/vr/ - Retro Games

>>2137108
>>2137119
It starts out like that, you see a character named Locke, or a ship named after another ship, but by the last disc the allusions really begin to affect the plot, to the point where it is hard to say whether it is just coincidence or not.

Battling the classic 4 fiends at the end of the game, the two worlds idea, the crystals, Kuja overtaking what we believe to be the main villain, the crystals, Kuja and Zidane being brothers[/spoilers], Necron, all of those were very blatant references to older games that worked in their games because their games were built around those ideas from the start except for the Necron/Zeromus thing, however IX just throws them in at the end and they barely make sense. It feels like they are in there just to be in there, and not because the developers genuinely put them in the game because it was a good idea. The fact that FF X was such a radical departure from the series, arguably even more than VII or VIII were, reinforces this fact. This was, in Square's eyes, the last traditional FF before they moved on to completely change the series. IX is still pretty good, but it completely falls apart narrative wise on the 4th disc.

>>1872101
>buying into the hype after all these years. it was a mediocre game at best.

I really liked IX, but Christ did it have a lot of problems. It was linear as fuck, Freya was completely meaningless and her plot didn't finish(it just kinda ended after disc two, and then we get a half-assed "They live happily ever after!" cutscene at the end), the load times were insane, it tried too hard to capitalize off of the older entries in the series, and at times it felt like the game was giving the references more attention then its own world and plot, the twists at the end were retarded Necron was bullshit, he came up out of nowhere and started spouting Star Wars references. Fuck that, Kuja should have gotten a second form or something, and speaking of villains the game couldn't make up its damn mind. First it was Brahne, then Kuja(which makes sense since most of the other FFs did this), then Garland, then Kuja again and finally Necron. Just stick with maybe one or two villains and have the player get attached to them, more villains =/= better story. And to top it all off the plot was full of holes. Not big ones, but small ones that you could notice if you were paying attention, and fuck did they pile up.

It's weird because when it wanted to be, it did things so much better than any other entry in the franchise, but it just dropped the ball so often it was hard to really get invested.

>>1743634
>Lately we've been doing nothing but arguing and bitching over Final Fantasy
Agreed, and it's stupid. A board like this should be more friendly and positive.

>Your first FF
FFI, in 1991. I was 6. Me and my older brother, who owned the game and NES, played through it. He later gifted my his older games.
>Favorite FF
FFIX, for all the right reasons. One of the greatest games ever made IMO.
>Favorite track
Very hard to tell. "Maybe I'm a Lion" or "Sword of Doubt" probably, with honorable mentions to "Vamo'Alla Flamenco", "Crossing Those Hills", "You Are Not Alone", "Man With The Machine Gun", "Fisherman's Horizon", "Mako Reactor", "Red XIII's Theme", "Cayenne's Theme", "Run Past Through the Plain", "Clash on the Big Bridge(in all of its forms)", and "Theme of the Empire" from FFXII all are very close runner's up.
Hitoshi Sakimoto to me is the best composer overall, but Uematsu has more solid gems to his credit.
>Favorite character
Zidane, hands down. Steiner, Sabin, Wakka, Zell, Barret, Ramza, Selphie, Galuf, Kain, and just about every Cid are all charming and enjoyable to me.
>Where you think the series is headed/what you want from Square Enix in the future
It's dead, Jim.

The creative forces behind the series have mostly moved on. Square is more of a publisher than developer now.
Sad to see. The FF movie was a serious blow to the company, internally.