Anyone else feel Noctis is the worst protagonist in the FF series?

[Justin_760]

He never has anything significant or even mildly interesting to say, only ever complains, is a brooding moody downer 24/7, and hes apathetic to a ridiculous degree. I know, hes a young prince and sure that might be a believable behavior considering his origins, but for the main protagonist and player character, it makes no sense. Hes a one sided character with extreme emotional shallowness, only ever displaying anger or sadness.

Is anyone else shocked that Square took this direction for the MAIN protagonist? I cant wrap my head around it...

Dont get me wrong, Square clearly has the ability to write good characters, as we see with the rest of Nocts entourage, but its such a dissapointment that were stuck with such a vapid and triffling hero. He never vocalizes opinions on anything, and 90% of his responses to people are petty inanities. That may work for some characters, but with Noctis it gives precious little room for growth, because not only do we never get insight into his character, but the character that is there is so damn shallow he is VERY hard to empathize with and like.

It almost feels like they were trying to shape Noctis into a character that would have appeal to younger audiences, as the developers have stated numerous times, they wanted to bring "new" people to the series. Considering most people like myself grew up playing the FF series, I imagine newcomers would most likely mean adolescents.

[Bigbazz]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Spawk:

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

Yes but the basis of your argument is a subjective manufactured position that is based purely on your own perception and selective interpretation, a perception and interpretation that is not shared by others. It's not an argument, and using apples vs oranges examples to support it isn't helping anything with your point of view.

You're just arguing for the sake of arguing and throwing honest observations to the wind in favour of whatever you can churn out that you feel supports your point of view, regardless of whether it holds any truth or merit to begin with.

What is even the point at this stage? Just agree to disagree and move on, instead of this constant closed off pettyness.

No, he's making very fair points. You appear to just be trying to wave away fair critique of the quality of the story and character development.

For instance, if a comparison to another medium is made, you dismiss his argument that the game has poor writing on the basis of the mediums not being the same, despite the content in both mediums being expected to make narrative sense.

If he points out that the game is part of a story-driven genre and explains succinctly what he feels is wrong with the writing, especially in regard to the character development, you call that a "subjective manufactured position" and that he's just "throwing honest observations to the wind in favour of whatever you can churn out that you feel supports your point of view, regardless of whether it holds any truth or merit to begin with.', whereas you are more guilty of that than he is.

The point being that it's apples vs oranges.

In a game the story is told through visuals, through sound, through first hand experience of events. Have you heard the saying "A picture is worth a thousand words?" Well what about experiencing a moment first hand?

A book is a telling of a story where the words have to feed the imagination and mind with a enough information to paint a picture, this is not comparable with the game where the story is told and perceived through actions, events, visuals, sounds in real time as they unfold.

So no, his example is not valid by any stretch of the imagination, certainly not in the context in which he used it in reply to my post, and by all accounts all he does is dodge and then reinforce his previous position by continiously overexaggerating his previous views while getting more frustrated.

I've asked him to agree to disagree, at this point he's long lost his composure for discussing it reasonably and he has considerably hardened his line of thought to the point of dishonesty, and along with that frustration has come his petty closed minded attitude.

[Temaz]

I dont understand the game...
I just dont get it, but graphics is okay.

:)

[Onionhorse]

....f@ck everything everyone has said until now, the only problems we have right now are the ram usage, the bushes in combat areas and why didnt Gentiana carry the bloody ring to Noctis?

also Sviep knows whats up
https://kotaku.com/what-final-fantasy-is-according-to-its-creator-1672622214
"Final Fantasy is Final Fantasy if it has a blue window with text in it." Sakagushi aka the most beautiful man in existance

[Metadragon]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Onionhorse:

....f@ck everything everyone has said until now, the only problems we have right now are the ram usage, the bushes in combat areas and why didnt Gentiana carry the bloody ring to Noctis?

also Sviep knows whats up
https://kotaku.com/what-final-fantasy-is-according-to-its-creator-1672622214
"Final Fantasy is Final Fantasy if it has a blue window with text in it." Sakagushi aka the most beautiful man in existance

No points for half answers.

"At the time, I was really drunk and just rattled off a response." Sakaguchi laughed. "But I regretted it the next day and wrote a proper response that I sent by email."

Sakaguchi's official answer was much more eloquent.

「足跡のない幾多の道を、ひたすらに生きる者たちで駆け抜け、最後には同じゴールに到達した後に生まれるもの」とでもさせてください。やっぱ、新しいことをつねに目指してたし、今後もそうあってほしいよね。

Translation:

Say it's "what is born after those who live intensely, run across a multitude of unbeaten paths to reach the same goal in the end." After all, we've always strived to do new things, and I'd like it if we kept doing that.

[Onionhorse]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Metadragon:

Początkowo opublikowane przez Onionhorse:

....f@ck everything everyone has said until now, the only problems we have right now are the ram usage, the bushes in combat areas and why didnt Gentiana carry the bloody ring to Noctis?

also Sviep knows whats up
https://kotaku.com/what-final-fantasy-is-according-to-its-creator-1672622214
"Final Fantasy is Final Fantasy if it has a blue window with text in it." Sakagushi aka the most beautiful man in existance

No points for half answers.

"At the time, I was really drunk and just rattled off a response." Sakaguchi laughed. "But I regretted it the next day and wrote a proper response that I sent by email."

Sakaguchi's official answer was much more eloquent.

「足跡のない幾多の道を、ひたすらに生きる者たちで駆け抜け、最後には同じゴールに到達した後に生まれるもの」とでもさせてください。やっぱ、新しいことをつねに目指してたし、今後もそうあってほしいよね。

Translation:

Say it's "what is born after those who live intensely, run across a multitude of unbeaten paths to reach the same goal in the end." After all, we've always strived to do new things, and I'd like it if we kept doing that.

and his favorite one is 9, but its more fun for people to actually look it up

[Metadragon]

Its funny because I generally dislike FF9. I should really give it another go and see how I feeel now since the last time i played it all those years ago.

[Onionhorse]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Metadragon:

Its funny because I generally dislike FF9. I should really give it another go and see how I feeel now since the last time i played it all those years ago.

I did too because of the whole "furries" but really the game much more than that
Hell i would say there is no "bad" Final Fantasy in the main timeline series, i would even include 13 in there considering that the sequels destroyed everything the first game tried to accomplish just to fix a few technical issues and sell more waifus than 10-2

[FauxFurry]

He's Leonardo. Leonardo is never the most interesting Ninja Turtle.

[FauxFurry]

Bland generic leader man persona aside, I'd take Noctis over Vaan anytime.
Noctis doesn't seem like an afterthought like Vaan did (probably due to the fact that he was a last minute addition for the sake of appealing to the teenage female demographic).

[Moogy]

I didnt like any of them really. None of the characters in the game appealed to me, i still liked the game to some extent though, but i thought the movie before it was more exciting.

Same with Noctis like OP explained, has not much going for him. There hasnt been a good protagonist since FFX.

[Metadragon]

Początkowo opublikowane przez FauxFurry:

Bland generic leader man persona aside, I'd take Noctis over Vaan anytime.
Noctis doesn't seem like an afterthought like Vaan did (probably due to the fact that he was a last minute addition for the sake of appealing to the teenage female demographic).

Naw he was an addition for young players on the whole. Theres enough cheesecake with Ashe an d Fran and enough beefcake with Balthier and Basch. SE thought young people wouldnt play it if the main character was older, in this case Basch was supposed to be the "main" character

[Dark Exile]

squall was worst, followed very closely by tidus, this kid aint that bad

[Metadragon]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Dark Exile:

squall was worst, followed very closely by tidus, this kid aint that bad

Tidus was awesome. Change my mind.

[Chaos Residue]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

The point being that it's apples vs oranges.

Except that it's not. Let me elaborate since your comprehension is lacking:

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

In a game the story is told through visuals, through sound, through first hand experience of events. Have you heard the saying "A picture is worth a thousand words?" Well what about experiencing a moment first hand?

I highlighted your own words : through sound. Name a single JRPG (Final Fantasy XV aside) where they rely solely on visuals to explain the main characters thoughts/emotions/character development. I can't think of a single one.

Now let me name the Final Fantasy games that have the main character using speech to let us know what he/she is thinking and/or feeling before the game is 90% complete:

Final Fantasy Tactics
Final Fantasy VII
Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy X
Final Fantasy XII (this only counts because Vaan says pretty much anything on his mind, and that actually makes me not like him)
Even Final Fantasy XIII did this to some extent (although Lightning was still an absolutely horrible character)

And yet with Final Fantasy XV they didn't WRITE anything for the main character's development for 90% of the game. They let him suffer in silence, and now you're telling me that that was good writing... because they didn't have him talk about anything. Yeah, that sounds right. I know I love it when I have to assume what the main character is going through instead of the game detailing it.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

A book is a telling of a story where the words have to feed the imagination and mind with a enough information to paint a picture, this is not comparable with the game where the story is told and perceived through actions, events, visuals, sounds in real time as they unfold.

Let me educate you on how books work since you obviously haven't read one (unless it's a picture book). When the writer is describing their main character they don't describe all of the things that are happening to him and then saying that he/she looks upset. They write about the emotions that character is experiencing. They write about what the character is feeling. They describe it so it's impossible for the reader to walk away saying, "I don't know what he/she was actually going through... guess I have to use my imagination to try and understand the character." But that's exactly what they did with Final Fantasy XV. They told you nothing about his thoughts or emotions, and you just had to try to figure out exactly what he was thinking and feeling to get him to behave the way he was behaving. They show bad things happening to Noctis, and they show him getting closed off. Except for Jared. No, no... Jared was special. He died and Noctis showed emotion with Talcott. He let that boy know what he was going through wasn't right. I don't believe he even consoled Iris in that scene. He didn't act that way with his father's death. He didn't act that way with his fiance's death. He didn't even act that way when one of his best friends lost their eyesight saving Noctis' life. But you seem to think that's good writing.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

So no, his example is not valid by any stretch of the imagination, certainly not in the context in which he used it in reply to my post, and by all accounts all he does is dodge and then reinforce his previous position by continiously overexaggerating his previous views while getting more frustrated.

You refuse to listen to logic and reason. I'm not trying to make you dislike the game. I'm proving that the writing was poor from an objective standpoint based on the fact that not developing a character is considered poor writing. You even agree with that for books apparently, but somehow you don't feel that it matters if you can see that Noctis is struggling with stuff internally. Even though we have no reference to exactly what he's trying to overcome interntally for most of the game because he never says anything about it. He just one day got over everything he was struggling with (at the end of Chapter 13 when the game was nearly over) and it was never brought up again.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Bigbazz:

I've asked him to agree to disagree, at this point he's long lost his composure for discussing it reasonably and he has considerably hardened his line of thought to the point of dishonesty, and along with that frustration has come his petty closed minded attitude.

There was no dishonesty in what I said. I was never closed-minded. You're an antagonistic troll who doesn't understand the concept of poor writing. You're arguing nonsensical points as if they disprove what I'm saying. I've said you can like the writing and the game, but it doesn't make it good writing. I've given analogies to support this and you throw them away because it's not the same medium even though you agreed that the analogy I used was poor writing. I gave other examples in the same medium and explained how they actually discuss in some way what the main character is struggling with and dealing with. I can't give examples of games that have done what Final Fantasy XV did with their lazy writing because I literally don't know of a single game that had a main character that was so poorly written. I have provided logic and reason to back up my claim that Noctis' story in this game is an example of poor writing. Your entire argument that I am wrong essentially boils down to either "nuh-uh" or "not having him talk and clarify what he's dealing with is an example of good writing". You haven't given any examples of other games that have done this. You've done nothing to disprove what I have said. Do that and get back to me.

[Bigbazz]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Chaos Residue:

Lots of words with little substance

Yes completely ignore that story and emotion can be displayed without words fairly simply with a game, while not at all with a book. Keep missing the point, keep dodging the questions and moving the goal posts.

Keep ignoring clearly obvious factors where the game displays my point of view on a moment to moment basis and focus on only the literal spoken observations. All I think we can take from this is you're emotionally inept at reading situations and need someone to spell it out for you at every turn.

Doesn't surprise me, like I've said before agree to disagree because your dishonesty and desparation shows through too strongly on what is a pointless discussion at this point, and by dishonesty I'm describing your ever increasing exageration of previous points, and ever more intention to ignore reasonable thought as frustration creeps in with your inability to "win" a subjective argument.