Nonsense and Falderol

Reblog if you were ever bullied.

madeofdoom:

jamdalfs-milph:

squeekz4all:

rox1108:

007-reporting:

angelsontheearth:

17851

That’s disgusting.

Well done society.

Well done.

20,299.

148,628

173,490

208,261 that is horrific.

Depressingly, I think it would be a lot higher if people understood that if it’s from friends it counts, if it’s from family it counts, if it’s so subtle no one else notices it still fucking counts.

(Source: nickastig.me, via puella--magica)

Quoting my own rebuttal to some internet MAN CRUSADER

“As a man, I reject your ideas of what’s masculine. My idea of masculinity is: Identifying as male. That’s about it. Everything else has plenty of exceptions, even genitalia. I’ve certainly known preoperative trans-men who were more masculine than me.

“Okay, let’s add ‘feeling totally comfortable with the idea of having a penis’ to the list. There, being masculine means two whole things. Again, I’m telling you this as someone born male.”

This game hollowed me out and filled me with feels

A rant about how Final Fantasy IV is the worst, even worse than XIII

FF IV was a far worse game than XIII. Not that I’m a staunch defender of XIII (I think they had a lot of interesting ideas but they really didn’t pan out well) although I will say XIII-2 is a vast improvement.

But still. IV is the worst numbered installment in its original format. I can’t speak for any of the more recent remakes where they’ve apparently fiddled with the gameplay a lot, but the original version and earlier remakes was terrible.

Even the original Final Fantasy had more customisation. At least in that game you could choose your party members (albeit once, at the very start). IV gave you a wide variety of characters throughout the game, but you could only ever use whoever the plot said at that time. And character progression? They actually managed to make it worse than XIII, by having stark linearity combined with randomised stat changes. With the risk of losing stats at level up.

Do I need to repeat that? You could gain a level and be weaker for it. The only way to avoid it was to save frequently, but the best places to grind XP tend to be away from save points. And it’s not like your whole party is going to level up simultaneously every time.

Then there’s how dull combat is. Yeah, yeah, XIII is an alarmingly hands-off experience, but when you do have to pay attention it’s to make actually pretty meaningful decisions. IV, like a lot of the series really, in the bulk of battles demands a lot of time spent doing little more than mashing your confirm button on whatever controller you’re using. The only real difference is that XIII will cause less RSI.

But what about the story? That’s the good bit, right? The part that causes everyone to hold it up and say it’s a great game! Eh. It has a lot more dialogue and event scenes than the first three, but the quality isn’t really any better. In fact, the plot is basically a patchwork of those earlier games.

It’s got the political drama against the backdrop of a world at war, like II. Or at least it pays lip service to the concept, but doesn’t delve into it even as much as that earlier game even with its technologically limited script space.

It’s got a final villain who echoes Chaos from the original. A chessmaster moving all the pieces around to bring about the end of the world, who was once a fallen hero but over interminable ages of solitude saturated with magic became an unstoppable rage monster. Actually, yeah, Zeromus really is just a rehash of Chaos. No wonder he’s not the guy they used for Dissidia.

There’s the two worlds in conflict theme from III. Except here the other world is pretty much dead and just used to explain the villains and why the main protagonist is such a special snowflake. There’s no interesting contrasts, no commentary on how people from other places are people just the same. They’re just nearly-extinct Lunar Ubermenschen.

But hey, what really sets the game apart from what came before is all the characterisation they could fit in! That’s where the technological improvements really helped them step up their game. I’m not even being sarcastic. Unfortunately, they’re still not interesting characters, because they’re just broad sketches of personality at best.

Cecil is the original Final Fantasy emo pretty boy. He tends to be the assigned player character more than anyone, which means he has very few character moments where he’s being proactive. In making him the player avatar, he just gets herded along where the story needs him to go. His only decisions are the player’s decisions, which are very little other than ‘do I grind here a bit longer or can I take the boss now?’

Kain and Golbez are pretty much the same character. One is like a brother to Cecil, the other is his long-lost brother. Both spend a lot of time as villains under the control of the next villain up the ladder. Both briefly see sense before turning bad again only to redeem themselves in time to help defeat the final villain. Both have really cool, ornate armour. Both are part of an ancient but diminished legacy of badarses. And both have no personality.

Rosa has a little personality, most of which is how she loves Cecil. And is a pure and virtuous White Mage. And that’s it.

Rydia has a lot of crazy stuff happen to her, but the entire extent of her personality is that she’s besties with all the Summons.

Edge is pretty much Han Solo with less charm, except that he has hidden depth! His parents are deeeeeeeeaaaaaaad! Hm. I take back the Han Solo thing. He’s exactly like Dick Grayson.

Cid and Yang? Another pair of characters who are the same person. Older mentor figures who assist the heroes for a time before appearing to sacrifice their lives (but miraculously survive)? And they’re both sources of forced comic relief to boot! At least they have different personalities. Not that ‘serious monk’ and ‘crazy engineer’ are particularly interesting when there’s nothing more to them than that.

Palom and Porom …You know what I was saying about pairs of characters who are the same person? Yeeeeeeeaaaaah. And they’re so precocious to boot!

FuSoYa is a plot and exposition device. The End.

But, uh, that does leave Tellah and Edward. And you know what? Those two are both pretty legitimately well-realised and distinct characters. I kind of have to wonder if their section of the story was written by one person who didn’t have as much input on the rest. In fact, you could remove them without significantly harming the main plot.

So, worst gameplay, entirely derivative story and largely shallow characters. That’s why IV is the only numbered installment in the series I outright scorn.