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Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

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Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#31

Post by RGamma »

coolbreezetft22 wrote: post #21
VyseofArcadia wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I genuinely agree, especially for gamers of my particular demographic who knew Final Fantasy VI as "Final Fantasy III". I would like to point out, though, that there are plenty of games that the English-speaking world didn't get, at least not on their initial release, and there is one in particular that I want to highlight here as I don't see it get the fanfare I think its owed. That game is Dragon Quest V, which tak…

Playing FF VI for the first time right now having wanted to play it for past two decade and loving it. Also played Earthbound for the first time earlier this year and agree with this sentiment. The music was also amazing

Good to know I'm not the only one who just cannot let go of his 'to be played' list (though I'm only ~15 years behind wanting to play Earthbound). Recently finished SNES Chrono Trigger...

There even was a time I was under the illusion that I could experience all 'major' games in a reasonable timeframe after they came out.

And then the video games market blew up for good during the 10s and now there's so ludicrously many of them...

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#32

Post by andruc »

xwdv wrote: post #3

I still feel Final Fantasy 6 was the best JRPG of the retro era. At the time it had heavy themes you wouldn’t expect a child to grapple with: the ideas that the good guys can just straight up lose and having to live with the consequences, characters whose arcs may never truly be redeemed (because they can fucking die ), and even complex issues like the passing of loved ones, committing suicide when all hope is lost,…

You should try the Brave New World mod for FF6, if you ever feel like revisiting it. Vast QoL improvements, among many other welcome and interesting changes.

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#33

Post by dfxm12 »

xwdv wrote: post #3

I still feel Final Fantasy 6 was the best JRPG of the retro era. At the time it had heavy themes you wouldn’t expect a child to grapple with: the ideas that the good guys can just straight up lose and having to live with the consequences, characters whose arcs may never truly be redeemed (because they can fucking die ), and even complex issues like the passing of loved ones, committing suicide when all hope is lost,…

It's a coin flip with Earthbound, IMO. If we're talking specifically about kids playing through a game, Earthbound would be more relatable though. I think this goes even more so for kids in NA considering Earthbound's cheeky localization and western references.

source: played both at ~10-11 years of age.

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#35

Post by dfxm12 »

jstarfish wrote: post #15
VyseofArcadia wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I genuinely agree, especially for gamers of my particular demographic who knew Final Fantasy VI as "Final Fantasy III". I would like to point out, though, that there are plenty of games that the English-speaking world didn't get, at least not on their initial release, and there is one in particular that I want to highlight here as I don't see it get the fanfare I think its owed. That game is Dragon Quest V, which tak…

> Earthbound as a curiously mature JRPG for the time. I like to cite it as an example of a game that is more about the journey than the destination. I could never put my finger on what made that game so compelling. The "Yakuza: Like a Dragon" game had a similar vibe. The working title for it might as well have been "Friendship is Magic." > making sure to stop and take a coffee break every now and then The lesson you…

I could never put my finger on what made that game so compelling.

The game's director and writer, Shigesato Itoi, is a creative writer by trade, so he brought a fresh perspective, and frankly, is a better writer than most who work on videogames. Being an outsider, he also wasn't bogged down by common video game tropes.

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#37

Post by aidenn0 »

zerocrates wrote: post #11
aidenn0 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love Chrono Trigger; it's also what got me into emulation. I wasn't allowed to have an SNES but my 486 could just manage to run an emulator (esnes I think it was called?) that could do SNES with no sound or translucency (there were keyboard shortcuts to toggle the layers so e.g. you could hide fog that would otherwise make the whole screen gray).

zsnes is an older SNES emulator that definitely in its earlier days had some issues with transparent/translucent layers and had keys to turn each layer off. I think I remember needing to use those toggles for the same fog layers in Chrono Trigger that you're talking about (though I definitely wasn't on a 486). I think esnes may be a little bit older?

Just a tiny bit older: https://archive.org/details/ESNESv012a

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#38

Post by jstarfish »

spinningD20 wrote: post #28
jamie_ca wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the one hand there's Setzer "Let me swoop in on my airship to kidnap a beautiful opera singer" that was not likely to end in just a coffee date. On the other hand, no way in hell does someone like Kefka invent something called a Slave Crown and then just use it to force someone to pilot a magic mecha.

This is not explicitly stating that it is rape by any means, and I don't interpret it that way. It seemed to me that Maria and Setzer had a history already and he was stealing her away from her opera life, which she may or may not have wanted, we are not told whether or not she even wanted to work at the opera house, or what those conditions were. Casting characters in these negative lights without explicit proof is…

> Especially after you get the backstory on Setzer and his love interest - nothing else in the game paints him as character that would do something awful like that.

Did we play the same game? However you define "rape," Setzer was an amoral gambler and rogue whose idea of romance was kidnapping and forced marriage. His relationship with Darril was mostly one of sport. He planned to kidnap the opera singer, was duped into kidnapping Celes instead, and was only willing to help them save the world or whatever if Celes married him. She only got out of that by challenging him and literally beating him at his own game (gambling).

Setzer was misogyny incarnate...Darril, someone he had an actual "relationship" with, was only ever his girlfriend. The opera singer, he wanted to marry on sight. Dude's priorities were seriously fucked.

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#39

Post by entropicdrifter »

jdlyga wrote: post #25

I remember when it was "console style rpg" and "pc style rpg". It just so happens that "pc style rpg" games started getting released on consoles too, and somehow took over the RPG label.

Those are some especially confusing labels since the classic subgenre called "CRPG" correlates to "pc style rpg" as opposed to "console style rpg"

Re: Putting the "J" in the RPG, Part 1: Dorakue

#40

Post by spinningD20 »

jstarfish wrote: post #38
spinningD20 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not explicitly stating that it is rape by any means, and I don't interpret it that way. It seemed to me that Maria and Setzer had a history already and he was stealing her away from her opera life, which she may or may not have wanted, we are not told whether or not she even wanted to work at the opera house, or what those conditions were. Casting characters in these negative lights without explicit proof is…

> Especially after you get the backstory on Setzer and his love interest - nothing else in the game paints him as character that would do something awful like that. Did we play the same game? However you define "rape," Setzer was an amoral gambler and rogue whose idea of romance was kidnapping and forced marriage. His relationship with Darril was mostly one of sport. He planned to kidnap the opera singer, was duped i…

Let me rephrase... Regardless of the interpretation of intent, this was not "rape in ff6" or "discussing rape", and "rape" is not in ff6.

If I heard as a parent that a game has rape in it, I am thinking "there is a scene in which a character is raped", and there is no way I would let my kids play that game, regardless of the rating, until I felt they were mentally or emotionally ready to be exposed to such an awful scene.

This is not rape in a game or anything like that. Speculation or interpretation of events or intent is FAR different than a scene literally displaying such an act.

So, my commentary in this thread has been to clarify, there is no such scene in this game, and any interpretation or speculation is just that. It does not explicitly actually occur in the game.

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