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21 - Final Fantasy VI and the Will to Meaning · Mythic Mind Games

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Mythic Mind Games, an extension of
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: the Mythic Mind Fellowship, which pursues wisdom on the paths
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: between primary and secondary worlds. I'm doctor Andrew Snyder, and
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: I'm glad that you're here. Hey there, welcome to our
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: discussion of Final Fantasy VIX. This is an incredible game,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: and I really appreciated having the opportunity to talk about
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: it with these guys, although unfortunately I did have to
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: suddenly cut out of the conversation a little bit early.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Our eight month old son suddenly started getting really sick
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: from a food allergy that we just discovered, so I
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: had to go help out with that. He's fine now,
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: but that's why I suddenly drop out of the conversation.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: I told the other guys just keep going as long
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: as you feel like going, and stop whenever you want to,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and so I appreciate them doing that, but obviously not
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: ideal situation. But nonetheless, I think it was a good
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: conversation and I hope that you enjoyed.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: All right, welcome back.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: As we now are finally continuing our Final AC series.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: We had to skip one one session of this due
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: to my scheduling issues, but now we're back into it. Yeah,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: so this is this is a game that I do
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: have some nostalgia for. I remember it on the SNS,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: although I wasn't fully equipped yet to really get into it.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: I was a little young for at the time, but
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: I still had enough familiarity with it that this is
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: one that brings back all kinds of memories to the
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: various scenes, various characters and whatnot. But now really getting
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: into it now as an adult, Like, there's so much
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: in this game, like way more than we can realistically
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: cover in a single podcast conversation, but I do appreciate
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: it on a very general level. We can get to
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the specifics later, but just these themes of self deifying
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: nihilism that we get in the likes of Kefka. You know,
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: this is where I think we go from dealing strictly
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: with archetypal villains to really having a character who's a
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: villain in a more profound, more particular sort of way
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: than we've had so far. And so I really like
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: the k character, very strong connections to what's going to
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: happen with Suffer ofth very similar motivations and character profiles.
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: But yeah, so you know, you get this character that,
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: because he hates meaning, he aspires for meaning, but in
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: so doing he ends up just sucking everything within himself.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: And so then our our various protagonists, this large ensemble
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: cast here of heroes, you know, they have to go
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: through their own encounters with despair, their own encounters with
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: potential pathways nihilism, but discover meaning through meaningful connections. And
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: so there's just there's a lot of really just dramatic,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: significant things happening in this story on an even deeper
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: level than what we've seen so far. We've seen it's
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: gotten progressively deeper and more complicated up to this point.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: But I feel this is just a big jumping point.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: But yeah, so I'd love to just hear some of
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: your thoughts wherever you want to go. Personal experience brought
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: themes kind of however you want to kick us off, michaeh,
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: what do you.
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  Speaker 2: Have for us? Yeah? Yeah, I first played From six
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: as one of my first jerpgs I ever played, way
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: back in like the nineties. At some point, like a
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: friend lent it to me and said, you gotta play
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: this game, and I was like okay, and uh yeah,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: I remember thinking like this game is like way more
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: fun than I expected, like as someone who didn't have
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: a lot of experience with RPGs.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Uh.
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  Speaker 2: And there's so many characters in it, Like when you
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: played other RPGs, you kind of realized just how many,
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: Like fourteen, there's fourteen playable characters, which is bonkers for
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: the genre. And what's interesting to me is like it's
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: really hard for me to say like if there's even
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: like a main character per se, Like it feels like
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: Tara for most of it, but like once you get
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: to the back app like it's like anybody could compete
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: for main character than like the two throwaway extras like
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Baghetti Umaru and the mime. But uh yeah, Like like
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: you said, Kefka is like one of the best villains
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: I think in the series. Like it's one of my
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: favorite villains ever. He's like I describe him to people
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: as like the Joker with a god complex who actually
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: becomes a god, which is like absolutely terrifying. And yeah,
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: it deals with nihilism like you said, it's like it's
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: kind of mind blowing, especially for that time, like when
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: you see, oh, the world actually got destroyed. Okay, well
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: now what the villain one? Where do we go, But yeah,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: it's super fun. Like you can tell found face he
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: was really like trying to reinvent itself at this point,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Like it was getting away from a lot of the
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: very basic RPG whimsical tropes that were carried all the
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: way up through five, And like, I love the stories
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: of four and even five, but six is just like
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: a whole different ballgame, and you can see it's a
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: clear inflection point where the whole series changed after that.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: So really fascinating game and still I think, super fun
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: to play.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think we've mentioned this in some of the
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: previous chats that at least I feel like six is
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: where Final Fantasy really got into its.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: Own where we get this.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: We've seen already some of this blends of like fantasy
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: and technology and whatnot, but now that becomes more of
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: a central theme rather than just the aesthetic. Right, We're
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: now we're dealing with nature versus progress, or the artificial
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: versus the natural. May it's a better way say that.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: And we've already seen in the last game in five
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: that some of these themes about misusing the earth, misusing nature,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: But now I feel like that again that gets more
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: of a I don't know. It gets more play, more impact,
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: more significance here, but we can get into more of
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: that as we move on. David Ellet, here's some of
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: your thoughts here.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I first played it right when it came out.
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: I think it was ninety four Final Fantasy three as
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: they called it here on the Super Nintendo. But I
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: have not played it since then, so I've been playing
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: through it again on the Pixel remasters, and I still
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: had my I found my Final Fantasy three Complete Guide,
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: like a physical book that's several hundred pages, and I've
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: been keeping it next to me on the sofa, and
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: I was playing it this evening, and but I only
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: got so far as I just got Mog on my team,
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: and I was going around and collecting his dances from
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: the different places in the world because I know some
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: of that is missible if I go on to when
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: the world gets destroyed. So yeah, I didn't remember a
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: lot about the game. I hadn't noticed until I was
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: playing at this time how close some of the themes
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: really are to seven, and even some of the music
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: feels really close to the music in seven. And I
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: had never thought about the fact that this is the
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: first Final fanan game where the sprites for your characters
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: in the overworld are exactly the same as in the combat,
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: you know, and all the ones before this, you're a
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: little half height guy who's not as expressive, but in
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: this one, you know, they are the exact same sprites
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: as you have in combat, and they have that shocked
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: animation that they use to good effect sometimes, and they
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: even like wink and whatnot. But yeah, the number of
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: characters is almost overly ambitious that you can have on
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: your team. I think that may be one of the
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: reasons I had trouble coming back to it, because I
• 7:35
  Speaker 3: had I get decision paralysis in a game like this,
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: because I've been having times where I'm like, I'm not
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: sure where I'm.
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: Supposed to go.
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: The world's a little too open, and you know, you
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: have little parts where you actually split up, which is
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: pretty neat to have teams go in different directions and
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: then reconnect later on. But yeah, the idea that magic
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: is gone. Nobody alive has seen magic, and technology has
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: kind of taken over, so it's like a big deal.
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  Speaker 3: The first time you know that, the combat stops. The
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: first time you use magic, and everybody freaks out. Which
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: I think is pretty clever. But yeah, I've been enjoying it,
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: but there are some rough things that happen Cyan and
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: his family and you know, just all of the the
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: stuff that's going on with the the espers, right, Yeah,
• 8:29
  Speaker 3: I always forget what they call them from game to game,
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: but in this one, yeah, they're espers, and and the
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: way that they're treated in their world, and Terra and
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: how she just kind of goes berserk when she comes
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: in contact with with her with her past. Yeah, it's
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: it's it's pretty great. I'm I'm looking forward to finishing it,
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: but I'm sorry I wasn't able to pull it off
• 8:50
  Speaker 3: before this this podcast.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean you mentioned Cion. He definitely has one
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: of the heaviest art have you just things in the game.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: I mean yeah, when he has to wave goodbye to
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: his family on the ghost train and then you know
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: later on in the destroyed world where you have to
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: deal with everyone's problems. You know, he's like trying to
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: kill himself and you have to go in there and
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: deal with the like phantoms in his mind of his
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: dead family and like it's it's super super intense for
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: uh pixel RPG game I was not ready for all
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: of that when I just played through it recently. I
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: can't imagine playing it as a kid.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: Right, They do at least alleviate the ghost train thing
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: a bit with Saban suplexing the train. That's right.
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: Yes, I have a friend who this is just his
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: favorite game, and he told me the proper way to
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: defeat the train is suplex at once and then just
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: hit it with a Phoenix down because it's undead, so
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: if phoenix down just instantly kills it. So that's what
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: I did, and it was fun.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: Well, let's see what where should we even go with this?
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  Speaker 1: I mean, on the the broad thematic level of you
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: know magic, For example, it is interesting that the magic
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: has basically been gone forward from the world. It was
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: eradicated in ages, passed through this great war that happened.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: But but now it's this evil technological empire that is
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: more or less bringing it back. But in the wrong
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: sort of way. Right, It's that they're bringing it back
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: through oppression, through a closed hand rather than the open
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: hand that the magic is supposed to be received with.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: And so I feel like there's something there. I haven't
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: fully worked it out, something about you know looking back
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: to the ancients, but in the wrong sort of way,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: you know, instead of recognizing the heritage we've been given.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: It's a matter of, you know, how can we use
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: that for for ourselves? And there's something there I haven't
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: fully worked it out.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And there's it's exploitation of these this whole race
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: as a resource, you know, Kefka just like, well, I've
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: drained all the energy out of you and just kicks
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: them down into a hole, like he has no concern
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: for this sentient being that he's just a harvesting for
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: their ability. And I'm sure there's you know, it gets
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: more overtly environmental in seven, but I can feel the
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: same sort of a thing here in six.
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's definitely a relationship there. That exploitation
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: was exactly what I was thinking of. That's exactly what
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: it's going for. And there's this notion that like the
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: source of the magic in this case, the espers is
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: something you're supposed to have some respect for. It's like
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: they're like the land of the fay right basically is
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: what they are. At least that's my impression. And so
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: there's this notion like that's kind of tied into nature
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: forces and you need to respect that. And then when
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: you exploit it for your own game without respecting it
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: and just destroy it as you go, like, you cause
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: a lot of problemblems. And seven of course digs into
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: that much further. But yeah, but yeah, the notion of
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: magic having been gone and coming back is I think
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: kind of an interesting one in terms of comparing like
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: different fantasy epics. Like I think I remember there was
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: an interview where Brandon Sanderson pointed this out. I thought
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: it was super interesting where he was commenting that in
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: a lot of fantasy epics there's this notion that magic's
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: going away. Like correct me if I'm wrong, But I
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: think like Lord of the Rings is kind of doing
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: that towards the end, like because the elves are leaving,
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: and but but like there's an interesting like Reverse Explorers
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: where it's like when magic's been gone for a while
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: and it's coming back, Like what does that mean? What
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: is the impact of that on the world and how
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: do the characters deal with it? And I think you
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: see a little bit of it here. It's just kind
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: of in that kind of dark thematic way because of
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: the exploitation.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: Theme and from Keefka's nehilism. I mean, the question is
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: like why why not? Right, Like what, there's no natural law,
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: no more law pressing upon him, and so there's nothing
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: to prevent him from, you know, poisoning the river and
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: killing people or or exploiting. However we're defining the espers,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: whether they're people, forces of nature, a little this, little
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: of that, regardless nature people, it doesn't really matter because
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: he has no moral law placed upon him, which I
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: mean that's a dangerous position, but also it's very much
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: a reality of the world in which we live. Right,
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: we live in a world that is still clinging to
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: especially in the Western world. Right, we're holding onto a
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: world that's clinging to old Christendom. But in many ways
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: we are living in a post Christian reality regarding broad
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: scale institutions, I'd say for the most part, generally speaking.
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: But then people have to deal with the question of
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: what do we have now, which is how we get
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: into this postmodern mess where the best we can come
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: up with is, well, you just something, but whatever your
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: brace is going to be artificial. The problem is that
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: can only go but so far, and so I mean,
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: eventually the issue of the question of aught kind of
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: fades away, and then the question is what's wrong with
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: what Kefkin's doing? This is just will to power philosophy,
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: is it not what exactly what Nietzsche prescribed. God is dead,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: therefore create your own values, be your own God. And
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: so it's Kefka's kind of philosophy is the sort of
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: thing that like everyone looks at that recognizes he's the villain,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: like he's the bad guy, but at the same time,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: on a philosophical level, he's not that different than a
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: lot of contemporary academics.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: So you're saying phantasystic is exploring themes from abolition of Man, then.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: I mean very largely yes. I mean I just think
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: of it towards the end of that Hideous Strength where
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: they're talking about you, how could all these terrible things
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: have happened at Belbury? And one of them says, nothing
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: happened there that wasn't previously taught by some lecturer at
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Saint Anne's or not stands at at edgetow right that
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: it starts in the university. And then what we see
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: in Belbury is the playing out of ideas that no
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: one really expected to be played out.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: It's all in Lewis. Oh, yeah, Lewis is very relevant.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: But yeah, the exploration of Kefka is like the postmodern
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: like self made deity, I think is actually a very
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: salient point. And then it becomes kind of a question
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: of like can the stories themes actually accurately argue against that,
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: And I think the characters try, particularly at the end
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: when they confront Keofka and they're like, here's why life
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: is worth living that sort of thing. But I think
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: it's still coming from like a not particularly well like
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: spiritually rooted place in how they write it. I don't
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: think it's like badly written at all, but it does
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: feel like they're struggling to define first principles of like
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: why life is worth something and why you shouldn't just
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: destroy everything and be your own god and oppress everybody.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: But I guess they're trying to argue, like I said,
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: why life is worth something, not like why this specific
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: use of your life is wrong? If that makes sense.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean they they kind of fall into just
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: a different branch of secular existentialism, where you still we're
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: saying that our life is meaningful because we choose to
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: treat it as meaningful, that we choose to embrace friendship
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: and love and compassion all these things, because that seems
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: to us better than what Kefka's doing. But it's still
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: it's very shaky ground because it still comes down to
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: the same sort of exercise of will that Kefka's doing.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: They're just pointing it in a different direction that most of
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: us will look at and say that's a positive direction.
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: But they're not operating within a worldview that has any
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: objective standard for what positive means, and so it still
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: kind of comes down to the fields, as the kids
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: would say. I don't know if the kids will say
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: that or not, but that's what it comes down to.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: I mean, a positive reading might be this is a
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: puddle glum situation of you know, it looks like a
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: Narnia and even if there is no Narnia, right, Like,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: that's I think a more positive way of approaching that.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: But I think it's a stretch to identify our characters
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: with puddle glum.
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I see, I've seen memes online that are, you know, like,
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: I don't treat people well because I'm scared that some
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: God is going to send me to Hell. I treat
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: people well because it feels good to not be a jerk.
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: And I'm like, but that's still a self serving motive, right,
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: You're not treating this person well because they have inherent
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: worth or because there is ultimate objective moral reality, You're
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: still doing it because of what you get out of it.
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: You just think, think the idea that you know there's
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: there's life after death. You think that's silly, And uh, yeah,
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: I feel like that could be the same sort of
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: a thing here. Like they've got other reasons, but there's still,
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: like you said, Mike, are not really rooted in any
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: kind of objectivity.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that's a struggle of a lot
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: of fantasy, not just in video games, but like because
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: like fantasy is so often is trying to deal with
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: really epic themes, right of like fundamental matters of good
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: and evil. But like in the modern day, typically these
• 18:33
  Speaker 2: are written without a spiritual root to them, and so
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: it's very very hard to find, like and rebuild from
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: those first principles when you don't have that spiritual root
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: of like what defines the good side here and its
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: argument against this fundamental evil side. And I think Promise
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: You is just one in a long line of fantasy
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: stories that struggles with that.
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, and it's the problem, well, I mean
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: to specific point regarding fantasy. I mean, Tolkien even says
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: that fantasy is born of allegory, like people will, you know,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: whenever allegory comes up. You know, people think that Tolkien
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: just hated all things related to allegory. But that's not
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: at all the case that he says very clearly fantasy
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: is born of allegory. Allegory stands for things like, you
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: don't really have meaningful allegory unless you have a meaningful
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: framework of value, of good and of evil, and so
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: real fantasy, Tolkien says, is directly connected to these sort
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: of allegorical realities, even though fantasy itself is no longer
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: exactly the same thing as allegory, but it's still part
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: of the same family, and so good fantasy, he would say,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: actually does mean something. And the problem is you have
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: people who don't recognize genuine meaning trying to say something meaningful,
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: which isn't only a problem for fantasy storytellers, if it's
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: a problem for people trying to live as consistent secularists,
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: which nobody really does, is because everybody thinks that what
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: they do is meaningful otherwise they wouldn't make the choices
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: that they make, right, But yeah, so it but this
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: is the problem. I think that it's particularly poignant in
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: a genre that is trying to say something.
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and to be sure, I don't think that means
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: like it doesn't ask useful questions or like explores useful themes.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: Like one thing like I kind of read into it
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: is a theme that's important to me, is like facing
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: the reality of evil and actually confronting it, like not
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: just in the sense of like a cosmic balagance good
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: and evil, but like not putting your head in the sand.
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: It's like, like you have to walk through this pain
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: that Cion is going through with his family, like with
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: him through all that, for example, and when the world
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: gets destroyed, like the characters all have to ask themselves
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: is life still actually worth living? Like is there still
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: hope we can find in this? And it's like this
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: notion of like fighting against not just Sien, but like
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: sell Us has a very memorable moment like right after
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: the world's destroyed, where like she if I remember it,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: she tries to kill herselfing she shows herself off a
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: cliff and that's really hard hitting, like especially in like
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: this little sixty bit pixel game. But it makes you think, like,
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: like when you feel like all hope is lost, like
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: how do you find things to cling to? And obviously,
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: from a spiritual Christian rooted point, like it's like we
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: ultimately for the Lord who is eternal and so like
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: we can never lose all hope. But obviously the characters
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: here don't have that, But there is this notion of
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: like it is important to look for it because life
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: is intrinsically valuable to hold on to.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, I feel like even if I'm not fully
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: satisfied with all the answers, which I wouldn't expect that
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: I would be, they are asking a lot of the
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: right questions and they're a least beginning to move in
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: a positive direction. Like, like you said, it's a positive
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: thing to have all these characters who are not only
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: fighting against Kofka, that they're fighting against despair, right, that
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: they're fighting against their own inner demons, especially in that
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: second half of the game where you have to go
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: recruit everyone and deal with their various issues that they're
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: dealing with. And so I really do appreciate that kind
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: of existential turn. It's very psychologically oriented where they have
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: to get outside of themselves and recognize, like we still
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: have a purpose to serve. It's not all about me.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: There's a broader context in which I can find genuine
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: meaning and that's what I need to press into. And
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: so that I definitely would say is a very positive theme,
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: especially in the second half.
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: And I did fail to.
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: Mention.
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: I also think it's interesting we finally have a villain
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: that has some depth because you see Kefka in the
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: opening animation, like you see him before you're introduced to
• 22:52
  Speaker 3: any of the protagonists, and in a lot of Final
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: Fantasy games, you don't even know the name of the
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: primary antagonists until you're about to fight them at the
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: very end. So it's good to see, Like I mean,
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: it doesn't feel like he's the true villain necessarily at
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: the beginning, Like you know, there's this emperor, so he
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: works for the emperor, but the emperor doesn't really come
• 23:14
  Speaker 3: into the picture a whole lot. But it just it's
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: better than just having this nebulous it's evil, trust me,
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: and you need to kill it kind of a thing
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: that a lot of the earlier games had before they
• 23:27
  Speaker 3: really attempted this kind of storytelling.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's worth noting that in this one,
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: the villain really sets the theme for what the whole
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: story is about as he tries to suck everyone into
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: his despair. Yeah, so he definitely does play, I think,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: a more compelling role that we've seen so far of
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: just these random deities have thrown at us at the end.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know if I ever thought of Kafka
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: as having like much depth per se. He's one of
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: my favorite villains, mind you, but like, do we ever
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: find out like his backstory at all? I don't remember
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: if we ever do, or is it kind of like
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: just because again I compared to like the Joker from Batman,
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: like where the Joker just kind of is. You don't
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: have like a coherent origin story right in most cases?
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I guess by depth, all they really meant was
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: that he has lines and and and he is in
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: the story and interacting with the characters and in the
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: other ones. Yeah, but you're right, he's he's he's kind
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: of one note. He's he's he is who he is,
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: and we don't. Yeah, we're not made to sympathize with him,
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: Thank heavens. If they did a remake, there might be
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: some tragic childhood backstory for him, but not here.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's very clearly like just pure evil from the
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: get go, even though he's not, like it's not obvious
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: he's going to become a main villain for a bit,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: Like you're right, he shows up very early, Like I
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: think his first major scene is went at Saban's castle,
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: right when he's coming in with his forces to try
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: to tear it down, and then oh, surprise, the castle
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: is a submarine in the sand, because that's about it's
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: obviousally being goofy. But uh, yeah, like he's recurring like
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: his big thing obviously where he is what you guys
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: mentioned where he poisoned Science Town, Like that's where you're like,
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: oh my good, this guy sucks, uh and then he
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: just kind of reiterates constantly reminds you that he's there
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: up until he just does the unthinkable and destroys everything.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: But yeah, he's he's like this really he's like morbidly
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: entertaining and like this force of nature where it's.
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: Clear this guy's gonna be a problem, but actually a
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: bit cowardly, especially early on, you keep fighting him and
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: he keeps running away. You don't get any experience for it.
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: It's annoying. But yeah, as that's he's still working on
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: his master scheme. So where when you're in the the
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: Magic Tech Factory, that where he his plan's going so great.
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: He already calls himself a god at that point.
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it really does add to his character, the
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: fact that he keeps annoyingly running away. It shows that
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: this is despite the fact that this is a man
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: of a great presence, he doesn't really have any substance.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: He is a man without a chest right abolition of
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: a man. That he is somebody who doesn't have any
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: real substance, any real standards. All he is he's somebody
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: grasping to Apparently, I'm all over Lewis right now. But
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: it reminds me in The Great Divorce, where there's this
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: woman who's just grumbling and grumbling and grumbling, and the
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: George McDonald's character in the story says that, well, at
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: this point she may not be anything more than just
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: a grumble, like that's just what she has become. Now.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: So too, Kefka he is like a I don't know,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: he's a grasper, right, He's just all he does, is
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: he grasps for power, but he never really has it.
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, even when he has the power to sort
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: of assert himself, when he becomes a god and takes
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: the magic into himself, like even then, he doesn't really
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: have power because like there's nothing for him to achieve,
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: and so in a more Bowithian sense, like in a
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: more classical philosophical sense, he doesn't have the power because
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: he can't do anything because he lives in a vacuum,
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: and so from the beginning to end he is a
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: shell of a man.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and one thing I remember struck me last time,
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: I guess last time I played there, it was like
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: although Kefka is very present like up until he destroys
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: the world like for the whole like last act where
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: you're in the world of Ruin, Like even though like
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: he's obviously still the main villain, he's surprisingly not active
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: at that point, Like you see him blow up town
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: at one point, I think, but and you know, like
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: there's all these minions he's got running around, like all
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: these different demons, but like you don't actually interact with
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: him again until like you climb the tower in front
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: of for the final boss fight. So I feel like
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: that almost fits in the theme like you were saying too,
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: where it's like, well, he achieved his as far as
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: he could go, and now he's like, well, my life's
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: empty now, so I'm just gonna sit here and wait
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: while everybody struggles until they get there and they have
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: like an argument and he tells everybody they're sounding like
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: a self help book.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, in many ways, And when you get to the
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: world a ruin at that point until you get to
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: the end, I mean, Kefka, he doesn't really seem like
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: the main antagonist. That the main antagonist is themselves, like
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: the various characters, so it becomes much more with psychological
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: venture until the end when you do break out of
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: that and confront Keoka himself.
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: So once they've all dealt with their own demons, so
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: to speak, then they're equipped to actually fight the villain
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: that I I again, I don't remember a lot. I
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: remember just a few things from the first time I
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: played it, Like I definitely remembered the opera scene because
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: that was so unlike anything that had ever happened on
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: Super Nintendo before, and it was really tense because you're like,
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: I got to get all the lines right or I'll
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: have to do all that it's again, and I remembered
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: that there was a cataclysm, and I remembered the final
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: battle and how it's tiered with this giant boss that
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: you're fighting, but yeah, I didn't remember a lot of
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: specific details. So the second half of the game is
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: very side quest heavy, right where everybody is having to
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: deal with their own smaller problems for a bit.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that's a common thing with like
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: that era of JRPGs, like Krona Trigger does the same thing,
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: like get you get to a certain point and then
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: it's like, all right, here's a found dungeon just sitting
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: over here, and at some point you can go to
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: it whenever you get the airship to go there by
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: like and tell them there's all this other stuff you
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: can go do, and it's probably a good idea for
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: you to go do it in whatever order. So it's
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: like it's pseudo open world for a while. But yeah,
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: you mentioned the opera scene, like that's what like everybody
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: remembers is like one of the really iconic scenes from
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: that game. And like I remember, of all things, I
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: remembering when Nintendo Power did, they're like the old video
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: game magazine did their like top one hundred games of
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: all time, and they said, we were arguing about whether
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: to put fave a seed for them two and three,
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: four and six, which one to go first, and somebody
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: said five A C six is the opera seed, and
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: so it won, like because it's a very memorable moment,
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: and that kind of relates to like one of my
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: favorite things about the game, which is its soundtrack is
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: unbelievably good. Like that's probably my favorite soundtrack, like in
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: the series, maybe in all the video games. Like it's
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: just super ambitious. All the characters have light motifs, like
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: the final battle you mentioned, Like if you look at
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: a soundtrack, it's like a seventeen minute long song. It's
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: insane because it just goes through all these different stages.
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: It's like I think somebody says, like nobu Umatsu's like
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: Evil can Evil soundtrack where he was just showing off
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: like before we went into the fully recorded music era.
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: Though actually sorry, I take it back, Family's I'm still many,
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: but that's getting off topic. But yeah, it's very ambitious,
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: like they're clearly trying to do a work of art
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: with this game in ways they were not doing in
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: prior games.
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: That's true, and I as I've been playing through these
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: Pixel remasters, I've been periodically going to the settings and
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: switching it back and forth from the arranged version of
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: the original because I was trying to remember how the
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: original sounded. And I've noticed in six it's much closer
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: to the original in most cases than it is in
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: any of the previous games.
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: Like they took a lot of.
• 31:36
  Speaker 3: Liberty and sometimes even changed sort of the style of
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: music for the arrangements in some of the early ones,
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: but in this one they kept it pretty pretty true,
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: almost just like you said, an orchestral arrangement of the
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: of the same music, and it's well done. But for me,
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: Final Fantasy Sevin has my favorite soundtrack of Final Fantasy games,
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: but you know that's just a matter of taste.
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and six is the game I'm really nostalgic about
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: from that series, So that's my soft spot for me too.
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I appreciate that as dark and intents as this
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: game can get that that also are some lighthearted elements
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: like that, uh, what was it, old Ultross or there's
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: the octave sponsor.
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and he's rigging havoc in the opera and Yeah,
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: he's fine.
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's funny.
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: He kind of reminded me a little bit of the
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: role of Gogomesh in five of just the comic relief
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: filling that keeps showing up Tata. It's nothing deeper philosophical there,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: but I just I find it charming.
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think that's important. Like six, excuse me,
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: And I feel like six honestly understood. This is a
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: little better than seven is. I think like it understood
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: it needed levity to make to like balance the extreme
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: darkness the story goes to, like I mentioned, like you've
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: got the ghost Train, which is like this terrifying exploration
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: of death with Cyan losing his family, and then Samon
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: suplexes it just for fun. Yeah, like yeah, all the
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: characters have some goofy moment with them to kind of
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: just bounce it out.
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think Sayan, I felt like they used
• 33:22
  Speaker 3: him for a little comic relief a little too soon
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: after he found his family dead in his house. But
• 33:27
  Speaker 3: uh yeah that like even before I can't even remember
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: what happened. But I think Sabon has something to say
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: in regard to Cyan, and then he joins, you, I
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: guess things are happening so fast he doesn't have time
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: to mourn at that point, but it's still like just
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: you know, he goes in his kids lane in the
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: floor like it's it's just terrible. I don't know why
• 33:48
  Speaker 3: anybody drank the purple water, but that's just just what happened.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: Don't drink the purple cool aid. Are there any other
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: specific characters that seen out to you or where should
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: go with us?
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: I was just thinking characters would be a good exploration,
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Like we've always talked about the villain a lot, but
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: I mean it does quite a bit of work with
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: all of its characters except for a couple of throwaways.
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: Like yeah, Tara is like one of the few like
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: heroin female leads in a JRPG from that period, and
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: I think she's pretty solid because she's got this constant
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: struggle of like do I know, like am I really
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: a person? Like what does it mean to be human?
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: Kind of thing, which also is like going into like
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: her her mixed nature because like Craig if Wrong was
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: like she's the kid of a human and an esper right,
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: and so she's got that identity struggle and like she's
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: dealing with the depression over that, like what does it
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: mean to love that sort of thing? Which is kind
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: of melodramatic, but still it's like you can kind of
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: understand like where she's coming from there. Locke is Locke is,
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: He's got like this, Like when you first meet him,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: he's very insistent, I'm not a thief. I have a
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: treasure hunter that like that Lne always stuck with me
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: is like really defiding his character. It's like he's trying
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: to be noble like in his life even though he's
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: kind of a rogue. You have Setzer who's on the
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: other side. He's just unapologetically like a womanizer, but like
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: he still helps the good guys anyway. Like, yeah, and
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: there's the romance between Locke and Celeste, which I think
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: is pretty well done at least up through the opera scene. Yeah,
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: there's there's some fun characters. That's like a small percentage
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: of them. There's a bunch of others.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I maybe I consider Tara to really
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: be a foil to Keofka in that Kefka's concern is
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: how can I take? How can I absorb? How can
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: I consume? Her struggle is like how can I love?
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: How can I give myself away? How can I have
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: a meaningful relationship that actually makes other people better? And
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: she ultimately finds that in a kind of maternal role
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: with these orphans in the world of Ruin, Like that's
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: when where she really discovers love, because now there are
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: these people who need something that she has and she's
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: able to provide that for them, that motherly kind of role,
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: and so that's where she finds love. Though of course
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: her struggle is once she finally finds that, then you
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: are celest shows up and says, all right, now we
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: gotta go, and she has to forsake that was she found.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: And so it just adds to the intensity that that
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: she has to surrender the lesser good for the greater,
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: and in so doing, I think she ultimately ends up
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: finding the lesser back. But yeah, that's another intense positive note.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: And again I think it does set these two foundational
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: characters really as inverse images of each other. Yeah, I
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: think that's an excellent point that they're inverse, because like
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: one thing I was thinking earlier we were talking about
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: Kafka is like it feels like he's kind of at
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: some point or the story begins he's already just cast
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: off as humanity.
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: He doesn't even care about being a human. He just
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: is grasping it something else, and he doesn't really have
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: a coheren since of what that is just power and destruction.
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: But Tara, meanwhile, she starts out not feeling like she
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: has a sense of her humanity because it was kind
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: stripped away from her to begin with, because she was
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: brainwashed to start with. Remember they were using her for
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: her magic to do stuff. And then she's certainly like,
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: how do I want to be human? What does it
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: mean to be human? And she spends the whole story
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: trying to learn that, like what does what is healthy humanity?
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: And so you have kind of that inverse thing where
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: Kepta does not value humanity at all and she desperately
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: wants it, And so then that makes it more impactful
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: at the end when she's talking against Koefka, like, hey,
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: I've discovered what humanity is and this is something.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Valuable right in embracing human potential, she becomes human fully.
• 37:54
  Speaker 3: There are some characters I vaguely recall that I have
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: not encountered yet. There's like an old man and an
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: artist girl as she and she may be related to him?
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: Is that how that went?
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and realm is okay? Who I'll be honest, those
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: are characters that didn't stick out as much to me
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: as others. But yeah, I think they're related.
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: Isn't that like a is it a the grandfather and
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: granddaughter or sounds right?
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: I was caning adopted, But I think I think they're
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: actually related.
• 38:26
  Speaker 3: To Okay, I thought you guys would have this. I
• 38:28
  Speaker 3: was just trying to spark the conversation and then I
• 38:31
  Speaker 3: was going to listen. But yeah, I remember that she
• 38:34
  Speaker 3: would like she had a move where she would paint
• 38:37
  Speaker 3: like an enemy and then it would attack or something
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: like that.
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't really use them very much.
• 38:44
  Speaker 3: And I remember the one. I guess it was the
• 38:46
  Speaker 3: mind guy you're talking about, like you have to let
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: a specific kind of sandworm swallow you to get him
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: or something like that.
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the sandworm from Doom swallows you like you find
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: of it. It's belly okay, But he has like no
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: character at all. But he does have a weirdly good
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: music associated with him, because again the soundtrack is crazy good,
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: like this random mind as some of the best music
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: in the game. Sure, why that?
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's kind of fun. You get swallowed by this
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: worm and then it's like a whole dungeon inside. It
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: reminds me of the other game where he gets followed
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: by Leviathan this whole community living inside see who else
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: I mean. Yeah, Locke is definitely interesting character. Like you said,
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: the treasure hunter not to the Thief makes you think
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: of like an Indiana Jones situation there, and he the
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: whole dynamic with Celesti is pretty intense because he also
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: has this other girl that he I can't remember if
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: he somehow he had her die. I don't remember the
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: exact situation. She she died on his watch in some way,
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: but he was basically holding out to bring her back
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: to life. Well, at the same time, the stuff is
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: happy with Celeste.
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: So I I just played that part a couple of
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: days ago. Had his flashback. So it was a woman
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: he loved and they went out to look for something
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: and then she fell, well he was going to fall,
• 40:11
  Speaker 3: and she dove to save him, and then she fell
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: and then she got video game amnesia, which which happens
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: in every video game. And then while he was gone,
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: some people came and killed her. But yeah, then for
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: some reason, a guy in that town is keeping her
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: body perfectly preserved, you know, sleeping beauty style, even though
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: she's basically dead. So I really, yeah, I don't know.
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: Does that never come of anything else?
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: Later? Yeah?
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: So later on through the phoenix Esper, I believe she
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: gets resurrected for a short time, but there's something wrong
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: with the match site, and so she comes up and says, look,
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: you have to move on. That's how that happens. So
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: I guess that then frees him up to follow his
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: new romance.
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: I'm glad. I'm glad she chose her words carefully before
• 41:03
  Speaker 3: she disappeared.
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: That yeah, it would have been an awkward love triangle
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: if she'd come back. My fun random story about the
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: character fam Phantasy is like in the Super Nance game,
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: at least you could rename the characters to whatever you
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: wanted when you met them. And I was playing through
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: the game a few years ago with some friends and
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: so like we just kind of hung out together and
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: just played the game, and we were naming all the
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: characters after people we knew, and we were trying to
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: get all of our close friends in there. But then
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: like at some point we ran out of female characters,
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: and so we ended up naming Umero the Yeti after
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: what of the girls we do, and she was very
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: unhappy about that, which she found that out, so oh man,
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: we jokingly called her the Yeti after that good daturedly.
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I used to always rename the characters. I just
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: leave them canonical at this point, but like I know,
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: there can be some some funny results depending on what
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: you rename the characters. I've seen people saying, like, if
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: you name Link in the Zelda games, my dude, you'll
• 42:07
  Speaker 3: have a really chill experience, and everybody just saying welcome,
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: my dude and stuff.
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's kind of fun that they throw in these
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: rand of characters like a Yetti, which just an I
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: have any character. He just smashes stuff. I don't think
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: you can even control what he does. If that's great,
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know, use him very much.
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: I saw him peeking out. He's a berserker.
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well that's his that'schetype is he's a so like
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: those tend to be the least interesting characters because you
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: don't make decisions for what they do.
• 42:41
  Speaker 3: Right, And even Gao, once you pick an enemy for
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: him to emulate, he he just automatically does whatever he's
• 42:49
  Speaker 3: going to do for the rest of the fight. But
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: some of the things, like Sabon's abilities and it's Edgar, right,
• 42:58
  Speaker 3: his brother. Some of his tools like if you get
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: the chainsaw on things like that, like they can be
• 43:04
  Speaker 3: really overpowered in certain situations and they don't really cost
• 43:07
  Speaker 3: anything to use, so it's it's kind of strange.
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's why, in this huge ensemble of characters, whenever
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: I had the choice, I just had my select few
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: overpowered people.
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: That's when the end game's tough because it forces you
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: to split the teams with three different teams, and it's like,
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: all right, i gotta start using people I'm not used
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: to because I've used everybody.
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: Right, and Gal I find him a little frustrating, but
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: it is interesting and has a whole area that exists
• 43:36
  Speaker 3: just for him to learn new moves. And you know,
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: he can even learn the moves, like he can fire
• 43:42
  Speaker 3: off missiles if you once you the Magitech armor. Once
• 43:46
  Speaker 3: he emulates it, they don't try to think too hard
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: about it, but it works.
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's the bluem Age type, which I've always thought
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: felt really strange on him because he's supposed to be
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: like this this wild like jungle book kid kind of
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: thing where he grew up in the wild and that's
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: how he knows how to like take monster abilities somehow.
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: But yeah, like when you have monsters that are mechs
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: that shoot missiles, it feels a little weird on him.
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I was trying to think through like other characters,
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: so like Edgar and Saban, we brought them up like
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: they have a whole story of like estranged brothers, right,
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: and Edgar does not come off as like he comes
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: off as a creep when you meet him, as he's
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: like hitting on every woman that moves. But and then
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: Saban is completely different, like he's over there, like studying
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: martial arts and like being acetic away from society. I
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: don't remember how they develop in the late game though.
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know. I feel like they more or
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: less maintain their their characters. I mean, you get a
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: little bit deeper with some of the backstory flashbacks. And
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: they flipped a coin to see who would be k
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: and I think it was if I would call correctly.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: I don't think either of them really wanted it.
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's right.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: So it's more like that the loser has to be king.
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: It's just not something either of them really wanted to embrace.
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: And so Edgar takes the throne, but he doesn't seem
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: very kingly. He's like King Johnny Bravo. Right, he's just
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: the frat guy. It's just doesn't really want to be king,
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: even though he does embrace his role, which again goes
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: through this idea of I'm going to embrace the role
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: that is given to me rather than what I might
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: want to do, and so that that is I think
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: a potential display of virtue.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: There. I'm gonna remember that line, King Johnny Bravo.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: See who else do we have? I mean, shadows kind
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: of fun. You don't really know a whole lot about him,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: so I don't know that can flossiphize too much.
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: But he's got the coolest dog ever. Though he does
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: just randomly dog's names interceptors. Sometimes they'll just run into
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: battle like bart and attack the It's like it's great,
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: good dog. Yeah.
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: I've pulled up a list of the playable characters to
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: see if there's anyone we've forgotten about. Yeah, go go.
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: He's the mime guy. Yeah, I feel like I went
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: to an island and went to a town where no
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: one will talk to me. They're all just like I've
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: never seen you before, and the shopkeepers won't do anything
• 46:26
  Speaker 3: for me, and I feel like Strego is standing there,
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: but he just says the same thing. So I was like, okay,
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: I'm not supposed to meet him yet. But he is
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: a bluem Age, so he actually does learn just magic
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: abilities from the enemies, I guess.
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: And my mast remembory is he the blue Mage and
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: noto Gout. Well, it's just different types of blue mag
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: The principle is.
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: Basically the same, but I think he actually learned specific moves,
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: I guess.
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: But right, I think he's the proper Blue Age where
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: a guy was more or less the same thing.
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: But gotcha, yeahh I was misremembering. Yeah, and and Realm
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: is his granddaughter.
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, yeah that's what I was thinking. Let's see.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: And then there's Setzer with their ship guy.
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's fun.
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah. It's a weird introduction to him though, that he's
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: basically trying to abduct a woman and marry her. And
• 47:20
  Speaker 3: then once you explain to him, look, there's there's terrible
• 47:23
  Speaker 3: things going on, then he just ditches all that and
• 47:26
  Speaker 3: and hangs out with you.
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: He also has a really interesting class type where like
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: his attacks involve playing a slot machine.
• 47:35
  Speaker 3: I like his card throwing because I loved Gambit in
• 47:37
  Speaker 3: the in the early nineties and from the X Men.
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: He is basically Gambit. Yeah, did mag ever have any
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: meaningful character stuff? I don't remember. I know he's the
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: geomancer type.
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: Well, he learned to speak English from ram Rama Ramu.
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: However you want to say it the summon, Yeah, that's
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: what he says he when he meets you, and that
• 48:02
  Speaker 3: that he told him he should help you, Coupo, and
• 48:06
  Speaker 3: then that's I think that maybe about it.
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: I'm not sure it's convenient that a galactic basic is
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: always English.
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: M hmm, that's right. There's some side characters here. It's
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: just like General Leo I thought was a cool character
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: up until he got offed by Kefka because he's like
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: the one noble general for the empire right where he's uh,
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: and then he just has the misfortunate of being an
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: oddsit with Kefka.
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: And I mean the CID in this game. Does he
• 48:39
  Speaker 3: come into play later he's in the Magic Tech factory.
• 48:42
  Speaker 3: He comes running in when all of the espers turned
• 48:45
  Speaker 3: themselves into magicite for you, and it's like, WHOA, what's
• 48:48
  Speaker 3: going on? And then he rides the elevator with you.
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: Was like, man, I really shouldn't have let him tell me.
• 48:54
  Speaker 3: I really shouldn't have done what Kefka wanted me to do.
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: I feel pretty bad about it. And I don't know
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: if he can spec later or not. But that's in
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: this game.
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: In this game, the most memorable thing that happens with
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: Sid is, like you remember when I said, like Celeste
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: like tries throws herself off a cliff, like right before that,
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: Sid is like dying in a hut, and like they're
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: on an island. Get there, the only two people on
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: that island, and so Celeste is just trying to take
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: care of him, like it's kind of like a it's
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: like to her, it's like carrying caring for like an
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: old man who's dying, and so like you go out
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: to get fish for him at the water and bring
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: them back to him as food. Uh. And there is
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: actually I think a way to keep him alive. But
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: you have to be very careful which fish you catch,
• 49:38
  Speaker 2: and it's not super obvious which ones you're supposed to catch.
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: Because most of them are like like poisonous to eat
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: because they're like the water is like messed with them,
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: and so you give him a poison fish and then
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: you come back to the hut later and he's dead.
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: And then after that's when she tries to kill herself.
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: So that's most people's memory of Sid I think from
• 49:56
  Speaker 2: that game.
• 49:57
  Speaker 3: Okay, well, I mean that's a little poetic in that
• 50:00
  Speaker 3: he is the one that made her into the magic
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: Site or whatever is it, Magicite warrior in this like
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: she has she has magic abilities, but they are not
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: like natural magic abilities. They come from She's been infused
• 50:19
  Speaker 3: with the energy of these espers, is how she gained
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: her abilities.
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think magicite refers to like the crystallized form
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: of the espers.
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: Right right, So it's just magic tech. She's a magic tech.
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Magic tech is the general term of the game
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: for combined magic and technology, which is kind of a
• 50:34
  Speaker 2: thing that's been adopted in a lot of in the
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: Fantasy trope. Is that notion of mixing the two, and
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: it feels like that that was kind of like one
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: of the big themes that like the first half at
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: least of like we were talking about like exploitations, like
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: how do we take magic and how do we break
• 50:53
  Speaker 2: it down into a science so we can use it
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: repeatedly and then they use it for like war and stuff.
• 50:59
  Speaker 3: So I will look at my Final Fantasy three Complete
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: Guide when I get to that part and see if
• 51:06
  Speaker 3: there's a way I can save Sid.
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I know whenever I play through it to be sure,
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: I only play through it like three times, which is
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: still three times. But yeah, like I remember specifically, I
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: got to say it's like, no, I'm keeping this guy alive.
• 51:20
  Speaker 2: He's not dying on my watch. And I think it's
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: like you have to like check either like it says
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: something when you get the fish or you have to
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: check your inventory every time you catch one to make
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: sure it's not deadly to eat. But I don't think
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: you get any particular rewards other than hey, he survived.
• 51:38
  Speaker 2: Actually he might give you an I know, I don't remember.
• 51:41
  Speaker 3: Well, I'm not a pragmatist. I want to save everyone
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: that I can.
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: Okay, So that's that's always me too. That's why it's
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: so hard. This isn't one of those games, but like
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: it gives where there's like a morality system. It's so
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: hard for me to go like bad or like a
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: mass effect like go renegade, even though I'm trying because
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: I want to see that that I just can't do
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: these horrible things. I can't push people out of windows.
• 52:04
  Speaker 2: It's like it feels too bad.
• 52:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we've talked about how I felt like it's harder
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: to be the bad guy in those kinds of games
• 52:14
  Speaker 3: because you can't tell when you're making the evil choice
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: or when you're just turning down a mission or just
• 52:22
  Speaker 3: being rude and cutting off relationships and things like that.
• 52:27
  Speaker 3: So it's easier to always just be the people pleaser
• 52:30
  Speaker 3: and like, oh yes, I'll do all that for you.
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: Oh no, don't pay me for that. Everything's fine, But yeah,
• 52:35
  Speaker 3: being the bad guy's tougher.
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, thankfully Fromtasy six is not really one of those
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: games like you're pretty right on the good side no
• 52:42
  Speaker 2: matter what. It's just like you get those things like
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: can you keep s it alive?
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah? I do. I do remember that this was really
• 52:50
  Speaker 3: long for a Super Nintendo game.
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: It is.
• 52:54
  Speaker 3: It took a long time. I think Final Fantasy four
• 52:57
  Speaker 3: I think it took me like twenty four hours on
• 53:00
  Speaker 3: the game clock to beat it. The first time, and
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: then this one, I feel like it got a lot
• 53:05
  Speaker 3: higher for me.
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: Maybe, Yeah, I have it in my head. Yeah, I
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: have it in my head from when when I last
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: played them both. So like Chrono Trigger is about twenty hours,
• 53:16
  Speaker 2: I think five ptasy four, I think is also about
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: that much. And I think if five ptasy six is
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: taking about forty hours, granted I like to do everything
• 53:27
  Speaker 2: me too. Yeah, it doesn't necessarily have to take forty hours.
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: I'm the guy who at the very end, there's this
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: little like patch of land you can go to in
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: the world of Ruin where you can fight these like
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: dinosaurs that are super powerful. They cay's like black hole
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: at you, but they will rarely drop like this relic
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: that I can't remember the name of, but it will
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: be the economizer, Like it reduces all of your spells
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: to one MP, even like Ultima, so I will go
• 53:58
  Speaker 2: farm those so I could put them on all my
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: mages before I go to the final battle. Yeah, which
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: is way more powerful than you need to be. Like
• 54:06
  Speaker 2: when you get gassed Ultimate every turn you're just going
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: to bow out everything of that battle. Dungeon like Kefka
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: is one of the easier final bosses because by the
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: time you get to them, you're usually like pretty powerful. Yeah,
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: because the game makes it very easy to like break
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: your characters and make them extremely But.
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: It is fun how they invented away, like, Okay, we
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: overstuffed this game with playable characters. How can we let
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: you use them all when you get to the end
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: so that they're not just kind of forgotten. And I
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: think that's that's pretty cleverly done.
• 54:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah. The different team dynamic, I think was a cool
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: one that they played around with, and it really makes
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: it feel like an event when you tackle the final dungeon,
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: just because everybody's involved, Yeah, and they're all going on
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: their different branches.
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: I'd forgotten about kind of the first person perspective sort
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: of aspects of this, you know, going through the mind, Yeah,
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: or when you're in the you have the bathosphere and
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: you're going under the water and you pick directions. Yeah,
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: that's pretty clever, And I think, well, there's a whole
• 55:10
  Speaker 3: sequence where it just kind of shows you when you're
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: trying to get out of the Magic Tech Factory at
• 55:16
  Speaker 3: the end, like you're writing on a thing and you
• 55:18
  Speaker 3: keep getting in fights and it culminates in a Boss Fight,
• 55:22
  Speaker 3: but you know, I don't think you have any directional
• 55:24
  Speaker 3: choices to make there, but that was pretty clever. And
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: then so they had to kind of simulate three D
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: on the Super Nintendo. But then in the Pixel Remaster,
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: I think they actually just did some three D stuff.
• 55:35
  Speaker 3: The opera scene actually has it looks more like Octopath
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: Traveler or something in the Pixel Remaster, and the singing
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: is all actually sung. You see the words on the screen,
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: but someone is singing them in English exactly as it's printed.
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: And I noticed that the translation because I remembered some
• 55:57
  Speaker 3: of the words, they were different from the Super Nintendo
• 56:01
  Speaker 3: version of the song, like it was a totally different
• 56:04
  Speaker 3: translation of it.
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I know they retranslated it. I know, at least
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: with the Gay Advance game the retrans lad. I don't
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: know if they're using the same one for the Pixel remaster.
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: But yeah, my friend seems to think that they're using
• 56:15
  Speaker 3: the Game Boy Advance translation here because he was saying,
• 56:20
  Speaker 3: like some of the lines like when you meet Shadow
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: the first time, Edgar or somebody says he'd slit his
• 56:29
  Speaker 3: mom's throat for a nickel or something in the original
• 56:31
  Speaker 3: Super Nintendo version and it's a little different, like you know,
• 56:34
  Speaker 3: he'd kill a friend for the right amount or something,
• 56:37
  Speaker 3: which maybe you know. Super Nintendo localizations were often pretty
• 56:43
  Speaker 3: fast and loose, just to try and make them more
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: fun for the American audience, or so they thought. Yeah,
• 56:50
  Speaker 3: later one's probably more accurate.
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I have lots of opinions about localization. We
• 56:55
  Speaker 2: can go on a whole time tangents on that. But
• 56:57
  Speaker 2: like the short thing for six is like originally it
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: was a guy named Ted Wolsey, who I think worked
• 57:04
  Speaker 2: for Square at the time. He did a lot of
• 57:06
  Speaker 2: their the supernes RPGs back then, and so he translated
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: five phasey six, and so you have some of the
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: weird quirky things because localization was a little more fast
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: and loose in that time, because they had more of
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: this notion of like we need to make things more
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: like relate more to a Western audience. So we had
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: what people jokingly called wolseyisms because that's what he came
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: up with that were in this game. Like the one
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: I always remember is like after like early on that
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: scene with Kavko, after the Edgar's castle like sinks into
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: the desert, he says, son of a sub mariner say
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: some ridiculous line. Like my favorite line that I'm kind
• 57:48
  Speaker 2: of sad that I think they dropped later was there
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: was there's a couple of spots where like there's lines
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: where people will kind of sputter and a like have
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: like repeat something a whole bunch like it'll scroll down
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: the tech box, like when Tariff first uses magic some
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: he says this with magic says, but magic it just
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: like has a whole bunch of ms. But like my
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: one of my favorite lines is when later on when
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: Kefka's just freaking out like I thun'k think on the
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: floating island, Like, uh, he's either I don't remember who
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: he's talking to, is that of the Emperor or like
• 58:22
  Speaker 2: you the characters because you did something that made it mad,
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: and he says like I hate hate hate hate hate
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: hate you, and like the amount of hates that he
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: says is insane, Like it just kind of keeps scrolling
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: down the textbox. I don't think they have that in
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: the later ones, And it's just like it's a really
• 58:35
  Speaker 2: memorable Bobick is Like, Okay, I guess he really hates
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: me now because it's like really like making me Uh,
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: making me feel that. But yeah, later translations, I think
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: they tried to go a little more literal and get
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: rid of like the overly dated, like goofy stuff that
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: just had no relationship to the original localization. And there's
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: whole debates that have gone on forever about like how
• 59:02
  Speaker 2: literal versus like local like ways of speaking should you
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: be in your localizations.
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: Right, So it's not it's not scripture, but there are
• 59:15
  Speaker 3: ways in which and I don't want to say anything
• 59:19
  Speaker 3: that's derogatory towards Japanese, but English oftentimes has more words
• 59:26
  Speaker 3: for the same thing than Japanese does. You know, They
• 59:30
  Speaker 3: are a sound poor language. They don't have as many
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: sounds in their vocabulary as English does. So I think
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: it's one of the reasons that English has become kind
• 59:38
  Speaker 3: of the universal sort of a language of business and
• 59:42
  Speaker 3: things like that. But so maybe they thought, well, we
• 59:45
  Speaker 3: can be a little more colorful in the English than
• 59:48
  Speaker 3: the original Japanese was.
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I think one of the more the crazier
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: localizations I've ever seen was like for Earthbound, very different game.
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: It's obviously a slight tangent, but like or Mother too,
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: as it was in Japan, but like I know when
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 2: they brought it over to the West, like they changed
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: a ton of references and like they changed graphics of
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: the game, so like some of the graphics were referencing
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: like obscure like Japanese like folklore stuff, and they changed
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: it completely different stuff Like I think something became a
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: pencil that was like a ghost.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: Yes, it was a pun that I think they just
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 3: couldn't translate. So yeah, you had to find a pencil
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 3: eraser and it was an item that would erase the
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 3: pencils that were in the way. And later on you
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: found an eraser eraser because they were erasers in the way.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: But yeah, like you said, that's the that's the wrong game.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that is a tangent. But h yeah, if
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: anybody hasn't heard from no that they haven't heard from
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: Andrew in a while. He had to step away. So
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: it's been just being David about thirty six. But I
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: don't know, is there anything else about forty six we
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 2: wanted to discuss.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 3: I don't know. I'm looking forward to finishing it. And
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: again I'm sorry I didn't get it finished but before
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 3: we had this conversation. But yeah, it's it's really good.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 3: I don't know why I never came back to I
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 3: think it was because I just remembered what a time
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: investment it was, and something like Final Fantasy, for you know,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 3: I could blow through much more quickly without getting lost
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 3: because it's it's very linear, and that one always just
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 3: because of like I said in that podcast, the time
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 3: that that came in my life, that one holds a
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 3: special place for me. But I know this one's really
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 3: a special one to a lot of people.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you can tell. This is the era when rpgus
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: were getting graduately longer and longer, like you compare to
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: like I like when we had our talk on Phantasy
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: one through three, Like I played through all of Fun
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: Fantasy three, like the Pixelary Master of the Nes game,
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: like in a week I think. Ye, that was like
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: fifteen hours on the game flock. So it was shorter
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: even than fan FBAC four. Yeah, but because they were
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: trying to get more cinematic at this point and get
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: more drawn out, more artistic presented stories, more epic, like,
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: they just kind of got longer and longer and longer,
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: and then you hit the PlayStation era and suddenly you
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: could do cut scenes that were more than just like
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: little pixel characters talking to each other, and you had
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: more space to like on the actual medium on CDs,
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: to actually write lots of text, and so they just
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: got longer and longer and longer until we got to
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: the current era where we have one hundred two hour,
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: hundred hour JRPGs, and like that's just like all of them.
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 3: Feels like, yeah, and I'm often I prefer shorter, shorter
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 3: experience because a lot a lot of these do. It
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 3: feels like there's padding that that is just not respect
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 3: respecting your time. But I remember when, yeah, Final Fantasy seven,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 3: you know, I did all the stuff in that, you know,
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: it did all of the chocobo breeding to get the
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: Golden Chocobo to go get Night to the Round and
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 3: all that stuff, And I think I had probably seventy
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 3: five hours on the clock the first time I finished that,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 3: which was really long for the time.
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do feel like even though Fantasy six is
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: longer than the ones before it, it does still feel
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: to me like it moves very fast. Like it's long,
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: not because the game is paced slow. It's long because
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of content, Like there are so many
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: story events, Like it felt like in some ways. It
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: feels like the big last big hurrah of the sixteen
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: bit era in terms of like big jeerpzes. I don't
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 2: think it was like the last of squares. I want
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: to say their last one was Mario RPG of all Things,
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: which had a massive jump in like graphics over this one,
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: because that was when they were experiending the cg which yeah,
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: pre rendered, which Fantasy seven was where it kind of
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: came to full fruition of what they wanted out of
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: that technology. They weren't yet experimenting with that with six,
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: but they were trying to do the much more larger
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: It feels like the style of game they were making
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: was straining at the edges of what that era of
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: video and consoles could do. Like they wanted like like
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: movie level experience in a video game, and the Supremers
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: couldn't quite do it, but they gave it their hard
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: as possible try.
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah with six. Yeah, well, how are we going to
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 3: wrap this up without Andrew here.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: As an extlepert. We don't have him here to kind
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: of guide us. I guess it's kind of like, uh,
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: what's our what's our like closing takes on the game. Yeah,
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: I guess like you can go ahead. Yeah, I think
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: I already cave. I gave mine pretty much. Yeah, I'll
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: just say like I think like there's a reason this
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 2: is probably my favorite game in the series, Like not
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: just nostalgia that though that's hard to extricate my nostalgia
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: from an objective analysis, but I do really think like
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: this is about as good you can do of like
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: of like good storytelling from the era that it was made,
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: like with the technology that they had in terms of
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: getting a s madic and experiences you could The writing
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: I think is really solid, Like there's shortcomings, like as
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: we establish like that, I feel like because like obviously
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: as Christians, we believe like ours is like the most
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: coherent worldview, right, so like it's always going to feel
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: a little unsatisfying to us when it feels like something's
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 2: not well rooted in like an understanding of God and
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 2: his eternal nature and like how that impacts our view
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 2: of morality and everything. And so when a story can't
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 2: appeal to that and it's trying to confront here's why
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: nihilism is bad, Like it feels inadequate to us, But
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 2: like that said, it still asks useful questions, like it's like, hey,
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 2: life is worth like exploring, like explore the value of life,
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: like there's something intrinsically good about it, which is something
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: that is scriptural that teaches like that life, because it's
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: made in God's image, has value and it may be
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: missing like the God's image part here and obviously six
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: a story, but it still understands like that life is
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: valuable and worth clinging to and like like it's worth
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: fighting against death, right, And when it seems like all
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 2: everything around you is hopeless kind of like what the
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 2: puddle Glum reference like that Andrew Maid, like, even when
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: it looks like there is nothing worthwhile out there, like
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: it's important that we trust that there is and to
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: go seek out that which is valuable. And I think
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 2: that's like that goes to a very fundamental aspect of
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: human nature that like we all need that sense of hope.
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: That's I am a Christian in the first place, right
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 2: because like I cling to that hope.
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, it's good.
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 2: Well shall we close it out on that then, I
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 2: guess so, all right, all right, we'll talk to you later,
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: David later. It's fun.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening, and if you enjoy these conversations
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: as well as maybe you've enjoyed some of the deep
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: dive stuff have been doing with the elder scrolls and philosophy.
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: Uh maybe like the main myth in Mind podcast, Maybe
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: like the stuff we're doing with the movies and shows podcasts.
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 1: If you like any or all of that and you
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: want to see more of that happening, then I welcome
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 1: your support over on Patreon at patreon dot com slash
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: mythic Mind. That's gonna allow me to do more things
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: like this. Also, it'll give you the opportunity to join
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: these conversations if you so desire. I would love to
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: do a lot more of the deep dive you know
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: whatever in philosophy studies. I think the next one I'm
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: probably gonna do at some point in twenty twenty six
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: is on fallout. But I can only do more of
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: that with additional support that allows me to turn my
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: attention away from other things that pay the bills. So again,
• 1:07:33
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• 1:07:35
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• 1:07:38
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• 1:07:40
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• 1:07:42
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• 1:07:45
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• 1:07:47
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• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: come out from a Mythic Mind will either be over
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: on the main Mythic Mind podcast as we really get
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: into the first three Narnia books, or I might post
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: something from the Elders Rolls course over here a little
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: bit earlier than that. We'll see. I'm just kind of
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: throwing that stuff in here and there, so keep an
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: eye for that and make sure that you're sup to
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: my YouTube channel as well. You can kind a link
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: to that in the show notes. All right, well, thanks
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: for joining us again. Next time over here, we're going
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: to be starting in on a fallout series and so
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: I'm really looking forward to that. But that's it, pronoun
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: until next time, God Speak