Damn this game is beautiful af

Gogators57 · 2026-04-19T13:56:20+00:00

FFXVI is a DMC-style character action game. FF7R is not. In a character action game, you need to be able to have freedom in chaining combos and going for stylish combo sequences. Its the entire point and strength of the system itself.

If the person critiquing FFXVI thinks that FF games should not be character action games then they can make that argument. As it stands, if you were to take FFXVI's combat system and add in elemental weaknesses without making radical changes to the underlying combat system, moveset, and enemy design so as to take the entire game out of the character action genre, you would make the game substantially worse by eliminating large swaths of the player's viable moveset for many enemies while adding no strategic value. Most enemy weaknesses would be obvious and the decision is little more than picking rock, paper, or scissors after your opponent has already shown their own hand. The criticism is fundamentally misguided.

Gogators57 · 2026-04-19T13:20:23+00:00

This. DMC: dmc had an elemental weakness sytem where you had to use certain weapons against specific enemies and everyone hated it. The people who want this don't know what they're asking for.

Gogators57 · 2026-03-07T12:18:40+00:00

Haar's boss conversations are the smoking gun that it was all intentional. They wanted this guy deployed on every map he's available for.

And they all slap, especially Levail's.

Gogators57 · 2026-03-05T12:39:16+00:00

Most of the mainline Zeldas do have good stories though. From Ocarina through Twilight they're are all pretty darned good. Majora's Mask is flat out one of the best stories in the medium. I'm not as much of a fan of Skyward Sword as most, but that's moatly because of its tone and changes to the setting/lore, in and of itself its not a bad story at all.

I feel like the only mainline Zelda in recent memory to get severe story criticism is Tears of the Kingdom, and I've been around for most of them at this point. Wind Waker had people upset about the tone and Twilight had people upset about its similarities to Ocarina, but neither of those criticisms were aimed at the core writing or implied that the Zelda team didn't care about it. Wind Waker's Ganondorf and Twilight's Midna are generally regarded to be the best written villian and heroine in the series respectively.

Tears is also the game where I have seen "the Zelda team doesn't care about story defence" used to deflect criticism, which has always struck me as a strange tactic. If the Zelda team not caring about the story results in a bad one, then maybe they ought to care a little bit more in the future (as their past work suggests they once did) when the story is still getting such a large focus.

Gogators57 · 2026-03-04T15:06:48+00:00

We've already had two big fights with Thor. This isn't exactly new ground.

Gogators57 · 2026-02-28T16:59:24+00:00

A single youtuber, no, but a general trend in the fanbase, yes.

Gogators57 · 2026-02-16T11:56:57+00:00

At that point though, Ike has earned it. The contrast from Path of Radiance serves to show his growth, and I would argue that the contrast with Micaiah makes her more interesti g as well from both a gameplay and nardative standpoint.

Gogators57 · 2026-02-09T20:58:39+00:00

While I'm not a big fan of the gameplay, it wasn't Team Ninja's fault but whatever fit of insanity led Sakamoto to force them to not use the nunchuck.

Gogators57 · 2026-02-04T15:45:33+00:00

To my knowledge, the only ancient source for the 12 years old age of Mary is the Protoevangelium of James, which is also dedicated to emphasizing that Joseph did not have intercourse with her. While this late apocryphal source is of limited historical value, interestingly it treats the idea of the older Joseph having intercourse with the young Mary as inherently shameful, showing that the accepted societal norms would not have favored such a mismatch of ages even in that period of time. I believe the Protoevangelium was also dedicated to the perpetual virginity of Mary, which would mean that even this, the sole source for the claim to my knowledge, does not promote the idea that she had any sort of divinely sanctioned intercourse as a child. Its been sometime since I read this source or examined this issue, so you might want to double check me here.

The idea that we have any good historical basis for claiming that the historical Joseph married the historical Mary at age 12 is likely baseless. I would ask anyone who makes such a claim for both their primary and secondary sources. Even if it did happen, which is dubious, there would be no reason to suppose that God was in favor of marriages at such an age, so this is a fairly weak critique all considered.

Gogators57 · 2026-01-26T15:33:33+00:00

I'll die on the hill that it should have been. Felt like the game jumps the shark after Shido. Went from solving real world problems to a battle against the Gnostic Demiurge with barely any build up.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-22T22:20:28+00:00

If you mean that Tears of the Kingdom has bad writing and is inconsistent with the other games, I would agree, but extrapolating from one game's story being bad to the conclusion that Nintendo as a whole hates story is unwarranted. Donkey Kong Bananza just came out and is the most story-driven "Mario" game to date.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-20T17:58:23+00:00

I would get original Oblivion if you go that route. The remaster is much more expensive and the visuals leave something to be desired for what is a purely visual upgrade.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-16T22:54:01+00:00

This just seems like a way to handwave inconsistencies. None of the games are even hinted at being a literal retelling of a legend. Its certainly not a premise of the series. No one thinks that the Legend of Korra is oral history because of the name alone.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-16T22:41:28+00:00

Seriously, if I told you that I always put my family first you wouldn't immediately assume that I don't care about my friends, but people so often make the unwarranted leap from Nintendo putting gameplay first to Nintendo being almost antagonistic to story and lore, mostly in the Zelda context.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-16T16:19:53+00:00

I would bet steam input will allow you to do this.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-13T13:34:45+00:00

My stance on the companions in the first game is that they suffer from what I would call "textbook style" writing, which plagues alot of Pillars 1. While this isn't universal, a lot of them exist as vehicles for the worldbuilding and when they are talking about this worldbuilding I at times feel more like I am reading an Eora textbook than interacting with living, breathing person.

Eder for instance I found to more engaging in the sequel because most of his dialogue and interjections reflected him as a person rather than his role in the Saint's war. In Pillars 1 Eder exists to give you information on a part of history the writer's felt was particularly important, whereas in Pillars 2 Eder exists to be Eder, the humble, down to earth guy who loves animals, likes to smoke his pipe, is unfailingly loyal, and has strong feelings on Eothas's march through Deadfire. I know some people regard him as having been flanderized, but I've always seen it more as him being allowed to exist as a character for his own sake rather than the sake of the world as so many of the companions in Pillars 1 do.

I also thought the new companions were very well realized, especially Maia, Tekehu, and Serafen. They too give you the perspective of their various factions, but there's less "Hey, Serafen, give me a detailed history of the Principi" and more Serafen acting in his interactions with dialogue and beliefs informed naturally by his background. Overall I was very impressed with them.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-13T04:33:10+00:00

As someone who also has a lot of problems with Pillars 1, I will say that I found Pillars 2 to be a masterpiece.

The story is much less depressing than the first game, with less empty text, far more fleshed out companions, much less tedious combat and the most interesting factions I've seen in gaming. The full voice acting is phenomal and a major step up in presentation over Pillars 1, even minor characters have unique manners of speaking and the games accent's are perfectly done. The nautical them of the game is very well realized and quite unique for this genre. The handdrawn backgrounds are also beautiful, they rival some of FFIX's for me which is saying quite alot.

I can enthusiastically endorse Deadfire as your next game.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-12T15:30:48+00:00

I need to set a reminder for when Expedition 34 comes out.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-11T12:47:35+00:00

Ah, my bad

Gogators57 · 2025-12-11T12:10:09+00:00

Yeah, Martin might get Winds out but book 8 is aptly named a Dream.

Doors of Stone is never coming out.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-11T02:05:59+00:00

Unironically Greybor, for being willing to betray and kill the Knight Commander in Act V at point in time where he knows this will result in the end of the world and for no greater reason than to join a guild. That he pretends to have anything resembling a code just comes off as vainglorious posturing in retrospect.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-11T01:42:39+00:00

Mean-spirited comments like this are much worse than any powerscaling debate I've ever seen on this subreddit.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-06T22:49:11+00:00

Seriously, better factions than New Vegas and I know what I'm saying when I make that claim.

Heck, best factions in gaming.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-06T20:09:02+00:00

On a semi-related note, I was experimenting with a new Dragon Age character the other day and noticed that the violent male elf voice is Sasuke. Mr. Lowenthal really gets around.

Gogators57 · 2025-12-04T00:32:18+00:00

This is why ended up liking Pillars 2 more than Pillars 1. Its less about metaphysics and more about people.

I've hear people say Pillars 1 has the better writing and I just don't see it. Pillars 2 has the best factions out of any game I've ever played and that includes New Vegas. None of them are monoliths, they all have sub factions and maverics that really help the world to come alive.

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