I'm a little disappointed that Justice Monsters Five was delayed, but, well, *inserts joke that references FFXV and delays here*
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Kai_SanCommonly known as Klineshrike!Registered Userregular
I finally had to go back and see what the heck people were talking about as I didn't notice this in the video (I am not sure how you get past all the verbal noise)
Welp... that is certainly what he is doing. That is the oddest idle stance I have ever seen.
My recollection of Abandon is that it doesn't work exactly the way you think it would (I forget how exactly) and what it does isn't terribly useful in the first place.
Being Invisible is useful I guess, but if you want it that bad there's an accessory that will do it for you permanently (and even regular cloaks can increase your evade to high levels, especially if you have a shield). I think Invisible also makes you more susceptible to magic. Abandon also relies on your unit getting hit, which is a potential problem unless they're wearing heavy armor.
I personally think Counter, Hamedo, or Blade Grasp are superior skills... but IMO? do what you think is cool. FFT is not a difficult game, there's no need for min/maxing or choosing an "optimized" skillset instead of something more tactical or interesting. I like to use classes like Geomancers, thieves and oracles, even though they've got some notable weaknesses and are less than ideal.
After my mistake I actually got curious and looked this up. Apparently, what Abandon does is just straight-up double your current evade percentages. So, not actually that useful on something like a mage.
But on one of the more agile classes - thieves, archers, monks, and of course ninjas - with a late-game mantle equipped? You should be practically untouchable. Not sure if it works on magic evade or not, but I think it does.
Alright, finally finished my playthrough of FFVIII. Start to finish streamed the whole thing (may have lost some stuff in the middle though. Got every GF, killed every boss, did almost every side quest (really could not be bothered to do the Chocobo forest stuff).
Did not play much Triple Triad beyond the beginning of the game, got some solid cards early on,got some power in Curaga early on for HP, and that was pretty much it, rest came from grinding up items from enemies and such.
The game was much better than I remember when I was 16 playing it for the first time in 1999. I was able to make much better use of the systems, and everything in general made more sense considering how different it is from your standard JRPG.
Squall is still an idiot, throughout the entire game, just one bad decision after the next. He's probably the most idiotic person in the game (or in the FF franchise in general) and it makes no sense why anyone would follow him to do anything. He redeemed himself at the very end (barely).
The story was all over the place, but enjoyable if you paid attention. Laguna is also the best person in the game by far. I also realized once I hit the fight with Adel+Rinoa that that was the part I could not get past when I was a kid. The fact that you really need to junction Rinoa before hand so she has more than 900hp and doesn't die in 1 or 2 hits from Adel draining her was the key. Super easy fight after that.
Highlight of the entire game though was the Omega Weapon fight. Once of the hardest boss fights in a FF game I've ever done. If I had abused the crap our of Triple Triad and spammed the invincibility item I could see it being trivial, but actually taking it on without cheesing it was incredibly difficult. Took me probably a good 6-7 attempts to get used to the fight and the timings and patterns. The final attempt was as close as you can get and I saved it because I thought it was a pretty awesome fight.
However it is 25 minutes long which I didn't realize at the time. I'll link it here if anyone wants to watch the whole thing (I apologize for humming along to the battle music, it's catchy!). The real cool part is from the 20 minute mark to the end though if you only want to see the close call and finish.
Overall I enjoyed the whole journey and I'm very glad I've played it again. It ranks much higher in my mind that it used to and it's something I wouldn't mind playing again and trying to really break it.
Next i'll be going on to FFIX and streaming that whole thing much like I did with FFVIII, not too much breaking, not much guide use unless I really get stuck or if I try to tackle bonus fights.
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Delphi, what did you think of Squall's supporting cast? When I originally played VIII, it really felt like after the other characters' introductory bits everyone except Rinoa was more or less the same person. I'm just wondering if that's just a remnant of me being frustrated with the game in general, or a valid complaint.
Delphi, what did you think of Squall's supporting cast? When I originally played VIII, it really felt like after the other characters' introductory bits everyone except Rinoa was more or less the same person. I'm just wondering if that's just a remnant of me being frustrated with the game in general, or a valid complaint.
Well let's go through them (Some story spoilers in here)
Squall: Idiot. Seriously this guy is about as observant as a box of rocks. There is a scene where Quistis convinces him to meet her at a popular date spot in the Garden, tells him she is no longer his instructor, and he then proceeds to tell her "Why are you telling me this? You should talk to a wall." He then proceeds to ignore all of Rinoa's advances, until she is gone. Then he pines after her like it's the end of his existence, he literally leaps into open space to save her in a very touching moment. They are rescued from certain oblivion by the happenstance of a derelict ship being nearby and the very first thing Rinoa wants to do after getting out of her space suit, is be hugged by her love Squall so she can feel human touch once more. His response? "We don't have time for this." Thyen she literally throws herself in his lap in the NEXT FUCKING SCENE and he won't stop telling her to get back into her seat. (Yes I get he was concerned for her safety but come the fuck on....). He then proceeds to let her get taken away, ignoring her once more, but the SECOND she's gone, he gets all fucking weepy again and MUST be with her. Jesus christ.
On a side note the translators didn't do Squall any favors apparently. Every time he says "Whatever." It's actually a much more meaningful statement in the original text that makes much more contextual sense. Check this link for an interesting read on the subject http://fyeahffviii.tumblr.com/post/72672083380/squall-whatever-leonhart
Ok got that one out of the way.
Rinoa: Ok so here's the deal. I actually like Rinoa quite a bit. She's flighty as fuck and a bit of a dreamer, but she's got a lot of life to her character and she's pretty consistent. It's a bit weird how quickly she dumps Seifer for Squall (especially since her response to finding out he might still be alive is basically. "Oh."), but whatever. She knows what she wants and for the most part tries to achieve it. She's also very strong in her signals to Rockhead/Squall. The 'daughter of the military leader/rebel princess' meme is a bit tired but it was played well in this case. She was by far the second most like-able character in the game for me.
Zell: Zell is a fireball, he's a coward at heart but puts on a brave face. He's pretty much an idiot, but even he can see why children love the taste of- I mean that Rinoa is madly crushing over Squall. He even goes so far as to help Rinoa out by making a replica of Squalls ring. He is a genuine person and one of the more believable characters in the game. That being said I never used him unless I was forced to, despite his awesome Limitbreak because fuck me if I could figure out how to actually use it when all the inputs were B4+B3+Up+B2 etc. Sad really, but meh.
Quistis: Quistis has some real issues early on surrounding the whole "Hot for teacher" thing. She's got it bad for Squall, but it turns out it's more of a sisterly love once they find out they've known each other for years (yeah right, you aren't fooling anyone Quistis.) Basically Rinoa knocks her out of the picture right off the bat. Quistis is a motherly type figure which makes her crushing on Squall a bit creepy. She is very competent though and a real asset to the team with her experience and generally calm demeanor.
Selphie: I don't like Selphie. There I said it. I don't generally have a problem with bubbly happy positive characters, but for some reason she just rubs me the wrong way. Her one redeeming section was the infiltration of the Galbadian Missile Base, that section was genuinely funny and a lot of fun when she had real meat in the game. Other than that she was background noise (Her shooting down Irvine was nice though).
Irvine:Speaking of the womanizing tool bag.... Irvine was just not very interesting as a character. He peaked early with his whole 'I'm a sniper who can't snipe' schtick and from then on he basically was just comedic relief in the form of chasing women. I will give him credit for being the only one to realize they were all orphans together, but that was more just that they needed someone to fill that role. Outside of that his character was not interesting at all and he was an asshole, he was going to leave everyone except Rinoa at the Desert Prison just because he was told to only get her out of there. Rinoa literally had to beat the crap out of him to get him to go back, real shitheel. However he was awesome in combat so he was a regular on my team.
Seifer: Fuck this guy...seriously. I get that he has 'Squall issues' and secretly adores/worships Squall but he went from bravado to dickhead at super sonic speeds. Yeah it suck you failed the SeeD exam because you got cocky, but you jump from that to working for the Sorceress, to then taking over her army....dude. His one redeeming 'badass' moment was when you summon Odin against him in a fight and he flat out kills Odin in a reverse-Zantetsuken. That was unexpected and awesome, as was the arrival of Gilgamesh now that he had Odin's sword. Major points for FFVIII on that whole setup, very cool. Squall is basically just an insecure bully and never really grows beyond that until the end credits, he is largely responsible for most of the fucked up shit that happens.
Raijin and Fujin: Awesome characters, interesting and pretty well fleshed out considering they are lackeys for toolbag Seifer. They experience some surprising growth throughout the game, starting with blind followers to betraying their friend to do the right thing. Was pretty impressed with them and they were fun to fight. Fujin get's extra points for the whole mono speak thing leading into a massive out of character monologue at the pivotal moment of betrayal. Very well played.
Laguna (and friends):Laguna was easily the heart and soul of this game, his sequences were fun, engaging, and interesting. His story was also much more interesting than Squall and you end up really wanting to know more about him and what happens to him than you do about Squall and his emo bullshit. After all here is the story of a Galbadian soldier who goes AWOL, wind sup in a sleepy town as it's defender, becomes an actor/journalist and eventually is the president of an entire country and the savior of humanity. Dude is as legit as you can get. Ward and Kiros were cool as well but pretty plain, especially compared to Laguna. Really makes you wonder how the fuck Squall got so fucked up considering the lineage....ah well, being an orphan sucks I suppose.
I think that covers most of them, I could go into Ellone, Edea, Cid, etc but they were mostly there as major plot devices so they got more attention by necessity.
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Not really, it's pretty clear his issues surround Squall. He looks up to Squall and thinks himself inferior to him, so he puts on an act about how he's so much better than Squall in an attempt to get some sort of recognition. His obsession is all about Squall and trying to get his approval. His whole "Sorceress' Knight" thing is just a means to that end. He needs to prove he is better than Squall so Squall will acknowledge him. When Squall becomes a SeeD and he doesn't he jumps at the first opportunity to obtain power to get back on Squall's level.
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AxenMy avatar is Excalibur.Yes, the sword.Registered Userregular
The Seifer/Squall beef, Seifer believes there is a certain way a gunblade user is supposed to be. Full of bravado, arrogance, heroics. Squall, who is as good if not better with the gunblade, shows none of these things and it pisses Seifer off.
It's like training/studying your whole life to be really good at something that you have a real passion for only to encounter someone who is just as good, if not better, and who doesn't really give two shits about it because it is just a job to them.
Or put it another way: You grew up loving Batman, trained your whole life to be Batman, and finally you get your chance to be Batman. Then you run in to this other guy who is a better Batman then you, but doesn't know the first thing about Batman and doesn't really care to. :razz:
A Capellan's favorite sheath for any blade is your back.
The Seifer/Squall beef, Seifer believes there is a certain way a gunblade user is supposed to be. Full of bravado, arrogance, heroics. Squall, who is as good if not better with the gunblade, shows none of these things and it pisses Seifer off.
It's like training/studying your whole life to be really good at something that you have a real passion for only to encounter someone who is just as good, if not better, and who doesn't really give two shits about it because it is just a job to them.
Or put it another way: You grew up loving Batman, trained your whole life to be Batman, and finally you get your chance to be Batman. Then you run in to this other guy who is a better Batman then you, but doesn't know the first thing about Batman and doesn't really care to. :razz:
Whatever.
:winky:
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I like Rinoa's character well enough, I guess, but I never, ever use her unless I'm forced to do so, because I can't stand the fact that her physical attack animation takes so long to play out.
Seriously, I bet it's like a 5-6 second animation. Meanwhile if you pick Irvine or Zell it's just BAM. They really should have made it where she just shoots the chakram thing like a gun. Watching it slooooowly loop back around and reattach is only potentially interesting the very first time you do it.
Writing Squall as the idiot who can't see that a girl is into him despite the giant neon signs above them is about as realistic as you can get.
No way man, not getting subtle signals is normal. Girl you actively like who you just literally jumped out of an escape hatch into open space to risk your life for after forcing someone to send you BACK IN TIME to try and save her first, who actively likes you and is standing in front of you arms outstretched after floating alone in space saying "Hug me, I need to be hugged RIGHT NOW". And his response is "We don't have time for this."
That's some next level bullshit.
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Squall knew, he was just terrified of getting close to people and it made him uncomfortable. He was conflicted.
It was also poorly written and/or translated and came across super meh, but I did at least get why he was the way he was.
You don't get to use that excuse when you just leapt out of a plummeting space pod in a million to one shot at saving your loved one in the vastness of open space with no strategy whatsoever on how to survive. As far as he knew he was going out there to die with her, it just so happens they run into a plot device/derelict spaceship.
You can't then say "I'm terrified of getting close to people", not if you expect any sort of believable scenario whatsoever.
Yes he's socially awkward, yes he is afraid of getting close to people for fear of losing them, but the scenarios he constantly finds himself in are far beyond the realm of plausibility in regards to that particular character flaw.
edit: I do want to point out that I really wanted to like Squall this time around, I really tried. But I just couldn't do it, his actions were too far beyond feasible.
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
I think I may actually start FFIX sometime soon! I finished my first playthrough of Dark Souls 3, so I can kinda go easy on my second one.
Squall is well-established as having extremely poor social radar and communication skills.
He's also a teenage character in a JRPG. A certain ritualized hesitance and nervousness between lovers is extremely common in that genre; it's as formalized as Kabuki. In Xenogears Fei is an 18-year-old martial artist, veteran mecha pilot who has soared through the skies and fought in a revolution against techno-organic god-kings and he still gets nervous and freaked out when he thinks Ellie might have been peeking at him in her shower. Even though those two actually do end up having sex later on in the story that's really unusual. I can't think of a single JRPG where teenage lovers run out and embrace each other like they would do in an American romance flick.
If anything Rinoa was being the weird one by genre standards, as forward as she was being. IIANM she generated a lot of conversation in Japan for being a departure from the standard heroine in that respect.
I'd really like to see them remake 8 with almost an equal emphasis on Laguna's story, and do a better job of exploring the parallelisms of Squall and Laguna's adventures. I think they could maybe rearrange things a touch to keep the beats between the two stories lined up.
There's some rather heavy-handed but still nice irony that Squall is constantly pushing people away and trying to be the lone wolf, when in actuality he's spending the whole game running around with, encountering, and fighting people who are pretty much his family.
I like @Delphinidaes assessment of the characters. Rinoa is good, zell is like-able enough, quistis is ok but rinoa just shoves her out of the picture. Most everyone else is just terrible. Fujin Raijin are cool characters and depending on the level you fight them at can actually wreck you. Laguna Kiros and Ward are easily the most interesting characters. Ward fights with an anchor, kiros has some kind of vampire berserker vibe going on, and laguna is like clutzy rambo. Delph definitely forgot the most important part though. Laguna and co's battle music is 10x better than the regular music.
Ultimecia's castle music is hands down for me the best piece of final fantasy music. As you're walking up to the castle and that starts playing, you know that the next area isn't going to be like the rest of the game. It kind gives off a castlevania vibe while not being dracula.
Back when VIII first came out, I remember thinking Kiros was gay. Did I just totally make that up, or was that in the game somewhere?
It's definitely not in the "text". I don't have the game script handy but I think people would have made a huge deal about that in the late 90's in a mainline FF game (although SaGa had gay characters in the same period and nobody really cared).
He doesn't ever really display any interest in women either, though, at least none that I can remember. Neither does Ward for that matter.
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DemonStaceyTTODewback's DaughterIn love with the TaySwayRegistered Userregular
Squall knew, he was just terrified of getting close to people and it made him uncomfortable. He was conflicted.
It was also poorly written and/or translated and came across super meh, but I did at least get why he was the way he was.
You don't get to use that excuse when you just leapt out of a plummeting space pod in a million to one shot at saving your loved one in the vastness of open space with no strategy whatsoever on how to survive. As far as he knew he was going out there to die with her, it just so happens they run into a plot device/derelict spaceship.
You can't then say "I'm terrified of getting close to people", not if you expect any sort of believable scenario whatsoever.
Yes he's socially awkward, yes he is afraid of getting close to people for fear of losing them, but the scenarios he constantly finds himself in are far beyond the realm of plausibility in regards to that particular character flaw.
edit: I do want to point out that I really wanted to like Squall this time around, I really tried. But I just couldn't do it, his actions were too far beyond feasible.
Uhh what does this have to do with him being afraid of getting close to people?
That is exactly the kind of scenario where one has to break out of that for.
You think that character trait means he just watches someone he loves die? That is some crazy talk right there. Like legit grade A what are you talking about?
The rest of the stuff makes sense but I'm not sure what you're trying to say here because there's no way it can be what it looks like here.
I think what Delphi is trying to say is that it's jarring for Squall to want to save someone he loves one moment, to the point of essentially committing suicide to do it, then go back to "...whatever" the next after they're safe and sound.
I think what Delphi is trying to say is that it's jarring for Squall to want to save someone he loves one moment, to the point of essentially committing suicide to do it, then go back to "...whatever" the next after they're safe and sound.
I think what Delphi is trying to say is that it's jarring for Squall to want to save someone he loves one moment, to the point of essentially committing suicide to do it, then go back to "...whatever" the next after they're safe and sound.
This is exactly it, within seconds of getting into the safety of the ship, he does a complete 180 and shuts off completely. This is immediately after he finally realizes how much she means to him and after he risks his life to be with her, then it's immediately back to full shutdown mode.
In spacesuit, full committal, spacesuit comes off, back to square one, no growth whatsoever in the wake of a massive life changing experience.
I don't care who you are or what your malfunction is, you don't come out completely unaffected after jettisoning yourself into space into certain death after the one you loved and are miraculously saved by happenstance of a nearby derelict spaceship.
I mean a hug at that point would have shown he was human and would have highlighted more realistic growth in the relationship. He could revert back later on once things settled, but that particular moment was very jarring.
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He's asserting dominance.
It seems like the best place for an assertion of dominance.
Welp... that is certainly what he is doing. That is the oddest idle stance I have ever seen.
Being Invisible is useful I guess, but if you want it that bad there's an accessory that will do it for you permanently (and even regular cloaks can increase your evade to high levels, especially if you have a shield). I think Invisible also makes you more susceptible to magic. Abandon also relies on your unit getting hit, which is a potential problem unless they're wearing heavy armor.
I personally think Counter, Hamedo, or Blade Grasp are superior skills... but IMO? do what you think is cool. FFT is not a difficult game, there's no need for min/maxing or choosing an "optimized" skillset instead of something more tactical or interesting. I like to use classes like Geomancers, thieves and oracles, even though they've got some notable weaknesses and are less than ideal.
But on one of the more agile classes - thieves, archers, monks, and of course ninjas - with a late-game mantle equipped? You should be practically untouchable. Not sure if it works on magic evade or not, but I think it does.
Did not play much Triple Triad beyond the beginning of the game, got some solid cards early on,got some power in Curaga early on for HP, and that was pretty much it, rest came from grinding up items from enemies and such.
The game was much better than I remember when I was 16 playing it for the first time in 1999. I was able to make much better use of the systems, and everything in general made more sense considering how different it is from your standard JRPG.
Squall is still an idiot, throughout the entire game, just one bad decision after the next. He's probably the most idiotic person in the game (or in the FF franchise in general) and it makes no sense why anyone would follow him to do anything. He redeemed himself at the very end (barely).
The story was all over the place, but enjoyable if you paid attention. Laguna is also the best person in the game by far. I also realized once I hit the fight with Adel+Rinoa that that was the part I could not get past when I was a kid. The fact that you really need to junction Rinoa before hand so she has more than 900hp and doesn't die in 1 or 2 hits from Adel draining her was the key. Super easy fight after that.
Highlight of the entire game though was the Omega Weapon fight. Once of the hardest boss fights in a FF game I've ever done. If I had abused the crap our of Triple Triad and spammed the invincibility item I could see it being trivial, but actually taking it on without cheesing it was incredibly difficult. Took me probably a good 6-7 attempts to get used to the fight and the timings and patterns. The final attempt was as close as you can get and I saved it because I thought it was a pretty awesome fight.
However it is 25 minutes long which I didn't realize at the time. I'll link it here if anyone wants to watch the whole thing (I apologize for humming along to the battle music, it's catchy!). The real cool part is from the 20 minute mark to the end though if you only want to see the close call and finish.
https://www.twitch.tv/delphinidaes/v/63870916
Overall I enjoyed the whole journey and I'm very glad I've played it again. It ranks much higher in my mind that it used to and it's something I wouldn't mind playing again and trying to really break it.
Next i'll be going on to FFIX and streaming that whole thing much like I did with FFVIII, not too much breaking, not much guide use unless I really get stuck or if I try to tackle bonus fights.
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Well let's go through them (Some story spoilers in here)
Squall: Idiot. Seriously this guy is about as observant as a box of rocks. There is a scene where Quistis convinces him to meet her at a popular date spot in the Garden, tells him she is no longer his instructor, and he then proceeds to tell her "Why are you telling me this? You should talk to a wall." He then proceeds to ignore all of Rinoa's advances, until she is gone. Then he pines after her like it's the end of his existence, he literally leaps into open space to save her in a very touching moment. They are rescued from certain oblivion by the happenstance of a derelict ship being nearby and the very first thing Rinoa wants to do after getting out of her space suit, is be hugged by her love Squall so she can feel human touch once more. His response? "We don't have time for this." Thyen she literally throws herself in his lap in the NEXT FUCKING SCENE and he won't stop telling her to get back into her seat. (Yes I get he was concerned for her safety but come the fuck on....). He then proceeds to let her get taken away, ignoring her once more, but the SECOND she's gone, he gets all fucking weepy again and MUST be with her. Jesus christ.
On a side note the translators didn't do Squall any favors apparently. Every time he says "Whatever." It's actually a much more meaningful statement in the original text that makes much more contextual sense. Check this link for an interesting read on the subject http://fyeahffviii.tumblr.com/post/72672083380/squall-whatever-leonhart
Ok got that one out of the way.
Rinoa: Ok so here's the deal. I actually like Rinoa quite a bit. She's flighty as fuck and a bit of a dreamer, but she's got a lot of life to her character and she's pretty consistent. It's a bit weird how quickly she dumps Seifer for Squall (especially since her response to finding out he might still be alive is basically. "Oh."), but whatever. She knows what she wants and for the most part tries to achieve it. She's also very strong in her signals to Rockhead/Squall. The 'daughter of the military leader/rebel princess' meme is a bit tired but it was played well in this case. She was by far the second most like-able character in the game for me.
Zell: Zell is a fireball, he's a coward at heart but puts on a brave face. He's pretty much an idiot, but even he can see why children love the taste of- I mean that Rinoa is madly crushing over Squall. He even goes so far as to help Rinoa out by making a replica of Squalls ring. He is a genuine person and one of the more believable characters in the game. That being said I never used him unless I was forced to, despite his awesome Limitbreak because fuck me if I could figure out how to actually use it when all the inputs were B4+B3+Up+B2 etc. Sad really, but meh.
Quistis: Quistis has some real issues early on surrounding the whole "Hot for teacher" thing. She's got it bad for Squall, but it turns out it's more of a sisterly love once they find out they've known each other for years (yeah right, you aren't fooling anyone Quistis.) Basically Rinoa knocks her out of the picture right off the bat. Quistis is a motherly type figure which makes her crushing on Squall a bit creepy. She is very competent though and a real asset to the team with her experience and generally calm demeanor.
Selphie: I don't like Selphie. There I said it. I don't generally have a problem with bubbly happy positive characters, but for some reason she just rubs me the wrong way. Her one redeeming section was the infiltration of the Galbadian Missile Base, that section was genuinely funny and a lot of fun when she had real meat in the game. Other than that she was background noise (Her shooting down Irvine was nice though).
Irvine:Speaking of the womanizing tool bag.... Irvine was just not very interesting as a character. He peaked early with his whole 'I'm a sniper who can't snipe' schtick and from then on he basically was just comedic relief in the form of chasing women. I will give him credit for being the only one to realize they were all orphans together, but that was more just that they needed someone to fill that role. Outside of that his character was not interesting at all and he was an asshole, he was going to leave everyone except Rinoa at the Desert Prison just because he was told to only get her out of there. Rinoa literally had to beat the crap out of him to get him to go back, real shitheel. However he was awesome in combat so he was a regular on my team.
Seifer: Fuck this guy...seriously. I get that he has 'Squall issues' and secretly adores/worships Squall but he went from bravado to dickhead at super sonic speeds. Yeah it suck you failed the SeeD exam because you got cocky, but you jump from that to working for the Sorceress, to then taking over her army....dude. His one redeeming 'badass' moment was when you summon Odin against him in a fight and he flat out kills Odin in a reverse-Zantetsuken. That was unexpected and awesome, as was the arrival of Gilgamesh now that he had Odin's sword. Major points for FFVIII on that whole setup, very cool. Squall is basically just an insecure bully and never really grows beyond that until the end credits, he is largely responsible for most of the fucked up shit that happens.
Raijin and Fujin: Awesome characters, interesting and pretty well fleshed out considering they are lackeys for toolbag Seifer. They experience some surprising growth throughout the game, starting with blind followers to betraying their friend to do the right thing. Was pretty impressed with them and they were fun to fight. Fujin get's extra points for the whole mono speak thing leading into a massive out of character monologue at the pivotal moment of betrayal. Very well played.
Laguna (and friends):Laguna was easily the heart and soul of this game, his sequences were fun, engaging, and interesting. His story was also much more interesting than Squall and you end up really wanting to know more about him and what happens to him than you do about Squall and his emo bullshit. After all here is the story of a Galbadian soldier who goes AWOL, wind sup in a sleepy town as it's defender, becomes an actor/journalist and eventually is the president of an entire country and the savior of humanity. Dude is as legit as you can get. Ward and Kiros were cool as well but pretty plain, especially compared to Laguna. Really makes you wonder how the fuck Squall got so fucked up considering the lineage....ah well, being an orphan sucks I suppose.
I think that covers most of them, I could go into Ellone, Edea, Cid, etc but they were mostly there as major plot devices so they got more attention by necessity.
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Oh, and his entire persona is based upon Laguna's TV/Movie character.
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Not really, it's pretty clear his issues surround Squall. He looks up to Squall and thinks himself inferior to him, so he puts on an act about how he's so much better than Squall in an attempt to get some sort of recognition. His obsession is all about Squall and trying to get his approval. His whole "Sorceress' Knight" thing is just a means to that end. He needs to prove he is better than Squall so Squall will acknowledge him. When Squall becomes a SeeD and he doesn't he jumps at the first opportunity to obtain power to get back on Squall's level.
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It's like training/studying your whole life to be really good at something that you have a real passion for only to encounter someone who is just as good, if not better, and who doesn't really give two shits about it because it is just a job to them.
Or put it another way: You grew up loving Batman, trained your whole life to be Batman, and finally you get your chance to be Batman. Then you run in to this other guy who is a better Batman then you, but doesn't know the first thing about Batman and doesn't really care to. :razz:
Whatever.
:winky:
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Seriously, I bet it's like a 5-6 second animation. Meanwhile if you pick Irvine or Zell it's just BAM. They really should have made it where she just shoots the chakram thing like a gun. Watching it slooooowly loop back around and reattach is only potentially interesting the very first time you do it.
No way man, not getting subtle signals is normal. Girl you actively like who you just literally jumped out of an escape hatch into open space to risk your life for after forcing someone to send you BACK IN TIME to try and save her first, who actively likes you and is standing in front of you arms outstretched after floating alone in space saying "Hug me, I need to be hugged RIGHT NOW". And his response is "We don't have time for this."
That's some next level bullshit.
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It was also poorly written and/or translated and came across super meh, but I did at least get why he was the way he was.
You don't get to use that excuse when you just leapt out of a plummeting space pod in a million to one shot at saving your loved one in the vastness of open space with no strategy whatsoever on how to survive. As far as he knew he was going out there to die with her, it just so happens they run into a plot device/derelict spaceship.
You can't then say "I'm terrified of getting close to people", not if you expect any sort of believable scenario whatsoever.
Yes he's socially awkward, yes he is afraid of getting close to people for fear of losing them, but the scenarios he constantly finds himself in are far beyond the realm of plausibility in regards to that particular character flaw.
edit: I do want to point out that I really wanted to like Squall this time around, I really tried. But I just couldn't do it, his actions were too far beyond feasible.
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Maybe.
He's also a teenage character in a JRPG. A certain ritualized hesitance and nervousness between lovers is extremely common in that genre; it's as formalized as Kabuki. In Xenogears Fei is an 18-year-old martial artist, veteran mecha pilot who has soared through the skies and fought in a revolution against techno-organic god-kings and he still gets nervous and freaked out when he thinks Ellie might have been peeking at him in her shower. Even though those two actually do end up having sex later on in the story that's really unusual. I can't think of a single JRPG where teenage lovers run out and embrace each other like they would do in an American romance flick.
If anything Rinoa was being the weird one by genre standards, as forward as she was being. IIANM she generated a lot of conversation in Japan for being a departure from the standard heroine in that respect.
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It's definitely not in the "text". I don't have the game script handy but I think people would have made a huge deal about that in the late 90's in a mainline FF game (although SaGa had gay characters in the same period and nobody really cared).
He doesn't ever really display any interest in women either, though, at least none that I can remember. Neither does Ward for that matter.
Uhh what does this have to do with him being afraid of getting close to people?
That is exactly the kind of scenario where one has to break out of that for.
You think that character trait means he just watches someone he loves die? That is some crazy talk right there. Like legit grade A what are you talking about?
The rest of the stuff makes sense but I'm not sure what you're trying to say here because there's no way it can be what it looks like here.
It never seemed jarring to me, to be honest.
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It's starting to get a bit creepy, the way that is being judged.
Some people have real problems with that.
How he felt about Rinoa conflicted with what being close to her was making him feel.
*male lead saves pretty lady from mortal danger*
*they accidentally hug*
*heehee, this is awkward*
Being emotionally distant or immature doesn't preclude you from being a decent person.
This is exactly it, within seconds of getting into the safety of the ship, he does a complete 180 and shuts off completely. This is immediately after he finally realizes how much she means to him and after he risks his life to be with her, then it's immediately back to full shutdown mode.
In spacesuit, full committal, spacesuit comes off, back to square one, no growth whatsoever in the wake of a massive life changing experience.
I don't care who you are or what your malfunction is, you don't come out completely unaffected after jettisoning yourself into space into certain death after the one you loved and are miraculously saved by happenstance of a nearby derelict spaceship.
I mean a hug at that point would have shown he was human and would have highlighted more realistic growth in the relationship. He could revert back later on once things settled, but that particular moment was very jarring.
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