The Lessons Not Learned.

[Midareyukki]

It's baffling to me how much people over shill Heavensward and Shadowbringers stories for being these "masterpieces" and highlights of the entire game. Baffling because singling them out kills a lot of the substance owed by everything that came before it. They're all very shallow stories on their own. Ishgard is just a lite version of FF Tactics's plot, Shadowbringers is just a very lite version of FFX and Tales of Symphonia that deal with it's themes and conflict much better.

I just think the way they took a theme (Plato's Loves, Aristotle's concept of a perfect society -> More's Utopia), broke it down into ways that theme can be manifested and explored each in specific sections and people. Then they brought them all back up at the end so that it'd all connect. I like how it draws on philosophy. ARR was mostly worldbuilding, HW was exploring faith and how far a lie can go, SB explored how war is a constant back and forth/the values of freedom/how all it takes is one person to be mistreated to make them agree with opressive regimes... But SHB was mostly just blatant philosophy on the structure of society and the virtues of man. I liked that. And I liked that it wasn't especially preachy with it unlike Endwalker's vague aesop of "Suffering is what makes you appreciate life". Endwalker rubbed me the wrong way. SHB let you explore the concept, see how they do it and draw your own conclusions. And each character grows a little based on those aspects.

But that's just bc I'm a massive nerd and my favourite FF is 12, so I have really bad tastes as far as the FF community sees it.

idk



of course, it does still have flaws, particularly the way they use some characters (Ran'jit) and the weird insistance on some elements. But it was still my cup of tea, and that's why I generally defend it as a good story. If it's not your cup of tea tho, it's fine, it doesn't have to be. Hopefully something else about this game is.

[Renalt]

But that's just bc I'm a massive nerd and my favourite FF is 12, so I have really bad tastes as far as the FF community sees it.

Depends. Did you like 13 or X-2? I might judge a little bit then even though you're a real chill dude.

[VictorSpoils]

But that's just bc I'm a massive nerd and my favourite FF is 12, so I have really bad tastes as far as the FF community sees it.

You mean as far as a small handful of contrarian zealots are concerned.

[Midareyukki]

Depends. Did you like 13 or X-2? I might judge a little bit then even though you're a real chill dude.

I like them. Generally speaking.

I liked FNC, I'm the kind of guy who feels Type-0 was dropped too quickly and damned too harshly. I liked 13 and its world. I understand why people had such an issue with the game's story being mostly told in Analects and the linearity of the gameplay. But to me, those were fine. The linearity was justified, even if a little overdone: not only are they running away all the time in Cocoon, they're also in a technological world thar likely doesn't have that many open-ended paths when security is that tight. And as for the plot, all you need to know is told to you, and you can sort of tell what some stuff is through context. Consider this: if I liked the FF12 Bestiary, the Analects really didn't bother me. It's part of why I like Bozja and the Variant Dungeon. You go through the adventure yourself, but if you want more, you can look it up.

As for 10-2... Even if it is too goofy and causes whiplash, I kinda didn't really mind it? I understood why they went for that sort of mood, even if I prefer 10 itself over the sequel. I know so much is different from 10, but it just didn't feel like it NEEDED to be. 10 was gloomy and mournful, whereas in 10-2 the reasons for why that was are gone, and people clearly became more indulgent. So it made sense, since breaking 10's depresso-espresso spiral was 10's whole point. But I did mind one thing: not all of the humour was my taste, especially the really cringeworthy dialogue. Even if I enjoyed the gameplay and the story was alright, the writing was... disasterrific. Besides that, I like how some stuff are explored from the past game too, especially some Ronso who obviously don't like the Guado after Seymour Thanosed them. I need to replay it, actually. I only learned that you can end up making Garik kill all the Ronso in these forums ^^; I never saw that.

i thought garik would just ignore me getting stuff wrong lol... What? :| That happens in FF14 all the time, don't @ me!

Also helps that I liked Koda Kumi as a kid xD

You mean as far as a small handful of contrarian zealots are concerned.

o,o;; FF12 isn't that popular in the community, by far. A lot of people criticised it back in the day, from its "boring and political" tone to Vaan being annoying. A meme in 2010 was that they thought 12 was the worst until 13 came out.

[VictorSpoils]

o,o;; FF12 isn't that popular in the community, by far. A lot of people criticised it back in the day, from its "boring and political" tone to Vaan being annoying. A meme in 2010 was that they thought 12 was the worst until 13 came out.

It's a pretty big community and 12 is one of the most popular ones. The fault would be on these hypothetical people for finding quality boring and an easygoing character annoying.

[Midareyukki]

hypothetical people

I hypothesize you weren't around online as much during 2006 to 2012.

[VictorSpoils]

I hypothesize you weren't around online as much during 2006 to 2012.

That's generally the impression given when an FF9 fan tries to claim it was more popular than FF8 or 10.

[Midareyukki]

That's generally the impression given when an FF9 fan tries to claim it was more popular than FF8 or 10.

Where have you gotten this from? The conversation is about FF12. You know? Vaan, super political story, Fran fanservice, all those things people hammered for quite a while a decade ago?

Also, isn't FF8 also considered unpopular due to its gameplay and confusing plot past CD1?

FF9 does have its detractors, but it's generally received well for having returned to FF's roots both in setting and gameplay, especially after FF8 showing up with its weird junction system.

Whether FF10 surpasses 9, I can't say, both are generally favoured over most FF games as far as I've seen.