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What opinions have changed over the years?

#1
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So back in my younger days, I have very set opinions about what characters and game elements and whatnot I liked or didn't like. For instance: for the first several years I played FF6, my main party was always Terra, Sabin, Gogo, Setzer... always always always. And when doing Kefkas Tower, I always left behind Gau and Umaro, cause I didn't like mechanics I couldn't control...

As I've gotten older, and I've gotten more into the literary elements of the game, and several of my less like characters got a significant boost.

Sweat Cyan went from barely being above Gau to being one of my favorite characters. His story isn't as cliche as I assumed it was as a kid, and I find myself relating a lot to his themes. Being a father, specifically, drove home a lot of the emotion in his story.

Smile Edgar is another middling character that got a significant boost the more I thought about his character. The young man who lost his father, and instead of choosing freedom, specifically rigged the rules of his bet to make sure his brother got what he wanted. He gave up what he wanted (remember, he never wanted to be king). Then seeing how, as a character who didn't have as much primary plot significance, was actually one of, if not THE, strongest leader in the group.

Laugh I always liked Locke, but he's been boosted to being one of my favorite fantasy characters of all time. There's not enough to say about his complexity, character, hurts, and triumphs. It might be fun to write an analysis of him one day, cause I just can't put it all here. There's a good chance FF6 is actually HIS story (a small chance, but still).

All in all, I don't think my opinion of anyone's character has decreased... I think I've just discovered how much of a masterpiece this game really is and how deep and relate-able just about every character is. I could mention things I've learned and appreciated about everyone, but these are probably my biggest swing characters from my early days of playing FF6 to now.

What about you? How have your tastes and opinions changed over the years? It doesn't need to be about characters, it was just what came to mind when I was writing this.

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#2
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Mog used to be my favorite character... probably because he was in all of the advertisements. He has been demoted quite a bit since my first playthrough. Cyan has become my go-to character over the years. He is a sweeper if you play him right. I also think he has the best musical theme of any character.

Celes has also grown on me... probably because I didn't originally understand how to use Runic. My party for my last playthrough included Cyan and Celes whenever possible.
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Whenever I do a playthrough of ff6 these days, I always spoil Relm with enough levels in WoB to prevent any disadvantage potential for level averaging later and once rerecruited, always end up leveling her to 99 before anyone else. I sometimes even have her solo in the multi party scenarios cause I spoil her to the point that she effortlessly ends all enemies and doesn't need help from the other party members.
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#4
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I grew up thinking Gogo was a man...
Then for a while I thought Gogo could be a woman...
Now I think Gogo is either both or neither.


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lol, that was deep, Gi  Laugh

I won't share my thoughts, since i was a child back to those days and so my impressions were childish as well...
like... i like terra, i hate celes, no appearent reason... i said enough.


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#6
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Oh boy, let me see.
Gau-When I was kid, I used him a lot because I was a kid as well and he served me pretty well. Now as an adult, it just wasn't worth keeping him because of all of the Rages you have to learn to for him to carry his weight. But he still is fun to take to some areas and events but not everywhere, since you can't stop Rage and he will heal the enemy.
Terra-Terra was always a bit unsure of herself, and not my cup of tea as a character and obvious plot device. But my opinion has changed over the years. She is a talented sorceress and finally grows into a protective wall of strength for a bunch of children, even though she gets way too much special treatment in the game, her abilities really help the party through some situations, if you teach her the right magic and boost her stats she can really make mincemeat of a lot of tough bosses.
Locke-Locke was kind of just okay with me, he didn't really stand out much aside from steal(which for some reason has a low success rate sans Thief Glove. Later on as I got older, Locke had so much versatility, if you need a back row fighter he could do that, front row fighter, offensive juggernaut and he really shines in the end game. I just totally liked Locke's interaction with the group and his role throughout the story.
Sabin-As a kid, I bypassed Sabin because I couldn't figure out how to do Blitzes!! But that opinion has changed since I realized the cursor has to be pointing at Sabin. After that issue, Saban is awesome! He can cut through any enemy's defenses and just overpower everything in the game with his Blitzes. The guy is a great addition to any team.
Celes-always like her better than Terra, even more so now after Eternal Filena has a similar type of character.
Shadow-Shadow's awesome, I just hated him taking off when he felt like it, but his tragic backstory and relationship with Relm are interesting. Plus he is a badass ninja and his sprite looks awesome.
Mog-I will admit that I kind of overrated Mog to an certain extent because he is a cute little cat creature but his dances really aren't all that great and some of them can heal the enemy. I like to give him a Spear and DragoonBoots and make him a Jumper now. I don't use him all that much anymore, but he will always be a part of my final team in the endgame.
Setzer-This guy is kind of middle of the road, his backstory is tragic and interesting but he really isn't much of a character to take on an important mission. That isn't to sell Setzer short, though. He has the only airships in the game and he can help out a great deal since you have to utilize the airship as your form of transportation.
Edgar, Cyan, Relm, Strago, Gogo, Umaro, and Bannon-My opinion on them has remained the same, and that I don't have an issue with any of them.
Now for Kefka:As a child, I thought he was a jester or clown of some kind but as a I got older, I realized that he is completely insane and he creates a lot of trouble in the World. At one point, I thouyht that Kefka and Terra were in a relationship, but it doesn't seem like that at all now, he just used her as a slave. But he does manage to take over the world but in the end, it seemed like his bark was worse than his bite.
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#7
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Hmmmm let's see

When I was a kid I did think Sabin was like the protagonist and my absolute favourite character, I remember that. I also thought Shadow was beyond badass. I didn't like Kefka all that much, or at least the official art of him, and of course had no special attachment for any other ally or foe that wasn't a main character.

Now I fell in love with Terra's character which obviously has pushed Sabin out of the spotlight but I still like him, and also Shadow remains a badass but not as much. Kefka skyrocketed to my favourite villain of all time and I'm strangely attached to the Warring Triad of all things. Yeah, strange considering they literally don't say a word ever.

I thought Leo wasn't interesting and my opinion of him now is worse, I think he's overrated (bring the hate mail fellas), and I don't particularly care for Celes or Locke either. I mean, I don't even dislike them or anything but the arc between the two just seems too implausible for me.

I'm more of a Chocobo guy than a Moogle guy so I feel nothing for Mog either. I do like Strago and Relm much more now than I did before, now that I can understand the jokes they crack at each other, and I hold Cyan and Edgar closer to me than I did before too.

My opinion of Ultros hasn't changed. I thought he was hilarious then and I still think he's hilarious Tongue
I did use to think Seigfried was badass too, but since he reminds me of Gilgamesh (and infinitely better character imo), I tend to not care for him at all.


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#8
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When I first played this game I thought that the three switch puzzle area was near impossible to solve. I also thought Setzer was the most useful character in the game, but the only reason why I thought that was because he had over 7000 HP (which is obviously just because he was the highest leveled character). I also really enjoyed just walking out in the WoB deserts against FossilFangs and seeing who would die last for some reason. I thought the scene where Kefka poisons Doma was hilarious because people were falling off buildings and I didn't really understand why (so it felt like slapstick comedy).

As for more recent and less fuzzy memories, I didn't realize as a kid just how much Magic overshadows special attacks, so I tended to undervalue it. I also thought Cyan was relatively good, when in reality he's relatively lousy (even though the characters are so similar by the endgame that it doesn't matter much). Unlike a lot of people, I did use Gau, but I didn't get a lot out of him because I didn't know how to use him properly. I never did have a "favourite team" like a lot of people seem to, however. I also thought that Battle @ Narshe was a lot harder than it actually is.


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#9
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Believe it or not, I used to think there were more connections and deeper mysteries that would be solved by analyzing the game. I used to think the characters were more unique in terms of archetypes than what they were.

General gameplay: I know it sounds unbelievavle, but for the first few years I played this game, I paid no attention to stats except HP, MP, Level, and Experience points, as well as Battle Power and Defense in the equip menu. To be fair, even though I had played the Final Fantasy series since the NES Final Fantasy, I didn't actively pay attention to stats until Final Fantasy VIII (yes, eight), when you junctioned spells onto stats and were thus forced to see how stats were affected. To me, the stats page was just a page of funny numbers. Thus I never really paid attention to how certain characters would do more damage with spells than other. I also didn't pay any attention to Esper level up bonuses and just tried to get everyone to learn every spell.

I also never used the back row with regular weapons. I could never understand why one would decrease their offensive output by purposely giving characters a disadvantage. Just swing the sword and kill things.

As far as general plot goes, the major nuance I did not get was what the Floating Continent was. I didn't get that this was both the risen continent and the former Esper homeworld. I just thought an island started floating in the sky for no reason. Also, the first time I played, I thought the Emperor really did have a change of heart right before his fate, only to realize that he was defiantly obsessed with ruling until the bitter end.

More character notes follow.

Terra - Although there were moments she seemed unsure, for the most part, I didn't see her as a seemingly frail girl hiding power. I actually saw her as more firm and tough and once her initial doubts resolved, positively fearless (showing shades of this before her second encounter with Tritoch). I was absolutely floored in Dissidia when she came across softer and shier...but then I realize that's much how the character originally was, it was just that the pixel art made her seem like a more brawny, brazen girl than her actual self.

I also saw her as a couple of years older (21) than what her canonical age is.

Gameplay wise I liked her, but as a kid I could only figure out the basic heuristics of Morph so I didn't use it. I still don't use it, but that's because I don't need it.

Looking at her now, though, I do see where she does embody some of the tropes of anime heroines and defies other tropes. She is still unique, but not as groundbreaking as I originally imagined.

Edgar - Weirdly, I had attributed his proclivity to flirting to him missing his brother. It was only when I came across information on the Internet that I realize this character trait was flourish and not a manifestation of his loss.

I also assumed Edgar was a little younger, more about 21 or 22. Yes, I thought that Sabin and Edgar were kids, not near-grown when the decision was made to split the kingdom.

Sabin - I assumed that his desire to train and do right wasn't just because that he wanted to do, but latent guilt at abandoning his kingdom. I also didn't understand for several playtrhoughs that Edgar set Sabin up in the coin toss, and I had idly wondered what would have happened if Sabin had lost that coin toss before I realized the truth.

I also didn't use his Blitzes as much because I simply couldn't perform them, and the single-targeted ones were auto-targeted. Thus I had him hit things with his claws and didn't understand his potential until many playthroughs later.

Celes - When I was a kid, despite her being a mirror of Terra gameplay, I didn't understand how much she was a mirror of her in plot. I just saw her as a no-nonsense, super serious general who learned to let herself laugh. I also thought she was a little older than what she was (21 or 22).

Cyan - Because of the Phantom Train sequence, I interpereted Cyan seeing his family board the family and being too late to stop them in a very literal manner. Yes, I thought the intact bodies and souls of the Doma victims were boarding the train, and that if Cyan had stopped them, everyone could have exited the forest and that Cyan's wife and son would be restored to life. I somehow thought that part of his guilt wasn't just that his family died due to the Empire, but that he failed at his only chance to save them (by stopping them from boarding the train) as well.

Gau - In earlier playtrhoughs, I did not catch the significance of Gau's line in Vector. I assumed Gau's father was always a senile old man who was too old to have kids but chose to do so anyway. I also thought that given Gau's ability to mimic monster attacks, and given Mobliz proximity to Thamasa, that Gau was really a descendant of the Magi and that's why he could learn monster techniques.

I also didn't fully appreciate Rages at first. I thought they were cool, but gimmicky.

Shadow - I used to dislike him. Why would this cold mercenary tell me to essentially buzz off when I wanted to talk to him? And why would be be so helpful to Sabin when Sabin was stranded? Either he should make up his mind or sit at the cafe.

I did not catch the significance of the Memento Ring as I was wondering why Shadow's mother would be looking over him.

I also did not understand the meaning of his dreams. Clyde not killing his partner seemed like the right thing to do as a kid, as I thought it was selfish of Baram to ask his friend to kill him. I thought he was doing the right thing and that by killing his emotions he killed his conscience and became a jerk. When I saw he abandoned his daughter for no real reason, I thought he was the WORST PERSON EVER AND HE NEEDED TO TELL HER THE TRUTH RIGHT NOW!

However, with subsequent playthroughs, I see he was running out of fear. Also, I began to realize that while it was never outright said, the Thamasans probably had no small hand in making Clyde feel unwelcome (or maybe even ratted him out) and that he would have to at best, raise a gifted daughter on his own with insular people who may hold resentment for him "killing" one of their own, a great love of his wife. I still think he was SUPER wrong for what he did, BUT it wasn't as black and white as him leaving the family because he wanted to be an assassin like I originally thought.

I used to hate him gameplay wise, since he would join me and then just decide to leave sometimes because he felt like it. This irritated me to no end, especially the one time I did break down and hire him in Kohlingen, when he abandoned me on the way to Zozo. I didn't even make it to Jidoor! Plus, he used consumables for his attacks, which meant that I would have to constantly buy items for him to be useful. I also could not understand why he was mysteriously absent for the second half of the game or why his headshot and theme panned over Thamasa at the end. It was only when I read in a magazine that you have to wait for Shadow that I realized he was dead because I hadn't waited.

Now that I know how to keep Shadow, he's awesome!

Relm - I HATED her character. She was an ungrateful brat who was horrible to the only adult figure in her life, and was too old to be acting like a 6 year old. When I was a kid, I wanted to smack her. I would NEVER talk to my grandfather like that. I didn't even get the point of her flashback in the WoR.

Despite this, I used to like using her...until I encountered the Sketch bug in Phoenix Cave. Before then she was fun and I liked how, she, Strago, and Gau used enemy attacks. I'd form a Veldt party with those three and another character. I actually wished she and Gau would have been more connected, not necessarily shipping, but either as friends or for Strago to adopt Gau so they'd be adoptive brother and sister (and fitting how Gau, the wild child who grew up with monsters, showed more social skills and compassion than this little girl).

Then the Sketch bug turned my screen crazy. I no longer liked using Relm and thought the whole convoluted process of getting her back was a pain in the neck. Why would I have to first go to a cave in the Veldt, then go to Jidoor and go through a haunted mansion AND fight a boss just to get this girl?

Then I saw Shadow's dreams and I realized that's why she was an awful child.

Mog - I thought he was just there. I didn't like him, but I didn't hate him. I thought his Moogle Charm was nice, but at the same time I didn't use it because I knew you had to level up to get stronger, so avoiding battles was not in my gameplay style. Plus Dance was awful to me because not only did it fail sometimes for reasons I did not then know, I could not control Mog for the rest of the battle when it succeeded. With Gau, at least, I could get free spells. With Mog I got some good attacks. However, with Mog, I could attack normally, so that was a plus compared to Gau.

Now that I know you are not supposed to level up if you want the best stats, I think he's awesome.:
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#10
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That was quite an interesting read Turbotastic!


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