I'll compile all my pennies to pay for it. Best way to get rid of them.
I might be able to bargain a piece of lint in to save me some money.
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FINAL FANTASY Community Thread: XV Mainline Entries and Counting
- Thread starter Kagari
- Start date
I might be able to bargain a piece of lint in to save me some money.
Makoto Yuki
Banned
Two awesome songs, might I add. Guess people think a pop song and a ballad make a game too anime. Regardless, I'll always have a special place in my heart for real Emotion and 1000 Words. By extension, Eyes on Me, Melodies of Life, and Kiss Me Goodbye. Don't judge me >_<, I love them all ^_^. Not that song in FFXIII though, felt out of place and I didn't like it. Now to lull myself to sleep with the beauty of the Piano Collections.
I remember thinking that the whole premise of chapter 4 just seemed manufactured. And then the song was dumb.
The opening song I give a pass because I feel it's meant to be in stark contrast with the subdued and reserved Spira and Yuna you had come to know in FFX.
Like WELCOME TO THE SEQUEL, SURPRISE
Even if it does lean back by then providing the context to the whole thing.
The opening song I give a pass because I feel it's meant to be in stark contrast with the subdued and reserved Spira and Yuna you had come to know in FFX.
Like WELCOME TO THE SEQUEL, SURPRISE
Even if it does lean back by then providing the context to the whole thing.
Zantetsuken88
Member
I may have accidentally learned all the words in Japanese to Real Emotion, 1000 No Kotoba and Hikari.....
Ooops
Yeah it actually bugs me that people lambast FF for being "too anime" these days when there are games like Tales and Persona that are way more anime. The people who accuse Fire Emblem Awakening of being too anime have their heads up their asses, though, because Fire Emblem has been pretty damn anime for as long as I've seen it.
Course, having played Persona 4, I can honestly say that "being anime" really doesn't mean anything negative on its own to me anymore. Cuz Persona 4 is anime as fuck and it still has a stellar cast.
FE:A does go hard on the anime way more than previous games though. Having a self-insert protagonist that can waifu/husbando every single character in the game doesn't help matters.
Waifus have been a part of this genre since Dragon Quest rolled out Hand of the Heavenly Bride, & everybody's favorite Fire Emblem 7 had anime character designs AND a self insert protagonist (Oh and marriage mechanics).
The only way this accusation sticks at all is Nowi catering to the creepy loli fanbase. That I'll give, but the rest of it is just Fire Emblem fans not realizing their franchise has been anime forever.
FE7 had a face-less self-insert that did nothing and stood in the background while Eliwood, Lyn and Hector stole the show. Awakening's self-insert is half the reason the game's plot even happens and he/she can marry every single character that can join your army, whether it's the other main character, all of the future kids, the villains, or even
the other main protagonist's sister that died but not really cause she got better plus has amnesia now
FE7 also didn't have marriage mechanics, unless you count any kind of support/people bonding as "marriage". What it did have though, were support conversations between men/women that didn't end with said two people getting married by obligation.
It's easy enough to handwave the designs away as "anime designs", but even that has a variable scale. Unless you to explain to me how any of the character designs in Awakening are suitable for fighting in a battlefield, where the designs for the characters in every game before it are entirely practical more often than not. And this is made even more ridiculous when the game expects every single character that can swap to a class to wear the stylized outfit meant specifically for one character.
Lynn has her marriage to one of numerous suitors, as does Eliwood to one of several women. I'm almost certain that more support conversations lead to more romances than that, too. Lyndis' outfit is no less anime than Lon Qu's. Frederick's armor no more impractical than Kent's. Libra's no worse than whatever that effeminate priest he's based on in FE7 wore. Sure you have Tharja and Nowi in unreliable outfits, but FE7 has more in common with Awakening than naught.
Maybe the problem is that Awakening is a different kind of anime, but even that I have a hard time really believing Fire Emblem fans are unaware of. I mean yes, Olivia is prancing around in her lingerie on the battlefield, but then again, Pirotess in Record of Lodoss basically wears two halves of a shirt into battle and that's it. Yeah, the armor is gigantic and oversized, but have you seen Fantasy anime? That's the armor they wear. And those massive armored knights in FE's earlier installments were every bit as impractical as they are now. Yes, Severa's prancing around with her tits out in the open, but then again, so were Sonia's. Cordelia has breastplate armor but hey, so did Fiora, and so did Shiida in Fire Emblem 1.
In fact, there's no small amount of FE1 characters with counterparts of equal design in FEA. Gregor to Ogma, for instance. Nowi and Tiki as the little, green haired dragon girls. So character designs are pretty much off the table as far as "It's too anime!" goes. Can't be the game's marriage mechanics, cuz those've been in other games. Can't be the My Unit, cuz those've been in other games.
As someone who isn't a big fan of Fire Emblem and doesn't feel a shred of nostalgia for its older games, it's a load of hullabaloo this "too anime" complaint. Much ado about very little. I'll give Nowi. I'll give the Bride Job class. But character design? Pfft. Not as long as the GBA games exist.
How is only one of these considered "anime" to the fanbase?
The shift to the marriage focus in support conversations of Awakening was a turn-off for me. Nearly every single male/female support pairing leads to a romantic outcome. I prefer the wider variety that support conversations had in earlier FE games - there were some romantic ones of course but a lot of other types of relationships as well, oftentimes revealing the characters' pasts. Awakening's pairings felt arbitrary, having anybody being able to support with practically anybody of the opposite gender.. It's hard to pin down with words, but the character relationships didn't feel as genuine to me in Awakening as they did in the earlier games. Supports simply weren't as interesting.
I'm not saying that the GBA/GCN/Wii game's weren't anime style though, although I prefer that artstyle to Awakening's as well.
I'm not saying that the GBA/GCN/Wii game's weren't anime style though, although I prefer that artstyle to Awakening's as well.
I think equating having a handful of scripted pairing options and being able to pair anyone at will as simply "both are anime, they are the same" is a little unfair. Especially when the majority of pairing options in 7 are just a small subset of all of the support options, act a bit like simple little easter eggs for recognizing character history, and aren't just an obligated result of having one male talk to one female four times. But FE:A was designed with the generational gameplay in mind, so it's hard to fault it too much for that being present, so I understand it, I just don't enjoy it.
I'm still not sure how I feel about the shift in the slider towards a more pure gameplay focus for supports in Radiant Dawn and then in Awakening (though that pushes the slider back a bit). I felt like the 7-8-9 had a decent balance between the supports providing depth to the roster and history, as well as offering a degree of replayability and providing a good deal of gameplay freedom as well. Having limitations to the supports made the game like a puzzle in which you had to frame your roster options around the possible supports (if you wanted), making it interesting to see how your army would come into focus as the chapters progress. Being able to support anyone with anyone (RD) or pair pretty much any female-male combination (FE:A)..arragh I can't word it well. It feels like it just rewards the player without much in the way of planning.
Edit: I guess I love just having a roster of characters where you have to take knowledge of the character's
1.) Class (and thus weapon type use and special skills if applicable)
2.) Availability
3.) Viability
4.) Support options and limitations
And then have to craft a team around those parameters. With re-classing becoming more and more common, and supports being less and less limited, and well as grinding making it possible that absolutely everyone becomes viability to a highly similar degree...it's just not as fun to me anymore.
I also don't care for the artstyle shift, but I would never say the older style(s) are not anime. I just generally think they are sharper and more colorful, seem less washed out. I hope that makes sense.
I'm still not sure how I feel about the shift in the slider towards a more pure gameplay focus for supports in Radiant Dawn and then in Awakening (though that pushes the slider back a bit). I felt like the 7-8-9 had a decent balance between the supports providing depth to the roster and history, as well as offering a degree of replayability and providing a good deal of gameplay freedom as well. Having limitations to the supports made the game like a puzzle in which you had to frame your roster options around the possible supports (if you wanted), making it interesting to see how your army would come into focus as the chapters progress. Being able to support anyone with anyone (RD) or pair pretty much any female-male combination (FE:A)..arragh I can't word it well. It feels like it just rewards the player without much in the way of planning.
Edit: I guess I love just having a roster of characters where you have to take knowledge of the character's
1.) Class (and thus weapon type use and special skills if applicable)
2.) Availability
3.) Viability
4.) Support options and limitations
And then have to craft a team around those parameters. With re-classing becoming more and more common, and supports being less and less limited, and well as grinding making it possible that absolutely everyone becomes viability to a highly similar degree...it's just not as fun to me anymore.
I also don't care for the artstyle shift, but I would never say the older style(s) are not anime. I just generally think they are sharper and more colorful, seem less washed out. I hope that makes sense.
Well see, I have no problem with the game being criticized for actual reasons. If the shift to focusing on marriage more heavily undermined the supports, fine, cool.
But the shift to focusing on marriage made it more anime? That's what I think doesn't make sense.
I was just stating a preference specifically regarding support conversations and how they differ a bit.
Fire Emblem is definitely anime styled, without question.
I agree with this.
Note: I've never argued that Fire Emblem isn't anime-styled. But what I always liked about the series pre-awakening was how again, more often than notes, the outfits worn by characters were both slightly stylized AND practical to be worn on the battlefield. What I take issue with is the inability to recognize that Awakening's design veer way more towards "make it super stylized, damn their actual applications" and devolved most of their characters into one-note walking tropes. Not to say that previous games didn't have said tropes, but at least then you could dig up their support conversations and reveal background info on why the characters were how they were. Awakening characters don't have that because the endgoal of supports for that game revolves entirely around getting them hitched and being so wacky.
tl;dr - every fire emblem game is anime but awakening takes it to a different extreme than the other games did.
There's a big difference between marriage mechanics as done in Awakening and and every other game. Multiple characters in FE can get married at the end of the game by having super conversations with them, that's fine and natural and of no consequence. FE:A marriages occur in the middle of the game and are an active part of the game design process: you get the characters hitched so they have kids so you can recruit future versions of those kids to your party. Getting Lyn or Eliwood or Hector married to Kent or Farina or whoever at the end of the game has no direct consequence other than the stat bonus for having those units close to each other mid-battle. In short, the games don't even have a marriage mechanic like you're trying to imply they do.
The only other game in the series to having anything remotely similar to awakening was Genealogy of the Holy Way, and the logic behind that was way less contrived than "we've come from the future to help even though we didn't exist until the moment you decided to pair so and so together!"
There was exactly one other time where the series has had anything comparable to Awakening's My Unit, and that was in FE12, the game right before Awakening.
FE12's Avatar still wasn't the central plot point for the whole story. It had a ton of support options available to be, but he/she still wasn't allowed to just marry any single army member he/she wanted to.
tl;dr - every fire emblem game is anime but awakening takes it to a different extreme than the other games did.
There's a big difference between marriage mechanics as done in Awakening and and every other game. Multiple characters in FE can get married at the end of the game by having super conversations with them, that's fine and natural and of no consequence. FE:A marriages occur in the middle of the game and are an active part of the game design process: you get the characters hitched so they have kids so you can recruit future versions of those kids to your party. Getting Lyn or Eliwood or Hector married to Kent or Farina or whoever at the end of the game has no direct consequence other than the stat bonus for having those units close to each other mid-battle. In short, the games don't even have a marriage mechanic like you're trying to imply they do.
The only other game in the series to having anything remotely similar to awakening was Genealogy of the Holy Way, and the logic behind that was way less contrived than "we've come from the future to help even though we didn't exist until the moment you decided to pair so and so together!"
There was exactly one other time where the series has had anything comparable to Awakening's My Unit, and that was in FE12, the game right before Awakening.
FE12's Avatar still wasn't the central plot point for the whole story. It had a ton of support options available to be, but he/she still wasn't allowed to just marry any single army member he/she wanted to.
But what I fail to see, Noi, is how those mechanical nuances are somehow anime. And even if Awakening accentuates these things, it does not change the fact that these things are a part of the series in one shape or another. Which is my point. Marriage mechanics have existed in this franchise and in others to one extent or another for a long time. Character designs in Fire Emblem have looked anime for ages. 7 and 12 had player inserts, too. None of these things are new so the bizarre idea that Awakening is somehow some bastardized child of the series is only rivaled in bizarreness by the decision of Fire Emblem fans to blame this on anime and insist that their precious franchise was previously untouched by anime. Because an RPG from Japan looking like cartoons from Japan is simply unacceptable.
There are legitimate complaints to make against Awakening, sure. But it's pretty hard to not find a game you can make legitimate complaints against. But the whole of my point is that fans of a JRPG series suddenly going Now it's too anime!, especially when that series is Fire Emblem of all things, are flat out crazy. Because Fire Emblem has always been anime.
If you want to complain that the focus on marriage is bad, or that the idea of marrying a loli dragon girl is bad, or that reclassing makes things too easy, or that a world map grants too much freedom, or that the idea of a player-insert-protagonist is crap, sure, go ahead, no problem, that's just fine. Blaming that on anime is stupid as hell, though.
I mean what, did Knights of the Old Republic never happen? Or is Revan and Exile rolling in waifus suddenly anime? I didn't realize that a romanceable character in a video game was the sole property of anime, and one of its chief characteristics.
This is what I'm saying. I don't care if these mechanics corrupted this franchise, cuz I've played 4 Fire Emblems. It's fun but I'm not gonna be zealous for its legacy.
There are legitimate complaints to make against Awakening, sure. But it's pretty hard to not find a game you can make legitimate complaints against. But the whole of my point is that fans of a JRPG series suddenly going Now it's too anime!, especially when that series is Fire Emblem of all things, are flat out crazy. Because Fire Emblem has always been anime.
If you want to complain that the focus on marriage is bad, or that the idea of marrying a loli dragon girl is bad, or that reclassing makes things too easy, or that a world map grants too much freedom, or that the idea of a player-insert-protagonist is crap, sure, go ahead, no problem, that's just fine. Blaming that on anime is stupid as hell, though.
I mean what, did Knights of the Old Republic never happen? Or is Revan and Exile rolling in waifus suddenly anime? I didn't realize that a romanceable character in a video game was the sole property of anime, and one of its chief characteristics.
This is what I'm saying. I don't care if these mechanics corrupted this franchise, cuz I've played 4 Fire Emblems. It's fun but I'm not gonna be zealous for its legacy.
Last thing I'll say is that the player insert in FE7 is significantly different than FE:A. I think just because you had a name attached to the game file, some bare-bones "justification" for the grid- map gameplay (by assigning the role "tactician") doesn't mean that the role of the player-insert was "not new" in Awakening (I have not played 12, but then that's the second-most recent release). I would say the player-insert, in the form it is now, is new to the series. In FE7, half the time you would forget he's there or even a thing.
As for the art-style going from not-anime to anime, I've never (or rarely) seen anyone frame their distaste for Awakening's art direction in quite that way specifically, so I don't really have a comment there otherwise.
As for the art-style going from not-anime to anime, I've never (or rarely) seen anyone frame their distaste for Awakening's art direction in quite that way specifically, so I don't really have a comment there otherwise.
I've always seen it framed that way, and that's why I brought it up. As to the Tactician, I acknowledge there is a difference between the one in 7 and 13, but the fact remains there is one in 7, he is spoken to during plot points, and he is a player insert. I'm not arguing it's an identical execution, only that the concept has been around in Fire Emblem before.
I uh, I hadn't really planned on derailing the thread like this, guys, haha. I'm supposed to be compiling a bibliography, though, so I'm sorta procrastinating it by doing this . . .
Okay, I think I understand your position. I just think that they are so exceedingly disparate that you can't use someone's indifference to its presence in one game to discredit a negative response to the presence in another since the implementation is enormously changed. But I guess now we are just arguing different definitions of "how new is 'new" when we actually mostly agree.
Um.
Is Lightning Returns on sale yet.
Um.
Is Lightning Returns on sale yet.
To be fair, this entire argument has been me splitting hairs all along. Noi's flat out said that (s-she?) agree that Fire Emblem's always been anime but (h-her?) point has been that it's accentuated in Awakening. Which is a point I can honestly see and probably accept. I'm just procrastinating doing my homework.
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
Noi's a dude. 
I never want this company to put platforming in their FF games again, though. Lots of errors and mistakes and as a platformer person, it makes me cringe repeatedly to see stuff like this all over a dungeon.
You have something like a P-meter and a jump button. HOW ABOUT PUTTING THEM TOGETHER NEXT TIME? Let there never be a next time.
Nah.
I never want this company to put platforming in their FF games again, though. Lots of errors and mistakes and as a platformer person, it makes me cringe repeatedly to see stuff like this all over a dungeon.
Oh yeah, I'm definitely not one of those nutsos that goes out and says the "mechanics" are too anime (although the combination of them certainly brought about more... unsavory "fans" to the series than I'd have liked.)
The one aspect that I think is... anime in regards to mechanics though, is how the My Unit in Awakening is a customizable self-insert that can be any job in the game, can marry any character in the game and happens to also be directly responsible for pretty much everything in the story. The marriage aspect in particular is definitely very harem-ish, with no male or female being denied the advances of the self-insert. Specially when the My Unit is god damn boring and devoid of personality.
I should probably separate my other mechanics argument away from the anime talk really. My main complaints regarding that are just related to the character design and personalities and not related to that. That was just me disagreeing with the assertion that "FE7 has marriage mechanics and is the same as Awakening so there's no reason to complain about the latter".
The one aspect that I think is... anime in regards to mechanics though, is how the My Unit in Awakening is a customizable self-insert that can be any job in the game, can marry any character in the game and happens to also be directly responsible for pretty much everything in the story. The marriage aspect in particular is definitely very harem-ish, with no male or female being denied the advances of the self-insert. Specially when the My Unit is god damn boring and devoid of personality.
I should probably separate my other mechanics argument away from the anime talk really. My main complaints regarding that are just related to the character design and personalities and not related to that. That was just me disagreeing with the assertion that "FE7 has marriage mechanics and is the same as Awakening so there's no reason to complain about the latter".
Noi's a dude.
I fucking suck at this.
See, even then I dunno. I can definitely see why you'd say it, but I think that there are enough faceless, nameless, ageless, sexless, protagonists on the Western side of the pond who can romance who they damn well please and be whatever class they please that I just don't know that I'd call that anime.
Nowi is, though. No two ways about it. I don't think I knew anybody in person who found marrying Nowi off to be a pleasant experience.
tiggerkiddo
Member
I'm still confused as to how a RPG can be too anime, or just anime in general. I guess I don't watch enough anime to really know.
hipsterpants
Member
Cause it has waifus? And anime cliche characters? That's my guess. (Don't quote me on this I don't have examples).
All I know about FE: A is that I'm scrub tier and just used MC/Chrom and wrecked everyone on easy mode.
All I know about FE: A is that I'm scrub tier and just used MC/Chrom and wrecked everyone on easy mode.
Outright calling it and generalizing it as "anime" is, like I said earlier, probably not the right way to go about it, but I get where people who do so are coming from. To be more precise, it's akin to the ever popular harem tropes in japanese games/anime/visual novels where the main character is an insert for the reader/player/whoever and has carte blanche on anyone he wants because said character can be molded into whatever the male/female in question wants. It's a trope that I at least tend to really dislike, so seeing it forced into FE:A wasn't entirely pleasant.
There are only two tiers in FE:A. Those who have Galeforce, and those who do not have Galeforce.
Also the tiers of Those who are voiced by Laura Bailey, and those who are not.
I can agree it's a trope. I've never equated it to Japanese though since quite a few western novels do it such as Twilight.
Either way, I think your point is more fair now. I just had an issue labelling the trope present as anime rather than the specific trope you view it to have.
I still absolutely adore FE:A and would love for more of it. The self insert was fun and I wouldn't have any issues with it again. Only gripe was no gay marriages. I want to see two bulky sexy men get married.
tiggerkiddo
Member
So what if Lightning was voiced by Laura Bailey?
Professor Beef
Banned
What if she IS Laura Bailey?
It is?
We just discuss other stuff once in awhile to keep the thread alive + the main participants know each other.
Nope. It's a North Korean Coal Mine where we're beaten if we get off task.
YOU WEREN'T SUPPOSED TO REVEAL THAT.
*Ahem*
They treat us wonderfully here. *unnaturally smiles while a gun is pointed at the back of my head*
That's right, back to our afternoon worship of Kagari Il Jong.
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
OH YOU GUYS. lol. I barely ever see off-topic tangents in this thread. It's actually one of the stricter community threads I've posted in. Zelda thread was probably the strictest and it dies every now and then. Every now and then I see a bump in my subs but for the most part, there's barely any participation. That actually happened to the FF thread a few times and there wasn't a lot of discussion going on in it for a while.
A little tangent is usually bound to happen if people are familiar with each other. It's what people do.
So, I'm almost finished Lightning Returns. I did all of the main quests, and I only have sidequests to do with 5 in-game days left. Which means I'm probably going to be kinda bored doing some of these quests.
...I... kinda think... that some of these sidequests aren't necessary outside of stat gain. Especially since they're all fetch quests and I'm groaning at the thought. I hate this sort of quest design in video games.
A little tangent is usually bound to happen if people are familiar with each other. It's what people do.
So, I'm almost finished Lightning Returns. I did all of the main quests, and I only have sidequests to do with 5 in-game days left. Which means I'm probably going to be kinda bored doing some of these quests.
...I... kinda think... that some of these sidequests aren't necessary outside of stat gain. Especially since they're all fetch quests and I'm groaning at the thought. I hate this sort of quest design in video games.
It's also a community thread.
Dark Schala
Eloquent Princess
Agnès is pretty bad. Her dub actually made her worse for me, lol. Even her design and Yukiko's/Queen's Japanese VA couldn't save her.
I was going to respond with, "I can't hear you over my budget calculating" until I realized I actually cared. :/
I'm just as disappointed! How big is the thing, anyway?To think you could be playing the PS4 FFXIV beta instead and having fun if it weren't for awful canada internet.
I was going to respond with, "I can't hear you over my budget calculating" until I realized I actually cared. :/
hipsterpants
Member
The best part about Agnes is that she only gets worse.
The best character is Ringabel and it's not even close.
The best character is Ringabel and it's not even close.
Her voice actress is awful. She sounds like she's drooling every sentence and when she get's mad her shrieks are ear and soul piercing.
Her design is okay. Only decent thing about her. If I hear 'unacceptable' one more time...
No. Please. I can't handle anymore of her.
10GB for the initial thing, 38GB once fully updated.
Is it bad that I consider the characters to be the highlight when compared to the plot/world that they're in? Agnes and co maybe stereotypical of their respective tropes but at least they're not depressing bleak and stupid to the extent I can only see as trying to hard to be edgy.
CrimsonCrescendo
Banned
While I like Hillis, Bailey trumps her in every way. However, I think Bailey would default to her Helena Harper/Boss of the Saints voice for a character like Lightning and in my mind, that doesn't fit Lightning.
I like all the characters with the exception of Agnes. No personality, grating voice and an overall just a boring and annoying character.
Also like I said in the pokemon thread, where you beennnnnn?! You missed VIII's anniversary thread!