"Leave XIV Alone!" ~ Dragon Age

[Bowen]

I think what bugged me about it was how much I wanted to like it and wasn't allowed to. 75% of the game was a rail adventure, and 23% of the rest was farming various levels of turtles. So much lost potential (and bad character development. I hope the XIII adventure got Lightning to be a little more than the character equivalent of a blank piece of paper.)

While we are talking about FFXIII. Omg can't wait til' FFXIII-2

[Viridiana]

(If anyone cares, Final Fantasy Tactics for PSX was my favorite by far

I knew I liked you for a reason.

[Elexia]

Aye, that's what I've been thinking about. The thing is, the original point of Final Fantasy was to bring Western fantasy to Japan because it was so exotic and ... fantastic.

Subjective, I personally find western fantasy dull and generic. I like eastern and middle eastern fantasy and mythology. The original point of Final Fantasy was to save the company and bring out a good RPG, not westernize the RPG genre in Japan because the 80s and 90s Japan were starting to turn out the key JRPGs at the time which was significantly different from western RPGs in ways. The only relevance to western RPG FF shared was the magic system was sort of similiar to Dungeons & Dragons, then they went with the current Mana setup that they threw out for FFXIII.

why most of the items in the Japanese versions are katakana of English words (Grass Viper = Gurassubaipa). It sounds more exotic.

You're definitely stretching it a bit. It's not done because it sounded exotic, it's done because it's common practice in Japanese media (specifically gaming) to use generalized names, a lot of FF names, that you forget to point out, are generally much more rooted in older (and usually) middle eastern/asian mythology with the exception of heavy use of norse for some. If I'm in Japan and I try to write out that I seen a Garden Snake, am I trying to be exotic? Or am I just saying it's a Garden Snake?

XIV is a very blatant attempt at westernizing the (MMO) series, much like XIII was for the offline series since fast paced straight to the point gaming is what's popular now but that doesn't mean it's a good thing at times, because it's the biggest reason Korea dislikes TERA, even though it's not a horrible MMO, it's very clearly trying to appeal purely to western bases which Korea's main complaint about TERA aside lack of content, is "It feels to western, if I wanted to play a western MMO I'd play World of Warcraft or Rift."

I get the idea of the thread, but some things are a tad bit of a stretch of the imagination. No one is resistant to change, but remember that Final Fantasy wasn't made to westernize Japanese RPGs, it was made purely to save Square's asses lol.

[Synfrag]

XIV is a very blatant attempt at westernizing the (MMO) series, much like XIII was for the offline series since fast paced straight to the point gaming is what's popular now but that doesn't mean it's a good thing at times, because it's the biggest reason Korea dislikes TERA, even though it's not a horrible MMO, it's very clearly trying to appeal purely to western bases which Korea's main complaint about TERA aside lack of content, is "It feels to western, if I wanted to play a western MMO I'd play World of Warcraft or Rift."

I don't know where to break your quote due to missing periods but....

Tera is Korean, and has been Korean long before it even announced a western launch so why would it be developed for western appeal? Aion was exactly the same way being created in Korea and then ported west. In that process they westernize some extra things. I get your point about them failing with creating a western like theme but it was intended for the Korean market not the NA/EU.

Regardless, Korea is not a thing like Japan. You should know, you live there. In MMOs Korea is vain and superficial, their games are always about looking cool/sexy with scantly clad women and crazy looking men. Their gamer market is actually younger than NA/EU unlike Japan's which is older than the west. I can't speak for Tera but as far as Aion is concerned, the largest bulk of content releases coming from NC East was costumes and aesthetics, not anything to do with Mythology or Westernizations. Content is developed only for their market.

[grandm]

i'll never forget the headline

"final fantasy 13, a fantasy too far"

i hated reading that. but i hated more that i had to agree. anyhoo i love what yoshi is doing with 14. and i even love the look for 13-2. and if SE has proven one thing over and over again, its don't count them out

[Verecund]

The thing I've liked about many Final Fantasy titles is that they really try to incorporate the raw, deity-esque fantasy stuff into more modern pseudo-universes (which is no doubt a parody of the modern Japanese culture - new ideas sitting alongside old tradition).

Though, if I were to compare XIV to another FF RPG title, or set it side-by-side with a Western fantasy RPG title, I would probably say that it is a little weak in both regards, all things considered... It's really nothing like the western DND style at all as far as the character of the game is concerned (though some of the dialogue is mature... and actually funny), and when paired up with the single-player FF titles it doesn't really have the same calibre of new/old harmony.

But, one thing I really like about this game is that everything is completely true to Yoshitaka Amano's brilliant concept works

[grandm]

@elexia

you are wrong to say final fantasy was created to save square. square was a failing company that was about to go bankrupted this is true. however when Hironobu Sakaguchi used the last of his money to create final fantasy, it was his swan song. he knew he had enough money to make one last game, so he thought if he was going out he was going out on a high. and he made final fantasy, the final in the title was to represent this was squares last game. what was a huge surprise was that fact that it was so successful, not enough to get them out of trouble but enough to keep the litghts on a little longer, long enough for them to make a second game FF2 which was what saved the company

"final fantasy the most ironicly named game in the world" (wish i could remember where i read that quote)

[Elexia]

@elexia

you are wrong to say final fantasy was created to save square. square was a failing company that was about to go bankrupted this is true. however when Hironobu Sakaguchi used the last of his money to create final fantasy, it was his swan song. he knew he had enough money to make one last game, so he thought if he was going out he was going out on a high. and he made final fantasy, the final in the title was to represent this was squares last game. what was a huge surprise was that fact that it was so successful, not enough to get them out of trouble but enough to keep the litghts on a little longer, long enough for them to make a second game FF2 which was what saved the company

"final fantasy the most ironicly named game in the world" (wish i could remember where i read that quote)

Exactly, thus to save the company, since it was their main IP that actually..saved them. =P If it wasn't for it, we'd never have gotten Seiken Densetsu or Romancing SaGa, let alone Chrono Trigger which would have been sad days for gaming lol.

I just never heard of it being made to bring Westernized RPGs to Japan, especially in the 80s/90s, only that it was their final shot at a good game. Also that quote was from the retrospective of the series.

[grandm]

it was not made to save the company. it was a vanity game made only because Hironobu Sakaguchi could make it. if he had thought it would be so successful he would have made it in the first place instead of the 5 crap games he made to begin with that nobody liked. final ment his last ever game. not last game unless it works. that fact that it was a success was a happy accident, not a plan

[Seif]

I don't think the FF-feeling was ever about just airships or Chocobos. It was the fresh take on everything in their own fantastic worlds. Western game companies do the generic medieval setting literally ALL the time.

I personally don't need another game company like SE to jump on that boring trend. What SE has offered us with the past FF titles is something western game companies can't even dream of doing. That level of imagination can't be bought with just money alone.

It's also the themes of writing that were very distinct in their melancholic tone to anything else the western market has offered. XIV's writing just feels generic in the sense that it's lacking a general theme like all the past FF-titles.

The dev team needs to open their eyes and put some soul into this game. Superficial things like yellow birds or features from this or that FF-title don't make a good FF-game. It's designing new things with brave originality and around a certain theme based on a good writer/director like Sakaguchi.

Slapping a Gold Saucer from VII certainly will make a few fans squal in glee but it won't lift XIV in the same category of past FF titles.