#square enix fans rise up | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

spiritgamevibe · 4 months ago

Text

FINAL FANTASY XVI, REVIEW (PC/PS5)

Final Fantasy 16 is an action/RPG developed by Square Enix. It released on June 22nd, 2023 for Playstation 5, and later for PC on September 17th, 2024. It's a long awaited installment to the franchise, and delivers in terms of gameplay, graphics, and story.

Final Fantasy 16 is a game that forges its own path, and its battle system feels no need to emulate the turn based, grind-fest mechanics of the past. It's a no holds barred action game that knows it was born to kick-ass. This comes together with some excellent visuals that hold their own against any modern action-RPG, along with outstanding writing.

Its somber, duty-driven narrative, corresponds with its grim premise. Central to the story, are people called "Dominants". They possess the power to become IKONS, which are elementals that take the form of giant beats. These unique individuals are almost always, used by their nations to fight wars and bring about destruction. We see IKONS such as Shiva, Ifrit, and Bahamut to name a few. Clive's crew struggles to learn about their role in possessing such powers.

Valisthea's wars are brought about by the abuse of crystal technology, and the tinkering by a false God, named Ulitma. Final Fantasy 16 follows a slow but encompassing route to showing us who our main characters are, as it tracks their rebellion and rise to social and spiritual power. This is all brought to you with a good soundtrack, so there is little to complain about. Valisthea is a world I think Final Fantasy fans will really enjoy, and that goes for any action-RPG fans alike.

Now on to the full review!

PRESENATION Final Fantasy 16 looks fantastic, let's get that out of the way. Valisthea's moody vibe, is met with captivating architectural sights, giant luminescent crystals, and beautiful savage beasts. Character designs are impressive as well. Surrealism is present, but a bit of the anime flavor the series is known for remains intact. Overall, Final Fantasy 16's armor and attire also looks interesting, and we can see some visual themes explored in other Final Fantasy games, such as those big pointy hats for soldiers on the battle field, which I remember from Final Fantasy 12 and Mist Walker's "Lost Odyssey". Unfortunately, changes in armor are not represented on the player, but what they give you for most of the game looks both fashionable and functional.

Final Fantasy 16's color palette has many interesting grey and blue color tones that capture the lay of the land, and it's ever-present overcast. The overcast backgrounds make using magic look especially vibrant. Magic spells get more impressive as you level-up, making for a variety of spectacles. The IKONS also look awesome. There are spectacular cosmic battles they bring to life with detailed character models, and massive attacks.

Enemy designs are as expected. They look excellent with a decent variety of wild beasts, robots, and humanoids roaming about, along with some classic foes. Boss battles bring about a ton of flashy special effects and the bosses themselves, are well designed. They can also look quite intimidating.

Some NPC's are lacking graphically, almost like they are from another game, but that's not too often. The well directed cut scenes make up for these issues, in my opinion. Final Fantasy 16 is a visual treat for Final Fantasy fans.

GAMEPLAY

I'm not too fond of "button-mashing" RPG's, but I can say that FFXVI's battle system still carries a sense of grace, in spite of this personal issue. Things are more technical than what its fast pace might imply. That being said, Final Fantasy 16's gameplay is solid. I don't like the larger IKON battles as far as controls go, but they are visually dynamic and fun to look at.

There are a good amount of magic and special abilities you get throughout the game. They can be assigned as button prompts, and the system allows you to assign several magic abilities to buttons of your choice. Final Fantasy 16 also has 2 difficulty settings "Story" which like a normal mode, and "Action mode" which makes enemies harder to beat. The story remains the same regardless of this choice.

The gameplay can actually grow on you even if the fast pace doesn't suit you as well as you'd like. It's nice to see a fighting system, that boldly goes where it wants to go. You fight alongside a party of characters most of the time, and battle can be very engaging. An awesome magic dog named Torgal also fights alongside you, and you're able to give him prompt commands. You also have Clive's old friend Jill who is the IKON Shiva to aid you on your quest. Eventually, Clive's brother joins him on his quest as well. This gives battles a nice group dynamic. You don't play as different characters, which I can understand as far as storytelling and linearity is concerned. The battle system is one that can take a while to get used to, but also one you can look forward to getting back to after some time away.

You can view a log of the characters in any given cutscene, through a feature called "Active Time Lore". It's similar to the "X-Ray" feature on Amazon Prime Video. Initiating ATL , will give you details about the characters in any given cut-scene in the game. This can help players contextualize the story, in case things become a bit unclear. An option like Active Time Lore (ATL) is something I hope to see more story-driven games include in the future. It's one of the things that make this game truly unique.

STORY

FF XVI really shines when it comes to story. It's wartime theme is latched onto a tale of self-discovery and transformation for all involved. Final Fantasy type-0 might be the only other Final Fantasy game with a vibe this grim. It was the first time the horrid sight of blood-soaked Chocobo was thrown in our faces. Yuck! FF 16 also has the candor of Final Fantasy 12, and some structural elements found in Final Fantasy 15.

The story features an intense family dynamic, much of which is between Clive and his brother Joshua. Clive starts out as part of the noble family of Rosaria, but after a devastating strike on the royal castle during the war going on at the time, he ends up a mere soldier for the opposition. He's kept under control due to him also being a "Bearer", which is a person that can use elemental magic. Bearers are typically considered to be of a lower social class in Valisthea.

The main part of our story starts with the tragedy of Clive's family House being overtaken. It then shifts to the war at hand. Several kingdoms fight relentlessly, due to waning resources on the continent. The theme of a dying world due to the overuse of technology is a prevalent theme the series deals with. Final Fantasy 7 and 12, are good examples of this, in my opinion.

After some time, Clive finds out that he is an IKON. The second IKON of fire, to be specific. This leads to him having the power to start a revolution against the warmongers of the land, and find a safe place for those formerly subjugated. Clive and the gang also venture out to discover the reason behind the death of Valisthea's Mother Crystal, knowing it to be the cause of the war.

They come to realize that the overuse of technology, and interference to the Mother Crystal by a powerful entity named "Ultima" that fancies himself the God of the universe, is the problem. The most powerful people on the continent get together to try to fight this so-called God, hoping for a new life not overly dependent on technology. Check out the game to see how it all turns out!

SOUNDTRACK Final Fantasy 16 has a riveting and dramatic soundtrack. It's overall��sound design is another strong point to consider. We find some encompassing new songs along with a few reinterpretations of older Final Fantasy themes. Although this is a review of the base game, I think it would be wrong not to mention that the "Sagespire" DLC offers some excellent music as well, and is my favorite in the game. Everything from modern classical music, to killer drum and bass tracks with cutting edge production, are included in Final Fantasy 16's diverse track list.

The voice acting is exceptional, and it's sound effects are complimentary to gameplay. The voice actors also do a great job bringing the story to life, they sound convincing and vocally dynamic. Conversations are also poetic and engaging. They encourage the player to just chill, and appreciate what's being said, despite a general slow pace.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Final Fantasy 16 stands tall, alongside the best games in the series. It has an incredible narrative, making for a fitting addition to a multiverse that really enjoys its emo side. Finally, this entry not only looks great, but more than holds its own against other modern action-RPGs out there, in terms of gameplay and sound.

FINAL SCORE: 9 out of 10

Thanks for reading SGB, and peace to the ghosts! Please let me know your thoughts on Final Fantasy 16 in the comments section below. Do you plan to play it as well? It would be great to here from you.

-Howl Blake

0 notes

arkus-rhapsode · 1 year ago

Note

Hey there, I just read your post on Smash/Nintendo and I have to ask, why do you think so many Nintendo fans and youtubers like care so much about like how many games the company squirts out?

So in my mind there are two reasons. The first with Nintendo specifically is just Nintendo is kinda this Disney level recognizable characters so they honestly have a lot more franchises people recognize and want to see come back. Both people who genuinely are enthused for these series and if more games are made the likely hood of those being the utilization of those wealth of iconic characters goes up. But also there are the people who just want that output larger because it means more of a brand that they like even if they may no necessarily be fans of the specific franchise, but rather a fan of Nintendo as a whole. Which leads into my second reason and I think the easiest answer is its sports team logic. There's nothing wrong with being a fan of something and wanting it to do well, but there's a lot of people who really gauge success of something by how it compares to the other. So making the most games is kinda that "win." Not the most games that are actually fun and quality experiences, just more games. I want my brand to be the biggest one there is.

You see that a lot when like people talk company acquisitions, but don't really consider like what that means from like an economic and marketplace sense. Like Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard is them winning. They now own more than playstation. Hell, there were people who kept saying "Xbox should buy Sega next." As if the corporate consolidation wasn't a real scary thing. There are people who cheer on Sony potentially buying Square Enix and I always am flummoxed by that. Because I see that as, "oh hey this major corporation became even more powerful and took out a prominent third party developer and publisher. Better be thankful I invested in Playstation." While others who are fans see this as Playstation is now the home of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. Its ours now. You'll never have it. Like imagine people saying that if we were talking about, I don't know, Nintendo buying Ubisoft.

You also saw that with like the MCU vs the DCEU. Y'know it wasn't "Oh hey DC fans get a chance to see their favorite characters on the big screen." I was, "I as a marvel fan need to be the best mega multi billion dollar franchise. Know someone doing something similar to us are trash." And like that mentality can even be seen in the company. Remember the DC announced like a hundred DC movies and shows before like they really had like a good superman, good batman movie under their belt? Like in their second film they're jumping straight to crossovers like... trying to match and out do output leads to this kind of stuff.

And like, I understand Nintendo fans. There are some who really do love a lot of these franchises that languish and want them to return. But there is just these very loud people who want more games because its more. You need to have a new Star Fox or a new Eternal Darkness or a new F Zero because its more Nintendo brand. Y'know more games doesn't just automatically equal good. In fact, with how much bigger and longer it takes to make games, I'd actually say its a good thing people prioritize healthy release schedules.

And like its not just about like older franchises, you see that with newer ones to. You know me, I've even been an advocate for Nintendo to make new franchises beyond just the ones people recognize from Smash Bros. Like Astral Chain and Arms are nice to have as a piece of the Nintendo family. But there isn't a doubt in my mind that when Nintendo comes up with a new IP that's not something we've seen, there are people who are not gonna see that as "Oh cool Nintendo trying a new thing" they're gonna see it more like "Oh my god look at this thing only we have now". After seeing how much people go crazy over like Rise of the Ronin and Stellar Blade being new playstation games, you'd think they announced like the next Bladur's Gate 3 with the amount of victory laps taken.

This isn't to say, hey don't be a fan of something and don't demand better of a company, but like I think where we are at with Nintendo and Sony and Microsoft, its probably wise to not treat everything with the lens of fandom. I watched State of Play, and yeah Rise of Ronin looks really fun, just like how Hi-Fi Rush Looked really fun, just like how Princess Peach Showtime looks really fun. I want these companies to make good fun games from their first and second party games. Not make the most period. And I certainly don't want to cheer on crummy business practices just because it makes you feel better that you have something a perceived enemy doesn't.

#nintendo #playstation #xbox #video games

1 note · View note

jcmarchi · 1 year ago

Text

The Making Of Final Fantasy VII Remake

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/the-making-of-final-fantasy-vii-remake/

The Making Of Final Fantasy VII Remake

The ground beneath Square Enix’s Tetsuya Nomura’s feet trembled. In his time since serving as character designer and visual director on Final Fantasy VII, his legend has grown substantially. In addition to working on nearly every acclaimed Final Fantasy game since Nomura also helped create the Kingdom Hearts series and has become a figurehead and luminary within the stacked ranks of Square Enix’s stable of developers. But this 2015 trip to Los Angeles, California, was different.

PlayStation’s E3 2015 livestream had just revealed a teaser trailer featuring the iconic Final Fantasy VII protagonist, Cloud Strife, walking through Midgar in glorious, modern, HD graphics. The dream of so many – a remake of the classic RPG – was finally realized. The fans weren’t the only ones feeling the weight of the moment, though, and it was no longer just the ground that was shaking; it was Nomura’s entire body.

[embedded content]

“There were no staff members around, so I was kind of just off to the side, standing there alone,” Nomura says. “When I heard the cheers from the crowd and the passion, I became overwhelmed and I started shivering. I was walking like a fawn, just overwhelmed by the intensity of the crowd. I thought, ‘This has become such a big deal,’ and I wanted to cry.”

Meanwhile, series producer Yoshinori Kitase was at his home in Tokyo watching it on YouTube. “It still comes up on my ‘Videos You Should Watch,” he says with a laugh. “Someone should have taken a video of you, like a reaction video and uploaded it to YouTube!”

“I don’t think we had that culture of reaction vids back then,” Nomura says. “If I knew, I would have taken it, but I might have been shaking mid-way through!”

The road to this moment was long and arduous but something Nomura had dreamt of for years. Operating as a team of one, Nomura had spent part of the 2000s imagining what a modern remake of Final Fantasy VII could look like. Unfortunately, not much progress was made since the rest of the team members were tied up with other projects.

Around this time, fans started clamoring for a modernized remake of Final Fantasy VII, and the developers began hearing about it from media members. Kitase, who has worked at Square Enix since 1990, serving as director on beloved games like Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, the original Final Fantasy VII, and Final Fantasy X, was inundated with questions during a series of 2009 interviews.

“We were on the U.S. media tour for Final Fantasy XIII, and we took on a bunch of interviews, and we got a ton of questions from reporters asking, ‘When are we going to make a Final Fantasy VII remake?'” Kitase recalls. “Just hearing that so many times, I did think that we would do it one day, that’s for certain.”

Kitase returned to Tokyo and approached Nomura about making it a reality. As two of the creators of the original Final Fantasy VII, they noticed the writing on the wall; fan and media demand was at a fever pitch, and Square Enix was beginning to embrace the idea of modern remakes for classic games more than ever before. They knew they had to act.

“Within Square Enix, gradually, remakes were being made, and these ideas for remakes were coming up in other departments,” Nomura says. “If we weren’t going to do Final Fantasy VII, others were going to do it, so we had to rise up and do it! We had the sense that we had to guard Final Fantasy VII and have to be the ones taking this on, or someone else is going to do it. I thought it may be a bit troublesome is other teams without us took on the project.”

Nomura and Kitase are a pair of legends within the Final Fantasy and Square Enix fandom, but they needed help to make it a reality. To create the team, the duo tapped into Square Enix Creative Business Unit I, the group historically responsible for many of the most beloved Final Fantasy titles. Kazushige Nojima, who joined Square Enix in 1994, working on games like Final Fantasy VII, VIII, and X, as well as the Kingdom Hearts series, and Motomu Toriyama, who joined Square Enix in 1995 and worked on the original Final Fantasy VII in addition to Final Fantasy X, XIII, and more, signed on to co-write the remake.

“I had always hoped to be a part of the title if and when a remake was to be made,” Toriyama says. “I was very happy when hearing the news [that we were making one].”

But the development team behind this project couldn’t just be members of the original dev team; most had left the company or were working on other projects. “I would say the majority of the dev staff and production members are those who were players of the original, not creators,” Toriyama says.

Motomu Toriyama and Teruki Endo

Two of those developers who started as fans of the Final Fantasy series before joining Square Enix are Naoki Hamaguchi and Teruki Endo. Hamaguchi joined Square Enix in 2003, working on titles like Final Fantasy XII and the XIII trilogy. After serving as project manager on the mobile title Mobius Final Fantasy, he joined the Remake team as a co-director. Endo got his start in the late 2000s at Capcom, working primarily on the Monster Hunter series, but when he heard about a remake for Final Fantasy VII, as a fan of the original, he couldn’t resist joining the team as battle director.

“I was working for another gaming company when I heard they were looking for members to be involved on the battle side of creating this game and felt like this was a great opportunity in which I could utilize the skills that I had gained thus far working in the industry,” Endo recalls.

With the core team assembled, Final Fantasy VII Remake was underway.

Naoki Hamaguchi

When a game is as beloved as Final Fantasy VII, modernizing it without alienating fans of the original can be a tricky proposition; if you keep things too close to the original, then you don’t keep up with the latest trends, squandering the opportunity to create something distinct. Conversely, if you put things too far away from the source material, you risk alienating those who made Final Fantasy VII so famous in the first place.

According to Toriyama, the members of the team who experienced VII as fans, like Hamaguchi and Endo, are more protective of the source material than those who worked on the original title. Kitase worried those younger staff members would be too loyal to the original title, but his concerns eased once the team started working together. “This concern was all for naught because this was clearly not true,” Kitase says. “We were able to work together very well and realize all of our visions and a game that can be accepted and enjoyed by contemporary users, so that was wonderful.”

“The top consideration, I believe, is that for both players who may not know Final Fantasy VII and those who do know or have played it, for both of these types of users to be able to play [Remake] and enjoy it,” Nomura adds.

The team worked together to balance the old with the new, to create something that definitively retells the story of Final Fantasy VII with modern conventions while not going too far in either direction. “For me, it really comes down to considering what it was that the players enjoyed and loved in the original title,” Endo says. “Of course, we expect a variance in each player’s depth and span of what they enjoy and the things that they love, but at the end of the day, I do have to trust my instincts and thoughts on what I loved and enjoyed playing the game.”

Teruki Endo

For Endo’s part – the battle system – he opted to blend action with the more traditional Active Time Battle (ATB) mechanics from the original game, in which characters can act once a meter fills. The result appeals to both new and longtime players. “Seeing that the Final Fantasy series has a strong focus on its characters, I believe the action enhances this and lets the players be further immersed into the characters they play,” Endo says. “Along with the strategic battles that I believe are key to Final Fantasy VII, I wanted to see how best I could mix these two elements of the command and strategy-based battle with the action that allows for instant immersion.”

Though Endo wanted to introduce action, his desire to balance it with the traditional ATB elements struck a chord with Nomura. “I do have this idea of how Final Fantasy battles should be and should feel,” Nomura says. “We want to still keep this strategy element, in which the player will consider the elemental weaknesses of enemies during battle while using these action moves and being engaged, intact. That was always my core belief in how we should approach Final Fantasy battles. […] I thought this was truly vital to this game; I didn’t want it to be a game where it’s a reflex-type action or reflex-based battle; we wanted to combine all of these elements.”

For Hamaguchi, it was more about removing barriers that exist for players when trying to feel as though they’re a part of the world. “I do believe that, not just for RPGs, but for other fantasy-type titles as well, the trend will be such that it’ll be moving towards incorporating more action elements and that will be the trajectory of games overall,” Hamaguchi says. “It’s very much favored by contemporary players in that it creates a sense of immersion because players are able to receive this immediate response to the input from the controls. There’s this immediacy that brings about further immersion into the gameplay. Instead of viewing this fantasy world from the outside perspective as a player, you’re able to be fully immersed as if you are inside that world.”

“In that sense, I believe the Final Fantasy VII Remake series has this wonderful balance of all these elements,” Nomura adds. “It’s not quite completely action-leaning or action-focused, but it very skillfully combines these elements into a balanced and enjoyable, immersive experience.”

The battle system of Final Fantasy VII Remake garnered acclaim, but it’s not the only piece of the title that changed. The visual leap forward is immediately recognizable, and the story received numerous upgrades. Instead of retelling the entire Final Fantasy VII arc in one game, Square Enix opted to release the remake in the form of three games. The first title, Final Fantasy VII Remake, retold the party’s initial push through Midgar – a section of the original that takes about 6 hours to complete – across a 30 to 40-hour title.

This decision came from Nomura, who identified early on that fully capturing the events of Final Fantasy VII in a modern way and with enough depth to do the story justice wouldn’t be possible in its original one-game form, not to mention the drastically different format the game takes following the party’s emergence from Midgar. “To recreate the world of Final Fantasy VII as it was in the original today in its full volume, the only way for us to realize this was to divide the titles or else it simply was not possible,” Nomura says. “We had to divide it, or we can’t do it right.”

Final Fantasy VII Remake’s extended stay in Midgar fully fleshed out characters previously relegated to minor roles like Biggs, Wedge, and Jessie and further developed the personalities and relationships of the main characters like Cloud, Tifa, Barret, and Aerith. “When the remake project was first decided, at that point, we had already felt that if we are going to take on this series, it’s imperative that we depict the characters much deeper,” Nomura says.

Final Fantasy VII Remake was released on PlayStation 4 on April 10, 2020, earning an 87 out of 100 on reviews aggregator Metacritic, including an 8.75 out of 10 from Game Informer. And now, with the quality bar set high and fan expectations even higher, that same team sets out to push the well-known story forward as Cloud and his friends step out of Midgar and venture into a massive world full of adventure and intrigue in the second act of the Remake series, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth arrives on PlayStation 5 on February 29. To learn more about Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, visit our exclusive coverage hub through the banner below.

Parts of this article originally appeared in Issue 362 of Game Informer.

0 notes

ranmagender · 4 years ago

Text

Tactical RPG from Square Enix

oh thats rad

#final fantasy tactis fans rise up #nintendo switch #nintendo direct #nintendo #final fantasy #square enix

4 notes · View notes

papirouge · 2 years ago

Note

Gamerbro will always be more accepting of Japanese characters because most of those games are japanese and also Japanese are honorary White people (see my previous post).

But even Japan has this habits of shoving japanese characters in non fantasy/realistic games/manga (supposed to be in a White setting)... because they can. For example Shadow of Hearts: Convenant is supposed to happen around World War II in France and yet, there's a Japan samurai in it 🥴 Same for Shingeki no Kyojin that's set in a very (titans apart) conventionally European/germanic medieval world, and yet, Mikasa, the last Japanese alive, is here lol

Gamerbro have no issue letting these overbearing stunt pass because they're 🌟japanese🌟 but they refuse to let that fly is Western (so multiracial) studio do the same¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

I think Final Fantasy main characters have always been dubbed by gamers (even for FFVII that's a fans' favorite, Sephiroth seems more popular (?)), and I think it got worse when Square Enix transformed the serie as a gigantic cash grab (bc of the Final Fantasy movie flop) with unecessary sequels (it started with FF X-2), several part games, FF VII desperate neverending milking (remake + movies), releasing an unfinished game that you had to PAY to get the actual ending/finished/fixed version...(hi FF XV). Wasn't FF XV unanimously clowned for its awful chara design (at least the main squad looking like an outdated camp vkei band)? The Final Fantasy serie lost its luster since a while already so I understand the gaming community clowning it... But yeah, men loooove complaining about how male mental health isn't taken seriously, and then call 'pussy' entertainment soft bois.

And yeah, manga/anime censorship isn't new and every scrote seething about PC culture has no idea of what they're talking about. I'm from France and my country was one of the earliest to import anime/manga. Dragon Ball came out on our screen in the early 90s. This anime a censored like crazy. Kame Sennin peeping (underage) Bulma butt, Goku touching Bulma genitals, extreme violence....all of this was edited out by the producers of the CHILD PROGRAM that was broadcasting it 🥴 THEY ALSO BROADCASTED HOKUTŌ NO KEN WHICH HAS TO BE ONE OF THE MOST VIOLENR ANIME OF ITS GENERATION and they literally had to change dialogue and edit out like mad the 'worst' scenes (this shit was still violent nonetheless 🥴)

Same in Ranma 1/2 with Happōsai stealing girls panties and in the french dub they called them "tissues" 💀

And even for Dead or Alive 2 they censored Ayane and Kasumi age because they were canonically 16 years old but since they were highly sexualized in the game it didn't fly for the Western version so their age got switched to "Unknown" for those local version💀

Those scrote screeching about SJW culture have no idea how DEFENSIVE parents were against that anime trash when it first got imported her. If what we have today is SJW, I have no idea what they would have called what happened in the mid 90s .... If anything, society has become more lenient an open to the rEsPect cUltUrEs crap that's made us more enabling of straight up pedo bait bs. If anything we need more censorship. There's a literally rise of pedo sexual assault in Japan. Any person trying to say iT's fIcTiOnAl is either an idiot or a pedo. Pedophilia is going rampant on society and anime culture has totally a part in it.

you are right, "woke" has truly lost all meaning as a term... one of my new favorite games has a very basic and positive message to it but because the localization inserted some nonsense about a nonbinary character it got labeled as "woke SJW trash" even tho the rest of the script is pretty accurate to the original Japanese

I also saw comments about how just including a gay relationship in this game is "agenda-pushing" like I really don't get that tbqh. it just reminded me of people complaining that the new Zelda game is "woke" because it has a few characters who aren't lily white and Zelda has short hair lmao

LMAO Dying at the "woke" Zelda bc some characters are Black. Isn't that a fantasy game? like, with magic, talking trees, trolls and shit but Black people existing is a reach?? (they did the same for Lord of the Rings TV show)

I think the reluctance of these folks to see non White people in fantasy content is bc White people want to gatekeep fantasy as a 'White only' genre. Which is funny because White people have no problem reappropriating foreign genre for their own gain 🙃

Funny how these woke hunter always forget those Hollywood movies adaptation of foreign stories where the studio ALWAYS need to shove a WHITE hero for some reason or purposely use a story where a White character can outshine others?

Remember the samurai movie with Tom Cruise? 7 years in Tibet? Also Mulan love interest was supposed to be a White man initially, but people complained and it's been scrubbed off. There are whole think piece exposing how the Whites LOVE inserting themselves into POC stories to elevate themselves as heroes. Even woke storyline don't go that far with their non White characters ; they are always confined as side kick and minimum screetime (is it true that all the dark skin characters of the house of dragon ended up dying after the first season?? lmaoooo)

And I always said that the issue wasn't non White people being shoved in "White people story" because when Black Panther happened their were still mad and were seething about that movie catering to Blacks (but don't you dare saying movies featuring mostly White people are catering to White, it will make you an awful wokester lmao). Whites will always feel entitled for other races to relate to their stories, but never the other way around. There's a post floating around cathblr with Catholics raving about Arabs discovering the Lord of The Ring and enjoying it a lot. And I couldn't help but think: would those catholics turn the favor and rave about an Arab movie with islamist undertones...? 🙃 lmao.... Those people are soooooo transparent 💀

Everything is woke if you try hard enough, anyway. Scrotes are seething because they consider some video game female characters are purposely made ugly (like Aloy from Horizon Dawn. A scrote was coping bc the mocap actress was much more beautiful and he couldn't wrap his hand as of why they would change her face to make her look more 'rough' ...when he's just too stupid to grasp that this choice is actually pretty coherent with the storyline since homegirl is nomad WARRIOR.).

I also remember when they made a revamp of Mortal Kombat chara design and changed characters body proportion to become more realistic, scrotes got mad lmao It's hilarious how they think they're really doing something 'counter-culture' but they only show how porn fried they are. There's no way to think this

...is better than that

Btw, all those ANTI praising Japan for being anti woke are up to a very hard wake up call. Many japanese celebrities are vocal LGBT+ supporters, a significant amount of online stars are gay/queer (Ryuchell, Peey, Kemio...). Even recently a member of AAA (a famous pop band) came out as gay 😬 there's a huuuuge push for LGBT visibility into the Japan entertainment right now, so it's obvious they have no idea of what they're talking about... The other day on Twitter I've seen a post summing up why Western conservartard scrotes love Japan

This post was in a thread about nuclear bomb and American burgers saying it was oKay tO kIlLs thOusaNd of CivIlIanS bEcAuse jApan wEre tHe bAd GuYs 🤡

The USA humiliated Japan in the non threatening " tech/anime obsessed pacifists". Unlike other countries that still have a minimum of pride and honour, Japan doesn't remind the USA how bad they are and the unchecked harm they done to them. They are also completely economically submitted to the USA (there are still American base out there.....). So the USA give them a cookie and constantly elevate them as the perfect non White country 🙃

#anime culture was a mistake

3 notes · View notes

stephanythedramaqueen · 3 years ago

Note

Same anon(2). These were the convo I had with a close friend. She thought FF15 was going to be the next iconic FF games alongside FF7, FF10, and FF8. Hell, she told me that FF15 is the FF series version of cyberpunk 2077 in terms of lost opportunities and how messy it was on day one release lmao. I think the ff fan would love to see Nomura's dark & twisted version of FF15 or rather FF Versus 13. Hey, at least we got Verum Rex even if it was only a teaser or an easter egg.

I, too, thought XV was going to be the greatest thing created since sliced bread. I kid you not, pre-release I was loving everything about it, obsessing over it for years, studying every trailer and interview with Nomura I could get my eyes on. FFXIII & VersusXIII were my life’s breath. They were announced together, they got trailers together, they had ads together. I wanted Versus XIII, I was screaming over the rooftops about how amazing Versus XIII was gonna be. I played XIII keeping in mind that Versus XIII was gonna complete it…

And then, well, XV happened.

I will continue to miss what Versus would have been until the day I die. I’m not saying Tabata ruined everything about it but he ruined everything about it. Evil had been defeated that day he left Square Enix. *throws salt after him*

Having played Cyberpunk 2077 upon release, I can safely say that XV wasn’t that much of an unplayable mess, but it was definitely unfinished. You could tangibly feel and see the parts they had to cut out of XV and downgrade in order to release it. Unlike XIII, whose graphics hold up even today, XV looked aged upon release. Mind you, games like The Witcher 3 and Rise of the Tomb Raider came out a year before it, and yet XV looks older than both 😂😂 All the story elements that were amazing were in Versus and they just— didn’t use it?! The story suffered for it and any character who isn’t Noctis felt inadequate because of it. You could argue even Noctis lacked satisfying development.

Verum Rex is Nomura’s little salty baby, borne from bitterness and spite, but still it’s not what Versus would have been. His dream vision has sailed, sunk and dead by a watery grave now, no matter how much (or if) Verum Rex will ever be a thing. It saddens me so much what XV has become of his dream. Nomura once said he considered Sora and Noctis like his sons. After they took Versus away from him and gave it to He Who Must Not Be Named, Nomura never spoke nor drawn Noctis again, until they forced him to do so for that SE cafe.

Oh, boy lemme not even get started about Luna. I could give you a list kilometers long about Maryfreya Sue that I disliked with the intensity of a thousand suns. I hated her so much that I had to distance myself from XV for years bc I couldn’t stand her ass. just thinking about her and the game filled me with murderous intent. Imagine coming off from an amazing FF heroine like Lightning to Lunafreya… how the mighty have fallen. Luna was badly written, hardly a character and mostly a plot device. She couldn’t even compare to a random moogle.

I loved Stella so much and I was so much looking forward to her dynamic with Noctis! I came into their games shipped Noctis and Lightning from the start but I loved Stella. They ruined her when they made her Luna. And made her forgettable. She is so forgettable in fact, that SE isn’t even bringing her up in spin-off games 😂 I don’t think SE will ever indulge in Noctis and Lightning, even tho they like to pair the two of them a lot, I don’t think they’ll deviate from canon too much when it comes to romance, but as long as I don’t have to see Luna’s pretentious, depthless, weeping-about-Noctis-24/7 ass anywhere else, I’m happy.

#final fantasy xv #final fantasy xiii #noctis lucis caelum

3 notes · View notes

maddiebiscuits · 4 years ago

Text

Personal Opinions on FFXIV Villains (in general order of appearance)

As a note, I will not be including any pre-A Realm Reborn villains (as I did not play the original Final Fantasy XIV) nor will I be including any one-off primals, raid bosses, etc. I will be trying to focus on villains as they appear in main or side storylines, in cut scenes, that have some over-arching influence on the story they participate in with something akin to a clear presence - Garleans, Ascians, and so on. Also SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS.

Rhitahtyn sas Arvina

Rhitahtyn gets the shaft out of Gaius’ three main players in A Realm Reborn. A conscript from a Empire-conquered land who rose to power and respect, directly honored by Gaius himself, and possessing an even temper and noble ambition really helped to level out Nero and Livia’s general nonsense. Unfortunately, Rhitahtyn is provided almost no screen-time, development or exploration, and as years have passed, his in-game 8-man trial can now be completed in a regular synced party in mere seconds. He deserved a lot better than what he got, yet remained too sidelined to really leave me feeling invested in wanting to see what sort of story this character could be used to tell.

Livia sas Junius

When first playing through A Realm Reborn my feelings on Livia were...tepid, but optimistic. Of Gaius’ three main players, Livia was easily the most active and ruthless, lacking the shady “long game” and self-serving ambitions of Nero or the more honorable, measured personality of Rhitahtyn. Suffice to say, the dawning (and then confirmed) realization that Livia’s sole motivation seeing the plan of the man she loved through to completion by any means, to the point of tunnel-visioned, murderous intent, was...disappointing. Add to that Livia was raised by Gaius in her backstory, the man being a father figure to her, and the romance motivation becomes even more unhinged (especially since it is largely considered to be a reciprocated romance, at least physically, by Gaius - barf)

Nero tol Scaeva

Nero has become a fan favourite character over the years, thanks to his continued development into Cid’s boyfriend foil rather than outright villain of the main storyline. This development was easy to spot early enough though, as it was clear Nero’s fealty to Gaius was largely self-serving. He didn’t care much about conquering Eorzea or felling primals/eikons - he just wanted to show that he possessed the brilliance to build weapons capable of doing so. His speech/squabble with Cid during the Praetorium sequence paints that picture even more clearly if the players missed the not-so-subtle implications for Nero’s character already. The man lived, breathed and seethed with inferiority when compared to Cid, and in the end he did ultimately prove his engineering mastery, even if the Warrior of Light took it (and him) down. Ultimately though, Nero serves as a much better supporting and “redeemed” character than a villain, so I do have to rank him pretty low.

Gaius van Baelsar

Aside from whatever...weird...thing was going on between him and Livia (again - barf), Gaius in A Realm Reborn was a pretty solid villain, with clear-cut motivations that I actually understood, and begrudgingly agreed with to a small extent. As legatus, Gaius was still the tyrannical arm of the Garlean Empire, but a level-headed one who was more interested with the purging of the primal/eikon threat from Eorzea than subjugating other peoples. Further development of this character into something of an anti-hero and glimpses of how other characters viewed him in flashbacks in later expansions ends up providing his A Realm Reborn rendition with more strength in retrospect. The heads of the three city-states deciding to accept Gaius off to willingly join the Empire is a pretty good sticking point for the validity of his plan as well. Ultima Weapon is...you know, pretty impossible for Ul’dah, Gridania and Limsa Lominsa to face down if they refuse, but more enticing is its ability to, indeed, single-handedly defeat primals/eikons - something the city-states desperately need at their disposal, having been plagued by such threats constantly, for years and years.

Gaius cuts a pretty direct swath to the truth of the Twelve as well - they’re no different than the primals/eikons he seeks to eradicate, and the more stock Eorzeans put into them, the more empowered they become should someone ever try to summon one, making Eorzeans no better than the beastmen and their ‘gods’. Join the Empire and have protection from such powers, and put faith into the leadership of man, versus that of fictional deities that can be given terrifying form...in the world of Final Fantasy XIV, that’s not a terrible proposition. But it would still subject thousands of people to the Empire’s tyranny, so even if Gaius has the oft-coveted ‘Point’ that most villains wish they had, he still must be stopped. Eorzea will simply find other ways to endure the primal/eikon threat rather than bend the knee, and I like that defiant angle the Warrior of Light represents to counter Gaius’ character. Also, Ascian meddling and Hydaelyn shenanigans, sure, but I don’t feel that takes away from the core conflict that Gaius presents. He was a good villain, and I’m happy to see him return and go through the motions of penance for his past deeds and aid the supporting cast now, elevating him even higher into a good character, in general.

Lahabrea

I admit I have a soft spot for Lahabrea, only because he seems to be a universal punching bag for heroes and villains alike in Final Fantasy XIV. He lacks the more subdued, long-term planning of Elidibus or the explored nuance and sympathy of Emet-Selch - he’s sort of the odd one out between the trifecta that make up the unsundered Ascians. Just a blindly-tempered zealot of Zodiark, seemingly more enthused by the ancient primal’s return than the promise of the world being set back to how it was before The Final Days. Even the other Ascians don’t seem to like Lahabrea that much - Elidibus seems keenly aware that Lahabrea has gone off the deep end, constantly needing reminders and wrangling-in to keep the plan in motion. But I will admit, he serves his purpose well enough, and the additional side-story that reveals that Lahabrea was a brilliant scholar unmatched in the Amaurotine field of ‘phantom creation’ was a nice touch to explain why he’s pretty dang good at getting people to try and summon primals and conjuring or corrupting monsters himself. By no effort of Square Enix themselves, I sort of feel bad for the guy. He really was just Doing His Best, and getting no respect for it. His end was also anti-climatic, but by the time it happened, there were far more interesting characters and stories to tell, and he was unnecessary - it was just better this way, Lahabrea.

Nabriales

This one-bit player served one substantial purpose, and it was to see an Ascian get obliterated permanently and thus provide the means and understanding to battle Ascians in the future. Except that the cost to do so was a throw-away villain, a throw-away damsel-in-distress 8-man trial, and turning Moenbrya, a character with a lot of potential to be great, into a throw-away character who has to make an untimely sacrifice because the script says so. Nabriales you’re boring, you’re bad, you’re a waste of time and your mutton chops are dumb as hell.

Ilberd Feare

You know what, I like this villain. I absolutely want to punch his face in, but I figure getting that sort of rise out of me on sight is intended, since, you know: villain. His motivations aren’t bad either, even if his methods are deplorable. The speech he gives at the very end of A Realm Reborn to rile up Raubahn is pretty effective too. Despite both being refugees of Ala Mhigo, Raubahn fought his way to wealth and status, and Ilberd was never afforded that chance, or at least never quite managed. Raubahn pledged himself more to Ul’dah and the Immortal Flames with his new privileges, however, and Ilberd was perhaps right to resent that, with Ala Mhigo still under the yoke of the Empire, and so many refugees left to flounder in The Black Shroud and Thanalan both, Raubahn seemingly unwilling to step in. Ilberd saw the opportunity to change the status quo and took it, and proceeded to rally others to reclaim Ala Mhigo. If the city-states would not help, then they would be forced to help, and for all his dirty tactics, punch-able face and Shinryu-summoning finale, Ilberd’s plan did work: he forced the hand of the city-states to fight against the Empire to reclaim Ala Mhigo, and did indeed remind Raubahn and other passive Ala Mhigans that there was still an important job to do. So, good job Ilberd. Gold star. Now perish.

Teledji Adeledji

I thought the politics at the very end of A Realm Reborn were intriguing, and Teledji’s heel-turn pretty fun, since of all the Monetarists, he seemed to be painted as the most reasonable. Though I found his game plan a bit...suspect. Yes, a poisoned goblet assassination attempt on the Sultana that he could frame on someone else, while usurping control of the Crystal Braves so he could make a bid for full Monetarist control of Ul’dah (with him at the helm) makes sense on paper, but I’m not sure why he sought to frame the Warrior of Light for it, and implicate the Scions either. While it’s true that the Warrior and the Scions would be an obstacle and want to investigate the death, and would prove tenacious foes, if you think about the scenario a bit more, it seems unnecessary. The Warrior and Scion efforts were likely going to start swinging towards Ishgard and the Dragonsong War, to better embellish the northern city-state’s relations with the Eorzean Alliance, nor are the Warrior or Scions people you’d want to make an enemy, especially with the Warrior being one of the only people who can defeat primals (a very active threat in Thanalan).

Framing Lolorito would have been a wiser idea, as he was already disliked and untrustworthy in the eyes of many, powerful and dangerous to compete with though he is. If Lolorito had been framed, Raubahn and the Scions may not have questioned it, and Teledji could have enjoyed planting himself in the eye of the power vacuum that was to come while the Warrior of Light focused their energy up north. Instead, Teledji bet on the wrong chocobo and paid dearly for it - his plan fell apart (and so did he) in more ways than he could anticipate, but on the whole? This was a pretty intriguing and entertaining storyline, I enjoyed it.

Lady Iceheart / Ysayle Dangoulain

I debated putting Ysayle on this list because by the first act of Heavensward, she’s not a villain - but, she certainly was in A Realm Reborn and going into Heavensward, so we might as well just keep representing how good Heavensward is and include her here. Aside from Minfillia, this is one of the only ever characters you meet early(ish) who shares The Echo with the Warrior of Light. Unlike Minfillia or the Warrior, though, Ysayle doesn’t really adhere to the call of Hydaelyn. Instead, her powers allowed her to hear and learn the truth of Ishgard’s history: that it was a lie, and that King Thordan broke the peace in a bid for power for Ishgard, turning Nidhogg to rage and setting the Dragonsong War into motion. Having witnessed Ishgard’s cruelty at a young age when her home was destroyed by snow and ice after the Seventh Umbral Calamity, and knowing what she knew and maintaining close bonds with dragons throughout her life, it’s sort of easy to see why Ysayle would be set upon the path she is. She wishes to end the war much like how Thordan does: ending it, with the dragons as the victors.

Her slap in the face is when she confronts Hraesvelgr though, her bid to sort of not only take the form of Saint Shiva but embody her memory being dismissed as a pale imitation. Saint Shiva wished for true peace, whereas Ysayle demands it through bloodshed - she realizes this, and changes her current course. This is why I debated to list her as a villain, because her gradual change into a supporting character and hero is a logical conclusion as she and Heavensward’s story develops. She starts a villain and dies a hero.

Igeyorhm

Full disclosure: I completely forgot this character existed. And I still don’t actually know why they exist. They’re a second to Lahabrea during the events of Heavensward, and is easily shut down by the Warrior of Light before being annihilated permanently by Thordan. Despite this, I don’t find their existence as offensive as Nabriales’, so...that counts for something.

Archbishop Thordan VII

When I first encountered Thordan (”pope grandpa”, if you will), I thought “oh, he’s evil”, because “church bad” isn’t exactly and uncommon trope and it’s apparent that Ishgard is a broken and unjust society, with this man sitting at the highest seat of power and consorting with Ascians. Yet to my surprise Thordan was...pretty reasonable. At least to start. He makes his audience with the Ascians known and seems unaffected by them and their schemes, is polite and cordial to the Warrior of Light...he doesn’t seem so bad. But the gut feeling remains, and slowly builds as Thordan’s true plan is revealed, becoming a primal-esque deity. And much like Nidhogg, I do get his motivations. Trying to broker peace with the dragons, to him, is just not going to happen - in fact, it’s insulting to ask dragons and Ishgardians both to make a bid for it, when so many people have died and live with the burden of hatred and grief. His solution is more direct: end the war entirely, by winning it for Ishgard.

After assuming his new form and powers, him and his Heavensward have the power to thwart any dragons that oppose them, perhaps even Nidhogg himself if the dreadwrym were to re-appear. Fueled by the generations’-worth of prayers from the Ishgardian population, Thordan was set on ending the war and ousting the dragons from the land, ushering in peace and prosperity. But the Ishgard he sought to protect and defend was built on a history spun of bloodshed and lies, and the dragons were not the true enemy and did not deserve to be put to the sword. Thordan’s plan would have worked in the way he envisioned it, and he made a good argument for it, even if it was ultimately wrong, and that’s a good villain.

Nidhogg

Having come to Final Fantasy XIV from World of Warcraft, a giant, scary black dragon that rants on and on about suffering and misery and pain and vengeance was something of a red flag for a Very Bad Story. Imagine my surprise when Nidhogg was given the screen-time to be properly fleshed out and explored, his motivations and hatred more sympathetically-human than his giant dragon body would have one believe, his presence menacing and well-paced, and his overall being representing the true, dark heart of the Dragonsong War: the cycle of hatred. For dragons, centuries are like days, and the pain Nidhogg feels is no less than what he felt when the Ishgardians brutally broke their pact. Because of this, with each re-emergence of him and his brood, the wheel of suffering turns anew, breathing new hate-filled life into the ongoing Dragonsong War, generation to generation. Time has no effect on his turmoil, and his existence ensures that no other Ishgardians will ever be able to move on from the war either, even as generations continue on.

I find Estinien being consumed by Nidhogg’s rage very thematic as well, Estinien truly embodying the countering hatred the Ishgardians feel towards the dragons, and it makes the final trial with Nidhogg bittersweet. He defeats Hraesvelgr, because as long as Nidhogg exists even the brightest hope for peace will be squashed under the cycle of malice and war. The Warrior of Light must put him down because he cannot be saved - but Estinien still can, and can choose to move on and pursue the peace that Nihogg strived to prevent and Ysayle died to see come to fruition. And he does, and it’s touching, and Heavensward is SO FUCKING GOOD I LOVE THIS EXPANSION.

Quickthinx Allthoughts

I don’t care much for timey-wimey storylines, but I found the Alexander plot easy enough to follow, and the timeloop it creates to be manageable. The truth about the Enigma Codex and the journal Quickthinx has isn’t exactly hard to figure out though once time travel becomes a part of the plot, and beyond beind a fun goblin with a cute kitty cat friend...there’s just not much in the way of compelling character writing here for this gobbo.

Diabolos

Big ancient demon is revived and wants to wreak havoc. Uninspiring, but its also not necessary for Diabolos to be anything more than what he is either. The heart of the Void Ark storyline is the tribulations of Cait Sith, the sky pirates and the history of the Mhachi, Diabolos just being an excuse to explore those characters and lore.

Regula van Hydrus

Regula deserved better damnit. This is the last Garlean villain with nuance and humanity before Stormblood turns everyone who is so much as associated with the Garlean Empire into a cartoonishly-evil, absolutely twisted, reprehensible confusing mess of a person.

Fordola rem Lupis

Stormblood has a lot of story, pacing and character problems. A lot. It has its moments and some people love this expansion, but I do not and its villains are a very large reason why that is. Fordola, for example, had the potential to be quite interesting. She was raised to believe in what her father did: that Gaius and the Empire were not all bad, and then watched her father die trying to protect her from angry, almost barbaric Ala Mhigans who decided that pelting a little girl with rocks because her parents were Empire-sympathizers and supporters was an okay thing to do (as the Garlean soldiers just watched on and let it happen without intervening because they didn’t feel like it - a fact that Fordola knows and remembers). You would think this event would have a sort of polarizing effect on her, feeling betrayed by both her people and the Empire her father believed in, feeling caught in the middle, in need of finding her identity and sense of self. Instead she...basically throws her entire stock in with the Empire, deciding that if she’s a good little soldier for the Empire, then Garleans will have to change their minds about Ala Mhigans and respect them because, see, look: an Ala Mhigan is a respected Garlean asset.

Except this backfires over, and over, her Ala Mhigan team nothing more than vicious dogs that never bite the hand that feeds them, turning their teeth on their own people instead. Fordola is constantly belittled and ridiculed for her heritage and even her gender by the Garleans, and at no point does she ever stop and go “wow maybe the Empire sucks hot ass and I’ve been terribly wrong about my motives this whole time”. And yet, no...Zenos offers her power in some magitek-aether experiment, she kills her own Skulls team, she finished the expansion jailed for her crimes, believing until the very end that the Garleans will win (they did not). She utilizes her anti-primal abilities once, and vanishes from the plot entirely, only to re-appear in a bad side-story where the Immortal Flames have her hooked up to some penalty-of-death submission collar so she doesn’t act out so they can use her synthetic Echo abilities to fight a re-summoned Ifrit.

Bad character, bad writing, and a waste of her new, game-changing anti-primal abilities.

Grynewaht pyr Arvina

This is such...a stupid character. His design, his voice and dialogue...I can’t tell what Grynewaht is supposed to be. Is he comedic relief? Because he’s not funny. Is he a character that you’re supposed to pity or despise? Because I felt nothing towards him. Is he supposed to be a rival? Because...no. I had to look up what his name was. The only thing I can clearly remember about him is that he was the final boss of the Doma Castle 4-man dungeon. That’s it. If you removed him from the plot entirely, nothing of value would be lost.

Yotsuyu goe Brutus

Between the two female villains of Stormblood, Yotsuyu is the more popular. It’s easy to see why: she has a cool design and a lot more screen-time and development, with a big 8-man trial to finish things off. But like Fordola, something is just off about her writing.

I don’t understand her motives or how she even came to feel the way she does about Doma, specificially. And anything bad that could happen to her, has happened to her. She suffered an abusive childhood under her adoptive parents, was sold off to an abusive husband, then sold off again to a brothel after her husband died to repay his debts. She later became a spy for the Garleans, rose in rank and was appointed acting viceroy of Doma, to keep the masses terrified and under her heel. At first, it seems pretty reasonable for her to turn against Doma, and lash out as she does on its people - her Doman upbringing left her used, abused and powerless, and with the Garleans she found power and strength. But this reading falls apart when you quickly realize that Doma was already occupied by the Garleans during the course of her upbringing, her family obedient to the Empire and her suffering just as much the fault of the Garleans. There’s an argument to also be made that not enough time was really spent portraying Doma as the disgusting place Yotsuyu sees it, as from the onset of Stormblood’s story journey into the Far East, Domans are only ever portrayed as a terrified, broken people, scared of the Garleans and Yotsuyu. I also don’t personally care for “character was abused, so now they’re sadistic and crazy” clichés either.

What does work well for Yotsuyu is the theme of power and control. Yotsuyu is a woman who lived a life not her own, weak and frail, until she obtained power. Now that she has it, her drive is to do anything to maintain it and survive - yet for some reason the story is written in such a way as to downplay this much stronger theme of her character, and play up this slightly confusing, all-consuming hatred for Doma instead. Her transformation into Tsukiyomi is also a bit odd (though decently thematic, with her ‘cold, uncaring and distant as the moon’ comparison), with not enough time paid to explore her understanding of Doman deities and why the mirror would trigger this change (and why would she even keep Doman deities in her mind, with her supposed hatred of Doma?)

I also take some issue with her “Tsuyu” arc, where she reverts back to the last time she was ever truly good or innocent, and has the personality of a child while still being an adult woman (and suffering amnesia). I find these infantilizing tropes pretty offensive, especially when Yotsuyu’s arc here is largely just to reinforce and reiterate what cartoonishly terrible people her family were, and provide Gosetsu with some development instead. Aside from killing Asahi and having a cathartic death herself, everything about Yotsuyu just baffles me. Every time I think I like something about her, athe bad writing twists it around.

Zenos yae Galvus

I don’t like Zenos, he’s a bad character, and I hate that Square Enix decided this limp-haired sullen-faced clown was going to be their poster-boy villain for Final Fantasy XIV.

What is the appeal of this character? Yeah, some people find him attractive. I don’t, but I also didn’t find Sephiroth attractive so, okay, whatever - like what you like I guess. But what else does Zenos have going on besides people seeming to think he’s their buff bishonen thicc daddy or whatever the kids are saying these days? His entire character can be summed up in one sentence:

“While the Warrior of Light was practicing empathy, Zenos studied The Blade.”

He’s a Garlean lordling with a bland and cold upbringing who likes katanas and blood sport. That’s it. He’s a sociopath, finding no joy or meaning in life for whatever reason: he just wants to collect Cool Swords and push his bizarre love-hate fight narrative on the Warrior of Light. Because they are opposites, you see: the Warrior of Light is a cardboard cut out of a Good Guy and Zenos is a cardboard cut out of a Bad Guy. He’s not even entertaining about it. He doesn’t want to watch the world burn, he just wants to fight the Warrior because the battle will make him Feel Something. Meanwhile, all I feel whenever I see him in-game, either in a cut-scene or when I’m locked in an unskippable “survive the drawn-out battle!” sequence with him, is a groan coming on. And sometimes villains who are evil just for the sake of it can be fun! But Zenos is not fun - he’s dull, he doesn’t get me hyped up for a fight...I feel nothing.

When he died after using his uber-synthetic Echo to possess Shinryu by taking his own life I thought, “well, at least that’s over” and I felt relieved. And then he came back, bigger and worse than ever! Yippee! I love confusing, unrelatable, boring villains who are recurring. Whatever Square Enix wants to do with Zenos, they need to hurry up and get it done. I care so little about him and just want to explore other stories and characters. I’m assuming he’s going to like, possess Zodiark or something, and then the Warrior will possess Hydaelyn, and there will be some big anime light fight showdown where Zodiark and Hydaelyn both shatter for good and Zenos dies and the Warrior lives another day and uuuugggghhh. How the hell did an expansion like Stormblood follow up Heavensward? Who let this happen?

Asahi sas Brutus

Bowl-cut twink hates his sister because he’s a Zenos fanboy and is angry Yotsuyu got all of Zenos’ attention instead of him. Filled with spite and piss, cartoonishly evil just like everyone associated with Yotsuyu or the Empire in Stormblood. Rest in pieces you little shit.

Varis zos Galvus

I’m lukewarm on Varis. He’s a better villain than Zenos, but that’s like saying a flat three-day-old glass of soda is better than sewage water. The bar is set very, very low. He’s ruthless, but not entirely unfair in his thought processes. Hell, he doesn’t even seem to like his own son (and really, if Zenos was my kid, I wouldn’t like him either). But Varis is a bit too...static, in my opinion. He doesn’t feel like a major player, and his batshit “let’s all just burn so the world resets and we can stick it to the Ascians” is pretty asinine and plays so transparently into the Ascian’s hands. I was originally bummed that Zenos killed him pretty unspectacularly, but...like with Lahabrea, it was probably better this way.

Omega

I don’t have much to say about this villain, really. The heart of the Omegascape storyline hinges on Cid, Nero, Alpha and the abstract concept of free will and accepting imperfection. It’s almost hard to say if Omega really is a villain, simply acting out a series of programs and statistics in a cold, robotic way, not really with malicious intent, so I think where Omega sort of shines is just as a being to build this sort of story off of, and provide a lot of fun boss fights as well.

Ran’jit

I had no strong opinions on Ran’jit for a long time, so I guess he improved for me as I now have An Opinion of him. He’s fine. He’s an okay villain. His Zenos-esque “survive the timer” encounters are annoying, but I find his persistence and presence more inspiring than any time crummy ol’ Zenos showed up. The biggest issue with Ran’jit is the lack of time devoted to developing him. This is a man who lost his home in the Flood of Light (which was the First’s equivalent to the Source’s Far East), and has essentially trained and raised numerous Minfillia reincarnations to battle Sin Eaters, just to watch these poor girls he saw as his own daughters die and die and die again. That cycle of loss would break down anyone, and make Vauthry’s postulations of paradise in Eulmore until the end finally comes appealing. Ran’jit pursues the Scions and Minfillia/Ryne not because he’s resolute in following orders, but because he just wants to bring this one psuedo-daughter back and keep her safe - something he could never do for the others who came and went in his tenure.

Naturally, this protectiveness leads to giving in to Vauthry’s nihilistic promises and stifles Minfillia/Ryne as a person. Thancred eventually learns to let the Minfillia he knew go so that Ryne could floruish into her own person - she was not ‘his’ Minfillia and it was terrible of him to ever impose that upon her. But where Thancred can move on and let Ryne develop into the wonderful person she is, Ran’jit cannot. And I’m disappointed this aspect of his character couldn’t be more at the forefront of his narrative.

Vauthry

If you ask me, this is more in line with how I figured Zenos might be. Vauthry lived a life or privilege and power, a child born of divine providence with no true regard for life, just his own desires. He’s spoiled and unreasonable, but his nihilism isn’t really nonsensical in the world of the First. All but a fraction of the world is destroyed, and Sin Eaters are a constant, devastating threat, so why not just relax in luxury, in the safety of Vauthry’s control over the monsters, and live in peace until the world truly ends? The battle against the Sin Eaters is exhausting and has no hope of victory anyway (until the Warrior of Light/Darkness arrives, that is). Even without the meol subplot, it makes sense why so many would flock to Eulmore once Vauthry takes over. Goofy as he can be, I do think Vauthry’s embodiment of just giving in to nihilism, hedonism and annihilation stands as a good thematic contrast to Shadowbringers strong themes of stubbornly striving for hope in even the darkest, bleakest hour. His trial is also fun and a slight swerve. All the Light Wardens up to that point had been monstrous, and Sin Eater transformations the thing of nightmares (Tesleen), so to see Vauthry take on the form of Innocence (ironically appropriate, as he truly believes he is blameless in all he has done) and become a golden-haired, angelic being of beauty - how he likely has always seen himself - is very entertaining, and defeating him feels great.

Emet-Selch / Solus zos Galvus / Hades

Ah yes. The Big One. Most people like Emet-Selch and his involvement in Shadowbringers. He’s sardonic, he’s entertaining, he’s honest, he’s explored, and he’s even sympathetic. The revelation of how Zodiark (and Hydaelyn) came to be, Amaurot and The Final Days is truly tragic. Emet and the rest of the Convocation were trying to save their world, and the cost was staggering - the lives of so many of their own, their minds, and eventually even their own world in the Amaurotine schism that followed. Being able to see a shadow of what Amaurot and its people were like really helps drive home the sorrow of it all, and Emet himself admits that he did try to learn to appreciate what the fragmented world had become. He’s also one of the most “successful” villains in Final Fantasy XIV - his intertwined association with death and masterful ability to raise up and lead empires like the ancient Allagans and modern Garleans to their self-destructing, Calamity-inducing downfalls (of which he was almost successful did with Varis and the Black Rose in the latter’s case) is pretty impressive as far as villainous plans and activity is concerned. Being forced to work alongside him in Shadowbringers because your goals are aligned while attempting to guard yourself from his inevitable schemes - which he’s pretty blunt about admitting he has - is an interesting way to develop him as a villain too. He spends most of Shadowbringers actually helping you rather than outright antagonizing you.

His conundrum is sympathetic as well, if not entirely relatable. If you had the ability to bring back your world, your friends and loved ones, at the cost of countless lives that are trivial in the grand scheme of the cosmos and start again, anew, in a better world that could repair and rebuild, would you do it? Tempered by Zodiark or not, Emet would, and while I don’t agree with him, I don’t entirely blame him either, for feeling how he does. Similar to Ran’jit and Vauthry too, Emet is nihilistic: he clings to something long-gone and will burn the current world down to get it back. To him, the Rejoining and Zodiark’s return is inevitable, and people like the Warrior of Light/Darkness are futile, frustating obstacles that cannot understand not only his plans, but just how he feels. They don’t remember what they lost. Emet does.

And yet in his final moments, Emet seems at peace. He seems to realize, as he is fading into oblivion, that the Warrior of Light/Darkness isn’t just the reincarnation of Azem, but what Azem believed in that made Azem part from the Convocation. Fractured life is still life, and Azem believed that the world and its beings was worth learning about, loving and protecting, capable of great things even when faced with insurmountable odds. The last act of good will Emet can do after requesting that the Warrior not forget about Amaurot, is to free the Warrior from Elidibus’ binds so that the last unsundered Ascian can be put to rest at last. It’s a very emotional throughline for Emet’s character, rather than a more logical one, but it works very, very well and really helps push Shadowbringers into that amazing high its story can get to.

Elidibus

I never liked Elidibus all that much for the longest time. It’s not that his character was “bad’, per se - he’s polite, diplomatic, and enigmatic, providing a much more leveled, intriguing villain to counter-act Lahabrea’s more active plays and cackling. But Elidibus’ long game always left me sort of wanting: I was never really sure what he was trying to accomplish expansion to expansion and how it related to the Rejoining that would bring about Zodiark. His plans also seemed to just regularly...fall through. Sending the Warriors of Darkness to antagonize the Warrior of Light in the Source ended up bringing about the halt of the Flood of Light on the First entirely. Picking up Zenos’ body and squashing Garlemald uprisings while nudging Varis to make and use the Black Rose was promptly halted by the true Zenos making an unspectacular return. I don’t know, I just feel like any plan Elidibus sets into motion gets stopped before it really gets started.

My opinion of him did change, however, during the course of the Shadowbringers expansion. Being the heart of Zodiark, manifesting as the First’s...uhh, first, Warrior of Light, summoning them from across the other shards to wreak havoc and empower himself, only to finally be put out of his misery not just be the true Warrior of Light/Darkness, but Emet-Selch’s last act of will and revealing that he had been an over-working, sad youth who just wanted to save the world he knew was...well, sad. And his first (and last) real gameplay with the various hero summonings was a pretty amazing set piece too, though it also tells me how devastating Elidibus could have been earlier on if he’d taken a more pro-active approach, access to the Crystal Tower notwithstanding.

Valens van Varro

Much like how I wanted to punch Ilberd, because Ilberd is a deplorable person but an effective villain with decent motivations, Valens is just...I just want to punch him, in general. He’s just Disgusting On Purpose. And since we still haven’t shaken Stormblood’s insistence that Garleans are Evil So Evil Oh My God Evil You Guys they’re trotted out a demented borderline sex-offender who forces his child wards to brand subjects who are out of line with red-hot irons. Valens is...entertaining, I guess, in that regard. And Valens does serve as an appropriate counter-part to Gaius in this storyline, the themes of which seem to largely deal with fatherhood and penance for past misdeeds. I just...really miss Garlean villains with nuance.

Fandaniel

Oh god damnit Asahi is back. Square Enix stop doing this, stop bringing back bad characters. Though it is unfair to say Fandaniel is anything like Asahi. Oh sure, he’s using Asahi’s body (and therefore the Brutus’ family inheritance to fund his machinations), he fawns over Zenos, and he’s cartoonishly evil, but at least this go around there’s a certain...goofy charm to it. Fandaniel is a sundered Ascian - he doesn’t care about the Rejoining or Zodiark, he’s aware that he’s a broken being and he is, quite frankly, loving it. He lays his intent out pretty plainly to the Warrior of Light/Darkness: he’s evil, he loves destruction, and he’s doing it because that’s just what he feels like doing. Don’t reason with him, don’t try to understand him, just fight back and cry about it. On some basic level I appreciate that brutal honesty, so much so that I’m comfortable writing my thoughts about him now because I don’t think they’re going to change. What you see is what you get with Fandaniel, and he’s just having such a good time. He’s a terribly-written villain but gosh darnit I just can’t bring myself to hate him.

#don't @ me zenos fans or i will always win need rolls on mount drops by one point in your queues #ffxiv

74 notes · View notes

recentanimenews · 4 years ago

Text

Manga the Week of 9/29/21

SEAN: The end of September brings some nice books, but also a long-awaited new volume of a beloved series, so let’s start with that.

Yen Press has Yotsuba&! 15! Do you know when the last Yotsuba&! came out? 2018, that’s when. Rejoice!

ASH: Ah! A great series to start us off with!

ANNA: Wow!

MICHELLE: When last we left off, Yotsuba and her dad were acquiring a car, so I look forward to some fresh new adventures.

MELINDA: Oh!!

SEAN: Yen Press also has A Certain Magical Index 24, Combatants Will Be Dispatched! 5, In Another World with My Smartphone 3, Love and Heart 3, Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story 3, and Star Wars: Rebels 2.

Apologies to Udon, who I forgot about last week. They have already out Steins;Gate 0 Volume 1, an alternate universe manga set after a Bad End from the original game. This is an omnibus of the first two volumes.

Square Enix has By the Grace of the Gods 3.

Seven Seas has been awfully quiet all month… TILL NOW. Get ready to be buried.

ASH: I am prepared.

SEAN: We start with the Bloom Into You Anthology, a collection of manga by various artists revolving around the cast of this yuri manga.

ASH: I like seeing these anthology volumes released. Once upon a time, seeing them licensed was somewhat rare.

SEAN: Hello World, the manga, is a complete in one omnibus retelling of the light novel. It ran in Ultra Jump.

Karate Survivor in Another World (Yajin Tensei) is a Dengeki Daioh title for those who wish that more isekai titles were like old-school Shonen Champion “teens fight” manga.

ASH: I am interested in portrayals of karate in manga, but am significantly less interested in isekai these days.

SEAN: The Masterful Cat Is Depressed Again Today (Dekiru Neko wa Kyou mo Yuuutsu) is from Kodansha’s Suiyoubi no Sirius, and is about a young woman who takes in a giant cat… who’s really good at nearly everything. Better than her, at any rate. Cats and comedy, love it.

ASH: Indeed! Love a good cat manga.

ANNA: Sounds promising.

MICHELLE: Ooh.

MELINDA: This sounds fantastic!

SEAN: The NPCs in this Village Sim Game Must Be Real! (Murazukuri Game no NPC ga Namami no Ningen to Shika Omoenai) runs in Young Ace Up, and is based on the novel. I enjoyed the novel much more than expected, so the manga should also be fun.

Reincarnated as a Dragon Hatchling (Tensei Shitara Dragon no Tamago Datta – Saikyou Igai Mezasa Nee) runs in Comic Earth Star, and is ALSO based on the novel. I didn’t read that one, but I assume it is cute and has dragons.

That is SIX debuts. Wow. We also get BL Metamorphosis 5 (the final volume), How to Build a Dungeon: Book of the Demon King 7, Mushoku Tensei: Roxy Gets Serious 6, Pandora in the Crimson Shell: Ghost Urn 14, She Professed Herself Pupil of the Wise Man 2, and We Swore to Meet in the Next Life and That’s When Things Got Weird! 3 (the final volume).

ASH: BL Metamorphosis is wonderful; I’m so glad that it was translated.

MELINDA: I never managed to start it, but now is the time!

SEAN: One Peace has the 16th manga volume for The Rising of the Shield Hero.

Kodansha gives us the first volume of the updated Eternal Edition re-release of Codename: Sailor V.

Also in print: Eden’s Zero 12, Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest 8, Fire Force 24, Shikimori’s Not Just a Cutie 6, To Your Eternity 15, UQ Holder 23, and Witch Hat Atelier 8, the most important of those titles. (Please buy Witch Hat Atelier.)

ASH: Yes, please do! I’m a little behind in my reading, but To Your Eternity is a favorite of mine, too.

ANNA: Witch Hat Atelier is one of the few series I’m not behind on!

MICHELLE: I totally am!

MELINDA: I’m… I can’t even bear to speak of it.

SEAN: Digitally, our debut is The Girl, the Shovel, and the Evil Eye (Youjo to Scoop to Magan Ou), a Shonen Sirius title whose content is not as cute as it sounds. A man dies and is reincarnated as a worker in a mining camp, without any powers, even! But when he tries to help a bullied girl, will he have powers after all?

Also out digitally: Am I Actually the Strongest? 5, Back When You Called Us Devils 5, Chihiro-kun Only Has Eyes for Me 2, Fate/Grand Order -Epic of Remnant- Pseudo-Singularity III: The Stage of Carnage, Shimousa – Seven Duels of Swordmasters 3, The Great Cleric 7, Harem Marriage 9, Mr. Bride 2, Saint Cecilia and Pastor Lawrence 4, That’s My Atypical Girl 2, and What I Love About You 7. Half that list is just the title of the Fate book.

J-Novel Club has 4 debuts, three light novels and one manga. Dahlia in Bloom: Crafting a Fresh Start with Magical Tools (Madougushi Dahliya wa Utsumukanai) is a J-Novel Heart series about a woman who was isekai’d after overworking herself to death. She’s not a villainess… but she’s still dumped by her fiancee. She’s been trying to be quiet and get on with life… well, screw that. Now she resolves to make a career for herself.

Min-Maxing My TRPG Build in Another World (TRPG Player ga Isekai de Saikyou Build wo Mezasu) is a series that features, well, an isekai’d guy using game mechanics in another world, but apparently the audience for this is more 45-year-old D&D players than teen MMO gamers.

The Reincarnated Princess Spends Another Day Skipping Story Routes (Tensei Oujo wa Kyou mo Hata o Tatakioru) is a villainess otome game series from J-Novel Heart. In this game, most fans agreed that the support guys were better than the love interest. Our villainess is going after one… but the heroine is determined to stop her. We shall see.

Also out as a light novel: Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill 10.

On the manga front, we get the debut of My Instant Death Ability Is So Overpowered, No One in This Other World Stands a Chance Against Me! —AΩ—. Based on the light novel, it runs in Comic Earth Star.

We also get the 4th Record of Wortenia War.

Ghost Ship debuts Manga Diary of a Male Porn Star (AV Dan’yuu Hajimemashita), a Shinchosha title from Kurage Bunch about a young man who moves to Tokyo to enter the world of Adult Videos. It’s… harder than it looks. No pun intended.

ASH: I’ll admit to being curious.

MELINDA: Same.

SEAN: Cross Infinite World gives us Return from Death: I Kicked the Bucket and Now I’m Back at Square One With a Boyfriend Who Doesn’t Remember Me. As you might guess, it’s a Peggy-Sue story a la Tearmoon Empire, and the title is also the plot.

Lastly, we have Airship. In print, they debut She Professed Herself Pupil of the Wise Man, and we also get Classroom of the Elite 9 and The Hidden Dungeon Only I Can Enter 5.

And we get an early digital release of Berserk of Gluttony 4.

Ooof. The Suez is unstuck, folks, and the September of Quiet is over. What are you getting?

By: Sean Gaffney

#Anime #News #Manga Bookshelf

2 notes · View notes

virtual-lara · 4 years ago

Photo

A round up of the events within the Tomb Raider universe that happened in 2020.

2020 was a quiet year for Tomb Raider when it came to games, however it was a good year for those who love to collect Tomb Raider goodies. Fans also helped to fill the gap between games, doing some very exciting things!

With 2021 being the 25th anniversary of the franchise, there were expectations of upcoming plans to be teased. The Tomb Raider Twitter began dropping some news, showing a preview of Weta Workshop's 'Anniversary' statue on July 25th. Weta then released a piece of concept art of the statue on October 25th. In addition to merchandise, Square Enix released a teaser trailer for an upcoming free-to-play mobile game called 'Tomb Raider Reloaded' on 23rd November, showcasing a more classical Lara and familiar themes from Tomb Raider 1. The trademark 'T.R.U.E' (Tomb Raider Ultimate Experience) frequently caused a frenzy throughout the year, hinting to possible remakes or remasters of past games but as of yet, nothing has come from it.

There were many a crossover as well. On February 16th, it was announced that Ubisoft’s ‘Rainbow Six Siege’ would receive a Lara Croft Tomb Raider elite skin for the character of Ash. Later in the month, the 26th of February, a Tomb Raider / Brawlhalla crossover was announced, where players could choose from either classic or reboot Lara and play on a Tomb Raider related map called 'Temple Ruins'. On May 12th, Tomb Raider outfits were released for the game 'Animal Crossing: New Horizons'. These were the 'Classic Lara Croft', 'Angel of Darkness' and 'Tomb Raider (2013)'. Also included was a piece of Lara Croft wall art.

Also on May 12th, a new Community Manager & Social Media Manager for the Tomb Raider brand was announced: @Rinoaaa, who helped in the creation of the Animal Crossing goodies. Sadly, the franchise lost Neal Boyd on 7th March. He was a level designer on Tomb Raider and the sequel Tomb Raider II. The community also lost Badassgamez's amazing Tomb Raider walkthroughs in December when he decided to step away from all forms of social media, removing his content from the Internet. Video gamer Steve of Warr presented fans with an interview he did with Core Design executive producer Adrian Smith. From this, he was given a disk that contained a 2000 E3 demo build of Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness. These files were later put up for download on fansite Core-Design.

Various pieces of merchandise were released: ’Tomb Raider Omnibus Volume 2’ was available on the 1st of January. Royal Mail heavily featured Lara Croft in a selection of stamps and postcards that celebrated classic video games. The third Gaming Heads statue based on Lara Croft in ‘The Temple of Osiris’ released in the second quarter of the year whilst a fourth Gaming Heads statue was announced, featuring Lara as seen in 'Rise of the Tomb Raider'. The OST of 'Shadow of the Tomb Raider' was released on vinyl by Laced Records in February.

The Tomb Raider Suite is nearing its end, with the final items of KickStarter goodies - the deluxe tin CDs - finally shipping to fans in January. In November, Nathan McCree announced that the documentary was almost complete and almost ready for publishing, however, on the downside, the Coronavirus had forced Nathan to postpone the Paris concert at Le Grand Rex, originally scheduled for October 24th, and the 2 concerts in Australia.

The Coronavirus didn't halt the shipping of the ‘Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel Symphony' goodies, as 'Janice' worked hard throughout the year to make sure that everyone received their items. On February 14th, the Symphony was available to download on all major streaming and digital platforms. Two new clothing designs were released September 22nd on the Dark Angel store.

Core Design developers have mingled more with the community this year, whilst explaining details of Tomb Raider game development. Ash (from tomb-of-ash.com) hosted various livestreams that featured Peter Connelly, Andy Sandham, Tom Scutt, Jamie Morton and Murti Schofield, where the audience could ask questions and share stories whilst AJ of SurvivorReborn played Tomb Raider III, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation and Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness. Jonell Elliott joined Instagram in September and has been communicating with fans, even sitting down with Chris at Raidercast to provide the first interview concerning her role as Lara Croft and Tomb Raider.

Talking of Core Design, early in the year, Ash was given access to files relating to Core Design's ‘Tomb Raider 10th Anniversary Edition’. As well as publishing imagery of locations, characters and enemies, he asked the Tomb Raider community for help by creating a petition on 4th August for the permission of the legal release of Core Design’s ‘Tomb Raider Anniversary Edition’ assets. After hearing no response from Square Enix or Crystal Dynamics on the matter, he released the files via Archive.org on December 31st, where the community dived straight in to fix and explore the contents.

Fans have also been busy throughout the year. AOD modder Nakamichi had to step away from modding in August but he gave out the source code to his tools for others to continue his work. This enabled many others to come forward and port various characters into the game as Lara. 2020 also saw the breakthrough for modding in 'Tomb Raider' (2013) and 'Rise of the Tomb Raider', allowing players to change and customise Lara's model. Other fan projects that were ongoing throughout the year were: Giovanni Lucca's Tomb Raider III HD Remaster, Nicobass' Tomb Raider II remake and freakraider's TRAoD 1.5. Now of course these are just a few projects; fans have also produced artwork, 3D renders, cosplay imagery, music, videos, fiction and websites. 2020 has also been the year of Tomb Raider speedrunners and challenge players, where the aim of the game is to abide by certain conditions, be it using pistols only or playing the whole game in one sitting without using a medipack. The Tomb Raider Level Editor finally gained its own category on Twitch in January, separating its gameplay from Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation. Once again, the TRLE community at Lara's Level Base put together an Advent Calendar for builders and TRLE level players to enjoy throughout December.

One final note... Tomb Raider fans rallied together once again for another year of Extra Life, led by Stellalune, playing games on Twitch (not just Tomb Raider) to raise money for charity. They managed to raise $8,583, more than any previous year! And Tomb Raider Marathon VII managed to raise almost $5,000 within one year. Plus there have been some kind-hearted, generous fans out there, such as Nicolas Croft, that have ran giveaways, offering various Tomb Raider merchandise.

#VL Articles #VL Posts

10 notes · View notes

hellyeahheroes · 5 years ago

Photo

Asian Herritage Month Character of the Day: Kamala Khan

16 years old Kamala Khan was an average nerdy Pakistani-American Muslim teenager from Jersey City, who loved superheroes in general and Carol Danvers, Captain Marvel, in particular. But when she was exposed to cloud of Teriggen Mist she discovered she is descended of the Inhumans - a highly advanced civilization of genetically modified superhuman beings that have been living hidden from humanity for centuries. She gained set of shapeshifting powers like an abilitty to strech her limbs or change her size. Since then the character has won over hearts of the fans across the world in her three solo series.

She was a member of All-New All-Different Avengers (in first 12 issues and the annual), Secret Warriors and Champions in their first and second book, miniseries and crossover World’s Collide with the Avengers, as well as involved in teams of two Marvel Rising miniseries.

She also starred in Marvel Team-Up, miniseries Avengers: Back to Basics and anthology Fearless.

Finally, she made a number of guest appearances from the Totally Awesome Hulk #15-18, Incredible Hulk #715-717, Nova #3-4, Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur #9-11, Gwenpool Strikes Back #3-5, Shuri #6-7, Amazing Spider-Man #7-8 and Spider-Man #3, #8-10 and #239-240. Alternate versions of her character have shown up in Exiles #1-5 and #11-12, All-New Wolverine #33 and Inhumans: Attilan Rising.

Kamala has also made appearance in cartoons like Marvel Rising or Avengers and in video games like Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Black Order and upcoming Square Enix Avengers game. Kamala is also protagonist of a novel Ms. Marvel’s Fists of Fury and will be protagonist of a Disney+ series currently in development.

-Admin

#Ms. Marvel #Kamala Khan #Magnificent Ms. Marvel #Champions #All-New All-Different Avengers

65 notes · View notes

rainbowdonkee · 5 years ago

Photo

With 2019 coming to an end, I wanted to make a list of my personal top 10 video games that came out this decade. I was 12 in 2010, and now being 21 video games have always been important to me! Many of the games that are the most dearest to me sadly came out before 2010 (HG/SS barely made the cut with the NA release). I tried to not make recent releases be part of my bias (FE3H lol), plus there were many games such as Bioshock 2, Fallout New Vegas, DA2, ACNL, and many more that I love but this list would have been too long!

1. Dark Souls (2011)

2. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017)

3. Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver (NA 2010)

4. NieR Automata (2017)

5. Final Fantasy XV (2016)

6. Bloodborne (2015)

7. Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia (2017)

8. Astral Chain (2019)

9. Granblue Fantasy (2014)

10. Deemo (2013)

Dark Souls: Although I haven’t really completed the game personally, I’ve seen many playthroughs and videos about the story and characters. Hidetaka Miyazaki is absolutely awesome in creating those fantasy worlds and characters, everything that Dark Souls ended up influencing was pretty groundbreaking. And the OST is always enjoyable to hear again.

Breath of the Wild: This game took quite a long time for Nintendo to release, and when it finally came out on the final year of the WiiU and the birth of the Switch... it was pretty emotional. Also to realize that Iwata-san never made it to see the rise of Nintendo’s success after the failure of the WiiU gets me everytime, but I hope he sees all the smiles and joy BOTW has brought since its release. The game changed not only what is a LOTZ game but what is an open world, I’ve played it twice and each time I picked it up was a new experience.

Pokemon HG/SS: This game was released around Fall 2009 in Japan, but for NA it was out in March 2010. I still remember the anticipation for Spring Break to arrive in order to spend all my week playing it! I never had the chance to play the original Gold/Silver, so everything was new to me. My 12 year old mind almost exploded when I ended up finishing the Johto League only to find out we were ALSO traveling to Kanto!!! I was shook! This game is amazing, and I’ll forever wait for them to somehow add our Pokemons following us around, that mechanic was so cute! And of course the OST is golden, and I can always listen to it and be brought back to those days.

NieR Automata: I never played any of the past NieR games (although I was aware of their existence). The first trailer I ever watched had the “Become as Gods” song so I was hooked from the start! And learning that PlatinumGames and Square Enix both developed the game made me hyped for its release. I love everything about it, the characters, story, music, themes. By the time I finished the game, it had brought me into a journey of questioning so many heavy topics about life...I really wasn’t expecting that about a game. Not going to lie it may or may not have brought me a mini existential crisis but with a game made my Yoko Taro can’t be too surprised.

Final Fantasy XV: The game I so often heard fabled tales since as back as 2009 and the hype was just building up for this game! I remember going to the movie theater when they were having special screenings for the Kingsglaive movie (I dragged my friend, little brother, and mom lol). The game went through so much, many cuts and changes were made but I personally ended up liking what we got. Still super sad that many unreleased DLC’s were cut off, but the love I have for the characters and music will always stay.

Bloodborne: Hey another Miyazaki game, what can you say...the man just makes brilliant games. He took everything I love about gothic, victorian era, and Lovecraftian esque and made this extraordinary game. I’m here hoping that maybe this 2020 we can hear a slither of news of Bloodborne 2, the theme for this game is too good for them to leave it as only one game.

Fire Emblem Echoes SoV: After the train wreck that was Fates, I literally was not expecting for us to get another FE title so soon! Japan waited 2 years for Echoes but thanks to localization giving us Fates in 2016, we got SoV a year later. I never heard of Fire Emblem Gaiden, before this game I never played any of the Japan only FE games, so when news was coming out about this title I tried 100% to AVOID it. Why? Because this was the first time I could start a FE game without personally knowing anything about it, and when I first played it, right from the start it felt so different, it didn’t felt like a Fire Emblem game (which isn’t bad at all). With the new art direction it also felt like a whole new world, I love Hidari and I hope we get to see them more in future FE games. The game had a simple plot which I didn’t held it against them, I knew this was a remake, and personally I’m glad they didn’t added things like an Avatar or S-Supports. They stayed true to its original source, and SoV will stay as my personal favorite FE game. Also Heritors of Arcadia will be the best vocal theme we got in FE series.

Astral Chain: Oh snap another PlatinumGames IP? This developers are just too good! Astral Chain came out of nowhere although I’ve heard it was worked on for a long time, supposedly even before NieR Automata was developed. I really enjoyed the game very much, from all the 2019 games that came out it caught my eye and I went in with not too many expectations but I had a good time. The story took a crazy turn and I could see some similar themes as NieR Automata but it held its own ground to become unique. The fighting mechanics were so much fun to play and the music was also awesome! I wish more people talked about this game since it is Nintendo’s new IP. I hope we can get the twins for Smash Ultimate!

Granblue Fantasy: I first new anything about Cygames back in 2016 when I saw the OP for Rage of Bahamut. After Seeing the OP for season 2, seeing Azazel in all his glory I knew I had to watch the anime! Luckilly Rage of Bahamut season 2 was continuing in 2017 so I was able to catch up just in time for its final 10 episodes. I LOVE Azazel and Kaisar and of course ROB Lucifer! Then to my surprise I found out about GBF, and I was dumb and thought the app was unavailable in the west which is technically true since you need a Japanese account to download the app which has an ENG text option. So it wasn’t until 2018 that I downloaded the game and started my journey through the sky. This gacha game literally changed what is a gacha game to me, the developers listen to fans, the community is fun, and just everything about this franchise is so great. I’m not a hardcore player so I’m not too worry about grids, I’m here for the cute husbands. (Lancelot, Sandalphon, Albert, Grimnir I lov u).

Deemo: I love this game, one of the best app games I’ve ever had. Back in the day I used to play TapTap Revenge and that was my first taste of rhythm games, Deemo brought me back to those types of apps. Whenever I was anxious I could always play this game and pass the time while keeping my mind busy. Plus without Deemo I would have never known artist’s such as Mili. The game is on the Switch which I’m so happy because I was able to just get all the songs without flooding my tablets storage space.

#i won't explain why these are my favs since it will literally turn into an essay #fire emblem echoes shadows of valentia #fire emblem echoes #dark souls #darksouls #botw #loz #the legend of zelda #pokemon heartgold #pokemon soulsilver #ffxv #nier automata #top 10 #bloodborne #astral chain #gbf #deemo #video games #list

152 notes · View notes