So I watched the official English dub of the trailer here [joystiq].


Now I must rant.

Good lord, this franchise is cheesier than ever. I've noticed a trend among JRPGs looking back to become more melodramatic each generation. This one takes the cake. What happened to all the heroes in JRPGs games? It's just been groups of characters getting progressively exaggerated.

I loved JRPGs of the SNES and PlayStation era. While there was a decent amount of melodrama, it wasn't the primary focus and it wasn't overwhelming. The main characters still acted like heroes. Square-Enix has definitely become the worst of the lot. Their casts have become almost primarily pacifists and complainers. They never seem to want to own up to the task given to them. Somewhere along the line, they seem to just up and forget that they were complaining and just finish things for the sake of ending the story...

...which usually has the same generic overall premise lately too.

"We may not like what we're doing, but we have to do it for the sake of saving Spira/Spira(again)/Dalmasca/Cocoon"

Ugh. I'm just tired of the same generic premise. I get it, they're reluctant heroes. Why don't they step up like the old FF protagonists used to do? The only role playing I get out of the games anymore is pondering why I should care about saving the world if the characters aren't even that into it.

Hardcore fans of JRPGs like to bash recent Western RPGs for trying too hard to be "edgy." While that is occasionally the case, at least the heroes still act like heroes, even if some of them are the occasional anti-hero (or the player can make them into one if they so choose).


So, after lusting after this game seeing the initial trailers, and listening to Maaya Sakamoto play the lead in the Japanese dub, my interest is beginning to cool. I don't have a problem with the dub, Squeenix typically does a much better job on their trademark franchise than the crap they role out for their other series. All in all the English dub is fine.

But the story is really turning me away from this.