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It could also be a Frosty the Snowman thing where he just found lumps of black mage material, gave it some magic life thing, and called them kids.
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Aug 19, 2014 11:48
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Last Celebration posted:Even though Vivi's supposed to "look nine" he's probably only like two or three years old. I just always assumed Kuja designed his prototype to asexually reproduce so he wouldn't have to make another one before working out the kinks on the mass-produced models. Tae posted:It could also be a Frosty the Snowman thing where he just found lumps of black mage material, gave it some magic life thing, and called them kids. No matter what it is, the fact that there are multiple Vivi's takes you out of the ending and makes you think about a lot of uncomfortable questions. Vivi is supposed to be this sympathetic little kid and idea of him sexually/asexually reproducing or him discovering the golem formula and creating more black mages is either really loving weird and nasty or downright hellish - him creating even more zombie golems from concentrated dark energy to keep his "race" alive - and it all works against the character. The writers must have thought that having all the black mages just dying in a few years and leaving Vivi alone again would be pretty rough, when the ending of the story is Zidane surviving and him affecting everybody he met positively, so they made Vivi have kids, but it still is very weird. I just pretend it never happened.
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Aug 19, 2014 12:18
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I think he built the kids himself, since he probably learned a few tricks from his Black Mage buddies and there seemed to be several different designs anyway so defects and early death made sense. He knew he was gonna die soon, so why not spend the rest of his short life trying to give life to others, considering he helped so many people already what with the whole "saving-the-world" and "giving hope to several different races of people" thing. drat, I need to play that game again.
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Aug 19, 2014 12:51
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ManOfTheYear posted:No matter what it is, the fact that there are multiple Vivi's takes you out of the ending and makes you think about a lot of uncomfortable questions. Vivi is supposed to be this sympathetic little kid and idea of him sexually/asexually reproducing or him discovering the golem formula and creating more black mages is either really loving weird and nasty or downright hellish - him creating even more zombie golems from concentrated dark energy to keep his "race" alive - and it all works against the character. Dude, that's all kind of weird. I always just assumed there were other black mages out there made the way Vivi was, or something? Iunno, you're the one projecting weird sexual poo poo onto it.
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Aug 19, 2014 13:09
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Yeah, you're definitely putting your own creepy poo poo into it. Don't do that.
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Aug 19, 2014 16:03
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I just figured the other black mages made them. They revered Vivi and were not really receptive to the idea of their people vanishing forever (unlike Vivi himself, who seemed to have come to terms with it).
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Aug 19, 2014 17:05
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ManOfTheYear posted:No matter what it is, the fact that there are multiple Vivi's takes you out of the ending and makes you think about a lot of uncomfortable questions. Vivi is supposed to be this sympathetic little kid and idea of him sexually/asexually reproducing or him discovering the golem formula and creating more black mages is either really loving weird and nasty or downright hellish - him creating even more zombie golems from concentrated dark energy to keep his "race" alive - and it all works against the character. I think you missed the point that the Black Mages weren't "creepy golems," they were individuals with souls just like every other living thing (the souls were just artificially placed in them instead of happening "naturally" through the cycle of souls on the planet). Death was this terrifying thing for Black Mages, so Vivi figured out how to make other Black Mages. By "reproducing," they've left their mark on the world and don't just cease to exist when they die. It's a supposed to show hope. There is never any suggestion that Black Mages are created through any sort of sexin', so don't be creepy.
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Aug 19, 2014 17:14
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You guys are really overcomplicating things. -Only a short period of time passes between the final battle and the ending, maybe a month or two -Vivi finds some way to make more black mages (the details are not important) and dies -Everyone dies because a dead world just merged with Gaia
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Aug 19, 2014 17:30
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I sit at my desk, doing whatever, and then I remember, "oh yeah, Vivi dies at the end of FF9" and  Story of my life.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:10
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AngryRobotsInc posted:I'm not entirely certain how the little pep talk speech she gives to Seifer at one point is handled in Japanese, though. She drops her affectation for that one monologue and talks like a normal person.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:11
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It's been a long time since I really played FF9, is there anything that definitively states he dies? Or are people just assuming that because he doesn't directly show up in the ending? IIRC, a few people state that being one of the prototypes Vivi's lifespan is much longer than the average black mage so it seems unlikely to me that he just kicked the bucket while the other black mages are still truckin'.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:13
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Silver Striker posted:It's been a long time since I really played FF9, is there anything that definitively states he dies? Or are people just assuming that because he doesn't directly show up in the ending? IIRC, a few people state that being one of the prototypes Vivi's lifespan is much longer than the average black mage so it seems unlikely to me that he just kicked the bucket while the other black mages are still truckin'. They said that the regular Black Mages have a lifespan of about a year, and Vivi has pretty clearly been around longer than that, based on the time he spent with Quale. Also, it's probably been several months between the final battle and the ending sequence, considering how it's treated as a reunion with everyone traveling back to see the show. So even outliving the other Black Mages, there's a good chance he's reached the end of his lifespan. Also, the fact that Vivi doesn't show up when everyone else does, including Amarant and Vivi's own children, and no other explanation is provided, is pretty strong evidence that he died. I always found it kinda hosed up how none of the other party members even acknowledge his death. Poor Vivi... 
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Aug 19, 2014 18:21
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Also, the ending has "someone" say "I wish we could have gone on more adventures, but we have to say goodbye someday. Everyone, thank you, and farewell." He's dead, Jim.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:28
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Schwartzcough posted:They said that the regular Black Mages have a lifespan of about a year, and Vivi has pretty clearly been around longer than that, based on the time he spent with Quale. Also, it's probably been several months between the final battle and the ending sequence, considering how it's treated as a reunion with everyone traveling back to see the show. So even outliving the other Black Mages, there's a good chance he's reached the end of his lifespan. Poor Amarant, so unimportant he only shows up for one CG, along with Quina. But at least Quina is the joke character, Amarant is just tacked on way too late and with Freya already rapidly losing plot relevance after the first hour of Disc 3, Amarant just never really got to shine despite Ipsen's Castle.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:32
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Also he doesn't join your party until over halfway through the game, so it kind of discourages you from using him in battle, even though his skills are great and he can pump out a poo poo ton of damage. His ultimate weapon is wind elemental, and a lot of things are weak to wind, including Ozma. It's just such a pain to teach him all the abilities that everyone else learned a whole disc ago.
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Aug 19, 2014 19:05
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Fister Roboto posted:Also he doesn't join your party until over halfway through the game, so it kind of discourages you from using him in battle, even though his skills are great and he can pump out a poo poo ton of damage. His ultimate weapon is wind elemental, and a lot of things are weak to wind, including Ozma. It's just such a pain to teach him all the abilities that everyone else learned a whole disc ago. He catches up fast, though. All the stuff that cost 40-100 AP for other characters costs like 10-30 for him. Plus, I think he's got immediate access to the AP-doubling ability.
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Aug 19, 2014 19:09
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True, but I also hate his character design!
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Aug 19, 2014 19:18
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He's the Blue Man Group's forgotten rasta cousin, what's there not to like? 
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Aug 19, 2014 19:31
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Amarant does have the opportunity to be your biggest damage dealer for a short time around the time you're headed to Oeilvert. If you've kept up with Hot and Cold (and I know you did) then that's the time you get the Kaiser Knuckles, which allow him to drop 4K damage Auras throughout the whole dungeon like it ain't no thang. I can't in good conscience keep him in my ~*~optimal endgame party~*~, but he does get his time to shine, mechanics-wise.
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Aug 19, 2014 19:31
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He hits hard, he can cast Reraise and Regen on characters for super-cheap. Plus, he works great with spellcasters- he can give enemies additional elemental weaknesses, and he can recharge MP easily for those of us who want to hang on to the 200 Ethers you get during the game. Edit: vvv There's a difference between hitting for 6000 and 9999. Unless you're overleveled or spending a ton of ability crystals on Auto-Reflect or Reflectx2, you won't be hitting for 9999 without targeting a weakness. Schwartzcough fucked around with this message at 19:57 on Aug 19, 2014 |
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Aug 19, 2014 19:51
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If you can't hit the damage cap with spellcasters I feel bad for you, son. I got 9999 problems but making any of the three spellcasters hit like a ton of bricks ain't one.
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Aug 19, 2014 19:54
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THE AWESOME GHOST posted:So I should actually be excited about the Vita re-release of Chaos Rings? I have an iphone but for some reason never got around to buying any of them. I think after playing FFT in its entirety on iOS I decided to stop playing really long rpgs on a phone Probably! They'll probably add some extra content and fix some issues with the game. People didn't really get into the CR games because they coat like 20 bucks. They are legit full length games though.
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Aug 19, 2014 20:43
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Schwartzcough posted:He hits hard, he can cast Reraise and Regen on characters for super-cheap. Plus, he works great with spellcasters- he can give enemies additional elemental weaknesses, and he can recharge MP easily for those of us who want to hang on to the 200 Ethers you get during the game. Curse is semi-random and every boss bar human ones all have weaknesses anyway (and even then you have Eater abilities) so I wouldn't really call it a major advantage. Chakra and feeling like using someone different is the main reason I'd use him, that and being the best source of Wind damage since Eiko needs a terrible accessory to gain access to that element, Twister is random and you need to seriously invest to make Dagger or Eiko solid physical attackers with rackets. Otherwise I like Steiner better.
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Aug 19, 2014 20:51
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Cape Cod Crab Chip posted:Amarant does have the opportunity to be your biggest damage dealer for a short time around the time you're headed to Oeilvert. If you've kept up with Hot and Cold (and I know you did) then that's the time you get the Kaiser Knuckles, which allow him to drop 4K damage Auras throughout the whole dungeon like it ain't no thang.
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Aug 20, 2014 00:58
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THE AWESOME GHOST posted:So I should actually be excited about the Vita re-release of Chaos Rings? I have an iphone but for some reason never got around to buying any of them. I think after playing FFT in its entirety on iOS I decided to stop playing really long rpgs on a phone If its just Chaos Rings 1 you should get about as hype as you can for Generic PS1 RPG Quest. The game is also mind-numbingly easy after your first of the plot mandated 4 "playthroughs" and you'll be able to set the enemy level to be 20 higher than yours and crush bosses with a string of auto-attacks. Did I mention that each of the 4 playthroughs is the same 4 areas and bosses just put in a different order with a whole two sets of dialog difference between them leading to a burnout only avoided by the fact that as mentioned before there is absolutely no difficulty.
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Aug 20, 2014 03:06
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I have a soft spot for throwing things at bad guys so I use Amarant
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Aug 20, 2014 03:12
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Barudak posted:If its just Chaos Rings 1 you should get about as hype as you can for Generic PS1 RPG Quest. The game is also mind-numbingly easy after your first of the plot mandated 4 "playthroughs" and you'll be able to set the enemy level to be 20 higher than yours and crush bosses with a string of auto-attacks. Did I mention that each of the 4 playthroughs is the same 4 areas and bosses just put in a different order with a whole two sets of dialog difference between them leading to a burnout only avoided by the fact that as mentioned before there is absolutely no difficulty. I can call the games a lot of things, "generic" isn't one of them, especially CRI. While the four playthrough thing is annoying, it fits the narrative and lets you find out more about each individual character. Likewise, I consider the difficulty to be a good thing and if you want a challenge, the game has optional bosses for that. I have no idea what you mean by the dialogue because the dialogue constantly changes between playthroughs. There is a lot of hidden dialogue as well, so returning from dungeons back into the main hall is a good idea. You can also turn off encounters after a certain point. And keep in mind that this is a mobile phone game, so I'd encourage you to pace yourself. This is a great game to play on the go. The downside is that it is repetitive.
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Aug 21, 2014 04:52
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Cape Cod Crab Chip posted:Amarant does have the opportunity to be your biggest damage dealer for a short time around the time you're headed to Oeilvert. If you've kept up with Hot and Cold (and I know you did) then that's the time you get the Kaiser Knuckles, which allow him to drop 4K damage Auras throughout the whole dungeon like it ain't no thang. I can't in good conscience keep him in my ~*~optimal endgame party~*~, but he does get his time to shine, mechanics-wise. Yeah, you can get some pretty ridiculous damage multipliers going on him. Like I said, his ultimate weapon is wind elemental, so with wind-enchancing gear equipped, against an enemy weak to wind, and with MP attack and a killer ability equipped, that's four 1.5x multipliers, or over 5x normal damage. 7.5x if he crits.
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Aug 21, 2014 06:39
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The Vita Chaos Rings game is gonna be all 3 games in one package and possibly some bonus stuff. I did hear CR1 gets weird and grindy but hey 3 games.
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Aug 21, 2014 07:13
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So I beat FF13 today. Really...bizarre game. It's like a bunch of nice ideas but so heavily overproduced in some ways? The whole time I was like, 'this game really needs to loosen the gently caress up about itself'. It was REALLY good looking, and really well optimized, but a lot of its systems lacked a lot of personality that a sort of structure needs when it's that involved. I felt like the progression was barely noticeable and the weapon upgrading made no sense. Once you sort of figure out to open each fight as SEN/SYN/MED and then transition into SEN/SAB/MED and then just unleash hell the second Imperil lands on poo poo, it got pretty simplistic but even then really banal trash mob fights took way too loving long. Every single fight in the game takes way too long, and the game tended to throw monsters at you that were just ridiculously time-consuming to fight effectively, even when you should be more than well-equipped to fight them. That said, it actually had a really good cast of characters. I actually wound up liking Fang, Vanille, Sazh and Hope. Lightning and Snow kind of stop being relevant halfway through, when the game becomes the Fang and Vanille Show in the games last third. The plot felt kind of directionless, like you're just running in circles for a lot of it. Still, it had a really bizarre charm about it I couldn't help but appreciate, like I get what it was TRYING to do and I really appreciate it for its cast moreso than what their overall goal was, whatever it was. But gently caress that, I threw that back in the box and immediately launched into FF13-2 and HOLY CRAP WHAT A FUN GAME. It's like 13 just loosened its tie and went 'gently caress it let's just like, have a weird serialized time travel adventure thing'. The mechanics and the core gameplay have been nailed down finally, and it's like everything is just a lot faster and more mechanically coherent than before. It's unrepentantly weird and interesting at all times, and it's kind of breakneck in its pace. The monster training aspect is loving fun as hell, the paradigms shift a lot faster so now they feel more reactionary than strategic which is a lot more fun and snappy. You actually get to run around and explore poo poo. It's really cool, I'm really enjoying it. It's like all the fun things about one-off Doctor Who episodes collided with a mid-2000s JRPG and it's just this really entertaining, unashamed mess. I put a hat on my weird jar cat and how can you not love this game.
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Aug 21, 2014 08:37
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Rei_ posted:Once you sort of figure out to open each fight as SEN/SYN/MED and then transition into SEN/SAB/MED and then just unleash hell the second Imperil lands on poo poo, it got pretty simplistic but even then really banal trash mob fights took way too loving long. Every single fight in the game takes way too long, and the game tended to throw monsters at you that were just ridiculously time-consuming to fight effectively, even when you should be more than well-equipped to fight them. Trash mob fights took so long because you played it ridiculously safe and used paradigms that barely do any damage. Medics should only come out when you need them and Sentinels honestly aren't required at all until post-game poo poo. One thing about FFXIII that it didn't really communicate well is that stuff like 'no MP or long-term resource management' and 'no Game Over screen if you lose a fight' skews the game towards random encounters being less about beating them in general and much more about beating them as quickly and efficiently as you can(it even grades you after each fight!). Besides that though, I pretty much agree with your assessment. It's a clusterfuck in alot of ways but somehow I enjoyed it more than I hated it.
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Aug 21, 2014 11:17
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I love the idea behind the upgrading system - that instead of progressing through stronger and stronger weapons, you get a bunch of different weapons with different strengths and upgrade whichever one you want to be your ultimate weapon - but it could have been implemented better.
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Aug 21, 2014 12:57
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I completely fell out of love with FF series after playing FF8, does anyone have any background information on the games development that caused such a mess of game or was it just simply trying to best the phenomenon that was FF7 partnered with over ambitiousness and a rushed story?
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Aug 21, 2014 13:20
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Ronnie posted:I completely fell out of love with FF series after playing FF8, does anyone have any background information on the games development that caused such a mess of game or was it just simply trying to best the phenomenon that was FF7 partnered with over ambitiousness and a rushed story? A lot of it was just the beginning of Square's growing pains. You can't make a game with constantly shifting creative goals (like they did for pretty much all previous projects) and fill it with expensive, time consuming CGI and expect things to mesh in the end. Everything Square had made up to that point had been a seat of the pants affair with directors handing down sweeping changes with little warning or explanation required. Suddenly they're a vastly larger company that's also trying to become Japan's answer to Pixar and it starts falling apart.
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Aug 21, 2014 13:34
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Brother Entropy posted:Trash mob fights took so long because you played it ridiculously safe and used paradigms that barely do any damage. Medics should only come out when you need them and Sentinels honestly aren't required at all until post-game poo poo. Yeah this is true. I beat all the story stuff without using any Sentinel paradigms and it was really only some of the later C'ieth Stone missions where using it became necessary. The Sab/Syn paradigms are really good but using them against random enemies is just a huge waste of time.
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Aug 21, 2014 13:38
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Rei_ posted:Once you sort of figure out to open each fight as SEN/SYN/MED and then transition into SEN/SAB/MED and then just unleash hell the second Imperil lands on poo poo, it got pretty simplistic but even then really banal trash mob fights took way too loving long. Every single fight in the game takes way too long, and the game tended to throw monsters at you that were just ridiculously time-consuming to fight effectively, even when you should be more than well-equipped to fight them. So you spent the first...I'm going to be generous and say "minute" (but it was probably longer) of every single fight dropping a whole set of buffs and debuffs before even starting to attack the enemy, and you're asking why trash mobs took so long to kill?  If you're going to use that strategy (and it is valid, if slow as poo poo), at least use SEN/SAB/SYN to do your buffing and debuffing at the same time. RAV/SAB/SYN is even better, because you can actually get your chain gauge rolling while the buffs are still coming down.Anyway, whatever. Enjoy 13-2 for what it is, but I hated it by the end because the difficulty curve was practically non-existent (it is ludicrously easy to break that game over your knee) and then suddenly it decides "Oh wait, this is the final dungeon, it's supposed to be hard" and goes into full gently caress you mode. Also I thought the plot was dumb as poo poo, but you clearly are going to enjoy it a lot more than I did.
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Aug 21, 2014 14:21
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I easily spent most of the game swapping betweeen Relentless Assault and Combat Clinic but basically the whole of Chapter 13 has you spending an ungodly amount of time whittling through each mob, certain fights are like you NEED Sentinel because anyone else is going to get one-shot. And up until then there's the occasional fight where you need to be dropping pain/fog on things, like those huge accordion-looking robot fuckers in Taejin's Tower where if you aren't keeping the thing silenced/pained he'll just continuously call in more reinforcements. Like did everyone else just spend the entire game in tricasting? It felt like the game goes to great lengths starting with Chapter 11 to have you buffing and debuffing a lot. Rei_ fucked around with this message at 14:59 on Aug 21, 2014 |
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Aug 21, 2014 14:48
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There's a pretty noticeable difficulty spike at the start of chapter 11 when you get introduced to a ton of new enemies that are basically a cut or two above what you've been fighting before that, but I never had issues after I adjusted. Nothing in the final dungeon one shot me, so I don't know what was causing that for you. I did like 13-2 a lot, though. The story is goofy but I never got why people say it's awful. I like how they limited your options and made monster choices matter. I don't like what they did to the leveling system for Serah and Noel, though. It's just plain annoying when you can level your characters wrongly. Otherwise, I had a lot of fun just exploring all the different areas. By the time the game pulled the "you must find X number of things to proceed" on me I already had pretty much all of them, which was cool.
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Aug 21, 2014 15:17
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Rei_ posted:those huge accordion-looking robot fuckers in Taejin's Tower where if you aren't keeping the thing silenced/pained he'll just continuously call in more reinforcements. It literally didn't occur to me that that would be a 'spell', I just focussed on killing him while attempting to not be killed by the Hoplites or whatever. It's not like they spawn in infinitely, there's only 3 or maybe 4 of them at any given moment. Rei_ posted:Like did everyone else just spend the entire game in tricasting? It felt like the game goes to great lengths starting with Chapter 11 to have you buffing and debuffing a lot. I didn't step outside of COM and RAV if I didn't have to, yeah, didn't feel worth the effort. Maybe I was "overlevelled" for chapters 12/13 because I did a bunch of Cie'th stone missions before moving on.
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Aug 21, 2014 15:21
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Rei_ posted:I easily spent most of the game swapping betweeen Relentless Assault and Combat Clinic but basically the whole of Chapter 13 has you spending an ungodly amount of time whittling through each mob, certain fights are like you NEED Sentinel because anyone else is going to get one-shot. And up until then there's the occasional fight where you need to be dropping pain/fog on things, like those huge accordion-looking robot fuckers in Taejin's Tower where if you aren't keeping the thing silenced/pained he'll just continuously call in more reinforcements. I only used Sentinal for a quick swap recovery paradigm. If you pay close attention you can usually see the big attacks coming (moreso in XIII-2), swap quickly, take the hit and swap back. RAV/SAB/SYN is a great way to start battles but don't stay in it long. Lay one or two buffs/debuffs then switch to your RAV/RAV/COM (or RAV/RAV/RAV if you're feeling cheeky). The game is encouraging you to swap quickly and often. You've beaten it so it's a moot point now; I hope you enjoy the pace of XIII-2. It's a lot faster but tends to be very easy especially towards the end.
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Aug 21, 2014 15:22
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