Final Fantasy XII, a tragedy of RPGs. So much potential, but the corporate suits at Square Enix had other plans. Creative differences and all that.

"What is this!? Where is the androgynous male lead? Where is the love story!? Quick, get someone in here who can shoe horn these things in to save our brand image! The 14 year old girls will be in an uproar."

Nothing proves Squares incompetence better than the 20 hour mark of Final Fantasy XII where all the political intrigue and subtle nuances of character development are tossed and what proceeds from there is the worst rush job in RPG history. It's depressing to think what might have been had Square had the balls to let Matsuno do what he wants.

Could you believe members of the FFXII staff were actually resistant to the removal of random battles? God, I'd fire those people on the spot.

Of course, that's all speculation. Maybe Matsuno just got tired of making the game, and just mailed in the last 40 hours with long endless treks across empty wastelands in pursuit of the wholly unsatisfying conclusion to a story that promised so much more. (Looking at FFT and Vagrant Story, it's hard to believe that to be the case, however.) But what else can you do, not like a major corporation in Japan is ready to spill the beans on how ball-less they are. (I'd kill for a documentary about the inner workings and drama of Japanese game design. Gosh that sounded nerdy.)

Final Fantasy XII isn't perfect, but I'm not looking to quantify it's worth anyway. I got tired of figuring out the best FF sometime around the 10th grade. But it was in many ways the best step forward Final Fantasy had seen in a long time. You can't deny that, based solely on the fact that removing random battles should have happened 6 years before FFXII was even released! If they had built upon Matsuno's work, we'd be looking at a completely different company right now.

I don't even know why I'm writing this. Japan hardly matters anymore when it comes to the video game industry. Not that America is doing much better. MW3 anyone? Or how about a regurgitation of Oblivion with slight improvements in the form of Skyrim!

So, whatever, I'm enjoying FFXII. The characters are human and believable (mostly) and even for this jaded 27 year old gamer, most of the lines don't make me cringe -- some of them are actually quite good. Even the combat system is fun. Yes, you can automate it so you never have to touch a button, but there's something satisfying about watching your pre-programmed fighters clear up mobs so seamlessly. And it's not like there aren't fights that require you to pay attention and micro-manage, provided you haven't spent 10 hours grinding up your characters on Mark quests, but that can be forgiven.

But this isn't a review, per se. I just want to say that it hurts to see a game with so much potential...um, well suck isn't the right word, but just to see it fall short. Imagine if Sakaguchi had been let go half way through FFVI. Yeah, that's about right.

Fuck Skyrim.

I don't read a lot of video game articles, comments, and so forth, in fact it wasn't until this week that I began really delving into the world of video game journalism, the media, and people who contribute to it. I mean, I LOVE video games, naturally, but I've never really embedded myself in the hysteria so fully as I have this week.

It's ridiculously entertaining to be honest. Video games are such a diverse and growing medium so full of varying points of view and varying ideologies for what games should be. It's like being in Paris in the 1890s, well, that's an insult to Renoir, but well, maybe there is some truth in that.

The ideology I don't understand is how it comes to be that some people can be so incredibly invested in the companies and games that are released. I'm not talking mere excitement here but full on hysteria bordering on unhealthy obsession.

Before I go any further, I want to reiterate that I fucking LOVE video games, so don't go any further in labeling me as someone who just doesn't get it. I do get it, this shit is awesome, but I think a lot of fans need to take a step back from the medium and reevaluate the amount of faith they put in these games and their developers.

A game company is simply a massive corporation that finds out what sells and then offers it. It has no stake in your well being, is largely unconcerned with artistic credibility, creatively pushing any envelopes, or doing anything other than making sure they have enough money to develop another game. Of course, we have exceptions, but even then it's a long shot. So I can't understand how anyone could so vehemently defend a game, series, or company? You're an individual, not a spokesperson for these multi-billion dollar corporations. Trust me, they have their own people for that sort of thing.

Artistic growth is not dependent on making sure mega billion dollar companies survive or blindly praising the latest and greatest sequel because the advertising bonanza and all of your friend's opinions are so hard to resist. It's about always questioning the status quo, about expecting more out of the medium, and of course, enjoying it a hell of a lot every so often.

I propose that in the future when someone says a word that you don't' like about your favorite game, series, what have you, don't flippantly curse them out and storm off, try to take a moment to consider what they are saying, where they are coming from, and perhaps through mutual understanding you can gain a better appreciation for this fantastic art form and perhaps even begin to expect more from it. We need healthy discussion in this industry and among it's consumers, not soldier's defending the honor of a mega corporation that could likely care less about you - as an individual.

Of course, I'll try to do the same.

First of all, Final Fantasy XIII does not look like a fun time to me. Now, I've been a big, HUGE, fan of Final Fantasy games for about 12 years and for the first time in my life a Final Fantasy game does not entice me. It honestly looks awfully juvenile and quite bland. Of course, I could easily write it off and claim that's because it is the worst RPG ever, is terrible, horribly designed, and so forth, but I want to take a moment to look deeper than simply tossing insults.

Aside from looking abhorrent to me, FFXIII is in many ways absolutely genius.

Wait, what?!

SE has made a bold and gusty move with this game because they know more than we do. Or at least for the purpose of this article I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. The current RPG scene is essentially, JRPG, WRPG, and MMOs, this is more the case now than it ever was. Never before have western RPGs had such a large chunk of the market. These games essentially represent everything that SE is not and they know this or at least I hope they do. These western games are open ended with an emphasis on role playing and classic European inspired medieval settings - Fall Out not withstanding.

Square Enix essentially had to make a choice, chase the WRPG market and strive for something of the same feel or appease the people who really have no interest in WRPGs in the first place. The people who are likely to say, "I only play RPGs for the story." These people don't want to wander around some cave for hours, strike out on their own to save some village that has nothing to do with the main plot, or do anything of that sort. They want an in-depth story hard and fast and sooner rather than later. If there isn't a good bit of story or rambling exposition somewhere in the near future, they're likely to get bored.

So, the choice was obvious for SE. Take the classic FF formula, strip it down to it's bones, make it a strictly story driven RPG, for the people who have been buying their games since FFX came out. I can assure you it is likely these people who love it the most.

This is another point I want to make. SE is absolutely NOT making RPGs for those who played FFVI any longer. It is quite clear by now that they are focusing on a new audience or those who started with FFX and have no inkling of the "good old days". Some companies attempt to grow with their market but I think SE has taken a different road. I think their market is strictly 12-18, give or take a few years, and it is with these ages that their aesthetic and story telling most resonates.

So I suppose the genius is really in understanding their market.

So, to read some particularly scathing reviews, it's hard not to say, "Well this game wasn't made for you anyway," because really, it wasn't, and yes, that sounds horribly elitist, but I don't really mean it that way. I mean that SE gave their core fans what they want in this release, and that core does not consist of people who loved FFVI or people who enjoy WRPGs, or towns, or well designed dungeons, decisions being made by the player, immersion, or battle systems that involve actual strategic think - oh, there I go.

Um, yeah, I'll just end it here.