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How is it that Zelda maintained its status while Final Fantasy couldnt?
- Thread starter LakeOf9
- Start date
Hardensoul
Member
He did, Miyamoto played some of the early BotW demos and made a few suggestions. I call one of them being about climbing being too restricted.
Mibu no ookami
Member
I think it's just been too long since Final Fantasy was perceived to be at its franchise peak. Square Enix's love affair with FF7 reminding people of their peak doesn't help.
Nintendo on the other hand has hit numerous considered peaks with Zelda over the years. Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, and Breath of the Wild, with Breath of the Wild obviously being recent in mind. These games were all considered groundbreaking in their time. Hell even Windwaker broke ground on cel-shaded animation.
When was the last FF game that really broke ANY sort of ground? FF7, 8 and 10 were probably the best looking games of their time. Since then, they've fallen behind. The stories no longer wow us and their characters have been lackluster, particularly the main characters.
A 20 year gap of any major quality hits and it's not like Square Enix is raining hits outside of the Final Fantasy brand where someone would think, maybe give this guy a FF game he is crushing it.
They put all their eggs into FF and as a result, there isn't much breathing room for directors/producers to shine.
Why is Keisuke Miyauchi not getting a Final Fantasy game to direct? Maybe if Octopath Traveller 1 had released on PS4 it would have been a bigger hit for Square Enix.
What about Takeshi Uchikawa?
They drove out so much of their talent and haven't really given anyone else a chance to really shine.
They gave FF16 to the guy who saved FF14, so we'll see how that works out, but they used to have a slew of games that got people excited before they turned into a Final Fantasy factory.
Parasite Eve, Xenogears, Vagrant Story, Bahamut Dragoon, Star Ocean, Seiken Densetsu, Quintent's games, Musashi, Tactics Ogre, Final Fantasy Tactics, Saga and on and on...
Nintendo on the other hand has hit numerous considered peaks with Zelda over the years. Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, and Breath of the Wild, with Breath of the Wild obviously being recent in mind. These games were all considered groundbreaking in their time. Hell even Windwaker broke ground on cel-shaded animation.
When was the last FF game that really broke ANY sort of ground? FF7, 8 and 10 were probably the best looking games of their time. Since then, they've fallen behind. The stories no longer wow us and their characters have been lackluster, particularly the main characters.
A 20 year gap of any major quality hits and it's not like Square Enix is raining hits outside of the Final Fantasy brand where someone would think, maybe give this guy a FF game he is crushing it.
They put all their eggs into FF and as a result, there isn't much breathing room for directors/producers to shine.
Why is Keisuke Miyauchi not getting a Final Fantasy game to direct? Maybe if Octopath Traveller 1 had released on PS4 it would have been a bigger hit for Square Enix.
What about Takeshi Uchikawa?
They drove out so much of their talent and haven't really given anyone else a chance to really shine.
They gave FF16 to the guy who saved FF14, so we'll see how that works out, but they used to have a slew of games that got people excited before they turned into a Final Fantasy factory.
Parasite Eve, Xenogears, Vagrant Story, Bahamut Dragoon, Star Ocean, Seiken Densetsu, Quintent's games, Musashi, Tactics Ogre, Final Fantasy Tactics, Saga and on and on...
That's a matter of tastes.
Personally I think OoT is better but I love both games.
Certainly OoT was the more advanced and ambitious game of the two, and the one closer to how videogames would eventually evolves.
Stuff like inverse kinematics was almost unheard before on consoles (can think only about Virtua Fighter 2 on Saturn as an earlier example and that's a genre which focus everything on the two characters on screen unlike in the action/adventure genre).
Final Fantasy VII on the other hand took full advantage of the CD medium with tons of pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs but was otherwise quite reminescent in structure of the games Square had developed previously on SNES (it was 'flat' in design if you understand what I'm saying despite the superflous rotations during battles).
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ShadyAcshuns
Member
FF has made a lot of changes over the years with their main series games, so it's not always going to be the right move. Zelda made some changes too, but more slow and steady ones to protect the integrity of the franchise.
AmuroChan
Member
Also, Aonuma is still the producer on all the Zelda games even after he handed directorial responsibilities to someone else. So he is the constant that has shepherded the franchises for 3 decades. Sakaguchi left Square in 2003 and had no involvement with any future FF games thereafter.
Yoboman
Member
Killer8
Member
No?
There are over 100 games now in the Final Fantasy franchise. It's not even remotely comparable.
Syphon Filter
Member
Zelda hasn't been good since the gamecube.
PSYGN
Member
HazukiSensei
Banned
This, to be honest. If this was a multiplat random new IP, then Im not sure it would be met with the same level of reverence.
It's more of a "im trying this out/hyped because of what people say" rather than "what i'm seeing is so next level and extraordinary anyone and their mom could see why this is impressive"
Also factor in that these non narrative, unfocused botw era zelda titles work better with the mobile experience that is switch.
lachesis
Member
Basically Zelda series have more defined criteria that can be focused on for quality control.
Zelda = gameplay first, story is more or less afterthought.
FF series = story first, with gameplay in tandem.
It is much more difficult to nail a great story all the time. Zelda's gameplay though - it's built upon each installation in a lot of cases with a lot of knowhow accumulated, such as dungeon designs and all. Even if the system gets overhauled, that knowhow is still there and apparent.
FF series, though - in order to keep things fresh, they tend to overhaul entire thing from ground up - because environment interactivity (dungeon puzzles, or metroid-like access points) isn't part of the game mechanics or there as very limited way - the games feel disconnected except item names and few reference-type names, items etc. Me being the old school turn base FF fan, I couldn't get into recent ones, nor could recognize it as such... On the other hand, I felt so much better and more excited to play DQ XI - which is basically on the opposite spectrum of FF series, which I believe kept the identity of the series quite well over the years.
Zelda = gameplay first, story is more or less afterthought.
FF series = story first, with gameplay in tandem.
It is much more difficult to nail a great story all the time. Zelda's gameplay though - it's built upon each installation in a lot of cases with a lot of knowhow accumulated, such as dungeon designs and all. Even if the system gets overhauled, that knowhow is still there and apparent.
FF series, though - in order to keep things fresh, they tend to overhaul entire thing from ground up - because environment interactivity (dungeon puzzles, or metroid-like access points) isn't part of the game mechanics or there as very limited way - the games feel disconnected except item names and few reference-type names, items etc. Me being the old school turn base FF fan, I couldn't get into recent ones, nor could recognize it as such... On the other hand, I felt so much better and more excited to play DQ XI - which is basically on the opposite spectrum of FF series, which I believe kept the identity of the series quite well over the years.
daveonezero
Banned
I think Zelda stayed more humble and focused on gameplay. FF is in the make it as crazy as possible and outdo the last version with tons of cutscenes.
One requires a lot of resources for not a lot of gameplay.
One requires a lot of resources for not a lot of gameplay.
K2D
Banned
Only way I see OOT as more advanced and ambitious is on the techical/programming side, and even then the vanilla OoT was apparently not that well optimized. OG FF7 on PS1 was actually quite well polished as well, with very little jank, unlike the pc version that's been ported and grandfathered all over the place.That's a matter of tastes.
Personally I think OoT is better but I love both games.
Certainly OoT was the more advanced and ambitious game of the two, and the one closer to how videogames would eventually evolves.
Stuff like inverse kinematics was almost unheard before on consoles (can think only about Virtua Fighter 2 on Saturn as an earlier example and that's a genre which focus everything on the two characters on screen unlike in the action/adventure genre).
Final Fantasy VII on the other hand took full advantage of the CD medium with tons of pre-rendered backgrounds and FMVs but was otherwise quite reminescent in structure of the games Square had developed previously on SNES.
You might call FF7 a cheat on the graphical side of things, but I prefer the prerendered scenes of FF7 over the bland 64 graphics og OOT.
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Arsic
Loves his juicy stink trail scent
FF has struggled with pretty jarring development issues. TOTK for example had a year of pure polish time according to interviews.
FF15 started as vs13, had multiple iterations , tons of missing story content until dlc, an entire chapter (13) that was a lore dump in books, and you had to watch a CG movie just to understand the villain better lol.
FF can be just as successful and relevant but it needs to be treated with the love and passion that Zelda gets from Nintendo.
FF15 started as vs13, had multiple iterations , tons of missing story content until dlc, an entire chapter (13) that was a lore dump in books, and you had to watch a CG movie just to understand the villain better lol.
FF can be just as successful and relevant but it needs to be treated with the love and passion that Zelda gets from Nintendo.
Team Andromeda
Member
You compare it to other open-world games and it's empty and well boring.
Team Andromeda
Member
Zelda I?
E-Cat
Member
The first Zelda game
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
I played other open world games and again empty how?
Team Andromeda
Member
So have I.
Zelda Open world feel like Sea of Thieves, they both look amazing, but are rather empty and you don't get that feel of a living breathing open world like in other Open World games
Lunarorbit
Member
There have been several times no one cared about Zelda over the years. Feel like ff has had better sustained success.
Boy bawang
Member
If the Zelda after Skyward Sword had sucked, it wouldn't have maintained its status.
But they made one of the greatest have ever, and did it again 6 years later. The day Final Fantasy can do that, it'll regain its status. But the truth is that they haven't made a goty material since FF6 and FF7.
But they made one of the greatest have ever, and did it again 6 years later. The day Final Fantasy can do that, it'll regain its status. But the truth is that they haven't made a goty material since FF6 and FF7.
Chukhopops
Member
I was really hyped for TotK but now I don’t like it nearly as much as BotW, because the exploration feels completely different now that you can zip through the map very easily between the towers and devices.
The map feels very « artificial », in the sense that it’s designed for your abilities to be used.
Personal opinion of course and the game is still fun to play.
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
You keep saying “empty” and I’m asking empty how? You see NPC and animals and enemies around open world and interacting with each other, so I’m not getting what you mean by “empty”.
Team Andromeda
Member
You see the odd ones and you don't the sense that they're living their own lives or doing much. Not compared to how NPC's act in the likes of GTA5, Fallout 4, Skyrim
Like I said it feels all very Sea Of Thieves to me. But I get it one can't find any fault with a Nintendo game...
tomato shrub
Member
Actually... yeah. People pretending Zelda was still this unrivaled series between Twlight Princess and BotW felt very forced. A pretty dire decade, both quality- and sales-wise.
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
Are you kidding me!? When it’s night NPCs goes to sleep and when it rains they look for cover. Heck I recently saw random NPC painting one of sky islands and at night he rested in his small tent. You see enemies hunting for animal and sometimes you NPC fighting one of the enemies.
You also those giant dragons you inside underground, I once ride one them to underground.
SeraphJan
Member
I don't know about other community, but here at Gaf its definitely true.
Or we could see this the other way around, maybe other fanbase are way too demanding. Just look at this post, around 1 week time window we already had more than 20 pages of complains for a game that didn't even look bad at all. I could never imaging that happening to Zelda games, If it was the same standard, people would be screaming for the company to release a new hardware, yet I've seen many of the fan here actually didn't wish a Switch successor at all.
Yes, Nintendo definitely programmed, or precisely "filtered" them. They started this filtering from Wii era where they filtered out all the demanding consumer that are looking for cutting edge technology and realism presentation. They did this "filter" process for three console generations. If you look at pre Game Cube (include Game Cube which was my all time favorite console) era, Nintendo fans are just as demanding as other fanbase. Satoru Iwata's strategy come to fruition in Switch era, by the time of Switch most demanding consumer already move to other platform, while Switch as a portable device (and Nintendo's dominance in the portable market) incentivize purchase from many new audience that are raised in mobile age (where they had vastly different gaming habit and standards).
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Lunarorbit
Member
Everyone who played the phantom hour glass stand up.
Oh... So barely anyone played that? Weird. Well surely yall rushed out back in the day to play season of time or link between worlds.
No? T tomato shrub knows what's up too
GigaBowser
The bear of bad news
Final Fantasy isn't even the best JRPG right now Xenoblades surpassed it longs ago
TOTK reached the bests game ever status not in the sames leagues
TOTK reached the bests game ever status not in the sames leagues
Danjin44
The nicest person on this forum
I’m very surprised hearing that from you.
Because I remember when Xenoblade 3 was coming out in remember you made thread about how Nintendo wasting time investing on Xenoblade series and instead they should invest on F Zero.
GigaBowser
The bear of bad news
I donts likes JRPGs but still Xeno mores than FF especially X
K2D
Banned
Don't agree about game design. Tech wise sure, but not design as a whole. Though OoT and Mario 64 should absolutely be praised for design. It's apples to oranges, and very subject to taste.
It's like; one of my favorite series Fallout: I'd still like to see a new isometric Fallout even though the fps formula can work just as good, better or worse.
tomato shrub
Member
Nah. I've been on GAF when I had a WiiU, so I saw the worst depths of fanboyism, Nintendo hardcore fans practically bordering on religious fanaticism for their dumb nostalgic toy. The sheer copium and resulting hatred for all the people who didn't want to sugarcoat anything were unbearable. Since then, I'll always prefer a critical fanbase, even if it's overly critical towards something I like.
Thankfully the worst of them went to purple site, where you now literally get banned for saying Pokemon games have bad graphics.
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NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt
Gold Member
My main issue with the way Final Fantasy is turning out. FF16 looks like a Western RPG and the gameplay seems more in line with Western RPGs. I have no issues with Western RPGs but I like the differences between JRPGs and WRPGs. I think it will be good, since YoshiP is heading the project, but it's an instant skip for me.
As for Zelda Tears of The Kingdom, I might be turned off by playing this game and hating Breath of the Wild, but I admit its more true to Zelda, due to the same team being there since the beginning. Like I hate Breath of the Wild, but I can see it's really changed the landscape, I have the same feelings towards Bethesda Games, especially with Skyrim.
hyperbertha
Member
Anything less than 85 on metacritic is hot garbage.The hyperboles in this thread are among the wildest ones I've ever seen in a thread.
FF games are polarising, they sure are because they try to change the formula each time. Sometimes it works sometimes not as much as wanted.
But people just saying things like "hot garbage" speaking of any main Final Fantasy title are out of their mind.
It can be disappointing sure (FFXV vanilla urgh it was rough...) but "hot garbage" really ?
source: my favourite game is ride to hell retribution.
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Days like these...
Have a Blessed Day
Shut your mouth it's what we want! /s
twinspectre
Member
Simple, because Square Enix is ashamed of their herritage and they are willing to kill the spirit of Final Fantasy to please the wrong audience. It would be a wake up call for Square Enix if FFXVI sell poorly compared to TotK.
With statements like "It will be like a Hollywood blockbuster" or "it will be like a Western tv show" is a proof of everything what's wrong with Square Enix and Final Fantasy.
Team Andromeda
Member
No, I'm not. NPC's In Shenmue looked to us umbrellas when it rained and that was 1999, I saw AI enemies fight against each other in Exhumed in 1996
In games like GTA 5 or Fallout 4 I feel the world is living and breathing. Don't get in Zelda BOTW it feels rather more basic and empty IMO a lot like Sea Of Thieves.