A Theory on Final Fantasy XIII

It's been a while since I put the tunnel vision behemoth down after reaching a particularly difficult Eidolon battle. And since these insolent little conflicts are one of the games biggest flaws in my opinion, I took a break. Who doesn't under such circumstances, and I will not take any flack for my waiting to continue. However, I returned to the game, passed the fight, and proceeded, and discovered something very odd as I progressed.

Let's go ahead and note that Final Fantasy XIII hasn't been widely accepted by the gaming community, and only a few people have found enjoyment out it. I enjoy it despite it's flaws, mostly due to the fact that it tells a story better than it's predecessor. Sure, the story may not be that great, and still pales in comparison to the Playstation and SNES era, but it's a story that kept my interest.

And now that I've cleared my throat, it's time to get down to business.

Final Fantasy XIII is a perfect example of Square-Enix trying to apply the style of American mainstream games to the Japanese role playing game, specifically calling on first person shooters.

Let that sink in, folks. It's an odd statement, and I have plenty to support it with. Just...breathe it all in.

Alright, now that you are ready for this, let's dig in.

Anyone who has played the game knows very well how narrow the path is, leading you from story event to story event, with absolutely no variation in the game until the eleventh chapter. I can compare this to the average modern first person shooter, wherein which you go down streets or tunnels or whatever the path de jour, and go from battle to battle. Even the actual combat plays out similarly to an FPS. Attack, defend, heal, repeat. Sure, the FPS is going to be a bit more intense seeing as your character is directly controlled by you, but I still stand that this is the flow of combat in FFXIII. Not to mention that potions of almost all kinds are nearly worthless now. It's much easier to switch paradigms for a quick heal than going through the menus for potions several times.

At the end of each path, following several rounds of combat, a story event comes, at times paired with a more difficult round of combat than before. Yes, this is an element of pretty much every game, so this one is a bit unfair, but keep in mind that exploration offered something to keep the player interested in plowing through those random battles. No such variety exists here, until the aforementioned eleventh chapter. I can't think of very many modern first person shooters that offer branching paths out into open areas that stray from the missions provided. So, needless to say, why not apply such constant focus on the story of a game through a similar method of progression? The story of FFXIII seems to be what is in the sight of the director, allowing no way to step away until almost the end.

But that's not saying that they haven't been going this direction in the past. Final Fantasy X suffered a similar progression, despite having many more opportunities to step off the beaten path.

The lack of cities and the usual variety of NPC's is almost unexplainable for a JRPG. I can only assume that this is something else borrowed from the mainstream FPS tradition. Sure, even Gears of War has a cast of someone other than Marcus Fenix, but aside from the squad of Gears that accompany him, the world isn't exactly populated with fine folks offering you guidance from city to city. And that's fine for the genre. You don't need a world full of people in a game where aliens are annihilating cities and wiping out the general population. However, when you are playing a game where you traverse a few still standing cities, you should expect to see a few people in passing.

Also missing from the usual formulas are the shops. Yes, there is a menu where you can buy and sell weapons, accessories, items, and components, but there isn't any personality beyond the backgrounds and sound effects associated with them. I can't say that there was much variety between the shops in towns in past games, but at least you had a sense of place, going through the game as it progressed. All of the environments in FFXIII felt more like they were there as a result of necessity. Have we programmed a snow/ice area? Okay, stick on here. Industrial? Alright, let's play that card. Undergound? Do it. What does this have to do with American FPS games? Not much at all, other than it's something you often see in those games as well. And every other game.

The only place I can see the differentiation is in the way the story plays out. While many have gotten this right, most first person shooters keep the story and the game play apart from one another. You could make the argument that Final Fantasy has been doing that since the first installment. However, I stand that a lot of the story from the classics in the series came from the world, and the people you interacted with throughout the story. More than anything, FFXIII and the modern first person shooter have you interacting with set piece events and combat sequences that do little more that add some of that good old "wow" factor.

While I don't think that FFXIII stands on the same level of quality as it's predecessors, I still enjoy it, warts and all. It's a bizarre run of experimental game design, filtered through a unfocused development process. It will never stand on the same playing field with Final Fantasy VI, but it's still more interesting than some games. If you agree, disagree, or whatever, that's fine. Just think about this if you stick the game in some time in the near future. You might be surprised by what you see.

And now for some...

words...

Yes, it's time to sit down and make my little word count meters move. I decided I'd warm up with a little bit of conversation on how I've spent my morning. It was a little bit productive, you might even say.

I have just bugged a few more editors about getting paid work, including another shout into the ear of the kind editor of The Escapist. I'm hoping that this will garner some attention, and get me a shot, or at least the bloody bullet. The last pitch I sent to Escapist warranted another rejection, but I'm not disappointed. It's just a rejection letter, friends, and if you write, you will see many of them.

In other news--The podcast seems to be doing okay for a hardly advertised bit of rambling about the state of the video game industry. I'd like to see more listeners, but then again, I'd also like to see more readers for this blog, which has a feature that I have spoken of, but have yet to introduce, which leads me to...

PAST GENERATIONS! I have two articles in the can, awaiting editing. I'm just looking for the right time to post them, and this just isn't it. Besides, I've only got five 32X games so far, and that's not enough to really launch this thing off in style. Perhaps I will find a few more in good time, and not go broke in the process.

Alright, enough babbling. I think I need to blindfold myself now, and see which of the giant manuscripts I will stab with it's pointy business end. Wish me luck.

Writer's Blocks

Nope, this is not a post about difficulty with writing. This is my post to show how unproductive I have been, and how I plan to measure my productivity, and give myself a little tool by which to shove myself into writing more. You know, because I'm crazy.

Providence

Alchemyst (Musician story)

Untitled Collaborative Piece (which I should really return to, and wrap up my segment...)

Sure, 75000 is a bit low, but I'm just using those as ballpark estimates. I don't really know what the final total will be, but these are my goals for the three prose projects that I am working on. Anyway...I am writing! It's happening! Keep watching my ridiculous little meters, and see how I come to the final numbers. Anyway, I'm going to see what I can do to get to 20,000 by the end of the week on Alchemyst. Also, I need to find a new title for that story.

Star Wars Comics

Obviously, I enjoy Star Wars more than the average person does, and this drags me into quite a bit of a mess sometimes. Arguing with Star Trek fans aside, the dirty business of trying to keep up with the canon in some way tends to be the most painful thing that a Star Wars fan has to do. Verbally assaulting Trekkies (Trekkers...whatever) isn't that big a deal in comparison.

Dark Horse has held the Star Wars license for twenty years, and has done a lot with the franchise. From sweet adaptations of the films and the Thrawn trilogy, to recent ongoing works like Legacy and Knights of the Old Republic, they treat the property with a lot of respect, providing readers such as myself with a diverse selection of material to read when I drop by my local comic shop. Then there are the recent books that make my eyes roll directly out of my skull.

Now let me say this first: none of these books are innately bad. They just don't reach the level of quality of the other books from the Star Wars franchise. For example, KOTOR writer John Jackson Miller is writing a new series called Knight Errant, focusing on new character Kerra Holt, a Jedi knight who is going to fight Sith and blah blah blah, oh dear God why is this series about another bloody JEDI! Knights of the Old Republic was a great series, and it ended. Most writers would want to move onto new material, or at least make it seem fresh. Kerra Holt is a largely uninteresting character, and I'm rather bored with Knight Errant, and there's only been six issues. Miller is a great writer, and knows the universe well, so I can't help but wonder why this series is so unbelievably dull.

This isn't the only Jedi focused attempt at cashing in on the Clone Wars television craze. An Episode I precursor about Qui-Gon Jinn is coming up later this year, and I'm not exactly excited about this one either. I'm going to read it, yes, but that doesn't mean I have high hopes. There doesn't seem to be any reason why it should exist, other than to tell another story about another Jedi.

That said, Dark Horse does have two series with Jedi in them that don't irritate me. One of those is Dark Times, a particularly dismal take on the period between episodes III and IV, about a wayward Jedi, redefining his role in the universe after the fall of the Jedi order. Sixteen issues, and it's a far cry from Knight Errant, with great characters, fantastic writing, and everything I love in a good Star Wars comic. The tone of the story sits somewhere between classic Samurai film and a good Spaghetti Western. If you haven't read this one, you are missing out on what is easily the best Star Wars book running.

The other end of the quality Jedi-ish books are the Legacy series, which received an absolutely pointless restart after issue 50, which was supposed to be the finale. Considering the delay of the last issue, I think that there was a decision made somewhere to extend things, and a convenient little six issue mini series was dictated at the proper move. Well, I'm going to say that the mini has been just as good as the fifty issues that preceded it, but it still stings going through my comic boxes, and there is a renumbered ending for the end of a series. It looks odd, and now I'm just showing my insane OCD behaviors, which only exist for my hobbies! Aside from that, Legacy is a blast, riding on the vibe that you are actually supposed to be enjoying this rather unwholesome galaxy that exists when the focus isn't directly on the Jedi. It's also nice to see a Skywalker with personality. We haven't got one of those since Luke Skywalker, and thankfully Cade isn't exactly like his lineage would suggest.

Now that I've got my Jedi bashing out of the way, it's time to poke the giant elephant in the corner with a javelin--Blood Ties was terrible. It's unforgivable fan service pointed directly at the possibility of selling a book just because Boba Fett is on the cover. I am probably in the minority in saying this, but I feel like Fett is far less intimidating since AotC. Gone are all of the possibilities of his origin that could have been far more exciting, just like the neutering of the Clone Wars, which were always hailed as a far more interesting time than the Robots Vs Stormtroopers bit that we got instead. Anyways, let's get back to mark here.

The Darth Vader mini-series running right now is actually pretty good. I have to give them credit here: they are trying something different with the character, which allows him to be the cold hearted killer that we remember from the first film over thirty years ago, all the while giving us the inner turmoil of the past he could have had as Anakin Skywalker, with only one child that shows Jedi potential (nice move on writer W. Haden Blackman's part). Blackman is making strong strides for the quality of writing in the Star Wars universe, although I question his decisions in the production of Force Unleashed II. But that is beside the point. He's doing good things. Next target, please.

John Ostrander, who is responsible for Legacy, is putting a new book out that is set in the classic Rebellion/Republic era. It's called Agent of the Empire, and that's pretty exciting to me. Star Wars usually is at it's best in this era, at least for me. Empire/Rebellion were two fantastic books that delved into territory that hasn't been touched enough--the period between IV and V. There's little information on the series right now other than it's coming out this year, and crowding my box at the shop, along with...

CRIMSON EMPIRE III. Yeah, they are bringing this one back. Here's hoping they reprint the first two volumes, as I missed out on those back in the late nineties, aside from a great article in Star Wars Insider, covering the launch of the series. There is a preview of the series coming out next month in Dark Horse Presents no. 1, so maybe I'll stick a review of it up here.

I also read in Previews this month that there is to be another arc of The Old Republic comics. This hurts me quite a bit actually, as the first six issues were horrible up to merely acceptable in quality. When great things are happening in the Star Wars universe, and this is the stuff that they send for me to read, it's easy to be disappointed.

And that's what is in store for Star Wars fans who read comics this year, and why I'm skeptical. Well, not as skeptical as I could have been. I could just write off the whole franchise right now, claiming that the giant arc focus of the novels makes it almost impossible for me to get into any of the new stuff, and the mediocre selection of comics makes me cringe when I see that I have to drop three more dollars on another story about someone swinging a sword made of light against another sword made of light while talking about how they will be killed and Sith and dull and why am I still typing this sentence? I know I don't have to buy these books, but I will, and hope that they grow into something. I'm just dying for Dark Horse to impress me once again. They've done it, and they do it often, so I just want them to get on with it!