Letter from the Producer LIVE Part XXVII Lore Discussion

[Rocl]

And in 7 month form now we'll be once again working lurking in the shadows

More like LORKING EH????

Wonder if Dancing Doll Calcobrena will play for the boss fight in Antitower

or is it Calcabrina or Calbrina or Calbrena dear lord MCKF wasn't kidding

[Enkidoh]

Given it's obvious Ipsen's Castle parallels (and that the game is seriously lacking in FFIX references), maybe a remix of Ipsen's Heritage (itself a remix of FFIX's main title theme The Place I'll Return to Someday) is more likely?

I'm more disappointed the Warring Triad battle isn't including a remix of Dancing Mad though. *Sad cat*

[Rocl]

Given it's obvious Ipsen's Castle parallels (and that the game is seriously lacking in FFIX references), maybe a remix of Ipsen's Heritage (itself a remix of FFIX's main title theme The Place I'll Return to Someday) is more likely?

Nine ranks among the few Final Fantasies I've never played, so I was basing my rambling based off:

It was hard coming up with the name for the boss inside this tower. A boss from a previous FF title can be found inside this tower, and we had to figure out how we’ll bring them together. This was because the previous title was made before the Localization team was created, and there wasn’t any uniformity in translation. The Localization team was created 15 years ago, and since then we have been trying to keep it uniform.

For example, Typhon comes from mythology but in previous FF title it was called Chupon. This is essentially wrong, but we didn’t know if we should go with Chupon to prioritize memories, or to change it to the official name. In FFXIV it’s named Typhon.

I have absolutely no frame of refence for the Ipsen/Memoria parallels :S

And the obvious two sets of dolls we see before the Antitower fades out @ http://www.twitch.tv/finalfantasyxiv...96?t=01h21m45s is what lead me to Calcabrina; combined with Ferne's bit about the localization

I'm more disappointed the Warring Triad battle isn't including a remix of Dancing Mad though. *Sad cat*

While I wouldn't say no to Dancing Mad eventually appearing in FFXIV-- they did pick the correct track for the homage to the Triad fights! It's the same that plays when you fight them in VI within Kefka's Tower!

[Enkidoh]

Ipsen's Castle was a dungeon in FFIX which... looked like a mirror image of itself. It started out normal but halfway through things turned... weird. The bottom half was a mirror reflection of itself that was upside down, literally. And connected to that was a unique mechanic where suddenly enemies became... extremely hard to kill. This was because the aforementioned mechanic made it that your strongest gear suddenly became weak, and vice versa, it literally reversed the levels and stats for gear, so level 1 gear ironically became the strongest in that dungeon. Luckily level 1 equipment was scattered around the dungeon in treasure chests for those players who had long since disposed of their original starting gear.

Because of this, the parallels with the upcoming 'Antitower' are quite pronounced, hence how I think that aforementioned music track would be a nice reference to it.

As for Dancing Mad that's not quite correct - the entire track of Dancing Mad consists of four separate tiers, each tier changing as you defeated each member of the Triad in turn before finally ending up against Kefka. So I guess you are right, from a certain point of view... but as I listen to the whole piece usually I associate all four tiers as the one track (rather than regarding each tier/fight separately). But I digress...

[Rocl]

As for Dancing Mad that's not quite correct - the entire track of Dancing Mad consists of four separate tiers, each tier changing as you defeated each member of the Triad in turn before finally ending up against Kefka. So I guess you are right, from a certain point of view... but as I listen to the whole piece usually I associate all four tiers as the one track (rather than regarding each tier/fight separately). But I digress...

Au contraire mon ami! You fight the Warring Triad individually BEFORE the Statue of the Gods fight & Kefka.
You seem to be conflating the Statue of the Gods and the Warring Triad, which it definitely feels like there are parallels (hell, we might even go Fiend > Demon > Goddess in XIV which would support the idea of Statue of the Gods being a rematch)

http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/G...nal_Fantasy_VI)
http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/F...nal_Fantasy_VI)
http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/D...nal_Fantasy_VI)

And a youtube for good measure:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GYClcIhlqc

These individual fights against the Triad within the tower, as you can hear, use the theme present in the Containment Bay S1T7 shown off in the Live Letter. (Which is also used for our friend Atma/Ultima Weapon on the Floating Continent)

[CyrilLucifer]

Opinion time: I'm of mind Dancing Mad is one of the weaker boss battle themes in VI, not bad, just weaker, so I'm extremely pleased they went with Battle to the Death, which is my second favorite.

Dancing Mad is more an elaborate Kefka's theme. It shouldn't really be played with the Triad members individually.

[Theodric]

The mistake many people make - including quite a few writers - is believing that most character deaths are for 'shock value'. They're not - and quite a lot of people simply cry foul just because they happen to like a character and never, ever want to see them die. This is dangerous, however, since it quite easily leads to stagnation. When you have the same characters showing up to save the day frequently whilst remaining largely unscathed then there reaches a point where you know they're never going to truly be harmed and that every antagonist they cross paths with is going to fall before them.

Estinien is one of my favourite characters. I think he's pretty interesting, cool, and I love a good tale of someone falling prey to that which they seek to do battle with. He may or may not survive - we'll have to see - but if's he's redeemed, I hope it's done tastefully. If he dies, again, I hope it's done tastefully. Yet either option has the potential to be great for the story. The same applies to the Scions. They don't need to die for the sake of dying yet nor do they need to stick around for the sake of sticking around.

[Knahli]

I fully agree with you. What makes me even more angry with none of the scions dying is that it makes Alphinaud's character growth kinda pointless. His character growth is something Yoshi-P was proud of, however now him learning from his arrogance is pointless because in the end, 'Hey your Crystal Braves didn't kill anyone, buddy!' So now I feel that Heavensward's story is kinda more lame because it takes away so much from Alphinaud's journey.

But what I fear, is that 3.2 will have only a couple of cutscenes dealing with Ishgard, then all the rest dealing with pointless Minifilia and the utterly boring scions just like 3.1. Maybe if they take some characters from this expansion and they were to join us and make this all worth wild then maybe I would be less critical. But we are just going back to the 'good old days', or so it feels.

No-one needed to die for him to learn his lesson, he just needed to think that they died. All that their survival really meant was that he was alleviated of some of the guilt that had followed the realisation that he had been an idealistic fool. In the end, a lot of people were put in serious danger if not killed. The fact that he might have been a bit closer to the Scions than some of the lower key characters doesn't really count for a whole lot considering that their deaths/wounds/grievances would still have been on his conscience. Not to mention the fact that he completely destabilised the Ul'dahn government and indirectly threatened to bring about a civil war as a result. He spent the entire MSQ fighting for a united Eorzea that could stand strong and repel the inevitable return of the Empire only to perceivably shatter the existing alliance following the tensions that 2.55 would only have surely brought about between the three powers - again, not even mentioning how Eorzea's strongest military force was now further crippled and sent into disarray so soon after it had been disrupted by the discovery of Garlean agents and sympathisers among their ranks. To add another layer to it, a lot of Brass Blades that were killed or maimed during the course of the 2.55 storyline were very likely just following orders and had no idea that they were on the wrong side of things. As well as that, at least some fragmented remnants of the Crystal Braves continued to function for at least a while without his leadership following his forced departure, meaning that he had a powerful and potentially rogue military force acting on their own beyond his control.

Guilt aside, talking to the NPCs between every dialogue exchange often reveals a lot of extra information and it was clear that Alphinaud was very eager to prove his worth and redeem his past mistakes. That would include, though not be limited to, searching for and potentially rescuing the missing Scions, all of whom were put in jeopardy because of his actions and only continued to remain missing all throughout the storyline and up until now. His motives aren't simply 'doing the right thing' and striving for a united Eorzea as they had once been, he is still seeking to make up for the damage he has caused. Hell, he even insists on joining you and fighting by your side on a number of occasions despite the serious risks it poses to himself. If I'm not mistaken, he even intended on joining you for your encounter with Ravanna(or perhaps it was Nidhogg) before being discouraged by Estinien. None of that was a return of his arrogance, that was his way of trying to do all that he could to make things right.

Alphinaud has come a long way from just being a mere political figure, going to and fro with his bright ideas. He accompanies your party throughout the entire journey despite the fact that he didn't have to. He could have just stayed back in Ishgard the entire time and worked toward finding the Scions, but he wasn't interested in wasting any time he felt could be better spent being more proactive. He, a privileged noble boy, was actually eager to collect firewood on at least two occasions.


With that and perhaps a lot of other points I didn't think to mention, I respectfully disagree that there were no real consequences for him in the end which diminished his lessons learned, even considering how things turned out. Alphinaud has still come a long way from the boy he was back in the 2.0 line. Feel however you may about deaths being written off because, believe me, despite how utterly crushed the 2.55 scenes had left me feeling in their wake, I felt a little strange to see at least Nanamo return in the end, but I cannot agree that Alphinaud's journey was "pointless".

[Belhi]

I am not opposed to character death, not even characters I like. Infact the opposite is the case. The issue with Minfilia isn't that I like her. Its that killing her off would have been an off screen rather pointless death that did nothing for the narrative and more importantly, that she wasn't popular. Her death wouldn't invoke any positive response. Many people wouldn't care or would actually be happy to hear it. That's not the response you want to invoke by killing a main ally of the protagonist.

From a narrative perpective 2.55 served two purposes. Firstly it got us into Ishgard. Secondly it scattered the Scions and left them outside their traditional places allowing for character development for them. This was I think done at least partially because ARR was sadly lacking in developing our core cast of NPCs. We are one patch into 3.X and we have Y'shtola having revisited her past past and given a burden that over time might kill her. Thancred has be forced out of his norm and robbed of his Aether channelling which creates the challenge of forcing him to adapt to the change, possibly seeing him start to look into Magitek to make up for his weakness. Its made Tataru have to be proactive, Alphinaud to grow up and become both more humble but less naïve. It's taken Yda and Papalymo out from their traditional odd couple background role and stuck them into a place which shows signs of touching on their pasts (Yda seems a lot more aggressive and frankly serious than we have seen her in the past in the small cutscene we saw) and its gotten Minfilia out from behind her desk and actually doing something which is by far the biggest issue she has had.

The true problem with 2.55 was them bringing back Nanamo cause by far narratively that was the biggest and most important death. The implications of that way outreached any of the Scions being killed of to the narrative. The fact it went from this huge thing to being pretty much nothing was a huge anticlimax to a very dramatic patch.

[Fenral]

snip

After a point you just have to accept how narrative causality works and move on. They don't win because they're the main characters, they're the main characters because they win. Most works with fairly stable ensembles get around the "if nobody dies how do we know they're a threat" by focusing on the negative emotions brought about by the villain's actions, i.e. he's making people we like hurt, and we want them to stop hurting.

It's actually something that can only be done with a stable ensemble, as revolving-door casts with an "anyone can die" option deliberately hamstring their ability to pull that off. The absolute worst-case is where FFXIV currently is, where the "anyone can die" rule is in play but only for characters introduced after 1.X. This is why nobody likes Mide. We've been trained by past experience not to expect anything from her afterwards either way.

If they aren't going to kill off members of the main cast (and they aren't, not that I want them to start), I'd rather they find more clever ways to establish threat levels than simply killing sidekicks and other characters who will only be around for this one arc either way.