Riona (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rionaleonhart) wrote2024-04-08 07:48 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2024-04-08 07:48 pm
I'm Not Sure XVI Really Has A Party.
I've been replaying Bravely Default on and off, and I really enjoy the closeness between the party members. It builds gradually, but the party really feel like friends by the end of the game. I can easily envision them remaining close friends long into the future.
This led to a thought: once the world has been saved and the dust has settled, would the parties of other RPGs I've played stay in touch?
RPG parties: do they remain friends after canon?
Bravely Default, Bravely Default II: yes, absolutely. One of my favourite things about these games is how intensely the parties bond over the course of their adventure.
Persona 3/4/5: I think these all fall into the category 'the group stays in touch, but some characters are closer than others'.
Final Fantasy VI: there are so many characters! A few will probably drop out of contact, but I think Locke, Terra, Sabin, Edgar and Celes will remain friends, and Sabin might stay in touch with Cyan and Gau.
Final Fantasy VII: I think the two party members I'm most confident will stay in touch are actually Barret and Tifa, but you can probably add Cloud to that. I'm less sure about the others.
Final Fantasy VIII: I think the whole party might manage to remain friends in this one! At some point Selphie and Irvine are going to have a breakup that seems at first like it's going to be really messy. In the event, though, Selphie just pouts for two days and then decides that they're friends again.
Final Fantasy IX: Zidane and Steiner will definitely stay close to Garnet and, by extension, will see a lot of each other. I think the party as a whole will get together occasionally, rather than being a consistently large part of each other's lives.
Final Fantasy X: I think the party will remain friends, largely because they all gravitate around Yuna. Kimahri might spend a lot of time off doing his own thing, though. Paine would stay friends with Yuna and Rikku, but I don't know if she'd bond with the others.
Final Fantasy XII: not really. The party will split off into the Ashe-Basch, Balthier-Fran, Vaan-Penelo pairs, two of which already existed before the party was actually formed. This is part of the reason XII ranks relatively low in the series for me; I never felt like the party really bonded, and I think that's a shame!
Final Fantasy XIII: maybe! I mean, if you ignore the sequel making half the characters disappear. These guys bonded pretty strongly over the course of their journey; they wouldn't all necessarily be the closest people in each other's lives, but I think they'd probably stay friends.
Final Fantasy XV: yes. Yes, obviously. Yes.
Compiling this list, I notice that my favourite Final Fantasy games - VIII, X, XIII, XV - are the ones that lean more towards 'the bonds of the party are strong enough for it to be easy to imagine that they'll all remain friends afterwards'. It's evidently a good way to win me over!
If you have your own thoughts on whether the party of a particular game would remain friends after canon - or whether the central characters of your favourite canon would stay in touch, videogame or not - I'd be interested to hear them! And, of course, feel free to argue against any of my thoughts.
This led to a thought: once the world has been saved and the dust has settled, would the parties of other RPGs I've played stay in touch?
RPG parties: do they remain friends after canon?
Bravely Default, Bravely Default II: yes, absolutely. One of my favourite things about these games is how intensely the parties bond over the course of their adventure.
Persona 3/4/5: I think these all fall into the category 'the group stays in touch, but some characters are closer than others'.
Final Fantasy VI: there are so many characters! A few will probably drop out of contact, but I think Locke, Terra, Sabin, Edgar and Celes will remain friends, and Sabin might stay in touch with Cyan and Gau.
Final Fantasy VII: I think the two party members I'm most confident will stay in touch are actually Barret and Tifa, but you can probably add Cloud to that. I'm less sure about the others.
Final Fantasy VIII: I think the whole party might manage to remain friends in this one! At some point Selphie and Irvine are going to have a breakup that seems at first like it's going to be really messy. In the event, though, Selphie just pouts for two days and then decides that they're friends again.
Final Fantasy IX: Zidane and Steiner will definitely stay close to Garnet and, by extension, will see a lot of each other. I think the party as a whole will get together occasionally, rather than being a consistently large part of each other's lives.
Final Fantasy X: I think the party will remain friends, largely because they all gravitate around Yuna. Kimahri might spend a lot of time off doing his own thing, though. Paine would stay friends with Yuna and Rikku, but I don't know if she'd bond with the others.
Final Fantasy XII: not really. The party will split off into the Ashe-Basch, Balthier-Fran, Vaan-Penelo pairs, two of which already existed before the party was actually formed. This is part of the reason XII ranks relatively low in the series for me; I never felt like the party really bonded, and I think that's a shame!
Final Fantasy XIII: maybe! I mean, if you ignore the sequel making half the characters disappear. These guys bonded pretty strongly over the course of their journey; they wouldn't all necessarily be the closest people in each other's lives, but I think they'd probably stay friends.
Final Fantasy XV: yes. Yes, obviously. Yes.
Compiling this list, I notice that my favourite Final Fantasy games - VIII, X, XIII, XV - are the ones that lean more towards 'the bonds of the party are strong enough for it to be easy to imagine that they'll all remain friends afterwards'. It's evidently a good way to win me over!
If you have your own thoughts on whether the party of a particular game would remain friends after canon - or whether the central characters of your favourite canon would stay in touch, videogame or not - I'd be interested to hear them! And, of course, feel free to argue against any of my thoughts.
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there's this fantastic FF9 fic someone wrote that covers the "so to what extent do they all remain friends" post-canon, head-on, and it's delightful. garnet is doing queen things! freya and zidane get a buddy quest for old times' sake!!!
highly encourage you (AND ANYONE ELSE READING THIS COMMENT) to give it a chance if that intrigues.
sorry i just love this fic a lot and don't get to simp for it very often lol
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I agree with this, although I've forgotten a lot about FF9. I just don't remember them being close except for Zidane and Garnet, which was basically due to romance iirc?
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It was strange to think about IX when writing this post and realise that the party members don't really feel that close! I'd never consciously thought about it before, whereas I'd definitely thought about how the party never seems to gel in XII.
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I think what I like especially about P3 is it's more upfront about the smaller friend groups and social dynamics. The tangible distance between certain characters outside of missions is really fun to take into account in their daily lives.
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The Last Remnant: Well, David and his Generals obviously stay close, but I think probably also David would make a point of staying in contact with all of Rush's friends, family and contacts (not least because it'd be sensible politically).
The World Ends With You and NEO TWEWY: where possible, I think they'd stay friends and actively try to stay in each other's lives.
Xenoblade Chronicles series: god, yes, especially in 3 where there's a LOT of plot revolving around these people not wanting to be separated.
Chrono Trigger: I mean, it's tricky given that people go back to their very distant own time periods, but even so, some of the (multiple) endings are very pointedly about these friends still managing to check in on each other.
Tales of Vesperia: abso-goddamn-lutely. For a start, I don't think any of the others would let Yuri be alone for very long, given his track record. I don't think that boy's getting a moment's peace again in his life.
Star Ocean 4: Some of them will pair off but I don't think the group as a whole will stay close. A few of them might check in with each other occasionally, maybe.
Resonance of Fate: the core three are absolutely bound to one another, to the point where I feel sorry for any future romantic partners of any of them.
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This may be most correct statement I have ever seen anyone make about Yuri Lowell/the Vesperia party and I am here to +1 it.
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One of my favorite things about FFXII is its politics and the fuzzy space between the connections party members have with one another, the connection the party has with temporary party members, and the plot-shaping actions of Ashe's political contacts. Inter-party dynamics are often combative, a forced closeness, and remind me a little of Dragon Age's friendship/rivalry system, a similar insistence that being close to someone = intimacy and knowledge, and =/= being friends/saying what they want to hear. The temporary party members hammer this home, especially Vossler's "betrayal": you can know & work alongside &c and still pick a different side. Ashe's political contacts range from family to sky pirates, and particularly her relationship with Ondore as her uncle is that interpersonal closeness and political action/usefulness don't share a 1:1 relationship.
So I think Ashe is indicative for how the post-game party dynamics would operate, namely: knowing & loving someone doesn't mean a happy ever after with them; contacts are useful, especially a diversity of contacts; the between knowing and loving and social/political usefulness is blurry!
Frex. Basch and Larsa and Ashe form one web of social/political bonds, Basch's new primary loyalty actually being to Larsa, but Ashe is his former ward, and Ashe and Larsa are political allies, so they're all simultaneously bound up & separated.
Similarly, Ashe now has a lot of experience with and appreciation for the capabilities of sky pirates, and would keep those lines of communication open (with Balthier; Vaan as an up-and-comer is probably less useful).
So the web of connections attenuates but doesn't disconnect, Ashe to Larsa c/o Basch (and Basch c/o Larsa), Ashe to Balthier and Fran, and to Vaan and Penelo c/o Balthier and Fran. Does this mean "remain friends after canon"? FFXII is v. much about "what does 'friends' mean, anyway," and ends on that same note, in that same gray space between friendship and usefulness. Which I love!! It's my favorite Final Fantasy game, and thinking through the interpersonal mess of this has helped me realize some of why, because normally heavy politicking doesn't land for me but the politicking in FFXII is thorny and interpersonal, and I find I like how it bleeds into the party bonding, making it more subdued and richly imperfect.
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it's interesting seeing people's thoughts on this stuff because like, fully adhering to canon, you and others are probably right in your assessments, but I like to live in my own little world where everyone is besties and stays friends forever after the game ends. does ffvii cid WANT to hang out with yuffie? probably not. will I make him do so? absolutely.
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Also thinking about FFVII a little more, I think that's one of the lucky canons that actually has post-game content so you DO get to see that they do stay in touch with stuff like Advent Children and whatnot. Plus a lot of FF games have at least one of those really chipper friendly girl characters who you know would be the one writing everyone letters/texting people all the time/etc and trying to plan meetups even though half the group is like, too busy to go bowling on Saturdays or whatever. But by golly she will keep trying!
Also I'm glad you posted this entry too I just read the rest of the comments and I'm loving the FFXII meta, XII is one of my favorite FFs and I'm very glad to see people smarter than me swoop in with the good commentary.
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As a deeply dedicated Ashe/Balthier shipper, I have to disagree with your FFXII analysis. ;) While I agree that the three couplets you mention will continue to have the most in common and stay closest, I did see bonds forming among the rest of the party, and I always anticipated that they would remain friends even if they didn't see each other much. Even setting romance aside, I can easily see Balthier and Fran's mentorship of Vaan and Penelo continuing and Ashe and Basch staying in touch as best they can. In particular, I've often written Ashe and Penelo staying close, with Ashe relying on Penelo as her ear on the ground beyond the palace.
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Please.
(Play a game where I don't have to comment on entries half a year after the fact!)
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Obviously. That's his husband and their adopted child, after all.
I actually think the VII cast keeps in touch. Even forgoing the much deeper closeness between them in the remake trilogy, Advent Children and the in-canon novels show that they all seem to keep in regular phone contact (except Vincent), and it seems like Barret, Cid, Nanaki, Reeve and Yuffie all come visit Cloud/Tifa at Seventh Heaven pretty regularly. And for all its failings Dirge of Cerberus makes Reeve and Vincent fairly chummy (+ Yuffie and Cid.)
Cloud's an interesting case because I think people jump to how he acts in AC as proof that he'd go all lone wolf, but he only acts that way because of the terminal illness and the idea of being a burden to others. He seems like one of the protagonists who most needs those interpersonal connections to stay sane.
The FF12 cast seemed a lot closer to me. Vaan's desire to be a skypirate and crush on Balthier, plus Fran's seeming affection for Vaan and Penelo, makes me think those four would work together fairly often and hang out occasionally. I imagine Penelo keeping up with writing with Ashe and Basch. I imagine Basch would see Penelo and Vaan every so often, because I think Larsa would want to see
Penelothem and has enough power to make it happen.no subject
Especially about Larsa/Penelo.He seems like one of the protagonists who most needs those interpersonal connections to stay sane.
He does! But, at the same time, I'm not sure how good he'd be at maintaining his interpersonal connections. Still, he's got some pretty determined friends who might be willing to do the maintenance on his behalf.
I actually haven't seen Advent Children; I really should!
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This is Torgal erasure and I won't stand for it.
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spoiler cut for XVI endgame
listen, I am of the opinion that Everyone Fucking Lives, and with that being the case I cannot see Clive, Joshua, and Jill *not* remaining close.
I think in 12 you have a pivot where Balthier and Fran have cause to interact with the baby sky pirates, and also with Ashe and Basch (I will die on the hill of shipping Balthier/Ashe as a fucking disaster that never quite settles, I love mess) but not much reason for Ashe/Basch and Vaan/Penelo to interact, at least until Penelo marries Larsa, ha.
I think with mainline SMT games it's less likely for the group to stay together because so much of the point is that everyone has radically different, and sometimes very opposed, opinions about how the world Should Be.
(Hard agree about Bravely Default)
Octopath Traveler: definitely subgroups in 2 stay together (you will pry Throné and Temenos as either a ship or buddy cop drama from my cold dead hands). Octopath 1 is written so that every character operates independently, but there are some I think would stick together post-canon, and which ones depend on my emotional needs at any given moment. (Therion and Primrose recovering disasters trying to make their baggage go together, Primrose and Ophilia as day/night balancing each other out, Therion and Cyrus and maybe Alfyn as world wanderers finding all the weird lore, Olberic and Primrose figuring out how to rebuild a life when everything that gave it structure is gone......nnnngh I love this game.)
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Your suggestion of Balthier and Fran staying in touch with both of the other pairs makes a lot of sense.
at least until Penelo marries Larsa, ha.
Extremely true!
I've heard the first Octopath Traveler has hardly any party member interaction, which is part of the reason I've never played it myself, so it's interesting to hear your thoughts on characters staying together; presumably they must interact at least a little!
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