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Originally posted by: honda_insightful
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Originally posted by: Bill
"FF7/9/10 are some of the best Final Fantasies made to date"
Terranigma is the best Enix game ever made.
Re-read my post. Terranigma is not a Final Fantasy game.
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Originally posted by: KDR_11k
If I compare games like ff5 and ff8 (the only ones I played)...
How can you properly compare pre-Sony and post-Sony when you only have two data points? Totally stupid. FF8 is a lousy game. But FF7/9/10 are totally awesome games. Go play the GOOD games, collect more data, and *then* make a conclusion.
Anyway, I was thinking about this message last night, and I suddenly realized that it was NINTENDO who was heavy-handed with Square. Nintendo:
(1) Forced Square to rename their games. FF4/6 were renamed FF2/3 by Nintendo.
(2) Forced Square to change character names to more "acceptable" formats (rather than keep the original names).
(3) Nintendo compromised story integrity by removing all of Square's references to adult & sexually suggestive ideas.
Sony has actually given Square MORE freedom in developing the Final Fantasy games... which is likely the real reason Square abandoned Nintendo. Square was tired of Nintendo constantly re-naming, re-working, re-writing their FF stories.
It actually quite true about Square's old-school FF games being quite different from their original Japanese versions. For example, right now I'm playing an FF4 ROM with a translation patch, so I could see for myself the things that were changed, and there were quite a few; Cecil and Rosa are sleeping together and not just childhood sweethearts, Baron kills any opposers to their empire, Cecil actually uses the Dark Sword in the Japanese version, etc. But some things to consider:
- Square changes the names of characters for Americans willingly, not because they were censored. Think about it, using FF6 as an example; Mash doesn't sound right to us, yet Sabin sounds badass. Lock seems kinda cliched (because he's a thief, he picks locks...) so they added an extra "e" on the end and it's Locke, which sounds better IMO. In FF4, Kain's original name is Cain, but they WILLINGLY changed it, now the official name is Kain.
- Square also renamed their games because they wouldn't make sense to us. Back in the day, thay basically thought we were too stupid to understand RPGs (thus the "easy type" of FF4 with hints, easier monsters, bastardized script like "Karate Man" instead of "Monk", etc.) and so they were reluctant to release those games here. Therefore, when they did bring one here, it had in actuality two sequels behind it. That's why the American versions had different names until 7.
- On the topic of sexual themes, they edited them because Americans are much more strict with censorship than Japanese, and Japanese children have a different understanding of sexuality and such, so it's not offensive to them. So again, Nintendo didn't force them, Square did it willingly to get their games overseas; games like original FF4 would've never made it to the US otherwise, until the PlayStation era where more teenagers played games and America's views of stuff like sex and violence were changing. And even now, there is a level of discretion...do you think that if Xenogears, another Square game, had been a mainstream game instead of a little known game, it would've gotten away with half of the stuff in it?
Anyway, the moral of the story is, Nintendo didn't force anyone to edit the games, Square themselved did it to avoid having them pulled from the shelves or argued about. To this day they edit their games for specific audiences; check out the opening of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, then look at the Japanese version's opening, with drunken Cid stumbling around offering Mewt a beer...
Oh and BTW, just because the guy only played FF5 and FF8 doesn't mean he doesn't have a good idea of how good the series is. You think that FF8 sucks, but he doesn't, just like I think that FF6 sucks and FF8 is good, and you don't. It's an opinion thing.
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