Something to discuss.
 

This, well, this honestly pisses me off: http://www.vgcats.com/comics/

Now, I could just write it off as Scott for some reason choosing to be a douche, because he's being very good at it. But instead of that, I'm going to ask a question. Just how much can you strip away from something before it passes the proverbial atom?

To illustrate this, Scott's point is that if you strip away all the plot, characters, graphics, music, and strategy, RPGs are shit. My argument is, of COURSE they're shit. You just stripped away every aspect of the game but the time.

So I'm leaving this open. How far can you strip a game, any game, before it's lost all that it is?

It would seem his point is more that the newest final fantasy games takes away all the GOOD of JRPGs, leaving only the bad.

Whoa whoa whoa.

People still read VG-Cats?

Well, he'd be wrong, because FF13 has plot, characters, graphics, music, and strategy. You know, stuff that makes a decent game. If all he wanted to do was bitch about the game being linear, he didn't need to target JRPGs as a whole and he certainly didn't need to do it by arguing that an entire genre is shit just because he's butthurt that the game follows its basic conventions.


@ Mac: No, he's probably lost 90% of his audience with his constant failure to update with any consistency, but I was scraping the bottom of the barrel.

I am going to venture a guess that Scott's view of jRPG's is somewhat dim. To him the only ones of that genre are Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. He dismisses ones like Persona, Disgaea, Lunar, Star Ocean, Suikoden and all the others. Now granted some of these listed aren't very good. But Persona is incredibly well received to the point that even Spoony likes it.

Whilst I am not the biggest Spoony fan, I see it if he likes it then there has to be something good about it.

Whoa whoa whoa

Someone still writes VGCats?

You'd have a point if that was what he said, but he said it took away 'engaging characters, story and any semblance of strategy by restricting it to one person.' You can argue whether or not FF13 has those or not, though I'd be inclined to agree since I didn't engage with any of the characters aside from Sazh, and making the death of the leader end the game was really stupid, if you take away engaging characters and a decent strategy, then the game will be a very common, bland jrpg, because it won't stand out from the legion of other jrpgs out there.

It doesn't seem like all he wanted to do was bitch about linearity because he did bring up those other points as well as generic music, so I think he was just disappointed in a game that didn't live up to the franchise as a whole, rather than bitching about one little game that upset him.

I don't even read VG Cats, so the guy might be a douche. All I'm saying is I can see his point. It's not particularly articulate and it's not very well represented but I can see it.

Ninja Edit:

@Blues

No, Prems is right, he's saying that whatever the new Final Fantasy is is a bad game. He likes Final Fantasy. He doesn't like the core mechanics of JRPGs but he likes Final Fantasy because of all the other things they add. He then says that this new Final Fantasy doesn't have that. Not in the sense that they are not physically present, there are obviously characters in the game, but in the sense that they are not good characters, and they are acting out a not good plot.

He's not saying anything about RPGs being shit if you take out all those parts. The comic isn't even about JRPGs being shit, it's an offhand mention in the first two panels and not at all what the comic's about.

I think you're getting all offended at the drop of a hat because it's almost like you're going out of your way to find something to get offended at.

I think writing it was outsourced to the Dalek homeworld years ago.

No, i think Blues has a point. It's a bad rant... one where the guy tries to make the whole "It's a bad game because i don't like it" point like it was a real point to make... for any game.

Also the whole "jRPG's are shit" is quite tiring, and honestly, a very stupid argument to stand behind. Also one of the reasons why i can't stand the Escapist Forums.