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Final Fantasy XVI

LNK

Pro Adventurer
AKA
Nate
After watching the trailer a few more times, I don't think Joshua changes into Ifrit. I think it might be the Dragoon that changes into him after being defeated by the protagonist. Maybe even his father or the one who killed his father. I just don't think it's Joshua
 
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LNK

Pro Adventurer
AKA
Nate
i think joshua is the protag's younger brother, is somehow unconscious and is being killed by whoever the ifrit person is (and that's who the protag is saying he's going to kill at the end)

just a little speculation from me to you

I'm thinking the same thing
 

Obsidian Fire

Ahk Morn!
AKA
The Engineer
Have you seen the hour long FF7R commentary videos on story and lore we know barely anything about? That's... about what I expected.

The Final Fantasy YouTube community is currently in an "let me show you the lore/story you didn't catch because these stories are so complex" phase. YMMV on if the "complexity" is from actual complexity or just not having the entire story revealed to us yet.
 

Theozilla

Kaiju Member
i think joshua is the protag's younger brother, is somehow unconscious and is being killed by whoever the ifrit person is (and that's who the protag is saying he's going to kill at the end)

just a little speculation from me to you
I'm thinking the blonde soldier is meant to be Joshua's older brother.

Even if the main player character is also Joshua's brother, I think he could only be his half-brother because if he was his full brother he would likely be going with Joshua to see Joshua's father.
 

LNK

Pro Adventurer
AKA
Nate
I'm thinking the blonde soldier is meant to be Joshua's older brother.

Even if the main player character is also Joshua's brother, I think he could only be his half-brother because if he was his full brother he would likely be going with Joshua to see Joshua's father.

I think he is the older brother, but it's hard to tell if that's his voice at the end. It sounds a lot different from when he's saying "a 2nd Eikon of fire."
 

Clement Rage

Pro Adventurer
@Mr. Ite

What part of your post on page 17 do you feel I didn't understand correctly?

Sorry for drawing this back off track, but I want to hammer this out to ensure we understand each other, it's important (if admittedly rather off track for this thread)

@LicoriceAllsorts

That's just the 'historical accuracy' argument people were so dismissive of either. If representation among prominent characters matter, then representation among minor and disposable characters matters too. You can't pick one and dismiss the other.

There are just as many deconstructions in those same stories, and most of those wars you're talking about are fought with conscripts, not volunteers.
. Shooting your officers and going home is a fast way to get hanged.
 

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
AKA
Ite
@Mr. Ite

What part of your post on page 17 do you feel I didn't understand correctly?

Sorry for drawing this back off track, but I want to hammer this out to ensure we understand each other, it's important (if admittedly rather off track for this thread).

I don’t think it’s off track, I’ll echo what others have said in regards to my general counter-counter-criticism:

What we have is a 2 minute short film that tells its own story; that is FF16, for now, and I think it should be looked at for its own merit and not just as a portent. I’m going to be annoying and call it a “short film” for the rest of this post because I really mean it when I say we should divorce what we’ve seen from what will eventually be a game that may/may not include what we’ve seen. Square was telling us something here with every frame, sound, and word. Looking at what we’ve been given isn’t prematurely damning or praising a future game, we can’t do that until we’ve played it. But we’ve seen this short film, we have been given lots. Editing is everything, and if this is the stuff they’re putting forward, the stuff they’re soliciting us with, then I’m of the mind that we should absolutely scrutinize it. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have shown us anything, would they?

In regards to your question, I admit I was a bit defensive in replying to your post. I took from your wording ("if you're going to be someone that calls out sexism in other people's works that you're not holding your own to the same standards") an implication that I was on some high horse, and not scrutinizing my own stuff, when my intention was to do the exact opposite. Of course, unlike the writers of FFXVI, I’m present in the conversation to provide extra context when needed, so it still isn’t quite an even playing field. With regards to Joshua and the No Good Very Bad Day I’m still some outsider analyzing someone else’s art and guessing at their intentions. But, so what? Ya put something out there, it’s gonna get looked at. It’s the same whether it’s graffiti, a tweet, stand-up comedy, or your friends at the D&D table. It matters to me that we have this conversation with whatever’s out there, I think you feel the same.

That’s why I brought up my elf thing, and I took heart seeing everyone’s replies. You and @Odysseus brought up men as the expendable gender, which I think is a great point, and @LicoriceAllsorts brought up the biological factor (which I interpret as: in real life, 100% of fathers can die in the months between conception and childbirth and the species will still propogate, and 0% of mothers can). @Makoeyes987 also talked about what it means to tell a story 'in public' versus with friends. I love this community because we're all thoughtful and debate in good faith. And no one was afraid to tell me that what I did was sexist, and I wasn't afraid to hear it, because my goal is to be less sexist, and discovering my blindspots is a victory. That's why I brought it up.
 
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Obsidian Fire

Ahk Morn!
AKA
The Engineer
I’m going to be annoying and call it a “short film” for the rest of this post because I really mean it when I say we should divorce what we’ve seen from what will eventually be a game that may/may not include what we’ve seen.
To me, this is doing the trailer a grave disservice for what it is: a trailer. It is not a short film, nor is it trying to be one. So judging it like one is going to give people a wrong idea about what it is really saying.

To me... judging a work based on a trailer is like judging a book by it's front cover and the blurb on the back. The trailer is not representative of the entire work because it can't be. Books can't give away the entire plot and character list before they start. Or the story is spoiled. Trailers can't do the same. Or at least, they shouldn't.

The point of a trailer in a very real sense is withholding information from the player so that they want to find out what the withheld information is in the game. While giving us just enough info to know if we want to figure out the hidden information.

And for the past... decade and a half, Square has been very bad at withholding information from players. And now that they are, everyone is acting like SE isn't.
 

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
AKA
Ite
To me, this is doing the trailer a grave disservice for what it is: a trailer. It is not a short film, nor is it trying to be one. So judging it like one is going to give people a wrong idea about what it is really saying.

To me... judging a work based on a trailer is like judging a book by it's front cover and the blurb on the back. The trailer is not representative of the entire work because it can't be. Books can't give away the entire plot and character list before they start. Or the story is spoiled. Trailers can't do the same. Or at least, they shouldn't.

The point of a trailer in a very real sense is withholding information from the player so that they want to find out what the withheld information is in the game. While giving us just enough info to know if we want to figure out the hidden information.

And for the past... decade and a half, Square has been very bad at withholding information from players. And now that they are, everyone is acting like SE isn't.

Fair point, but my read of an advertisement's purpose is the opposite. An advertisement shows you something, and you say "I want more of that thing" and then you go out and buy it, getting, presumably, more of that thing. The goal of an advertisement isn't to get people to buy something in the hopes of getting something the advertisement didn't show them, that's setting yourself up for disappointment. If I saw an advertisement for the Blues Clues DVD Boxset, I wouldn't hope that there was blood and gore hiding in the scenes they didn't show.

Using XII as example, I was happily surprised at the irrelevance of Vaan after Act I, and looking at that trailer, the downplaying of Ashe is baffling. But, because of her lack of press, I didn't go into FFXII expecting Ashe to be a huge character, I expected the game to be Final Fantasy Aladdin, which was the foot it put forward in the advertisements. And, I did get Final Fantasy Aladdin, XII was just awesome enough to give me that and a whole lot more. Likewise, the trailer you posted for XIII was very much what we got in the game, a bunch of flashy graphics with zero understanding of why anything was happening. That's what we got in XIII, but we also got Fang! But one shouldn't expect a Fang, that's folly. In the same vein, FFXVI may well happily surprise me. I would still never expect it to. All I have to go off is this "short film" -- looking at it as merely an advertisement, it must only advertise more of what we saw... which was dudes.

Of course, there's the broader FF brand that's coloring our perception, and those of us who trust the brand in regards to gender can be forgiven for expecting the brand to deliver. But the brand also has a habit of flipping the table with each title. What are we to make of that? We can wait for the whole game to come out (we must, if we want to judge the game) or we can talk about what we're looking at. I'm doing the latter, because making assumptions based on a trailer is less interesting to me than taking the trailer at face value.

Edit: obviously there's more than just "dudes" in the ad, I was being glib. I'm pretty sold on what they did show me: low tech, unstable/dangerous summon monsters, politics and changing alliances, fantasy-Renaissance fashion, a time-skip, and impactful violence. I want more of that stuff.
 
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Clement Rage

Pro Adventurer
Licorice, your point as I understood it was that it is historically and biologically credible that the expendable fighters are largely male. Probably true. But the same applies to the representation of prominent characters in the leadership of an army (or combat capable lead character PCs).

So if there is an objection made to the lack of gender balance among prominent characters, then the same applies to non prominent characters. So any objection as the lack of representation among lead characters applies to the disposable characters. If it's not acceptable at the top, it's not acceptable all the way down.

I wasn't objecting to Ite's setting on the basis that it was implausible, but that it was sexist (and it wasn't so much an objection as 'you realise this, right?'). I'm not sure what you were trying to say with that post, then.

Ite, you invited scrutiny of your work, and then when I took you at your word, you told me I misunderstood you.

I'm not trying to be some dick on the internet tearing down something close to your heart for kicks. It's relevant because of how you reacted to this trailer, because when you're objecting to the concept of women being rare on the battlefield, the fact that you do that same thing in your own work, apparently unremarked, is relevant. Because apparently representation at the top (and not evil) is important to you, but you would actively be uncomfortable if that representation extended to disposable characters. That's okay, everyone has their inclinations, but when you are criticising someone else's work on the basis of apparent sexism, your own work matters.

I'm partly overreacting because I see this so much in fandom.

The first lady basically has the standard line of any character with the care of an important child in dangerous times. 'Come in, be safe, don't take risks.' There's no particular basis for assuming the women is this trailer are not trustworthy, which you have to do in order to draw your conclusions. They don't have names, but the (presumed) lead character doesn't either, the only names we hear are Joshua and Shiva.

Trailers are often deliberately designed to be misleading by nature. It's surprisingly often that they deliberately play a character as on one side of the coin when in context they are actually another. The idea you took away that 'women will not be prominent in this game' requires looking at it in a very narrow lens, including dismissing the women that are actually present in the trailer in the name of calling out gender inequality.

I regard this as an active obstacle to achieving better representation. Whenever we get a character that is representative, people try to disqualify them from being really representative ('they're token, they're evil, they're gender swaps') No single character can represent everyone, which leads to bickering over what is 'real' representation or not. Individual characters can only represent certain parts of the population, but those not represented by any particular one go 'that's not real representation' instead of 'cool, but I want something like this too' (ideally with 'and I will try to write it').

Sorry I came on so strong, your setting slammed right down on my sore spot.

In terms of settings, my limited d&d knowledge tells me that you might be interested in the drow.
 
Licorice, your point as I understood it was that it is historically and biologically credible that the expendable fighters are largely male. Probably true. But the same applies to the representation of prominent characters in the leadership of an army (or combat capable lead character PCs).

So if there is an objection made to the lack of gender balance among prominent characters, then the same applies to non prominent characters. So any objection as the lack of representation among lead characters applies to the disposable characters. If it's not acceptable at the top, it's not acceptable all the way down.

Yes, that was my point. More of humanity's existence has been spent grappling with the problem of under-population than over-population. And I agree with you: if you're world-building a fictional society that has been shaped by certain forces, you have to show those forces at work at every level, not just the top.

(I was really, really disappointed that SE didn't come up with one female trooper model to go along with the male trooper model in the Remake, especially since it's canon now that they have women in their army).
 

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
AKA
Ite
I regard this as an active obstacle to achieving better representation. Whenever we get a character that is representative, people try to disqualify them from being really representative ('they're token, they're evil, they're gender swaps') No single character can represent everyone, which leads to bickering over what is 'real' representation or not. Individual characters can only represent certain parts of the population, but those not represented by any particular one go 'that's not real representation' instead of 'cool, but I want something like this too' (ideally with 'and I will try to write it').

Sorry I came on so strong, your setting slammed right down on my sore spot.

In terms of settings, my limited d&d knowledge tells me that you might be interested in the drow.

Bad representation can be more harmful than no representation. Think of the "gay predator" stereotype, or J. K. Rowling's upcoming trans murderer book (ugh). A few years ago I saw a parody musical of Titus Andronicus that added a bunch of subversive mic drop feminism moments... in Tamora's dialogue. I walked away scratching my head, because despite changing the story in a bunch of ways, it kept her as the villain, and she got her just desserts. How did her status as a villain undermine the points she made? When the ultimate conclusion of the story is still "this woman committed great evil, and her punishment is to choke and die" what's to be gained by tying up progressive values in her motivation? What's the message?

Similarly, the Drow are still the only matriarchy in any official D&D product, and until Elistrae came along, they were evil to their core. What the hell was Ed playin' at?

You're only misunderstanding me in thinking that I'm not accepting of your conclusion. I accept it, even anticipated it, and conclude much the same. If I were to do it again, I wouldn't have done it. I don't see where I'm disagreeing with you, but you keep saying that I am. So, stop?
 

Obsidian Fire

Ahk Morn!
AKA
The Engineer
@cold_spirit Thank you for posting that!

Seems like we have a situation where the MP might not want to be following the orders they are getting, but they still have to follow them. Weather that's because they've given an oath of some kind or... heh... are magically prevented from doing so. Either are interesting. It reminds me a bit of the situation some of the FF6 characters are in who used to be working with/for/under the Empire. Really have to wonder how he got into that situation.

The clarification that the countries are fighting over a (the?) mothercrystal is nice. As is some of the clarification at the meeting. Namely that at least one of the sides at the meeting won the last war. I wonder if it's less a meeting between allies and more a meeting between former (and current) enemies... The last guy (the one with black hair) we see at the meeting looks a lot like the guy who stabbed the person guarding Joshua when Joshua gets splattered with blood.

And confirmation that the people don't think there should be more than one Fire Eikon. So that there are two... is a problem. Although given how many summons there are in the FF franchise now, it wouldn't be that hard to make two summons for every element...

That we have Imperials attacking the place that is heavily suggested to have the Mothercrystal... and the Mothercrystal is said to protect people somehow... I wonder if we have something like the Imperials asking the people who currently have it if they can barrow it for some reason and the people with the Mothercrystal say "no", so the Imperials decide to take it by force. Only the situation litterally blows up on them when Ifrit is summoned. And then a war breaks out because of that. It would at least fit why in the "present" we see war and armies and summons fighting each other.

Of course... the big question is... if the Mothercrystal protects people (from some kind of blight?) why is this the story about people wanting to end the reign of the crystals... Also interesting is that it's "crystals" plural when only one crystal has been talked about so far, a Mothercrystal. I get the feeling it's not just one thing that is being fought over, but a lot of different things that are all interconnected with each other.
 

Clement Rage

Pro Adventurer
How can you use something that isn't out yet as an example? (Also, thanks for spoiling that.) Are you assuming something is bad representation without reading it? You can't tell if something is bad representation until you know the full nuance and context.
 

Ite

Save your valediction (she/her)
AKA
Ite
How can you use something that isn't out yet as an example? (Also, thanks for spoiling that.) Are you assuming something is bad representation without reading it? You can't tell if something is bad representation until you know the full nuance and context.

Is this... about J. K. Rowling?? I think you might be missing some context, then.
 

LNK

Pro Adventurer
AKA
Nate
Seems like we have a situation where the MP might not want to be following the orders they are getting, but they still have to follow them

This character reminds me of Nyx so far.

Also interesting is that it's "crystals" plural when only one crystal has been talked about so far, a Mothercrystal

Reminds me of FF9. The main crystal was split into 4 shards and given to each "empire."
 
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