I'm playing the latest remake of FFIV.
Having not touched the game since I was a little dude, it's fun to see how my perspective has changed over the years.
- It's really, really fast. All of the dialog feels like the abbreviated version of a modern game. As an adult, this is refreshing. As a kid, this just made sense for my kid brain.
- ATB. Active Time Battle. As an adult, the combat still feels well-designed and the bosses challenging (granted, this is a remake). As a kid, ATB held my attention better than turn-based because it demanded my constant input. The game's battles were more immediate and the bosses were memorable. That demon wall thing still freaks me out.
- Cecil, the badass Dark Knight, captain of a fleet of airships (wouldn't that make him an admiral?), is your main character. As an adult, this is a lot more appealing than modern Final Fantasy games. It's like having Auron or Balthier for a protagonist instead of Tidus or Vaan. I don't know why Square assumes that their younger players want a younger character to identify with, because as a kid I thought Cecil was fucking awesome while Palom and Porom were dumb as hell.
Re: Cecil, I think the important thing is variety! I was on the opposite end of this argument when a lot of my friends couldn't get into Grandia because the main character was "just a kid." That didn't stop 'em from loving Secret of Mana and Chrono Trigger a few years earlier!
ReplyDeleteThat said I don't think Square is making younger protagonists to appeal to younger fans, I think it's to appeal to an audience that wants a pretty boy to look at, kind of the opposite "problem" most video games have. Maybe I'm wrong, Cecil's certainly no slouch in the looks department either. Maybe it's because he's married?