Final Fantasy X
Brandon g
Ah, Final Fantasy X. This is the first Final Fantasy to actually have voice actors (aside from a few notes of song in Final Fantasy IX), and with it, every Final Fantasy player's worst dreams were realized: Final Fantasy has cheesy dialogue. It's like the first time that someone said Star Wars had cheesy dialogue, and you were like, "Nuh-uh!" but then you went back and watched it and it was cheesy dialogue. So sad.
It doesn't help that among our main characters are a whiny crybaby teen superstar, a dense-as-lead sports fanatic, a furry beast with the brain of a fruit fly, and a busty but angsty woman with the emotional capacity of a six-year-old boy. It also doesn't help that the female protagonist was voiced by someone who can't form complete thoughts. And the lead villain sounds like a gay Disney character from the 40s. Once you get past all that, it's a pretty good story.
There were no startling advances in Final Fantasy logic in this game—just more of the same: breathing underwater, fighting monsters that inhabit every inch of every road everywhere, fighting a villain who ends up being the protagonist's father, and earning money by killing wolves in the forest. The graphics and sound were far superior to previous games, but at its core it's the same Final Fantasy we all know and love.
Religion Strikes Again!
One thing you should know about Final Fantasy games is that religion is always bad. If there's a religion that claims to be the answer to life's problems, you can be sure that it's rooted in evil. If there's a group of heathens that don't follow the religion's teachings, you can be sure that you'll join up with them at some point. And if there's a god or central religious figure that everyone keeps talking about, you can be sure that you'll have to kill it. Final Fantasy X is no exception to this rule; in fact, this rule is pretty much the focal point of Final Fantasy X.
In the beginning of the game, you find out that there's a monster called Sin that's been ravaging the world for 1,000 years. (They call it Sin because they believe that it's their penance for their past sins.) Summoners battle Sin by—are you ready for this?—calling upon the Fayth to give them strength. Ironically, the only way that our team is able to defeat Sin once and for all is by sinning! Along the way, they also get excommunicated from the church, cheat death, take up refuge with the notorious sinners, and assassinate just about every major religious figure in existance, dead or alive. If nothing else, they're thorough.
The Breasts! The Breasts!
I know I said earlier that magic power was not stored in the breasts, but it does seem to be in this game. The game's powerful black mage has enormous breasts. They make no efforts to hide this. After battles, it's customary for Final Fantasy characters to do a little victory dance. Lulu's dance involves her leaning down toward the camera and shaking as her breasts jiggle ever so gently. Yeah, that's subtle. And as the black mage (the one who casts destructive spells), guess how many battles she wins? That's right. All of them. At least, she did in my game.
But Lulu's not the only one! Besides Yuna, the female summoners in the game seem to have been endowed with more than magic. This is accented by their chronic lack of any clothing. Apparently, they're so busy battling Sin that they never have time to finish getting dressed. Take a look at Yunalesca, the first summoner to defeat Sin (pictured left) and you'll see that there is indeed something magical about breasts. Nevermind the fact that she's nearly 1000 years old. Her breasts age very well.
Even the aeons (the summoned creatures in the game) are walking, talking advertisements for sexy sex. Take alook at Shiva. She totally saves your ass in a fight when you first get her and have to face off against this weird mummy-fish. I have to say, I was quite surprised when my new aeon came out wearing that. Come save me, Shiva! Save me with your breasts!
Shiva has the ultimate badass aeon attack. She freezes everything around the enemy, creating a sort of half-coccoon of ice—then she snaps her fingers and the whole thing shatters, inflicting massive damage on your foes. Don't mess with the breasts!
"Teach us how to blitz!"
Have you ever played a game or seen a movie in which a normal civilian falls into a quest to save the world and instantly turns into a fierce warrior? That's kind of what happens in Final Fantasy X, but with a twist—the civilian is actually a professional athlete. They get around a few logical fallacies with that fact. But they went further with it—you can't go five minutes in Final Fantasy X without catching a Blitzball reference. Even if there's not a direct reference, one of the main characters actually uses a blitzball as a weapon (and occasionally yells "Boo-yah!" as he slays an enemy). If you don't like sports, too bad—you're playing the wrong Final Fantasy. If you like sports, too bad—this is a sad excuse for a sport. And if you don't care one way or the other, too bad—you need to play Blitzball to unlock Wakka's overdrives. Everyone loses.
Plot Device, Mr. Frodo, Plot Device
Final Fantasy games are typically full of plot devices. (If you don't know what plot devices are, Wikipedia has a lot to say on the subject.) There are characters long thought dead that come back to save the day, red herrings thrown about, characters with motivations that have no real relevance to the plot, and a host of others. But Square stumbled upon a goldmine with this game. The big monster, Sin, literally exudes plot devices. Every time someone gets near him, they're exposed to the "Sin toxin" that causes a variety of effects, including temporary amnesia. This may not sound so bad, but at one point characters actually run into Sin on a snowy mountain, black out, and wake up in a desert hundreds of miles away (except for one, who mysteriously shows up in a wedding dress in a far-away city). Nobody questions anything. Once the Sin toxin was established as a legitimate excuse for anything, it excuses everything.
The funny thing is, sometimes Sin's toxin just causes people to get Tourette's syndrome or hallucinate. It's kind of like alcohol is in our culture. Example: "Oh, I didn't mean to have sex with you last night. I was drunk," translates to "I meant to have sex with you, but I don't want to talk to you. Luckily, there was alcohol involved." Both alcohol and Sin's toxin can do pretty much whatever you want them to do.
Players might also notice that there aren't really any big cities in Final Fantasy X. This isn't because the programmers were lazy--it's because Sin destroys big cities!! How was Tidus able to travel 1000 years through time and space to Spira? He touched Sin!! And just when you think the main character's daddy issues don't tie into the plot, Sin is Tidus's father!! Take note of this, Hollywood—your jobs are about to get a lot easier.
Final Fantasy Logic Score: 8
They lose a few points for trying to come up with logical explanations for why things happen, but overall it's still a pretty solid score. We also lose some points for Wakka's Jamaican accent, but Sin more than makes up for this. Square has created another Final Fantasy masterpiece and we're all very proud of it.
