Before Crisis is canon but shoddy.

[Clement Rage]

Powerful does not equal credible.

Failure does not equal incompetence, I've argued this before in other fandoms, and it's why I didn't include any of the rest of FF7 Compilation on my list. In those, they're just up against superior opposition, they can't be expected to do much against them. And I just assumed it was an unlucky day for them, as well as they were up against protagonists.

The thing about BC is that we see the day to day life of the Turks, and they aren't any better. It's a mobile phone game, fair enough. I'm not going to complain about a fairly good plan that didn't work.

Y'see, generally I'm fine with bad decisions under pressure. But I'm a little stricter with people who have to make decisions under pressure on a regular basis, and especially with elites when they aren't protagonists. I generally expect an elite black ops unit to make better decisions than standard heroes. Bad decisions under pressure, fine. But when you lose to a guy three times in succession, you think of another plan to take him down. I expect a certain pragmatism. I'm not asking for much, just slightly better disguised survival, like reinforcements arriving, one of my list up there, rather than 'the plot demands it. You don't have to lose every fight with Shears, just have a couple of them end inconclusively, a subordinate saying 'Boss, we don't have time, there'll be more coming soon' which makes perfect sense, since they're terrorists and can't match the army toe to toe, rather than 'oops, sorry, I have to go now.'

That way, there's a balance of power, where the villain isn't either 'curses! Foiled again! See you next week.' or ' I have you at my mercy. Bye!'

Leave in the defeats in missions 3 and 11, and make the rest inconclusive, or else design missions where you have to avoid the big guns, rather than take them on and lose.

It's a bit like wondering how it's possible that Cloud and his companions can defeat Reno on the pillar, fight their way into the Shinra Building, defeat Hojo's thing (Experiment HOS2 or whatever it's called), and then, when success is almost within their grasp, allow themselves to be taken prisoner in the elevator by a couple of Turks armed with nothing but sunglasses and sarcasm. Cloud doesn't even try to fight. How is this possible?

The difference is that this happens once, rather than every couple of bosses. In FF9

Spoiler

I have no problem with losing multiple times to Beatrix, for instance, because they genuinely are insignificant and her heart's not in it anyway

Besides, we don't know that there wasn't fifty soldiers standing outside the elevator that time.

And it's kind of ridiculous to say that the party in FFVII were not special people. They may not have realised they were special (except for Yuffie) but it's obvious they're not ordinary either: Cid was chosen to be their world's first astronaut, Tifa was an exceptionally gifted student of martial arts with years of training behind her, Vincent is an ex-Turk (had to get that one in), Yuffie has been training all her life to be a ninja, Barret has a gun instead of an arm, for god's sake, and he knows how to use it, and Red XIII is the scion of a long line of warriors.

That's fair. But they aren't an elite unit expressly recruited to counter terrorists repeatedly failing to counter terrorists.

you used to complain that in my fic the Turks were never faced with credible enemies and never screwed up

That was different. In your fic

Spoiler

when the Turks got in gear, they pretty immediately got results, like running down Charlie's killer in 7 hours without difficulty. They were sometimes overwhelmed by power, but things like Scarlet's spy being used as comic relief -Scarlet is an executive, she can take her pick of half of Shinra, the fact that the man she sets to follow her greatest enemies is bad to the point of being laughable... He doesn't have to be their equal, but he should be reasonably skilled. I can discuss it further in PM if you'd like.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Okay

Mission 1: Protect Reactor. Success. Elite operative Reno and player are completely at the mercy of AVALANCHE and survive by dumb luck. Also, caught completely by surprise by terrorist attack.

They don't survive by dumb luck. Shears leaves them to be finished off by an underling and they overpower said underling. This was an error of judgement on Shears' part, and it arose from the contempt he felt for the Turks.

Mission 2: Protect President. Result: President Shot, left completely at the mercy of AVALANCHE leaders again.

They manage to get the President safely through a number of attacks. He is, in fact, only shot after he sends the two Turks away to recapture the cannon, when his only protection is Heidegger's military.

Mission 3: Prevent cannon from being fired. Bailed out by Sephiroth.

Yes. It is necessary for the game to establish that Elfe is a force to be reckoned with. It is also essential to introduce Sephiroth, or the fans will be unhappy. Reno single-handedly kills large number of the enemy and it's arguable that the player Turk;s actions buy enough time for Sephiroth to make a difference.

Mission 4: Recruit for SOLDIER. Two elite operatives corner the most vulnerable of the AVALANCHE leadership. Both of them together fail to kill, capture, or deal him any lasting harm.

Yes. Shears is very strong. It's too bad they didn't capture him, because the game could have ended right there. Fortunately, this is a game, and not real life where terrorism is not a game.
In this episode the player Turk also single-handedly defeats a number of Costa del Sol's strongest fighters, including Azul, and when Avalanche later leads a breakout she and Rude defeat them all over again. You're cherry-picking.

Mission 5: Protect data disc. AVALANCHE obtains data disc.

The player Turk is forced to choose between the data disc and a woman's life, and, influenced by Cloud, decides the life is more important. And they do manage to save her.

Mission 6: In which Reno is nosy.

The sorrow of being a Turk. True love is hard to find.

Mission 7: Infiltrate AVALANCHE base undetected. Detected.

Mission 8: Escort column of soldiers. Separated from column, column slaughtered. Rescue missing SOLDIERs. SOLDIERs killed. Base evacuated before it can be destroyed.

Things went pear-shaped. Zack doesn't exactly tiptoe. Despite being detected, player Turk manages to free two SOLDIERs from the mutation tanks and escape. They then managed to get themselves recaptured in a display of incompetence far beyond anything shown by the Turks. This whole sequence of events is essential to show the horror of what Avalanche (or at least Fuhito) is up to, and validate the Turk's mission to eliminate them.

Having a recce mission go pear-shaped is pretty standard fare for a thriller, you know. Even James Bond's recce missions go wrong sometimes.

There is no proof that the column was slaughtered; that's just your headcanon. This was a joint mission with SOLDIER and the army, and whatever went wrong is as much to blame on them as on the Turks.

Mission 9: Protect Junon. Tseng does first rate work here, diguisingf himself and discovering the enemy objective. The others wander aimlessly until the end, where for some reason killing a Raven in the airport saves the day. Success

They wander aimlessly because Heidegger tells them to. Once Veld regains command, success.

Mission 10: Save Hojo. Bailed out by Sephiroth, once again nonchalantly handled by AVALANCHE leaders

Once again I have to say, the fans want Sephiroth in this game. Plus there's an irony in Sephiroth saving Hojo. The Turks dealt efficiently with all the monsters uleashed in the building and kept the Board safe.

Mission 11: Protect girl from avalanche. Girl brought to AVALANCHE. Player survives due to girl begging for life

The girl is Aerith. The player Turk is fighting alone against numerous Avalanche operatives including its three leaders. Outnumbered much? Would any other outcome have been realistic?

Mission 12: Investigate Nibelheim reactor. Fail to do so. Stop Sephiroth. Fail to do so.

Scriptwriter's hands are tied here.

Mission 13: Spring clean Shinra manor. Success.

Okay, that ws funny, but it's not a true representation of the mission.

Mission 14: Destroy AVALANCHE base. Success. AVALANCHE predicted and were counting on this, howver.

Otherwise, Game Over.

Mission 15: Protect Tiny Bronco. Success. Prevent sabotage of launch. Fail.

Cid insisted on going ahead with the launch even though the Turks suspected there was a problem and Shera knew there was.

Mission 16: Protect Corel reactor. Corel reactor destroyed. Protect Rufus. Success

Their mission was not to "protect the Corel reactor" so much as to 'stop Avalanche once and for all', but a certain game-changing revelation prevented that.

Mission 17: Escape caves. Knocked out for 3 years.

Well, yeah. How long do you want this game to be?

Mission 18: Kidnap Red. Success

[quoteMission 19: Apprehend Zack. Refuse. Fuhito gains materia, Turks all fugitives.[/quote]

This is what's called "rising action". Their refusal to apprehend Zack is, I believe, meant to be heroic, and a sign of their growing disenchantment with the Shinra company and its objectives.

Missio 20: Find materia. pickpocketed by Raven.

Mission 21: Find materia

A miz of success and failure, then.

Mission 22: Rescue Veld/Elena. Success. Prevent Fuhito from gaing support materia. Fail

Yes, because we have to have a final Boss.

Mission 23:Stop Fuhito from summoning Zirconiade. Fuhito summons Zirconiade. Is killed by Shears.

No, Fuhito is killed by Shears after he transforms himself into a Guado. Shears himself dies in the battle. The Turks take down Zirconiade.

Mission 24: Save the world. Success.

They can deliver when it matters.

Pretty patchy record, no?

A less patchy record than your humorous analysis would suggest.

Not even Mossad is 100% successful all of the time. The CIA and M15/6 have screwed up on numerous occassions during the war on terror. Before Crisis has the merit of being at least somewhat realistic in that respect. If the Turks were so awesome and consistently totally competent that they could crush all opposition and successfully complete all missions, there would be no game.

I mean, I agree that the game is shoddy in some respects, but to complain that it takes 24 episodes for the protagonists to decisively defeat the antagonists makes it look like you're wilfully disregarding the fact that it's a game.

Spoiler: Re my fic

I understand your point, but if you recall it takes Tseng an hour to lose his tail in that chapter. I just couldn't be arsed to describe it; i find that kind of stuff boring. It's not that the spy is bad at his job so much as that Tseng always takes it for granted that he's being tailed, and so it isn't usually very difficult for him to spot who the tail is. This is his area of expertise, after all. It was bad luck that the poor spy ended up in the lingerie department. As for newspaper man, he got complacent and underestimated them. The Turks don't underestimate Scarlet's spies; it would be tedious for me to constantly be describing the lengths they have to go to to avoid them, but I do describe it a couple of times. They don't even try to remove the bugs in their offices. And Scarlet does outsmart them in the end.

 

[Roger]

Repeatedly putting the player character in a situation where success would mean the end of the game or going against previously established canon and therefore failure or at least partial failure is the only option is no excuse.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Wellm that means the writers were incompetent, not the Turks.

 

[Shademp]

Without delving into a deeper discussion about the story of Before Crisis, I'll refer to the wisdom of the Nostalgia Critic. Two weeks ago he uploaded a video, titled "When is it right to nitpick"?

One of the conclusions in his video

Spoiler

is that the greatest stories may have huge flaws, but if they manage to grab our attention and make us live the story, the flaws or holes in logic won't matter as much. Picking apart the small things that feels inconsistent is a sign that the story did not grab us well enough. I believe this to be part of the reason why the original game is loved despite some construed part of its plot; they do not matter because the world already grabbed us.

This would then be why I could go on and on about the small things in Before Crisis which doesn't add up or that annoys me. The game/story just failed to grab me. If the story was better crafted, to draw me in emotionally, then I would not nitpick the small things.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

I met him last weekend (Doug Walker) at Con Bravo. Such a nice guy.

 

[CameoAmalthea]

Mission 14: Destroy AVALANCHE base. Success. AVALANCHE predicted and were counting on this, however.

Otherwise, Game Over.

Rather than AVALANCHE "predicted" I would point out that Rufus likely told them. In fact, it's possible Rufus set it up so the Turks would "discover' the location of AVALANCHE's base right then by having them leak the information. Although by that point Veld had discovered what Rufus was up to so the bigger question is why hey didn't arrest him immediately and interrogate him.

I'll add that I think it's hard to be caught up in the story when you can't play the game (and maybe the game play isn't so bad if you're actually playing it, though it's not great given it's a cell phone game). However personally, I love the story. I thought episode 6 was unlike anything I'd ever seen in a video game because it was so plot/character driven, like an episode of a TV show.

I'll agree with Clement that there are times when it feels like the player survives for no reason. Having the player escape or something happen aside from "I'll leave you to this subordinate to finish off" would have been better writing.

That way, there's a balance of power, where the villain isn't either 'curses! Foiled again! See you next week.' or ' I have you at my mercy. Bye!'

Yeah.

This scene.

Shin-Ra Soldier
Scarlet, ma'am, what should we do with the Turk?

Scarlet
Leave her. (Thought) After all, it'll be more fun if I round them all up at once. (Out loud) All right, move out!

Oh come on, she's laying unconscious right there!

I could see Scarlet letting her go if she'd, you know, escaped and chasing her down wasn't worth it. Scarlet's objective was to capture Veld and Scarlet could assume she'd die in the desert (maybe have her escape while wounded instead of being knocked out). Hell have her escape and have Scarlet send people after her and have them fail to find her. But just leaving her, when she was like right there. Although, perhaps Scarlet wanted to let her go so she'd report to Tseng that Veld had been captured because that would be a good way to lure out the other Turks, but having Scarlet say that would also have been better. (And having the Turk call Tseng rather than him happening to stumble on her, so you know the player could be driving the plot)

However, while I think the instances where the Turk survives after being knocked out could have been better written in terms of giving us reasons for why the Turk escaped death (better reasons than the villain just leaving) that fact that the Turk is defeated so often isn't a problem for me.

What makes Before Crisis unique is that makes you play a game through the perspective of the 'antagonists'. The Turks aren't "heroes", BC's AVALANCHE
are the traditional hero types. (The super solider ex-experiment with a complicated past, the freedom fighter whose village was destroyed) AVALANCHE is meant to mirror the protagonists of the original game while still being great characters in their own right and embodying the hero archetype. Give that they are the "heroes" they're going to be more powerful than the "low level antagonist NPC" you're playing as in this game.

Playing BC is like playing Pokemon as a Team Rocket grunt.

In BC they don't simply take the Turks and make them the "heroes" of the game (although they are the protagonists and ultimately become the heroes in the end), rather BC creates a set of heroes (Elfe, Shears) and has you playing the other side. BC could have easily been Elfe and Shears' story, they have an interesting character arc and they're exactly the type of hero you get in this sort of game, but instead we play from the perspective of the enemy they defeat. What an interesting concept.

Elfe is level with Sephiroth, you can't defeat her because you aren't a hero on that level. Shears, though an ordinary human, is, like Tifa, better than most fighters. The game establishes that Reno and Rude are strong and competent by having them one shot grunts you as a player struggle to subdue. However, they are defeated by Shears, establishing that he's on another level. That level is that of a "video game hero."

 

[Cat Rage Room]

It's a bit like wondering how it's possible that Cloud and his companions can defeat Reno on the pillar, fight their way into the Shinra Building, defeat Hojo's thing (Experiment HOS2 or whatever it's called), and then, when success is almost within their grasp, allow themselves to be taken prisoner in the elevator by a couple of Turks armed with nothing but sunglasses and sarcasm. Cloud doesn't even try to fight. How is this possible? He, Barret and Tifa could easily defeat Rude and Tseng, but the next we see them they're being dragged in front of the President with their hands tied behind their backs. Are we to mock them for allowing themselves to be taken prisoner by two Turks? We can't even say that it would be too dangerous to fight 69 floors up in a glass elevator, because Aerith, Barret and Red XIII do precisely that not much later in the game.

This isn't exactly accurate. Up until them meeting Reno and friends in the elevator, Cloud and co. has managed to avoid the greater part of Shinra's security and elude alert during their escapades in Shinra Tower, mostly through subterfuge and the possibility that a lot of the places where they did slip up and reveal themselves are top secret anyway, and thus hitting the 'ALARM' button might be hasty in the eyes of the security stationed there.

When they're caught by the Turks in the elevator, that doesn't mean or really imply that Reno and Rude and a crowded elevator are literally all that stands between Cloud getting away, no, them showing up means that all of Shinra tower is on to them now, the Shinra infantry, SOLDIER, the automated weapons, everything, and the Turks are there to personally demonstrate to Cloud and friends that they're fucked. Cloud and co could have fought past them, but great, now they just have the entire Shinra tower guard staff on high alert that know exactly where they are to fight past as well! Have fun!

They didn't surrender because they're afraid of Reno and Rude, they surrendered because they got caught. By everyone.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Nice try Mog.

Tifa could take Rude out with one good punch to the side of the head, Barret's armed and Cloud's sword can block Tseng's bullets. They could have killed both the Turks (who are totally incompetent anyway, apparently) ride the elevator to the mezzanine pronto and be out of the building in no time.

Cloud and co fought their way past any and all opposition to get to Aerith. Or are all visitors to executive floors - visitors authorised with key cards - greeted by killing machines that try to mow them down? If they fought their way in, they could fight their way out. They didn't try, because the story needed them to be inside the building for what happened next.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

Tifa could take Rude out with one good punch to the side of the head, Barret's armed and Cloud's sword can block Tseng's bullets. They could have killed both the Turks (who are totally incompetent anyway, apparently) ride the elevator to the mezzanine pronto and be out of the building in no time.

You don't think the first thing they'd do is block the route out the front of the building? Even when they did escape, they didn't go waltzing out the front door; they bust out in vehicles in high speed and barely made it. There is a difference between taking out a few security guards and machines here and there sneaking around and plowing through the citadel of the world's government unscathed while it's on high alert and actively looking for you.

The narrative made a point that even if the player took the option to bust in, a fair amount of the time was sneaking around; hence the FMV of the security guard sleeping at the camera room.

I really dislike the inflated sense of power everyone in the FFVII universe gets, every scenario is bordered by the question of 'how come they just didn't kill everyone in sight???'

Tifa could take Rude out with one good punch to the side of the head, Barret's armed and Cloud's sword can block Tseng's bullets. They could have killed both the Turks (who are totally incompetent anyway, apparently) ride the elevator to the mezzanine pronto and be out of the building in no time.

While not as powerful as the heroes, the original narrative always consistently painted the Turks as at least competently powerful in terms of fighting ability. Reno held off three members of AVALANCHE by himself. There's absolutely nothing in the original game that implies that a fight would just be a one hit slaughterfest, even though the heroes always win in combat. Yes, they could have beaten the Turks, but there's nothing saying it wouldn't be a hard fought battle, followed by you know, everyone else in the building.

 

[Octo]

a couple of Turks armed with nothing but sunglasses and sarcasm.

If I ever get round to writing a blog I'm going to name it this.

 

[Roger]

You don't think the first thing they'd do is block the route out the front of the building? Even when they did escape, they didn't go waltzing out the front door; they bust out in vehicles in high speed and barely made it. There is a difference between taking out a few security guards and machines here and there sneaking around and plowing through the citadel of the world's government unscathed while it's on high alert and actively looking for you.

The narrative made a point that even if the player took the option to bust in, a fair amount of the time was sneaking around; hence the FMV of the security guard sleeping at the camera room.

I really dislike the inflated sense of power everyone in the FFVII universe gets, every scenario is bordered by the question of 'how come they just didn't kill everyone in sight???'




While not as powerful as the heroes, the original narrative always consistently painted the Turks as at least competently powerful in terms of fighting ability. Reno held off three members of AVALANCHE by himself. There's absolutely nothing in the original game that implies that a fight would just be a one hit slaughterfest, even though the heroes always win in combat. Yes, they could have beaten the Turks, but there's nothing saying it wouldn't be a hard fought battle, followed by you know, everyone else in the building.

You have the option of storming the frontdoor of the building without any attempt to hide your presence at all. Clearly AVALANCHE is not afraid to face the security of the Shinra building head on.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

A surprise attack is very tactically different than fighting your way out the beehive when all the bees know you're there.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

They were able to sneak around undetected when the story needed them to do so - and yet they bump into security machines, or personnel, on all the floors, and instantly have to fight them, despite the fact that they - Cloud & Co - are not unauthorised personnel: they have a keycard!! If they are capable of destroying Hojo's thing and all its thinglets, they are capable of killing two Turks. If they could steal the bike and car and escape after the President was dead (with the building on high alert and crawling with soldiers), they could certainly do it before. They are as powerful as they need to be at any given point to advance the story and keep the battles interesting, and their enemies are powered accordingly.

I think Shademp's (Doug Walker's) point was an excellent observation: we don't feel like nitpicking when the story, the creation, is really well made and engaging. There is no story without plotholes. It's impossible to rationalise them all away. We forgive these flaws in stories we love - in fact I'd say that they become a part of what we love about them.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I'm well aware of sometimes narratives having to 'make a way' around to enable certain things to happen but I dislike the notion of letting it derail the notion of critical thought.

I rationalized the ease of Cloud and co getting caught in a very simple way; the Turks represented everyone else on to them as well. I can draw conclusions intelligently without having to throw my hands up and go 'WELL THE STORY...' (even though I know that happens.) A good narrative doesn't make stuff happen simply because 'well this is what I needed to happen to continue the plot'. A good narrative makes everything that happens consistent with itself and doesn't excuse events with 'just because'.

There are very logical reasons why Cloud and co. ended their winning streak in that elevator, some of which I've already outlined. 'Just because the story needed it to' is not something I'm willing to accept.

If they are capable of destroying Hojo's thing and all its thinglets, they are capable of killing two Turks.

Where are you getting the impression that one feat equals another in that context? Being able to kill a mad scientist's 5th grade science project and being able to kill two of the most powerful operatives of one of the most vicious, selective organizations in their setting is two very different things. That's quite a stretch. It just sounds like you made that up!

 

[CameoAmalthea]

To be fair, I thought part of the reason the party was able to escape after the President died was because a lot of the security that would have been there otherwise was killed by Sephiroth. Think about it, the building was painted with blood, alarms were triggered, the President was murdered and I imagine a lot of Shinra's defenses were taken out along the way. So though you fight your way down and there are still forces present it is likely there were more forces before Sephiroth's attack. (Also, where were the Turks during that, you'd think they'd have gotten an alarm call or something)

In terms of character's power, the senior Turks are pretty powerful in BC, just not as powerful as Shears and Elfe. Which isn't to say the Turks aren't good so much as AVALANCHE is better. While I agree that character's power/ability to win is sometimes shackled to the plot, we have to think about what the game makers are telling us with these plot points.

What they're saying by having Cloud and Co captured is they couldn't have won that fight in the end. What they're saying by having the Turks defeated so much in BC is that they aren't on AVALANCHE's level.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

Where are you getting the impression that one feat equals another in that context? Being able to kill a mad scientist's 5th grade science project and being able to kill two of the most powerful operatives of one of the most vicious, selective organizations in their setting is two very different things. That's quite a stretch. It just sounds like you made that up!

Well, in my game it was no trouble at all to defeat Reno on the pillar, but HO512 caused me a lot of problems, and in fact the first time I fought it I got a Game Over, so compared to the one Turk Cloud's actually fought up to that time, it's no pushover. It has the same HP as Reno but is two levels higher and has higher attack and defence, plus it has those respawning minions. I wouldn't call it a 5th grade science project, and I don't think it was a trivial victory for Cloud to defeat it.

 

[Roger]

A surprise attack is very tactically different than fighting your way out the beehive when all the bees know you're there.

But fighting your way into a beehive, announcing your presence every step of the way implies to me that you expect them to know you're there by the time you try to get out. They might as well have made the choice "backdoor" or "turn yourself right away" in if encountering resistance that is forewarned of your presence was never part of the plan and means instant surrender.

 

[Shademp]

I won't question the "Cloud & team gets captured" thing too deeply, because the game's overall presentation is primitive enough that AVALANCHE getting captured doesn't bother me. They get captured because the plot requires it, yes, but it doesn't have to defy all logic because we don't know the details of what just happened. The party is split at this point; the two members you did not choose could have been caught already and that might off-screen have been used as leverage for Cloud and his two team mates to surrender. Or perhaps they were surrounded by soldiers, just outside the elevator. Or perhaps Tseng knows the Vulcan nerve pinch. I fail to consider their capture as a big deal.


You might also argue that there is a hole in the logic because we don't ever see Cloud & Friends retrieving their weapons when they escape from prison. If you enter the menu whilst imprisoned, they will have their equipment all the same. The scenario is almost as bad as in Chrono Trigger, where Crono is left with his sword in his cell and can use it defeat a guard and escape. I say "almost" because in FFVII the narrative doesn't inform us about whether they have their weapons or not.

There is a question mark with the scene when the team speaks to President Shinra and they are all handcuffed. If this scene was presented in high-end, modern 3D graphics, I would shout inconsistency if Cloud wasn't wearing some seriously thick, sci-fi-metal bonds. If he was just wearing normal handcuffs I wouldn't buy that he can't just break free. My opinion is that he has showed too high feats of strength to be bested by standard handcuffs.

Fortunately, the original game's graphics are primitive enough to leave this detail up to interpretation. Same with AVALANCHE's capture.

 

[Clement Rage]

Licorice. You believe Tseng to be competent, right? I happen to agree, actually. So, in your opinion, if he discovered three highly dangerous fugitives in the Shinra building would he decide to bring one associate with him to apprehend them alone and not tell anyone else or raise the alarm at all?

If I remember rightly, most of those random encounters happen on floors that are otherwise deserted. There are no random encounters on floor 61, or the one with the gym, the encounters that happen are either on floors where no one, at all, is supposed to be, or in highly restricted places like the science labs. (or guard posts)

Not even Mossad is 100% successful all of the time. The CIA and M15/6 have screwed up on numerous occassions during the war on terror. Before Crisis has the merit of being at least somewhat realistic in that respect. If the Turks were so awesome and consistently totally competent that they could crush all opposition and successfully complete all missions, there would be no game.

I mean, I agree that the game is shoddy in some respects, but to complain that it takes 24 episodes for the protagonists to decisively defeat the antagonists makes it look like you're wilfully disregarding the fact that it's a game.

That's not what I'm saying at all! Of course intelligence agencies mess up, I'm not asking for a 100pc success rate (in fact, they'd become boring invincible heroes like James Bond). What I'm saying is that when the villains have you at their complete mercy on at least seven or eight separate occasions in one game, you need to supply reasons why they a) are never killed, and b) never come up with an alternative plan than confront villains, fail, get beaten up, hope they're in a good mood, rinse, repeat. That plan doesn't even have to work, it just has to exist! If they don't learn from near constant defeats, questions start to arise about how capable they are about containing the threat.

it's arguable that the player Turk;s actions buy enough time for Sephiroth to make a difference.

Considering that he gets there before she does, I don't think so.

Yes. Shears is very strong. It's too bad they didn't capture him, because the game could have ended right there. Fortunately, this is a game, and not real life where terrorism is not a game.
In this episode the player Turk also single-handedly defeats a number of Costa del Sol's strongest fighters, including Azul, and when Avalanche later leads a breakout she and Rude defeat them all over again. You're cherry-picking.

But the narrative presents this as a victory for teamwork or something, when in fact the clash achieves absolutely nothing.

There is no proof that the column was slaughtered; that's just your headcanon. This was a joint mission with SOLDIER and the army, and whatever went wrong is as much to blame on them as on the Turks.

From the Compilation Timeline on this site:

A SOLDIER force including Zack is dispatched to destroy an AVALANCHE base in Icicle Lodge. Zack attends to his fellow SOLDIER comrades, Sebastian and Essai, as their death approached. With the exception of Zack and the Turks, every member of the unit is annihilated.

As for blame, sure. Failure does not equal incompetence, but when it repeats a lot, it's time to ask why. I'm considering this in light of every other mission as well.

I make exceptions for long running comics and TV shows, because the reason is they want to make more money.

They wander aimlessly because Heidegger tells them to. Once Veld regains command, success.

But what about Tseng? He's able to improvise and gain valuable intel even without a voice in his ear telling him exactly what to do. Heidegger tells them to scout for AVALANCHE, and they outright defy those orders by not reporting in when the player finds the AVALANCHE flagship. The fact that the others don't even try to achieve anything counts against them

No, Fuhito is killed by Shears after he transforms himself into a Guado. Shears himself dies in the battle. The Turks take down Zirconiade

That's what I said, isn't it?

What makes Before Crisis unique is that makes you play a game through the perspective of the 'antagonists'. The Turks aren't "heroes", BC's AVALANCHE
are the traditional hero types.

Well, they sure do get a lot of the standard hero dilemma of 'save girl v give villain key to evil plan'.

I think the canon Shinra assault went up the stairs, Cloud has regretful line of dialogue if you break in along the lines of 'I didn't want to cause trouble until we'd found Aeris'

 

[Clement Rage]

Sorry for the double post, but if I just edited it's possible that no one ever looks at the thread again.

I have difficulty with the 'Turks as antagonists' position because they keep making hero decisions. They are presented several times with the trademark hero sadistic choice, and always go for the 'heroic' save the person decision, even hardened Turks like Veld and Tseng. That's the whole point of his special episode.

I dunno, maybe it's just my unconscious preconception that a black ops unit makes the hard calls, but it seems as though the Turks are marketed as as the people who weigh the odds and make the right (ie. whatever gets the job done most effectively) choice but we never actually see them do it. They're not willing to sacrifice anything that belongs to them for the greater good(Shinra's Interests), not even about two hours of vacation time in Wutai, where that might save company lives.
Turk professionalism (the mission above all else) is talked about a lot, but no one follows through on it.

Mostly, what the Turks seem to do is serve their own interests, at the expense of literally everyone else. I'm actually fine with that, but there's a lot of emphasis on the iron sense of duty they all have that they seem to nearly never act on.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

You're absolutely right, Clement. Colonel Erwin Smith would have no truck with their attitude. Anyway they'd all get eaten by titans in no time.

What I can't figure out is whether we're actually meant to realise that they're bullshitting or whether it's just incompetent writing on the part of the BC scriptwriters that makes them express one set of values while following another. Like, in the OG it's obvious that Rude and Reno are mocking Elena for taking the departmental mantra seriously, ("Is that really how a Turk, a professional, should behave?" "A pro isn't someone who sacrifices himself for his job...." etc). As the rookie, she still hasn't figured out yet that it's all about making the least amount of effort you can get away with. So she rushes off to Icicle to avenge Tseng's "death", and she's the one who wants to carry out their orders when they bump into the party one last time in the train tunnel.

BC is neither so subtle nor so realistic. I think the problem there for the scriptwriters is that the Turks are supposedly 'good' people working for a bad cause, so any sacrifices they might make on Shinra's behalf would be likely to alienate, rather than engage, our sympathies. Like, in "Attack on Titan" - if you watch that - the mantra is that unless you are willing to make sacrifices, you can't win, and that in order to defeat monsters you may have to sacrifice your own humanity. Colonel Erwin is prepared to sacrifice every last one of his men to ensure the survival of humanity. But that's what's at stake: saving humanity from extinction. Saving Shinra money or covering up its mistakes just doesn't have the same heroic stature.

In the end, nothing is more important to them than each other (which is why Rude and Reno are willing to stir their stumps to save Elena). They don't really give a shit about Shinra, ideologically, but they like their jobs and their lifestyle. They are, however, prepared to put everything, lifestyle, jobs, lives, on the line to save the Chief. The fact that Rufus helps them (in fact they couldn't have done it without him) is what wins him their personal loyalty.

 

[Kieron_ODuibhir]

FFVII itself has a lot of lazy writing in it. Personally, I can forgive the Shinra Tower arrest but not by justifying it as in any way logical, and Tifa and Barrett coming tamely along to be executed next time they're in Shinra custody despite being alone in a room with Rufus when he informs them of this plan is worse; Tifa's dialogue is often pretty blatantly just what needed to be said to move the scene in the desired direction, rather than derived from any particular motive located within the Tifa character, etc.

For all it has good bits, BC is lazier, and I absolutely agree that its greatest weak point is that it couldn't commit to making its protagonists bad guys, even intermittently, even in Reno's punch-clock amoral way. The narrative demands that their enemies be worse, and that they make a lot of (dumb) heroic decisions. It would be a better story if you as the player were cornered into doing actual evil, even the banal sort, more often earlier in the game, so there was more of a character-development moral arc that leads toward refusing to hunt down Zack. A story that keeps contriving ways to keep its corporate secret police main characters from crossing major moral lines, but has a story arc that's more about power than anything, comes across to me as bankrupt in the most boring of ways. In a way, the Turk organization seems to have come down with a weak strain of Mary Sue in this game, in that those opposed to them don't become weak but do turn out to be deluded, wrong, and/or hopelessly evil with remarkable regularity, considering they are Big Brother.

When it comes to the Turks' competence as depicted by the story, I think it isn't really about whether they can defeat the superstrong enemies--having them beat them would, in fact, completely miss the point of the type of game it was supposed to be. But the story didn't need to be framed around quite so many dramatic battles, you know? They could have spent a lot more time succeeding at strategic goals through subtlety.

Also as far as I can tell BC managed to make the incomprehensible snarl of Tseng's personal timeline even snarlier?

My much-belated two cents.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

I agree with everything you said. As for Tseng, he seemed to have been born aged 28 and never gets any older.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Am I the only one who likes some villians in anything to have a chance to redeem themselves once they realise their wrong doings?

I mean, I respect the Turks because, while yes they did the wrong things, but I like the fact that they also have a backstory and that they go from good to bad and then to semi-good again. Or put it this way, they're more of the anti-villians from their point of view.

If we're talking about a hero becoming a villian, maybe you ask for a Sephiroth gameplay back story if Crisis Core and FFVII haven't already done that.

And despite the story being slightly cringy, I still love the portrayal of the Turks and the main cast of the original game and Advent Children. Still have false hopes for a HD remake of Before Crisis...which will never happen.