Squeenix Spoony plays Final Fantasy XIII

[felipepepe]

I really cannot think of any other major western title (maybe Call of Duty?) where this shit is prelevant.

Call of Duty and Battlefield goes without saying, but I'm not talking just about video-games... the most eye-rolling example I can think about is Spider-Man 3, with that whole "workers of New York gather to help the hero, cause that's what good americans do", crowned by this shot:

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

 

[Gurkog]

I really cannot think of any other major western title (maybe Call of Duty?) where this shit is prelevant.

Call of Duty and Battlefield goes without saying, but I'm not talking just about video-games... the most eye-rolling example I can think about is Spider-Man 3, with that whole "workers of New York gather to help the hero, cause that's what good americans do", crowned by this shot:

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

That shot made me facepalm when I saw it in the theater. Every time they force feed some 'child saving the super hero' segment makes me vomit a bit in my mouth as well.

 

[Jick Magger]

To be fair, the movie was released not long after 9/11, when Pro-American propaganda was at its highest.

Still doesn't mean the scene has aged well and isn't ridiculously corny in hindsight, though.

 

[felipepepe]

To be fair, the movie was released not long after 9/11, when Pro-American propaganda was at its highest.

Spiderman 3 is from 2007 bro...

 

[Jick Magger]

To be fair, the movie was released not long after 9/11, when Pro-American propaganda was at its highest.

Spiderman 3 is from 2007 bro...

Sorry, thought you were mixing up Spiderman 3 with Spiderman 1.

Not that I could be bothered double-checking seeing as Spider Man 3 was afwul, so my bad.

 

[Mrowak]

I really cannot think of any other major western title (maybe Call of Duty?) where this shit is prelevant.

Call of Duty and Battlefield goes without saying, but I'm not talking just about video-games... the most eye-rolling example I can think about is Spider-Man 3, with that whole "workers of New York gather to help the hero, cause that's what good americans do", crowned by this shot:

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

Yeah, but that kind of is given seeing what the movies are. And again, it's not that we praise those films, so it's a feeble excuse to extol Japanese media when they use the very same mechanism.

Don't get me wrong - I love many Japanese pieces of music, film and games. It's just it's been getting harder and harder to find anything of value, without the said sensationalist elements spoiling the fun. Even when something starts interesting 9/10 you can count that it will end as contrived mess. Which is exactly what happened to Final Fantasy XIII. Damn shame.

 

[tuluse]

Sam Raimi was butthurt about studio interference and intentionally made Spiderman 3 shitty. So I wouldn't really use it as an example of anything.

 

[Lagole Gon]

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

You haven't actually seen the movie. huh?

 

[evdk]

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

You haven't actually seen the movie. huh?

"presented as"

 

[Lagole Gon]

Or more recently, Iron Man 3, where even the fucking MANDARIN is presented as "mid-east terrorist"...

You haven't actually seen the movie. huh?

"presented as"

Well, it was done on purpose, that's the point.
It's rather unfair to compare it to the straightforward AMERICA! FUCK YEAH! in the spiderman.

 

[Tytus]

To quote the update on his site:

NOTE: Don’t worry, folks, I will review XIII-2, and naturally, I can’t address the events of that game without covering the endgame of XIII. Don’t worry that the “ragequit” ending was the end of FF13. Basically I was trying to illustrate that THAT was the exact point where I quit the game in real life.

 

[felipepepe]

Well, it was done on purpose, that's the point.
It's rather unfair to compare it to the straightforward AMERICA! FUCK YEAH! in the spiderman.

True, it's obviously a commentary on the situation, but it works so well because it's not something unexpected or unseen nowadays.

 

[Infinitron]

NOTHING IS OVER http://spoonyexperiment.com/2013/12/22/final-fantasy-xiii-part-5/

 

[felipepepe]

Meh.

 

[Tytus]

The finale will be probably in January. If he will make a skit when he fights himself as Sephiroth for 30 minutes, I'm gonna puke. I still have nightmares after FF X finale.

 

[Rahdulan]

It's better than the last few, but you can still tell he's just doing for the sake of completion Also, he had to plug in his relationship update in there because, you know.

 

[Tytus]

It's better than the last few, but you can still tell he's just doing for the sake of completion Also, he had to plug in his relationship update in there because, you know.

He has to make excuses to himself to still feel like a human being for not having a real job and leeching of his brother.

 

[rpgcodexusername]

So do Japanese devs create these nonsensical convoluted stories because Metal Gear did it first?

 

[tuluse]

Metal Gear did it first

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime

 

[rpgcodexusername]

Metal Gear did it first

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime

ohhhh

 

[SausageInYourFace]

So, is the story really as horrible and nonsensical as Spoony makes it out to be? I haven't played a JRPG in ages and thought about picking one up again, just to spice my gaming up a little. But the way Spoony describes the story, it really seems like a complete disaster. He has a tendency to exaggerate though.. so, should I give it a try?

 

[Whisky]

So, is the story really as horrible and nonsensical as Spoony makes it out to be? I haven't played a JRPG in ages and thought about picking one up again, just to spice my gaming up a little. But the way Spoony describes the story, it really seems like a complete disaster. He has a tendency to exaggerate though.. so, should I give it a try?

It really is a fucking mess.

If you want a good jrpg, look in the JRPGs with interesting mechanics thread. FF has shit itself and won't change its pants.

 

[Gozma]

I'd like to see a good insider's post-mortem of one of these games because the chain of decisions that could lead to shit like FF13 happening is completely inscrutable. It's not like it's dumb and lowest common denominator in a straightforward way. It's just, fucking... what do they think they are selling exactly, do they have like a working theory of what people get out of their games or is everyone in the building cargo culting it up with the highest budgets you can get without being hooked up to American finance spigots

 

[Whisky]

What little inside information we've received about Square makes it seem a very odd place. Nobuo said that his main reason for quitting was that Square's executives moved their HQ to a place he didn't want to transit to, all because a fortune teller told them to.

Toriyama's obsession with Lightning is uncomfortable and reminds me of Sakamoto and Samus, but we could really use insider information. I bet there is some premium crazy.

 

[felipepepe]

So, is the story really as horrible and nonsensical as Spoony makes it out to be?

FFXIII's story is about a group of random people being chosen and receiving magical powers to save the world. But instead of joyfully accepting it like every other story ever, they refuse it, threat it as a curse and spend most of the game trying to escape from it.

IMHO, that's a goddamn brilliant storyline. Knowing that, Lightning describing an area as "training areas for heroes" and getting pissed at it makes total sense (obviously Spoony is busy trying too hard to make fun of it to notice that). The problem is that it's baldy executed, being buried under too much exposition about stuff that don't really matter, too many forced "epic moments", and characters that simply don't work, like Vanille.

And of course, even if it was a massive success in its proposal, I doubt that the weaboos & otakus that it's aimed at would like it. It's sad, there are really good ideas inside Square-Enix, but they all seem chained down by the need to make AAAAA+ RPGs, that sell billions and use every cheap trick in the book to cater to their retarded otaku audiences. Vide FF XII's Betrayed Veteran Basch being replaced by Tidus-clone Vaan as main character because of focus groups.