Final Fantasy 10

Games Alive: 1980-2017

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The Well-Red Mage asks: “What’s your favorite game every year you’ve been alive?”  I’m one of the last to answer, because I’m always late to these types of parties.  I’ve seen plenty of “Favorite Game” posts, but never one quite like this, and it was both challenging and enjoying to put together over the last two months.  I’m one of the oldest people to respond, meaning I have quite a lot of years to go through, so without further ado…

1980 – Pac-Man

This one was more difficult than I’d like to admit, but there weren’t too many games I could draw from at this point in time, which led me to this classic among classics.  I wasn’t very good at this game, but if you stick your finger in your ear and wiggle it around, I think you’ll hear something familiar 😀

1981 – Donkey Kong

Donkey Kong game coverBack when Mario was merely Jump Man and Pauline was a kidnapping victim, long before she was the mayor of New Donk City, there was this arcade classic.  I was better at this than Pac-Man; I’ve always been better at platforming than avoiding random enemies.

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Final Fantasy Friday: Over Tunes

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Final Fantasy Friday

No Final Fantasy soundtrack is complete without a rousing overworld song.  With that in mind…

What’s your favorite overworld music?

I’ll answer this question in two parts.  First, my favorite music directly from the game as in unaltered from what you hear while you’re playing, and second, my favorite overworld theme orchestrated.

I have to go with Final Fantasy IV for my favorite theme in game.

FFIV was just ahead of its time and so proficient in numerous areas, not the least of which was music.  It boasts the greatest number of good songs in its soundtrack (based on my opinion of course) that is to say, I like the majority of songs on its OST.  While I might like the music from other games more, I like more of the music from Final Fantasy IV.

And Final Fantasy X takes the gold for my favorite orchestrated theme.  It more than occasionally brings the tears, so I have to declare it the winner.

What’s your favorite overworld theme?  As you can see mine doesn’t align with my favorite game (it actually took a bit for FFVII’s “Main Theme” to grow on me.  I like it now, but wasn’t that fond of it when I first heard it).  Does yours?  Discussion party in the comments!

Creative Christmas – New Year Swag

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Tis the Christmas season (or Advent to be theologically accurate), and in the spirit of the season, the lovely blogger over at Later Levels has decided to celebrate the 12 Days of Christmas a few days earlier with 12 gaming related questions for all of us good, little gaming elves out there.  These are my responses.

👗   30 December 2017:   You’ve been invited to a swanky New Year’s Eve party but have nothing suitable to wear! Which video game character do you call to ask if you can borrow an outfit?

Luckily for me, I’ve already talked about this in my Fashionistas and Fancy Fellows post!  Of course they’re all from Final Fantasy, though I’ve noticed my favorite series either dresses its characters in the best get-ups…

Runway model quality

Picture Source: Sephiroth from FFVII by AHague

…and the worst…

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Final Fantasy Friday: Creepy Caverns

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Final Fantasy Friday

Hat trick of creep this week.  Bonus: it rhymes, too!  Also  reminder that this will be the last Final Fantasy Friday post until December.  I’m going to make an official announcement post about what’s going to be suspended throughout November, but I figured a reminder in the final one isn’t a bad notion either.

I’m currently recovering from anesthesia.  No, I didn’t get bionic limbs (though I did ask for them), just something weird but simple that required your favorite Narcissist to be knocked out.  Never fear, I woke up even more beautiful and amazing than ever, and when I returned home, there were offerings to my greatness at my door.  The peasants do love me ♥

I usually try to tie the week’s question with something going on, and I suppose waking up from brief, medically induced unconsciousness could be considered coming out of a dark cave so….

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Final Fantasy Friday: Fashion Faux Pas

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Final Fantasy Friday

Longer ago than I’d like to admit, I posted a Final Fantasy Friday about Fashionistas and Fancy Fellows, in which I detailed whom I thought was the dapperest dresser of them all.  It was one half of a pair of questions, and I promised to fulfill the other side of the promise the following week.  I didn’t do it then, but I didn’t quite forget and figured I’d pull the question out a week when I was too busy or too tired to think up something more complicated.  I’m feeling a little under the weather.  The past two days have been extra stressful, and my throat is a bit sore, which could mean this asthmatic is about to develop a chest cold, so now is the perfect time to pose an easily answered question.

Who is the worst dressed Final Fantasy character?

Before I answer this, let me quote from the site I also linked in the
Fashionista” post, because it’ll give you a major clue about whom I’m about to lay the fashion smack down upon (FYI – don’t click that until you’ve seen my answer if you don’t want it spoiled).

“This outfit is preposterous.  It’s a send up of ’90s urban fashion, scrubbed clean for an appearance on The Lawrence Welk Show.  [They] look like [they’re] ready to deliver a sanitized performance of “I Left My Wallet in El  Segundo,” complete with clarinet accompaniment and bubbles floating by. “

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Final Fantasy Friday: The Final Act

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Final Fantasy Friday

Even the most epic stories must eventually come to an end.  Even The Neverending Story had a final page, and I suspect even the freemium Brave Exvius will eventually come to a halt.  Stories rely on their endings for resonance.  You can’t truly talk about them until you know where they end up and how all of those threads draw together.  So with that in mind…

What is your favorite Final Fantasy ending?

A story doesn’t have to have a happy ending in order to be satisfactory.  In fact sometimes a happy ending is woefully misplaced.  The ending should fit the narrative.

In light of that, this is a really .hard question for me to answer lol.  FFVI was the first Final Fantasy ending I ever saw, and I absolutely loved it.  It was so joyful, so full of hope, and I remembered being inspired by it for days afterwards.  It perfectly exemplified and  framed the theme of hope in the game and could very well be the reason my favorite stories are the kinds that are dark and sorrowful with a joyous conclusion.  This bleeds into writing, as well.  Oh, I’ll make my characters (often literally) crawl through hell before they can bask in the light.  They have to earn their happy ending.

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Final Fantasy Friday: Negative Traits

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Final Fantasy Friday

Alright, it’s time to get nasty…

Who is your least favorite main character?

I’m sorry, but he’s annoying as fuck.  It’s not the stranger in a strange land motif, which is not only common, but often an integral part of the Monomyth/Hero’s Journey.  It’s also not the fact that he was sensitive as a child and had “daddy issues.”  I was and remain hypersensitive, and Tidus’s dad is a total douche nozzle.  My annoyance and dislike probably hinges on his voice/voice acting, and I know that’s incredibly shallow.

He’s also…kind of useless.  Okay, I concede that because he is a stranger in a strange land, he has no qualms about bucking tradition to question the faith (literally), because he *spoiler* falls in love with Yuna and doesn’t want her to die. *end spoiler*  Without his fresh insight, the cycle would’ve arguably continued as it always had, though as a counterpoint, there was Auron, *spoiler* the Unsent, *end spoiler* who knew the truth about Sin and that the summoner’s pilgrimage could have been avoided.  Then the narrative could’ve focused on Yuna (as it should have!) coming to realize the truth about Yevon and the Fayth without the shoehorned romance angle, since Auron already knew the truth.

Though without Tidus, we don’t have the time travel/time loop aspect, which is a throwback to the very first Final Fantasy.  Just…make Tidus a less annoying character.  At least he’s halfway decent in a fight *grumble*

What main character do you like the least?  Because this is a decidedly negative post, you must give some reasons for your dislike.  No just bashing characters and no flame wars.  There have to be reasons beyond “they suck!”  All of the regulars here are good, so I know you’ll present exemplary behavior for any noobies 😉

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Final Fantasy Friday: Someone Grab a Cane

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Am I still going to do this in he midst of my 30 Day Video Game Challenge?  Yes  Yes, I am, but since we just had a question that dealt with the same thing across the scope of video-gamedom, I’m not going to use the same response, and I should make a caveat that no one else can either, but I think only Cheap Boss Attack picked the same character I did (“the” Tama ughhhhhh), and he’s a resourceful guy who’s played more Final Fantasy and Squeenix games than I have anyway  So this week’s question is…

Who is the most annoying character?

As much as I love Final Fantasy IV, it has some of my least favorite main characters.  I’ve already expressed my disgust of Edward, rolled my eyes at Edge, and applauded Porom for whacking her brother Palom upside the head numerous times.

I forget whom I was in a conversation with (a common occurrence), but we were discussing how difficult it is for child characters not to be annoying, and it’s true.  I don’t find children particularly annoying, no more so than I find particular adults, but child characters are either overly precocious, overly hyper, or a combination of both.  It’s difficult to write children/youths, which is ironic since all of us who are adults have lived through that experience.  Because we view that age through the lens of (often) rosy nostalgia with a mind more mature, it’s harder to put ourselves back in that place.

I’ve written a few child characters.  One in my original novel whom I’ll admit now is very annoying and lately in the Northern Lights flashback with Sephiroth and Aeris.  With the flower girl, I did some observation of three year old behavior and asked some of my parent friends, so I’d like to think I portrayed her as more than an annoying, little brat.

So on the subject of annoying, little brats, whom do I find to be the most annoying character…

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Final Fantasy Friday: The Sign of the Times

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I’m seeing Wonder Woman tonight and have to work late due to a doctor’s appointment in the afternoon, which is why the scheduling function is my friend.

What’s your favorite Final Fantasy insignia?

You know…the picture that represents each game.

The one you like best doesn’t have to correspond to your favorite Final Fantasy, but if it does that’s okay, too.

*The Shameful Narcissist uses Sight*

I really don’t want to say VII, but…the insignia for VII almost perfectly mirrors the game: more than what it appears on the surface, up for debate on what it means.

At a casual glance, it’s clearly the meteor, but if you take a closer look, you notice there’s a little blip near the middle part of the tail.

Is it just a bit of the debris that makes up that part of it?  Or is it something more?  It’s actually in every iteration of the Final Fantasy VII logo.

It’s kind of flower shaped in Advent, which is a nice touch in and of itself, but it’s always there.  So, because I over-analyze everything most of all FFVII, I started to see the logo not as the meteor, but as the Planet flying through the cosmos, being chased by the meteor, which is what that smaller blip was.  From all proof I can find, though, I’m completely wrong about this; however, it is not an entirely unreasonable double entendre.

I was so close to picking FFX as my favorite logo.  Yuna sending is absolutely beautiful, and I love how it goes from her cool blue and purple to a brilliant gold.

It also looks like the risen waters shape something.

What’s your favorite logo?  Does it correspond to your favorite game?  What do you like about it?

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Final Fantasy Friday: A Grand Introduction

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A Final Fantasy (et al) post to welcome you to the glory of Friday (if you don’t have weekends off then may this hopefully brighten the midst of your work week) with more located here!

Last week I substituted a review for my typical post, which I’ll probably opt to do every now and then when I have a review prepared.  Now we’re back with a typical question and discussion, and this one was garnered from the extensive discussion on my Un-Final Fantasy post.  I’m sorry I don’t remember who mentioned it, but if you’re reading this, let me know in the comments so I can give credit where it’s due!

Which Final Fantasy would you recommend to a series newcomer?

I’d want them to start with either Final Fantasy IV or Final Fantasy VI like I did with the latter.  Now that I’ve played IV, which I like a little bit better, I’d want them to start with that one since it’s earlier and the first Final Fantasy with a cohesive story, deep plot, and well developed characters.  Final Fantasy VI has a simpler, more straightforward story line, but it’s a huge fan favorite and manages to have enough plot for all 14 possible characters.  This might also be a good reason to start a newbie there.  Some people argue that VI exemplifies the series, but I’d have to disagree a little bit since VI has a simpler plot than the rest with a more blatant and straightforwardly evil villain whereas other games go into more depth with motivation and background.  VI did set an example for the JRPG world, and there would be numerous attempts to duplicate the magic it created.

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