Let's keep Character Crossovers from other Square-Enix titles out of FFXIV.

[Keyln]

Ok, you have me intrigued. As far as I understand it, although some single FFs take place on multiple nearby worlds (V), and some even take place on the same world (Spira, Ivalice), nowhere do we have a specific reference that places two separate FFs on different worlds (or world-groupings) within the same physical plane. To clarify, what I would be looking for is a reference that says, for example, Hydaelyn and Spira are some number of light-years away from each other and you could travel from one to another if only you had a sufficiently effective mode of direct transport (i.e. not teleporting).

There are two instances of inter-planetary travel. The first is in IV:After Years where the big villain of the game is shown to have been the last member of an ancient space faring civilization, and had been using crystals to gather information about life in the universe. From the creatures previously fought in the final dungeon, it is heavily implied that the villain has been to the worlds of I, II, III, V, and VI. Also, it was heavily implied that the descendants of the people in X and X-2 will eventually develop interplanetary travel and go to the world of VII to form the Shinra Power company. It was also confirmed in the Ultimania for X and X-2.

All of this implies that unless it's explicitly stated otherwise, all of the games in the Final Fantasy series take place in the same universe (and I dare say galaxy), but in different systems/planets. Thus, with sufficient resources, means, and power, it is possible for a civilization to travel from one world to another. Thus, it is quite possible to have Lightning appear in XIV, and any other character from the Final Fantasy series for that matter. I wouldn't be surprised in the least if they use the Aethernet system that is present in XIV to do that.

On an unrelated diversion, do I get nerd points for this? And what do I use them for?

[Rythwen]

There are two instances of inter-planetary travel. The first is in IV:After Years where the big villain of the game is shown to have been the last member of an ancient space faring civilization, and had been using crystals to gather information about life in the universe. From the creatures previously fought in the final dungeon, it is heavily implied that the villain has been to the worlds of I, II, III, V, and VI. Also, it was heavily implied that the descendants of the people in X and X-2 will eventually develop interplanetary travel and go to the world of VII to form the Shinra Power company. It was also confirmed in the Ultimania for X and X-2.

All of this implies that unless it's explicitly stated otherwise, all of the games in the Final Fantasy series take place in the same universe (and I dare say galaxy), but in different systems/planets. Thus, with sufficient resources, means, and power, it is possible for a civilization to travel from one world to another. Thus, it is quite possible to have Lightning appear in XIV, and any other character from the Final Fantasy series for that matter. I wouldn't be surprised in the least if they use the Aethernet system that is present in XIV to do that.

On an unrelated diversion, do I get nerd points for this? And what do I use them for?

Infinite nerd points. I hope more people read your post to see what's been possible in the Final Fantasy universe.

[Sleverin]

Okay, so the idea of Greek mythos is a little strange, but I can see and understand your confusion. While the locations themselves are described as having physical locations, they are not reachable by man. An example would be that while you could sail upon the water, Poseidon's domain, you could never actually reach where he is via human travel even tough his location is on the physical plane of Earth. It would seem that this is the encompassing logic presented to us in 14, that the Crystal is within our plane but we cannot access it via normal means, as with this game's version of the Void.

I don't have much, if anything to say of Lightning and her story. Her becoming one with a goddess (whatever that means) or any of her other strange abilities that she possesses. The more and more I learn about her, the more and more she sounds like a Mary Sue. That, however, isn't the point of this thread.

In fact, we have gotten a bit off topic here about what we're discussing. This thread isn't about how Square-Enix has apparently written some insane Illuminati level conspiracy theory about how a sequel to a 20 year old game retcons all of the games into the same time-space continuum, but how that doing so makes stories seem less plausible. Even doing so with only "implications", no matter how heavy they may be, are merely implications. Yet again, this sort of thing actually pushes the point further: they write a new story in to force every game into a same continuum and in fact even destroy the worlds of several games, causing a further schism in their story. This displays a good point that the fans feared, that this will hurt the core story of 14 which has been fantastic so far and didn't need any inter-dimensional shoehorning to make the game better. Simply because it's been put into a game doesn't make it a decent story or any more acceptable, in fact this silly writing they put into the After Years is surprisingly shoddy in comparison to some of Final Fantasies' other great stories. At this point I have to wonder if they aren't just building a crazy story to appease fans in some weird way.

Looking at it, however, I would have to say that these seem more like references for the sake of knowing them, not merely creating some retcon story, but more a fun tale for fans who wanted to revisit the world of 4 with a new story. I'd take this much less seriously than anything else. Now that I think about it, this looks more and more like a fun game for the fans, like an extra DLC, than something to quote as canon.

This business of X and X-2 going to FFVII's world is even more ridiculous retcon work made possible after the fact of the games being made and from a Japanese companion book that doesn't even look like it's been translated into English. If any of that were particularly true, that would erode stories yet again. Why wasn't it mentioned anywhere in VII's history? Why would Shin-Ra be formed from people who came from space, tried to build rockets, and gave up when they had the technology in the first place? Basic questions like this quickly show weak storytelling and weirdly foolish attempts to make some sort of continuity between the game world when, from a storytelling standpoint, it simply isn't feasible without re writing the whole series to be a single story. Yet again why the problem of crossover writing, you need to tweak too much to make it forcefully work and it still just damages the core idea.

[Obsy]

snip

[Keyln]

Okay, so the idea of Greek mythos is a little strange, but I can see and understand your confusion. While the locations themselves are described as having physical locations, they are not reachable by man. An example would be that while you could sail upon the water, Poseidon's domain, you could never actually reach where he is via human travel even tough his location is on the physical plane of Earth. It would seem that this is the encompassing logic presented to us in 14, that the Crystal is within our plane but we cannot access it via normal means, as with this game's version of the Void.

I don't have much, if anything to say of Lightning and her story. Her becoming one with a goddess (whatever that means) or any of her other strange abilities that she possesses. The more and more I learn about her, the more and more she sounds like a Mary Sue. That, however, isn't the point of this thread.

Thing is that we have very little understanding of what the Void exactly is. Is it a space between worlds? An extra-dimensional space that can't be readily seen by normal means (and which poor Gilgy keeps getting trapped in)? It's something that hasn't been explained very well at this point, and probably won't be explained in the near future.

In fact, we have gotten a bit off topic here about what we're discussing. This thread isn't about how Square-Enix has apparently written some insane Illuminati level conspiracy theory about how a sequel to a 20 year old game retcons all of the games into the same time-space continuum, but how that doing so makes stories seem less plausible.

But that's exactly what I've been doing. The whole reason why I put those examples up is to show that it's entirely plausible for Final Fantasy characters to appear in a different game, and it'll still be canon and not a retcon.

Even doing so with only "implications", no matter how heavy they may be, are merely implications. Yet again, this sort of thing actually pushes the point further: they write a new story in to force every game into a same continuum and in fact even destroy the worlds of several games, causing a further schism in their story

What? Dude, examples! You're making very little sense here. How would the idea of these Final Fantasy worlds being in the same universe (or galaxy or even same star system) "destroy the worlds of several games"? How does it create a schism in the story if the story allows such a thing?

This displays a good point that the fans feared, that this will hurt the core story of 14 which has been fantastic so far and didn't need any inter-dimensional shoehorning to make the game better.

How is it a shoehorn? How does it hurt the core story of XIV? Considering we don't even know what the core story really is in XIV outside of snippets and some early level quests.

Simply because it's been put into a game doesn't make it a decent story or any more acceptable, in fact this silly writing they put into the After Years is surprisingly shoddy in comparison to some of Final Fantasies' other great stories. At this point I have to wonder if they aren't just building a crazy story to appease fans in some weird way.

Wait...are you calling the writing of IV: The After Years shoddy? Really? A game that's been well received by most critics?

Looking at it, however, I would have to say that these seem more like references for the sake of knowing them, not merely creating some retcon story, but more a fun tale for fans who wanted to revisit the world of 4 with a new story. I'd take this much less seriously than anything else. Now that I think about it, this looks more and more like a fun game for the fans, like an extra DLC, than something to quote as canon.

Dude, IV:The After Years IS canon. It's a direct sequel of a game of the main series. It's as much canon as X-2 and XIII-2. Now, if you've got something that says otherwise, I'd suggest you present it.

This business of X and X-2 going to FFVII's world is even more ridiculous retcon work made possible after the fact of the games being made and from a Japanese companion book that doesn't even look like it's been translated into English. If any of that were particularly true, that would erode stories yet again. Why wasn't it mentioned anywhere in VII's history? Why would Shin-Ra be formed from people who came from space, tried to build rockets, and gave up when they had the technology in the first place? Basic questions like this quickly show weak storytelling and weirdly foolish attempts to make some sort of continuity between the game world when, from a storytelling standpoint, it simply isn't feasible without re writing the whole series to be a single story. Yet again why the problem of crossover writing, you need to tweak too much to make it forcefully work and it still just damages the core idea.

Do you realize that these guys don't necessarily plan things out like this, right? They're not too worried about continuity snarls between their games because each game takes place in their own little world.

Now, technology can be lost, history can be forgotten, it isn't that big of a stretch to surmise a reason why the people of VII have forgotten where they came from and how they got there, considering we don't know the time scale of between X and X-2 and VII.

The Core idea of VII and X aren't hurt at all, the games are still playable today as they were long ago, and I fail to see how crossover writing hurts the "core ideas" of these Final Fantasy games.

[SkyeWindbinder]

Okay, so the idea of Greek mythos is a little strange, but I can see and understand your confusion. While the locations themselves are described as having physical locations, they are not reachable by man. An example would be that while you could sail upon the water, Poseidon's domain, you could never actually reach where he is via human travel even tough his location is on the physical plane of Earth. It would seem that this is the encompassing logic presented to us in 14, that the Crystal is within our plane but we cannot access it via normal means, as with this game's version of the Void.

I don't have much, if anything to say of Lightning and her story. Her becoming one with a goddess (whatever that means) or any of her other strange abilities that she possesses. The more and more I learn about her, the more and more she sounds like a Mary Sue. That, however, isn't the point of this thread.

In fact, we have gotten a bit off topic here about what we're discussing. This thread isn't about how Square-Enix has apparently written some insane Illuminati level conspiracy theory about how a sequel to a 20 year old game retcons all of the games into the same time-space continuum, but how that doing so makes stories seem less plausible. Even doing so with only "implications", no matter how heavy they may be, are merely implications. Yet again, this sort of thing actually pushes the point further: they write a new story in to force every game into a same continuum and in fact even destroy the worlds of several games, causing a further schism in their story. This displays a good point that the fans feared, that this will hurt the core story of 14 which has been fantastic so far and didn't need any inter-dimensional shoehorning to make the game better. Simply because it's been put into a game doesn't make it a decent story or any more acceptable, in fact this silly writing they put into the After Years is surprisingly shoddy in comparison to some of Final Fantasies' other great stories. At this point I have to wonder if they aren't just building a crazy story to appease fans in some weird way.

Looking at it, however, I would have to say that these seem more like references for the sake of knowing them, not merely creating some retcon story, but more a fun tale for fans who wanted to revisit the world of 4 with a new story. I'd take this much less seriously than anything else. Now that I think about it, this looks more and more like a fun game for the fans, like an extra DLC, than something to quote as canon.

This business of X and X-2 going to FFVII's world is even more ridiculous retcon work made possible after the fact of the games being made and from a Japanese companion book that doesn't even look like it's been translated into English. If any of that were particularly true, that would erode stories yet again. Why wasn't it mentioned anywhere in VII's history? Why would Shin-Ra be formed from people who came from space, tried to build rockets, and gave up when they had the technology in the first place? Basic questions like this quickly show weak storytelling and weirdly foolish attempts to make some sort of continuity between the game world when, from a storytelling standpoint, it simply isn't feasible without re writing the whole series to be a single story. Yet again why the problem of crossover writing, you need to tweak too much to make it forcefully work and it still just damages the core idea.

[Alaltus]

On X and VII... from what i know of it, it comes off as a bit of a forced after thought. It adds little to either games story and creates more questions than it answers.

If we see X characters will that mean VII characters cannot appear because time line wise the story predates it? Likewise if we see VII characters will that mean X characters cannot appear because they are long dead? Or is there going to be some wibbly wobbly timey wimey reason to explain them both into XIV? Whats more what does any of these characters stand to gain by leaving their worlds story wise? Many characters are done by the end of their games they don't have any reason to just up and leave where they are settled.

Thinking about it Quina probbably has the best excuse to show up that i can think of. His/her life goal is to explore new places, in his/her quest to eat new foods and is the sort of impulsive character that would get himself/herself flung to another world. She/he also has little ties to the story of IX in his/her quest for yummy yummies and could operate as comic relief just as well in XIV as in IX.

[Obsy]

While I really don't want this discussion to derail into a debate about semantics, there is nothing false about Sleverin's use of the word 'retcon' as you attempt to invalidate his argument. Now, while it's plausible, I'd posit that it's still highly improbable that SE/Squaresoft/Square—in their earliest conceptions of their RPG franchise—initially intended for each standalone iteration to be cosmically tied to each other. No, it's much more likely that after decades of pumping out individual stories with similar themes and concepts, they decided to retroactively tie things together through pathways you yourself pointed out. This "looking back and making adjustments" to allow for a new form of unity between worlds fits the definition of retcon quite snugly.

The whole reason why I put those examples up is to show that it's entirely plausible for Final Fantasy characters to appear in a different game, and it'll still be canon and not a retcon.

"Retcon" and "canon" aren't mutually exclusive terms. In fact, the general point of retconning is to purposely force a new concept/event/story to become canon.

How is it a shoehorn? How does it hurt the core story of XIV?

It's a shoehorn because it is literally being forced into a plotline where it otherwise doesn't belong, much like, oh I dunno... having our characters suddenly high-five Shaquille O'Neal during the victory pose at the end of Brayflox's Longstop would be a shoehorn. Even if that's the only place in the entire game we'd ever see him (because we uh... we rescued him from a mud drake! Yeah, that works! The writers put it in, so it's canon!), would that hurt the core story of XIV? Not necessarily, but it sure would put some people off, wouldn't it? (You see, Shaq played a genie in the movie Kazaam, so we could just say that some kid 'wished' him into XIV, and because the developers made it happen, it's suddenly canon. Yes.)

Considering we don't even know what the core story really is in XIV outside of snippets and some early level quests.

I really hope I'm just misreading this.

Wait...are you calling the writing of IV: The After Years shoddy? Really? A game that's been well received by most critics?

Positive reception in no way correlates with good or bad writing.

Do you realize that these guys don't necessarily plan things out like this, right? They're not too worried about continuity snarls between their games because each game takes place in their own little world.

Hennnnnce, retroactively adjusting their stories to force...? Continuity.

Now, technology can be lost, history can be forgotten, it isn't that big of a stretch to surmise a reason why the people of VII have forgotten where they came from and how they got there, considering we don't know the time scale of between X and X-2 and VII.

You're doing it yourself right here.

The Core idea of VII and X aren't hurt at all, the games are still playable today as they were long ago, and I fail to see how crossover writing hurts the "core ideas" of these Final Fantasy games.

I personally beg to differ. If the crossover of VII and X really is true, then in my eyes (and I'd wager a few other people's), the core ideas of those games are, in fact, hurt. Whether you choose to accept that or not doesn't negate that fact, and I'm again willing to bet that in this example, VII wasn't initially written with the intent that X (written several years later, mind you) will serve as some sort of L. Ron Hubbard-esque origin story. That came later; retroactively.

[Aish]

It's a shoehorn because it is literally being forced into a plotline where it otherwise doesn't belong, much like, oh I dunno... having our characters suddenly high-five Shaquille O'Neal during the victory pose at the end of Brayflox's Longstop would be a shoehorn. Even if that's the only place in the entire game we'd ever see him (because we uh... we rescued him from a mud drake! Yeah, that works! The writers put it in, so it's canon!), would that hurt the core story of XIV? Not necessarily, but it sure would put some people off, wouldn't it? (You see, Shaq played a genie in the movie Kazaam, so we could just say that some kid 'wished' him into XIV, and because the developers made it happen, it's suddenly canon. Yes.)

I think you're being too nitpicky about this. Just about any of the classic jobs or famous monsters would have to be 'shoehorned' in too, you realize. How would they bring Golden Saucer, Crystal Tower, classic jobs like RDM or any of the other things people want in the game without 'shoehorning' it? (Keep in mind, the vast majority of these have never been mentioned in the in-game lore before either) They do this by creating a story that works and fits within the lore. (Just like they plan to do with Lightning!) If we can't bring Lightning in through a legitimate story, what about these other iconic FF things that weren't originally planned for? Are we just going to pretend that the story they made up for these things is somehow okay, but not the one they make for Lightning just because she's from a different game?

Also, let's not forget, for new things in an MMO there will eventually come a time when they have to do some 'shoehorning' anyways, unless you somehow think SE can plan for everything they might add later on.

[C-croft]

I personally beg to differ. If the crossover of VII and X really is true, then in my eyes (and I'd wager a few other people's), the core ideas of those games are, in fact, hurt. Whether you choose to accept that or not doesn't negate that fact, and I'm again willing to bet that in this example, VII wasn't initially written with the intent that X (written several years later, mind you) will serve as some sort of L. Ron Hubbard-esque origin story. That came later; retroactively.

This would be an example of a poorly executed cross over. Not to mention the vast amount of time difference between the events. Canon or not, it is silly writing. Religion had a huge part in X. I doubt that they would forget that in a few thousand years... But since it has been mentioned, anyone notice the bahamut cross over in Advent Children? Since they used the X bahamut instead of the VII bahamut. Wasn't a fan. But it was whatever.