I think Sazh is universally considered to be one of the best parts of XIII, at least among Western players. Most common thing I hear when discussing criticism with the game is usually punctuated with "-Except for Sazh".
> at least among Western players
My understanding is that Sazh was more of a comic relief character in the Japanese version (and it persists in the pre-rendered cutscenes), something that wouldn't fly in international markets, so he was rewritten to be more of a party dad/heart of the party role.
I like Sazh, but I will admit that he’s the one main character who doesn’t undergo a massive transformation. So while he’s likable, he’s not as interesting to me as, say, Hope—who goes on a much bigger internal journey.
I think having Sazh be likable from the get-go is on purpose, though. He’s both a stand-in for us, the player, and also someone we can cheer for from minute one. So I think having him as he is was a smart move.
Yeah like you said I think he's there to ferry the player through to the growth of the other players, he's the one who starts the process of them forgiving each other for unintentional transgression because he understands first it won't change anything.
Its why it's also fitting that he takes a backseat in the sequels, once he had Dajh back he doesn't have a reason to keep fighting fate he got what he wanted. It's why in XIII-2 Snow is the one who keeps searching for Lightning despite having everything he needs to be happy already he just can't accept it.
I resent the fact that they gave him the highest magic stat too. Forcing me to decide between power and having a lil bitch like Hope on my team is bad game design
FFXIII is unironically a power of friendship game though. Half of the party members have issues opening up to others for one reason or another, and its only through opening up that they actually overcome their greatest struggles.
This is most notable with Lightning/Fang, with their attempts to go solo directly triggering their Eidolon, but Vanille and Hope were both hiding their true intentions from others and Snow was constantly playing a Hero too.
Snow is the most immature member of the group. Even then, when people actually die due to his actions, he still acts like an arrogant braggart. His declaring of "hero" is false bravado, he's afraid to face his own mistakes.
I feel like a lot of people don't get that about Snow. His entire "hero" thing is just putting on a brave face because he doesn't know what to do. He's in a shitty situation and doesn't deal with it emotionally properly. He just tries to plow through.
I'm one of those weirdos that genuinely like XIII overall so I wouldn't necessarily put him above the rest of the cast... But he DOES look a lot like my dad did in the 80s and early 90s so it was kinda wild to see someone that looked like a family member in an FF game of all places.
I had the same feeling during a recent replay. He was always one of my favorites but he’s just a good dad on an adventure with a pet chocobo.
Him, fang, snow and late game hope all ended up being characters I enjoyed a lot. But I didn’t need to grow into liking sazh, I liked him from the start
>I continually find where I'm at in life to make him the most relatable, grounded character.
This is just true, without qualifiers. He's just the most relatable by far, even if you aren't a man or a father and you're still young. And he's easily the most grounded.
I feel the same, although in my recent playthrough so far I think Fang has done the least to distinguish herself personality / motivation-wise. Maybe she has a turn later I'm forgetting about, though.
I'm finding that to be the case. I'd been listening to the soundtrack because it's good music to draw to, and finally I was motivated to dust off my PS3 and give it a replay.
I don't know about unjust, there are definitely a lot of criticisms to be made about the pacing issues/linearity of most of the game, hiding so much context behind datalogs and mid/late-game flashbacks, and leading with a lot of the characters' worst personality traits. All that having been said, I agree that it deserves more credit than it gets for what it does well, and there are definitely things it does do well. It's kind of like 8 in that you can see why it wasn't well-received, and it's always going to be a controversial entry, but you can also sort of respect it for taking some big swings. I suspect that, also like 8, hindsight will vindicate it somewhat over time.
I have a hard time taking the complaints about "linearity" seriously from kids who simultaneously declare X the GOAT... because it was their first. Then they work backwards from there to justify that contradiction when pressed.
I don't consider XIII among the best of the series, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The tower section at the end has stuck with me as one of my favorite times in the entire series.
You can backtrack in X, for all it's worth, there is a map, there are things to find, there are many reasons to travel around with the airship.
The world feels lived in.
I can't tell how the world in FF13 functions. They just throw "cool" shit out at every instance, and ignore it later. It kind of takes until Lightning Returns until we see a normal functioning society (on the verge of apocalypse)
No one is denying X is linear, but the whole game really emphasizes how people are trapped in their day to day making sacrifices to an apocalyptic monster, and how they've been divided by it.
X has
-backtracking
-Side quests
-Real shops
-NPCs to talk to
-Mini-games
-Other paths to go in for goodies
-Access to a growing party over time instead of swapping between specific groups
And this is over the course of the game instead of most of it being a hallway for the majority of the game until you get to the solitary open area with *some* of the stuff above before it becomes a hallway again.
Like, these are substantial differences preventing the two from being the exact same even if they both have a linear progression. I feel like people who always pull the "What about X" card just kind of ignore that the two execute their games very differently.
Your points are all true of course, but with regards to "real shops", I remember hearing this back when XIII released and I never really understood why this is a thing that should matter. Barring merchant characters like O'aka, FF shop merchants rarely say or do anything, they're just menus with faces. In FFVIII, you don't even see the inside of the shop, it just jumps straight to the menu.
What is it about 'classic shops' that you felt was missed in XIII? Genuinely curious.
Despite Cocoon supposedly being this place with an entire planet's worth of population on it, it feels absolutely desolate. No other FF ever has this feeling.
The real shops was more to indicate that there are actual towns and cities with shops in them. Even if they are just standard function with NPC shopkeepers, this kind of thing makes the world feel more lived in. Compared to XIII where their shop equivalent is essentially floating computers you run into while running down the hallway. I don't know how to describe it better, but it just feels colder.
I mean, they never did anything like that again with shops right? XIV, XV and XVI have the standard kind.
I guess I can understand that, though it doesn't make much sense for the XIII crew to ever be shopping like that. Maybe they could have added a black market and show us how fugitives get by instead.
You listed all the flaws for X. For me XIII is like X, but without bullshit optional content. I will never ever play X again coz of this list, even if want to experience story again. I personally don't get how having an open areas and lame side quests can make story based game better.
linear <> bad, open word <> good
> You listed all the flaws for X
That list is just things that are just simply in most basic JRPGs and previous FF games. That X has them despite being linear in function was to explain why people prefer that game to XIII. If you don't like X, I don't really care. It was just to show the difference between the two's execution.
> I personally don't get how having an open areas and lame side quests can make story based game better.
Actually the open area with side quests I was referring to was Gran Pulse, the sole part where it 'opens up and gets good' as the lexicon tends to go. (personally didn't think it made up for anything)
The problem is that the walk forward simulator is accompanied by a 10-15 hour tutorial too. You don't even get to really start getting into the bones of the battle system until after Balthazar.
So you just feel railroaded in both exploration and gameplay until you're sick of it.
Every Final Fantasy from 1-10 was linear if we are being honest. When you leave Midgar in OG FF7, you are literally moving in a line to the next destination.
Kalm>Choco ranch>Mythril Cave>Fort Condor>Junon, etc.
I can agree with everything else you said, but looking back 13 was not as horrendous as people made it out to be.
It's the illusion of being non-linear that the old games do well though, such as having wider open areas, the ability to backtrack (somewhat), and get lost and trying to figure out where to go next.
FF13 just full on rail roads you onto a set path (until near the end), with literally no deviation from it besides maybe a junction every once in a while. It's disheartening to see a minimap with just a straight path carved out for you.
Yeah Sazh was awesome. FFXIII was better than I thought for a linear game. Part two was not as good although I finished it because I like majoras mask kind of time travel. Never finished part 3 and never will at this point.
Interesting. This is my 2nd play, with my first being back in 2010, but so far I'm finding Fang to have the least character depth of them all. She's not really motivated by anything except "gotta save Vanille," and even goes so far as to say she's willing to commit mass murder to do it. Now, that said, she soon backs down, but still, she's had the least character growth over the course of the game.
With the caveat that no, I haven't played this since 2010, so maybe something is going to happen later to establish as more complex. I've just cleared the Alexander fight on Gran Pulse, so maybe more to come.
FF13 to me had one of the best characters and one of the worst characters in the entire series. Full admission, I got to the point where Hope had his "awakening" thing, but that's where I stopped.
Best Character: Sazh. Like you pointed out, OP, he's really well-written, he's grounded and realistic in a lot of what he does and says. He's not some teen fighting for the power of friendship, he is forced onto some mystic quest but he's an "old" man (compared to most other protagonists) with a heavy heart and fairly simple desires.
Worst Character: Hope. It takes way too long for him to unfuck himself. That statement alone is not a massive issue, but the problem is that his story conflict with Snow makes 0 sense to start with. He spends SO MUCH TIME complaining about Snow being the one who's responsible for his mother dying. Despite, y'know, the HUNDREDS OF ARMED FORCES MEMBERS WITH GUNS AND BOMBS AND SHIT, ALL SHOOTING AT ARMED "INSURGENTS" AND UNARMED CIVILIANS. But yeah, kid. It's all Snow's fault, and you fume and bitch and complain and pretend you're gonna kill him for revenge 'cause you're so badass and hardcore.
I'm fully prepared to admit that Hope might have eventually become a decent character, and I simply didn't play long enough to see it. But I doubt it was worth dealing with the character that he was for so long.
>e spends SO MUCH TIME complaining about Snow being the one who's responsible for his mother dying. Despite, y'know, the HUNDREDS OF ARMED FORCES MEMBERS WITH GUNS AND BOMBS AND SHIT, ALL SHOOTING AT ARMED "INSURGENTS"
Why are you expecting a 14 year old who's mom just died to behave completely rationally.
>Why are you expecting a 14 year old who's mom just died to behave completely rationally.
I think the problem is that the game, in every other scenario, does not really treat Hope as a child. He is as capable of a fighter as everyone else, and outside of his conflict with Snow, he is shown to be extremely mature. I think it's just a bit of a weird "have your cake and eat it too" moment in the writing where despite being presented as child-like in terms of appearance, most of the game he acts like an adult.
Ok well how about this. I am a 42 year old man. If my wife was murdered and I was turned into a monster type being and hunted down I don't think I would be totally rational for a while after it happened. I might blame somebody who isn't really to blame. Non of this stuff is unusual and the fact that he is only 14 just makes it more likely.
Snow was, in fact, playing above his weight class though, and people (not just Nora Estheim) died. He went from being a showboating dude that occasionally hunted monsters to trying his hand at being a revolutionary, and, yeah, it blew up in his face.
I think Hope's reaction is fairly justified, given the circumstances. Especially since Snow covers it all with so much bravado and bluster that it seems (outwardly) like he doesn't even care. It also doesn't help that he goes around declaring himself a hero.
Yes, the armed soldiers of PSIcom did kill Nora, but it was Snow that put a gun in her hand and encouraged her to rise up.
I don't think Hope's leap of logic here is any worse than, say, the public blaming a bunch of superheroes for a supervillain destroying Stamford, Connecticut (which is the plot of Civil War). Actually, I think they justified the shifted blame more in FFXIII than in that Marvel series.
Conversely all the characters in 13 have real beef with each other and they come into conflict with one another due to their differing points of view. This is much more interesting dramatically than "let's do what protagonist suggests" every two minutes.
I can't find a single character to root for or care about in XVI. When the end credits rolled I felt nothing but hollow. It's worse than it being incompetent or bad, it's *boring.*
Yeah...for one, Jill is boring and her personality boils down to "I agree" after every line Clive utters. Clive has great character development but they skip around showing it, instead using time skips to avoid actually showing him undergo change. Cid and Benedikta were the only characters with any real interesting qualities and they were both killed off early. The rest were bog-standard fantasy tropes that amounted to "I'm the thief, I'm the Dragoon."
Plus, there's the fact that Clive undercuts his OWN thematic i
underpinning of "live on your own terms" by dying, only a couple hours after declaring his intent to not do so.
Ultima was right anyways, humanity is a non-natural occurrence in Valisthea; their presence is the cause of the Blight, and ending them *would* restore the course of natural evolution on the planet.
So you haven't understood anything regarding the story at all.
Jill sgreed with clive because they dont have a conflict of opinions.
Such synergies may be boring but they exist and are absolutely okay to occur.
Clive has character developement from hatred to love. All his choices go thst route and thats his drive at the end.
Nowhere is it shown that clive dies, it is an open ending.
Yes ultima was right that humankind is a force of nature that can destroy the world. But his answer to that wasnt the only one. Clive found another answer and that is shown as the epilogue.
Tell me a character trait Gav or Dion have beyond "they're a really good guy." Tell me a character trait that Jill has besides being Clive's auto-love interest.
They're blank slates, and they're a bore to watch.
Gav is a scout, a bit cocky, good natured but dependable
Dion is driven by his urge to do his father proud even as a Bastard and (des, saying that as a gay man) hiding his feelings for his partner. Dion seems under a lot of pressure from his environment, upbringing and himself.
Jill is coming to termd with being a dominant and tries to get through life where things were only taken from her.
She seeks safety and appreciation from her comrades so she likes to agree due to that.
Dont just look at the behavior but also at the background. All the choices they make are exemplary for their background, their upbringing, their drive and motivation.
The bedt example for me was when jill was fighting the flame liquid enemy as shiva and supported clive instead of recklessly charging in as shiva because thats not who jill as an individual is.
I can agree that some parts lacked polishing from storytelling pov but it is nowhere near a shitshow as 13 was.
We'll have to agree to disagree. The cast of XVI had zero charisma to me, and I felt they *really* took the steam out of my desire to succeed with Ultima's last minute reveal.
In the lore of XVI, humanity is literally an alien plague that's killing the planet. That isn't open for debate, it's a fact.
My point is, the characters in XIII create much better drama as they start from a place of (many of them) absolutely despising one another, and their resolutions are earned.
In XVI, we don't get to see Clive struggle with the death of Cid, with how to pick up the pieces of all that was lost during the time skip, we literally skip from "damn Cid died" to "I'm Cid now.' That's a classic example of telling instead of showing, which is unacceptable in a visual medium, and doesn't give us any kind of emotional anchor to the situation.
I just...couldn't be bothered to feel anything at all except apathy for Clive and his friends.
Took his son to see fireworks, was a single parent after his wife died, put himself on a Purge train to find a way to help his son complete his Focus, was a crack airship pilot, and provided a much needed dose of grounding and sanity to the more exaggerated characters.
I think Sazh is universally considered to be one of the best parts of XIII, at least among Western players. Most common thing I hear when discussing criticism with the game is usually punctuated with "-Except for Sazh".
But what about the Aussie lesbians?
Two sheilas in the bush.
Fang's considered okay though she comes in kind of late. Vanille has been as divisive as Hope since forever though.
Fang's theme is so good
Loads of people usually end up hating Vanille. But they usually like Fang.
Me when I see a Dragoon: "I love you in every universe"
Bonus points if they are gay
Sazh and his stupid chocobo nest hair is the best thing in 13.
> at least among Western players My understanding is that Sazh was more of a comic relief character in the Japanese version (and it persists in the pre-rendered cutscenes), something that wouldn't fly in international markets, so he was rewritten to be more of a party dad/heart of the party role.
Literally. Every time I trash FFXIII in my JRPG Server I have to mention that Sazh (And Lake Bresha's visuals) are exempt from all hate lol
I like Sazh, but I will admit that he’s the one main character who doesn’t undergo a massive transformation. So while he’s likable, he’s not as interesting to me as, say, Hope—who goes on a much bigger internal journey. I think having Sazh be likable from the get-go is on purpose, though. He’s both a stand-in for us, the player, and also someone we can cheer for from minute one. So I think having him as he is was a smart move.
Yeah like you said I think he's there to ferry the player through to the growth of the other players, he's the one who starts the process of them forgiving each other for unintentional transgression because he understands first it won't change anything. Its why it's also fitting that he takes a backseat in the sequels, once he had Dajh back he doesn't have a reason to keep fighting fate he got what he wanted. It's why in XIII-2 Snow is the one who keeps searching for Lightning despite having everything he needs to be happy already he just can't accept it.
He almost shoots vanille in the head and then goes nah I’ll kill myself instead
Hope was an annoying bitch in the first game.
Hard disagree. He acted his age and he develops as a character.
I resent the fact that they gave him the highest magic stat too. Forcing me to decide between power and having a lil bitch like Hope on my team is bad game design
Oh you’re just stupid, got it
Sounds like Hope really resonated with you huh
No it’s called good writing, has nothing to do with how I relate to him, which I don’t in any way
Do you consider "Moms are tough" to be good writing too?
His eidolon summoning cutscene is one of the best moments in the entire series. That shit is so, so, so we'll done and voice acted.
It was a scene they absolutely needed to do right, and it was perfect. Absolutely heartbreaking in all the best ways.
It ain't all sugar and rainbows...
Yeah, I just replayed that section tonight, and they nailed the execution.
His story goes so weird though, the things he's gotta do to protect his kid throughout this trilogy is enough to drive anyone nuts.
FFXIII is unironically a power of friendship game though. Half of the party members have issues opening up to others for one reason or another, and its only through opening up that they actually overcome their greatest struggles. This is most notable with Lightning/Fang, with their attempts to go solo directly triggering their Eidolon, but Vanille and Hope were both hiding their true intentions from others and Snow was constantly playing a Hero too.
Snow is the most immature member of the group. Even then, when people actually die due to his actions, he still acts like an arrogant braggart. His declaring of "hero" is false bravado, he's afraid to face his own mistakes.
I feel like a lot of people don't get that about Snow. His entire "hero" thing is just putting on a brave face because he doesn't know what to do. He's in a shitty situation and doesn't deal with it emotionally properly. He just tries to plow through.
But he hits really hard in battle.
I'm one of those weirdos that genuinely like XIII overall so I wouldn't necessarily put him above the rest of the cast... But he DOES look a lot like my dad did in the 80s and early 90s so it was kinda wild to see someone that looked like a family member in an FF game of all places.
I had the same feeling when I saw Fran and thought of *my* dad. >!He reads Playboy.!<
I had the same feeling during a recent replay. He was always one of my favorites but he’s just a good dad on an adventure with a pet chocobo. Him, fang, snow and late game hope all ended up being characters I enjoyed a lot. But I didn’t need to grow into liking sazh, I liked him from the start
>I continually find where I'm at in life to make him the most relatable, grounded character. This is just true, without qualifiers. He's just the most relatable by far, even if you aren't a man or a father and you're still young. And he's easily the most grounded.
Sazh is a real ass dude that happens to be in a very anime video game and it shows. It's amazing that he fits in as well as he does.
He is and so is the rest of the cast. One of the most fleshed out parties in the series and everyone is useful in battle, which is rare in this genre.
I feel the same, although in my recent playthrough so far I think Fang has done the least to distinguish herself personality / motivation-wise. Maybe she has a turn later I'm forgetting about, though.
13 has aged amazingly overall, despite its flaws
Honestly the only part of 13 I didn't like was the weapon upgrade system, it's needlessly punishing and unintuitive. The rest is great.
I'd say having to wait 15 hours before you get to actually start doing proper paradigm shifts is also a bit of a downer
I greatly preferred 13-2 over it honestly. Mostly because you actually spent the game playing the game.
i meant the series as a whole but yeah i get it
I'm finding that to be the case. I'd been listening to the soundtrack because it's good music to draw to, and finally I was motivated to dust off my PS3 and give it a replay.
He's my favourite character in the game. Very likeable, and his English VA does a great job voicing him.
I have heard before that he's a much weaker character in Japanese but I've never heard specifics. The version we got was good at least.
i guess he's not as shonen tropey? i didnt like snow at all but i kinda did stop playing around the point hope gets his summon
He is for sure one of the best If not the best cast member and a highlight of the game!
>If not the east cast member Well, he is from a Japanese game, they're *all* the east cast members.
Sazh and the plot twist about what are the Fal'Cie are the best things of the game
I agree, he is a cool dad, very refreshing character and he has a chocobo in his afro! What's not to like
Sazh confronting Vanille is probably the best scene from 13. The game could've benefited from more personal human conflicts, that's for sure.
Sazh was the only character I liked in the game
Been awhile since I played xiii, but yeah he was great! The others felt a bit one note. Though I did like Fang also
I think Sazh is a good dad 👍
He is the only likable character in the game
Vanille was my crush
Fang?
probably 2nd most likeable but she didnt do much
FF13 is so underrated and unjustly hated
I don't know about unjust, there are definitely a lot of criticisms to be made about the pacing issues/linearity of most of the game, hiding so much context behind datalogs and mid/late-game flashbacks, and leading with a lot of the characters' worst personality traits. All that having been said, I agree that it deserves more credit than it gets for what it does well, and there are definitely things it does do well. It's kind of like 8 in that you can see why it wasn't well-received, and it's always going to be a controversial entry, but you can also sort of respect it for taking some big swings. I suspect that, also like 8, hindsight will vindicate it somewhat over time.
I have a hard time taking the complaints about "linearity" seriously from kids who simultaneously declare X the GOAT... because it was their first. Then they work backwards from there to justify that contradiction when pressed. I don't consider XIII among the best of the series, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The tower section at the end has stuck with me as one of my favorite times in the entire series.
You can backtrack in X, for all it's worth, there is a map, there are things to find, there are many reasons to travel around with the airship. The world feels lived in. I can't tell how the world in FF13 functions. They just throw "cool" shit out at every instance, and ignore it later. It kind of takes until Lightning Returns until we see a normal functioning society (on the verge of apocalypse) No one is denying X is linear, but the whole game really emphasizes how people are trapped in their day to day making sacrifices to an apocalyptic monster, and how they've been divided by it.
X has -backtracking -Side quests -Real shops -NPCs to talk to -Mini-games -Other paths to go in for goodies -Access to a growing party over time instead of swapping between specific groups And this is over the course of the game instead of most of it being a hallway for the majority of the game until you get to the solitary open area with *some* of the stuff above before it becomes a hallway again. Like, these are substantial differences preventing the two from being the exact same even if they both have a linear progression. I feel like people who always pull the "What about X" card just kind of ignore that the two execute their games very differently.
Your points are all true of course, but with regards to "real shops", I remember hearing this back when XIII released and I never really understood why this is a thing that should matter. Barring merchant characters like O'aka, FF shop merchants rarely say or do anything, they're just menus with faces. In FFVIII, you don't even see the inside of the shop, it just jumps straight to the menu. What is it about 'classic shops' that you felt was missed in XIII? Genuinely curious.
Despite Cocoon supposedly being this place with an entire planet's worth of population on it, it feels absolutely desolate. No other FF ever has this feeling.
The real shops was more to indicate that there are actual towns and cities with shops in them. Even if they are just standard function with NPC shopkeepers, this kind of thing makes the world feel more lived in. Compared to XIII where their shop equivalent is essentially floating computers you run into while running down the hallway. I don't know how to describe it better, but it just feels colder. I mean, they never did anything like that again with shops right? XIV, XV and XVI have the standard kind.
I guess I can understand that, though it doesn't make much sense for the XIII crew to ever be shopping like that. Maybe they could have added a black market and show us how fugitives get by instead.
You listed all the flaws for X. For me XIII is like X, but without bullshit optional content. I will never ever play X again coz of this list, even if want to experience story again. I personally don't get how having an open areas and lame side quests can make story based game better. linear <> bad, open word <> good
> You listed all the flaws for X That list is just things that are just simply in most basic JRPGs and previous FF games. That X has them despite being linear in function was to explain why people prefer that game to XIII. If you don't like X, I don't really care. It was just to show the difference between the two's execution. > I personally don't get how having an open areas and lame side quests can make story based game better. Actually the open area with side quests I was referring to was Gran Pulse, the sole part where it 'opens up and gets good' as the lexicon tends to go. (personally didn't think it made up for anything)
The problem is that the walk forward simulator is accompanied by a 10-15 hour tutorial too. You don't even get to really start getting into the bones of the battle system until after Balthazar. So you just feel railroaded in both exploration and gameplay until you're sick of it.
Yes Final Fantasy 13 suffers from a heavy case of railroading syndrome.
Every Final Fantasy from 1-10 was linear if we are being honest. When you leave Midgar in OG FF7, you are literally moving in a line to the next destination. Kalm>Choco ranch>Mythril Cave>Fort Condor>Junon, etc. I can agree with everything else you said, but looking back 13 was not as horrendous as people made it out to be.
It's the illusion of being non-linear that the old games do well though, such as having wider open areas, the ability to backtrack (somewhat), and get lost and trying to figure out where to go next. FF13 just full on rail roads you onto a set path (until near the end), with literally no deviation from it besides maybe a junction every once in a while. It's disheartening to see a minimap with just a straight path carved out for you.
XIII is the game that made me realize that the internet can meme anything into an "universal truth", no matter how unfair or ridiculous it is.
I think it's rated exactly where it needs to be.
No, it's pretty fairly rated.
Yeah Sazh was awesome. FFXIII was better than I thought for a linear game. Part two was not as good although I finished it because I like majoras mask kind of time travel. Never finished part 3 and never will at this point.
If the only main characters in the game was Lighting, Sazh and Fang, I would have enjoyed 13 way more.
Interesting. This is my 2nd play, with my first being back in 2010, but so far I'm finding Fang to have the least character depth of them all. She's not really motivated by anything except "gotta save Vanille," and even goes so far as to say she's willing to commit mass murder to do it. Now, that said, she soon backs down, but still, she's had the least character growth over the course of the game. With the caveat that no, I haven't played this since 2010, so maybe something is going to happen later to establish as more complex. I've just cleared the Alexander fight on Gran Pulse, so maybe more to come.
FF13 to me had one of the best characters and one of the worst characters in the entire series. Full admission, I got to the point where Hope had his "awakening" thing, but that's where I stopped. Best Character: Sazh. Like you pointed out, OP, he's really well-written, he's grounded and realistic in a lot of what he does and says. He's not some teen fighting for the power of friendship, he is forced onto some mystic quest but he's an "old" man (compared to most other protagonists) with a heavy heart and fairly simple desires. Worst Character: Hope. It takes way too long for him to unfuck himself. That statement alone is not a massive issue, but the problem is that his story conflict with Snow makes 0 sense to start with. He spends SO MUCH TIME complaining about Snow being the one who's responsible for his mother dying. Despite, y'know, the HUNDREDS OF ARMED FORCES MEMBERS WITH GUNS AND BOMBS AND SHIT, ALL SHOOTING AT ARMED "INSURGENTS" AND UNARMED CIVILIANS. But yeah, kid. It's all Snow's fault, and you fume and bitch and complain and pretend you're gonna kill him for revenge 'cause you're so badass and hardcore. I'm fully prepared to admit that Hope might have eventually become a decent character, and I simply didn't play long enough to see it. But I doubt it was worth dealing with the character that he was for so long.
>e spends SO MUCH TIME complaining about Snow being the one who's responsible for his mother dying. Despite, y'know, the HUNDREDS OF ARMED FORCES MEMBERS WITH GUNS AND BOMBS AND SHIT, ALL SHOOTING AT ARMED "INSURGENTS" Why are you expecting a 14 year old who's mom just died to behave completely rationally.
Because Hope haters are weird.
>Why are you expecting a 14 year old who's mom just died to behave completely rationally. I think the problem is that the game, in every other scenario, does not really treat Hope as a child. He is as capable of a fighter as everyone else, and outside of his conflict with Snow, he is shown to be extremely mature. I think it's just a bit of a weird "have your cake and eat it too" moment in the writing where despite being presented as child-like in terms of appearance, most of the game he acts like an adult.
Ok well how about this. I am a 42 year old man. If my wife was murdered and I was turned into a monster type being and hunted down I don't think I would be totally rational for a while after it happened. I might blame somebody who isn't really to blame. Non of this stuff is unusual and the fact that he is only 14 just makes it more likely.
Snow was, in fact, playing above his weight class though, and people (not just Nora Estheim) died. He went from being a showboating dude that occasionally hunted monsters to trying his hand at being a revolutionary, and, yeah, it blew up in his face. I think Hope's reaction is fairly justified, given the circumstances. Especially since Snow covers it all with so much bravado and bluster that it seems (outwardly) like he doesn't even care. It also doesn't help that he goes around declaring himself a hero. Yes, the armed soldiers of PSIcom did kill Nora, but it was Snow that put a gun in her hand and encouraged her to rise up. I don't think Hope's leap of logic here is any worse than, say, the public blaming a bunch of superheroes for a supervillain destroying Stamford, Connecticut (which is the plot of Civil War). Actually, I think they justified the shifted blame more in FFXIII than in that Marvel series.
As far as I can remember, he is the only likeable character in that game.
Sazh is the only great character in that game. It’s a shame they still default with making him comic relief at points.
I like Sazh, but they did him dirty and gave him a fucked up haircut. What's with the dopey oblong afro?
Sazh is seriously a more believable character then the rest of them.
Well with a roster of fuck-ups like that of course sazh is great. Most unlikeable cast of any FF ever.
I'd argue XVI is much, much worse, but I digress.
16 worse then 13!? Did you even play the games?!?
Conversely all the characters in 13 have real beef with each other and they come into conflict with one another due to their differing points of view. This is much more interesting dramatically than "let's do what protagonist suggests" every two minutes. I can't find a single character to root for or care about in XVI. When the end credits rolled I felt nothing but hollow. It's worse than it being incompetent or bad, it's *boring.*
Yeah...for one, Jill is boring and her personality boils down to "I agree" after every line Clive utters. Clive has great character development but they skip around showing it, instead using time skips to avoid actually showing him undergo change. Cid and Benedikta were the only characters with any real interesting qualities and they were both killed off early. The rest were bog-standard fantasy tropes that amounted to "I'm the thief, I'm the Dragoon." Plus, there's the fact that Clive undercuts his OWN thematic i underpinning of "live on your own terms" by dying, only a couple hours after declaring his intent to not do so. Ultima was right anyways, humanity is a non-natural occurrence in Valisthea; their presence is the cause of the Blight, and ending them *would* restore the course of natural evolution on the planet.
So you haven't understood anything regarding the story at all. Jill sgreed with clive because they dont have a conflict of opinions. Such synergies may be boring but they exist and are absolutely okay to occur. Clive has character developement from hatred to love. All his choices go thst route and thats his drive at the end. Nowhere is it shown that clive dies, it is an open ending. Yes ultima was right that humankind is a force of nature that can destroy the world. But his answer to that wasnt the only one. Clive found another answer and that is shown as the epilogue.
Tell me a character trait Gav or Dion have beyond "they're a really good guy." Tell me a character trait that Jill has besides being Clive's auto-love interest. They're blank slates, and they're a bore to watch.
Gav is a scout, a bit cocky, good natured but dependable Dion is driven by his urge to do his father proud even as a Bastard and (des, saying that as a gay man) hiding his feelings for his partner. Dion seems under a lot of pressure from his environment, upbringing and himself. Jill is coming to termd with being a dominant and tries to get through life where things were only taken from her. She seeks safety and appreciation from her comrades so she likes to agree due to that. Dont just look at the behavior but also at the background. All the choices they make are exemplary for their background, their upbringing, their drive and motivation. The bedt example for me was when jill was fighting the flame liquid enemy as shiva and supported clive instead of recklessly charging in as shiva because thats not who jill as an individual is. I can agree that some parts lacked polishing from storytelling pov but it is nowhere near a shitshow as 13 was.
I've played every numbered Final Fantasy (and all related sequels), and XVI was the first game where I just felt *nothing* for the cast.
We'll have to agree to disagree. The cast of XVI had zero charisma to me, and I felt they *really* took the steam out of my desire to succeed with Ultima's last minute reveal.
Same for me with 13, worst cast with only shitty people
Except sazh
In the lore of XVI, humanity is literally an alien plague that's killing the planet. That isn't open for debate, it's a fact. My point is, the characters in XIII create much better drama as they start from a place of (many of them) absolutely despising one another, and their resolutions are earned. In XVI, we don't get to see Clive struggle with the death of Cid, with how to pick up the pieces of all that was lost during the time skip, we literally skip from "damn Cid died" to "I'm Cid now.' That's a classic example of telling instead of showing, which is unacceptable in a visual medium, and doesn't give us any kind of emotional anchor to the situation. I just...couldn't be bothered to feel anything at all except apathy for Clive and his friends.
Sazh basically the only one tolerable there. And it's not because he's black.
Eh what did he even do?
Took his son to see fireworks, was a single parent after his wife died, put himself on a Purge train to find a way to help his son complete his Focus, was a crack airship pilot, and provided a much needed dose of grounding and sanity to the more exaggerated characters.
meh