Game Debate #170: Final Fantasy VIII

[RH | 4,903]

14 hours ago, Renmauzo said:

I was hype for months leading up to release, went to the midnight launch...I was all in. Set pieces, music and atmosphere were all memorable, everything else was a disappointment:

- The combat was interesting but ideas not completely thought through made it a throwaway experience.

- The story was told in such a way as to be unbelievably obtuse and occasionally breaks it's own rules.

- Speaking of breaking it's own rules, the card game is infuriating, especially considering the concept would have made for an amazing card game like Gwent from The Witcher.

- The characters are absolutely insufferable, and their teen stupidity and - often - idiotic worries (like, does this guy like me?) during points of crisis made for a game that made me dislike everyone except Zell who felt like an honest portrayal of who he was supposed to be.

The bones of a good to great game are there...the bones of a great story are there too, but there are too many misses here for it to be considered worthy of the name, especially when sandwiched between two amazing entries in 7 and 9.

To be honest, this is the game that comes to mind when I think of Square's tonal shift in culture and story telling and - in my mind - marked the beginning of the end of it's golden run. While there has been the odd release since that has been memorable, Square's never seemed quite the same and is a company that I find is largely not for me anymore (and really doesn't gear what it makes towards people like me and what I care about in a game). This started the trend of me buying titles based on the company's pedigree while continually being disappointed and thinking, "Maybe the next one will be great like they used to be..."

Square seems too focused on nailing a specif aesthetic and trying to tell stories in as obtuse a fashion as possible. To my mind, the hubris that this attempt at playing 'I'm the smartest one in the room' shows with their story composition and delivery is very tiresome.

In any case, I got games like Xenogears, Chrono Trigger, FF Tactics, and Live A Live out of them (to name but a few), so FF8 - and much of what's come out since - being throwaway for me is no big deal in the grander scheme of things,

Curious what are your thoughts on Kingdom Hearts, or at least the first one. I haven’t played much by Square since the end of the PS1 era.  I enjoyed FF X well enough but, yeah, it was such a divergence from what I hope and expected to see in an FF game, I’ve had no desire to go back as I’ve seen how they’ve evolved the franchise. IMHO, Kingdom Hearts was the last, big title they made that I enjoyed, but I’ve not yet played any other games in the series.

12 hours ago, Sumez said:

This sums up quite precisely how I felt about FF8. 

FF7 already did a bunch of things that I felt was an unfortunate change to the formula, but those really feel like nitpicks compared to how FF8 started to steer the series, company (and in some ways the whole genre) if not off a cliff, then at least far away from the lane I was happy in.

Yeah, see my comments above.  However, it wasn’t until I had given up on the FF series after playing FF X that I discovered Dragon Quest via DQ8.  Man!  That was what I wanted.  I’ve since come to basically except that SE seems to be keeping the DQ series a consistent turn-based, nostalgia style RPG franchise where Final Fantasy is what evolves and “grows”.  I think that’s BS but over the past 20 years, I’ve come to appreciate DQ for what it is, but I just wish the series touchstones were little things like guys named “Cid”, lovable Chocobos and the eventual arrival of an Airship.

Edited September 9, 2023 by RH

[Tanooki | 4,933]

18 hours ago, Sumez said:

This sums up quite precisely how I felt about FF8. 

FF7 already did a bunch of things that I felt was an unfortunate change to the formula, but those really feel like nitpicks compared to how FF8 started to steer the series, company (and in some ways the whole genre) if not off a cliff, then at least far away from the lane I was happy in.

FF7 I can tolerate in bursts (enough yet never finished it) but it went off the rails how I did not like things, but FF8 basically was like that angry cartoon character that has this F this moment and flips the table over entirely just the ruin things people like.  FF9 I have said for over 20 years was Square apologizing for the last 2 games because it largely is like a 3D version of the SNES games mechanics, taking the best bits of all three.  It was the last true honest FF game by title, Bravely Default kind of pick it up but made some big mistakes too.

[Sumez | 2,951]

20 hours ago, Tanooki said:

FF9 I have said for over 20 years was Square apologizing for the last 2 games because it largely is like a 3D version of the SNES games mechanics, taking the best bits of all three.

That's also how I felt about FF9 when it came out. At least in terms of tone and world building it's loaded with all the classic stuff you'd originally associate with the FF series at that point, that I agree FF7 and especially 8 had kinda taken away.

That said, on replaying FF9, which I have done a couple of times now, there is still a lot of "modern day FF"-isms in that game that I'm not super keen on, despite the classic-looking skin. But it's probably more relevant to jump into that subject whenever Reed makes that debate thread, provided he hasn't already.

[Tanooki | 4,933]

4 hours ago, Sumez said:

That's also how I felt about FF9 when it came out. At least in terms of tone and world building it's loaded with all the classic stuff you'd originally associate with the FF series at that point, that I agree FF7 and especially 8 had kinda taken away.

That said, on replaying FF9, which I have done a couple of times now, there is still a lot of "modern day FF"-isms in that game that I'm not super keen on, despite the classic-looking skin. But it's probably more relevant to jump into that subject whenever Reed makes that debate thread, provided he hasn't already.

Agreed and I'd go there.  It does, there's a few of the angsty pretty boy things going on, but the core mechanics swing largely back to the 16bit era and it's appreciated.  Recently it had a solid 50% off sale (square does them 2x a year) on iOS so I put 9 on my phone to enjoy again at my own slow pace.