Old school vs. New school Final Fantasy

[Guest Coffey]

You mean U.S. 2 and 3.

 

Otherwise known in the "true" Final Fantasy scheme as 4 and 6.

I guess you just proved your vast Final Fantasy knowledge over my weak, feeble mind. Obviously everyone must have been so confused as to the point that I was driving home. Thank you, my savior, for blessing us all with your intellect and clearing up the confusion.

 

 

Spoiler (Highlight to Read):

That was sarcasm. Basically, I'm saying you're a cake by trying to show off fucking Final Fantasy knowledge.

Edited September 22, 2003 by Mr. Jag0

[AndrewTS 0]

My reply to Sakura: Complete with some PERSONAL BIASES and maybe some BITCHING!

 

Reasons FF VII is god: Complete with SPOILERS

 

1. Cloud is the original FF angst filled lead character and angst filled lead characters are cool. His look, with the goofy spiked hair and his hoss sword are cool.

 

I mistook him for a walking bundle of cliches with no originality whatsoever. If I wanted angst I'd listen to emo. As for the sword, he's...um...overcompensating.

 

By the way, this cool badass character was easily mistaken for a young girl when he dressed in drag. What a MAHNLY MAHN!

 

2. Aeris is the cliche sweet and innocent girl character, but her death is really well done and not at all funny. Also it is cool that in the end her death is what saves the planet.

 

The cinema looked way too lame to take seriously to me. Note you admitted yourself that she's cliche. Terra had a little struggle coping with her half-humanity and had a cool transformation power.

 

Oh, and Phantasy Star IV pulled off the "shocking death" WAY better, in my humble opinion.

 

3. Barrett is Mr. T with a chain gun. That owns.

 

Three cheers for ripped-off character designs with slightly racist overtones!

 

I won't blame Square Japan, because maybe before the localization team got their hands on it he wasn't a jibber-jabberin' foo.

 

4. Cid is funny and a badass. His ranting on Shera is entertaining no matter how many times I play through the game.

 

I'll conceed this point. I'd rather him have been the main character than Cloud.

 

5. Cait Sith is the best comic relief/weird character design EVER MADE. You cannot beat a cape and crown wearing cat on top of a stuffed mog. He is so cute and adorable I wish I owned one. What's even better and weirder is that he is actually relevent the story and even turns heel for a bit. Cats rule so he automatically is incredible.

 

I've already admitted I like Cait Sith, but I don't think he's the best comedy character. Currently I'd pick a Norimaru, Chop-Chop, B.B. Hood, etc. After all, Cait didn't actually do much that was funny, it was mainly the appearance.

 

Oh, and "on top of a stuffed MOOGLE!" Mog is the Moogle in FFIII(US). I don't know or care what the original Japanese titles had them called. They're moogles to me.

 

6. Shinra is the most badass stable of villains in gaming. You've got Rufus, Reeve and Rude in one group. Heidegger and Palmer round it out(pun intended) with some memorable comedy.

 

The Turks are a little subdivision of the Gods of Silk. I don't care to list any other badass stable of villians, but they are a bright point of the game automatically for threatening to rape and kill Yuffie.

 

7. Sephiroth is the original angst filled FF villain and still the best. Angst + bishonen = cool. He has a cool outfit and the coolest music. Final boss form is one of my all time favorite boss fights in gaming.

 

Angst + bishonen = cool? Bullshit. Try telling that to the gamers who crapped all over Raiden in MGS2. However, they're popular with the fangirls. The "haunting Sephiroth" theme is great for providing atmosphere. The rest is your opinion which I won't dispute.

 

8. Memorable cities. Junon, Midgar, the Golden Saucer, are all really awesome. Like I can remember every town and location fondly, unlike a lot of games where I forget them and get them mudeled up while still playing the game.

 

Okay, that's a good point. Although it really isn't too much of a big deal because of the linear nature, but if the towns were more memorable in older RPGs (not just older FinFantasies), knowing where you need to go would be much easier.

 

9. Excellent soundtrack. So many tunes that I love. Not as good as VIII's though and the quality could have been better.

 

Okay, agreed about the soundtrack being good, which I've already admitted to. Hardware differences obviously lead to that, natch.

 

10. Simple fighting system, but has a lot of room for experimentation and tons of stuff to use.

 

Since the systems are virtually identical in most of the games, this is a non-factor. However, only three characters are controllable in battle for FFVII.

 

11. The game is easy and doesn't require hours and hours of leveling up like some old school games.

 

I rarely had to fight to level up only in the older games--usually to find a secret item/break a curse. I rarely skipped fights though. However, leveling up is a tedious process so there's a decent point there.

 

I agree about Kain/Cecil, incidentally.

 

Why are angst ridden whiny characters cool? They're the kind of people I want to slap in real life and tell to grow up.

Why can't they be...you know....heroic? Why can't they be brave and not have all these teenage problems?

 

That's "character depth," don'tcha know?

[chaosrage 0]

Because the death scenes sure as hell didn't make me laugh in FFVII.

 

Watching one Precious Moments figure have the polygons of his sword enter the polygonal model of the other character, and watching the saccharine Aerith plop over dead while a piece of glass (white materia--whatever) falls out of her eye, and goes "dink...dink" bouncing into the water wasn't hilarious? At least the FFVI deaths didn't give you close ups of the action to see how hokey the sprites looked.

Cloud: My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning!

 

If you didn't laugh at that, you have no sense of humor.

[chaosrage 0]

I hate FF4 because it tried to get over on the plot and the characters, but the plot and the characters all sucked.  All the characters were cardboard cutouts with no depth to them at all.  Why am I supposed to care when undeveloped characters sacrifice themselves to save other undeveloped characters? 

 

FF4's had depth. Unless you only played the easy type where all the depth was taken out, but that's FF2US, not FF4. You knew what each character was about, their motivations, their goals, how they changed, how they felt about everything.

 

Did you say you liked FF7? How is FF7 any different? Look at them. Cloud was a schizophrenic with a big sword who went from a tough guy to a tough guy with a bit of self questioning. Aeris was happy all the time, and that's.. her entire character. Barret was just Mr. T, along with some shallow attempts at cheesy introspection Tifa was just there, she never changed at all, even though she should have been more pissed at Sephiroth than anybody in the game. The other characters were pretty much cliched non-entities. FF6 was the only FF game with really awesomely developed characters. Although even that still had the standard rebels vs evil empire plot.

 

FF4 didn't have a complex story, but it's fantasy, so I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. FF7 crumbled under its own weight.

 

The only characters I liked were unplayable (Golbez and Fu So Ya), and instead of using Golbez as a villian, they used the retarded "God of Hate" that you hadn't even seen until the very end.  Yuck. 

 

At least you've got Golbez for all of the game up right until the end. Unlike Kefka who you don't even see in the second half. Hell, you don't even have any villains at all from the time WOR starts and you get to Kefka's tower. The plot just stops dead.

 

The gameplay was terrible too, since you had no freedom whatsoever.  They always told you what to do and who to use, which felt horribly constraining after FF1, where you could choose your party and, after beating Lich, do things in whatever order you wanted. 

Not having any freedom is a good thing. Because then you can't turn your characters into super gods. FF4 was a lot better than FF6, FF7, or FF8 in strategy since with them every character could do everything and it's way too easy to and get the strongest guys with the best attack and cure spells. Bleh. It's pretty silly when you have Gau and Sabin pumping out ultima spells. You actually had to improvise in FF4 because your party kept changing and every character had limits on what they could do.

 

All RPGs are linear after the NES era, so that's not a big deal. Except for Saga Frontier, and we know how that turned out.

 

And the mangled prototype ATB was an important step towards the beauty of real ATB, but was so badly done that it's worse than turn based battle.

 

They didn't mangle it until FF6 when they took away the time to cast magic. I mean, you shouldn't be able to conjure up Ultima just as quick as you could a potion. What the hell is that? ATB felt like it was slower too.

[chaosrage 0]

Squall is the best character like ever. I love him. The angst is cool

 

::sound of jaw hitting keyboard::

 

Again, look at the hyped up Cecil/Kain stuff. This story is hyped as this epic saga and it's really like Kain turns heel and Cecil is like "nooooo~!" and then the scene is over. There's no depth, no emotion, it's like barely explained. Cecil never talks about it or anything. The scene with Cecil turning into a Paladin is also extremely short and no big deal, despite being hyped as this classic moment. Even if it is a hardware problem, why should I care? The topic is to compare them...hardware's fault or not.

 

Did you ever play the Hard Type version or FFC for PS? It wasn't a hardware problem that made everything dry and short. They butchered up the dialogue in the translation.

 

For the record I still like IV and V, just not as much as new school. Though I'll probably never beat them again(too much leveling up).

 

Hah, I never once had to level up in FFIV.

[Lightning Flik 0]

You mean U.S. 2 and 3.

 

Otherwise known in the "true" Final Fantasy scheme as 4 and 6.

I guess you just proved your vast Final Fantasy knowledge over my weak, feeble mind. Obviously everyone must have been so confused as to the point that I was driving home. Thank you, my savior, for blessing us all with your intellect and clearing up the confusion.

 

 

Spoiler (Highlight to Read):

That was sarcasm. Basically, I'm saying you're a cake by trying to show off fucking Final Fantasy knowledge.

</b>

Actually, I was trying to make sure the people who don't know, knew.

 

I wasn't yanking on ya.

 

And yes, I have etched in my brain more fucking knowledge about FFs than is normally healthy.

[AndrewTS 0]

At least you've got Golbez for all of the game up right until the end. Unlike Kefka who you don't even see in the second half. Hell, you don't even have any villains at all from the time WOR starts and you get to Kefka's tower. The plot just stops dead.

 

I don't find that as being a problem. You learn near the beginning that he's up in the tower, using the Light of Judgment to reign down FIERY DEATH AND DESTRUCTION!! From there, you can recruit the main characters again, leaving some behind, kill the dragons, and then go after Kefka.

 

Not having any freedom is a good thing. Because then you can't turn your characters into super gods. FF4 was a lot better than FF6, FF7, or FF8 in strategy since with them every character could do everything and it's way too easy to and get the strongest guys with the best attack and cure spells. Bleh. It's pretty silly when you have Gau and Sabin pumping out ultima spells. You actually had to improvise in FF4 because your party kept changing and every character had limits on what they could do.

 

I kind of agree. No one is MAKING YOU learn all those spells with everyone. I usually would pick my designated healers, the magic attackers, etc. The game does kinda force you to learn the magic because you need to have a pretty stacked party to conquer the final dungeon(s).

[chaosrage 0]

Why are angst ridden whiny characters cool? They're the kind of people I want to slap in real life and tell to grow up.

Why can't they be...you know....heroic? Why can't they be brave and not have all these teenage problems?

Exactly, it's a RPG, so you're supposed to understand and like and be able to relate to the role you're playing. Not want to beat the shit out of them.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

Why are angst ridden whiny characters cool? They're the kind of people I want to slap in real life and tell to grow up.

Why can't they be...you know....heroic? Why can't they be brave and not have all these teenage problems?

This is why I like Zidane. He actually wants to be a hero.

[Lightning Flik 0]

Hehe you really underestimate the exponential progession of computers. SNES ran at about 4 MHz with 128 KB of work RAM and 64 KB of VRAM. The entire cartridge for games was only between 1-4 MB, which is pretty amazing when you think about it. FF6... 3 MB. CT... 4 MB. That's some pretty amazing compression/programming efficiency.

 

PS1, I think, ran at 33 MHz (either 25 or 33, I get Saturn and PS1 mixed up), with 2 MB of work RAM and 1 MB of VRAM, I think. It's been a long time since I actually saw the specs.

 

But the point is, they both ran on hardware that by modern standards is unbelievably crappy. That doesn't add anything to the argument, but I find it interesting.

I knew someone would come and bit me in the ass. Yes, I know nothing of the specs, but I do know that there was a lot more they can/did do with the newer machines. Hence it does cause it hard to compute.

 

Still though, it is impressive what they can do with such crap given too them to build games.

[AndrewTS 0]

Why are angst ridden whiny characters cool? They're the kind of people I want to slap in real life and tell to grow up.

Why can't they be...you know....heroic? Why can't they be brave and not have all these teenage problems?

Exactly, it's a RPG, so you're supposed to understand and like and be able to relate to the role you're playing. Not want to beat the shit out of them.

"I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away..."

 

Did you ever play the Hard Type version or FFC for PS? It wasn't a hardware problem that made everything dry and short. They butchered up the dialogue in the translation.

 

I haven't played those versions. No Japanese.

 

However, I avoided FFC because I heard the games were kinda busted because of tremendous slowdown problems. Is this true with FFC? Or was that for FFA?

 

Which games are on FFC besides FFIV?

[{''({o..o})''} 0]

If you play it on PS2 and change the driver using triangle before loading to quick load it isn't too bad but compared to a normal game it still sucks ass.

[Lightning Flik 0]

I haven't played those versions. No Japanese.

 

However, I avoided FFC because I heard the games were kinda busted because of tremendous slowdown problems. Is this true with FFC? Or was that for FFA?

 

Which games are on FFC besides FFIV?

Hard version is the one you want. FFC isn't that much different than the original FF4, but then again, I don't think I'd want it different.

 

And yes, FFC (4 and CT) and FFA (5 & 6) had slowdown problems. However, it depends on what copy you get. You might get lucky and get a pure one.

 

I just know that my FFC-CT game is slowed down. That's all.

[chaosrage 0]

I don't find that as being a problem.  You learn near the beginning that he's up in the tower, using the Light of Judgment to reign down FIERY DEATH AND DESTRUCTION!!  From there, you can recruit the main characters again, leaving some behind, kill the dragons, and then go after Kefka. 

 

But he doesn't do anything. As far as we know, he only destroyed two towns in a year. He needs to be taken down, but there's no real urgancy about it. The world is already destroyed anyway.

[chaosrage 0]

Did you ever play the Hard Type version or FFC for PS? It wasn't a hardware problem that made everything dry and short. They butchered up the dialogue in the translation.

 

I haven't played those versions. No Japanese.

The rom is translated if you have a snes emu.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

I've never had any problem with CT, IV or V. Only VI is slowed down.

[Guest Sakura]

I have never hated Squall or wanted to slap him. I always thought he was cool and felt sorry for him. I think it rules when Rinoa cracks his shell.

 

And Raiden is cool in MGS2.

[Jer 0]

I hated Raiden. His look was fine, but MGS is the kind of series that needs a strong hero, not an obnoxious, whiny one. Angsty heroes aren't as bad in RPGs, but in a game where you're sneaking around killing people and blowing up big mechs with missiles, it's really annoying when the story is interrupted by a five minute whiny coversation with your girlfriend.

[Jer 0]

FF4's had depth. Unless you only played the easy type where all the depth was taken out, but that's FF2US, not FF4. You knew what each character was about, their motivations, their goals, how they changed, how they felt about everything.

 

I haven't played the FFC version, so I can't say anything about that. But the US version that everyone seems to love has no character development at all, and a very random, shallow plot.

 

Did you say you liked FF7? How is FF7 any different? Look at them. Cloud was a schizophrenic with a big sword who went from a tough guy to a tough guy with a bit of self questioning. Aeris was happy all the time, and that's.. her entire character. Barret was just Mr. T, along with some shallow attempts at cheesy introspection Tifa was just there, she never changed at all, even though she should have been more pissed at Sephiroth than anybody in the game. The other characters were pretty much cliched non-entities. FF6 was the only FF game with really awesomely developed characters. Although even that still had the standard rebels vs evil empire plot.

 

Red XIII, Cloud and Sephiroth all have well developed characters with backstory. The rest of the cast doesn't have much going for them storywise, I'll give you that. The plot of FF7 was what I got into, not the characters, for the most part. Red XIII was an awesome character though, one of my favorites in the series.

 

FF4 didn't have a complex story, but it's fantasy, so I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. FF7 crumbled under its own weight.

 

I didn't think FF7's story crumbled at all, shrug. I found it compelling the whole way through and loved the ending.

 

At least you've got Golbez for all of the game up right until the end. Unlike Kefka who you don't even see in the second half. Hell, you don't even have any villains at all from the time WOR starts and you get to Kefka's tower. The plot just stops dead.

 

I loved the world of ruin, it's probably my favorite part of any RPG. If you develop the villian as well as they developed Kefka, then you don't need him constantly doing villianous antics for him to be imposing. The world of ruin has a lot of great miniplots focusing on the characters and an imposing villian you have to eventually fight, that's good enough for me. And it has freedom but with direction, which is my ideal for RPGs.

 

And I'd rather have no plot than a bait and switch plot. Why is it good that Golbez is doing villianous things when he's not even the villian? It felt like a huge waste of story that could have been spent on, say, developing Zemus.

 

Not having any freedom is a good thing. Because then you can't turn your characters into super gods. FF4 was a lot better than FF6, FF7, or FF8 in strategy since with them every character could do everything and it's way too easy to and get the strongest guys with the best attack and cure spells. Bleh. It's pretty silly when you have Gau and Sabin pumping out ultima spells. You actually had to improvise in FF4 because your party kept changing and every character had limits on what they could do.

 

I just completely disagree with every bit of this. FF4 is more constrained, but that doesn't somehow make it more strategic. I beat the game by using my offensive characters' best attacks over and over while using my healer's best magic over and over. Wow, what incredible tactics that took!~! Damn, having the black mage cast Nuke every single turn, that certainly taxed my brain power! FF6 lets you use the characters you want, as opposed to being stuck with several characters that I found very unappealing like in FF4, and, if you want to put in the time, customize them to make them feel like they're yours, instead of just what you were given. That's just much more interesting than being given spells at arbitrary points through leveling, which is boring as hell. I remember one point where you had to be at level 32 to cast reflect on a boss, because that was the only way to beat it. I was at level 28, and therefore was forced to do nothing but level for four levels to get around Square's retarded "clever" boss. That's just bad design, and there's nothing like it in FF6. If you needed reflect in FF6, you'd just put an Esper on someone and learn it, not have to stop dead and waste two hours leveling for no reason.

 

All RPGs are linear after the NES era, so that's not a big deal. Except for Saga Frontier, and we know how that turned out.

 

No, the World of Ruin is very nonlinear and turned out beautifully.

 

They didn't mangle it until FF6 when they took away the time to cast magic. I mean, you shouldn't be able to conjure up Ultima just as quick as you could a potion. What the hell is that? ATB felt like it was slower too.

 

You could cast Nuke just as fast as you could throw a potion in FF4. I'd rather not have a time delay dynamic than have a poorly balanced one like in FF4. Plus FF4 didn't even have an ATB guage, so you didn't even know when your characters would get a turn. It felt very arbitrary.

[Guest Sakura]

I have played the FFC version and the story is nonexistant.

[Star Ocean 3 0]

I've already admitted I like Cait Sith, but I don't think he's the best comedy character. Currently I'd pick a Norimaru, Chop-Chop, B.B. Hood, etc.

 

Who/what the hell are they?

[Guest Sakura]

Norimaru is a Japanese comedian who appears in the JPN version of Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter

 

Chop-Chop is, I assume, Chop Chop Master Onion from Parappa.

 

B.B. Hood is an evil little red riding hood from the Darkstalkers series. Awesome character she is.

[AndrewTS 0]

Norimaru is a Japanese comedian who appears in the JPN version of Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter

 

Chop-Chop is, I assume, Chop Chop Master Onion from Parappa.

 

B.B. Hood is an evil little red riding hood from the Darkstalkers series. Awesome character she is.

Yup--and to clarify, Nori's only in the Japanese Saturn version--you need a RAM cart/converter to play. One of the wackiest fighting game characters ever. One of his kicks involve him slipping on a banana peel, and he also does the immortal "windmill wuss punch" (Andy Kaufman tried it on Lawler).

 

Chop Chop Master Onion cracked me up, from his first rapping lesson to his Unjammer return.

 

B.B.'s hilarious. The ending drawn in storybook form, and the super where she remembers her grandmother, then while crying stabs you, smacks the crap out of you, presses you over her head, and slams you into the giant puddle of tears she made--wacky stuff. The exploding apple kinda pales compared to that, but still cool. And her fierce attack is an UZI!!

[Guest Sakura]

Norimaru is on arcade and PSX MSH vs. SF too.

[dubq 0]

That reply was for Andrew, not you. In another thread he said he wanted reasons.

D'oh!

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Kick, punch, it's all in the mind, if you wanna test me, I'm sure you'll find, the things I'll teach ya, are sure to beat ya.

[Guest Sakura]

Dojo...Casino...it's all in the mind.

[AndrewTS 0]

Norimaru is on arcade and PSX MSH vs. SF too.

Okay...um...but those don't count--considering the money it would cost to import an old arcade machine, and all PSX Capcom "vs." titles absolutely suck.

[Guest Sakura]

I like MSH vs. SF for PSX. I don't have a problem with it.

[Guest Sakura]

Why is everyone like shocked that someone would like angsty girly looking guys in games? They're cool. I'd rather see an angst filled bishonen guys than weaksauce "heroes".

 

And Zidane had some angst, especially at the end. Even Squall didn't get as whiny as he did at one point.

 

I don't see why everyone hates Squall. I never thought of him as mean or unlikable, in fact I was happy to see him come out of his shell. I want to give Squall a hug, not hate him.