If there's one game that has had every single minute detail of its events analyzed a hundred times over, both by people smart as a whip, and by those so inhumanly ignorant and intolerant that every sloppy word of their communication is a victory against human culture,* it's Final Fantasy 7. And after a few years of listening to such things, I can say with some confidence that I've heard most of the many criticisms that the latter group of people can levy at it--I've seen people who claim to hate the entire game more than any other they've ever played for reasons including, but not even close to limited to, Cloud's height, Cait Sith's Limit Breaks, the lack of sufficient canonical proof for the "clearly factual" romantic relationship between Vincent and Cid, the fact that the game has violence, and its audacity to include colored people in its cast.** I kid you not on any of these items, and I say with certainty that there are plenty even stupider ones that I just don't remember.
There are, of course, many complaints about the game that come up over and over. Some are valid. Others are most definitely not. Of this second category, though, one of the ones that annoys me the most is how much people complain and whine about the Wall Market scenario--specifically, the fact that Cloud cross dresses.
Now look. I'm not exactly a huge fan of the event myself. It's a rather dull little humor mini-quest that isn't actually funny most of the time, and it takes way, WAY longer than it should even if it WERE entertaining. And the entire thing suffers from an already slightly sub-par translation having to censor the bejeezus out of something like half of the dialogue, which means that a lot of the time what's being said makes no sense whatsoever. It's practically like a practice run for reading the online posts of the people who complain about it,*** it's so bad.
But of course, most of the people who cry out against this scene with such rage aren't mentioning any of the above points. THEY just hate it because it's so "gay," and shout about how it proves that Cloud is gay.****
Putting aside the fact that cross dressing doesn't have any real conclusive link to homosexuality, people just don't fucking THINK about this whole scene. Cloud NEEDS to get into Don Corneo's perverse mansion. Tifa's in there for reasons he doesn't know, and could be (probably is) in danger. The only people who get in there on short notice are girls. So to get in there, he needs to look like one.
Some will point out that Cloud is pretty tough and kills stuff for a living, so he should have just barged in there by force. And yeah, he probably could have. But that would be forcing a conflict with armed guards who could, for all Cloud knows, number in the dozens--it's a mansion; it's got plenty of space to fill with henchmen. It would be stupid to just charge into a fight against unknown odds in unfamiliar ground if (note the "if," I know Cloud does this plenty more times later in the game, but he doesn't have the easy alternative of going incognito in those cases) there's a better alternative. In addition, he doesn't know the status of the person he's trying to rescue--her location, whether she's in immediate danger, and most importantly, whether she will be PUT in immediate danger by him invading Corneo's pad.
It's also not entirely out of character for Cloud, either. No, no, I don't mean the cross dressing--I mean going for tactical stealth over diving headfirst into hostile territory. He has his whole team dress up as Shinra troops later in the game to infiltrate Junon, because sneaking in is a clearly better option than outright attacking. In both situations, disguising himself appropriately makes SENSE.
Along with being annoyed at how short-sighted, ignorant, and intolerant many of the people are who make complaints about this scene, I'm also frankly confused about why the idea of a guy dressing up as a girl to avoid trouble is so shocking to people. I mean, have they never watched a Bugs Bunny cartoon before? Or...well, just about any TV show made in the 60s to early 70s (was there some sort of cross-channel mandate at the time that all shows had to have at least one time when a guy prettied himself up?)? It's not even like it's an unknown to the RPG world. Kyle of Lunar 1 disguised himself as a girl to lure some bad guys, Mike in Startropics does the same to get into an amazon nation, and "Reyna" in Eternal Poison turns out to be a guy pretending to be the real Reyna, and wears his disguise for the entire game. Granted, that last example is from a game that almost everyone will have played after FF7, but the other two came from games released before Cloud ever threw on a dress.
People need to actually THINK. And being less ignorantly prejudiced would be good for them, too.
* Oh, Gaia Online Final Fantasy Subforum, how I loathe thee.
** Oh, Gaia Online Final Fantasy Subforum, how I really loathe thee.
*** Oh, Gaia Online Final Fantasy Subforum, how I just fucking hate thy guts.
**** Oh, Gaia Online Final Fantasy Subforum, how I wish that 90% of your members would die in a fire.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Chrono Trigger's Next Sequel: Why SquareEnix Disgusts Me
Note: Thanks to good sir Seifersythe for correcting me on a numerical issue I initially made with this rant. The correction has helped to further prove my point here. Good man!
Yes, I know. This is pretty old news at this point. And there's not much to make a rant on. But I really just had to say something about it.
So here's the deal, for all 0 of you who haven't heard yet: a major representative of SquareEnix has gone on record to say that the company will not make, nor consider making, another game in the Chrono series because sales of the Chrono Trigger rerelease on the DS are not what they wanted. When told that fans were and always had been fanatically yammering, as fans often do, for another CT sequel, SquareEnix disregarded it by saying "That's not what trusty Mr. Sales Chart says!"
A few facts relevant to this situation:
Chrono Trigger is an SNES game released over 10 years ago initially.
CT is almost universally loved, and one of the most famous RPGs of all time.
It has already been rereleased before, on the PS1.
The DS release was priced at the same cost of a brand new game.
The DS release had sales of over 800,000 copies last year, its year of release. RPG Dark Cloud 1 has sold, years after being made, a total of about 800,000 copies as well. It has had a continuation of its series. RPGs Breath of Fire 4, Suikoden 4, and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 1 all sold significantly fewer copies during their years of release, as is the case of many, many other RPGs. Breath of Fire 4's units sold was less than in its initial year than CT's DS release, yet was deemed a success and had its series continued for a 5th game, not to mention was deemed one of the PS1's Greatest Hits. Suikoden 4 also had less than half the units sold in its launch year, yet not only had its series continued, but also had a direct sequel, Suikoden Tactics, made for it. And of course, Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 1, a SquareEnix game, was deemed a high enough success with fewer units sold in its initial year than CT DS to have its series continued, as well.
Putting out a remake of a game with minimal added content (new translation, bonus dungeon, programming it to work on the DS) costs a LOT less in time and, more importantly, money, than making a new game does, so SquareEnix makes a lot more on average from a remake purchased at full price than a regular, new game.
Chrono Trigger's SNES release sold multiple millions of copies.
Chrono Cross sold well, probably because it was CT's sequel more than anything else.
Final Fantasy Chronicles, the package that contained the PS1 rerelease of CT, was very successful.
So basically, Chrono Trigger has been wildly successful for the company, is a legendary name of gaming, and has proven that a sequel to it can be profitable. Its first rerelease sold well, and its latest rerelease doesn't seem to me to be a sales failure, especially given how cheap it had to have been to produce it. The fact that SquareEnix can move hundreds of thousands of copies of a decade-old 16-bit game at a new game's price that has been rereleased once before in the recent enough past without a whole lot of advertising is pretty incredible, if you ask me. Not just that, but it's greatly outsold many other RPGs known to be successful during their initial years, some of which were new SquareEnix games!
Now, for the record, I don't want a new CT sequel. I really, really hope we never get one. Because as far as sequels go, Square and SquareEnix have always had a horrible track record, particularly in recent years--although, honestly, SquareEnix has just been terrible all around in the last couple years. I see no evidence whatsoever from their products, statements, or general business attitude to believe that they would produce a worthwhile CT sequel. I'd even be surprised if a CT sequel they made wasn't actually WORSE than the first one they tried--and you've all probably picked up on my great dislike for Chrono Cross by this point. I love CT, perhaps more than any other I've ever played. I don't want them fucking around with it.
Nonetheless, this latest little stunt of SquareEnix is just repulsive to me. If the company could just take a moment to remove its head from its ass long enough to look at the big picture instead of search its colon for its next Final Fantasy 7 sequel/prequel/whatever, it would recognize that there is ample evidence to prove that there would be plenty of profitable interest in another CT sequel. But no, it wants to bitch and whine and moan because its latest transparent, heinous attempt to cash in on its fans with another cheaply-made but expensively-priced remake didn't sucker enough fools for its liking.*
It's as short-sighted as it is callous, and shows the company's true apathy** toward the people it owes its existence to--long-term, loyal fans, ones who will keep interest in a good product long after its initial debut. The company's current plan of action for quick, easy sales relies heavily on those fans' support in both sales and word of mouth--a significant portion of SquareEnix's market for its countless remakes are people who owned the game the first time around and are just further supporting the company by getting it again, and people who have HEARD those old fans go on and on about how great these old games were. This is also true of its business plan of sequels and prequels to older games, too--the people buying FF7's countless spin-offs and FF4's sequel and so on are significantly comprised of old fans who loved the original. So instead of giving one of their most profitable demographics, to say nothing of that demographic's worth as a consumer simply by terms of loyalty, an ear and letting them know that they're appreciated by at least considering their wants, what does SquareEnix do?
It makes a final, conclusive statement to prove that it cares for nothing, absolutely nothing, but making a buck. Or yen, in this case. Quality, fans, pride, they all fall before the mighty power of money. Disgusting.
* Hypocritically, I might add, since it's made series continuations for games that had less profitable launch years recently!
** "Apathy" is me being very generous and giving SquareEnix the benefit of the doubt. What I REALLY think this move shows is real, venomous SPITE for its consumers. But I wouldn't want to be accused of not being objective.
...Well, being LESS objective, anyway.
Yes, I know. This is pretty old news at this point. And there's not much to make a rant on. But I really just had to say something about it.
So here's the deal, for all 0 of you who haven't heard yet: a major representative of SquareEnix has gone on record to say that the company will not make, nor consider making, another game in the Chrono series because sales of the Chrono Trigger rerelease on the DS are not what they wanted. When told that fans were and always had been fanatically yammering, as fans often do, for another CT sequel, SquareEnix disregarded it by saying "That's not what trusty Mr. Sales Chart says!"
A few facts relevant to this situation:
Chrono Trigger is an SNES game released over 10 years ago initially.
CT is almost universally loved, and one of the most famous RPGs of all time.
It has already been rereleased before, on the PS1.
The DS release was priced at the same cost of a brand new game.
The DS release had sales of over 800,000 copies last year, its year of release. RPG Dark Cloud 1 has sold, years after being made, a total of about 800,000 copies as well. It has had a continuation of its series. RPGs Breath of Fire 4, Suikoden 4, and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 1 all sold significantly fewer copies during their years of release, as is the case of many, many other RPGs. Breath of Fire 4's units sold was less than in its initial year than CT's DS release, yet was deemed a success and had its series continued for a 5th game, not to mention was deemed one of the PS1's Greatest Hits. Suikoden 4 also had less than half the units sold in its launch year, yet not only had its series continued, but also had a direct sequel, Suikoden Tactics, made for it. And of course, Final Fantasy Tactics Advance 1, a SquareEnix game, was deemed a high enough success with fewer units sold in its initial year than CT DS to have its series continued, as well.
Putting out a remake of a game with minimal added content (new translation, bonus dungeon, programming it to work on the DS) costs a LOT less in time and, more importantly, money, than making a new game does, so SquareEnix makes a lot more on average from a remake purchased at full price than a regular, new game.
Chrono Trigger's SNES release sold multiple millions of copies.
Chrono Cross sold well, probably because it was CT's sequel more than anything else.
Final Fantasy Chronicles, the package that contained the PS1 rerelease of CT, was very successful.
So basically, Chrono Trigger has been wildly successful for the company, is a legendary name of gaming, and has proven that a sequel to it can be profitable. Its first rerelease sold well, and its latest rerelease doesn't seem to me to be a sales failure, especially given how cheap it had to have been to produce it. The fact that SquareEnix can move hundreds of thousands of copies of a decade-old 16-bit game at a new game's price that has been rereleased once before in the recent enough past without a whole lot of advertising is pretty incredible, if you ask me. Not just that, but it's greatly outsold many other RPGs known to be successful during their initial years, some of which were new SquareEnix games!
Now, for the record, I don't want a new CT sequel. I really, really hope we never get one. Because as far as sequels go, Square and SquareEnix have always had a horrible track record, particularly in recent years--although, honestly, SquareEnix has just been terrible all around in the last couple years. I see no evidence whatsoever from their products, statements, or general business attitude to believe that they would produce a worthwhile CT sequel. I'd even be surprised if a CT sequel they made wasn't actually WORSE than the first one they tried--and you've all probably picked up on my great dislike for Chrono Cross by this point. I love CT, perhaps more than any other I've ever played. I don't want them fucking around with it.
Nonetheless, this latest little stunt of SquareEnix is just repulsive to me. If the company could just take a moment to remove its head from its ass long enough to look at the big picture instead of search its colon for its next Final Fantasy 7 sequel/prequel/whatever, it would recognize that there is ample evidence to prove that there would be plenty of profitable interest in another CT sequel. But no, it wants to bitch and whine and moan because its latest transparent, heinous attempt to cash in on its fans with another cheaply-made but expensively-priced remake didn't sucker enough fools for its liking.*
It's as short-sighted as it is callous, and shows the company's true apathy** toward the people it owes its existence to--long-term, loyal fans, ones who will keep interest in a good product long after its initial debut. The company's current plan of action for quick, easy sales relies heavily on those fans' support in both sales and word of mouth--a significant portion of SquareEnix's market for its countless remakes are people who owned the game the first time around and are just further supporting the company by getting it again, and people who have HEARD those old fans go on and on about how great these old games were. This is also true of its business plan of sequels and prequels to older games, too--the people buying FF7's countless spin-offs and FF4's sequel and so on are significantly comprised of old fans who loved the original. So instead of giving one of their most profitable demographics, to say nothing of that demographic's worth as a consumer simply by terms of loyalty, an ear and letting them know that they're appreciated by at least considering their wants, what does SquareEnix do?
It makes a final, conclusive statement to prove that it cares for nothing, absolutely nothing, but making a buck. Or yen, in this case. Quality, fans, pride, they all fall before the mighty power of money. Disgusting.
* Hypocritically, I might add, since it's made series continuations for games that had less profitable launch years recently!
** "Apathy" is me being very generous and giving SquareEnix the benefit of the doubt. What I REALLY think this move shows is real, venomous SPITE for its consumers. But I wouldn't want to be accused of not being objective.
...Well, being LESS objective, anyway.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
General RPG Lists: Greatest Endings
For such a small part of a game's plot, usually taking half an hour at most of a story that took 40+ hours to tell, an ending can have an enormous effect on the impression the gamer takes from an RPG. A game can be just fine up until its final moments, but if its ending disappoints you, you're likely going to remember that part most prominently. Hell, it happened to me with Valkyrie Profile 2--most of the game's okay (I wouldn't say good, but certainly okay), but the finale was so monumentally awful that I hate the game and wish it had never been made.* Likewise, a spectacular ending can make one remember a game far better than it would have been. Again, going on personal experience, this was the case for me with Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3. Not to say that I wouldn't have thought it was a great game anyway, but a lot of its main plot was, to me, considerably less interesting and gripping than the Social Link side quests. So the ending, which brought the events of the main quest and those of whichever side quests you completed together to the same, incredibly touching conclusion, really made it a better game overall to me.
What makes an RPG ending great? It's nothing I can really define, but I'd have to say that major factors include how strongly it touches you emotionally (be that emotion jubilant or sorrowful), how well it concludes the game's events (it doesn't have to tie every loose end, and can leave a few possible future problems around in case there's a sequel or something, but it better damn well at least ADDRESS the major parts of the story that are meant to be resolved), and how effectively it shows you the way things go for everyone (not everyone has to become king of a nation/world, but they ought to have SOME kind of life beyond taking up space in the Active Party). Basically, it should speak to you (as the rest of the game should), and there should be conclusion, but not complete finality (the game's events are done with satisfactorily, but life is shown as going on)--the promise of more is good, in moderation.
So, which endings are the best? To me, they're the ones below. And, again, I must emphasize that, while most of my rants have some spoilers one way or another, this one has MAJOR ones. I mean, there aren't many greater spoilers than giving away endings. Seriously, if you don't know the game mentioned and feel that there is any possibility that you'll ever play it, don't read the description.
Endings listed are the Good or Best endings available in each game, unless otherwise noted.
5. Mass Effect 1 (Paragon Ending)
While ME1's Renegade ending is alright, for what it's going for, the Paragon ending is just really the perfect conclusion to this epic sci-fi RPG. After an incredible space battle between the Geth and Sovereign, and the fleets of the Citadel and Earth, the galaxy is saved, and humanity recognized for its great contribution to all the galaxy's races with a seat on the council that rules over them all--a momentous responsibility and privilege, that only 3 other species share. Yet there's always the possibility that Sovereign's kind will come again, and with the assurance that humanity has a future with the other peoples of the Milky Way, the protagonist leaves to continue defending all. This ending's great--it gives you a strong sense of accomplishment, with the promise of more to come amid the praise and fanfare, all coming after a struggle that was shown to be truly epic. Sci-fi stories are rather given to this sort of ending, and Mass Effect 1 exemplifies its genre.
4. Final Fantasy 10
A real tear-jerker, this one. After a journey of self-discovery that led to true love, a revelation of truth about the world's society and history, and a chance to bring about a new age of security for a world living in never-ending terror and preparation for demise, Yuna watches helplessly, in heart-rending sorrow, as her beloved Tidus fades away, having sacrificed himself for a world he barely knew so that she could live in it happily. He leaves her to join his father Jecht and friend Auron in the afterlife, a hopeful dream who bettered himself, Yuna, and so many others. And afterward, she speaks to the world, a new world, to tell them that a new day has finally come, and remembers the lessons and sacrifices of the past that brought them to this point. It's absolutely beautiful, and is filled with promise for the future.** It makes you happy, sad, and content all at once--a mark of a great ending.
3. Shadow Hearts 2 (Yuri Dies Ending)
Shadow Hearts 2, like FF10, goes for an ending that's satisfying, rewarding, happy for most of the characters involved, and so goddamn emotional that you'll want to put your controller down so it doesn't short out from all the tears falling on it. Alright, that's a slight exaggeration, but it's nonetheless extremely touching. After a long journey across half the globe to protect the world that his dear Alice loved, always in a race against time with a curse that devours his memories, Yuri feels that his business is truly finished--his enemies are vanquished, his friends are being transported through space and time to where they belong, and the world is safe. After a last, hurried but heartfelt goodbye to his closest companion Karin, Yuri declines to let himself be transported anywhere--without Alice, there IS nowhere he belongs. Instead, he stays at the crumbling site of his last battle, and lets himself die, choosing death over a life without the memories that define him and hold the only happiness and contentment he's ever known. Finally, he'll be with Alice. It's tragically romantic to an incredible degree, while still leaving you satisfied that the world is safe and sound and the people who saved it have gotten what they deserved and wanted--even poor, one-sided-lovesick Karin, in a twist that I think not a single damn person in the entire world could have foreseen, is provided the opportunity for love, which she wanted, if not under the circumstances she had thought. And then, at the end...yes, we do get a happy ending, for we see that, through some divine time-shifting providence, Yuri is brought back to the beginning of the adventure where he met Alice, and can do it all again and be with her.*** This ending's one for the books. Or at least for this list.
2. Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 FES
You know, if you asked me whether I thought that killing the protagonist off in the ending of a game made the ending better or worse in general, I would instinctively say worse. In most cases, I'd imagine that it'd be superfluous, done mostly for shock value, and would lessen the satisfaction you feel from the game as a whole, and leave a bad taste in your mouth. And I'm not entirely wrong, persay--Valkyrie Profile 2 has Alicia (along with most of the good members of the cast) die in the end, and I hate that ending so damn much. And Fallout 3's ending before the Broken Steel add-on drove me crazy, though admittedly more for its stupid circumstances.
Still, the odd fact is that out of the 5 endings I think are the best of all RPGs, 3 of them involve the main character dying. But as saddening as they are, their beauty and quality as conclusions is nearly unsurpassed. SMTP3FES exemplifies just how excellent an ending you can create while NOT trying to make your audience happy. After a year of making personal connections with people and becoming a cherished friend to so many, developing an incredibly strong bond with each one and greatly influencing each one's life for the better, the consequences of the final battle finally begin to fully catch up with protagonist Minato. Nearly overtaken by an exhaustion that grows with the hour, Minato uses his last day of school to speak to each of the people who he formed a truly lasting and meaningful relationship with. Each person whose life he touched forever is there to thank him, to make known just how important he is to them, and to look forward to seeing him again. On a grand scale AND a personal level, Minato has done everything for them. And then, on the day of graduation, after lingering long enough to fulfill his promise to his allies to see them again on that day, he finally succumbs to his affliction, and falls asleep with his head resting on the lap of she who loves him most, never to awaken again. Heartrending, but absolutely beautiful. Satisfying, yet so full of regret. I usually like my endings to make me feel content, but for one made so well as this, I don't mind something different.
1. Chrono Trigger (Unfed Cat Ending)
Actually, the Fed Cat ending's great, too, but I think this version's just a bit better, for its promise of continuing excitement.
This ending is basically the perfect happy ending. I don't think I can think of an ending to anything, RPG or otherwise, that has a more satisfactory conclusion. It wraps the adventure up with celebration, resolution of personal conflicts, and tearful, yet happy farewells as each party member goes their separate way. Yet at the same time, it gives you the promise that the companions who are now friends will have more adventures, even if they're such small ones as searching for a temporally-misplaced homemaker and feline. Finally, the credits roll to a scene of protagonist Crono and his friends flying over a peaceful, safe world, passing by the places where their companions live and seeing that each is doing well, after which the saved world is shown sitting peacefully in space, and a star rolls by to denote The End. It's so simple, yet it delivers satisfaction and a sense of peaceful accomplishment so perfectly.
Honorable Mention: Mass Effect 3 (Fan-Created MEHEM Ending)
It's no secret that Mass Effect 3 has one of the worst endings ever created for a game, or anything else, for that matter. Every part of it is a detestable slap in the face to the players, to the characters, and to the art and integrity of the series as a whole.
The Mass Effect Happy Ending Mod changes that. Now, I think it's pretty obvious, having gone through this list, that I understand a good ending doesn't have to be "happy." As I noted, the majority of the endings I've put on this list involve the hero of the game dying heroically. I didn't need an ending that was happy for ME3, as many of the brainwashed Bioware yes-fans claim of those who disliked ME3's ending--I just need one that satisfies, that ends this great trilogy with the epic power it deserves and delivers an experience in tune with the greatness that permeates Mass Effect. To put it simply, Mass Effect needs an ending that is Mass Effect. Apparently that's too difficult to fathom for the pretentious, self-important asses at Bioware, so 1 fan, going by MrFob, stepped forward and made, with a little help from the ME fan community, a mod for ME3 that transforms its ending from a colossal failure into a grand, sensational finale to a true sci-fi classic. It's not perfectly streamlined, but it's damned good; there are times when the entirely fan-created sequences are indistinguishable from the "real" game content...and for an ending that so properly concludes Mass Effect, I'd take a hell of a lot worse, to be sure. I plan to do a rant on MEHEM at some point, so I'm gonna cut this off here, but in parting, I happily declare that I celebrate this modded ending for ME3 as the true finale to Shepard's tale, and I recommend--hell, I plead to anyone who plays and enjoys Mass Effect to experience the series with this as its ending.
* Even a modestly okay game can deserve to never have been made, folks, if its ending completely erases a previous, much better game's events from ever happening. Great idea, SquareEnix, retcon one of the most famous and desired RPGs of all time out of existence. I'm sure no one will have a problem with THAT.
** Okay, maybe the future that actually DOES come about is a horrible mess of incompetent writing wrapped in shallow marketing ploys, but you can't hold that against FF10's ending.
*** And he can do things right this time, perhaps--the good ending of Shadow Hearts 1 had her live, so we can assume that the actual chronology of the games is Shadow Hearts 1 occurs with the Bad Ending (Alice dies), Shadow Hearts 2 occurs with the Good Ending (Yuri dies and goes back to Shadow Hearts 1's beginning), Shadow Hearts 1 occurs with Yuri's better understanding of himself and its events and Alice lives in the Good Ending.
What makes an RPG ending great? It's nothing I can really define, but I'd have to say that major factors include how strongly it touches you emotionally (be that emotion jubilant or sorrowful), how well it concludes the game's events (it doesn't have to tie every loose end, and can leave a few possible future problems around in case there's a sequel or something, but it better damn well at least ADDRESS the major parts of the story that are meant to be resolved), and how effectively it shows you the way things go for everyone (not everyone has to become king of a nation/world, but they ought to have SOME kind of life beyond taking up space in the Active Party). Basically, it should speak to you (as the rest of the game should), and there should be conclusion, but not complete finality (the game's events are done with satisfactorily, but life is shown as going on)--the promise of more is good, in moderation.
So, which endings are the best? To me, they're the ones below. And, again, I must emphasize that, while most of my rants have some spoilers one way or another, this one has MAJOR ones. I mean, there aren't many greater spoilers than giving away endings. Seriously, if you don't know the game mentioned and feel that there is any possibility that you'll ever play it, don't read the description.
Endings listed are the Good or Best endings available in each game, unless otherwise noted.
5. Mass Effect 1 (Paragon Ending)
While ME1's Renegade ending is alright, for what it's going for, the Paragon ending is just really the perfect conclusion to this epic sci-fi RPG. After an incredible space battle between the Geth and Sovereign, and the fleets of the Citadel and Earth, the galaxy is saved, and humanity recognized for its great contribution to all the galaxy's races with a seat on the council that rules over them all--a momentous responsibility and privilege, that only 3 other species share. Yet there's always the possibility that Sovereign's kind will come again, and with the assurance that humanity has a future with the other peoples of the Milky Way, the protagonist leaves to continue defending all. This ending's great--it gives you a strong sense of accomplishment, with the promise of more to come amid the praise and fanfare, all coming after a struggle that was shown to be truly epic. Sci-fi stories are rather given to this sort of ending, and Mass Effect 1 exemplifies its genre.
4. Final Fantasy 10
A real tear-jerker, this one. After a journey of self-discovery that led to true love, a revelation of truth about the world's society and history, and a chance to bring about a new age of security for a world living in never-ending terror and preparation for demise, Yuna watches helplessly, in heart-rending sorrow, as her beloved Tidus fades away, having sacrificed himself for a world he barely knew so that she could live in it happily. He leaves her to join his father Jecht and friend Auron in the afterlife, a hopeful dream who bettered himself, Yuna, and so many others. And afterward, she speaks to the world, a new world, to tell them that a new day has finally come, and remembers the lessons and sacrifices of the past that brought them to this point. It's absolutely beautiful, and is filled with promise for the future.** It makes you happy, sad, and content all at once--a mark of a great ending.
3. Shadow Hearts 2 (Yuri Dies Ending)
Shadow Hearts 2, like FF10, goes for an ending that's satisfying, rewarding, happy for most of the characters involved, and so goddamn emotional that you'll want to put your controller down so it doesn't short out from all the tears falling on it. Alright, that's a slight exaggeration, but it's nonetheless extremely touching. After a long journey across half the globe to protect the world that his dear Alice loved, always in a race against time with a curse that devours his memories, Yuri feels that his business is truly finished--his enemies are vanquished, his friends are being transported through space and time to where they belong, and the world is safe. After a last, hurried but heartfelt goodbye to his closest companion Karin, Yuri declines to let himself be transported anywhere--without Alice, there IS nowhere he belongs. Instead, he stays at the crumbling site of his last battle, and lets himself die, choosing death over a life without the memories that define him and hold the only happiness and contentment he's ever known. Finally, he'll be with Alice. It's tragically romantic to an incredible degree, while still leaving you satisfied that the world is safe and sound and the people who saved it have gotten what they deserved and wanted--even poor, one-sided-lovesick Karin, in a twist that I think not a single damn person in the entire world could have foreseen, is provided the opportunity for love, which she wanted, if not under the circumstances she had thought. And then, at the end...yes, we do get a happy ending, for we see that, through some divine time-shifting providence, Yuri is brought back to the beginning of the adventure where he met Alice, and can do it all again and be with her.*** This ending's one for the books. Or at least for this list.
2. Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 FES
You know, if you asked me whether I thought that killing the protagonist off in the ending of a game made the ending better or worse in general, I would instinctively say worse. In most cases, I'd imagine that it'd be superfluous, done mostly for shock value, and would lessen the satisfaction you feel from the game as a whole, and leave a bad taste in your mouth. And I'm not entirely wrong, persay--Valkyrie Profile 2 has Alicia (along with most of the good members of the cast) die in the end, and I hate that ending so damn much. And Fallout 3's ending before the Broken Steel add-on drove me crazy, though admittedly more for its stupid circumstances.
Still, the odd fact is that out of the 5 endings I think are the best of all RPGs, 3 of them involve the main character dying. But as saddening as they are, their beauty and quality as conclusions is nearly unsurpassed. SMTP3FES exemplifies just how excellent an ending you can create while NOT trying to make your audience happy. After a year of making personal connections with people and becoming a cherished friend to so many, developing an incredibly strong bond with each one and greatly influencing each one's life for the better, the consequences of the final battle finally begin to fully catch up with protagonist Minato. Nearly overtaken by an exhaustion that grows with the hour, Minato uses his last day of school to speak to each of the people who he formed a truly lasting and meaningful relationship with. Each person whose life he touched forever is there to thank him, to make known just how important he is to them, and to look forward to seeing him again. On a grand scale AND a personal level, Minato has done everything for them. And then, on the day of graduation, after lingering long enough to fulfill his promise to his allies to see them again on that day, he finally succumbs to his affliction, and falls asleep with his head resting on the lap of she who loves him most, never to awaken again. Heartrending, but absolutely beautiful. Satisfying, yet so full of regret. I usually like my endings to make me feel content, but for one made so well as this, I don't mind something different.
1. Chrono Trigger (Unfed Cat Ending)
Actually, the Fed Cat ending's great, too, but I think this version's just a bit better, for its promise of continuing excitement.
This ending is basically the perfect happy ending. I don't think I can think of an ending to anything, RPG or otherwise, that has a more satisfactory conclusion. It wraps the adventure up with celebration, resolution of personal conflicts, and tearful, yet happy farewells as each party member goes their separate way. Yet at the same time, it gives you the promise that the companions who are now friends will have more adventures, even if they're such small ones as searching for a temporally-misplaced homemaker and feline. Finally, the credits roll to a scene of protagonist Crono and his friends flying over a peaceful, safe world, passing by the places where their companions live and seeing that each is doing well, after which the saved world is shown sitting peacefully in space, and a star rolls by to denote The End. It's so simple, yet it delivers satisfaction and a sense of peaceful accomplishment so perfectly.
Honorable Mention: Mass Effect 3 (Fan-Created MEHEM Ending)
It's no secret that Mass Effect 3 has one of the worst endings ever created for a game, or anything else, for that matter. Every part of it is a detestable slap in the face to the players, to the characters, and to the art and integrity of the series as a whole.
The Mass Effect Happy Ending Mod changes that. Now, I think it's pretty obvious, having gone through this list, that I understand a good ending doesn't have to be "happy." As I noted, the majority of the endings I've put on this list involve the hero of the game dying heroically. I didn't need an ending that was happy for ME3, as many of the brainwashed Bioware yes-fans claim of those who disliked ME3's ending--I just need one that satisfies, that ends this great trilogy with the epic power it deserves and delivers an experience in tune with the greatness that permeates Mass Effect. To put it simply, Mass Effect needs an ending that is Mass Effect. Apparently that's too difficult to fathom for the pretentious, self-important asses at Bioware, so 1 fan, going by MrFob, stepped forward and made, with a little help from the ME fan community, a mod for ME3 that transforms its ending from a colossal failure into a grand, sensational finale to a true sci-fi classic. It's not perfectly streamlined, but it's damned good; there are times when the entirely fan-created sequences are indistinguishable from the "real" game content...and for an ending that so properly concludes Mass Effect, I'd take a hell of a lot worse, to be sure. I plan to do a rant on MEHEM at some point, so I'm gonna cut this off here, but in parting, I happily declare that I celebrate this modded ending for ME3 as the true finale to Shepard's tale, and I recommend--hell, I plead to anyone who plays and enjoys Mass Effect to experience the series with this as its ending.
* Even a modestly okay game can deserve to never have been made, folks, if its ending completely erases a previous, much better game's events from ever happening. Great idea, SquareEnix, retcon one of the most famous and desired RPGs of all time out of existence. I'm sure no one will have a problem with THAT.
** Okay, maybe the future that actually DOES come about is a horrible mess of incompetent writing wrapped in shallow marketing ploys, but you can't hold that against FF10's ending.
*** And he can do things right this time, perhaps--the good ending of Shadow Hearts 1 had her live, so we can assume that the actual chronology of the games is Shadow Hearts 1 occurs with the Bad Ending (Alice dies), Shadow Hearts 2 occurs with the Good Ending (Yuri dies and goes back to Shadow Hearts 1's beginning), Shadow Hearts 1 occurs with Yuri's better understanding of himself and its events and Alice lives in the Good Ending.
Monday, June 8, 2009
General RPGs' Packaging Extras
Packaging extras are a rather neat little idea that a lot of RPG companies have incorporated in minor ways to their selling strategies, but only a few have done so to any major extent. Why is that, I wonder? It seems like a rather neat idea, and the companies that do it do so in ways that must be profitable I feel.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Because you're probably wondering what the hell I'm talking about. What's a packaging extra, you ask? And why do you always assume that you know exactly what I'm thinking about asking, you presumptuous prick, you ask? Well, my definition of a packaging extra is an extra item of interest that comes with a game you buy that isn't the game itself, its instruction manual, or the myriad of little paper cards jammed into the case that inform you, in the highly unlikely case that you haven't already guessed, that the company that made this game has also made OTHER games, and that you should buy them. Most commonly, this comes in the form of an extra CD with the game's soundtrack on it.* At other times, this will be something like a small book of official art that will come with the game for free if you reserved a copy with your local vendor and thus guaranteed the game company a sale. This quick, easy little packaging extra has the advantage of usually being a free addition that gamers can appreciate without paying extra for.
There are, however, a few cases (steadily becoming more numerous) where a company will come out with two game package options. The first is just the standard deal--you buy the game, you get the game, its manual, and plenty of ads to insulate your house with, or whatever people do with them (I could probably avoid buying toilet paper for a month if I decided to wipe my ass with the ones I get each year with my games, there's so many). The second, however, is at an elevated price (often like $20 - 35 higher, I think), and comes with the game, manual, colorful TP, AND neat little knick-knacks related to the game. Art books and soundtrack CDs are usually just the start of the stuff offered, and sometimes it can get so silly that it's fun. For example, Fallout 3's special edition came with an art book and a Making Of DVD, which is nice, standard stuff, but it also came with a Vault Boy Bobblehead and a Vault Lunchbox, both of which are fully functional at head-bobbling and boxing foods, respectively.
Does having my very own video game lunchbox that I'll never use matter all that much? Well, no, not really. But it's fun to have! And cheaper than most video game collectible crap you can find.**
Why don't game companies do this sort of thing more often, I wonder? I mean, plenty do the pre-order stuff with minor tidbits, but those ones are almost never all that interesting. Let's face it, you can get the art book's pictures online the day after the game's released pretty easily. The upcoming Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner 2's pre-orders come with a stuffed Jack Frost doll, which is something, but Jack Frost is boring and overplayed as their mascot. I'd rather have an adorable plush doll of somebody like Beelzebub, or Thanatos--something you'd want to hug and then run screaming from.
But they don't often go all-out with the little trinkets, and I kinda like them, sometimes. I mean, maybe there's no point to having a cloth map of Lunar 1's world, but the Lunar 1 packaged extras made such a big fuss over the game that it was endearing (in fact, I was way more satisfied with the map than I was with the game's plot and characters, sadly). It's got to be at least a little profitable for the company--a cheap plastic bobblehead and a lunchbox can't be as expensive as the difference in price for them that Fallout 3 charged--and it's something a lot of gamers are happily willing to pay for, should they need to. And hell, even if you don't want to invest the time and effort into a separate collector's edition with goodies in it, offering something really cool with the RPG's pre-order instead of just the normal art/music crap that anyone can view/download online would be effective and appreciated, too--the best game-related pieces of merchandise I own has got to be, without any competition whatever, the Ghaleon Punching Puppet that came with pre-orders of Lunar 2. That thing is WAY more fun than the actual game is. I mean, it's Ghaleon. As a punching puppet. I just think that this is a largely unexplored market for RPG-makers, is all.
Also, I unfortunately couldn't really find a proper place for this in the rant above, so I'll just stick this in as a parting: a half-assed bonus disc of ads, art that's easily obtainable elsewhere, and very short, largely uninformative "History Of Final Fantasy" video that eventually becomes another ad does not count as a Collector's Edition just because you put it in a fucking metal case, Square. I can't believe that people were actually paying extra for a fucking METAL BOX with their FF12 copy. As if all these game remakes didn't already prove that you'll do ANYTHING to have your fans give you money for nothing.
* Although, oddly and unfortunately enough, I've noticed that most of the time an OST is included in games whose soundtracks are generic and have maybe 1 or 2 songs max that are noteworthy. I guess it makes sense, though, that if a company knows they've got a good soundtrack, they'll want to sell it separately instead of just give it away.
** Have you SEEN what they charge for crappy, fragile, non-moving Final Fantasy figures lately? I know this ain't the early 90s, but my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures cost 1/5th of the cheapest FF figure price, and could actually DO stuff, not to mention manage to keep their goddamn limbs and heads attached to them. Even adjusting for inflation and extremely minor additional costs for the FF figures' detail, it's fucking crazy.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Because you're probably wondering what the hell I'm talking about. What's a packaging extra, you ask? And why do you always assume that you know exactly what I'm thinking about asking, you presumptuous prick, you ask? Well, my definition of a packaging extra is an extra item of interest that comes with a game you buy that isn't the game itself, its instruction manual, or the myriad of little paper cards jammed into the case that inform you, in the highly unlikely case that you haven't already guessed, that the company that made this game has also made OTHER games, and that you should buy them. Most commonly, this comes in the form of an extra CD with the game's soundtrack on it.* At other times, this will be something like a small book of official art that will come with the game for free if you reserved a copy with your local vendor and thus guaranteed the game company a sale. This quick, easy little packaging extra has the advantage of usually being a free addition that gamers can appreciate without paying extra for.
There are, however, a few cases (steadily becoming more numerous) where a company will come out with two game package options. The first is just the standard deal--you buy the game, you get the game, its manual, and plenty of ads to insulate your house with, or whatever people do with them (I could probably avoid buying toilet paper for a month if I decided to wipe my ass with the ones I get each year with my games, there's so many). The second, however, is at an elevated price (often like $20 - 35 higher, I think), and comes with the game, manual, colorful TP, AND neat little knick-knacks related to the game. Art books and soundtrack CDs are usually just the start of the stuff offered, and sometimes it can get so silly that it's fun. For example, Fallout 3's special edition came with an art book and a Making Of DVD, which is nice, standard stuff, but it also came with a Vault Boy Bobblehead and a Vault Lunchbox, both of which are fully functional at head-bobbling and boxing foods, respectively.
Does having my very own video game lunchbox that I'll never use matter all that much? Well, no, not really. But it's fun to have! And cheaper than most video game collectible crap you can find.**
Why don't game companies do this sort of thing more often, I wonder? I mean, plenty do the pre-order stuff with minor tidbits, but those ones are almost never all that interesting. Let's face it, you can get the art book's pictures online the day after the game's released pretty easily. The upcoming Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner 2's pre-orders come with a stuffed Jack Frost doll, which is something, but Jack Frost is boring and overplayed as their mascot. I'd rather have an adorable plush doll of somebody like Beelzebub, or Thanatos--something you'd want to hug and then run screaming from.
But they don't often go all-out with the little trinkets, and I kinda like them, sometimes. I mean, maybe there's no point to having a cloth map of Lunar 1's world, but the Lunar 1 packaged extras made such a big fuss over the game that it was endearing (in fact, I was way more satisfied with the map than I was with the game's plot and characters, sadly). It's got to be at least a little profitable for the company--a cheap plastic bobblehead and a lunchbox can't be as expensive as the difference in price for them that Fallout 3 charged--and it's something a lot of gamers are happily willing to pay for, should they need to. And hell, even if you don't want to invest the time and effort into a separate collector's edition with goodies in it, offering something really cool with the RPG's pre-order instead of just the normal art/music crap that anyone can view/download online would be effective and appreciated, too--the best game-related pieces of merchandise I own has got to be, without any competition whatever, the Ghaleon Punching Puppet that came with pre-orders of Lunar 2. That thing is WAY more fun than the actual game is. I mean, it's Ghaleon. As a punching puppet. I just think that this is a largely unexplored market for RPG-makers, is all.
Also, I unfortunately couldn't really find a proper place for this in the rant above, so I'll just stick this in as a parting: a half-assed bonus disc of ads, art that's easily obtainable elsewhere, and very short, largely uninformative "History Of Final Fantasy" video that eventually becomes another ad does not count as a Collector's Edition just because you put it in a fucking metal case, Square. I can't believe that people were actually paying extra for a fucking METAL BOX with their FF12 copy. As if all these game remakes didn't already prove that you'll do ANYTHING to have your fans give you money for nothing.
* Although, oddly and unfortunately enough, I've noticed that most of the time an OST is included in games whose soundtracks are generic and have maybe 1 or 2 songs max that are noteworthy. I guess it makes sense, though, that if a company knows they've got a good soundtrack, they'll want to sell it separately instead of just give it away.
** Have you SEEN what they charge for crappy, fragile, non-moving Final Fantasy figures lately? I know this ain't the early 90s, but my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures cost 1/5th of the cheapest FF figure price, and could actually DO stuff, not to mention manage to keep their goddamn limbs and heads attached to them. Even adjusting for inflation and extremely minor additional costs for the FF figures' detail, it's fucking crazy.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
General RPGs' Hot Spring Scenes
Hot Spring Scenes. Oh how I loathe them. They are the bane of my existence (well, one of them...I seem to have quite a few). They are almost invariably pointless, crude, and degrading just to have to sit through.
What is a Hot Spring Scene, you may wonder. You also may not wonder that, knowing what I'm talking about or just not caring, but I'm going to explain it to you anyway, because I like the magic words that appear when I hit the letter buttons and want to see more of them. Well, a Hot Spring Scene is a small, but (given its typical lack of importance to the plot) unusually time-consuming event in an RPG (or anime or comic, but I focus on the RPGs) in which the main party spends time soaking in one of those communal baths that Japan is famous for. The guys will be on one side, and the girls will be on the other--in theory, anyways. I'll admit that I don't really see the appeal of sharing the joys of scrubbing armpits and soaping up asscracks in the great outdoors with a bunch of other people a few feet away, but I don't have anything against the idea of a social bath thingy, and the impression that the games give is that they're supposed to be relaxing.
My problem with Hot Spring Scenes in RPGs is that they will, without fail, include at LEAST one of the following stupefyingly idiotic and crude situations* that manage to be possibly the cheapest gags that Japan has to offer. Seriously, fart and dick jokes have no less integrity than this crap:
A. Breast Comparisons. Dear lord. There is some kind of unwritten law in Japan that if any two or more females are naked near one another, they have to, under penalty of death, loudly compare the size and shape of one another's bust with their own. Why? Because the lowest common denominator demands it, of course! I mean, I know that girls probably do talk about that every now and then during their teens, but these characters are often adult women, and it's like they have nothing else they can possibly talk about. And the actual dialogue is always just unbelievably stupid. This is basically how it will go, with only a little variation:
Girl 1: OMG Girl 2 you have breasts and they're nice!
Girl 2: OMG no way Girl 1 your breasts are bigger! EVERYONE IN THE WORLD WISHES THEIR BREASTS WERE BIGGER BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT GAME DEVELOPERS THINK FANBOYS WANT.
Girl 1: Yeah but ironically the only people in all of anime-RPG land who don't want big breasts are the girls who have them! If only I had your lesser-sized breasts, Girl 2! Which I must, of course, emphasize loudly the niceness of, again!
Girl 3: I am very flat. This is sad, but somehow humorous, as well!
Optional Girl 4: What up bitches, sorry I'm late and/or over in the corner so that my joining the conversation sets up the possibility of my surprising you.
Girls 1, 2, and 3: OMG Optional Girl 4 you have the most perfect breasts of all, even though you are the least likely to have such things, given that you are very innocent, a cross-dresser, or possibly an entirely different species!
I can't help but feel that even the breast-comparing talks that do occasionally occur in real life between girls can't possibly sound so stupid. You could call a phone-sex operator and hear a speech less blatantly (and poorly, for that matter) designed to turn you on.
B. Attack of the Fanboys. What could possibly be more HILARIOUS than the idea that men want to see naked women? Nothing, hope many a game maker.
Many of the Hot Springs have two separate areas, one for men and one for women (which seems too few in some RPGs; you'd think some of them would have more divisions, given how many different species of sentient beings exist in them), meaning that the entire party can bathe at the same time, segregated by gender. Well, fine, right? I mean, most RPG casts are made up of fairly respectable people who aren't indecent savages, so I'm sure they can manage the bare minimum of etiquette and keep to their own side, right?
Ha ha ha, no. Not at all, it seems. These paragons of heroism that we're supposed to respect may be able to resist the temptations of power and the very essence of the forces of darkness, but tell any one of'em that there's a topless girl bathing next door, and suddenly they have less integrity as human beings than Austin Powers. If one of the male party members doesn't outright try to sneak into the girl's side, then he's at least going to find a hole in the wall or boards or rocks or whatever separating the two sides. Of course, he'll usually succeed, because for some reason, not only does every single word whispered on the girl's side carry over to the men's, so that the breast-comparison nonsense can further inspire them to voyeurism, but there's almost always SOME part of the boundary that can be looked through. Sure, you'd THINK that an established business running a Hot Springs area would take some sort of steps toward privacy, but where would be the "humor" in that?
And of course, the finale to all this is usually the girls finding out that one of their friends has developed an instant case of Seriously Creepy Stalker Syndrome, and physically harming him in punishment. While the logical conclusion to this scenario, I would like to note, for the record, that this, like all other parts of the scene, is not really at all funny.
C. Unintentional Attack of the Fanboys. Like Scenario B, Scenario C involves the boys invading the girls' bathing area (don't ever expect to see the roles reversed, incidentally, because, as we all know, while every male alive has to be perverted, not a single female could ever be). This time, however, it is, incredibly enough, unintentional! Somehow, through a turn of events that is more contrived than the plot of Xenogears, the boys wind up in the girls' area without intending to. Maybe somebody mixed up the time when the girls would be in the bath. Perhaps someone got the directions mixed up. Hey, maybe one of the guys was on his own side, leaned against the wall separating the sides, and somehow the wall caved in and he fell across the side. Nothing is too unlikely or obvious a ploy for this "comedy!"
This scenario, like the one above, ends in the guy being beaten up viciously, only this time he doesn't deserve it. Because, somehow, this is expected to be hilarious.
I swear, the Japanese have a disturbing obsession with men getting the shit beat out of them by violent, short-tempered, and totally unreasonable women. There've been animes where this happens at least twice every freakin' episode.
With few variations, at LEAST one of these scenarios is guaranteed to be in an RPG Hot Springs Scene. While perhaps not THE absolutely stupidest, base cliche scene in anime ever (thank goodness RPGs haven't started incorporating those fucking swimsuit contests that animes throw around all the time...Persona 4 just better not be the one that makes it a norm for the genre), I certainly can't think of a worse one common to the world of RPGs. Hot Spring Scenes are like the perfect mixture of low-class perversion, poor writing, crude semi-humor, and just a whole hell of a lot of "Wow, that's just pathetic" short of actually just being Final Fantasy 10-2. This bad cliche is one that needs to die more than pretty much any of the others.
* The Suikoden series is the only one that's sort of an exception, in that it has a crapload of Hot Spring Scenes that don't have the crappy events I list--but SOME of their scenes DO include the terrible cliches, so they're not really exempt.
What is a Hot Spring Scene, you may wonder. You also may not wonder that, knowing what I'm talking about or just not caring, but I'm going to explain it to you anyway, because I like the magic words that appear when I hit the letter buttons and want to see more of them. Well, a Hot Spring Scene is a small, but (given its typical lack of importance to the plot) unusually time-consuming event in an RPG (or anime or comic, but I focus on the RPGs) in which the main party spends time soaking in one of those communal baths that Japan is famous for. The guys will be on one side, and the girls will be on the other--in theory, anyways. I'll admit that I don't really see the appeal of sharing the joys of scrubbing armpits and soaping up asscracks in the great outdoors with a bunch of other people a few feet away, but I don't have anything against the idea of a social bath thingy, and the impression that the games give is that they're supposed to be relaxing.
My problem with Hot Spring Scenes in RPGs is that they will, without fail, include at LEAST one of the following stupefyingly idiotic and crude situations* that manage to be possibly the cheapest gags that Japan has to offer. Seriously, fart and dick jokes have no less integrity than this crap:
A. Breast Comparisons. Dear lord. There is some kind of unwritten law in Japan that if any two or more females are naked near one another, they have to, under penalty of death, loudly compare the size and shape of one another's bust with their own. Why? Because the lowest common denominator demands it, of course! I mean, I know that girls probably do talk about that every now and then during their teens, but these characters are often adult women, and it's like they have nothing else they can possibly talk about. And the actual dialogue is always just unbelievably stupid. This is basically how it will go, with only a little variation:
Girl 1: OMG Girl 2 you have breasts and they're nice!
Girl 2: OMG no way Girl 1 your breasts are bigger! EVERYONE IN THE WORLD WISHES THEIR BREASTS WERE BIGGER BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT GAME DEVELOPERS THINK FANBOYS WANT.
Girl 1: Yeah but ironically the only people in all of anime-RPG land who don't want big breasts are the girls who have them! If only I had your lesser-sized breasts, Girl 2! Which I must, of course, emphasize loudly the niceness of, again!
Girl 3: I am very flat. This is sad, but somehow humorous, as well!
Optional Girl 4: What up bitches, sorry I'm late and/or over in the corner so that my joining the conversation sets up the possibility of my surprising you.
Girls 1, 2, and 3: OMG Optional Girl 4 you have the most perfect breasts of all, even though you are the least likely to have such things, given that you are very innocent, a cross-dresser, or possibly an entirely different species!
I can't help but feel that even the breast-comparing talks that do occasionally occur in real life between girls can't possibly sound so stupid. You could call a phone-sex operator and hear a speech less blatantly (and poorly, for that matter) designed to turn you on.
B. Attack of the Fanboys. What could possibly be more HILARIOUS than the idea that men want to see naked women? Nothing, hope many a game maker.
Many of the Hot Springs have two separate areas, one for men and one for women (which seems too few in some RPGs; you'd think some of them would have more divisions, given how many different species of sentient beings exist in them), meaning that the entire party can bathe at the same time, segregated by gender. Well, fine, right? I mean, most RPG casts are made up of fairly respectable people who aren't indecent savages, so I'm sure they can manage the bare minimum of etiquette and keep to their own side, right?
Ha ha ha, no. Not at all, it seems. These paragons of heroism that we're supposed to respect may be able to resist the temptations of power and the very essence of the forces of darkness, but tell any one of'em that there's a topless girl bathing next door, and suddenly they have less integrity as human beings than Austin Powers. If one of the male party members doesn't outright try to sneak into the girl's side, then he's at least going to find a hole in the wall or boards or rocks or whatever separating the two sides. Of course, he'll usually succeed, because for some reason, not only does every single word whispered on the girl's side carry over to the men's, so that the breast-comparison nonsense can further inspire them to voyeurism, but there's almost always SOME part of the boundary that can be looked through. Sure, you'd THINK that an established business running a Hot Springs area would take some sort of steps toward privacy, but where would be the "humor" in that?
And of course, the finale to all this is usually the girls finding out that one of their friends has developed an instant case of Seriously Creepy Stalker Syndrome, and physically harming him in punishment. While the logical conclusion to this scenario, I would like to note, for the record, that this, like all other parts of the scene, is not really at all funny.
C. Unintentional Attack of the Fanboys. Like Scenario B, Scenario C involves the boys invading the girls' bathing area (don't ever expect to see the roles reversed, incidentally, because, as we all know, while every male alive has to be perverted, not a single female could ever be). This time, however, it is, incredibly enough, unintentional! Somehow, through a turn of events that is more contrived than the plot of Xenogears, the boys wind up in the girls' area without intending to. Maybe somebody mixed up the time when the girls would be in the bath. Perhaps someone got the directions mixed up. Hey, maybe one of the guys was on his own side, leaned against the wall separating the sides, and somehow the wall caved in and he fell across the side. Nothing is too unlikely or obvious a ploy for this "comedy!"
This scenario, like the one above, ends in the guy being beaten up viciously, only this time he doesn't deserve it. Because, somehow, this is expected to be hilarious.
I swear, the Japanese have a disturbing obsession with men getting the shit beat out of them by violent, short-tempered, and totally unreasonable women. There've been animes where this happens at least twice every freakin' episode.
With few variations, at LEAST one of these scenarios is guaranteed to be in an RPG Hot Springs Scene. While perhaps not THE absolutely stupidest, base cliche scene in anime ever (thank goodness RPGs haven't started incorporating those fucking swimsuit contests that animes throw around all the time...Persona 4 just better not be the one that makes it a norm for the genre), I certainly can't think of a worse one common to the world of RPGs. Hot Spring Scenes are like the perfect mixture of low-class perversion, poor writing, crude semi-humor, and just a whole hell of a lot of "Wow, that's just pathetic" short of actually just being Final Fantasy 10-2. This bad cliche is one that needs to die more than pretty much any of the others.
* The Suikoden series is the only one that's sort of an exception, in that it has a crapload of Hot Spring Scenes that don't have the crappy events I list--but SOME of their scenes DO include the terrible cliches, so they're not really exempt.
Monday, May 11, 2009
General RPG Lists: Greatest Swords
So, as a breather after a few rants of actual significance, I thought I'd do a rather pointless list rant today to answer the age-old question that everyone* has wondered at one point or another: of the many, many swords found in RPGs, which ones are the very most awesome? It's actually not an easy question answer, for, quite frankly, magical, super-powerful swords are a dime-a-dozen in the RPG genre. If we are to determine which unparalleled blade is better than all its unparalleled peers, we'll have to look at them as a whole and find the ones that stand out even when considering magical super-swords. Let's see, shall we?
UPDATE 12/14/16: AeternoBlade added; Elsydeon has been bumped off.
5. Master Sword (The Legend of Zelda Series)
The Master Sword isn't really all that incredibly powerful, by RPG magical sword standards (hell, it's been outclassed a few times by swords in its own game series). What makes the Master Sword really awesome isn't how powerful it is, but its singular ability to utterly repel evil. It just knocks back dark power like a ball pitched underhanded to Hank Aaron by a 10-year-old and cuts through barriers of evil magic like a battle axe through a birthday cake. The Master Sword may not be able to cleave mountains apart, but there's no better blade for bringing down a true, evil villain.
4. Excalibur (General RPGs)
Good old Excalibur. The greatest sword of legend on this planet shows up in quite a few RPGs, and is just consistently one of, if not the, best weapons in any game it's in. Add to that the fact that it often shows up in RPGs with intrinsic positive qualities (holy elemental, for example, and let's not forget how it had an intrinsic Haste effect in Final Fantasy Tactics, making whoever used it insanely strong AND fast), and the fact that, c'mon, it's freaking EXCALIBUR, and you've got something pretty cool.
3. Lightsaber (Knights of the Old Republic Series)
Yeah, yeah, okay, not exactly a sword, but...close enough, I say. Forget these other swords. This is what power is. The Lightsaber is just pure destructive potential. It just lazily goes through anything it encounters like it was nothing. There have been many other energy swords of various kinds in games and animes and so on, but none of them are so steadily unstoppable as this one. Graceful, simple, elegant, the Lightsaber is a little piece of killing technology that puts all those magical bullshit swords in other RPGs to utter shame. The Masamune, Ultima Weapon, Mana Sword, Eternal Sword, Glance Reviver, and so on...a Lightsaber would melt'em all on contact.
2. Dual Blade (Lufia Series)
(Note: The version of this sword from the beyond shitty Curse of the Sinistrals remake does NOT count).
Not only is the Dual Blade crazily powerful. Not only does it have a spiritual energy like that of a god's. Not only is it so powerful that you could theoretically suggest that it can distort the fabric of time and space around it over time (best explanation I've got for how jumbled and buggy-looking the area around it is in Lufia 2, besides it actually being bugged--but there's something about the area and the fact that it happens again at the bottom of the Ancient Cave where the ultimate monster is found that tells me that the Dual Blade's resting place was intentionally left looking like the universe's coding exploded). But the Dual Blade also resonates its spiritual power with and against your own, enhancing your strength with its power and using your determination to become deadlier itself. Its wielder can also use it in battle to completely recover their health and greatly increase their strength and ability. You practically become a deity just from wielding it--assuming that you're worthy enough for it to choose you. Now that's a legendary sword worth noting.
1. AeternoBlade of Past (AternoBlade 1 + 2)
This sword provides such raw, inconceivable power that it's hard to fathom. The AeternoBlade gives its wielder the ability to rewind the entirety of time around herself, while she can move freely, and every attack she scores on an enemy unknowingly going back in its own timeline will remain, leaving that enemy to, from its perspective, suddenly sprout dozens of fatal wounds from nowhere. How unimaginably overpowered is that? What foes could possibly counter such an ability? This is more than a time stop, such as a few of the most impressive spells in RPG history are capable of performing (such as Feena's power in Grandia 1, or Sailor Pluto's in Sailor Moon: Another Story, both of which are insanely overpowered). This sword's power gives all the benefits of a time freeze spell, but also the added bonus that since the foe is retreating backward in time, the AeternoBlade's wielder knows exactly what actions the enemy is about to take when she chooses to end the time rewind. Time stopping AND effective precognition! And if that weren't enough, the blade also allows its user to frequently make tiny hops through time-space in which she is invulnerable (think Tracer's blinking ability in Overwatch), to instantaneously warp back to a predeterminedspot she's been at previously, and (also like Tracer, only better) to rewind her own time line several seconds (or even close to a minute) to heal herself from fatal injuries she might have sustained, and allowing her to recall this averted fatal future so that she can avoid the same mistake. The sword even allows its holder to do this for a few seconds after death, it seems, since in the game it'll give you a bit of time after Freyja's HP has hit 0 to go back and fix things. And there are also certain relics one can equip that resonate with the sword, conferring even more insane power from it, such as the ability to heal oneself while rewinding the rest of the world, instead of just when rewinding oneself. Whoever wields the AeternoBlade is effectively immortal and unstoppable.
Honorable Mention: Star Dragon Sword (Suikoden Series)
While not enormously powerful (although its ability to kill immortal assholes is a nice plus), I'm rather partial to the Star Dragon Sword because it talks. And through talking you find that it is grumpy, vain, and just a jerk in general. If I were a sword, I'd be like this one.
...HA! Finally, a short list rant! It CAN be done!
* "Everyone" may need to be read as "me, and me alone."
UPDATE 12/14/16: AeternoBlade added; Elsydeon has been bumped off.
5. Master Sword (The Legend of Zelda Series)
The Master Sword isn't really all that incredibly powerful, by RPG magical sword standards (hell, it's been outclassed a few times by swords in its own game series). What makes the Master Sword really awesome isn't how powerful it is, but its singular ability to utterly repel evil. It just knocks back dark power like a ball pitched underhanded to Hank Aaron by a 10-year-old and cuts through barriers of evil magic like a battle axe through a birthday cake. The Master Sword may not be able to cleave mountains apart, but there's no better blade for bringing down a true, evil villain.
4. Excalibur (General RPGs)
Good old Excalibur. The greatest sword of legend on this planet shows up in quite a few RPGs, and is just consistently one of, if not the, best weapons in any game it's in. Add to that the fact that it often shows up in RPGs with intrinsic positive qualities (holy elemental, for example, and let's not forget how it had an intrinsic Haste effect in Final Fantasy Tactics, making whoever used it insanely strong AND fast), and the fact that, c'mon, it's freaking EXCALIBUR, and you've got something pretty cool.
3. Lightsaber (Knights of the Old Republic Series)
Yeah, yeah, okay, not exactly a sword, but...close enough, I say. Forget these other swords. This is what power is. The Lightsaber is just pure destructive potential. It just lazily goes through anything it encounters like it was nothing. There have been many other energy swords of various kinds in games and animes and so on, but none of them are so steadily unstoppable as this one. Graceful, simple, elegant, the Lightsaber is a little piece of killing technology that puts all those magical bullshit swords in other RPGs to utter shame. The Masamune, Ultima Weapon, Mana Sword, Eternal Sword, Glance Reviver, and so on...a Lightsaber would melt'em all on contact.
2. Dual Blade (Lufia Series)
(Note: The version of this sword from the beyond shitty Curse of the Sinistrals remake does NOT count).
Not only is the Dual Blade crazily powerful. Not only does it have a spiritual energy like that of a god's. Not only is it so powerful that you could theoretically suggest that it can distort the fabric of time and space around it over time (best explanation I've got for how jumbled and buggy-looking the area around it is in Lufia 2, besides it actually being bugged--but there's something about the area and the fact that it happens again at the bottom of the Ancient Cave where the ultimate monster is found that tells me that the Dual Blade's resting place was intentionally left looking like the universe's coding exploded). But the Dual Blade also resonates its spiritual power with and against your own, enhancing your strength with its power and using your determination to become deadlier itself. Its wielder can also use it in battle to completely recover their health and greatly increase their strength and ability. You practically become a deity just from wielding it--assuming that you're worthy enough for it to choose you. Now that's a legendary sword worth noting.
1. AeternoBlade of Past (AternoBlade 1 + 2)
This sword provides such raw, inconceivable power that it's hard to fathom. The AeternoBlade gives its wielder the ability to rewind the entirety of time around herself, while she can move freely, and every attack she scores on an enemy unknowingly going back in its own timeline will remain, leaving that enemy to, from its perspective, suddenly sprout dozens of fatal wounds from nowhere. How unimaginably overpowered is that? What foes could possibly counter such an ability? This is more than a time stop, such as a few of the most impressive spells in RPG history are capable of performing (such as Feena's power in Grandia 1, or Sailor Pluto's in Sailor Moon: Another Story, both of which are insanely overpowered). This sword's power gives all the benefits of a time freeze spell, but also the added bonus that since the foe is retreating backward in time, the AeternoBlade's wielder knows exactly what actions the enemy is about to take when she chooses to end the time rewind. Time stopping AND effective precognition! And if that weren't enough, the blade also allows its user to frequently make tiny hops through time-space in which she is invulnerable (think Tracer's blinking ability in Overwatch), to instantaneously warp back to a predeterminedspot she's been at previously, and (also like Tracer, only better) to rewind her own time line several seconds (or even close to a minute) to heal herself from fatal injuries she might have sustained, and allowing her to recall this averted fatal future so that she can avoid the same mistake. The sword even allows its holder to do this for a few seconds after death, it seems, since in the game it'll give you a bit of time after Freyja's HP has hit 0 to go back and fix things. And there are also certain relics one can equip that resonate with the sword, conferring even more insane power from it, such as the ability to heal oneself while rewinding the rest of the world, instead of just when rewinding oneself. Whoever wields the AeternoBlade is effectively immortal and unstoppable.
Honorable Mention: Star Dragon Sword (Suikoden Series)
While not enormously powerful (although its ability to kill immortal assholes is a nice plus), I'm rather partial to the Star Dragon Sword because it talks. And through talking you find that it is grumpy, vain, and just a jerk in general. If I were a sword, I'd be like this one.
...HA! Finally, a short list rant! It CAN be done!
* "Everyone" may need to be read as "me, and me alone."
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Shin Megami Tensei 3 Theory: Isamu's Folly
Time for another theory rant, this time perhaps a little more intellectual-sounding than my previous "KAIN = GAYZ" one.
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, henceforth referred to as Shin Megami Tensei 3, is a pretty neat game, following much of the spirit (if not even close to the brilliance) of the original two Shin Megami Tensei games as a semi-sorta-kinda-not-really sequel to them. As with SMT1 and 2, you get to choose a side between several warring factions, according to which side you believe is the better one. With SMT3, though, the lines aren't so cleanly cut between Heaven, Earth, and Hell, between Logic, Balance, and Emotion. The disciplines you have the opportunity to endorse are all more basic, human views of what the world should be, and as such, each one clearly has its elements of truth but also clearly is flawed in certain ways. And the game's fairly careful, as SMT1 and 2 were, not to show a particular bias for any path beyond the one you'd expect for choosing not to give in to any side's dogma and instead fight them all.
Save in one instance. Now, it may be small, and unimportant, and I may be reading too much into this, but there's one moment of SMT3 that sticks out to me as being, for this game, bizarrely uneven. It's like this: in the ending of the game, your main character, known semi-officially as Naoki Kashima, gets to speak with the leader of the group that he has sided with, provided he's sided with one at all, and hear that person tell him how totally awesome he is for making the world they desired come to be. Just about what you'd expect, really, right? If you sided with Chiaki, who believes in a world of eternal struggle and violent rule by the most powerful, you meet with her, and she gives you the verbal equivalent of a thumbs-up. If you sided with Hikawa, who wants a world of absolute reason and logic with no emotions or passions, he gives you the verbal equivalent of a unemotional raising of one's thumb to indicate satisfactory-but-not-emotionally-stimulating results. And if you sided with Isamu, who more or less advocates a world where everyone leaves everyone alone and has anything they want at all times so long as what they want isn't contact with any other living being in existence, his ghost will give you a verbal version of a thumbs-up that wouldn't be corporeal anyway, given his state.
To quote the bard, "One of these things is not like the others. One of these things just doesn't belong."* Yes, Isamu dies no matter what happens. Assuming that you ally with one of them, Chiaki and/or Hikawa will live to see her/his dream world's beginning, but even if it's not by your hand, Isamu's destined to go and get himself killed by Chiaki. Although, as I said, it may be nothing, it seems like an odd discrepancy.
What reason could there be, I've wondered, for singling out Isamu to die? Is it just because he, of the three discipline leaders, seems the weakest in power? I guess it could be as simple and harmless as that, but it seems odd nonetheless that they would take the time to emphasize that point. Yes, Chiaki does die if you follow her path, as well, but that's as a result of her intentionally fighting the protagonist to the death to determine which of them is the stronger and therefor the one to properly lead the way to the new world--it's the natural, acceptable result of her philosophy, a successful death, while Isamu's is against his will. And, as I said, Isamu's the only one whose death is emphasized during the ending conversation. So, as I said, it seems an odd discrepancy.
I then considered whether his death, and the idea of dying in general, could maybe just be emphasizing some part or concept of his discipline or the world he wanted to form, like Chiaki's is. But that also seemed to be a dead end. I mean, death does sort of remove you from the reach of all other people, but not in the idyllic way that Isamu wanted. And if you think of death as a way to get to Heaven or some other afterlife paradise, well, that doesn't quite work either, because those are typically thought of as places with lots of people (all the saved, chosen, virtuous, etc, depending on the version), which is definitely not what he advocated.
So it's probably not a simple show of power, and it's probably not some attempt to emphasize some aspect or virtue of his beliefs. It could just be nothing, but I couldn't very well rant about that. And anyways, I might accept most game plots not having any specific purpose in doing such a thing, but SMT games, as a general rule, have a design in every significant aspect of their story-telling. From what I've seen, at least. So I'm left with the (fairly reasonable) idea that Isamu is set apart from the others by a worse fate for a reason, something that he does or believes in that is different enough from the others that it's worthy of reprimand from the writers as being more flawed.
What I think it is, is this: Isamu's philosophy is based on inactivity, escapism, running away from reality instead of actually DOING something. Hikawa reasons out what he thinks is right and sets plans in motion to accomplish his goals, and wants to create a world of silence, logic, order. His actions and his world are about what to do, and how beings should live with each other. Chiaki, after experiencing life as a helpless wanderer in a hostile world, comes to covet the strength she lacks, comes to the conclusion that the world is and should be about the strong overcoming the weak, and sets out to gain power, and to create a world in which that is completely true. Her actions and her world are about what should be done and how beings are meant to interact with each other.
But Isamu? He isolates himself from the world in despair, and just happens across the means to change the world by fateful accident. He not only wants to run away from reality instead of dealing with it and working to change it, but he wants to create a reality that is paradoxically about rejecting itself. I mean, think about it--his world isn't one where no one else exists; it's just one where each person has his own little perfect fantasy life completely isolated from every other person having his or her own fantasy life. The reality would still be that other people existed, yet the world would be shaped in such a way to perpetuate a denial of that reality.
All three of the game's leaders have flawed visions, but Hikawa and Chiaki at least share the virtue that their disciplines are based on actually acting, working to better the world (in their eyes). Isamu just outright denies it and advocates escapism. And I think that's why he has such a notably worse fate than the others--the SMT3 creators couldn't help but subtly show his folly as worse than the others'.
* Assuming that "the bard" you're referring to is Sesame Street's songwriter.
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, henceforth referred to as Shin Megami Tensei 3, is a pretty neat game, following much of the spirit (if not even close to the brilliance) of the original two Shin Megami Tensei games as a semi-sorta-kinda-not-really sequel to them. As with SMT1 and 2, you get to choose a side between several warring factions, according to which side you believe is the better one. With SMT3, though, the lines aren't so cleanly cut between Heaven, Earth, and Hell, between Logic, Balance, and Emotion. The disciplines you have the opportunity to endorse are all more basic, human views of what the world should be, and as such, each one clearly has its elements of truth but also clearly is flawed in certain ways. And the game's fairly careful, as SMT1 and 2 were, not to show a particular bias for any path beyond the one you'd expect for choosing not to give in to any side's dogma and instead fight them all.
Save in one instance. Now, it may be small, and unimportant, and I may be reading too much into this, but there's one moment of SMT3 that sticks out to me as being, for this game, bizarrely uneven. It's like this: in the ending of the game, your main character, known semi-officially as Naoki Kashima, gets to speak with the leader of the group that he has sided with, provided he's sided with one at all, and hear that person tell him how totally awesome he is for making the world they desired come to be. Just about what you'd expect, really, right? If you sided with Chiaki, who believes in a world of eternal struggle and violent rule by the most powerful, you meet with her, and she gives you the verbal equivalent of a thumbs-up. If you sided with Hikawa, who wants a world of absolute reason and logic with no emotions or passions, he gives you the verbal equivalent of a unemotional raising of one's thumb to indicate satisfactory-but-not-emotionally-stimulating results. And if you sided with Isamu, who more or less advocates a world where everyone leaves everyone alone and has anything they want at all times so long as what they want isn't contact with any other living being in existence, his ghost will give you a verbal version of a thumbs-up that wouldn't be corporeal anyway, given his state.
To quote the bard, "One of these things is not like the others. One of these things just doesn't belong."* Yes, Isamu dies no matter what happens. Assuming that you ally with one of them, Chiaki and/or Hikawa will live to see her/his dream world's beginning, but even if it's not by your hand, Isamu's destined to go and get himself killed by Chiaki. Although, as I said, it may be nothing, it seems like an odd discrepancy.
What reason could there be, I've wondered, for singling out Isamu to die? Is it just because he, of the three discipline leaders, seems the weakest in power? I guess it could be as simple and harmless as that, but it seems odd nonetheless that they would take the time to emphasize that point. Yes, Chiaki does die if you follow her path, as well, but that's as a result of her intentionally fighting the protagonist to the death to determine which of them is the stronger and therefor the one to properly lead the way to the new world--it's the natural, acceptable result of her philosophy, a successful death, while Isamu's is against his will. And, as I said, Isamu's the only one whose death is emphasized during the ending conversation. So, as I said, it seems an odd discrepancy.
I then considered whether his death, and the idea of dying in general, could maybe just be emphasizing some part or concept of his discipline or the world he wanted to form, like Chiaki's is. But that also seemed to be a dead end. I mean, death does sort of remove you from the reach of all other people, but not in the idyllic way that Isamu wanted. And if you think of death as a way to get to Heaven or some other afterlife paradise, well, that doesn't quite work either, because those are typically thought of as places with lots of people (all the saved, chosen, virtuous, etc, depending on the version), which is definitely not what he advocated.
So it's probably not a simple show of power, and it's probably not some attempt to emphasize some aspect or virtue of his beliefs. It could just be nothing, but I couldn't very well rant about that. And anyways, I might accept most game plots not having any specific purpose in doing such a thing, but SMT games, as a general rule, have a design in every significant aspect of their story-telling. From what I've seen, at least. So I'm left with the (fairly reasonable) idea that Isamu is set apart from the others by a worse fate for a reason, something that he does or believes in that is different enough from the others that it's worthy of reprimand from the writers as being more flawed.
What I think it is, is this: Isamu's philosophy is based on inactivity, escapism, running away from reality instead of actually DOING something. Hikawa reasons out what he thinks is right and sets plans in motion to accomplish his goals, and wants to create a world of silence, logic, order. His actions and his world are about what to do, and how beings should live with each other. Chiaki, after experiencing life as a helpless wanderer in a hostile world, comes to covet the strength she lacks, comes to the conclusion that the world is and should be about the strong overcoming the weak, and sets out to gain power, and to create a world in which that is completely true. Her actions and her world are about what should be done and how beings are meant to interact with each other.
But Isamu? He isolates himself from the world in despair, and just happens across the means to change the world by fateful accident. He not only wants to run away from reality instead of dealing with it and working to change it, but he wants to create a reality that is paradoxically about rejecting itself. I mean, think about it--his world isn't one where no one else exists; it's just one where each person has his own little perfect fantasy life completely isolated from every other person having his or her own fantasy life. The reality would still be that other people existed, yet the world would be shaped in such a way to perpetuate a denial of that reality.
All three of the game's leaders have flawed visions, but Hikawa and Chiaki at least share the virtue that their disciplines are based on actually acting, working to better the world (in their eyes). Isamu just outright denies it and advocates escapism. And I think that's why he has such a notably worse fate than the others--the SMT3 creators couldn't help but subtly show his folly as worse than the others'.
* Assuming that "the bard" you're referring to is Sesame Street's songwriter.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Fallout 3's Ending Stupidity
To any Fallout series fanatic (and to be quite honest, I'm not sure there's any fan of the series who isn't fanatical about it) in the decade between 1998 and 2008, the term "Fallout 3" was...exciting, to say the least. "Exciting" the way the idea of Jesus's second coming is exciting to the clergy.
Once the long-awaited game finally came out, opinions on it were mixed, and quite often pretty violently polar. Some people absolutely love the game, while others spit on its casing and shake their fist at God in angered betrayal. Myself, I happen to quite like it--it may not quite live up to the Fallout name to me, but it's a solid entry to the series nonetheless. It's got a decent story that's epic in its simplicity, fine characters, and overall things tend to make sense (as much as the Fallout games generally do, at any rate) and follow logic.
Except the ending sequence. The ending sequence is bullshit. It's been a while since I officially gave a Spoiler alert, but I'm definitely going to right now.
So basically, in the final moments of the game, it's determined that the machine you're trying to save that can purify water in the hellishly irradiated Capital Wasteland is going to go boom if somebody doesn't go into its center chamber and enter in the Anti-Explodey access code that all plot-important catastrophe-prone machines have. Problem with that is, of course, that the radiation in the chamber is crazy lethal, so anyone going in isn't coming out. Now, you have the option of sending the heroic Sarah Lyons in to die instead of you, but if you have a heroic character who's not a dickwad/bitch, that option sucks. So it's up to your character, the Lone Wanderer, to do it, adding Self Sacrifice to Save the Future to your doubtlessly already impressive wasteland resume.
Well, that's all well and good, and I can respect an ending like that...except for one minor detail. Or really, 3 minor details: Fawkes, Charon, and Sergeant RL-3. These 3 are possible companions who can be with you at the time of the ending who are, for one reason or another, more or less immune to radiation. Fawkes is a Super Mutant who has proven previously that she suffers no ill effect from walking into tremendously radiated areas that would make Captain Planet villain Duke Nukem sunburned. Charon is a Ghoul, a fallout zombie-esque person who got so fried by radiation during the original nuclear bombings that it transformed them into a living corpse. I've yet to see a Ghoul in the Fallout series that had any problem with crazy doses of radiation; in fact, most of them enjoy the stuff. And Sergeant RL-3 is a robot with several manipulating limbs that could easily work the plot-machine's controls while he sits floats in radiation that, to a robot such as him, is pretty much harmless.
I'm not saying that every ally you can get should jump at the chance to go become a fleshy night light in your place. I wouldn't opt to send Jericho or Star Paladin Cross, for examples, in because they'd die. But why the HELL doesn't the game give you the option of having a friend who won't die go in to do the task that would kill you? These beings that are supposed to be your companions are just going to watch your character's face melt off instead of just walking in, putting in a code themselves, and walking out? The protagonist's life just isn't worth that much trouble to them?
And it's not just a case of the developers not thinking about it; at least not with Fawkes (haven't checked Charon or RL-3, although I'd be inclined to say it's the same case with them, most likely). Fawkes you can actually ask to go in so that nobody has to die a horrible death. You know what she says to that? Basically, "Thanks but no thanks; wouldn't want to rob you of your destiny."
...
Dot. Dot. DOT, motherfuckers.
You know what? If my destiny is to die horribly even though there's a completely harmless alternative that does the job equally well without having me or anyone else die, then go ahead and rob me of my destiny! Seriously, not gonna mind, won't even miss it. I mean, COME ON, rather than take a few steps and push a few buttons, you're gonna watch the person you've traveled from one end of Hell on Earth to the other with die because it's your personal opinion that it's their destiny to do so? SERIOUSLY? And with Charon's case, he's bound by the papers your character holds to do whatever the goddamn hell your character wants him to!
I'm fine with a dramatic self-sacrifice under reasonable conditions (even if it's a little over-played in RPGs), but this scenario is ridiculous.
RETRACTION (Posted 05/17/09):
So. Remember a (comparably) recent rant I did on how stupid Fallout 3's ending was, focusing on how it had some of your party members just sit around while you went to die from radiation that they were completely immune against? Gonna have to officially retract that whole rant.
See, it's like this. The makers of Fallout 3 have continued to develop for the game since its release, and have made new areas and missions available to Fallout 3 players to download and play (for a fee, of course). They're fairly neat additions in general, but the latest one, the Broken Steel package, extends the game past the original ending, as well as modifying the scene which used to be the game's final moments. Now, not only does your character survive no matter what (which makes sense, honestly; I mean, by the time you get to that point in the game, you've probably accumulated radiation-blocking medicine, clothing, and perks up the wazoo, not to mention craploads of radiation-removing medicine. My own character's got enough Rad-X and RadAway that she could curl up inside a nuclear power plant's reactor core for a nap without a problem), but you also DO get the option of making your radiation-resistant party members pick up the fucking slack.
So basically, the fine folks at Bethesda fixed the idiotic oversight or intentional apathy that made the ending stupid. It's not a perfect solution, in that the Broken Steel package doesn't actually give you an ending after completing it. You're basically trading off a stupid ending, but getting a non-existent one in return. Still, that's certainly better than it was. So yes. I take that whole rant back. Jumped the gun, it seems.
Once the long-awaited game finally came out, opinions on it were mixed, and quite often pretty violently polar. Some people absolutely love the game, while others spit on its casing and shake their fist at God in angered betrayal. Myself, I happen to quite like it--it may not quite live up to the Fallout name to me, but it's a solid entry to the series nonetheless. It's got a decent story that's epic in its simplicity, fine characters, and overall things tend to make sense (as much as the Fallout games generally do, at any rate) and follow logic.
Except the ending sequence. The ending sequence is bullshit. It's been a while since I officially gave a Spoiler alert, but I'm definitely going to right now.
So basically, in the final moments of the game, it's determined that the machine you're trying to save that can purify water in the hellishly irradiated Capital Wasteland is going to go boom if somebody doesn't go into its center chamber and enter in the Anti-Explodey access code that all plot-important catastrophe-prone machines have. Problem with that is, of course, that the radiation in the chamber is crazy lethal, so anyone going in isn't coming out. Now, you have the option of sending the heroic Sarah Lyons in to die instead of you, but if you have a heroic character who's not a dickwad/bitch, that option sucks. So it's up to your character, the Lone Wanderer, to do it, adding Self Sacrifice to Save the Future to your doubtlessly already impressive wasteland resume.
Well, that's all well and good, and I can respect an ending like that...except for one minor detail. Or really, 3 minor details: Fawkes, Charon, and Sergeant RL-3. These 3 are possible companions who can be with you at the time of the ending who are, for one reason or another, more or less immune to radiation. Fawkes is a Super Mutant who has proven previously that she suffers no ill effect from walking into tremendously radiated areas that would make Captain Planet villain Duke Nukem sunburned. Charon is a Ghoul, a fallout zombie-esque person who got so fried by radiation during the original nuclear bombings that it transformed them into a living corpse. I've yet to see a Ghoul in the Fallout series that had any problem with crazy doses of radiation; in fact, most of them enjoy the stuff. And Sergeant RL-3 is a robot with several manipulating limbs that could easily work the plot-machine's controls while he sits floats in radiation that, to a robot such as him, is pretty much harmless.
I'm not saying that every ally you can get should jump at the chance to go become a fleshy night light in your place. I wouldn't opt to send Jericho or Star Paladin Cross, for examples, in because they'd die. But why the HELL doesn't the game give you the option of having a friend who won't die go in to do the task that would kill you? These beings that are supposed to be your companions are just going to watch your character's face melt off instead of just walking in, putting in a code themselves, and walking out? The protagonist's life just isn't worth that much trouble to them?
And it's not just a case of the developers not thinking about it; at least not with Fawkes (haven't checked Charon or RL-3, although I'd be inclined to say it's the same case with them, most likely). Fawkes you can actually ask to go in so that nobody has to die a horrible death. You know what she says to that? Basically, "Thanks but no thanks; wouldn't want to rob you of your destiny."
...
Dot. Dot. DOT, motherfuckers.
You know what? If my destiny is to die horribly even though there's a completely harmless alternative that does the job equally well without having me or anyone else die, then go ahead and rob me of my destiny! Seriously, not gonna mind, won't even miss it. I mean, COME ON, rather than take a few steps and push a few buttons, you're gonna watch the person you've traveled from one end of Hell on Earth to the other with die because it's your personal opinion that it's their destiny to do so? SERIOUSLY? And with Charon's case, he's bound by the papers your character holds to do whatever the goddamn hell your character wants him to!
I'm fine with a dramatic self-sacrifice under reasonable conditions (even if it's a little over-played in RPGs), but this scenario is ridiculous.
RETRACTION (Posted 05/17/09):
So. Remember a (comparably) recent rant I did on how stupid Fallout 3's ending was, focusing on how it had some of your party members just sit around while you went to die from radiation that they were completely immune against? Gonna have to officially retract that whole rant.
See, it's like this. The makers of Fallout 3 have continued to develop for the game since its release, and have made new areas and missions available to Fallout 3 players to download and play (for a fee, of course). They're fairly neat additions in general, but the latest one, the Broken Steel package, extends the game past the original ending, as well as modifying the scene which used to be the game's final moments. Now, not only does your character survive no matter what (which makes sense, honestly; I mean, by the time you get to that point in the game, you've probably accumulated radiation-blocking medicine, clothing, and perks up the wazoo, not to mention craploads of radiation-removing medicine. My own character's got enough Rad-X and RadAway that she could curl up inside a nuclear power plant's reactor core for a nap without a problem), but you also DO get the option of making your radiation-resistant party members pick up the fucking slack.
So basically, the fine folks at Bethesda fixed the idiotic oversight or intentional apathy that made the ending stupid. It's not a perfect solution, in that the Broken Steel package doesn't actually give you an ending after completing it. You're basically trading off a stupid ending, but getting a non-existent one in return. Still, that's certainly better than it was. So yes. I take that whole rant back. Jumped the gun, it seems.
Friday, March 20, 2009
General RPGs' Racial Equality
RPGs are pretty diverse, generally. You get heroes and supporting characters ranging in ages from children to the elderly of both genders. You get a myriad of settings--fantasy lands of magic and legend, futuristic galaxies with high technology and aliens, post-apocalyptic wastelands, modern-day Earth towns and countryside, floating sky islands, underworlds, gritty cyberpunk cities, and many more. You encounter all kinds of ideas, themes, and messages in the games' plots. You even see dozens of different expressions of art--a game can be cartoony like Paper Mario 2, realistic and dark like the Fallout series, obnoxiously colorful like Chrono Cross, so anime it hurts like the Tales of series, pleasantly simple and pale like Breath of Fire 4, and so on. You just plain find all kinds of stuff in RPGs.
It is thus somewhat surprising to me that the genre is extremely homogeneous as far as race goes. Fact of the matter is, the extreme majority of RPG characters, villains, and NPCs are Caucasians. You do see a few Asians, but that's about it. There are very, very few people with darker skin in these games, and those that do exist are found by and large in North American RPGs, like Fallout and Mass Effect. RPGs that come from Japan (which is to say, almost all RPGs) very, very rarely show any racial diversity. Heck, you get far more humanoids of fantasy races like dwarves and elves (all Caucasian ones, of course) than you do of regular humans with different skin color. I can quite literally off the top of my head think of more centaur party members I've seen in RPGs than I can black people.* And are there ANY Hispanic RPG characters at all? I'm certainly having trouble coming up with one.
The other problem with this issue is that, with the Japanese RPGs, the few characters of different races shown are often callously stereotypical. I mean, let's face it, even if he had some modestly okay character development, Barret in Final Fantasy 7 is a Mr. T knock-off. And Natan in Shadow Hearts 3 is about as generic a Native American as can be imagined, from what his limited and lackluster dialog would indicate.** And if they're not mildly offensive stereotypes, the ethnic characters are usually just mild and unimportant--Kiros from Final Fantasy 8's a sidekick of a side character who's most memorable for interpreting someone else's eye blinking, and General Hauser from Suikoden 2 takes the backseat to pretty much all of the other military leaders and strategists in the game, for examples.
Now, the simplest explanation for this is that Japan by and large has a homogeneous population. Pretty much everyone over there is either Asian or Caucasian; it's very rare to see a person of any other ethnicity (or so I'm told by my friend Jolt, who's the best expert on Japan I know). What exposure the Japanese media gives to people who are different also often reinforces stereotypes (again, from what I'm told by Jolt, although I've read some online articles about the subject that corroborate this). So the Japanese who create these RPGs most likely don't have much exposure to various ethnic groups, and what experience they do have with them may not be good for breaking stereotypes.
The problem I have with this excuse, though, is that Japanese RPGs by and large are still founded in Western ideas and culture. You get European ideas dominating the games' bestiaries, weapons and armor, locations and worlds' general looks, names, and character designs. There's a significant amount of Japanese culture mixed in, sure, and plenty of games are clearly inspired almost entirely by that, but by and large, the genre started with its foundations in Western myths and history, and regardless of how much it's branched out, it's still significantly based around ideas and implements of Western societies. So if they're looking to other cultures for ideas, they should be getting at least enough of a glimpse of them to have the idea to throw in a few more ethnically diverse characters.
Now, this isn't to say that Japan never does well with this, or even that North American RPGs always do. I may have criticized Suikoden 2 for Hauser's insignificant role, but the Suikoden series as a whole makes a solid effort to have some racial diversity--Suikoden 3 has several characters from the dark-skinned, tribal Grasslander clans join up with you--a few of which are significant and important characters, and one of which is actually one of the three protagonists (canonically THE protagonist, for that matter). That's certainly a step in the right direction. Final Fantasy Tactics has Rafa and Malak, who, if not terribly important characters, are still fairly significant and get decent characterization. Gallows from Wild Arms 3 is an excellent character whose Native American-based heritage works FOR his characterization, giving him a strong basis for his development (his attempts to escape his overbearing destiny as dictated by his culture, leading to his eventual acceptance of it) while not limiting him to some cheap stereotype--pretty much the exact opposite of one of my previous examples, Natan. And by contrast, Shadowrun SNES, which was made by an Australian game company and was based on a North American pen-and-paper RPG, contains a black character named Jangadance, who is a superstitious, pistol-toting, laid-back Jamaican, and a Native American character named Dances with Clams, who wears a headdress, seems to speak with deliberation, likes to talk about spirits, and basically looks like every Native American chief stereotype you've ever seen. That more or less counts as a Western RPG perpetuating stereotypes as badly as any Japanese RPG might, I reckon. Still, these are more or less just exceptions to a trend.
So yeah. RPGs are pretty varied in general, and their creators are more often than not making stories containing many elements founded in Western culture, so the racial inequality of RPG characters just seems odd to me. C'mon, RPG makers, stop letting The Man keep a brother down!***
* To be fair, almost all these centaurs come from Shining Force games, since RPGs in general stupidly don't have many centaurs, but even still.
** Shania, another Native American from the same game, doesn't set any records for originality, either, but with her it's more just her lacking any personality, stereotypical or not, so it doesn't count.
*** I apologize if this is offensive. I am whiter than a cotton swab dipped in vanilla icing left in the snow, so it's hard for me to gauge.
It is thus somewhat surprising to me that the genre is extremely homogeneous as far as race goes. Fact of the matter is, the extreme majority of RPG characters, villains, and NPCs are Caucasians. You do see a few Asians, but that's about it. There are very, very few people with darker skin in these games, and those that do exist are found by and large in North American RPGs, like Fallout and Mass Effect. RPGs that come from Japan (which is to say, almost all RPGs) very, very rarely show any racial diversity. Heck, you get far more humanoids of fantasy races like dwarves and elves (all Caucasian ones, of course) than you do of regular humans with different skin color. I can quite literally off the top of my head think of more centaur party members I've seen in RPGs than I can black people.* And are there ANY Hispanic RPG characters at all? I'm certainly having trouble coming up with one.
The other problem with this issue is that, with the Japanese RPGs, the few characters of different races shown are often callously stereotypical. I mean, let's face it, even if he had some modestly okay character development, Barret in Final Fantasy 7 is a Mr. T knock-off. And Natan in Shadow Hearts 3 is about as generic a Native American as can be imagined, from what his limited and lackluster dialog would indicate.** And if they're not mildly offensive stereotypes, the ethnic characters are usually just mild and unimportant--Kiros from Final Fantasy 8's a sidekick of a side character who's most memorable for interpreting someone else's eye blinking, and General Hauser from Suikoden 2 takes the backseat to pretty much all of the other military leaders and strategists in the game, for examples.
Now, the simplest explanation for this is that Japan by and large has a homogeneous population. Pretty much everyone over there is either Asian or Caucasian; it's very rare to see a person of any other ethnicity (or so I'm told by my friend Jolt, who's the best expert on Japan I know). What exposure the Japanese media gives to people who are different also often reinforces stereotypes (again, from what I'm told by Jolt, although I've read some online articles about the subject that corroborate this). So the Japanese who create these RPGs most likely don't have much exposure to various ethnic groups, and what experience they do have with them may not be good for breaking stereotypes.
The problem I have with this excuse, though, is that Japanese RPGs by and large are still founded in Western ideas and culture. You get European ideas dominating the games' bestiaries, weapons and armor, locations and worlds' general looks, names, and character designs. There's a significant amount of Japanese culture mixed in, sure, and plenty of games are clearly inspired almost entirely by that, but by and large, the genre started with its foundations in Western myths and history, and regardless of how much it's branched out, it's still significantly based around ideas and implements of Western societies. So if they're looking to other cultures for ideas, they should be getting at least enough of a glimpse of them to have the idea to throw in a few more ethnically diverse characters.
Now, this isn't to say that Japan never does well with this, or even that North American RPGs always do. I may have criticized Suikoden 2 for Hauser's insignificant role, but the Suikoden series as a whole makes a solid effort to have some racial diversity--Suikoden 3 has several characters from the dark-skinned, tribal Grasslander clans join up with you--a few of which are significant and important characters, and one of which is actually one of the three protagonists (canonically THE protagonist, for that matter). That's certainly a step in the right direction. Final Fantasy Tactics has Rafa and Malak, who, if not terribly important characters, are still fairly significant and get decent characterization. Gallows from Wild Arms 3 is an excellent character whose Native American-based heritage works FOR his characterization, giving him a strong basis for his development (his attempts to escape his overbearing destiny as dictated by his culture, leading to his eventual acceptance of it) while not limiting him to some cheap stereotype--pretty much the exact opposite of one of my previous examples, Natan. And by contrast, Shadowrun SNES, which was made by an Australian game company and was based on a North American pen-and-paper RPG, contains a black character named Jangadance, who is a superstitious, pistol-toting, laid-back Jamaican, and a Native American character named Dances with Clams, who wears a headdress, seems to speak with deliberation, likes to talk about spirits, and basically looks like every Native American chief stereotype you've ever seen. That more or less counts as a Western RPG perpetuating stereotypes as badly as any Japanese RPG might, I reckon. Still, these are more or less just exceptions to a trend.
So yeah. RPGs are pretty varied in general, and their creators are more often than not making stories containing many elements founded in Western culture, so the racial inequality of RPG characters just seems odd to me. C'mon, RPG makers, stop letting The Man keep a brother down!***
* To be fair, almost all these centaurs come from Shining Force games, since RPGs in general stupidly don't have many centaurs, but even still.
** Shania, another Native American from the same game, doesn't set any records for originality, either, but with her it's more just her lacking any personality, stereotypical or not, so it doesn't count.
*** I apologize if this is offensive. I am whiter than a cotton swab dipped in vanilla icing left in the snow, so it's hard for me to gauge.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Tales of Symphonia's Characters
Lloyd: As per Anime Law for any hero who is not seriously psychologically damaged, the hero of the game is a good-natured, moral, yet utterly moronic simpleton. I'm really starting to wonder about Japan, at this point. Does it just never occur to them to try starring a character who is both sane and relatively smart?
Colette: In a small twist of character development that is about as close to originality as this game gets, the main hero's love interest is actually just about as nice-but-dumb as he is. Whether it's natural as with Lloyd, or simply brain damage as a result of all the clumsy accidents she has, is hard to determine. Either way, though, clearly a match made in heaven.
Genis: "Gasp! My new friend has betrayed my trust! I feel such a conflict of loyalty now--should I side with my honest and caring friends and family, half of whom I've known all my life, or with the manipulative traitor that I met about an hour ago? I CAN'T POSSIBLY DECIDE!"
Presea: Once her 10 minutes of plot are over, they're over. Frankly, you'd think that the game could get a lot of mileage out of an adult woman trapped in a super-strong child's body whose growth was stinted by a magical doohickey that also robbed her of her free will and personality for several years, leaving her alone and a temporally-misplaced freak of nature, but...they don't really seem to bother. After a little bit of remorse over her dad having died while she was zombie-ing it up, her only real role to play is just taking part in another character's development.
Regal: A backstory that's way lamer than it should be makes the only notable part of this character his fighting style--basically, he vowed to never use his hands to fight anybody, so he only uses various kicks and such in battle. That sounds kind of neat and all, but honestly, I gotta say, if you're in dangerous combat where the lives of you and your friends, as well as the freedom of millions and that of future generations, are on the line, it seems a little stupid to purposefully hold back.
Sheena: Much like Chisato in Star Ocean 2, Sheena has a strange kind of appeal as a character just by being a fairly normal and non-annoying character that makes her my favorite here. It's not that she's a good character per say--it's more just that she's really the only one that isn't a bad character.
Raine: For a character with a crapload of exposition, Raine doesn't have a whole lot of personality. When not fulfilling the role of "Character Who Is Knowledgeable About And Likes To Explain Plot Stuff," Raine's only real distinguishing trait is a mania for archeology. It's not even portrayed well enough to be as humorous as it should be (and that's not much); she never gets into enough detail or mumbles enough history about the ruins she's studying that you actually buy it. Will from Tales of Legendia's obsession with animal physiology is a much better execution of the same joke.
Kratos: Congratulations, Tales of Symphonia, on creating the most average Swordsman character of all time.
Zelos: You know your game's in trouble when the deepest character in it is a shallow playboy.*
Mithos: Y'know, I love my sisters a lot. But I have to say that if one of them died, I wouldn't split the world in half and create a military religious order that controls and enslaves countless people of other races, ruining their lives and their descendants' lives for centuries, with the intention of finding a human sacrifice through which to revive my sister. Maybe I'm just a bad brother, though.
* Final Fantasy 9 notwithstanding. Although Zidane isn't a shallow playboy to begin with, so it doesn't qualify anyhow.
Colette: In a small twist of character development that is about as close to originality as this game gets, the main hero's love interest is actually just about as nice-but-dumb as he is. Whether it's natural as with Lloyd, or simply brain damage as a result of all the clumsy accidents she has, is hard to determine. Either way, though, clearly a match made in heaven.
Genis: "Gasp! My new friend has betrayed my trust! I feel such a conflict of loyalty now--should I side with my honest and caring friends and family, half of whom I've known all my life, or with the manipulative traitor that I met about an hour ago? I CAN'T POSSIBLY DECIDE!"
Presea: Once her 10 minutes of plot are over, they're over. Frankly, you'd think that the game could get a lot of mileage out of an adult woman trapped in a super-strong child's body whose growth was stinted by a magical doohickey that also robbed her of her free will and personality for several years, leaving her alone and a temporally-misplaced freak of nature, but...they don't really seem to bother. After a little bit of remorse over her dad having died while she was zombie-ing it up, her only real role to play is just taking part in another character's development.
Regal: A backstory that's way lamer than it should be makes the only notable part of this character his fighting style--basically, he vowed to never use his hands to fight anybody, so he only uses various kicks and such in battle. That sounds kind of neat and all, but honestly, I gotta say, if you're in dangerous combat where the lives of you and your friends, as well as the freedom of millions and that of future generations, are on the line, it seems a little stupid to purposefully hold back.
Sheena: Much like Chisato in Star Ocean 2, Sheena has a strange kind of appeal as a character just by being a fairly normal and non-annoying character that makes her my favorite here. It's not that she's a good character per say--it's more just that she's really the only one that isn't a bad character.
Raine: For a character with a crapload of exposition, Raine doesn't have a whole lot of personality. When not fulfilling the role of "Character Who Is Knowledgeable About And Likes To Explain Plot Stuff," Raine's only real distinguishing trait is a mania for archeology. It's not even portrayed well enough to be as humorous as it should be (and that's not much); she never gets into enough detail or mumbles enough history about the ruins she's studying that you actually buy it. Will from Tales of Legendia's obsession with animal physiology is a much better execution of the same joke.
Kratos: Congratulations, Tales of Symphonia, on creating the most average Swordsman character of all time.
Zelos: You know your game's in trouble when the deepest character in it is a shallow playboy.*
Mithos: Y'know, I love my sisters a lot. But I have to say that if one of them died, I wouldn't split the world in half and create a military religious order that controls and enslaves countless people of other races, ruining their lives and their descendants' lives for centuries, with the intention of finding a human sacrifice through which to revive my sister. Maybe I'm just a bad brother, though.
* Final Fantasy 9 notwithstanding. Although Zidane isn't a shallow playboy to begin with, so it doesn't qualify anyhow.
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