[Lighthouse Spoilers] Can we please stop with the stupid fetch quests?

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Originally Posted by Lauront

Huh? Get a grip. It's a fantasy setting. The races in it are completely different species. He's not some dumb SJW, he hasn't undergone "muh diversity is our strength" training, probably because he has a functioning brain and a healthy in-group preference. If you can't handle "waaaaaaaaaaycism" (basically nothing but mild name-calling) in a Japanese RPG, you're probably better off seeking professional help.

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Can we tone down the personal insults? Those are not helping at all and wont make us take posts seriously...

He is racist and even the ingame characters point it out. He is rude and even his father calls him out of this. He also cant be that young anymore, since he is in charge of this if his father is not around, so he at least must be near adulthood. Also look at his sister. Younger than him but at least she has some respect for other people. Something that he is missing quite a lot.

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Originally Posted by Rokke

itt: people don't realize devs are playing up Ramza to be such an asshat to emphasize the difference between him and og Ramza and him and the moderate Garleans he travels with. He's the ye olde equivalent of an edgy teenager in a youtube comments section. You're supposed to not like how he's acting.


@ topic -
I would have been fine with it being a sidequest within the raid similar to how the bacon bread sidequest was. I already knew both Gegeruju and Hancock are swindlers, Drest is from a foreign country, and that Shamani is an honest person. All it did was waste some time before I queued.

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Well imo they could have shown this change much better without making the real Ramza so extremely rude and unlikeable. It was quite clear that they are doing this so that we might notice it better but that does not make it better written. Honestly they only managed to not make me care of his fate. He is only a few steps behind Asahi for me. And him being such a annoying character really does not help with feeling for this group. My character is just with them to be able to see that Ivalice and not because of them. With other raids I at least cared for the team.

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Originally Posted by Vhailor

If so, then it's clumsily done. This is the type of difference best illustrated subtly, over time, not with the narrative equivalent of a giant billboard smacking you upside the head. His age is also a bad thing to bring up here: SE need not do anything to highlight that teenagers are pains in the ass. From a broader 'different types of Garlean' standpoint, they needed to use another adult, or someone of a calmer temperament. Ramza is just a poorly-done character, full stop.

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Ramza's great. Characters such as him are incredibly popular within Japan - and even outside of it. Most of my favourite characters in RPG's are those with flaws...especially in Final Fantasy games. Yotsuyu. Seifer. Gabranth. Rufus. To name but a few. They're often far more interesting and memorable than characters that exist to tread on thin ice as to not offend anyone.

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Originally Posted by Vhailor

If so, then it's clumsily done. This is the type of difference best illustrated subtly, over time, not with the narrative equivalent of a giant billboard smacking you upside the head. His age is also a bad thing to bring up here: SE need not do anything to highlight that teenagers are pains in the ass. From a broader 'different types of Garlean' standpoint, they needed to use another adult, or someone of a calmer temperament. Ramza is just a poorly-done character, full stop.

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I won’t disagree that it’s a bit clumsy at the moment but I’m pretty sure the biggest foil be old Ramza that’s possessing our Ramza. I wish it happened sooner so the story would get rolling faster, but I can see what they’re trying to do.

As for the calmer garleans, the father and alma (along with the rest of the trope) are all pretty mellow. That the father regularly shoots Ramza down when he goes on one of his tangents shows that the kids out of line.

Despite my distaste for pointless fetch quests, at least the one for unlocking Ridorana is short.

My biggest problem with Ramza is that at times he seemed so over the top rude just to make the point for us to notice, not to even mention other characters pointing that out.

And as for the fetch quest, I don't mind them in general if they make sense, but the illusion of choice was what annoyed me the most. Sure, it's not like any of the other dialogue options in the game change anything but a line or two, but at least you don't fail quests because of them? That and how the other guy in Wineport treats the WoL; I don't need or want my character to be praised and thanked and worshiped all the time, but considering we were pretty helpful even to him personally some time back, at least some basic courtesy would be nice.

I really need to bump this post.
Enough of filler quests.
And I wish they remove the old ones from ARR.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

Ramza's great. Characters such as him are incredibly popular within Japan - and even outside of it. Most of my favourite characters in RPG's are those with flaws...especially in Final Fantasy games. Yotsuyu. Seifer. Gabranth. Rufus. To name but a few. They're often far more interesting and memorable than characters that exist to tread on thin ice as to not offend anyone.

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See the thing is. You know what else was popular in japan? Characters with the personality and likability of a cardboard box like Lightning. Yotsuyu was written better than Ramza. Seifer was honestly a terrible character in general. Gabranth was written better. So was Rufus. Ramza is just written poorly and it's becoming incredibly apparent you're willing to just forgive everything SE does instead of trying to accept someone might have a different viewpoint than you.

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Originally Posted by KyokuhoKensaki

See the thing is. You know what else was popular in japan? Characters with the personality and likability of a cardboard box like Lightning. Yotsuyu was written better than Ramza. Seifer was honestly a terrible character in general. Gabranth was written better. So was Rufus. Ramza is just written poorly and it's becoming incredibly apparent you're willing to just forgive everything SE does instead of trying to accept someone might have a different viewpoint than you.

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http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...82/861/e26.jpg

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Originally Posted by KyokuhoKensaki

See the thing is. You know what else was popular in japan? Characters with the personality and likability of a cardboard box like Lightning. Yotsuyu was written better than Ramza. Seifer was honestly a terrible character in general. Gabranth was written better. So was Rufus. Ramza is just written poorly and it's becoming incredibly apparent you're willing to just forgive everything SE does instead of trying to accept someone might have a different viewpoint than you.

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I mean, if you want to fool yourself into believing that I forgive everything that Square Enix does then you need only look at my signature to understand why that is an incorrect assumption...

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Originally Posted by Theodric

Ramza's great. Characters such as him are incredibly popular within Japan - and even outside of it. Most of my favourite characters in RPG's are those with flaws...especially in Final Fantasy games. Yotsuyu. Seifer. Gabranth. Rufus. To name but a few. They're often far more interesting and memorable than characters that exist to tread on thin ice as to not offend anyone.

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I'm not familiar with Gabranth, but I am with Yotsuyu, Seifer, and Rufus. All three of them are vastly better-done than Ramza. Their stories are layered with emotional complexity; their behaviour is offensive, but it doesn't go out of its way to be offensive, if that makes sense. They're just who they are. Ramza throws it in our face too intentionally for it to be believable, and therein lies the problem: he's badly written. Unlike Yotsuyu, there's no emotional history giving extra weight to his behaviour; unlike Seifer, he doesn't have a clear competitive motivating factor (and no Edea, either); unlike Rufus, there's no immediately apparent 'so spoiled and rich he's lost sight of morals' component. Part of this isn't SE's fault, of course; as a side-story character he can't be as fleshed-out as these others. But that's all the more reason to not give him a type of behavioural pattern that demands some sort of narrative depth.

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Originally Posted by Rokke

I won’t disagree that it’s a bit clumsy at the moment but I’m pretty sure the biggest foil be old Ramza that’s possessing our Ramza. I wish it happened sooner so the story would get rolling faster, but I can see what they’re trying to do.

As for the calmer garleans, the father and alma (along with the rest of the trope) are all pretty mellow. That the father regularly shoots Ramza down when he goes on one of his tangents shows that the kids out of line.

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Quite possibly this is the direction it's going in. If so, it might work in hindsight. But it's the sort of mistake that movie series fall victim to all the time: they make a problematic entry that 'could be good' if a sequel fills in the gaps. Given that we won't see the gaps filled in for months, this isn't a great idea, and it's a shame, because an historical Ramza possessing young Ramza is a nice sort of twist in my mind. But by the time it's revealed, too many players will have been turned off to the character, killing off its effectiveness. Like I said before, brevity is key here. It would also help, of course, if other characters were deliberately noting a certain strangeness in young Ramza, rather than acting as if it's his normal personality.