public service announcement

[seventhe]

I DON'T UNDERSTAND FINAL FANTASY XIII AT ALL

Comments

[whitemage]

WHY DID MY MIND ADD SPARKLES TO THIS?

[zen_monk]

So did you beat Orphan? Yeah, that was really something. I really don't know what kind of story this is. It's like a series of plotpoints but, like, zero exposition between them.

And apparently, there's going to be a continuation after XIII-2 (which is better than the first game, in a way), and it'll be called "The Lightning Saga."

So.... there will actually be introspective characterization? Resolution? Lore? More pink-haired ladies?

[lindorie]

Neither do I; I'm only in it for the Sazh.

[owlmoose]

Are you reading the datalog as you go? Things make much more sense if you keep up with the datalog. You have to keep up, though, because it actually *overwrites* the character profiles with new information as it goes.

I'm not excusing this, btw -- personally I found it one of the game's biggest failings.

[auronlu]

I'm only in it for the lesbians.

[temples]

There are lesbians. That's all you need to know. Really, they were the only reason I even attempted to not quit the game. (I did quit, eventually.)

[stealth_noodle]

I'm only a few chapters and feel largely the same way! I keep meaning to write reaction posts, but so far all my reactions are "WTF is this battle system" and "It has been too long since anyone punched Snow" and "Why aren't any of these ladies making out yet?" because otherwise I might have to think about the "plot."

[seventhe]

"It has been too long since anyone punched Snow"

YES. YES IT HAS. THE GAME'S MAIN FAILING, RIGHT HERE, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN

[seventhe]

FFFFUUUUUUUuuuuuuuu

I actually did try to keep up with the datalog initially - I had heard this from someone else too - but I just couldn't keep up. It was like seriously after ANY THING HAPPENED, it was there in my menu blinking at me with new info, and I wanted to play the game, not read it. :/

[madisuzy]

I don't want to understand it. I just want it to go away. I'd rather play dragon age where i can make characters of varying genders have sex... even if the attempt at a sex scene makes me laugh my ass off.

Sorry... rambling... sneaking away in shame. lol

[seventhe]

I'm surprised I made it this far, honestly.

[seventhe]

I'm on Orphan right now -- wisely saved right beforehand because I didn't think 1AM was a great time to start the multi-boss-final-battle what with the epic bullshit FFXIII throws at you in hard battles. However! The entire trek up to it, with the flying multi platform glowing ruby red FLOATING LADY STATUES THAT TAKE YOU TO MINIBOSSES WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT ANYWAY

[seventhe]

Because it deserved sparkles. Possibly sparkling penis text.

[seventhe]

I will be finally playing Dragon Age some time soon!

[owlmoose]

Yup, pretty much. Any game that forces you to take long reading breaks to understand what it going on, not to mention a not-insigificant portion of the character development, is not a well-designed game in my book.

[wallwalker]

This.

[thene]

Okay, what I don't get is why people complain about this in FFXIII but not in FFXII or in Dragon Age. I just read all the datalog entries by default, because that tends to be what I do in games, and I appreciated FFXIII's and thought they were great - especially the non-chronological unravelling of the Thirteen Days. I thought that was a lovely bit of storytelling and didn't mind that it existed in a game menu. I am aware that it didn't work for everyone but if the solution to this problem is 'don't tell good stories in game menus' I would be sad.

[owlmoose]

It's not about whether the information in the game menus tells a good story -- I loved the detail in the Dragon Age: Origins codexes, for example, and I felt like it added a lot of fantastic depth and breadth to the DA universe. And it also made a great reference if I'd forgotten a detail of a quest. But all the information was either supplemental backstory or repeated something we had learned during the course of the game. Same with FFXII. What bothered me was how often you had to refer to the datalog in FFXIII to understand what had just happened during gameplay. If it's that important, it needs to be *on screen*. And overwriting the datalog entries as the game progressed, rather than adding the new information as it came along, is pretty much unforgivable in my book.

I agree that it worked much better for unfolding the story of the 13 Days -- that's the kind of thing that menu-based storytelling does well.