Press B 12: Final Fantasy 6 vs 7

Everyone knows them. Everyone loves them. Final Fantasy 6 & 7
each hold a dear place in many gamer hearts. This episode we
examine what makes them so different, yet so similar.





Episode Transcript: The below is a machine based transcription of
this episode. Sorta like Skynet if it was 2 years old, and wanted
a cookie. Take it with a grain of salt.


Palsh 0:00
Tara or Tifa Eris or Eric Celeste or sell us today on Press B to
Cancel. Mm hmm.


Palsh 0:14
Oh wait, I don't know how our actual song goes because I


Jake 0:18
already have a dream crowd


Jake 0:19
right now.


Palsh 0:43
So guys, welcome. I am post one and nine. Today we are going to
talk about Final Fantasy six and Final Fantasy seven. With me I
have the council as I like to call them and I'm trying to make it
stick so hopefully it'll stick. I have


Jake 1:03
Sic Jake Hey, glad to be here. We have


Palsh 1:03
wereWulff Hay ho. And we have guy prime.


GP 1:06
I think I have to go with Rosa, Final Fantasy four. Thank you.
Deal. Okay,


Palsh 1:11
so yeah, let's just switch that skill straight into Final Fantasy
four instead. Let's talk about some Final Fantasy six and Final
Fantasy seven day that I think we're all for the most part Final
Fantasy fans in here in the council. Anybody want to argue
against that? Or state against that?


GP 1:31
And hold it against you? Hi.


Wulff 1:33
Okay. I am but depends on the game. Yeah, that's fair. So


Palsh 1:38
let's just try to talk a little objectively between the
differences between six and seven. There's been a lot of, you
know, debate on what is the greatest Final Fantasy game and seven
of course is at the top of most people's lists. For me, it's not
my just for argument's sake, mine personal Favorite is for but I
think the best game is six. Haven't you? GP?


GP 2:06
I'm with you Final Fantasy for actually my favorites. I Oh, yes I
think I do have to give a bit of an edge to Final Fantasy six
over seven


Palsh 2:17
edges in for about that six.


GP 2:20
Oh god that was good. Well done okay


Palsh 2:22
about Jake


Jake 2:25
you know like I've been as a kid I used to love the Final Fantasy
games and I like to say that I still like them. But I tried
playing seven recently and I tried playing for recently and I hit
a wall on for why just just so dissatisfied with it. So I don't
know if I'm still a fan of the series anymore.


Palsh 2:44
That's fair. I mean, I've I went through seven and I was kind of
a little bit of a grind for me, but I rushed through so I'm you
know, it could have been a whole lot worse when you were


Wulff 2:57
four is my favorite out of the


Wulff 3:00
franchise, but I know it's not objectively the best. And from the
ones I've played, I gotta give that one to six over seven for
sure.


Palsh 3:08
So I think we're pretty much on par with it here. Jake's kind of
got the same feelings as me here for seven. But in my research
now over the last couple of weeks, just trying to prepare for
this podcast episode here, I kind of got a lot more respect for
the things that seven is done. I mean, I had a lot of respect,
but there's, it's kind of cemented now. So six is a lot of stuff.
There's so many things about it that I can talk about for days
and days. It's like it says, not my favorite, but it might as
well be my favorite because there's so much great about it. Seven
i think is great for different reasons. It became what made role
playing games in North America, like socially acceptable. They
added things into it that made a role playing games just not you
know, turn based combat and nothing else. There was cool like bed
and MB badass fmvs there was many games, you know, there's
different systems and stuff that you could customize more and it
was a little bit less glitchy then, you know, Final Fantasy six,
at least as we saw s3 in North America was one of your earliest
memories of either six or seven. I just want to see which ones
pop out more. So what would you rather talk about really quickly?
GP?


GP 4:27
Okay, okay, I'm going to talk about seven. Because I want to
embarrass myself with a quick story. I got I got the game and my
PlayStation one for Christmas 1997. I started off, did not know
that I needed to have a memory card. So that was fun. We figured
that out eventually. Fast forward. I'm addicted as I made that
mistake to Final Fantasy seven. I get to the temple of the
ancients. I don't realize that the clock. You have to use it as a
bridge. So I'm trying every company


GP 5:00
nation of every fucking time and then going back through the rest
of the temple trying to see if anything has changed, spent 65
hours alone in that temple and wreck the rest of the game as soon
as I got out.


Palsh 5:15
Are you? Are you trolling with us again? That was That


GP 5:19
story is 100% true. The second time I played it, I went back and
got all the materials, but by the time I got out, I'm like, fuck
it. I just want to beat the game. But 65 hours in the temple of
the ancients. Even today when I go back and replay it, I have to
mute it because I cannot hear that music anymore. Yeah.


Palsh 5:40
Ouch. Well, dedication. I appreciate that. wereWulff. How about
you? Which one stands out to you right now?


Wulff 5:47
I'm six. It's It's gotta be that opera.


Palsh 5:51
Oh, yeah. That's, I'm not gonna argue with that.


Wulff 5:55
If there's a standout moment in either of those games, it's the
opera.


Palsh 6:00
You don't even need to talk about earlier because it's just like
one of those. Like,


GP 6:05
I'm not going to be rude here because you guys just let me tell
my story but not not the Kefka


Wulff 6:09
battle that's not what stood out. Know you the first time you're
going through that game, especially back then, you know when
Yeah. And and now when you're playing through it when you
understand the limitations of the hardware at the time, the fact
that they still managed to make an opera segment that actually
felt kind of like it was like an actual opera that you're just
watching in 16 bit. That is impressive as hell to me. Yeah. And
the fact that all the lyrics fit with the, the sound and tempo of
the music. Okay, yeah, it did such a good job and, you know, a
little, I don't know, 1213 year old me I got actual chills when I
was watching. I was like, This is awesome. Like, I totally nerd
it out.


Palsh 6:56
I never realized until doing my research either that


Palsh 7:00
It's a metaphor for what's going on in the world too. I was like,
oh, wow, so that kind of blew my mind. Yeah, at 35 years old.


Palsh 7:10
So, Jake, how about you?


Jake 7:13
Yeah, I mean, for me it was also found 96 I think I mean, I own
the first game is one the first. Probably the first JRPG I played
as a kid was the first Final Fantasy, and I borrow the second for
my friend all the damn time. So when the third was coming out, I
saved my pennies and I wanted to get it. But that car was
expensive and that's my most vivid memory of that game.


Jake 7:35
Well, okay, so in Canada, I don't


Palsh 7:37
have enough pennies.


Jake 7:38
Amen. Canadian poor, but they're up here we had a store called
consumers distributing which is an interesting store. And the way
it works, you walked in it was like a like a warehouse type store
and a small front area and he filled little index card with the
number of the item you want. So I went in there as a kid, and
then you know, put the number four Final Fantasy three in the on
the paper and I hand it to him.


Jake 8:00
earrings it up $90. This is Canadian, but $90 for the 90s. It's
an expensive cart. And then it comes out on this little conveyor
belt and there's just flies down. And then they hand it to you as
a very odd experience. That's how I bought video games and then
nothing keys. And that vaguely reminds me of toys r us when I was
a kid, or were they similar back then. Back then we would go into
Toys R Us, at least for like big ticket items or expensive items
that were small like video games, bikes, that sort of thing.
You'd go over to where you wanted it, find the tag for it, pull
out the paper, take it up front, ring it up, and they'd send it
out on a conveyor belt conveyor belt after you purchased it.
You'd have to take it over to the counter for getting your item
come out of conveyor belt and you're on your way. It's such a
weird contrast to today with Amazon where shit like that gets
dropped to my doorstep.


Jake 8:57
Like but like you music and finally six is The absolute standout
and for me, it was the various character themes, which I'm sure
we'll talk about, but I love the music and film a six and it's so
impactful. I mean, I like seven, two, but six was my standout
memory.


Palsh 9:11
I like that. I'm going to go with seven just just for that I like
six better I but I'm going to say that I haven't played six as
much as I've played seven, but I like six better. That makes no
sense to me. But I remember in high school, borrowing it from my
friend and played it for hours and hours and hours. I mean, I had
I think three or four master magic materias I had a double master
summon, I had all of them except for I think was the yellow one
because that was ridiculous to get. I played past the point of
where the game actually registers how long you've been playing
because it kind of resets itself after 100 hours. I think the
number would change so it'd be like flashing yellow or something
to show that you already went over 100 hours and then after You
went over 200 I think is how it worked, they would just kind of
just max out at like 9999 or whatever. And so I have no idea how
many hours I actually killed just leveling everybody up to a
level 100 So, for for a game that I loved in high school, I
really I think I burnt myself out on it because I really felt the
need to play it since. But I have in the last year and I played
it on stream actually and I kind of did the quick way through.
And I got through by the skin of my teeth. So, ya know, so
there's a lot of things going on in both six and seven stories
are just, there's so much different. They can have so many
similar themes, but six I find resonates more for me. I don't
know about you guys, but for me, it's just it feels like more of
a personal story because, you know, the world is it seems like
smaller, you know, all the towns that you go in are little, you
know, little spots, you know, little villages kind of thing and,
you know, there's a hardware limitation First off, but Know you
supposed to be still a big world? And I think they did with the
ps1, I think they were able to kind of give you a bigger scale,
the futuristic, you know, the steampunk angle and stuff like
that, and then you get outside of Midgar. And everything else is
more classic Final Fantasy. I found like that was a big shift for
me and it really threw me off a lot. So


Jake 11:23
were you disappointed after a big car because they spent so much
time I mean practically the first disc on midcard and it's such a
flushed out and it feels like a huge city. And then when you're
done with that mid garriga on the world map, nothing quite
compares that first city.


Palsh 11:39
I think I know what you're talking about there. But for me I was
because I was spent so much time in there. I thought it was going
to be like oh my god is everything going to be this intense. But
uh, no, when we got out of it, finally I was I was kind of
relieved because I was like, Okay, now this is where I want to
be. I want to I want to kill stuff and ride chocobos and so it
wasn't so big a deal, but I I think that's part of what made it
so integral is how much time you actually spend in Midgar. So
when you finally get out and realize there's a whole different
world besides the city, then you know, it's kind of cool. It's
just like, oh, wow, you know, what else is this game when I offer
so


GP 12:14
it's kind of like the matrix. So once you get out of mid Gar,
everything changes from those, like dark green and dirty kind of
colors into the clear, you know, clean green of the grass, and
then they finally introduce blue into the color palette. You know
what I mean? Like you have the sky you have the ocean, and it
feels cleaner. Like, you know, you understand it's a video game.
Your characters are real, but you can breathe better. Now that
you're out of mid Gar.


Wulff 12:45
Yeah, mid guard did a really good job of conveying that. This
city is just so polluted and smogged up and corrupted, and it's a
mess. Exactly.


Palsh 12:59
So It's I think they needed that, which was really cool. And they
did such a great job like it's not a small feat for you to get at
Midgar I mean, how many hours do you have plugged into the game?
It starts a whole lot faster with Final Fantasy six you jump in,
you don't know what's going on, you know, they they get your
attention in similar ways you start out beginning of six
controlling Tara and the magitek nights there and she's gone you
know if you don't know what's going on and question yes how many
questions and all of a sudden in seven this the same thing you're
about to blow up a reactor kind of deal and you're like, what's,
what's going on? So they start off very similar in the way that
you know, you don't know what's going on and you're trying to
piece it together as you go along.


Palsh 13:48
It's it's interesting because some of the things that made it so
well received in seven are a lot of the things that spawned off
of six you know materia system


Palsh 14:00
is a natural progression A lot of people say for coming from
espers, you know, is lot more strategy involved. It was a lot
more polished obviously. But they had so much in common with each
other. I mean espers were basically permanent materia. You know,
you could learn your spells, keep them, but materia required you
to strategize more so like that's, that's something in its favor,
or seven that I really never thought of before. metiria


Wulff 14:26
had strategy in, you know, material choices as well as material
synergies.


Palsh 14:34
Exactly. So there's different ways you could play it like if you
played through six, you know, this is probably the only complaint
I have about six is that everybody becomes a major. You get
everyone you know, you teach Stephen or seven as I always called
him. You teach him Ultima and then never use it because you're
too busy, you know, bomb trains. Yeah, exactly. It's weird
because you It's a little bit more typical older style generation
game for six, because you could still do that grind, you could
still teach everybody, every spell you need to do. You can do
that in seven to a degree, but it's a different way of doing it.
Like you can pass it on to another character. So you can have
another character instead of, you know, having to do the same
thing over with each character. So it's, it's a different
experience, but I thought it was, I don't want to say a better
one. I think statistically, it might be but I mean, like, I'm
just a naspers fan. I like to


Jake 15:36
see for me I when it came to the espers I didn't feel a need to
Maximo. I mean, I played six a few times over the years and I
never really felt the need to grind for spells for everybody or
at least didn't feel like much of a grind. Whereas materials
seven I felt especially toward the end game when you want to get
certain material maxed out in order to duplicate that took that
was a grindy I didn't like that at all. I felt as a little bit
much leveling the materia I did not like it all, I felt that too
grindy I guess is the way to sum it up. I also for the espers.
But I also found metiria as a, as a gameplay mechanic was
probably superior. And just like will set with synergies. The
customization aspect was really interesting that I don't think
they really kind of went all the way they should have whether
they could have done more with it. The best example of Materia I
think being done well, is a game called Path of Exile, which they
do their skills similar to metiria, where you can take a Firebase
skill and attach, you know, a sex another gem called split,
suddenly that fireball splits into two. Or you can attach an ice
effect to that fire spell. Suddenly, it's an ice fireball. Like
that kind of mechanic and Path of Exile is something I really
wish we had back in fontys seven, where you could do more with
the materia


Palsh 16:54
Yeah, that's that sounds really cool actually.


Wulff 16:57
Another thing to consider with six is and


Wulff 17:00
The espers versus materia is metiria kind of took not just the
espers, but also a lot of the relics from six and melded them
into one function. Do you want to give an example here for
anybody? Yeah. So what there was, I don't remember the names of
the relics from six anymore. It's been so long, but you'd get a
relic that would make it so you'd attack four times or something,
right. So that Yeah, there you go. So you to equip that and then
you do a big attack like that. And so stuff like that got turned
into metiria. But then, so did the big spell chains like the big
blood sagas and fire ragas and things like that. Those also got
dumped into a metiria. So it sort of meshed two systems that were
very broad strokes into one system with a finer brush, so I do
think materia on the whole


Wulff 17:59
was a much more focused mechanic than espers. But then you also
had a much smaller set of characters.


Palsh 18:11
Yeah, I like


Wulff 18:12
with that though it probably made the game that's that's probably
what made the game at least if it wasn't less grindy seamless
grindy because you were doing things, you weren't maxing out
espers for every single character, you were, that the material
could be transferred from character to character in the party,
and it would still maintain its level that it had before.


Palsh 18:36
Right. And that's, that's the thing like it ended up becoming a
point where you can pass it off to somebody so if somebody in
your party died, still kind of pissed about that boiler, please.
I'm not saying names okay. I'm just saying, but I mean, there's
there's different points in the game where your characters leave
like, you know, Eris is gone at one point, you know, maybe
Forever maybe not, you know no cloud is the main character
arguably of the entire game and you know you lose him Tifa leaves
to go with cloud at one point you know, so characters leave in
the party and you know what would happen if if I had if I had a
group of just cloud Tifa and Eris or error then you know you'd be
screwed but you can take their take their material put it on
another character and go and it's not a like a game changer
anymore. So you can you know, you have to learn you have to
adjust to it but it's not going to like ruin your experience.
It's kind of like you would lose characters in six as well my you
know, especially when you have to get them all back in the world
of ruined later on. But at the same time, it's a little bit
different because you know, the way the leveling scaled you know,
if you if you grind it ahead of time, everybody else that you get
further down the line or kind of on par with who you already have
It's a little bit isn't actually it's a lot more lenient, but it
can be a lot more grinding depending on how you play.


GP 20:06
So I want to interject and just kind of make a point here about
both Final Fantasy six and seven. I know we're contrasting them
but in one way that they are the same. I think they are the two
in my opinion of the kind of classic series will say up to like
nine or 10 the grind deist of the games, but I find that the
grind in both of the games is entertaining six for its own
reasons, you know, you can just make every age


GP 20:33
but with the thing about seven The reason I like seven so much.
With the end here we are halfway through the show, I'm
considering changing my my camp and saying Final Fantasy seven
because now I've got an urge to play it.


GP 20:47
But the thing about the materia system is if you know what you're
doing and you know where to go and you know what to equip and how
do we equip it. Grinding is not that bad. There are weapons and
armor out there. That will give you


GP 21:00
twice and triple the, you know, AP or whatever they go toward
that, or there are areas where you don't get experienced, but you
get a buttload of AP. And, you know, there's likewise similarly
again in six and seven parts of the game, where once you get to
this, this part, you realize there's nothing that you have to do,
you can just go and grind if you want to. And, to me, that's,
that's brilliant, they leave you the open window, and they say
you have access, you know, now to the entirety of the world. go
explore find out how to do this, or spend, you know, 200 hours
doing it, you know, or don't, it's completely up to you. But
first grindy as both six and seven can be, I don't get bored with
that part of the game. I get bored with other parts of the games,
but never, never the grind. And I think that's part of the
brilliant thing about the one thing with the grind for probably
seven specifically is so


Jake 22:00
Specially toward the late game. You want to use the summons to
nuke everything when you're doing fast battles, but it's not as
bad as a seven those summons are really long. How did you find
those? Wasn't


Wulff 22:15
Knights of the Round something like a minute and 30 seconds or
something like that?


GP 22:19
Unless you do dual cast Quadro magic and then it's all afternoon.
It's more time so No, you're right. They're very cinematic and
they are breathtaking and for the time beautiful. But yeah, once
you you spam them, you know four times in a row twice. They lose
their charm. You're exactly right. Yeah, Bahamas


Jake 22:38
Can you please stop love the earth and give me a short, short
one, please just just for your family.


GP 22:44
When you're 14 years old, and you have an opportunity to see
Shiva, eight times you use that Oh, baby.


Palsh 22:51
Thank you. Thank you. All right, she's still my favorite this
day. Now I'm gonna be thinking about Shiva for the rest of the
episode. So thanks there. Okay, so What where to go from here?


Wulff 23:00
All right. Let me let me take it for a moment. I'd like to say
that, you know, I, I know I ruffle a lot of feathers because a I
talk a lot about how I'm not the biggest fan of seven when seven
comes up. I for everything it gets, right. And it does, it gets a
lot, right. The biggest and most important shortcoming for me
with that game is it is a 90 hour pity party. I can't deal with
that much. That don't get me wrong. First time I played through
the game. I was enthralled. Everything was awesome. To me. It was
a wonderful experience. It changed how our PGS were presented.
And what was expected of JRPGs. Great, you know, but it's just 90
hours of constant sadness. know my story said no, my story said,
and yeah, there's the little bits of quirky in there like you can
make cloud and bear it go on a date at the gold saucer but I
mean, there's there's never a moment that's like yes, this is
awesome. You know? It's it's always just like God, everybody so
sad


Jake 24:14
clouds whiny to just evoke whiny


GP 24:18
yeah I don't disagree with you except for one part I will say I
think the weakest part of Final Fantasy seven is cloud and his
story everybody else's stories make some sense and all that kind
of stuff, but there's a lot of big question marks that aren't
very cohesive with cloud and he's so angsty and not a great
leader, but he's the protagonist. But the one thing I disagree
with you the most on on what you just said, Well, as you said,
you know, one of the weaknesses there compared to six is how sad
everybody's story is. Final Fantasy six as the most heart
wrenching, backstories, setser, cyan there has never been a more
tragic story than science story if you ask me. I don't disagree
with you. But you have points in that story where those
characters are not constantly in a low you know there are there
are a lot of points in six that are you know upbeat and not
necessarily to ever seem happy


Wulff 25:14
not necessarily but upbeat you know, it's it's a moment that's
not about the sadness there are points that are like, crap we got
to get this done. This is you know, this is awesome. This is
epic. This is amazing. You know, this is adventure. Seven never
felt like adventure to me.


GP 25:35
I thought it was plenty adventure, but you're right, even going
into the final battle. Cloud is like, Well, here we are. I guess
we might mosey? Yeah. Let's mosey. Yeah. Yeah. He's not the most
effective protagonist and I do find that to be one of the bigger
weaknesses of seven.


Palsh 25:50
You brought up two good points there both of you actually. And
one, I'm gonna I want to address one real quick because the
quicker of the two but I want to say like, I think Six has a has
an advantage, I'm being a lot more positive and upbeat
considering the graphics and the you know the overall art.
Because, you know, the it's pixel art, you know, it's it's
cartoony it's it's limited, they're trying to go for something
more serious with seven they're trying to make it more dark and
gloomy. So I think you're totally right though like it
everybody's always on a down note, you know, said I was a
cantankerous old geezer because you never get to go to the moon.
You know, Vincent was beating himself and braiding himself and
locked himself in a coffin because he couldn't do it couldn't
save the woman love, you know, all these everybody has this heart
wrenching story and, you know, these are the reasons why they're
fighting. But well, I mean, that's so much said but, but
everybody has a reason to go against Shinra everybody has a
reason to stick around in six because they all want to save the
world from Kefka because, you know, everybody has a reason behind
it. You know, cyan like I said, This is probably the most heart
wrenching, and I never realized it until now. But yeah, that's,
you know, he's, he's trying, he's trying to go for that. So all
this stuff I think with the art is what I'm trying to get at is
that, you know, the graphics of six, were there more chibi style,
they're more cartoony they're more pixel as opposed to trying to
go for something more serious with seven I think that in his
favor there because it kind of makes the light hearted moments
more light and then you kind of have to use your imagination more
for when things get darker. Because I mean, when I was a kid, and
I saw Kefka coming, I was like, this guy's a fucking asshole. And
I didn't like I'm just like he's a


Jake 27:40
joker but he's bad.


Palsh 27:42
Yeah, but exactly, but like I didn't respect it as much as a kid
but now that I look at it, I'm like, okay, you have that theater
in your mind like GP says and you know, it makes you think about
it and say, This guy is crazy. You know, he's not just like
wearing a clown makeup and just kind of nuts. He's


Wulff 28:00
Pure villain you know with the art style you have to kind of fill
in the blanks is what I'm trying to say. But see in seven you
don't get the the quite so quirky relationships that you get in
six. I mean you you get the you know they all have sad stories
let's let's take Gao for example. I mean poor kid he grew up in
the while he was basically raised by wolves. And, you know, never
knew his parents speaks poorly. He barely speaks, but his
relationship with cyan and saben it's it's not only heartwarming,
it's also hilarious. Yeah, they took a sad character and made him
not make you go God, this poor kid, this poor kid, this poor kid.


Wulff 28:51
I mean,


Jake 28:52
I don't think I was a sad story. I agree. You have this kid. He
goes out in the wilderness. He's battling monsters. He's
basically a Pokemon trainer. Everybody praises ash and bread and
Pokemon is like this great character guy was ash


GP 29:06
here's here's exactly why Gao


GP 29:13
okay it's not the girl is fighting the monsters he's living
amongst and learning their stuff and then once you feed him beef
jerky that's all you have to do to get him to turn on them
because then he will go and kill everybody he just ran with like
he's a liability is all I'm saying you better hope nobody else
has beef jerky or your whole crew is gone.


Palsh 29:33
I'm scared of Gavin now I love galax


GP 29:35
I love God. There's that there's that tragic thing about you
know, being separated from his parents living in the wilderness.
But he's never a character that feels bad for himself. Cloud
feels bad for himself every moment of every second even when
staring at diva he's like I'm sad that you're hot.


Wulff 29:52
And and if I'm my favorite character in seven is Barrett because
as sad as he is and as sad as his story. He's always trying to
find the silver lining. He's always trying to be upbeat. He's
he's trying to raise marleen to not see the world as the piece of
crap that it is, or at


GP 30:12
least identify the pieces of crap. Instead of saying everything
sucks, being like, No, it's just Shinra.


Wulff 30:19
Everyone. I mean,


Jake 30:20
there's always angry though.


Wulff 30:22
He's angry because he feels the need to fight for his righteous
anger. Even when I was a teenager playing this when it first came
out. I saw that and I loved that about that character. But I
think cloud is just like, how can you just not all the time?


Jake 30:41
like I do, but he's always so angry like cloud. Why don't you
care? I'm so angry. You don't care. Marlene I'm so angry my
glasses and I


Wulff 30:52
again, I suspect part of that is because of, I think some of it
is just how much anime


Wulff 30:59
style, they rubbed on the story. But I also think part of it is
translation.


GP 31:04
Well, but also think about this. They the characters didn't
really have faces. They didn't have facial expressions because of
the limitations. They had shape, but they didn't have faces. So
you think about the script and then like the animations of
Barrett whenever he gets mad, he shakes his fist and you can see
him trembling. That gives it a little bit more drama because you
can't see the anger on his face. You can read the words in the
script and know that he's he's cussing and know that he's
shaking. And yeah, you kind of take over that said, I do you guys
know the extra Craig Robinson. I imagined he is Barrett. So even
when he's angry, it still has that edge to it of, I'm going to
try to make everything okay, but this sucks. You know, so,
otherwise, I think everybody would just be crapping in their
boxer briefs the entire time


Palsh 31:50
where it is that the guy from Hot Tub Time Machine is and


GP 31:54
he's not very


Wulff 31:55
good. I can see that. I think next time I try playing seven. I
need to like pick it actor that kind of fits each character


GP 32:03
no you don't have


Wulff 32:05
one for Barry but I mean all the other characters I think need
one too.


GP 32:09
Okay, then I will do that too, but I will think that Steve Carell
is cloud that way I might like him a little bit more. I'm


Palsh 32:18
just gonna stick with Office actors. I'm gonna I'm gonna try to
rein things in and pretend them the hosts still are just cuz we
Oh no, no, it's great. No, because I just think that's hilarious
because we all have such different stances on this and like, I
swear to god this this episode could be six hours long if we kept
going.


Palsh 32:35
But I was gonna say I just want to say for cloud for me, I think
it's confusing. Thinking about him because he's he's a clone of
Sephora spoilers. I should say spoilers first. Too bad.


Unknown Speaker 32:51
My emerge sorry, not sorry.


Palsh 32:52
ruin my immersion. Yeah, so, but he's a clown. He's a clown, a
clone. And he doesn't even know who he is. He doesn't know he's a
clone. And he was a failure before that. So when he died, like
the real cloud, that's gone. Basically, he doesn't know who he is
he failed it becoming someone in soldier. And so he was just a
weakling, he was a coward. And then all of a sudden, he just has
more power than he knows what to do with. So I think that's what
they tried to do to balance them out a little bit is make him
cowardly. Make him like, oh, like, you know, he's got that shitty
attitude because he doesn't know who the fuck he is, you know?
So, I mean, I think that's relatable for me. It's just like, he
has no sense of self. And that causes him to just second guess
everything. And I thought that's, that's the only thing that made
him human to me is because he's the genetically modified super
soldier. You know, he's he's Sephora in with different hair and
All of a sudden, doesn't know who he is, you know, you go from
Sephora off being just crazy and wants to take over the world or
destroy the world so you can become powerful. Cloud just wants to
fucking know where he is. So that's, that's, I like, like I said,
I'm agreeing with everything you guys to say but I'm just that
that's my stance on Cloud is is actually recently changed because
I never thought about it this light is just he's he's lost


Jake 34:25
it just want to say like in terms of cloud as protagonists is
every time squared tries to do the silent protagonist. I don't
think he really works very well. I think their strongest stories
have been told with an ensemble cast, everybody speaking like six
or four. But clouds specifically the one of the reasons why I
think he's just so sad all the time, is I think it was the
producer of the game. At the time his mother died, yet he was
going through a grieving period and he just didn't know how to
express it. And when you take that, as the background, a look at
Cloud, he's just calm Constantly depressing and, and sad and
doesn't know how to deal with everything around me just numb
impersonality when I think of the producers dead mother nice
grieving that's kind of correlates to me and why he made cloud
that way. Even though clouds his motivations are different
ultimately, the feeling I get from the way he's in the game, kind
of call us back to that for me.


GP 35:19
Sure, I think it would be easier to create and write a character
like cloud from a point of despair. Speaking about the
retribution, or like the redemption moments that are lacking so
much, and seven, there is the same right before you battle Hojo
in Midgar, at the end, where he refers to cloud again and says,
Oh, yeah, you're the failure. Maybe I misjudged you recently, you
know, because that if for no other reason is the one relatable
part to cloud is, you know, you've been cast aside everybody at
some point, even if you're the most successful person in the
world has felt disenfranchised. So to kind of feel like you've
been captured


GP 36:00
Decide, but you've accomplished something nobody else has
accomplished, you know, in your ilk. I think that's the one
universal truth from cloud that everybody could relate to. It
just happens so late in the game, and it's somewhat predictable,
that it falls a little bit flat. Would you say is predictable?
Looking back at it, or was it predictable back then? Well, no. I
mean, he's your main character. And I mean, you know, obviously,
I'm gonna say,


GP 36:29
after Eris, what happened to Eris, everyone say, she's just
waiting for guys to fall out of the sky. So after she's gone, you
know that you're basically susceptible to losing anybody. We saw
that also in Final Fantasy six. But with cloud, you are always
given that idea of he is going to be your leader and your final,
you know, you're never not going to have them and even if you
lose them, which you know, you do, you'll get him back. So I
think the redemption arc there in that way.


GP 37:00
Of course, was obvious he was always going to be that guy,
because you don't have the option of removing them from your
party, which is the difference between six, you know, in six, you
can just take anybody out of your party, whatever the fuck you
want, with few exceptions. But yeah, I do feel like the cloud
stuff was predictable in that way. I know I'm kind of rambling
here. There's a lot of unpredictable, unpredictable stuff about
cloud story because it's nonsense. But the redemptive arc there
yes, I do think that was predictable, if that makes sense. Yeah,
I wouldn't have ever been like, oh, clearly he is, you know,
taking over somebody else's memories. No, that's that's absurd.
But the redemptive arc Yes.


Palsh 37:39
Well, I think that's part of what's making this game such a such
a big deal for people to want to see a remake is because look at
the conversation we're having over a single character, I mean,
yes, protagonist of the game, but you can you can talk about
other characters and other games just in much as much depth But
there's so much more back and forth there's a lot more to
consider so like you know he's not perfect and I like that sure
he's got annoying tendencies and stuff like that but I didn't
find it that bad personally. I mean you can look at all the
characters like whatever happened with shadow and stuff like that
like shadows backstory and you know everybody else's and egos
like it's kind of crazy to think about it but I mean you have to
go out of your way more with the with Final Fantasy sticks as
opposed to seven sevens. So much more in depth. It feels like
like the stories tighter but six I think because the ensemble
cast, it has a lot more. What do you want to say open like just a
little bit more you can take it at a glance if you want to. And I
think that's part of the charm for me is because if you have
favorite characters, you can pay more attention to what they say
you know, when you have a party of three versus party of four It
makes a big difference now. Three, I think the comment and stuff
like that aside, I think that six for me has a better story just
for the fact that there's a lot more going on. There's a lot more
personal things like they're all on a vendetta against Shinra and
six and seven, and six. They're all on a vendetta against Kefka.
But it's like they all have different motivations, but six
they're not all trying to save the planet. They're all trying to
save each other for me, you know? I mean, they are trying to save
the planet


Jake 39:30
you get a free the two villains I mean, it's it's Kefka is the
one wearing the boxers and separatists boring these, you know,
dainty silk briefs. They don't go pear Kefka is just a maniacal
like Joker esque crazy son of a bitch who's actually destroys the
world like he's scorch the earth and the latter half is in a
desolate wasteland basically because of Kefka separ auth. Has
mommy issues right? I'd like I'd never got the appeal separate
the Only thing I like about Sephiroth is he's got a really catchy
theme song which good for him? He's a rock star. Otherwise I have
he's just not Kefka he has a good theme to has even better but he
has the he has the the the actions to backup How crazy is he's a
great villain. I love Mr. villain.


Palsh 40:18
Yeah, I think Kefka is probably the greatest villain in the Final
Fantasy games to me. So that's the ones that I've played.


Jake 40:25
I think so he's up there. I


Wulff 40:26
agree with that.


GP 40:29
If we're talking about the series golden.


Palsh 40:32
Always rad Yeah, don't get me wrong.


GP 40:34
It's an amazing theme song that


Wulff 40:36
I have to disagree with that to the point for to the extent that
it wasn't really golbez pulling the strings there.


GP 40:43
You know, but that's an interesting point. Let's let's look at
this and not talking about four but talking about really a lot of
these Final Fantasies. You start off thinking the bad guy is one
thing or one person the Empire Shinra golbez. And there's always
this big reveal where it transitions to you know, Xena says A
wrongness or whatever, or the you know, Kefka


Wulff 41:03
I'm not saying Squaresoft is always nailed the transition to
like, Who's the big bad? It was the actual big bad. Final Fantasy
nine. Like you spend the whole game doing one thing, and then you
get to the tail end and it's like, I am big crystal floating
head. Okay.


GP 41:21
I'm saying I just never realized that, like, you know, who's a
better villain here? Shinra or the Empire?


Wulff 41:28
Well, who cares? But even early on Kefka was manipulating the
situation constantly. He was pretty regularly. The bad guy you
dealt with he was part of the Empire. But he was the worst of the
Empire. You know?


GP 41:45
Yeah, even the even the Empire


Jake 41:46
hated him stuff for I was just reading books and lifting weights.
is cool.


GP 41:50
But Kefka I think Kefka I think polish. Nailed it. He is probably
in my opinion, again, agreeing the the coolest and most
interesting. Like the one I would want to see appear in more
things. big bed. Yeah. And he sounds a lot like zoidberg.


Palsh 42:10
So, as you can see, there's, you know, we've only talked about a
couple of things we talked about protagonist. And for for one
game, basically because there is no single protagonist in the
second one, even though people talk about, you know, Tara in the
first half and Celeste and the second for Final Fantasy six, you
know, there's so many different things we can go on. We can talk
about either game for hours and hours. It's amazing to see how
much of a difference between this game and then you know, I
thought there was three in North America was what we got the six.
So when Final Fantasy seven came out, I thought there was you
know, Fallout four or five and six that came out in Japan or
something that we never got because the difference between six
and seven graphically I was like, Oh, wow. So you know, I was
trying to find out and then I found it. Oh, wait. This is this
was we never got we never missed them this time. So it's really
cool to see, you know, how much of a change not just graphically
I think they changed, you know, for better for worse they changed
everything. You know, they they tried to make it more appealing
for everyone I touched on it earlier, they added mini games, you
know, they had little backstories and things that just stood
apart that you didn't see in the other games that they couldn't
have done without the hardware. So they tried to make up for you
know, lack of hardware and I think they nailed it hasn't aged
well. No, I think you know, sixes as well. But because you know
it's 2d it has that advantage. It's always going to have that
advantage. So you're always going to remember the sprites exactly
as they are. I think when it comes to a 3d render of something,
you're going to pitch your cloud in your head closer to what you
see in the movies like an adventure hildren as opposed to the
chibby style guy that you run around on the world map. So I think
mentally, you're more predisposed to enjoying the 2d stuff
personally for me in a way. I don't know about you guys,


Jake 44:09
I agree hundred percent like I forgot how bad the models of cloud
and the party members are for most of the game. The in combat the
battle models look fantastic, but the rest of them aren't random
worldspace actually when you're zoomed in really close like the
opening area when you go in the train there and he drops down his
chibby style, right, but at least performance you stick to that
it looks fine. But the low poly lack of textures. It's an ugly
game. And nowadays because the rent is low and the backgrounds
are all low rez it just naturally can't age well, because of
that. I'm actually looking forward to the remake because of all
that


Wulff 44:46
in defense of seven on that front as far as the characters
presentation that the higher ups like the heads at square, they
wanted more of the same in regards to What Final Fantasy looked
like? So they really were like, let's let's keep the chibi
characters let's keep the the cutesy look. And so that's why they
all look doofy when you're running around everywhere, but the
director, I was at Sakaguchi thing so yeah, here knows Sakaguchi
Yeah, he he pushed for a better presentation where he could and
that's why the models look so much better in combat. Because in
combat he he was able to get away with that, since the characters
kind of needed to be able to convey more information as it was.
So he wanted the big characters that looked more detailed, like
in eight Did you know, but square management wasn't having that
they wanted chibi. They wanted what four, five and six had done.
So on that front. I don't blame the project managers of Final
Fantasy seven and the design and all that because That was that
was management imposed limitations not so much a design choice.


Palsh 46:06
Right. So yeah, that's great points there. And I find when you're
switching back and forth from the the world map sprites, to you
know, the battle ones and seven, I think that kind of is the
closest you're going to get for having the same experience as
playing sticks where you're always in the, you know, the sprite
mode. But when you fight, say, at my weapon, or Dullahan, where
these crazy crazy detailed sprites are, and then you have these
tiny little chippy guys there, you kind of think like, why is
that more realistic? And then I kind of think, okay, so these are
more like placeholders in my head. You know, the sprites are
placeholders, you kind of try to immerse yourself put yourself in
there he named them after your friends like I do in high school,
junior high, you know, you do that kind of thing. If you had,
like I said, use your imagination more and I think that's kind of
the closest You could do with six with seven when it comes to
having the cheesy world map versus the cool battle sprites. I
think the cool battle sprites for kind of what I was doing
mentally in six is like okay, this is what I pictured them
fighting like you know, so I don't know it's


Jake 47:18
like finally six the what helped me because you're right the
enemy sprites are very detailed and look awesome and they're kind
of a contrast that up characters of the main characters but what
helps me as we look at the profile screen or like the menu you
get to see those detailed artwork headshots of all the
characters. Yeah, and it's completely off the walls. Like, but it
helps tie things together.


Palsh 47:42
Exactly. And I think that's part of what made me picture those in
my head if if you guys haven't done that, try it sometime.
Anybody who's listening, give it a shot like it's, it's more
like, okay, you know the graphics are dated. Yeah, I don't care.
It was made in 9493 this stuff was I think it's still ahead of
its time you know crono trigger the same way you know, the art of
these old games, they stand up and they're iconic because you
know there's more to it than just like poorly drawn sprites for
some games you know, sometimes they're everything they do is on
purpose they all have a purpose and the one thing that helps
found a seven started her up is found by seven has the benefit of
emulation these days, right.


Jake 48:23
I want to go through it again, because I did start it but there's
a large amount of mods for valancy seven on PC, including
smoothing out the background environments, messing with the
music, adding better polygons to the overworld map. Just a whole
host of different mods you can install that make the game I mean
it better against other games in this generation. I guess it
makes it stand up a little bit better. Because some of the some
of the stuff and finally the seven like for me, it was the lack
of textures on some of the monsters. You got to remind yourself
it's a PlayStation era game, and PlayStation one games are ugly.
It was just the way it was right? demands help a lot. It was all
brand new technology. Right? So I mean, they were still working.
Probably they were still pushing the limits, I'd say back then
even with the lack of textures, right, so because I mean, a
polygon was like one color more than anything.


GP 49:13
I think if you're a fan of Final Fantasy one, for example, the
the argument about how bad the graphics are in seven is kind of a
moot point. And the reason I say that is Final Fantasy one was a
pioneer for what it was, and it's the exact same thing with
seven. If the gameplay is there, and I think it's retro video
gamers can appreciate what I'm Beth say, if the gameplay is
there, the graphics are secondary in their importance. And
there's meet Final Fantasy seven is exactly that way. They nailed
the gameplay. So the graphics while they haven't aged well, I
think people who complain about that really the only league they
have to stand on is all of the commercials for Final Fantasy
seven showed us the FMV so we all thought that salmony in
gameplay was going to look so when it came to Of course, you're
disappointed, but the gameplay was there. So to me the shittiness
of the graphics, of course, they matter, but it's not that big of
a deal because we already played Final Fantasy one. And it was
the same thing, great gameplay, but the graphics are, you know,
old world. So, for me, if I had one complaint about six, it's
probably the battle system for the fact that everyone becomes a
major, if I had a complaint for seven, it was probably the
controls just for the fact that, you know, if you play it, you
can't use the analog so that's that's something and it was the
way it's screwed up with the skewed on most angles like your
control your directions are just weird. So it's kind of wonky. So
that's like my biggest beef with the game which is a minor thing,
especially saying this is you know, it's it's not a platformer,
save us all if it was but


Palsh 50:52
but, so if you guys want to close it up here a little bit because
otherwise we'll be talking about this for another hour and a
half. So anything Any points you guys want to talk about before
before we shut it down for the night.


GP 51:04
Gold saucer was brilliant Chocobo breeding was amazing.


Wulff 51:09
You know what the Chocobo part is still the only part that I'd be
willing to go back and do and seven. And it's just because that
was the part that was most fun to me.


Jake 51:19
Have you played the MMO?


GP 51:20
I a talking about 14?


Wulff 51:23
Yeah, I played it a little bit because they added the gold saucer
and the Chocobo racing and that is actually loads of fun. They
also have triple triad in that as well. I almost because they're
subscribing to it just to play those I did. I did both of those
things. But yeah, like Final Fantasy six versus seven. I gotta go
with six myself. And that's like mechanically, I do think seven
is superior in almost every way. But if I'm going to sit and play
a game for 60 to 80 hours, it's it can't just be download after
download after down No like, to me seven is just a constant
downward spiral with quirks. Six is a roller coaster, there's
down moments, but they're followed by, you know, let's kick some
ass. Let's do something awesome. You know, let's, it didn't
constantly keep you in a state of despair. I gotta say I agree.
And that's what, that's what makes it more memorable to me. I
mean, you have, you know this story about the airship race
between sets are and Daryl and it was sad. But it was
interesting. And it was a cool little story backstory for setser
that the fact that I also kind of respect the fact that six you
can make arguments for who the main character is. Most people
will just be like, it's Tara, understandably so. But I've I
myself, I kind of use Celeste as the main character.


Palsh 52:55
Well, that's the thing to like after the second bird when you get
into the world or ruin. That's when I kind of takes over the
rules less and so people argue that you know the first half is
Tara second half slist both arguments valid like


Wulff 53:08
well, it's not just that it's that Celeste has the biggest
standoff with Kefka Celeste is the one you have to beat the game
with. You don't have to beat it with Tara. True.


Palsh 53:20
You can skip getting tear completely. So


Jake 53:22
wait, can you for the second half? I thought you had to get her.


Palsh 53:26
You can beat the game with test sets or Celeste and Edgar. As
soon as you get sets or you get the airship and you can actually
go take it. That's a challenge apparently amongst the runners and
stuck I


Jake 53:39
will say that for probably seven. There was just always so many
plot holes I guess in the overall story. I was still confused
about cloud and soldier and who is a clone of I never got that
I've watched all the movies and some of the other lore material
but the game on its own standing on its own. The plot holes are
too big six, I mean not Say that goes jgb there, but it's more
forgiving because there's so many characters, and there's at
least one or two sides story threads for each character. So you
get enough of a plot to fill in details for that the character
and it kind of doesn't matter that you don't have the whole
story. But with seven being so cloud focused, it's those holes
are really opening glaring, and that's why I like the story and
six so much more. I do I do like seven but six is my clear
favorite.


Palsh 54:26
I'm gonna agree with you there is seven, much more centric around
the you know, three or four characters. You have optional
characters in both games you have UEFI or euphy and Vincent and
seven you have tomorrow and go go and six, there's more backstory
that will come out of it, but it seems like is integral in seven,
like with delphis character and stuff like that you need to have
her for this net. It's just I don't know. I'm just going to
basically be Back home that I just like six better so I'm just
gonna shut up. I think this is great. I mean, play whichever one
you want. If you haven't played either play them both.


Wulff 55:10
absolutely absolutely don't get don't sit here and listen to
people in a podcast tell you don't play don't play six or don't
play seven or don't play any game. Because we tell you it's a
pile of garbage or we're not big fans of it or whatever. And
that's not to say I'm saying seven is a pile of garbage. Like I
said, I loved it the first time. The first time it was a great
game, but subsequent attempts I can't do and I do recommend if
you haven't played it and you like JRPGs absolutely do it.


Jake 55:37
And like the benefit from the Fast Forward option now in current
emulation, having a hotkey for fast forwarding through those long
grinding battles is amazing.


GP 55:46
No, we can't we can't talk about that right now. Jay.


GP 55:52
That's a whole other episode my man no brian ross.


GP 55:55
And yeah, can we can we get one of those randomizers like they do
with Link to the Past and Metroidvania are super metroid. Can we
get that with Final Fantasy? six and seven? Please? Isn't. Isn't
there one for six already


Wulff 56:07
know he's talking about like, combine them?


GP 56:09
Yeah, you enter a door and all of a sudden you're in Final
Fantasy six. And then you go back. Cloud is cross dressed. And
yes, cloud I have modeled a lot of my drag looks after him.


Palsh 56:24
You lie. That's, that's the missus.


Wulff 56:27
I'll rip him off. Smash.


GP 56:30
Done choreo he's a pretty pretty princess.


Wulff 56:35
He's a pretty guys.


Palsh 56:38
Alright guys, I want to thank you again for this is probably the
most heated discussion we've had yet. So it's first time we've
been talking over each other since like the first episode so I
like it. So I'm going to give that two plus 10 two energy. And it
was so a ladies and gentlemen, thank you for hanging out here.
This has been presby to cancel and Hope to catch you next time.
And in the meantime, don't match that be we got more coming.


Jake 57:07
For sure. Well, we everybody listening, we hope you enjoyed the
episode. And we all just want to come in and shout out our early
supporters. I mean, we've been doing this now for, I think 12
episodes now. That's That's pretty good. But I mean, our
listeners that have stayed with us from the beginning are much
appreciated. And we've had a lot of love and support from quite a
few people. There's a few, but we're just going to shut it a
couple of right now. I'll start off with Blitz Brom, who's a
notable streamer on Twitch, actually went ahead and added a
command for podcast to advertise for us, which is great. Really
appreciate that support, man.


Palsh 57:41
Yeah, I'd like to thank you got Marin. She's also been supporting
us and retweeted four episodes. So thank you, Mary.


Wulff 57:49
I'd like to throw a thank you at sinica gaming, who is also added
a command for us and constantly shouts out our podcasts in his
his streams and others. Twitch streamer.


GP 58:01
Yeah. And then another streamer who has been a not only a big
supporter, but the the composer of our theme music orther


Wulff 58:10
dang and theme music that


GP 58:12
manga. Yeah. But yeah, Arthur Arthur, the last ancient is is the
man. And so thank you all for the love the support and the
continued efforts at getting getting the word out about us. We
appreciate you.


Wulff 58:26
Absolutely. Thank you so much.


GP 58:28
I want to ask you guys before we go, what does it feel like?
Knowing all three of you were wrong today.


Palsh 58:38
This has been pressed me to cancel. Thank you very much.


GP 58:43
That was a lot of fun, guys.


Jake 58:45
Yeah, it was good episode. Yeah,


Wulff 58:46
that was a good one. Yeah.


GP 58:47
All right. I'm gonna go and hit stop and then that


Wulff 58:50
was a good one.


Jake 58:56
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Wulff 59:17
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