Riona (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rionaleonhart) wrote2012-08-11 08:38 am
rionaleonhart) wrote2012-08-11 08:38 am
Entry tags:
And The Rest She Can Figure Out.
This Revolutionary Girl Utena AMV to 'Brick by Boring Brick' is perhaps the best fanvid I've ever seen. I'd never heard the song before, but it works so well. Major (if confusing) spoilers for the entire Utena anime. I get a bit teary every time I watch it.
(I've realised that I have a big, big weakness for female characters who belong in Gryffindor. Utena, Yuna, Korra, Lightning, Elena Fisher, Donna Noble: all favourites of mine, all - in very different ways - Gryffindors. I'm not guaranteed to adore a Gryffindor girl, but it certainly helps. Not sure what to do with that knowledge. Write a giant Hogwarts AU?)
I'd love to be able to say that this second fortnight-long posting hiatus in a row was because I was having a second lovely holiday, but in fact it's because I've done almost nothing but work since I got back. The curse of the freelancer: you never have the right amount of employment. 'Too much work' is preferable to 'no work', but surely there must be some sort of balance between the two extremes?
I did find time for something non-work-related yesterday, though: I've had a replay of Final Fantasy XII saved just before the final area on my memory card for ages, so I decided to play through the ending. (The PS3, it turns out, has ruined PS2 graphics for me. I was really aware of the pixellation at the edges of the character models. I'd never noticed that before.)
Regarding the ending itself: it made so much more sense this time! The first time I saw the ending, I had absolutely no idea where Balthier and Fran had gone or what they were trying to achieve by endangering themselves. I was aware that they were doing something awesome, but I did not know what that awesome thing was. Now that I know, it is a lot more awesome!
I've also realised that I really, really love Larsa. I wish I'd been that centred and good-hearted and intelligent when I was twelve. Frankly, I could do with being that centred and good-hearted and intelligent now.
Final Fantasy XII is fairly far down in my personal ranking of the Final Fantasy games, I have to admit, despite scoring high on actual gameplay. This is in part because the plot is even more incoherent than I generally expect from a Final Fantasy (possibly this is just because there are great swathes of gameplay between cutscenes and by the time I reach the next scene I've forgotten what happened before), but it's mostly because the party never really felt like a group to me. They were always Balthier-and-Fran, Vaan-and-Penelo, Ashe-and-Basch: three duos (or even two duos and two individuals; Ashe and Basch seemed to stand apart entirely at times), not one... sixio. Sextet. WHATEVER THE WORD IS, THEY DIDN'T FEEL LIKE ONE. At the end, Vaan says to Ashe, 'You'll make it; you've got good friends,' which struck me as odd because they never actually felt like a group of friends to me. I think that's a great shame.
The other problem with XII is that Larsa is not a permanent party member. This is simply not acceptable. I was thinking recently about what I would do if I had the power to replace any one party member from each Final Fantasy game with any one non-party member; I would definitely replace Vaan with Larsa. (I'd also swap Beatrix in on Final Fantasy IX, incidentally. Possibly in Amarant's place. What would you do?)
Oh, hey, the Olympics are almost over! Better share the best fact I've learnt in a while: during the torch relay for the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, at the Sydney changeover, a student ran along the route with a fake torch consisting of a pair of flaming underpants in a plum pudding can on top of a chair leg. He managed to hand it to the mayor of Sydney and escape before the deception was noticed.
(I've realised that I have a big, big weakness for female characters who belong in Gryffindor. Utena, Yuna, Korra, Lightning, Elena Fisher, Donna Noble: all favourites of mine, all - in very different ways - Gryffindors. I'm not guaranteed to adore a Gryffindor girl, but it certainly helps. Not sure what to do with that knowledge. Write a giant Hogwarts AU?)
I'd love to be able to say that this second fortnight-long posting hiatus in a row was because I was having a second lovely holiday, but in fact it's because I've done almost nothing but work since I got back. The curse of the freelancer: you never have the right amount of employment. 'Too much work' is preferable to 'no work', but surely there must be some sort of balance between the two extremes?
I did find time for something non-work-related yesterday, though: I've had a replay of Final Fantasy XII saved just before the final area on my memory card for ages, so I decided to play through the ending. (The PS3, it turns out, has ruined PS2 graphics for me. I was really aware of the pixellation at the edges of the character models. I'd never noticed that before.)
Regarding the ending itself: it made so much more sense this time! The first time I saw the ending, I had absolutely no idea where Balthier and Fran had gone or what they were trying to achieve by endangering themselves. I was aware that they were doing something awesome, but I did not know what that awesome thing was. Now that I know, it is a lot more awesome!
I've also realised that I really, really love Larsa. I wish I'd been that centred and good-hearted and intelligent when I was twelve. Frankly, I could do with being that centred and good-hearted and intelligent now.
Final Fantasy XII is fairly far down in my personal ranking of the Final Fantasy games, I have to admit, despite scoring high on actual gameplay. This is in part because the plot is even more incoherent than I generally expect from a Final Fantasy (possibly this is just because there are great swathes of gameplay between cutscenes and by the time I reach the next scene I've forgotten what happened before), but it's mostly because the party never really felt like a group to me. They were always Balthier-and-Fran, Vaan-and-Penelo, Ashe-and-Basch: three duos (or even two duos and two individuals; Ashe and Basch seemed to stand apart entirely at times), not one... sixio. Sextet. WHATEVER THE WORD IS, THEY DIDN'T FEEL LIKE ONE. At the end, Vaan says to Ashe, 'You'll make it; you've got good friends,' which struck me as odd because they never actually felt like a group of friends to me. I think that's a great shame.
The other problem with XII is that Larsa is not a permanent party member. This is simply not acceptable. I was thinking recently about what I would do if I had the power to replace any one party member from each Final Fantasy game with any one non-party member; I would definitely replace Vaan with Larsa. (I'd also swap Beatrix in on Final Fantasy IX, incidentally. Possibly in Amarant's place. What would you do?)
Oh, hey, the Olympics are almost over! Better share the best fact I've learnt in a while: during the torch relay for the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, at the Sydney changeover, a student ran along the route with a fake torch consisting of a pair of flaming underpants in a plum pudding can on top of a chair leg. He managed to hand it to the mayor of Sydney and escape before the deception was noticed.
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female characters who belong in Gryffindor.
sdkfjskjf yes. Utena, Yuna, Elena and Lightning are some of my all-time favourite characters ever. Also: Meryl Stryfe from Trigun. Trigun and Utena, now that I think about it, are both fascinating for how they have Gryffindor protagonists but explicitly make the point that while being a Gryffindor is certainly Good, it is often not good for you.
Now I'm trying to think of who the Gryffindors are in the other fandoms I've been poking my head into. Madoka Magica certainly has a few but spoilerspoilerspoiler. Skulduggery Pleasant has no Gryffindors. None. Everyone is awful. <3
I continue to be really really excited to read your crossover!
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Your posts about this Madoka Magica thing rather intrigued me, but when I followed the link you provided I found that it wasn't available in my country. Alas! (Speaking of which: SOMEBODY LICENSE UTENA FOR RELEASE IN EUROPE, SERIOUSLY, WHY HAS THIS NEVER HAPPENED, YOU ARE MAKING IT REALLY DIFFICULT FOR ME TO GIVE YOU MY MONEY.)
I want to get the crossover into a state where I can start posting it, but I've been so busy! I really hope you like it. I keep thinking of you when I'm writing it.
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EDIT: Hey, I think I've found somewhere! I've just watched the first three minutes of the first episode and have absolutely no idea what's going on.
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(Anonymous) 2012-08-13 07:44 pm (UTC)(link)no subject
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Nooo, I was really hoping you would get to watch Madoka. It has friendships between ladies! In fact, if there is such a thing as a reverse Bechdel test, where a story should have two guys having a conversation about something other than a girl to pass, this series would fail that test. If that link up there doesn't work, let me know, and I'll keep poking around.
...My gosh, that's amazing that Utena isn't licensed there! How bizarre! (Ironically, the UK is getting a complete box set of Madoka while I can't find it in North America except in some super-duper expensive limited edition.) During my recent road trip I learned that EVERYBODY EXCEPT ME (and you, obviously) have this gorgeous remastered Utena boxset that I am horribly jealous of.
Also, I'm super intrigued by this HD remaster of FFX you mentioned. ksdjgklg.
It makes me ridiculously happy that you're thinking of me. As long as thinking of me is encouraging and not repulsive. I often think of me when I'm writing, and quite frankly I find me very discouraging.
Also, while I am babbling at you, I had a very distressing Uncharted dream last night where I was replaying Uncharted 2 and accidentally got Elena killed and the game just kept going without her! It was horrible! I think Infamous' system of punishing the player for killing innocent bystanders is to blame.
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Final Fantasy X is being remastered for PS3! No information beyond that so far, but I would love to see that game with XIII-level graphics. Sort of hoping they'll get the original voice actors back to redo the lines without being forced to match the mouth movements of the Japanese version.
Your Uncharted dream sounds horrible and makes me quite sad. What is this Infamous punishment system of which you speak?
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redo the lines without being forced to match the mouth movements of the Japanese version.
yessssss, that would be awesome.
Oh, there's just this whole karma thing where if you hurt innocent bystanders it makes you more evil and then you can't level up properly unless you make up for it by healing a bunch of people. Unless you're going the evil route, I guess, in which killing innocent bystanders would just be a bonus. Why didn't I go the evil route? Curse my overactive video game conscience.
I told Squeem about the upsetting Elena dream and she made me feel better by saying that Elena probably just got tired of carrying my ass and now she's hiding in the bushes, filming me and laughing while I fail to headshot people.
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The game did have great voice acting! (It's a shame they had to reduce the recording quality to save disc space, though; it often sounds as if Penelo is speaking through a sheet of glass.) The translation and world were excellent, too, and I actually quite liked the battle system. It's a shame it fell down on character interaction. All Final Fantasy games have things they excel at and things they don't do quite so well, I suppose.
In a weird way, Final Fantasy VIII's graphical limitations bother me less than Final Fantasy XII's do. I suppose that small flaws stand out more as graphics get closer to reality. I wonder what Final Fantasy X would look like to me now? That game's graphics astonished me when I first played it. I'd quite like to play through it again, but I'm waiting for the HD remaster.
Penelo is probably the character who can be taken out with the least bearing on the plot, but if you swap Larsa for Penelo you don't get the adorable Larsa-Penelo interaction! My favourite Penelo moments all involved Larsa. I might have 'shipped them a tiny bit.
In the Final Fantasy VIII/Final Fantasy XIII AU I'm writing, I've essentially swapped Irvine out for Seifer. I'm a little worried that Irvine fans will be annoyed by this. Sorry, guys! It just so happens that the plot is sparked off during the field exam and I couldn't work out how to involve Irvine.
Jecht as a party member in X would be hilariously nonsensical. I sort of want to see it now.
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I... would not swap Amarant out. I love that guy haha. I'd swap Quina I think (even though that'd then erase the hilarious marriage ATE).
I think I'm more biased towards XII cos of my massive shipping for it lolol. That always helps (as does basically ignoring Vaan and Penelo at all times)
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I think this is now the best fact I've learnt in a while.