Genten

A purist fan who believes the new should have continuity with the old. Genten (原点) means “origin; starting point; beginning.”

[Genten @ffpurist]

https://t.co/ZQGBUALbOG

[Genten @ffpurist]

Uh… hate to break it to you, but this guy is used extensively by the Voldemort of VIIR to corroborate the argument that the exaggerated “theatre acting” of the low-poly blocky models of the OG doesn’t translate well to the “movie acting” of the remakes.

Plus this guy has much less presence in the OG than in Rebirth. He’s definitely cringe in Rebirth. But since he’s a goofy character to begin with, the other cringe stuff stand out more.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@DashingDavidYT I don’t think the point is for it to look exactly like this. Think of it more like a quick sketch to test whether the idea is good or not. The final product, if ever made, would look much better—like this, but with soul.

[Genten @ffpurist]

I think the fact that the most common reaction by FF fans to that infamous movie is “this doesn’t feel like FF” should have given them the hint that there’s such a thing as “feeling like FF.” But no, they went on to incrementally double down on “this doesn’t feel like FF” with each iteration and making it the defining identity of the series by misusing the idea of “reinventing itself” as the justification for whatever they do that does not feel like FF—until now when, as long as there’s Chocobos and stuff, and it’s expensive as fuck to make, the next mainline FF can be any kind of game, so they can chase any of the current trends and justify it by saying nonsense like “realistic graphics and [the core of the Final Fantasy gameplay experience] don’t fit, so we will not be doing [the core of the Final Fantasy gameplay experience] for this iteration” (phrase in brackets in actual interview was “turn-based combat”). Let alone the fact that it’s not true (again, as E33 showed), even if it were—how ridiculous would it be if Nintendo said “throwing shells and shit doesn’t fit well with realistic driving sim experience, so we decided for the next Mario Kart that there won’t be items”?

There’s practically no “self” left in “reinventing itself” at this point.

[Genten @ffpurist]

I’m seeing the same flawed argument that Yoshi-P used when he claimed that realistic graphics and turn-based don’t fit (setting aside that Expedition 33 and Baldur’s Gate 3 prove this wrong).

If something doesn’t fit with the gameplay experience in a video game, then it’s not the gameplay experience that should go—it’s the thing that doesn’t fit with it! Arcade racing mechanics with red shells and mushrooms don’t fit with realistic driving games—wouldn’t it be ridiculous if Nintendo got rid of them to make the next Mario Kart a realistic driving sim like Gran Turismo?

But I’d also say that the whole scale argument doesn’t work. You need wide open spaces when combat is on the field. But Final Fantasy was turn-based. It doesn’t need gigantic open spaces. The artistically-staged smaller maps suited it better, and was more pleasant to explore. The dioramic world map from OG VII and E33 are much more suitable for a game like FF—you still get the illusion of scale, but you don’t need to invest your afternoon traversing it to look at the beautiful trees and rocks. This isn’t Breath of the Wild where you can find things at any given pixel on the map.

You need gigantic cities with 300 NPCs (hyperbole) only if you want to pad the content with chore-like fetch quests.

The point is that FFVII has more than 10x the staff and budget as E33 did. They can definitely make a faithful modern FFVII remake if they leaned into what is worth investing in to realize the game, what is characteristic of the game, instead of chasing trends and trying to make the most gigantic game that has ever been made.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@moejy94 @H4ppyd4yss @GamesRadar It is a big undertaking. But the Remake Series was an even bigger undertaking.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@Animex_Player 🤷‍♂️

[Genten @ffpurist]

1.1M views in 3 months.
3.4M views in 9h.

Interest in the OOT Remake is not even in the same league as interest in the VIIR Finale.

Remember that OG FFVII had outsold OG OOT.

And OOT Remake is a console exclusive.

[Genten @ffpurist]

Was it? If you look at sales figures, all the way up to Skyward Sword, FF and Zelda sold around the same ballpark of units. Final Fantasy is also a bigger franchise than Zelda as a whole (in terms of sales). It’s only since Breath of the Wild that the two aren’t even in the same league anymore.

Fair point about the subscription count, I hadn’t considered that. Still, the gap in number can’t just be attributed to that. Yes, Zelda is more popular than FF today. Why?

[Genten @ffpurist]

@Animex_Player @jtaylor9191 @FFPeasants Why would I tell that to FF7R haters? They’re entitled to their opinions just as you are. If you care so much about loyalty, here’s a fun fact: they are complaining because of their loyalty—if they didn’t care about the franchise, they’d move on to other things.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@FFPeasants I watched your whole video, and honestly, I agree with almost everything.

Fwiw, I wrote two articles specifically about this topic:
- Etiology of the Final Fantasy Disease: https://t.co/f23AntSbVR
- A Possible Future For Final Fantasy: https://t.co/u15FYiyCa2

[Genten @ffpurist]

https://t.co/PbvUdtysnT

[Genten @ffpurist]

https://t.co/PbvUdtysnT

[Genten @ffpurist]

@FFPeasants I don’t agree with your point about it being a hallway simulator. Literally talked about this today comparing XIII to X. It’s linear, but not a hallway:

[Genten @ffpurist]

FFXIII felt a lot more like there was a formula that alternates between dungeon and cutscene than FFX.

As @resonantarc puts it, many linear games are “wide linear,” in that there is one destination, but you can stray off the path on the way there. In FFX, you can literally walk back to many of the earlier parts of the game if you wanted to.

The issue with FFXIII is that it didn’t feel like you were placed in a world that you had the freedom to explore, but instead you were following a movie script and the game had to give you permission to play in just the current scene (for the most part).

Also, I think the feeling of linearity of FFXIII’s level design was exacerbated by the linearity of other aspects of the game as well, like its character progression system.

[Genten @ffpurist]

It’s just a video game. Relax. People are allowed to hate a video game and voice their opinions, especially if they really love the franchise and are unhappy with the direction it went. It doesn’t make your life any better or worse. If you want to argue with them, have fun. It’s an open forum. If it’s going to hurt your feelings, it’s probably better to stay away and just go and enjoy your games.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@Animex_Player @FFPeasants When this community’s Voldemort (he shall not be named) said something like how some people take criticisms against Final Fantasy as an attack because they’ve made it part of their core identity, he was talking about exactly this.

[Genten @ffpurist]

FFXIII felt a lot more like there was a formula that alternates between dungeon and cutscene than FFX.

As @resonantarc puts it, many linear games are “wide linear,” in that there is one destination, but you can stray off the path on the way there. In FFX, you can literally walk back to many of the earlier parts of the game if you wanted to.

The issue with FFXIII is that it didn’t feel like you were placed in a world that you had the freedom to explore, but instead you were following a movie script and the game had to give you permission to play in just the current scene (for the most part).

Also, I think the feeling of linearity of FFXIII’s level design was exacerbated by the linearity of other aspects of the game as well, like its character progression system.

[Genten @ffpurist]

That’s a made-up claim that requires one to believe that FFVI or FFVIII are more massive games than any single player RPG made in the last 10 years.

Let’s say they’re two—no, three—or no, wait, hold on—FOUR times more massive than Expedition 33 is—if a team of 30 newbie/first-time French developers with a budget of less than $10M can make that, I have the faith in Square Enix that they can figure out how to properly remake an entry of their most successful and beloved series.

[Genten @ffpurist]

@KPunchy If they release one more thing for FFVII after Revelation, it will be the end of the company. We don’t need anything more for VII for the next 20+ years.

[Genten @ffpurist]

You almost never need to draw, there are better ways. Think of magic like the equipments of this game. Staying low HP with your offensive party member(s) is a thrilling and rewarding double-edged sword. Always use Draw at least once on a boss fight to see if it has a GF. Triple Triad (the card game) is not just for fun.

You probably already know most or all of this, but whatever, this is my spoiler-free recommendation on how to approach FFVIII (which is my favourite of the franchise).

[Genten @ffpurist]

@hellouisex2 You’re forgetting helicopter hat kid Red XIII