r505Matt said:
Alic0004 said:
Yeah, but it's quite possible that you've got a problem when you define an RPG fan as "someone who thought Mass Effect 2 was a great game." Let me give you an example. My girlfriend is sitting here next to me -- she's not a gamer at all, but she's played through four of the Final Fantasies, Fable II, The Longest Journey, and a few other games. She saw a TV commercial for Mass Effect 2 during a Viking's game a while ago and it made her laugh at how cheesy it looked. I know this is impossible to understand to people like us, who read all the latest opinions about which games are great and which deserve to die, but the fact is, there are people who would never play video games if they were all like Mass Effect 2. Her opinion probably shouldn't matter about ME2 -- it doesn't affect my ability to enjoy the game that she scoffs at the somewhat generic sci-fi character designs whenever she sees me playing it and asks "when is Final Fantasy coming out?" But it makes it clear to me at least that many Final Fantasy games have strengths that ME2 doesn't even attempt to have, such as a Fantasy/Science Fiction world which is hard to define, a beauty which catches the eye of people who think most video games look horribly generic, and a type of gameplay which is fun even for people who almost never pick up a controller.
In the same way that Wii Fit fans should be discounted from most RPG reviews, because it can safely be assumed they won't like them, any subset of players who can be depended upon to universally hate a game probably shouldn't be considered its target audience by a reviewer. I know sometimes reviewers just want to voice their own opinion, audience be damned -- and personally I think that's fine. My worry is that it may be becoming a whole movement of "we like WRPGs, so JRPGs that aren't imitating them, no matter how polished and well executed they are, have to be taken to task."
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It's funny you mention that because I agree with her, those commericials are AWFUL. ME2 is one of my favorite games for strengths that no Final Fantasy has come close to having, namely an excellent sense of pace, and a deep, "realistic", political universe. By realistic, I mean there are plenty of small things, like the codex information stuff, that really adds to the depth of the game. In FF games (or really just JRPGs), it's not unheard of to just walk into someone's house, take their money, and walk out without them even batting an eye. Some people are like "well it's your reward for exploring" but I say "why would the people in a game care if you explore?". In those JRPGs, I feel you are more of a bystander, in games that aren't like that, you can actually feel like you participate in shaping the story (even if it's linear and you have very little actual effect other than just going through the game). I have yet to play a FF game that can even nearly reach that level of immersion.
But that's also okay, I'm not saying thats a bad thing, but it's just something that FF games haven't been able to do yet.
I do not think it's a case of "make JRPGs more like WRPGs" as it is a case of "we've seen this before, about 20 times, do something more". You can talk as much as you want about gameplay differences from each FF game to the next, but when it boils down, there's always this feeling that "this is a Final Fantasy game". Which is good, and bad. It's kind of like (if you're a Foo Fighters fan) you hear a Foo Fighters song, and even if you don't know the song, you KNOW it's Foo Fighters, they have their own sound that's very easy to recognize. Plenty of great bands are like this, and some of them fall into a trap of being able to use that as a platform to propel their music as opposed to a crutch to hinder themselves. Maybe reviewers, namely western reviewers, are starting to feel that the "this is a FF game" feeling is starting to hold the series back, and would like to see the series transform. That's at least how I've felt.
Yes, there's a new combat system, a new levelling system, new story/characters. But there's something else, a sort of abstract thing, that needs to be re-worked. Maybe this is how some reviewers see it too.
Not to mention, if it's boring, it's boring, no matter how you spin it.
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