I've been looking at a lot of different . . . entertainment mediums I guess, lately. Various videogames, movies, tv shows, music, etc. And, well, I have opinions on all of them, and for some reason, I just have the desire to share my opinions and get feedback from people. So yeah, I'm going to state my opinons on stuff, and, hopefully, anyone reading this will comment with thoughts of their own, and maybe it will spark another one of those fun, fun debates I enjoy so much. Here goes:
TV:
I recently just bought and recieved the second season of Farscape on DVD in the mail, and I've been slowly, but surely watching it. Granted, I've missed at least half of the first season. I didn't start watching it religiously until the 4th and final season. But nevertheless, I absolutely love this series. I'm glad that even though it's not longer in production, I can still watch episodes I haven't seen yet. Anyway, I'm just now realizing how incredibly amazing and unique this series is. And I would even go as far as saying it is the best sci-fi show I have ever seen. Better than Star Wars (Which I consider more Sci-Fantasy) and Star Trek (which I watched religiously for the three newest series). Farscape is just so radically different from anything else I 've ever seen. The various adventures are all so original. And while there is the occasional dumb episode, the quality of the show is unmistakable. The cleverness of the dialogue including pop-culture references that consistently confuse the alien characters are just so . . . intelligent. It's remarkably well written. And it's a very cohesive story. Sure it all comes together, like the whole series is actually one big story as opposed to a bunch of seperate stories experienced by the same characters.
And the characters are probably Farscape's biggest strength. They are all so well-fleshed out. Each one is incredibly deep and varied. And watching the different crew members interact is just fascinating. The performances by the actors are equally amazing. It's phenomenal actors like Ben Browder than make me want to be a performer. And his incredible sexiness just adds to the allure.
Bottom Line: Intelligent storytelling and intriguing characters make Farscape my absolute favorite Sci-Fi show ever. If they don't finish the series, when I'm famous, I'll finish it myself.
Music:
This will be short b/c I've descried most of this in a previous post. I 've just got more reflections on Sarah's new album. The more I listen to it, the more layers I can unravel. Both in the music and in the lyrics. It seems deceptively simple the first time you listen to it. But it just gets deeper and deeper as I listen. At first I said it was more calm than previous albums. But after listening to it, it's not less calm, but the angst is buried under more layers and is more subtle. And subtlety is something I love. Also, listening to it more, I can recognize several similarities to her other most recent two albums, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy (which this blog is named after) and Surfacing. Afterglow very much sounds like a combination of those two. The peace and serenity of Surfacing with a subtle layer of the angst of FTE. And there are musical similarities too. The album is mostly slow and melodic like Surfacing, but there are various musical ideas mixed in that were present in FTE. Probably the best example is the organ background in Perfect Girl: VERY reminicent of FTE. That's about all the new insight I have on it for now.
Movies:
After recently watching The Matrix Revolutions, I feel like reflecting on the trilogy as a whole. And, honestly, I'm reluctant to call it a trilogy. I very much feel that Reloaded and Revolutions should be considered one continuous movie. After all, they run together directly to tell the same story, and they are vastly different from the first film. If they are truly going to make The Matrix a trilogy, they need a new installment.
I honestly can't decide which I liked better. The original Matrix had a sense of mystery that the sequels didn't have. It may not have been possible, but that sense of mystery is part of what made the original so enthralling. Although the animatrix managed to capture the magic and mystery of the first installment in a way that the sequels didn't. But the sequels had a different focus than the first film.
Anyway, Reloaded seemed to focus more on the matrix itself while Revolutions focused almost entirely on the real world. I thought while Revolutions was a more polished movie overall than Reloaded, it didn't . . . oh, this is hard to explain. Reloaded had all of those cool sequences that could only happen in the matrix. Like the freeway scene. That was absolutely amazing. And while Revolutions had some kick ass sequences, it didn't have anything quite like the freeway scene. I also felt that Reloaded set up the story, and Revolutions was more just reactions and following the story through to completion. There were some more philosophical ideas presented, but not much in the way of plot twists. I expected a lot more to be done with the Smith that got out of the matrix. That was over and done with much sooner than I expected.
But, all in all, I loved Revolutions. The expanded characters of the asian Oracle guard guy (I forget his name), the Kid(didn't catch his name) and the black lady who was the wife of the black guy(No, I didn't catch thier names either) were really awesome. The defense of the dock was amazing, as was the final battle with Smith (Much shorter than expected, though). But I just loved Reloaded too. Sure, it had it's flaws. But I think without the flaws, I would have enjoyed it more than the finale. I do think a true third installment is neccesary, though. And with the open-ended ending (I apologize for the redundancy) that's probably what they're planning anyway.
Videogames:
This one is gonna be a long one. With the recent release of FF XI and the quickly approaching release of X-2, I feel like reflecting back on each of the past games. And since many people I know have gripes about some of them, I'm going to share my own opinions.
FF I: As the first FF game I ever played, it holds a special place in my heart. It is not, however, the FF that got me hooked. But it was still a great game that I played for hours upon hours. Despite it's extreme downplaying of mages and encouragement of warriors, the class system was really cool and really made replaying it all the way through interesting to try and beat it with different combinations of characters. And even though it had a fairly linear quest, it didn't really seem so. I don't know why that was. Maybe it was b/c you were never specifically instructed to do anything. You just did what you could to travel to different areas and even important NPC's told you brief bouts of information like any regular townsperson. It made unraveling the mystery even more personal and difficult to uncover. A true classic that still has redeeming qualities even when compared to more recent RPG's.
FF II: Haven't played it yet, so I can't really comment. But the character advancement system sounds fascinating. I can't wait to see how it actually works.
FF III: Hasn't been released in North America yet, so I can't comment on this one either.
FF IV: I haven't gotten around to beating it yet. I got pretty far, but I ran into a wall where you either fight ridiculously easy monsters for petty experience, or you fight ridiculously difficult mosters that kill you before you can even gain experience. One of these day, I'm gonna have to just dig in and level up a bunch.
But I must say that the individual character classes is nice. I like the idea that each person has their own special abilities. That way the characters aren't so interchangeable the way they are in later FF's. They each have their own role in battle, and you have to learn how to use it the best. And while having characters die is sad, having a constant influx of new characters is nice. I enjoy how the roster changes. That way there are multiple characters, but the pain of trying to choose between them at certain points isn't there. I find it hard to choose for the most part, and the inactive ones don't gain experience, and they have to be leveled up seperately, and it's just a pain. This doesn't happen in VI. If you can't use them, it's b/c their dead and you don't have to worry about them anymore. Well, I guess it's kinda sad, but it works in the game mechanics.
But the story is pretty interesting. If it wasn't for the insane jump in difficulty, I would've played it through to the end. Very engrossing for the graphical quality. And, I'm sorry, but graphics do make a diffference for me. I try not to let thim. I know it sounds superficial, but better, more realistic graphics make it soooo much easier for me to become engrossed in a game. If it's too fake looking, it's hard to be lost in it. But a very good story, nonetheless. And for the time, the characters are good. No particular favorites, but no bad ones either. Then again, it's been a while since I've actually played it. I'll have to go back sometime.
FF V: I absolutely love the Job system. It is the best of both worlds. It has maximum customizability while insuring that each party member has their own specific purpose in the battle. It's great. This game actually made random battles fun. Once again, I haven't finished it. The story wasn't quite as engrossing as IV's, but battles were more fun. Battle system was amazing, but the characters and story aren't as engrossing as other installments.
FFVI: Truly a classic. This games ensemble cast is one of my favorite aspects of the game. You get to know each of the characters equally, instead of always being forced to have one main character with you at all times. I also really liked how the characters would have to split up into different parties in order to pass certain dungeons. It was brilliant and that mechanic should be present in more FF's. The characters ranged from really cool (Terra) to really dumb (Relm and Gau). The story was amazing too, and also gripped me despite the graphics. If this game was made with PS2 graphics and the translation improved, it would truly be a masterpiece.
There really are no faults that I can think of with this game. If I had to nit-pick, it'd be how the characters are kind of interchangeable. They all have one unique command, but all learn the same magic, etc. And the character development system was simplistic. But I'm really grabbing for straws. A great game that would really be amazing if redone with today's technology.
FFVII: My personal favorite. This was the FF that got me hooked on Final Fantasy. And, surprisingly, it has more faults than many of the others, but it has soooo many redeeming qualities as well. Graphics were leaps and bounds over previous installments, but still would be greatly improved given a graphical facelift. In my opinion, it is the most engrossing of all the FF stories I've experienced. More plot twists and turns than anyother. This one was so complex there are still points that I'm unclear on. You really have to think and pay attention. And the characters were, at least for me, the most memorable. Sure, there were duds (cair sith) but all the others were enjoyable and it was difficult to choose who I wanted to play with. Well, ok, it wasn't because Aeris and Vincent are still my favorite fictional characters in any medium. And Cloud was a pretty cool main character. I actually didn't mind having him permanently stuck in my party. Barret, while a dork, was still cool in his own way. Red XIII, Tifa, and Yuiffie were also great. And Sephiroth is easily the baddest FF villain so far. This game just fills me with great nostalgia. It affected me emotionally more than any other videogame with Aeris's death. A truly magnificent story. The cyber-punk setting and anime character designs are my favorite in the entire series. And the materia system was pretty cool too. Lots of fun combinations to try, but as I mentioned before, the characters were very interchangeable. The only difference was in thier limit breaks. Other than that, they all had the same commands in battle. And the ending is its biggest flaw in that, well, it's not an ending. It's a cliff-hanger. It doesn't resolve any of the plot what-so-ever. Nothing is answered and it is ultimately unsatisfying. Thank GOD for the sequel, even if it is only a 60 minute movie. Apperantly, it's supposed to be a set up for another game. At least that's the gist I got from an interview with Tetsuya Nomura. I really hope that is the case. The story of this FF world is far from over.
FF VIII: The most hated of the FF's. At least it is with the people I've talked to. And while, it is far from my favorite, I respect this installment more than any other. With VIII, square genuinely tried to do something different. They didn't just churn out another FF to make money, they tried to rework everything we take for granted with RPG's. Sure, not all of the ideas worked, but at least they tried. I would have liked the Junction system if it wasn't so cumbersome.
It took ridiculous amounts of time to re-eqip if you changed pary members. It really ruined the pace of the game. And the weapon upgrades were cool, but also too big of a pain to actually work. These ideas just needed some tweaking to work. The only other gripe I have is that the characters were also very interchangeable in battle. Even more so than VII because the Limit Breaks were even less varied, and there was only one or two for each character. And Guardian Forces are the main damage dealers in the game. Magic is next to useless. It's only really good for boosting stats with junctioning.
But as for strengths, the only dud character was Selphie, and she wasn't even that bad. I just don't care for bubbly personalities and her limit break sucked ass. Squall was actually a very beloved character for me, and I would've had him in my party the whole time even if he wasn't the main character. More than any other hero, I identified with him. Yeah, he was an ass in the beginning, but his inner monologues revealed a lot about him, and I felt a certain connection to him that I never felt with an FF character. If I was any FF character, I would be Squall. We're just very similar. And he wasn't the typical hero, and I enjoyed that. There were also points in the game where you had to split into multiple parties like in VI. If it wasn't for the cumbersome junctioning, this would've been fabulous. And I enjoyed the story, though it went very slowly in the middle of each disk. But it really picked up and grabbed me at the end of each disk. And it has the best ending of any FF to date. Truly magical. And the intro is also the best. Absolutely amazing. And great music too. Lots of strengths to match its flaws.
FF XI: Overall, a good game. It just didn't stand out in any way for me. I loved using 4 characters in battle again. And each character had their own class and individual abilities that I loved. However, I just really didn't like any of the characters. Zidane absolutely annoyed the shit out of me. I really didn't like having him in my party. Quina was . . . very odd . . . and didn't really have much of a personality. Eiko was annoying too. Too bad she as so much more useful in battle than Garnet, whom I actually liked. Vivi was cool, Amarant was cool, and Freya was cool. But Freya had pathetically little to do with the story and mostly seemd to just be along for the ride, and Amarant came in way too late. Steiner was hilarious, but a dork, and not terribly useful in my experience. Summons were made out to be all-powerful, but were pathetically weak when used in battle. The 9999 damage cap was dissappointing. It made the game difficult, but annoyingly so. And the trance system was annoying how you couldn't save it. There were countless instances when a trance was wasted b/c the character tranced at the very end of the battle. And I really didn't like the cartoony art style.
The story started out strong, but fizzled out toward the end and got rather cheesy. But, overall, it was good. It just didn't stand out in my mind like others did.
Shit, I work in 3 and a half hours. I need sleep. But I'm not done. I'll finish tomorrow. night.
Eric 11/08/2003 02:50:00 AM
