No love for Crystal Chronicles?

[TeraRamis]

Crystal Chronicles was garbage.

Frankly, with the exception of FFXIV and the FFVII remake (which I am still slightly on the fence on), all Final Fantasies after IX have been below industry standards when it comes to storytelling. I play games like Valkyria Chronicles and look over at absolutely throw-away narratives like X and XIII and just shake my head.

[RyuDragnier]

Crystal Chronicles was garbage.

Frankly, with the exception of FFXIV and the FFVII remake (which I am still slightly on the fence on), all Final Fantasies after IX have been below industry standards when it comes to storytelling. I play games like Valkyria Chronicles and look over at absolutely throw-away narratives like X and XIII and just shake my head.

The stories of X and XII were below industry standards? Two of the most well beloved FF games of the past 20 years?

[ItMe]

The stories of X and XII were below industry standards? Two of the most well beloved FF games of the past 20 years?

Your mileage may vary.
In 10 I personally really disliked how much the plot relies on teleporting the party around.

On that note, many characters seem to make bad decisions solely for the sake of the plot trying to manufacture an exciting moment.

The actual beat for beat of the story gets really repetitive, especially with those three totally not Team Rocket stooges so consistently wasting your time and it seems like the characters are constantly rehashing the same conversation without saying anything new. 10 actually made me realize how much of each Final Fantasy game is the party just kind of fumbling around.

And having an obvious villain (Seymour) that everyone is so surprised is actually evil makes for some really limp drama that goes on for far, far too long.

I could continue, but I don’t wanna risk derailing this thread to make it about 10 instead.

Just because people like it doesn't mean it has a good story.

I can't speak for 12, but I don't understand how people can say 10 is above average unless they have a fairly low or resigned opinion of JRPG stories.

[MikkoAkure]

I can't speak for 12, but I don't understand how people can say 10 is above average unless they have a fairly low or resigned opinion of JRPG stories.

As much as I like most of the FF series in general, X wasn't the best story despite the game being in my top 5 FF. But I also feel like games are more than just the story anyway. Otherwise they would just be visual novels. Like FFVII before it, it was the first one on its console and had cutscenes which blew previous FFs out of the water. I still think it was fun in general. Which leads me into...

Crystal Chronicles was garbage.

Frankly, with the exception of FFXIV and the FFVII remake (which I am still slightly on the fence on), all Final Fantasies after IX have been below industry standards when it comes to storytelling. I play games like Valkyria Chronicles and look over at absolutely throw-away narratives like X and XIII and just shake my head.

Crystal Chronicles was a game made seemingly for a lower age range and released on Nintendo Gamecube. I don't think it was designed to be the most excellent RPG that ever RPG'd so calling it garbage is like criticizing a first-grader's drawing. I had a lot of fun with it when I was a kid and played it with my siblings and friends who all somehow had the annoying GBA adapter cord you needed to do multiplayer with it. I also feel like saying "every FF after a certain specific one is bad" is way to generalistic considering FFI, FFII, FFIII, FFV, FFVIII all had either throw-away plots or just bad stories overall. FFVII is too divisive so I won't swat that hornet nest.

It is funny you mention Valkyria Chronicles though considering VC2 was released on PSP and no one bought it, VC3 wasn't localized in the US, and Revolutions was garbage so that just leaves 1 and 4. But this thread isn't about which RPG series has better stories or even which FF has better stories. It's about people wanting references to older FF games that they enjoyed. If quality of story was the bar a FF game needed to pass to get a reference in FFXIV, we wouldn't have gunblades or Exdeath.