RPG Discussion (Formerly; Earthbound or Chrono Trigger?)

[Omegajak]

Everyone knows the TRUE ending is the one where Marle and Lucca go through all the male supporting cast and rate their sex appeal, and Chrono actually talks. Either that, or that awesome ending where Frog goes after Magus.


But you're still missing the point here:

legend of mana~

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF---i love that game to death.

The most creative Mana game ever. Few wonder how we go to the most non-nonsensical terms of a plot that leads everything to a unified conclusion, to Dawn of Mana quite possible the most un-fun Mana ever.

[DioShiba]

again, have you even PLAYED ff6

Actually you are quite right I never played 6 because the whole premise of it was the same fucking thing as past games.

Again, the whole concept got old during 5-6. Admittingly however, I was somewhat interested in FF7 when I first heard of it, but that ended up being an overhyped game with the same gameplay and concept, everything was just modernized a bit.

I don't understand your point.

You're saying that they all have the same gameplay and whatever, but that's the whole point. FF11, FF12, and FF14 aside, all of them are turn-based RPGs. It's sort of a given that they'd all play similarly.

not to mention that 6 isn't the same premise so um what???????????

Because 1-6 was the same damn thing over and over again base upon looks?

I can understand where all of them are pretty much the same gameplay. But I wasn't just talking about that. I was saying that 1-6's plot and concept got old, I didn't even bother to finish 5 because I simply got bored of it, and I never got 6 because it was the same game, with better looks.

Kind of why 7 got rid of the whole job system and tried to aim for a better plot, It didn't make it the best FF out there but it sure as hell made the series a little more bearable to play, same with 8-10 and after that I just stopped caring for the series waiting for an entirely newer FF that involved so much more the ether of those things.

Don't get me wrong here, but I honestly don't believe that 6 is the best RPG of all time, it just seems like another dungeons and dragons straight on to video games.

[Gors]

I remember getting frustrated at FF4 because I could defeat monsters thrice as tall as the characters but got owned by girls.

I'm not saying that girls aren't capable of doing such task; I just wish the programmers had more logic when giving stats to the enemies.

Because I believe that huge monsters are stronger than humans‽‽

[Ton]

ITT: people who don't know Final Fantasy games.

FF1-3 was exploring and defining the genre. They were experiments, if anything. FF4 was the first game to have a story on an epic scope. The characters were given traits, and the story had a strong narrative. FF2 has characters in the narrowest sense, and FF3 had the start of storytelling, but FF4 used them both to make a fantastic game.
When you talk about the job system, I'm not sure you're clear on what it is. Jobs were used in FF3, then FF5. Your character had their stats altered based on the class they became. Those were the only two games to use that system before FFX-2, so your claim that FF7 did away with the job system is incorrect. It hadn't been used since FF6 and was brought back later. What FF7 did was get rid of any uniqueness to the characters. FF6 had special skills, and FF7 allowed you to have shells that could all do the same thing. FF8 was worse in this respect. FF9 brought back specialized characters, and FF10 did away with it again.
As for the "tired of medieval setting" claim, that was mostly done away with in FF4. FF5 was almost a parody of it and FF6 was one of the first examples of steampunk.
FF7 did NOT have a better plot. The parts that aren't rewritten from FF6 are incomprehensible. Te golden age of Final Fantasy was the SNES era, 4-6, with 6 being the best in the series (imo). From there, things started to fall apart. 7-10 were varying degrees of good to great and the series has started to degrade in recent years, becoming more generic, convoluted, and pedantic.

tl;dr version- everything you like about FF7 was done better in FF4-6.

[water dog]

ITT: people who don't know Final Fantasy games.

FF1-3 was exploring and defining the genre. They were experiments, if anything. FF4 was the first game to have a story on an epic scope. The characters were given traits, and the story had a strong narrative. FF2 has characters in the narrowest sense, and FF3 had the start of storytelling, but FF4 used them both to make a fantastic game.
When you talk about the job system, I'm not sure you're clear on what it is. Jobs were used in FF3, then FF5. Your character had their stats altered based on the class they became. Those were the only two games to use that system before FFX-2, so your claim that FF7 did away with the job system is incorrect. It hadn't been used since FF6 and was brought back later. What FF7 did was get rid of any uniqueness to the characters. FF6 had special skills, and FF7 allowed you to have shells that could all do the same thing. FF8 was worse in this respect. FF9 brought back specialized characters, and FF10 did away with it again.
As for the "tired of medieval setting" claim, that was mostly done away with in FF4. FF5 was almost a parody of it and FF6 was one of the first examples of steampunk.
FF7 did NOT have a better plot. The parts that aren't rewritten from FF6 are incomprehensible. Te golden age of Final Fantasy was the SNES era, 4-6, with 6 being the best in the series (imo). From there, things started to fall apart. 7-10 were varying degrees of good to great and the series has started to degrade in recent years, becoming more generic, convoluted, and pedantic.

tl;dr version- everything you like about FF7 was done better in FF4-6.

thanks post, unthanks, thanks again while trying to aim for multiple thanks, fails at getting multiple thanks, replies to post

i would like to add to your ending statement though
"everything you like about FF7 was done better in FF4-6, and then FF9 basically took everything good from FF4-6 and used them in light of FF7 and FF8 lacking heavily and ultimately brought back the great things about FF and then 10 ruined it. then 11 brought it back but ruined it by being an MMO. then 12 was just, i dont even know. then 13 did something nice but still failed to realize the old way was better. then 14. 14."

your post is still very correct and i love you for posting it :- )

[Ultimecia]

I did a small analysis of FFI for one of my college subjects and it was surprisingly more significant than meets the eye, but you have to know where to look at. But the story itself was swallow, at best.
FFII got characters, some small depth of character, even deceased party members (YEARS before Aeris. Oh, and some years after that and long before FF7 people used to talk about resurrecting Phantasy Star II's Nei and Phantasy Star IV's Alys). The level up system was a good idea in the paper, but not what looks cool in the paper can become a good gameplay. Upon training you can turn your "mage" into a "fighter" so it really don't have jobs.
FFIII characters' personality was ditched, but the story was much deeper. Now you can change your jobs, and there's around 30 of them, all with unique proprieties, abilities, equips and graphics. Even for today's standards it's a customization system that deserves some respect.
FFIV was the first game to have a complete storyline. It was heavily based on Campbell's "The Hero's Journey" (or monomyth), the same source as Star Wars (that's why people says FF4 is so much like SW, both are like visual guides for it). The jobs are exclusive to each character, like in FFI. Cecil's personality grows during the game, something that a certain spike-head could use.
FFV they decided to be the last story to trust heavily on the crystals, so they got all the 'classic' elements (Crystals, Jobs) and made it. Think of it as a humorous version of FF3, but with less jobs and remarkable characters.
FFVI was pure streampunk. Heavy machines, experiments, a war of magic of yore, magic is now sealed and forbidden.... Unique characters are back. FFVII was SUPPOSED to be FFVI sequel, but because some disagreements with Nintendo, Square moved to the Playstation. All the streampunk and "unique" atmosphere of FFVII exists thanks to FFVI.
FFVII got a good story? ...Depends. The world itself is interesting, but Sephiroth didn't had a personality until Crisis Core (he was just a maniacal killing machine calling for his mommy). Aeris' death was a cheap plot device to keep the plot going (if you pay attention the party isn't so keen on finding Sephiroth until she dies) and cheap shock factor. The main character himself is an hindrance (you do many cooler stuff when he's OUT of the party). And the party itself is more like people just hanging out together than friends. They got common objectives, so let's help each other! Only after the sacrificial lamb did her job they start becoming a party. Good for industries and JRPGs, but as a game itself is overrated IMO.
FFVIII got a really BIG problem: you got to read all Timber Maniac issues through the Help menu, talk to EVERYBODY and put 1+1 and getting 4 or 5 sometimes. The real plot is hidden, so unless you read, for example, about the side-effects of the G.F. at the Glossary or who in the heck is Hymne, you can feel...Lost. The Draw system is a drag, if I was one of the producers I'd allow the players to buy "packs" of magic, not only the draw points. It DOES have one explanation, but you got to read the glossary (d'oh!).
FFIX's first project was going to be really different: by equipping summons you could access different jobs, like Bahamut for dragooner, so all characters would access every job, much like FF3 and FF5. For some reason the project was canned and they made a new game. That's really unfortunate, it sounded like it was going to be some sort of FF1 sequel (they even had the classical Garland!). I hated that 'you learn abilities from the weapons you have!', what a pain. But everything else was very much from the games FF1 to FF5: Crystals and their guardian Fiends (FF1 and FF2), a crazy monarch with perchance for destruction (FF2), a BFG of mass destruction (FF2 too), people from another planet sleeping (FF4) and so on. The only bad idea was the giant flea from outer space, I think it was a plot from the original FFIX that they forgot to reconnect.
FFX was like FFVI in a sense: FFIX was to break from the traditional mold and FFX was trying to make something anew. It worked, and it still had many classical elements on it. FFX-2 was one big experiment, it failed on the J-Pop and GIRL POWERRRRR! factor, but I guess they were trying to aim to casual Japanese gamers or just plain fanservice
FFXI...Haven't played it, but it borrows story elements from the classic series (crystal plotline, jobs) and some new stuff (like Gods)
FFXII... To speak the truth I hated it. The characters are annoying (except for Balthier and Barsch) and the system is...Well, don't get me started. It tries so hard to make it dramatic that all I want is to laugh, and the system tries to mimicks the MMORPGs. If I wanted to play MMORPG, I'd try Lineage or WoW
FFXIII...I have just started, the story seems deep, the characters aren't that bad but the fighting system so far is a joke (got 5 hours, still LOTS to go). Again, FF12 was "back to roots" (in a sense) and FF13 was a departure.

[TomGuycott]

I see a lot of you criticizing FF6 for being more of the same, and I'm one of those people who loves FF6 and I'd disagree with you to the grave about why you're positively wrong (in my opinion), but that's not why I'm here right now. There's something that a lot of you don't seem to put into the same perspective that I do, probably because of my age and US residence, and that's the order that these games were introduced to me and many other people.

1990: Release of Final Fantasy in North America on the NES
1991: Release of Final Fantasy IV, relabeled Final Fantasy II in North America on the SNES
1994: Release of Final Fantasy VI, relabeled as Final Fantasy III in North America on the SNES

So for me, it was simple swords and sorcery RPG, to more advanced swords and sorcery RPG with a more colorful cast, better graphics, and a more in-depth storyline where characters get killed off, and then finally an awesome, best graphics out of the three steampunk storyline filled with gritty, yet at the same time colorful characters trying to stop a war between machine-toting man and magic wielding beast.

Here's the reason I like VI the most in concise terms:

-Enormous playable cast
-Steampunk magic-technology
-Darker story elements (See poisoning of Doma)
-Awesome character abilities (RAGE!)
-Menagerie of summoned beasts
-Kefka
-Original and best Ultima Weapon
-Multi-party Dungeons
-Shadow
-Ability to lose characters based on your actions (Both NPC and Playable)
-Ultros
-Magi-tek Armor
-The world ends and you have to keep going
-Linear JRPG becomes less linear, western style RPG
-Searching the world for your lost comrades
-Optional, difficult boss battles
-Hidden characters

I got the most value out of Final Fantasy VI than I did out of any other game, and I still love playing it. In fact, the only SNES RPG that held a candle to it was Chrono Trigger.

Hey, didn't this thread used to be about Earthbound and Chrono Trigger? You guys remember that? Those were the days.

[SKELTON S. SKELETON]

ff7 is actually a good game

[Vipershark]

again, have you even PLAYED ff6

Actually you are quite right I never played 6 because the whole premise of it was the same fucking thing as past games.

Again, the whole concept got old during 5-6. Admittingly however, I was somewhat interested in FF7 when I first heard of it, but that ended up being an overhyped game with the same gameplay and concept, everything was just modernized a bit.

I don't understand your point.

You're saying that they all have the same gameplay and whatever, but that's the whole point. FF11, FF12, and FF14 aside, all of them are turn-based RPGs. It's sort of a given that they'd all play similarly.

not to mention that 6 isn't the same premise so um what???????????

Because 1-6 was the same damn thing over and over again base upon looks?

I can understand where all of them are pretty much the same gameplay. But I wasn't just talking about that. I was saying that 1-6's plot and concept got old, I didn't even bother to finish 5 because I simply got bored of it, and I never got 6 because it was the same game, with better looks.

Kind of why 7 got rid of the whole job system and tried to aim for a better plot, It didn't make it the best FF out there but it sure as hell made the series a little more bearable to play, same with 8-10 and after that I just stopped caring for the series waiting for an entirely newer FF that involved so much more the ether of those things.

Don't get me wrong here, but I honestly don't believe that 6 is the best RPG of all time, it just seems like another dungeons and dragons straight on to video games.

> Because 1-6 was the same damn thing over and over again based upon looks?

Your argument is moot within the first sentence.
FF6 is literally completely different than FF1-5. It's not just a generic knights and dragons story with a graphical update; the entire game is so far above and beyond 1-4 that I can't even compare them.

Maybe you should actually play it instead of knocking it with no knowledge of what it actually is? If anything, FF6 is closer in terms of feel and story to FF7 and FF8 than it is to FF1-5.

Also the Job system is gone in FF6.

[Cobalt Blue]

you know, most people get to love ff6 over anything else because it was p much the first Final Fantasy game they tried. and while i said its a great game on its own merit, the whole FF franchise got really old after it for those who played the previous ones.

it shouldn't surprise you that square had to create other franchises to actually try new stuff and experiment new concepts, considered how much FF depends on its own traits and gimmicks in order to still be a FF game.

i'd pick legend of mana or chronno trigger over any FF, any day.

[JackMan]

I assume that the Final Fantasy has no real connection to various sequels.
But then again, I've never played any of them, so...

[water dog]

I hated that 'you learn abilities from the weapons you have!', what a pain.

uhh thats actually one of the best ability systems ive ever seen, though it owuld work better in an MMO.

FFXI...Haven't played it, but it borrows story elements from the classic series (crystal plotline, jobs) and some new stuff (like Gods)

lemme help you here

FFXI was made in conjunction with IX and X (tey were all being developed at the same time). FFIX was meant to go back to FFs roots before they continued to make more sci-fi garbage, FFX was meant to be the foundation for what they would be going for with future FFs, and XI was meant to be an MMO... which it was. FFXI, much like IX, touches back at the roots with having a very medieval feel with significantly more technological advancements. At first the plot was very bare-bones and yawn inducing but with the release of Rise of the Zilarts, the world was expanded so much more explaining all the odd structures you find while adventuring around the world and setting the basis for all the apocalypse stirring events. Chains of Promathea is proclaimed by players to have one of the best stories in FF history, it legitimately makes you feel like you have averted the apocalypse without throwing you in the position of the chosen one. Treasures of Aht Urgan and Wings of the Goddess were made more of expanding content (since CoP didn't add much content other than a GREAT story) but had cute little stories with them as well. WotG's cut scenes are beautiful though.

FFXIII...I have just started, the story seems deep, the characters aren't that bad but the fighting system so far is a joke (got 5 hours, still LOTS to go). Again, FF12 was "back to roots" (in a sense) and FF13 was a departure.

The characters are made pretty shallow on purpose-- Lightning is made cold and distant because...

Spoiler

... she develops her character along with Hope. Hope is shallow as well-- after seeing his mother die before his eyes he becomes a blind revenge machine. Yawn. Lightning and Hope become interesting characters when they are forced together. Lightning begins notice how much Hope is now like her and recognizes how stupid it is to act as a cold avenger. Slowly but surely she convinces Hope as well as herself that they need to let go of what was taken form them and become legitimate people with legitimate feelings. It's actually really cute, and at first I hated Lightning and Hope as characters but now they are 2 of my favorites.

That being said, Lightning was meant to be the female counterpart of Cloud, and she was at first. But she did the one thing Cloud failed to do-- develop any sort of character.

[Omegajak]

you know, most people get to love ff6 over anything else because it was p much the first Final Fantasy game they tried. and while i said its a great game on its own merit, the whole FF franchise got really old after it for those who played the previous ones.

it shouldn't surprise you that square had to create other franchises to actually try new stuff and experiment new concepts, considered how much FF depends on its own traits and gimmicks in order to still be a FF game.

i'd pick legend of mana or chronno trigger over any FF, any day.

I think the opinion of anyone who claims whatever number is their favorite was the first they played and you know what they say: "You never forget your first"

My argument to this topic I now dub the RPG Wars, is that all of the titles up til' 7 had very good constructs and base. In terms of battle, Job system, and plot? War of the Lions has pretty much all current released Squarenix games beat.

[Vipershark]

believe it or not, ff6 was actually the LAST ff game I played.

I still think it's better than all of the 2D ones, and good enough to contend with the 3D ones.

[Alpha Six]

a lot of people really hate the FF8 storyline because it's confusing as fuck but

http://squallsdead.com/
this """""""""""""""theory""""""""""""""" suggests that squall actually dies in disc 1, which explains the confusing turn of events in disc 2

and when i read further into it, it sounds crazy but... it actually makes sense