The Very Big Final Fantasy XIII Thread

[Azisien]

Originally Posted by Krylo

And SOMEONE tell me what they needed to read in the datalogs to understand. Preferably Azi as he's less far than I am, and won't be mentioning things I haven't seen yet.

Perhaps it's not so much needing to read the datalogs to understand anything, as I said, being starved of context. I'm referring mostly to the introduction, which is a good five or six hours long. But more then enough time to form my initial impression.

The characters don't talk that much in the beginning. You know, its kind of understandable at least. They don't know each other, they're all pissed/driven, why talk? That's fine, I get it, but I also get bored.

I just wanted context. At the beginning they just throw around l'Cie and fal'Cie like I'm supposed to know what they are. Cocoon and Pulse. What are they? Is it the city they're in? A quadrant of the city? I have no idea and, I think I was sober at the time, because I don't recall the game elaborating until hours later. I did go into the datapad a few sparse times just to try to find some answers. This never happened to me in DAO or ME ever. I checked the codex out of genuine interest, moreso in ME, possibly because I'm a sci-fi nerd over a high fantasy nerd.

It's not so much the content taken as a whole as the speed of the delivery. The start is SLOW and I didn't like that. Square had whatever reason they wanted. I didn't find the ratio of content richness to speed of delivery to be satisfying. What was said could have been done in much less time, and probably not on one long winding road too, that would have aided in context. Some of that may be my fault, I didn't use the map much, but as far as I saw there were no world map pictures either.

To their credit at least the cut scenes are nicely spaced between monster segments, but often again I feel like whole scenes go by and nothing happened in them.

And I brightened slightly too when Hope started to gain some character. I've seen like half of what you described in his development, Krylo, and yeah it's better than the beginning. Wish I could say the same for the rest of the cast. And oh I hate Hope. Not because he's poorly developed, just because I hate him.


EDIT: I feel like now that, more recently, I'm feeling starved for a proper villain. Villains don't even seem to be introduced, I went several scenes before even figuring out that big-titted librarian colonel's NAME. It's starting to feel like the start of the game again.

EDIT 2: To give less numbery context, I'm just past the part where Dajh crystals and the other chunk of the party is raiding that big flagship thing. The polytamymeciasndndsf.

[Kim]

Okay, Krylo, let me ask you something. In the beginning of the game, what sort of personality does Hope have, other than Whiny Brat?

When he's driven by revenge, what's his personality outside that?

When he's happy and driven and a Power Ranger, what's his personality outside that?

Maybe I didn't notice it, but outside whatever is the focus of their personality at the time, they don't seem all that well fleshed out. They go through a lot of character development, but nothing outside what they are at the time seems developed. If it is, I honestly don't remember.

I suppose there are a couple things, like Hope hating his dad, but I just get the impression that, as dynamic as they are, they're still very simple.

EDIT: No, Krylo, you weren't the only one creeped out by it, but I ran out of Snow is a pedophile jokes before the game came out. :/

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by NonCon

Blues, you don't know my scale. You've seen what I say when I write posts, a lot of which I don't devote the proper amount of time to. Furthermore, the things I like about the game don't get nearly as much attention because I'm not the sort of person who is usually inclined to post and say "The combat's... pretty good!" unless I have very little else to say. You see my arguments as shrunken down to one or two paragraphs, and I'll be the first to admit they don't paint a clear picture.

Aside from that, talk shit on my preconceived bias all you like, but you had one, too, and that colors your current impressions, just like Krylo had his, and Azis had his, and Tera had his, because unless you literally haven't seen a single cutscene or heard a single thing about the game or the franchise it is a part of, you are going to have some sort of preconceived bias. Even if you aren't immediately aware of it, it's there. I know my preconceived bias. I have a pretty decent idea of how much it colors things. I went into FFX after years of not playing it because I had no interest in it, and thinking I would hate it. I literally played the game because I thought I could get a hateful review of it. Of the story centric Final Fantasies, it ranks as my third favorite in spite of its flaws and my complaints. I think this says a lot.

Non, you have no idea what I'm saying, do you? I'm saying you're the boy who cried wolf. You have sacrificed your reviewer's integrity in the eyes of the public on this game over the past year by ragging on it at every turn. Yeah, everyone has a bias based on what they see, but you've spent the past year establishing and reinforcing your own.

I'm saying this because I care, man. That's WHY I kept saying not to review the game until it was out, because you have some great points on it. But now everyone's inclined to write them all off, because they figure you've decided to hate the game no matter what.

See, Azi made a good point. You and RT didn't just come in with a bias, you both came in with a whole year's worth of hating on the game in a very strong and vocal manner. Azi's hating on the game based on its own merits. And there are good merits to hate on it for. The uber-long intro nearly killed it for Phantom and me, to be honest, and the first boss battle with Barthandelus took us somewhere like 20 tries, during which Phantom nearly broke the controller at least once and swore off the game twice until I could get tactics and finally a GUIDE for him. It pissed us off to no end that Snow was off dicking around for half the game and Hope is easily in the top 10 most annoying characters of FF.

See, I can say all that and have people listen, because I didn't establish a huge negative bias over the thing. I LOVE the game and even I'm saying rent before you buy.

The way things are coming off on your end are "I've hated the game for over a year now and I'm just going to keep on doing so, but, hey, there are a couple good things that I'll admit in between that." You've strongly established your bias over the past year and it's probably not going to go away for this round. On the other hand, I'm hoping you can learn from this for other games. It's not a matter of being positive about every title before release, or even trying to insulate yourself from it, but more about keeping a bit more of the appearance of an open mind, which is what this discussion has been suffering from over the past year.

I mean, yeah, you can write this off as being blunt and rude and wrong, but I didn't have the balls to say it before now and I really wish I had. I gave Dojo every one of its logos and wrote reviews for you, and even though I'm not still involved, I do still want to see it succeed as much as possible. Which is why I'm saying that you're lacking in professionalism, here. Maybe it won't show on Dojo, but it really shows on NPF.

[Kim]

So, you're telling me that my bias against the game before it came out means that what I say against the game can't be trusted, even though I acknowledge what I consider good.

You're also telling me that what you say in favor of the game can be trusted, in spite of your bias in favor of the game before it came out, because you acknowledge what you consider bad.

Riiiiiiiight...

Why, Mr. Pot! Next you'll be telling me I'm a black kettle!

Another fun tidbit!

Originally Posted by Myself somewhere else

In the end I'll probably dislike some of the story aspects, hate the long drawn out tutorial (If Kingdom Hearts DS is anything to go by), and love the gameplay. Being realistic about the FF series' ability to pleasantly surprise me, it'll probably rank as my fourth or fifth favorite FF game.

So I was actually disappointed by this game, instead of it just meeting my expectations! Awesome!

[Azisien]

To be fair, I have found it beneficial to have next to no background knowledge about a game I plan on reviewing. Through hell or high water I even managed to avoid reading any previews on ME2, quite a feat!

Sir NonCon knows what he likes and dislikes, though!

[MFD]

Huh. I'm at Bahamut, and you know what would have made my last boss battle a punch to the gut?

A Snow/Fang chapter when we were doing the character oriented chapters. It would have been nice to actually feel something at Cid's decision to fuck his focus and try to stop you before you have to fulfill Popey's evil plan, but wait, it turns out his focus was to make sure you're stronger than he is so you can complete your focus, which is seemingly Popey's evil plan. And it would have been another hour or so to add to the game!

Also, as to not explaining what l'Cie and fal'Cie are at the very beginning... it's science fiction. The best science fiction throws out words you'll figure out later. I never read the datalogs, and I figured out pretty quickly that l'Cie were mages with a divine purpose, and that fal'Cie appeared to be living gods. It's not exactly right, but it's close enough in context that I'm not lost by the end of the first chapter...

Also, I agree with Krylo about Serah, though I think alot of it has to do with her schoolgirl uniform.

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by NonCon

So, you're telling me that my bias against the game before it came out means that what I say against the game can't be trusted, even though I acknowledge what I consider good.

You're also telling me that what you say in favor of the game can be trusted, in spite of your bias in favor of the game before it came out, because you acknowledge what you consider bad.

Riiiiiiiight...

Why, Mr. Pot! Next you'll be telling me I'm a black kettle!

Another fun tidbit!



So I was actually disappointed by this game, instead of it just meeting my expectations! Awesome!

Well, there's no denying that I was excited about the game. I tried to keep it more in terms of "give it a chance" territory, but, reflecting on this, I joined a wiki dedicated to the series over it, so I do see your point. My point was more in terms of, if I really was overblown positive about it, my positive opinions should be taken with a grain of salt, as well, and my negative opinions should be taken into consideration more easily.

Honestly, I could go on and on about what I like about the game, like how I love the way Hecatoncheir takes care of and protects Vanille, or how well-voiced the game is, or how Fang is awesome, but I've largely taken an explanatory role in things, answering questions, being pretty fair in saying I personally love it, but that it's not for everyone for specific reasons.

I mean, I'm not trying to shit on you, buddy. Just saying when you say bad stuff about the game, people take it with a grain of salt as much as when someone else, possibly me, fangasms over it, because it represents an extreme stance backed up by a year-long pre-bias.



I'd really like to end this line of conversation, because I sent you a PM where we can continue the root of this discussion, and I'd like to get this thread back onto the game.

Soooo... has anyone figured out what the heck Alexander does against enemies with no particular weaknesses? There's no Holy element in this one, so it's supposed to do "weakness-specific" damage, and I was wondering if that made it less effective against more moderated foes.

[Azisien]

Originally Posted by MFD

Also, as to not explaining what l'Cie and fal'Cie are at the very beginning... it's science fiction. The best science fiction throws out words you'll figure out later.

Agreed!

[MFD]

I don't think this game was so ridiculous with made-up words that you had to guess meanings of. Maybe it's just me.

[Kerensky287]

Originally Posted by Azisien

Agreed!

You know I was about to go into a whole spiel on how many words Mass Effect makes up, but then I realized that damn near all of the made-up words are just names for alien species.

And the only made-up terms that I know of are l'Cie, fal'Cie, Cocoon, Pulse and the Purge. That's 5. They're all explained very quickly.

So... I guess that's a fairly accurate chart, actually. Starcraft is the exception. ZERG PROTOSS XEL'NAGA TASSADAR KHALIS URAJ OVERMIND AAAAAAAAAH