It wouldn't surprise me if we're never rid of any prominent characters because of a desire to potentially sell NFT's based around them in the future, though.

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I don't think it matters. Not like Square-Enix, of all companies, is shy about over-commercializing its most popular characters, whether they're dead or no longer relevant or not.

Aka, the Sephiroth effect.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

"Blobs of indistinguishable features" is certainly how you can describe pretty much every FF main character prior to PS1 hardware.

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FFVI's cast was all clearly distinguishable from one another on the SNES. In fact, all of the characters in FFs on the SNES are clearly distinguishable from one another. Try again.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Sm1tjp-cSi8/maxresdefault.jpg

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

As for adding a male highlander into the Scions, Arenvald was the perfect opportunity for this. And then they stuck him in a wheelchair. Note: he's supposed to be 19 and Thancred is supposed to be 32. It's infuriating because not only did Arenvald have some actual color in his design, he also had a better backstory than Thancred and an English voice actor who was more interesting to listen to. He fit the bill as this game's "Snow Villiers" character way better than Thancred or Estinien do.

https://img2.finalfantasyxiv.com/acc...65_400_400.jpg

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Maybe Arenvald can still join the Scions as a noncombatant (until we heal him, eh?)

Since Minfilia exited the story we haven't had a highlander in the main group. We need a highlander.

(Lyse is a highlander in lore but she's not a Scion anymore either)

I mean arenvald could learn a magic job? I wouldnt be surprised if he could be a arcanist or whatever. A lot of people who were apart of the resistence probably could as resistences require organization and certain skills which could be refluffed or useful for such a job.

Then again I dont know if we knew what he did before he joined the story do we?

While I have yet to finish Endwalker, thus far the venture to Garlemald is the single biggest let down so far. I realize it goes against the power of friendship and goodie two-shoes to a fault narrative of the main cast but some kupoing catharsis would be nice every once in a while, especially after everything that's happened, everything we've gone through. After everything Garlemald has done, they are finally on the back foot and crumbling from within. Everything before the Telophoroi were introduced in late 5.x seemed like Eorzea was gearing up to counter invade Garlemald and FINALLY dish out some divine retribution, crush their forces, and bring their aggressive people to heel. Lol nope, we're gonna risk sending limited soldiers and supplies behind enemy lines for humanitarian aid to people that up until now have despised us and tormented most of the world for years. Yeah, I know they're almost all tempered, but... they're more or less doing exactly what they were doing before that happened, just for another reason and for another master and I don't have much sympathy for the people that happily cheered on what the Empire was doing while they were the victors. I just really wish Garlemald itself, as a creation of the Ascians, could have been the big bad in need of taking down rather than them resurrecting Zenos, again, and pulling a new villain out of thin air, thus forcing us to rush to the rescue of our second biggest enemy for the last decade.

It's just so disappointing and underwhelming. It makes me wonder what Ishikawa had in mind for the story before she had to rewrite and change so much of it.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

As an aside, is anyone here interested in 'story focused' NFT's? :rolleyes:

https://www.siliconera.com/square-en...-focused-nfts/

Granted, the article implies that it is up in the air as to whether or not the Final Fantasy games will be subjected to such a thing though as we no doubt all know, plans change and even a hard no can be reversed on a whim.

It wouldn't surprise me if we're never rid of any prominent characters because of a desire to potentially sell NFT's based around them in the future, though.

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Every time this man appears in the news it always seems to be associated with something detrimental to people's gameplay experience, from the gutting of a classic Final Fantasy job like Blue Mage and quite literally dressing up as the posterchild for "Limited jobs!" to the constant pushing of NFTs despite widespread opposition amongst the people he is actually trying to sell products to. Under his watch, SE has produced countless failed projects and if left unchecked would have destroyed all the major brands that the company owns by now. If there is any evidence to suggest that he is fit to continue serving in his position, then I cannot find it. Yoship has already said that if FFXVI does not meet certain sales targets that the mainline Final Fantasy brand is in danger, because the series is no longer a household staple for a generation whose patience was exhausted by the original lackluster release of FFXV and the catastrophic launch of FFXIV 1.0.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

Dear God, burgers AGAIN?!

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I will continue bringing this scene up because it is the perfect example of the cringeworthy writing style of Endwalker which feels more like a walking simulator on a college campus at times than an expansion at the end of the world. Shadowbringers was exciting to play for me because there was always some level of tension there, with very little filler on par with the trolley sequence. Endwalker however wastes the player's time with multiple long treks in Sharlayan made even slower with the NPC that has to tag along behind you, and 3/4ths of the moon. So many people defend these out of place scenes as "oh but we need to alleviate the tension!" as if there weren't more logical and thematically on point ways to go about doing this.

In Shadowbringers, we would go back to our apartment in the Crystarium and have chats with Ardbert, who provided insightful commentary instead of just vomiting lore in a nonstop stream like the Sharlayans do. In Heavensward and Stormblood, we had our campfire scenes with our party members where we could look up at the sky and reflect on the adventure so far. That is what I expect out of this game - not Uber Eats in a college dorm. I will forever oppose this nonsense because if someone wants those kinds of scenes then they can already go play Persona and have an entire game's worth of them. I feel betrayed after having fallen in love with this game in ARR/Heavensward under the premise that this would be a game with high fantasy and sci-fi elements with a story that takes itself seriously and Endwalker ruined that.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/sDAVBXkfbp4/maxresdefault.jpg

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Originally Posted by Jagick

While I have yet to finish Endwalker, thus far the venture to Garlemald is the single biggest let down so far. I realize it goes against the power of friendship and goodie two-shoes to a fault narrative of the main cast but some kupoing catharsis would be nice every once in a while, especially after everything that's happened, everything we've gone through. After everything Garlemald has done, they are finally on the back foot and crumbling from within. Everything before the Telophoroi were introduced in late 5.x seemed like Eorzea was gearing up to counter invade Garlemald and FINALLY dish out some divine retribution, crush their forces, and bring their aggressive people to heel. Lol nope, we're gonna risk sending limited soldiers and supplies behind enemy lines for humanitarian aid to people that up until now have despised us and tormented most of the world for years. Yeah, I know they're almost all tempered, but... they're more or less doing exactly what they were doing before that happened, just for another reason and for another master and I don't have much sympathy for the people that happily cheered on what the Empire was doing while they were the victors. I just really wish Garlemald itself, as a creation of the Ascians, could have been the big bad in need of taking down rather than them resurrecting Zenos, again, and pulling a new villain out of thin air, thus forcing us to rush to the rescue of our second biggest enemy for the last decade.

It's just so disappointing and underwhelming. It makes me wonder what Ishikawa had in mind for the story before she had to rewrite and change so much of it.

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A Garlemald expansion would have indeed provided the sort of continued conflicts you express interest in, especially from military leaders who are uncompromising in their ideals and beliefs. I imagine that they would still humanize the Garlean people in different ways but in the end I did enjoy how they went about handling that specific aspect of Garlemald in Endwalker – it was still flawed in my view however because of the ridiculous decision to write Gaius out of the plot instead of trying to tie it together to the Weapons storyline. I think they did a good job of showing how not everyone in the Empire subscribes to the same mindset and the characters we did see were worthy of the screentime they took up.

(Ideally, such content like the trial series etc. should be made mandatory for not only story continuity issues but to enforce a skill check that this playerbase needs in endgame content. Especially if it would act as a filter for players whose aversion to more challenging battle content and Heavensward and Ivalice-style storytelling seems to overlap.)

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

FFVI's cast was all clearly distinguishable from one another on the SNES. In fact, all of the characters in FFs on the SNES are clearly distinguishable from one another. Try again.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Sm1tjp-cSi8/maxresdefault.jpg

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Funny you mentioned FF6 as I not long be back picked up a snes copy complete in box. :D Cost a pretty penny as they would say but I also sold another game I owned for a lot more.

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Originally Posted by Jagick

While I have yet to finish Endwalker, thus far the venture to Garlemald is the single biggest let down so far. I realize it goes against the power of friendship and goodie two-shoes to a fault narrative of the main cast but some kupoing catharsis would be nice every once in a while, especially after everything that's happened, everything we've gone through. After everything Garlemald has done, they are finally on the back foot and crumbling from within. Everything before the Telophoroi were introduced in late 5.x seemed like Eorzea was gearing up to counter invade Garlemald and FINALLY dish out some divine retribution, crush their forces, and bring their aggressive people to heel. Lol nope, we're gonna risk sending limited soldiers and supplies behind enemy lines for humanitarian aid to people that up until now have despised us and tormented most of the world for years. Yeah, I know they're almost all tempered, but... they're more or less doing exactly what they were doing before that happened, just for another reason and for another master and I don't have much sympathy for the people that happily cheered on what the Empire was doing while they were the victors. I just really wish Garlemald itself, as a creation of the Ascians, could have been the big bad in need of taking down rather than them resurrecting Zenos, again, and pulling a new villain out of thin air, thus forcing us to rush to the rescue of our second biggest enemy for the last decade.

It's just so disappointing and underwhelming. It makes me wonder what Ishikawa had in mind for the story before she had to rewrite and change so much of it.

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From my understanding is going to basically be a stormblood rehash if they did and expansion focused on Garlemald. Will leave it at that as I have long since removed myself from the topic of this thread.

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Originally Posted by Rulakir

My type are tall, skinny, pale guys. Were it not for the fact I don't find most male Elezen attractive I'd be living the dream in FFXIV.

Also, latest plug for the thread discord. :P https://discord.gg/htS5TTP2

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I'm curious to see how the graphics touch-up will benefit Elezen. It's mostly going to focus on improving the textures, but I'd like to see them take a stab at improving their proportions and sprint a bit. Yoshi has mentioned they may consider character creator upgrades but that it would require more thorough-going engine upgrades, and seeing as their approach to this game is spend as little as possible so long as people don't quit in droves, I'm not expecting much.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

As an aside, is anyone here interested in 'story focused' NFT's? :rolleyes:

https://www.siliconera.com/square-en...-focused-nfts/

Granted, the article implies that it is up in the air as to whether or not the Final Fantasy games will be subjected to such a thing though as we no doubt all know, plans change and even a hard no can be reversed on a whim.

It wouldn't surprise me if we're never rid of any prominent characters because of a desire to potentially sell NFT's based around them in the future, though.

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No SE you must resist!

I can't imagine any good coming from it as I doubt it'll be done subtly. And the comments on the article are indicative of what the reception would be in the West.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

reading my mind

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Agree with everything you said.

On another note, I can't recall if it was mentioned, but the producers of Dying Light 2 are also going to do an RPG of their own, so in addition to XVI, 7 Rebirth and Dragon's Dogma 2, there is that to look forward to.

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

FFVI's cast was all clearly distinguishable from one another on the SNES. In fact, all of the characters in FFs on the SNES are clearly distinguishable from one another. Try again.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Sm1tjp-cSi8/maxresdefault.jpg

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Once again, people seem incapable of intuiting the appendix "Although, there are some exceptions".

FF6 has such a large cast of characters that, yes, a few break the mold such as Cyan, Shadow, Sabin, Mog, Umaro, etc.

But that doesn't change the fact that it still has a cast full of pretty boys.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/c0...fc9fd6fda5.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/EAQ65CJ.jpg

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/fi...-6-locke-a.jpg'

Clothing, hair style/color and various accessories are the primary way you have to tell the characters apart, unless they aren't human like Mog, old like Strega or have no human features visible like Shadow or Umaro. Cyan, in fact, is the exception because he has a mustache.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

will continue bringing this scene up because it is the perfect example of the cringeworthy writing style of Endwalker which feels more like a walking simulator on a college campus at times than an expansion at the end of the world. Shadowbringers was exciting to play for me because there was always some level of tension there, with very little filler on par with the trolley sequence. Endwalker however wastes the player's time with multiple long treks in Sharlayan made even slower with the NPC that has to tag along behind you, and 3/4ths of the moon. So many people defend these out of place scenes as "oh but we need to alleviate the tension!" as if there weren't more logical and thematically on point ways to go about doing this.

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You can bring up the problems with the follower mechanic, and the padding that involved walking around Sharlayan, but that really doesn't have anything to do with the Dreaded "Burger Scene".

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

In Shadowbringers, we would go back to our apartment in the Crystarium and have chats with Ardbert, who provided insightful commentary instead of just vomiting lore in a nonstop stream like the Sharlayans do. In Heavensward and Stormblood, we had our campfire scenes with our party members where we could look up at the sky and reflect on the adventure so far. That is what I expect out of this game - not Uber Eats in a college dorm. I will forever oppose this nonsense because if someone wants those kinds of scenes then they can already go play Persona and have an entire game's worth of them. I feel betrayed after having fallen in love with this game in ARR/Heavensward under the premise that this would be a game with high fantasy and sci-fi elements with a story that takes itself seriously and Endwalker ruined that.

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The issue with this argument is that the scene did offer commentary. It's a seven minute cutscene, in which Gr'aha eating a burger takes up like 15 seconds total, while the rest of it is commentary on the events of the story, how the Scions have changed, speculating on what effect Hydaelyn possessing Krile might have, and with the final goal of showing what happens to the Elpis flower when people are happy or whatever.

Granted, I'm never going to call it a pillar of excellent storywriting, but it just feels like focusing on Gr'aha eating a burger to point out everything that's wrong with the story is like pointing at that moment when a Stormtrooper hits his head on the door as everything wrong with the original Star Wars movie.

And of the 3 pretty boys you've just posted are mature adults who behave as such in FFVI, as opposed to the brattier personalities of current G'raha which adds a layer of insufferability to a character who is too strange looking to fit that alien, mystical style of Amano heroes. Setzer literally stole a woman right off a stage, Edgar was a womanizer king, and Locke was entertaining to have around from start to finish. (Locke's in-game sprite is also wildly different from his artwork, resembling a beefy thug instead.)

Because of these reasons, they appeal to those who we can roughly characterize as having "western tastes" when it comes to the heroes they enjoy seeing in media. The personality is there, the looks are there, and hopefully the overarching plot knows what to do with these characters so they just don't sit around wasting oxygen for the entire game. They're not grating people's patience with overt fanservice at every other corner. Instead, the games use these characters to move the plot forward in meaningful ways instead of going around in circles repeating "I love you so much!" like G'raha Tia does each patch. Every time I look at this character all I can see is this:

https://a1cf74336522e87f135f-2f21ace...of-Narnia.webp

I do not want this in my party or for the game to keep forcing this on me without me having any say in the matter. Shove it into side content. Get this character off my screen. He doesn't look like a hero, he doesn't behave like one, and with the direction that the plot is going in, I doubt he'll ever have the chance to be one again because no one can hurt the community plushie. Stop forcing a man with a grown voice who looks like Lucy from the Chronicles of Narnia in my face.

Those of us who want a decent hero in the party have no real options besides Estinien, because the writers don't know what to do with Thancred besides mention Minfilia every now and then. However, this expansion they took away the cool factors of long elven hair and his defiant personality and turned it into mashed potatoes. At least in Stormblood we had Hien and in Shadowbringers we had Ardbert. In Endwalker we had nothing! Just a bunch of baby-faced men who do not look or act their age. Unless the player themselves decides on making a western style hero (and even then that's extremely difficult to pull off given this game's limited options), there's hardly any representation of them in the plot.

I do wonder if the inclusion of better designed masculine cast members aside from the generic WoL posterboy would do anything to win over the crowd who still paint this game as just an anime catgirl visual novel hub (which sadly, is on a fast track to becoming this). Imagine if besides the WoL, we also had high quality cgi and character models of men like Vossler and Basch sharing the stage. Something that makes people go, I want to either play as this or play with this character. That is how you sell me games like FFXII, I see a character that looks cool like Balthier and I take interest.

https://44.media.tumblr.com/c67ed3b2...db4bea36a.gifv

Of those 3, Vossler was probably my preferred design beating Basch solely because he had a better outfit during the time he was in our party, but in the end all 3 were examples of what kind men FFXIV needs to start including in the main cast in order to offset the other party members and the overwhelmingly bland makeup of the scions.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

And of the 3 pretty boys you've just posted are mature adults who behave as such in FFVII

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Again, that is your individual, personal opinion.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

I do not want this in my party or for the game to keep forcing this on me without me having any say in the matter. Shove it into side content. Get this character off my screen.

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To paraphrase yourself, it sounds like you want to play a Persona game, where you get to pick and choose who you hang out with. Not FFXIV.

Mischaracterizing my statements in order to argue for the sake of arguing is not the win you think it is, but then again it's not the first time this has happened across this and other threads.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

To paraphrase yourself, it sounds like you want to play a Persona game, where you get to pick and choose who you hang out with. Not FFXIV

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What an ironic statement considering a lot of the scion characters are devolving into persona characters, lol.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

Mischaracterizing my statements in order to argue for the sake of arguing is not the win you think it is, but then again it's not the first time this has happened across this and other threads.

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Except you DO come across as taking your G'raha hatred out on the game. I personally can't stand Y'shtola but you don't see me bashing the entire game because she exists.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

Dear God, burgers AGAIN?!

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The unique fury and fixation inspired by burgers and "a male character that doesn't aesthetically appeal to me" in an expansion as rife with actually substantive issues as Endwalker is sort of morbidly fascinating, if depressing.

Wait, no, I take it back. It's not fascinating. It's the most boring thing in the universe, actually.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

Except you DO come across as taking your G'raha hatred out on the game. I personally can't stand Y'shtola but you don't see me bashing the entire game because she exists.

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Wow it's almost as if me, being one of his original fans from Shadowbringers when he was actually a decent character feel betrayed by how he is being mismanaged worse than Summoner was for the past 8 years by the battle team except this time, it's the writers who decided to take away everything that made this character interesting and cool.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

Mischaracterizing my statements in order to argue for the sake of arguing is not the win you think it is, but then again it's not the first time this has happened across this and other threads.

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I said your statement was personal opinion and that you apparently want the ability to hang out with what characters you like and ignore the rest.

I'm not sure what part of that is "mischaracterization".

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Originally Posted by Brinne

The unique fury and fixation inspired by burgers and "a male character that doesn't aesthetically appeal to me" in an expansion as rife with actually substantive issues as Endwalker is sort of morbidly fascinating, if depressing.

Wait, no, I take it back. It's not fascinating. It's the most boring thing in the universe, actually.

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It's called lamenting mismanaged resources, it's not a hard concept, lol. Did you want the devs to show off the sundering or anything that was hinted at during the last decade? Too bad, have a very detailed scene that brings nothing to the story because twitter loves this stuff! It's like you are just plugging your ears and go "nuh uh, you just hate furries!" when people bring up the lack of a substantial story on an expansion that was meant to tie up a decade long build up. You can be critical with something you enjoy, SE won't ban you for that, I think, lol.

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Originally Posted by Lucida3b

Then again I dont know if we knew what he did before he joined the story do we?

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Well he does tell you his life story in the quests leading up to the drowned city of skalla, how he was a street rat robbing people to survive after his mom abandoned him. Then he became an adventurer. Yeah, it's not much. Also, he said he wasn't educated, so i don't think he could be an arcanist.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

Except you DO come across as taking your G'raha hatred out on the game. I personally can't stand Y'shtola but you don't see me bashing the entire game because she exists.

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There's almost no character that fits my "preferred aesthetic" in FFXIV. I like androgynous women. (Fordola is my wife!) I cannot even fathom throwing a never-ending tantrum about it over hundreds of pages and pretending like it's meaningful criticism of any kind.

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Originally Posted by Raoabolic

It's called lamenting mismanaged resources, it's not a hard concept, lol. Did you want the devs to show off the sundering or anything that was hinted at during the last decade? Too bad, have a very detailed scene that brings nothing to the story because twitter loves this stuff! It's like you are just plugging your ears and go "nuh uh, you just hate furries!" when people bring up the lack of a substantial story on an expansion that was meant to tie up a decade long build up. You can be critical with something you enjoy, SE won't ban you for that, I think, lol.

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Okay, I know it's not reasonable to expect someone in the thread to have gone back and read much of it, or go through peoples' post histories, but I still cannot help but just go "what" at stuff like this.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

I said your statement was personal opinion and that you apparently want the ability to hang out with what characters you like and ignore the rest.

I'm not sure what part of that is "mischaracterization".

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I do not mind if X character exists along with characters Y and Z as long as its not overly clear that X is the writers' favorite and they want to keep reminding everyone of this every chance they get. It has ruined the story surrounding G'raha in particular and turned his arc into something that means nothing.

I wanted the Crystal Exarch as a trust and party member back in Shadowbringers so badly because hey, cool sage that can fill any battle role and he's willing to give his all for a world that isn't even his own? That's an actual hero. Not the twinkly eyes fangirling that started up in patch 5.4 when he interacted with Estinien for the first time. It went from mutual respect to creepy obsession in the span of 30 seconds.

Fast forward to now, I don't want this character anywhere near me and I believe with all my heart that this game would be better off with him in the sidelines working as a cashier at the Sharlayan McDonald's than taking up the space that could go to literally any other potential playable character.

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Originally Posted by Brinne

There's almost no character that fits my "preferred aesthetic" in FFXIV. I like androgynous women. (Fordola is my wife!) I cannot even fathom throwing a never-ending tantrum about it over hundreds of pages and pretending like it's meaningful criticism of any kind.

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Fordola isn't what I would consider "androgynous" but I will say that I find her to be a compelling character who makes me take interest in her goings on whenever she shows up on screen. No nonsense, feet on ground, fighter attitude and has demonstrated a lot of growth over the course of the game. This is someone who is worthy of being in the main party, but if I'm not mistaken something happened to her at the end of the healer role quests that I haven't gotten around to doing myself?

In any case if people can throw 1000 page "temper tantrums" as you'd like to call it over highly requested features like male Viera and female Hrothgar then I am well within my rights to argue about how damaging I think G'raha Tia is until the situation improves by making him a worthwhile character again or he is banished from the plot entirely.

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Originally Posted by Brinne

but I still cannot help but just go "what" at stuff like this.

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How strange considering I had the same reaction during the second half of EW, lol.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

I do not mind if X character exists along with characters Y and Z as long as its not overly clear that X is the writers' favorite and they want to keep reminding everyone of this every chance they get. It has ruined the story surrounding G'raha in particular and turned his arc into something that means nothing.

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Again, that's a pretty personal opinion, especially when (as I mentioned), G'raha was hardly the only person in that scene and him eating a burger took up like 5% of the screentime of that scene alone. It comes across less as there being an actual problem and merely inventing new problems that we don't need.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

I wanted the Crystal Exarch as a trust and party member back in Shadowbringers so badly because hey, cool sage that can fill any battle role and he's willing to give his all for a world that isn't even his own? That's an actual hero. Not the twinkly eyes fangirling that started up in patch 5.4 when he interacted with Estinien for the first time. It went from mutual respect to creepy obsession in the span of 30 seconds.

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Again, that's personal opinion and, IMO, it kind of misses the entire point of the Exarch as a character. They make it clear to you multiple times that the Exarch character is a facade. Lyna tells you multiple times how immature the CE acts on occasion, the townsfolk tell you that he was giddy and humming when he finally summoned you to the first, and all it took was you calling him by his name for him to completely FORGET a plan he'd been working on for a century. The whole point they'd been building up to was that the Crystal Exarch was nothing but a boy pretending to be a wise old man. The boy's dream of saving his idol was literally his sole motivation.

I don't think there's anything wrong with you liking the Exarch as he was, but I do feel like it's along the lines of thinking Superman is cool but wishing they'd write Clark Kent out of the story.

Clark Kent just being a regular guy is in no way comparable to having G'raha Tia act like fangirling school child every time he's around someone important. They had every opportunity to not make G'raha Tia as annoying and as insufferable as he is but instead the character acts like he's from someone's fanfic. No substance, no sacrifices, only a personality that is built around catering to a specific sector of individuals and completely disregarding the possibility that other people might not like having this sort of thing pushed on to them like this.

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

Clark Kent just being a regular guy is in no way comparable to having G'raha Tia act like fangirling school child every time he's around someone important. They had every opportunity to not make G'raha Tia as annoying and as insufferable as he is but instead the character acts like he's from someone's fanfic. No substance, no sacrifices, only a personality that is built around catering to a specific sector of individuals and completely disregarding the possibility that other people might not like having this sort of thing pushed on to them like this.

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Uhhh…most versions of Clark Kent go out of his way to pretend to be a shy, awkward, dorky, meek and clumsy man. Who simps on Lois Lane incessantly. And sometimes it’s not an act. Put him next to Bruce Wayne and he becomes some of those things for real.

As I’ve said, I personally found G’raha’s personality to be believably human for someone who spent most of his life expecting to die without making his dreams come true. I even appreciate the bits of depth they give him in Megaduhta and Ultima Thule, but as I’ve mentioned elsewhere, it was too much tell and not enough show.

You disagree, and that’s fine.

Fair warning, nothing I am about to say has any bearing on any arguments about whether or not characters qualify as "pretty boys", "brats", "masculine", or any other "let's shove a human-shaped body into a tiny box and make it fit" terminology.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

FF6 character design

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I mean, if we're going to pick nits:

Setzer, Edgar, Cyan, and Locke all have different eyebrow shapes and colors. They also have different nose shapes—Cyan's is an eagle/aquiline nose, Edgar's is hooked/Roman, Setzer's is straight and sharp with a flat glabella, and Locke's is still straight but has a softer tip and concave glabella. Edgar's nose has a reddened tip, while Cyan's nostrils are a deeper shade than the rest of his nose. And lest you somehow mistake Locke and Setzer for the same person, Setzer's face is covered in scars. Their chins are different shapes, too, though this is obscured by clothing and hair in Edgar and Setzer's case.

The point I'm trying to make is that these faces are unique. If you cropped out everything but their faces, it would still be clear that they look like different people, and someone who knew about the cast of FF6 could reasonably identify without having seen Amano's artwork before.

Of course, none of this is relevant to the game itself, which uses 16-bit sprites designed to fit within a 16x24 grid. Notable victims of the process of converting these designs to sprite format are everyone's noses, everyone's eyebrows being distinguishable from their eyelashes, any variation in skin color since they have a limited palette to work with (making everyone vaguely beige), and Sabin's beard.

It shouldn't be surprising that when every defining facial feature except Cyan's moustache is removed, people will tell the characters apart by their clothing.

EDIT: Also, I have no idea why I'm here right now.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

intuiting

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You could just, you know, admit to being in error.

http://i.pinimg.com/originals/f8/5a/...e4af8963c7.jpg

https://www.giantbomb.com/a/uploads/...809-strago.jpg

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...08/unknown.png

https://fftcg.cdn.sewest.net/COTW%20...er-desktop.jpg

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...46/unknown.png

Anyway, for as long as the series has stuck to having Biseinen and what not, the games that do the best are the ones that feature characters outside of that mold.

IV has Yang
VI has Sabin, Gau, Cyan, Gogo, Umaro, General Leo, Shadow, Mog, Strago, and depending on which Amano art you're looking at, Edgar is also drawn with a wide, dimpled manly chin
VII has Barrett, Red XIII, Cait Sith, and Cid
IX has Steiner, Amarant
X has Wakka and Khimari
XI has Galkas(and Galka Mayo. Don't google that)

Also though, note that official Amano art isn't what sold the early games. We got weird western art portrayals for the earliest Final Fantasies. VI was actually the first one to really openly share the Amano art, having detail character bios in its instruction manual complete with both Amano portrayals of each character.

In the gameplay, of course the graphics at the time limit how the characters look, but they don't call to mind their art. They still all had stand out designs, and were unmistakably different. In the earliest games this took the form of different job designs, rather than characters.

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Originally Posted by Rosenstrauch

Fair warning, nothing I am about to say has any bearing on any arguments about whether or not characters qualify as "pretty boys", "brats", "masculine", or any other "let's shove a human-shaped body into a tiny box and make it fit" terminology.



I mean, if we're going to pick nits:

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The problem is that the complaint was about there being too many anime-esque bishonen pretty boys compared to "classically handsome" (aka, rugged and tough, from a Western aesthetic) male characters. Technically speaking, each of the Scions also draw from a variety of subtle facial variations as well, but it doesn't change the fact that they are still of the same beautiful bishonen archetype.

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

IV has Yang

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Who I mentioned along with Cid and Tellah.

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

VI has Sabin, Gau, Cyan, Gogo, Umaro, General Leo, Shadow, Mog, Strago, and depending on which Amano art you're looking at, Edgar is also drawn with a wide, dimpled manly chin

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Mentioned all of them except for Gau. Gogo, Umaro, Mog, and Shadow I mentioned as part as having "no human features". Leo is a relatively minor character, so we could technically mention General Ranjit or Rammbroes here if we wanted to be picky. And yes, Edgar's chin depends on the artwork.

I also said that VI has such a HUGE cast that you're bound to find more characters in it that break the mold. However, Amano was specifically instructed to make all of the main male characters that the player would interact with more regularly as "approachable" as possible -- which in Japanese media, meant "pretty". Locke, for instance, was originally designed to be an older rogue with a mustache before Amano was asked to redesign. All of the "unapproachable" features were moved over to Shadow, instead.

Likewise, Galuf and Ricard Highwind are temporary guest characters that get written out of the story or killed off at some point. It's not like FFXIV doesn't have guest party members like Gotetsu or temporary playable characters such as Hien.

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

VII has Barrett, Red XIII, Cait Sith, and Cid
IX has Steiner, Amarant
X has Wakka and Khimari

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I specifically said pre-PS1 era, and I likewise said that Nomura typically has a somewhat more varied diversity.

FFVII is also special, because Nomura was ordered to draw against his normal style for that game. Due to the limitations of early PS1 technical knowledge, they needed the characters to be exaggerated and recognizable by their basic shapes alone.


You could follow the whole conversation rather than call someone else "in error".

If the burger seething annoys you so much you can just ignore it, you know. Start a different topic. Please just do anything but fight for another 10 pages. What are you actually here for if "the wrong kind of criticism" just sets you off so badly? This thread is for venting about problems with the msq. People have different issues with it. Some issues are more problematic in the eyes of some than others. They might want to talk about it to considerable length. Who are you to try to gatekeep what is or isn't allowed to be discussed or viewed as an issue in this thread?

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Originally Posted by anhaato

If the burger seething annoys you so much you can just ignore it, you know. Start a different topic. Please just do anything but fight for another 10 pages. What are you actually here for if "the wrong kind of criticism" just sets you off so badly? This thread is for venting about problems with the msq. People have different issues with it. Some issues are more problematic in the eyes of some than others. They might want to talk about it to considerable length. Who are you to try to gatekeep what is or isn't allowed in this thread?

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This entire post is silly because it goes both ways. Anyone who wants to talk about G'raha and burgers endlessly can make a topic where they can discuss it there.

Likewise, they have as much a right to bring up the burger scene as a topic as someone else has to argue that the complaint is brought up far too often and with too much vitriol, and by the same clique of posters.

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Originally Posted by CrownySuccubus

This entire post is silly because it goes both ways. Anyone who wants to talk about G'raha and burgers endlessly can make a topic where they can discuss it there.

Likewise, they have as much a right to bring up the burger scene as a topic as someone else has to argue that the complaint is brought up far too often and with too much vitriol, and by the same clique of posters.

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Ok, and what's your goal in doing so? Quickly.

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Originally Posted by Brinne

The unique fury and fixation inspired by burgers and "a male character that doesn't aesthetically appeal to me" in an expansion as rife with actually substantive issues as Endwalker is sort of morbidly fascinating, if depressing.

Wait, no, I take it back. It's not fascinating. It's the most boring thing in the universe, actually.

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You, yourself, not seeing something as a valid issue does not negate it being something other people are free to discuss if it is something that they feel passionate about or see as an issue with the game.

The thread in itself has been a place to discuss perceived issues with Endwalker across the board. Not everyone is going to agree with every point raised, though that isn't a necessity in the first place.

I'd rather not see bizarre attempts at gatekeeping what is 'allowed' to be discussed - especially when they're turning on posters who have contributed extensively to compiling issues with how Venat and Hermes were handled.

It's not like there's anything new to discuss until the next Live Letter arrives, either.

Ok well if you want to change the direction of the thread back to Venat, I think it would have been far more interesting and made for a more entertaining experience if she really lived up to the whole fallen angel thing she quite literally has going on instead of pretending to be "everyone's mother." This woman isn't a benevolent goddess, she's a deceiver and one of the most destructive beings in the entirety of the mainline series outclassed only by the likes of Meteion and Jenova. Now, Venat wasn't that bad as a party member when was part of the Elpis trio but everything after (and before) that point is full of flimsy logic and desperate writing in attempt to retcon her into a positive figure, despite having very clear indications in Shadowbringers that she wasn't.

http://pm1.narvii.com/6869/d3468490e...3-403v2_00.jpg


I suppose a better way to have gone about it would've been to draw inspiration from the likes of Sirene or the situation revolving Ryo Asuka. Sirene for being an interesting villainess and having a fight sequence so prominent that it's even being replicated in FFXVI, and Ryo for the way in which such a betrayal could've gone about. Deliberately create a problem that necessitated the summoning of Zodiark, then presenting herself as the solution in the form of a seemingly loving and protective goddess, despite her "creations" being little more than magic putty in the direct aftermath of the sundering. When they went out and said in the Live Letter that the races "evolved" into their current form, none of us pictured that they literally became that after being jello for an unspecified amount of time. All this while subconsciously trying to bring back the friend (the WoL) that would wind up becoming her undoing after having manipulated and fostered his growth to well beyond what she could manage.

I would absolutely have preferred a final fight against her, starting from the depths of the Earth where she resided in a literal lake of ice to winding up fighting on the barren surface of the moon where she originally had banished Zodiark. Partway through the fight, instead of riding Zenos dragon, why not Vrtra? Or better yet Midgardsormr? Naturally given that this is an MMORPG the WoL would likely win instead of the alternate outcome that resulted from Ryo and Akira's battle. It probably would have been a lot more satisfying than willingly salvaging whatever was left of Meteion and unleashing that back into the universe, and then being forced into battle with Zenos which many posters have mentioned that doing this went directly against how they felt their WoLs would react in that situation.

https://www.geekmi.news/__export/161...1496862711.jpg

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Originally Posted by aveyond-dreams

A Garlemald expansion would have indeed provided the sort of continued conflicts you express interest in, especially from military leaders who are uncompromising in their ideals and beliefs. I imagine that they would still humanize the Garlean people in different ways but in the end I did enjoy how they went about handling that specific aspect of Garlemald in Endwalker – it was still flawed in my view however because of the ridiculous decision to write Gaius out of the plot instead of trying to tie it together to the Weapons storyline. I think they did a good job of showing how not everyone in the Empire subscribes to the same mindset and the characters we did see were worthy of the screentime they took up.

(Ideally, such content like the trial series etc. should be made mandatory for not only story continuity issues but to enforce a skill check that this playerbase needs in endgame content. Especially if it would act as a filter for players whose aversion to more challenging battle content and Heavensward and Ivalice-style storytelling seems to overlap.)

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I do enjoy the shades of gray in that regard, especially in that not every Garlean is the same. More of that would be fun to work with. But arriving in Garlemald and trying to figure out how to not kill the poor, poor tempered Garlean soldiers that would happily fight us to the death even if they weren't tempered? They were laying on the concepts of 'if you kill your enemy you're as bad as them' a little too thick. Sometimes I'd rather the people in the story be a little more emotional and human than just... the good guys. I think that's the biggest issue with FFXIV's story as a whole though, especially in Endwalker. The protagonist has no emotional agency (or agency in general) and everyone acts like robots that have a fleeting emotion and then are immediately over it, regardless of what's happening.