Final Fantasy general

People yelling "darkness" at each other until it loses all meaning is a general Kingdom Hearts issue, to be fair.

My main issue is that outside of the fact that you have no context, the dialogue between Sephiroth and Cloud is just terrible. It's stuff like that made me unable to take Seph seriously for years until I found out he wasn't quite like that in VII proper.

Something I realized only years after I first played FF 7 is how Sephirot is a pretty neat foil for Cloud. They both lose their identity, have a mental breakdown and cover it with delusion of being The Chosen One. The difference is, Cloud has a second mental breakdown, gets pulled back towards reality by people who care about him and accepts the truth (thus becoming The Unchosen One), while Sephirot holds onto his delusions until the bitter end.

Whenever Sephirot taunts Cloud about how Cloud's mental weakness allows Sephirot to control him, he's conveniently forgetting how the exact same thing is happening between Sephirot himself and Jenova.

Edited by Cozzer on Sep 2nd 2019 at 11:08:09 AM

Would be true on the last one except apparently Sephiroth was able to keep his consciousness in control over Jenova instead of the other way around.

Still, salient point on that once faced with the truth, he chooses to embrace it first mistakenly and then for real.

Hmm... in the original game it's ambiguous, and I consider the Compilation a... different canon, let's say. In any case, even if he wasn't directly manipulated by Jenova the whole time (and I agree that he was mostly in control during the game), his whole worldview was based on a lie he told himself in the basement of the Shinra Mansion, before torching Nibelhelm. I think we can safely say that Jenova's influence was involved in that moment, just like it was involved in the creation of the pseudo-Zack identity during Cloud's breakdown.

That said, it's not really important... I like how Sephirot, despite his later portrayal as an unfeeling, overpowering supervillain, was actually a broken man who grasped at straws to give some kind of meaning to his life, just like the main character, and how the difference between the two was embracing the empowering lie vs accepting the harsh reality.

Edited by Cozzer on Sep 2nd 2019 at 11:49:00 AM

Yeah whether or not Sephiroth is literally in control of his mental faculties, he is absolutely a slave to his delusions that he's a special Chosen One like Cloud was.

Edited by RodimusMinor on Sep 2nd 2019 at 6:18:12 AM

And just like Sephiroth, Cloud was flanderized into a stereotypical moody protagonist that many people assume he was like in the original FFVII.

If anything for most of the game, Cloud's stoic and kind of a prick to his team. It would be nice if the remake gave more hints of his dorkier self under the mask.

Besides the environmental Aesop, FF 7 also had a general anti escapism message. Do not run away from your problems. Cloud is the most obvious example of this, but you can kind of see it with other characters too.

I didn't think he was too much of a dick after the initial Avalanche raid. You can really see him softening up when he meets Aerith, he even makes jokes and laughs with her.

Cloud's less of an outright asshole and more that he's exuding a lot of personal confidence.

Edited by RodimusMinor on Sep 6th 2019 at 10:25:24 AM

I wonder if this song might get a reprise in VII's remake.

Its based on the assumption that they'll give Zack his own large piece of the games detailing his death.

Now THIS is cool. I really hope this is the boxart.

Edited by dmysta3000 on Sep 6th 2019 at 12:28:31 PM

Sephiroth's fandom perception as an aloof, pretty-boy Anti-Villain in the vein of characters like Sasuke Uchiha and Sesshoumaru is surprisingly at odds with how he's portrayed in the game itself. In the original he's a figure of straight-up horror, and spends a significant part of the story as essentially a slasher movie villain.

Did KH originate the former impression?

is because he's hot

If anything, KH 1's impression of Sephiroth is more in line with the "horror movie villian" angle since this is how he's introduced:

Edited by dmysta3000 on Sep 6th 2019 at 12:52:56 PM

In my experience, that perception of Sephiroth predates KH. People seem to have conflated Sephiroth from the flashback with Sephiroth the monster.

Even though in the flashback, he's kind of an aragant jerk, albeit very slightly nicer to Cloud/Zack. His duty kept him on the straight and narrow.

I do like that he's a little snarky about Hojo before he goes off the deep end.

IIRC in the Japanese version, Sephiroth uses "ore" (the rougher asshole version of "I") up until the reactor bit where afterward he switches to "watashi", and apparently the pronoun switch is meant to be significant.

I'm current on FF VIII Remaster,I never played this game before, so,my observations:

Of all the FF I played (XV,XIII trilogy,VII)this game as the best genuine comedy gold moments,as the other games on the franchise I played is more on involuntary kind of funny,Laguna sessions are awesome.

I predicting some Metal Gear Solid 2 Level of meta commentary twist with all that children soldiers,Laguna Movie,and the Shounen Battle Series that the groumpy oldman on the publishing bulding talks, the Cloud and Zeke relationship is already a precursor of this theme.

I feel that this game Disc Two Final Boss case is too extreme,maybe I lost something,but if the game just ends after disc 2 all the history beats are close, we even had a Final Dungeon preview,but the game just continues after that... is like some after tought problem happens during development looks like they want that breath taking(for its time,but its still relative cool to this day) futuristic city and Pandora sequence that will be DLC if the game was from the current industry,so we will find a excuse to extend the plot just for it.

or maybe was intentional...

Edited by LoutishHelminthic on Sep 7th 2019 at 8:48:38 AM

The problem with Sephiroth is post dip in the lifestream, They are too busy being enigmatic with him keeping the Cloud mystery going that once they pull the curtain away. Seph has no real characterization other then being aloof about Cloud's nature

Its like the Jenova/Sephiroth argument is pointless

It doesn't matter whose in charge since Seph is just doing the exact same thing Jenova did, He is effectively new Jenova, He's past or ramifications of being a normal person/ Fallen Hero are moot. Seph as the monster is no different then Ulty, Exdeath, or Zemus when it comes to depth, Why is he doing this evil thing! cause it makes sense to him. -shrugs-

and Jenova is just your atypical devours all life on your planet and leaves space monster

Thats why Sephiroth as Cloud's personal tormentor has been the aspect that people latch onto while wanting the Fallen Hero aspect to shine through

Sephiroth baiting Cloud on with the truth is the only times post Dip that Sephs not being a generic Doomsday Villain

Obviously English doesn't really have those kinds of pronouns, but the retranslation patch does a decent enough stab at conveying his past self being more of a prick before he loses it. Also gets rid of a lot of the swearing and Barret's more punched up dialogue, so that's nice.

I went to the Distant Worlds: music from Final Fantasy show last night. It was fantastic. They played music from V, VI, VIII, IX, X, XIV, XV, and the entire second half of the show was music from VII, since yesterday was the anniversary.

The vocalists from X and XIV — Ritsuki Nakano and Susan Calloway — were special guests, and they both performed songs from their respective games. "Suteki da ne", "Dragonsong" and "Answers".

They also showed off brand new footage from the FFVII Remake.

Edited by Primis on Sep 10th 2019 at 10:54:54 AM

Nice! What was in the footage? Nomura mentioned that the new trailer that’s gonna be shown at TGS this week will feature the Turks and the Shina characters

Edited by dmysta3000 on Sep 8th 2019 at 3:34:34 PM

Crystal Chronicles Remastered TGS trailer; releases January 23rd, 2020; comes with cross platform online co-op, new character skins, voiceovers, and more dungeons and bosses

Edited by tclittle on Sep 8th 2019 at 10:38:29 AM