[Auraeon]

What are your guys' and gals' thoughts on this?

http://devin-gaughan.blogspot.com/

[firefeng]

Auraeon, on 26 May 2010 - 10:48 PM, said:

What are your guys' and gals' thoughts on this?

http://devin-gaughan.blogspot.com/

Makes sense. A few points of contention, however:

1.) As a chauvinistic pig, I like female leads because I am severely perverted.
2.) FFVI, with Tina/Terra and Celes as the most prominent characters, showed that Square was willing to use female leads long before we were ever given a 3D iteration in the series.

[Aeonknight]

As long as it doesn't degrade into the BS that was X-2, I'm up for whatever.

[Varizen]

Part of their goal in 12 was to give it that Star Wars / Hidden Fortress feel where the story was told through the eyes of the 2 lowest ranked characters in a story about the higher rank ones. Star Wars is told through the eyes of C3PO and R2D2. At least the original 3, [4,5, and 6]. The Hidden Fortress, which inspired Lucas was told through the eyes of two bumbling and escaped peasants as they followed an ousted princess and her personal guardian as they journeyed to allied territory while packing gold that was to fund their army.

Look at the parallels between 12 and Hidden Fortress already. Ousted Princess out for vengeance. Disgraced personal bodyguard who was a high ranking captain. 2 peasants traveling with them by whom the story is told. Then for Star Wars, you take Han Solo and Luke, and merge'em into 1 guy. Balthier has a freakin' awesome Airship, a non-human partner, and all the bounty hunters are after him, while at the same time, his father has turned to darkness, While an Evil Empire seeks to take everything over with their supreme ultimate death weapon (Sky Fortress Bahamut = Death Star). And yes. I did just imply Fran = Chewbaca.

But by that same token, you could at the very least say Kurosawa was quite behind the women's movement as he used a princess in his story.

I also think that SE likes using the Observer method of story telling because you have one character who is defaultly easily related to, who makes it easier to relate to the characters in the more extreme circumstances.

Also... It's a shame the Tomb Raider series has been ruined. Tomb Raider 1-4 were freaking awesome, but they wanted to make 4 the last one, and ruined the whole series by doing that. But While I do agree that while Lara did start to make headway for female leads as you didn't see that many before her, the game industry is taking bad steps in trying to raise their actual female audience. Sure, Hannah Montana games might get 'tween girls to pick up a controller, but that's NOT gonna cement them and lock them in. They're gonna need something besides gimmicky Hello Kitty and Hannah Montana games to keep them. They really need more in that area, which amounts to more than virtually playing dolls and dress up. For that they're just going to need more NORMAL female protagonist. Not the ultra sexualized Bayonettas. Characters that aren't busty beyond belief, and act like normal.

[Kenshiro]

I can draw parallels between Star Wars and anything.

[Velhart]

A female as a lead character is fine with me, as long as the character is very in-depth. Hell, most of my WoW characters are female.

What I think about Vaan/Penelo to C3PO/R2-D2 was at least the droids were interesting to an extent, and the two peasents in Hidden Fortress also. Vaan and Penelo were two very uninteresting characters with little to almost no back story to work with except his brother's death.

Now on the other hand, Revenant Wings and FFTA2 made Vaan and Penelo shine and made them very interesting characters to get into. But when you have powerful stories coming from Basch, Ashe, Balthier, hell even Fran, it is really hard to care about Vaan or Penelo. But the storyline is incredible none-the-less.

Quote

I can draw parallels between Star Wars and anything.

Star Wars and Taco Bell.......go!

This post has been edited by Velhart: 27 May 2010 - 09:27 AM

[Vigilous]

Little known fact: Greedo owned a Taco Bell franchise before he became a bounty hunter.

[Cruzandercerberus]

Velhart, on 27 May 2010 - 09:26 AM, said:

A female as a lead character is fine with me, as long as the character is very in-depth.

Oh come on, there has to be at least some level of realism.

[Vigilous]

A lot of these so-called "strong female leads" have too much depth. Let's make her strong, willful, fiercely independent, and so on and so on. FFVIII probably had the most "realistic" female lead (I know, I know, I'm stretching). Rinoa wasn't overtly attractive, nor did she try to bow to masculine forms of justice and morality. Plus she had identifiable flaws - that she was aware of.

You can only add so many layers to a parfait before it becomes an unpalatable mess.

[Velhart]

Cruzandercerberus, on 27 May 2010 - 11:31 AM, said:

Oh come on, there has to be at least some level of realism.

Vigilous, on 27 May 2010 - 11:39 AM, said:

A lot of these so-called "strong female leads" have too much depth. Let's make her strong, willful, fiercely independent, and so on and so on. FFVIII probably had the most "realistic" female lead (I know, I know, I'm stretching). Rinoa wasn't overtly attractive, nor did she try to bow to masculine forms of justice and morality. Plus she had identifiable flaws - that she was aware of.

You can only add so many layers to a parfait before it becomes an unpalatable mess.

That is very true and Rinoa does come to mind when I think of a good female character. I would have to give props to Dagger from FFIX also, she developed from a weak hearted princess to a strong willed queen as the game progressed.