Zero Punctuation: Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII

[Trishbot]

It actually is. I found polls that showed this:

http://www.novacrystallis.com/2013/01/japan-ranks-their-favorite-female-characters-from-the-final-fantasy-series/
http://www.siliconera.com/2014/01/06/final-fantasy-airborne-brigade-players-vote-yuna-popular-heroine/

She's always in some form of top 3 females in the Japan FInal Fantasy. It's surprising to some I know, but this is the same country that thinks Tidus is the 4th most popular and amazing male main character in the FF series (save for Zack, Cloud and Zidane).

Believe me, Japan thinks ind much different ways.

Actions (and money) speak louder than polls. Lightning's game sales tanked HARD. You could have many polls where she wins, because die-hard Lightning fans will vote for her over anyone else (and the vote is more split between all the other characters... Aerith or Tifa alone splits FF7's fanbase's vote), and she has the benefit of being shoved in your face more than any other FF character in recent memory (Terra and Celes could be considered much better, but they haven't received NEARLY the promotional push that Lightning has and Lightning is far more recent and plastered all over the covers). And then there's the fact one of the major polls was from their own webpage with only 500 votes split between 42 characters. That's an incredibly small sample size.

But, again, sales numbers. If Japan really loved her like Toriyama claims, then why was her game the lowest selling console Final Fantasy of all time, behind even junk like Dirge of Cerberus? Why was it outsold a week later by a port of a 13-year-old PS2 Final Fantasy game? Why did Bravely Default nearly match it in sales despite being on just one single portable system with a lower install base? Why did the FF13 series SHRINK by 85% following FF13's launch where most trilogy of games INCREASE as they get better and gain more players?

The Japanese love for Lightning is vastly overstated, and the circumstantial polls conducted aren't supported by the sales of the games. What I'm told is, mainly, she's fun to look at and cosplay, but even people in Japan don't actually love her character.

Lightning keeps coming back because she is Nomura's waifu and he wants to dress her up like that girl at the conventrion who is trying waaaay too hard to get noticed.

Spoiler

He ever gave her breast implants. By the way, is there an in game explanation of that, or do they just hope no one will notice?

Square Enix let someone create a terrible game who's sole point was for one man to play dress up with his emotionless, idealized sex doll masquerading as JRPG. A wish fulfillment sex doll that no one else likes or cares about. They deserve all the derision they get at this point, final fantasy is beyond a joke.

Even worse, this same idiot is the guy who really thought FFX would benefit from playing dress up with the girls in Final Fantasy X-2... and then AGAIN in The 3rd Birthday (yes, he's the monster responsible for that abomination of a game). And then AGAIN in Lightning Returns.

He's made three games now taking otherwise strong female characters in earlier games, and reduced them to cosplaying fetish dolls with increasingly skimpy and implausible outfits. THREE TIMES he's done this.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

To be fair Yahtzee, pretty much ANYTHING loses to pie.

 

[kanetsb]

Well, since the game ends with Lightning killing God, who stole Hope's soul and was pretending to be him, creating our Earth and living happily in France or something like that... I would say mr. Y missed a bit there in the review.

Also, that target switching bit + guarding... I'm on new game+, hard mode, towards the end - never did I actually had to do any target switching ever. I'm sure some people do that. Can't explain why though.

Then the grinding thing because the combat got tough in the beginning - umm... don't know how to say this, without sounding like some fan boy but... there are weapon stores in the game, and those STR and MAG stats are there for a reason. The first upgrade weapon is ~twice as effective as the defaults so... there's a hint there what needs to be done. Also - you're suppose to do areas in parallel in this one. It's tough? Go elsewhere, do quests, return later. Also - do not go to the Chaos Temple unprepared... really... don't... please.

 

[KingdomFantasyXIII]

It actually is. I found polls that showed this:

http://www.novacrystallis.com/2013/01/japan-ranks-their-favorite-female-characters-from-the-final-fantasy-series/
http://www.siliconera.com/2014/01/06/final-fantasy-airborne-brigade-players-vote-yuna-popular-heroine/

She's always in some form of top 3 females in the Japan FInal Fantasy. It's surprising to some I know, but this is the same country that thinks Tidus is the 4th most popular and amazing male main character in the FF series (save for Zack, Cloud and Zidane).

Believe me, Japan thinks ind much different ways.

Actions (and money) speak louder than polls. Lightning's game sales tanked HARD. You could have many polls where she wins, because die-hard Lightning fans will vote for her over anyone else (and the vote is more split between all the other characters... Aerith or Tifa alone splits FF7's fanbase's vote), and she has the benefit of being shoved in your face more than any other FF character in recent memory (Terra and Celes could be considered much better, but they haven't received NEARLY the promotional push that Lightning has and Lightning is far more recent and plastered all over the covers). And then there's the fact one of the major polls was from their own webpage with only 500 votes split between 42 characters. That's an incredibly small sample size.

But, again, sales numbers. If Japan really loved her like Toriyama claims, then why was her game the lowest selling console Final Fantasy of all time, behind even junk like Dirge of Cerberus? Why was it outsold a week later by a port of a 13-year-old PS2 Final Fantasy game? Why did Bravely Default nearly match it in sales despite being on just one single portable system with a lower install base? Why did the FF13 series SHRINK by 85% following FF13's launch where most trilogy of games INCREASE as they get better and gain more players?

The Japanese love for Lightning is vastly overstated, and the circumstantial polls conducted don't match the actual sales don't support it. What I'm told is, mainly, she's fun to look at and cosplay, but even people in Japan don't actually love her character.

Sales do not equal popularity. Look at the FF7 compilations. None of them sell ANYWHERE near as much as FF7 despite both CLoud and Zack being top two male FF characters. Dirge of Cerberus sold only 1.7 million copies but it took a year.

Plus look at FF13-2. It started with only 500,000 copies sold initially, but it jumped to 3.1 million copies by the end of the year. Initial sales do not equate to well sold game. Any game can sell poorly initially but the yearly sales are what matters. Persona 4 Golden only sold 108,000 copies initially by Persona fans and it was regarded as the best Persona game ever. But by the end of the year, Atlus was waving around that it sold 700,000 copies in a year and that's about as much as a Persona game sells. Same thing with Xenoblade Chronicles. It sold initially bad at first despite the critical acclaim, but the sales spiked big time by the end of the year. Mario game focus on selling yearly sales instead of intial as well. Square does the same with their games. They don't start parading around their sales until the end of the year.

 

[crimsonspear4D]

y'know, if Yahtzee is still reviewing PS3 games I wonder if he'll ever get to Dragon's Crown? Artistic depictions aside (which I love btw) it's still a whole lot better than most Q1 crap that's out now for the current consoles.

 

[Cybylt]

Lightning keeps coming back because she is Nomura's waifu and he wants to dress her up like that girl at the convention who is trying waaaay too hard to get noticed.

The FF14 crossover set? There's an entire race that looks like that in that game.

Spoiler

When you wear that suit it changes the battle and victory tunes to ones from 14. There's also swords from each of the main regions of the game in 13-3.

Oh, and it's not Nomura, it's Toriyama. Nomura had nothing to do with any 13 except for Versus, which is now 15.

 

[Darth_Payn]

"God is building a better world, with blackjack and hookers..." Did Yahtzee just say God is Bender? Eh, wouldn't be the first time that happened. And why in the name of Cyborg Jesus did they bring back Lightning, the most misnamed character in a JRPG? I know for sure I didn't ask for this.

I expect Adam Jensen to chime in about that any minute now.

 

[SporkySpork]

I've already shared Yahtzee's opinion since watching Two Best Friends shit all over the game. In other news, Bravely Default is the best Final Fantasy since Chrono Trigger, guys.

 

[Artemicion]

I haven't laughed this much at a ZP in a very long time. Well done. I'm a fan of Lightning myself, but I'll be goddamned if all of her dialogue and personality in this installment wasn't penned by a group of high-functioning howler monkeys. The combat and difficulty in the game takes a lot of getting used to but once you understand why game mechanics function the way they do it all sort of comes together to become and incredibly satisfying system.

 

[alvaro barcenass]

I get the feeling by putting a direct time crutch to the game quoted at the first page might be an intentional turn to try and kill it, after all an final fantasy has always been fond of grinding to level up characters or skill, materia, etc. So my conclusion they ayre trying to kill off their franchise for good.

 

[KingdomFantasyXIII]

"God is building a better world, with blackjack and hookers..." Did Yahtzee just say God is Bender? Eh, wouldn't be the first time that happened. And why in the name of Cyborg Jesus did they bring back Lightning, the most misnamed character in a JRPG? I know for sure I didn't ask for this.

I expect Adam Jensen to chime in about that any minute now.

Actually, Lightning's name is a nickname. Her real name is Claire. Plus, Japan and other eastern countries like her a lot. Popularity polls show such. And believe me the "Brood-Loud Mouth-Whiny" trio that make up Lightning-Snow-Hope is popular over there. Just look at the manga Naruto. Sasuke is the brooder, Naruto is the loud mouth and Sakura is the whiner.

I recall seeing a video about a model in Hong Kong dress up in Lightning's XIII-2 outfit and Chinese people were all like "OHMAIGAWD SHE'S SO CUTEI!!!" Eastern people just have such different tastes in what makes a good character than to us.

 

[Ryan Hughes]

Wait, so Chocorodeo, the person literally threatening the lives of about a dozen people on this thread, only got a 3-day suspension? Escapist, ban that person permanently. I do not take kindly to that type of behavior, and it should not be remotely tolerated by the moderators.

I was going to say exactly this.

It's amazing how much people are allowed to get away with here, and still be allowed to come back again.

If you have issues with the Moderation, please contact a member of Staff. Airing your grievances in a thread will not get any attention.

How so? literally. The posts are already hidden, so I doubt flagging them would do anything more. How would I go about contacting or even petitioning a moderator with enough power to permanently -or even IP- ban that joker?

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

On the side of Lightning characterization? The guy who made the games/Lightning character said that she's really popular in Japan. I want to know if that's even true. Is a character that has no character really that popular? Heck, those idiot main characters in harem mangas seem to have more character than Lightning.

She's popular in the way a one-hit wonder rock band is. She's popular. Right now. Sure, she has won polls before, but then you look at the sales of the FF games and realize that maybe those polls aren't as objective as Toriyama wants you to think. She'll inevitably just sink into obscurity along with the rest of the XIII sub-series. As there's really nothing about her that's as iconic as Cloud, Aerith, Tifa, or even Tidus and Yuna. She's just another boring, brooding wannabe badass.

Anyway, I can't be the only one who noticed that this game's plot is essentially a worse version of Valkyrie Profile. You:

A) Play as a woman

B) Tasked by the gods

C) To collect souls

D) Due to the end of the world

E) And you have a limited amount of time to do so

But whereas Valkyrie Profile had a rich world, interesting characters, an intriguing and understandable battle system, and a plot that you could care about, LR has Lightning and is nothing short of a mess. Now that the XIII experiment has flopped, can we move on.

 

[gyrobot_v1legacy]

Hey it's not the first time Toriyama ruined a great name of a franchise that isn't final fantasy...

http://pspmedia.ign.com/psp/image/object/143/14353960/front_mission_evolved_pc_t.jpg

Toriyama penned the story for a great game that was great by itself. But he ruined it with his horrible storywriting.

 

[Alssadar]

Did someone say tolberone?

Spoiler: NSFW

HURTS MY HANDS

 

[MB202]

I'm willing to bet a lot of what he complained about is explained later on, but I honestly don't blame him for not sticking around that long.

 

[sky14kemea]

How so? literally. The posts are already hidden, so I doubt flagging them would do anything more. How would I go about contacting or even petitioning a moderator with enough power to permanently -or even IP- ban that joker?

Well, firstly there's a list of Moderators and Community Managers in the Code of Conduct [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/codeofconduct]. It's right at the bottom, so just scroll down. Each username in that list also links directly to that Moderator or Managers profile, which has a "Send Message" option on already.

There is also a Moderation Team [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/Moderation-Team] user group that is Open To All, which means you do not need prior permission to join. This allows you to join straight away in order to post about a problem with Moderation that you've encountered.

Alternatively, there is the Contact [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/contact/] form that's available directly on the front page that sends an Email directly to the Escapist Staff. On this form there is a drop down menu for the Subject. The options you could use for this situation would be: Forum Posting/Moderation Issues. Which I believe is the 4th option from the top.

 

[Trishbot]

Hey it's not the first time Toriyama ruined a great name of a franchise that isn't final fantasy...

http://pspmedia.ign.com/psp/image/object/143/14353960/front_mission_evolved_pc_t.jpg

Toriyama penned the story for a great game that was great by itself. But he ruined it with his horrible storywriting.

Don't forget how he utterly mangled the Parasite Eve franchise beyond repair and how, under his rule, we wasted an ENTIRE CONSOLE GENERATION on Lightning and her merry band of idiots.

Sales do not equal popularity. Look at the FF7 compilations. None of them sell ANYWHERE near as much as FF7 despite both CLoud and Zack being top two male FF characters. Dirge of Cerberus sold only 1.7 million copies but it took a year.

You'll notice Cloud was never the central character in any of them, and NONE of the games were anywhere near as good as the original. Nobody considered them more than cheaply produced spin-offs, usually on systems like phones and the PSP (which even in Japan didn't have the largest install base), whereas FF7 sold gangbusters on one of the most popular systems of all time. The fact that an utterly atrocious game like Dirge of Cerberus sold over 1.7 millions is actually a miracle and a testament to how much people loved Final Fantasy 7... because the game itself was nearly unplayable.

Plus look at FF13-2. It started with only 500,000 copies sold initially, but it jumped to 3.1 million copies by the end of the year.

Your information is a tad inaccurate. It eventually cracked 1 million sales after TWO years years on the market in Japan. The numbers you mentioned are global, not in its home territory. It took a long while for it to crawl past 1 million here in Japan. There was no sudden "jump" in interest. Even if it was 3 million, that would have still been a catastrophic drop off of players from the original.

Initial sales do not equate to well sold game. Any game can sell poorly initially but the yearly sales are what matters. Persona 4 Golden only sold 108,000 copies initially by Persona fans and it was regarded as the best Persona game ever. But by the end of the year, Atlus was waving around that it sold 700,000 copies in a year and that's about as much as a Persona game sells. Same thing with Xenoblade Chronicles. It sold initially bad at first despite the critical acclaim, but the sales spiked big time by the end of the year. Mario game focus on selling yearly sales instead of intial as well.

You're mostly correct... for games that, as you said, have "critical acclaim". Persona 4 is critically acclaimed. Xenoblade Chronicles is critically acclaimed. Mario games are critically acclaimed.

Lightning Returns is the lowest rated Final Fantasy game in a LONG time, with a paltry 66/100 Metacritic (compared to Persona 4's 93, Xenoblade's 92, and Mario 3D World's 93). There's a REASON those games continued to sell well after soft debuts, because the games themselves were utterly fantastic and positive word of mouth spread like wildfire. That has not been the case for Lightning Returns. Sales in Japan have not remain constant, showed no growth, and are going to bottom out faster than any other FF13 game thus far, easily making it the poorest selling game in the series based on the reception, lack of enthusiasm, and direct competition from better JRPGs (including rereleases of Final Fantasy X and X-2 outselling it).

Lightning Return's spotlight is over. She burned bright and brief, but already eyes have turned from her and the series to the inevitable Final Fantasy 15.

 

[Thanatos2k]

Even worse, this same idiot is the guy who really thought FFX would benefit from playing dress up with the girls in Final Fantasy X-2... and then AGAIN in The 3rd Birthday (yes, he's the monster responsible for that abomination of a game). And then AGAIN in Lightning Returns.

He's made three games now taking otherwise strong female characters in earlier games, and reduced them to cosplaying fetish dolls with increasingly skimpy and implausible outfits. THREE TIMES he's done this.

I mean, Kojima gets away being a creepy old man now in his games because he's made some really good games in the past.

Has Toriyama made a SINGLE good game?

You'll notice Cloud was never the central character in any of them, and NONE of the games were anywhere near as good as the original. Nobody considered them more than cheaply produced spin-offs, usually on systems like phones and the PSP (which even in Japan didn't have the largest install base), whereas FF7 sold gangbusters on one of the most popular systems of all time. The fact that an utterly atrocious game like Dirge of Cerberus sold over 1.7 millions is actually a miracle and a testament to how much people loved Final Fantasy 7... because the game itself was nearly unplayable.

Seriously. Also there *was* something released where Cloud was front and center the main character again: Advent Children, which sold 400k+ in the first week (more than FF13-3 lol) and over 4.1 MILLION worldwide. So yeah, Cloud is definitively more popular.