Final Fantasy general

Garland states once that Kuja was made with a limited lifespan. That is, he says it right after Kuja knocks him off that cliff and talks about his eternal kingdom.

He was looking for Eidolons to begin with, and then, during said hunt, encountered the power of Trance and decided to pursue that, once Alexander was destroyed.

Wait, which part doesn't make sense? Kuja fashioning a special Trance, or the party being able to defeat Garland?

I have a message from another time...

Did you miss the part where Kefka poisons the drinking water of Cyan's hometown, thus killing every man, woman, and child there in a way that is most definitely not "quick and painless"? No, Kefka is the kind of sadistic fuck who'd sooner torture you to death if he has the chance. Preferably by his own hand, so he can get off on your agony-fueled death screams.

Remember how Zidane "[doesn't] need a reason to help people?"

Kefka doesn't need a reason to make people suffer.

edited 11th Aug '14 9:09:29 PM by EvaUnit01

[Puts on hipster glasses] Meh, the Emperor did it first.

Joking aside, it's weird how he empties a vial or something of poison, the entire water turns purple, then people who aren't Cyan fall down just by being near it, all in the space of a few minutes.

"What's out there? What's waiting for me?"

I think the bright purple and the speed of it all are player-directed cues, so we know the deed's done.

Considering the king and several people deep in the castle were affected, I imagine the ones who died had taken the poison via their drinking water some minutes/hours(?) prior.

I have a message from another time...

I just find it funny to take symbolic cues as literally as possible.

"What's out there? What's waiting for me?"

Enlong: the part about Garlard being defeated so easily by the party. I'm talking about storyline wise not gameplay wise.

Unit 01: from my point of view kefka is just a generic insane psycopath you see in a bunch of other stuff, plus he so unrealistic and out of touch with reality that I have a hard time taking him seriously, while the poisoning part was horrific it's still nowhere as bad as Half the stuff kuja does.

The search for the eidolons is still pointless as appairantly going into trace makes you even more powerful than the eidolons, why couldn't kuja take out a few books and do some research on trance instead of wasting his time on the Eidolons?

edited 11th Aug '14 10:03:03 PM by jman7

I disagree somewhat on the "generic" bit myself. But then, I usually take "insane psychopath" villains pretty seriously, whether they're Kefka, Jagi, Carnage, etc.

Except for The Joker, oddly enough. Him I can't take that seriously a lot of times. Partly because he's a goddamn clown, and partly because he gets more hype than I feel he deserves.

But this is Final Fantasy and not Random Assorted Other Crap, so let's talk about Final Fantasy like men! And ladies! And ladies who dress like men!

edited 11th Aug '14 9:56:33 PM by EvaUnit01

Well, I wouldn't call it the easiest boss fight.

Then again, this is the player's party(tm). If it has hit points, and doesn't attack them in a cutscene, they can kill it, with enough level grinding.

I'm going to have to disagree with your assessment of Kefka. If nothing else, I think his characterization fits nicely with the story themes. But I think us disagreeing with each other may well be as far as this line of conversation can go.

edited 11th Aug '14 9:56:09 PM by Enlong

I have a message from another time...

Kuja couldn't use trance before he stole from Garland's flagship because he was emotionally stunted and thus unable to feel the surge of pure emotion to go into a Trance. Besides that the only reason Kuja's Trance is so powerful is because he had stolen the thousands of Gaian souls Garland had collected with the Invincible.

edited 11th Aug '14 10:48:31 PM by lycropath

In particular, he used Brahne's soul to achieve Trance. And the one thing I liked about Kuja was how he used the heroes for his plans and how nothing they did stopped his plans for long for all of Disc 3. They go to Oeilvert? He tries to kill the remaining party members just to be on the safe side and to piss off Zidane and then takes the Gulug Stone. Zorn and Thorn are killed despite being the only ones who can extract Eidolons? He learns more about Trance and how to achieve it.

The heroes break the Four Seals to Terra? He follows after them. They fight Garland? He uses Garland's being weakened to fight the party and uses them to help him achieve Trance and kills Garland.

Until finding out that his lifespan's almost up, Kuja snaps and decides to Put Them All Out of My Misery and he nearly destroys the Crystal for good and he kills the party (Or puts them on death's door). Outside of Caius, Kuja is probably the most successful villain in the series.

He's also a huge part in what makes Final Fantasy 9 so great, he's just such a great villain. His fashion sense, not so much, but he's a narcissist, I guess that makes sense for someone as vain as Kuja to wear.

edited 11th Aug '14 11:15:54 PM by DamascaRamza

Having played neither IX or any of FNC besides Type-0, I can't comment on them, but I think the villians in XII did actually achive most of their goals, except for Vayne becoming Dynast King maybe.

I can't say I like Kefka as a character. He's great as a villain, fun to watch and all, but I can't respect that guy. I can't root for him or hope that there's a way out for him after his plans ultimately fail. Which is completely fine because Kefka is set up to be an almost abstract force of evil, not an actual human.

edited 12th Aug '14 5:43:56 AM by Serox

I think the Emperor deserves some credit as well. Even though he gets killed by the party, his evil half takes over hell, and his good half is still so evil that it takes over heaven.

Not Three Laws compliant.

The Emperor is easily one of the best JRPG villains ever simply because everything the heroes did right up until the end just played into his hands and he got to rule both Heaven and Hell, he was that evil. Plus Pandemonium has one of the best final dungeon themes ever.

So because I'm the King of Dorks, I guess I'm going to give the PSX releases of IV~VI a shot.

Bring a favorite novel.

I sure said that!

I do have the entirety of Flame Of Recca on my to-read list, come to think of it....

Come to think of it, Kefka is an idea that they later revisited with Kuja.

Villain is altered/born for the purpose of making war, takes it as his purpose, decides to gain as much power as he can in order to overthrow his master and seize the reins of the world for himself, stares the question of mortality in the face right after getting ultimate power, and decides that there's no meaning to a finite life. And then decides to speed up the process.

Kuja, I think, has the advantage of a game hat was able to spend a bit more time telling its story.

edited 13th Aug '14 10:13:11 PM by Enlong

I have a message from another time...

Kuja's mortality angst has more than a bit of Xande to it, as well.

...

Though they hit upon different answers. Xande decides that he must become immortal again, and is willing to sacrifice the whole world, and quality of life (who wants to live forever... by being frozen in temporal stasis?) to do so.

I have a message from another time...

And of course, Kuja is a constant presence in IX, whereas Xande is barely in III and his backstory is only relayed to us by his former companions.

I sure said that!

As a villain, Xande is just baffling. I can get being mad about the "gift of mortality", but his method of immortality means that he can't experience it. And that he can't deal with any threats to it. Is he just really scared of the afterlife? Cause that's the only logical explanation I can think of.

...Maybe he really doesn't want to meet the Emperor?

edited 14th Aug '14 7:30:17 AM by Zendervai

Not Three Laws compliant.

We can add that to the list of reasons why Dissidia 014 has to happen.

...

I think that's the point. Xande is so afraid of death that he's willing to take the least enjoyable methods of immortality to avoid it.

If Noah's gift to him was some sort of test, I daresay Xande failed pretty hard.

I have a message from another time...

Need to call upon some aid! Since the character page for VII is locked but was in dire need of overhaul, I've been working on a sandbox that will replace the page as a whole. I'd like to call upon anyone who can contribute to add new tropes to the profiles that may be missing and to expand the smaller and newer profiles likewise.

Final Fantasy VII Characters

Why did the page get locked in the first place?