#if I’m honest the wedding ring part feels clunky to me

[didsomeonesaybuffet]

It isn’t often Dean gets to enjoy the quiet, so for now he relishes it. Feeling a warm spring breeze gracing the back of his neck and watching the cherry blossom petals dancing lazily to the sun drenched grass, which is still slick and glistening with morning dew – emerald green against the first hints of blue in the flowers that are just beginning to consider making their debut appearance for the year.

He looks up from the book he’s been pouring over – some old mushy romance novel he picked up from a yard sale a few towns back. He told Sam it was a sort of action thing; he told Cas the truth.

He lifts his face to the sun and lets the light just linger there, kissing each and every freckle as it warms him right to his core.

The Angel shifts beside him and a soft smile touches his lips. Slowly, he turns to face Cas, who is staring intently at the daisy between his index finger and thumb. Dean’s smile deepens as the warmth returns to his heart, this time without any involvement from the sun.

He fidgets, his arm brushing against Cas’, which seems to break whatever spell the daisy has on Cas, who looks at Dean with those soft blue eyes. At first he seems startled, as though he’d been as far from reality as anyone could be, but gazing into those green eyes that seem to have picked up some of the sun’s golden hues, he softens and grins.

‘Whatcha thinkin’ about, sunshine?’ Dean murmurs through his smile, all deep and honey-toned. Cas looks down at the flower in his fingers and then holds it up in front of Dean.

‘Just about the intricacy of this flower. Look at how perfect it is –‘ he passes the daisy to Dean, who holds it close to his face and considers it. ‘You see how the petals overlap? How the middle is such a bright yellow but none of the pollen stains the petals. And the very edges of the petals are pink – I just find them fascinating.’ He looks up at Dean, then, and almost forgets about the daisy as he takes in the soft way Dean considers the flower, the way the sunlight picks out each eyelash and the soft curve of Dean’s lips. Then Dean looks up at him and they share one of those smiles that makes Sam roll his eyes when he catches them.

Dean leans over and kisses Cas’ cheek before resting his head on the angel’s shoulder. He sighs deeply when Cas leans into him, inhaling the light scent of rose shampoo he’s always loved in Dean’s hair, before kissing the top of his head and relaxing into their usual relaxing-on-the-hood-of-the-car posture, which he’s sure he’d be happy to stay in forever, should the need arise.

In the back seat of the Impala, Sam looks up from the recipe book he picked up at that same yard sale (the cookies don’t sound too healthy, but they do sound good) to see why the sunlight was suddenly extinguished. He grins to himself, seeing his brother nestled into the Angel’s neck, Cas’ arm around Dean’s shoulder and their quiet mumbling carried into the car by the breeze.

‘Would you too get a room?’ He chides, holding back his laughter.

‘Shut it, bitch’ is all he gets back, but he can hear Cas’ affectionate eye roll and the smile in Dean’s voice.

Dean lifts his head from the Angel’s shoulder and rests his hand on top of Cas’, allowing their fingers to interlock a little and enjoying the way the sunlight glints off of the ring on the third finger on his left hand. ‘We should head off if we wanna make it for lunch – next town’s a couple hours away.’

Cas stands and pulls Dean with him, luring him into a tender kiss. Still smiling, he lets Dean go and walks back to the passenger door. Dean takes a moment to open his book, where he places the daisy that Cas gave him, taking one last wistful look at it before closing the pages and giving the book a gentle squeeze, hoping it would dry out nicely, just like all the others.

[returnerofthesky]

why do you hate skyrim so much, anyway?

To be honest, I don’t… “hate” Skyrim, per-say? Hate’s too strong a word for any game for me, and even then Skyrim isn’t necessarily a terrible game despite how much I dislike it.

Which probably sounds weird, but that’s just me; most games that I dislike aren’t just plain old bad games. I don’t have an emotional dislike of, say, Bubsy, or Superman 64, or so on. They’re shit games, but there’s nothing particularly redeemable about them. They might have had potential, but it’s more conceptual, rather than being very flawed games with some good ideas (like Gates to Infinity, or Super Mystery Dungeon to a lesser extent).

Anyway, to get back to the question, the reason I don’t like Skyrim is because it feels creatively bankrupt.

To steal a quote from Super Bunnyhop, it’s hard to get engaged in Skyrim when every character feels like the most boring character, when every quest feels like the most boring quest, when every dungeon feels like the most boring crawl… you get the idea. To me it feels like every single time Bethesda had the opportunity to do something creative or interesting in Skyrim or its DLCs, they took the easiest, most boring route possible instead, even though it actively hurts the game’s appeal. And it’s very telling that what I consider to be the two most interesting quests in the game (the murder mystery in Windhelm and the peace treaty in the main story) are also two of the buggiest quests in the game.

Like, vampires in Skyrim are a good example of what I’m talking about. There’s a book in the previous games about a vampire hunter and a scholar (actually a vampire) advising him, and he describes Skyrim vampires as having breath that could freeze the blood inside of you, as well as actually living underneath frozen lakes and being able to reach up through the ice, grab people, and drag them under to feed. That’s not only a fascinating (and grim) concept, but an incredibly cool idea for a snow-based vampire.

Now granted, that’s a fairly dynamic idea, and it’d be hard to implement in Skyrim (especially given they never bothered to add underwater combat), so while I could criticize them for that, I won’t. What I will criticize is the fact that they didn’t even try to make the best approximation of that idea, instead opting to make vampires into slightly tweaked and reskinned bandits/draugr/etc etc.

Like, it wouldn’t need to be exactly like the idea presented in the book, but imagine this: vampires spawn in this invisible, walk-through-able state and have a circle that activates them. Once you walk in and out of that circle, an “invisibility spell wears off” animation plays and they properly spawn, body, weapons and all. Then, they aggro and you might get ambushed if you weren’t being careful. It’s not exactly like the book, but it’s close enough, and since the rest of the game’s enemies are so samey it’d be a nice change of pace.

There’s so many elements that are lacking that it’s very easy to sense the hand of the devs making out exactly what you can and can’t do, despite the whole TES brand emphasizing freedom. It’s obvious that you can’t do absolutely anything (well, at least it was obvious until Breath of the Wild came out), but Skyrim is especially bad at locking you out or not considering other options.

You can’t double-cross or double-deal in the Civil War aside from one single part that basically is the last chance for you to decide your faction. Being a thief is basically useless unless you join the guild, because the Fence perk for Speech doesn’t unlock until the skill is almost max. Conversations in general are far less varied and open-ended than before, meaning speech checks are few and far between as is. Stealth is only really useful for sneak-attacking, since most dungeons aren’t designed to be stealthed through completely. Most of the game’s “puzzles” are those simple match-the-symbol ones, and there isn’t anything particular brain-teasing or dynamic compared to even Oblivion.

I mean, even dragons have this issue. Anyone ever try fighting a dragon without any ranged options? It’s hell. And boring. And oh, oh so bland.

Similarly, like I mentioned, the quests themselves are incredibly bland. I’ve already seen plenty of posts on here throughout the years about how even the most mundane, non-combat-sounding quests usually end up with “please go to this dungeon full of Draugr and get my thing”, but it really is that bad. Most of the quests in Skyrim are either being sent to a dungeon to deal with the incredibly mediocre combat, or you get a vague, completely unashamed fetch quest.

A lot of this is tied to the Miscellaneous quest option, which is basically the game’s way of saying “we whipped up a quick, shitty quest in an hour or two, have fun”. In Riften alone, there’s at least seven or eight Misc quests that essentially amount to “I need you to find me some items, please”:

Finding ten fire salts for the blacksmith

Getting a sword and bringing it to its owner at the castle

Finding alchemy ingredients for the alchemy shop’s apprentice

Finding some gemstones and other items for a jeweler

Finding some gemstones for a bartender’s unfinished wedding ring

Finding ice wraith teeth for a lady to preserve her

Going to another big city to deliver a dagger

Going to a small village to pick up some ore and bring it back

And there’s very little proper “masking” to make these quests seem more interesting. The two quests that I didn’t include that are still fetch quests are a quest about mead being stolen (actually smuggled out at lower prices, which you can partake in or tell to the guards), and a quest about a Dunmer raised by Argonians who wants to find out more about his real parents (which is at least vaguely interesting in and of itself, due to the general relationship between Dunmer and Argonians and all that).

It isn’t just the Misc quests that suffer from this, though. Most of the writing is flawed, bland, or otherwise retreading old ground already, and a lot of it suffers from huge pacing issues. The main quest seems to expect that you’re not going to get distracted, so all of the “urgent” situations it sets up fall flat.

The Fighters Guild recruits you, has you do one proper quest where you find out that they’re werewolves, do one more radiant quest and suddenly they decide that you’re important enough to become a werewolf too. Not that “you know so you might as well”, but that you’ve actually done enough work (two quests worth, oh boy) to merit it (also you’re forced to become a werewolf even if you don’t want to). The Dark Brotherhood essentially does the same Oblivion story of a traitor in the guild over again, except with less interesting characters and less personal stake in the goings-on.

And the quests that aren’t tied to guilds aren’t really that much better, save for maybe a handful that I can’t even think of off the top of my head. It’s lazy, messy, and boring. It’s not completely, utterly terrible or full of plotholes, it’s passable at its best, but it’s still not terribly thought-provoking. I mean, thinking about it is what made me realize it’s not that good, so.

Perhaps more damning than any of this though, is that the gameplay itself is so boring. It’s already kind of an issue that Skyrim has iffy writing in a genre that generally needs to have semi-decent writing most of the time, but its gameplay isn’t really interesting enough to pick up the slack, either.

Admittedly, this problem goes back deeper than just Skyrim - even back during the Morrowind days, people were complaining about the combat due to how you could walk up to enemies and attack or use a spell, and you’d miss even though you’re standing right next to them. People still complain to this day about how confusing the combat is for an action-RPG.

But the problem with that logic is that Morrowind isn’t an action-RPG, it’s a proper old CRPG, more along the lines of Baldur’s Gate or Icewind Dale. You might be moving in first-person with the WASD keys and so on, but make no mistake that its core gameplay is far more in line with how the older isometric RPGs played, right down to standing right next to an enemy and missing your swings even though the animation played. When you view the game this way, most of its design decisions make a lot more sense.

Unfortunately, that never really registered (again, people still say Morrowind’s an action-RPG), so Oblivion changed things to have some sorta-kinda action-RPG combat. They didn’t rebalance the rest of the RPG elements (how to level up, level scaling, etc) to compensate, though, but instead of tweaking everything to work more naturally in Skyrim, they just removed all of the RPG elements entirely except for the Health/Magicka/Stamina thing.

Of course, that results in another problem: if the game is going to lean so hard on its action elements instead of its RPG elements… why not just play a better action game? Like, Skyrim’s combat is nothing to write home about. Oblivion’s wasn’t great, but at least it was faster and you could attack while jumping and swimming. Skyrim’s is just slow and clunky, and lacking in depth unless you actively choose to add it in.

The perks system is what ties into the combat problems the most. The issue is that the combat actually does have a small bit of depth and quality of life improvements… if you pick the perks that activate them. There’s two main screws with this, the first one being that due to how the level scaling works, you’re better off choosing the perks that just upgrade the raw damage you deal. Since even the most basic enemies slowly become health sponges, the fancy perks usually aren’t as helpful when it comes to actually defeating them.

The other screw is that these upgrades are even perks in the first place. While some abilities are understandable (like the one that sometimes replaces a normal cinematic kill with a decapitation), the ones that alter your power attacks to have extra effects have absolutely no business being optional when the combat is already as shallow as it is. If these tweaks to the power attacks had been default abilities, the perk trees could have been changed or expanded to capitalize on the differences between each kind of attack. On top of this, the choice between maces, axes and swords could have been more significant, rather than simply being minor differences in speed and power.

I know there are more abilities and special things you can do with the dragon shouts, of course, but between having to fight through dungeons in order to get those shouts, and then kill a dragon for a soul to unlock it, it’s usually too much of a pain in the ass to be worth it. Forget going out of my way to get Throw Voice - why not just give me a Noisemaker Arrow or something and be done with it?

The unfortunate thing is that despite all these issues, the combat is still generally just okay at best, so it can be hard sometimes to complain about it. But when the entire game is focused almost entirely around this combat, with almost no quest or gameplay variety to speak of, the only way it could be really seen as “good” by any stretch is by people who haven’t played other, better games.

But anyway… uh, yeah. tl;dr: I don’t like Skyrim because even though it’s incredibly safe and boring to play… it’s incredibly safe and boring to play.

Like, it’s oddly depressing to hash all this out because I really was excited for Skyrim six years ago, and I did genuinely enjoy it at first. Hell, despite all these problems I’ve still probably put way too many hours into it than I really should have. But nowadays, it just doesn’t feel that interesting. Oblivion, Morrowind, Daggerfall, and ESO are all much, much better games, and even though they have their flaws, they have a lot more interesting ups, as well. Morrowind is all-around an excellent CRPG, Daggerfall is an incredibly interesting roguelikey experience, Oblivion generally has better atmosphere and more quest variety, ESO has great combat and writing, albeit at the expense of stealth and some puzzles.

Skyrim... I dunno. Skyrim is stuck somewhere between being an average game and an undercooked one, and that really eats at me because I know that the franchise can do better. I didn’t even discuss a lot of the other problems I have with the game, just the major ones. But considering that Fallout 4 has a lot of the same issues, but even worse... I worry for what the next entry in the series might be, if it’s handled by Bethesda proper.

[litrapod]

I love superheroes and I love to hear what people love, if you’re so inclined, please take the time to share your Top Three (3) Lists of a) Live Action Superhero Movies b) Live Action Superhero TV Series c) Animated Superhero Movies and d) Animated Superhero TV Series. Invite others to share by tagging or copy/pasting this into a friend’s ask and of course everyone should feel free to gush! (If you’re feeling extra kind tag your post “a superhero lover’s top three” so people know where to look.)

Okay you asked for it…

Needless to say, Here be spoilers.

Top 3 Live Action Movies:

Avengers (2012): First Group movies are hard. I’ve tried to write group stories and that’s hard enough when you don’t have to worry about fitting everything into 2 -2 ½ hours, And balancing out story arcs, and screen time. This movie may not be perfect, but it comes damn close. There was a whole lot of pressure on this movie, because everyone know they were building up to it, and while I would have loved to see more of certain characters *cough* Clint *cough*, It managed to set up basically the entire MCU world from then on. It may not have been a traditional origin story, but this is the movie that kicked everything off.

The Dark Knight (2008): Okay storytime. My first job was as a lifeguard, and we rotated around the pool in increments of about an hour and a half per circuit. In the break room there was a small Tv with an old VCR. We had exactly 2 movies,  The Matrix and the old 1989 Batman movie with Jack Nicholson as the Joker. By the end of the summer everyone hated those two movies, myself included, because they were the only things we ever watched. I, myself managed to see the scene in Batman where the Joker defeces the museum over twenty times. To this day that it the only scene I can remember from that movie (and I can remember it in crystal clarity) because with a 15 minute break that’s all I got to see.

I bring this up because that’s what I had in my head as the joker for a long time, and I hated it. I hated the movie, I hated the character, I hated everything about it. There was the occasional flashback to Batman the animated series, but overall, yeah, hate.

Then this movie came out. The first one was good, but this one was going to have the joker, and I detested the Joker (honestly he’s a very good character to hate) and I was floored. Not only was a sequel just as good if not better than the original, but it took the Joker in a different direction. This was something I hadn’t seen before and while I still hated him, this is a portrayal that didn’t make me drown in it and ruin the movie.

Unbreakable: This movie, I don’t even have words for this movie. I know people go on about M. Night Shyamalan plot twists, but forget that for a moment.

Just look at the opening scene. A guy on a train, a little girl making faces. A woman sits down next to him and they start to talk. He takes off his wedding ring. It gets awkward, and things start to fall apart, then boom train crash.

The attention to detail, and character building are amazing. So many superhero movies just don’t bother. They’re too caught up in the CGI or in finding a way to revamp an old character. Don’t get me wrong I love origin stories, but there’s only so many ways you can play them.  Instead of making everything bigger in scale in order to keep things interesting and challenging it keeps the focus on the internal and personal conflicts just as much as the external ones, so that they feed into each other.

This movie manages to give us a truly human superhero.

A common failing of superhero movies is that the character development seems forced or clunky because the focus is to get to the big ending fight scene. Not so here. The final big fight scene is important because of what it means to the characters, not because of someone’s powers or who/what they’re threatening. Which is why the ending twist actually really works.

I can’t even describe how much I love this movie.

Top 3 Live Action TV Series:

Daredevil: So I’m going to focus on season one here.

This series took risks and they paid off in spades. It focuses on the villains almost at the expense of the heroes, but because of that we know the full scope of what Matt is facing. This isn’t just “oh I stopped a mugging” it’s full on organized crime. For half the season Matt doesn’t even know who’s in charge, or that there even is one person in charge.

The cinematography is gorgeous. Pay attention to the colors. Everything is clearly chosen for a reason. By the end of the season I was getting nervous when Vanessa wore black. There have been a couple other movies that tried to play up the color thing, but most of them had crappy scripts. It this series, the stark color contrasts only amplify what is already a great show.

It eases you into the weird. This show is canonically in the same universe as the Avengers. Thor, Hulk, Aliens, they all exist, but it’s a distant presence to the average guy on the street. And this series shows that. When an honest to god Ninja showed up I was flabbergasted, because while I knew that they could be a thing in this universe, it still felt like something i’d never seen before. ( This is also a part of my disappointment about season 2 but I’m not going to get into that here. )

In a lot of ways this is actually a season long origin story. We got the time and breadth to fully explore how Matt became Daredevil. Training montages are fun and all, but this gave it depth.

I could go on. The catholic themes, the brutality that never seemed unnecessary or over the top.

This is a wonderful show that set an extremely high bar for the rest of the Netfix originals.

Heroes: I loved this show (before the writers strike ruined it) because there were so many good characters and none of them seemed to know what they were doing. The way everything slowly wove together in the first season was great. The recurring themes that were the paintings and the company.

This show had a lot of potential and it was clear the writers had a lot of ideas. Not many of those ideas actually made it to the screen in later seasons, but despite that, this was a fun show to watch every week and a fun show to binge watch when I need to lift my spirits.

Flash:  I had a hard time picking among the CW Flash/Arrow/Legends/Supergirl set.

Supergirl was the show I wished I had as a young girl. Legends has just the right amount of over the top that I love.

Flash ended up winning because Flash is my favorite superhero.

Wally was the Flash I grew up with and when the show came out I kind of wanted to hate it because DC had written him out of existence  ( in both the comics and Young Justice… Seriously DC what do you have against him? ) Barry, had featured in Arrow of course, which i Loved to Death, But that didn’t mean he’d be written well or be able to carry his own show…  The core of Barry’s character in any universe is that he’s hopeful. He will see the best in people and bring it out in those around him. Despite him being incredibly awkward in the first season he had that. It worked.

And then in episode four they gave us Len and he was so well done I just melted. After that I was sold.

Top 3 Animated Superhero movies:

Justice League New Frontier: If you watch nothing else on this list, watch this one.

The interweaving storylines, the art style, the plot, everything about this movie is gold. I’m a long time DC fan and the number of subtle hints, and worldbuilding they do is amazing, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a movie new fans can enjoy. Because it’s a sort of coming together of the Justice League, you don’t need to know anything beyond who Superman, Wonder Woman and Batman are. All the lesser known characters are given their own small arcs so you know what they’re about.

Then on a deeper layer it’s a social commentary on the cold war, and the space race, and the fear of the unknown. I have watched this movie dozens of times. I own an autographed copy of the DVD. Every time I watch it I notice something new.

Batman: Under the Red Hood: The Red Hood storyline in the comics is a bit of a monster. You have to be a fan and know the history in order to understand all the implications. The movie has a bit of that, but in my opinion it does a good job filling in most of the gaps.

While the Joker is the main villain he’s more of a foil for Jason and to a lesser degree Bruce. (which is definitely a plus in my book, see above rant of hatred regarded the Joker)

It’s hard to pin down exactly what I love about this one. It’s strange to say, but if I had to pick one thing it’d be the pacing. There are individual lines that are amazing but it’s the culmination that makes this a great movie. There’s a balance to it. Lighter moments even though the plot is very dark. Action and quieter moments each given their place.

Planet Hulk: This one makes the list because I have a soft spot for the Hulk and this is the first comic storyline for the hulk that I ever read. The movie isn’t as complex as the comics of course and they have to wrap everything up in a bow rather then lead into the next comic story, but it’s a good depiction nevertheless.

Top 3 Animated Superhero TV Series:

I realize this is kind of a cop out, but they really are my favorites.

Batman the animated series: It set the standard for all other superhero shows for the next few decades. It invented Detective Montoya, Harley Quinn and several other minor characters. It gave several villains backstories that are still used today, Freeze being the one that comes to mind. It was the start of the whole DC animated universe ( Batman animated, Superman animated, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, Static Shock, Batman Beyond and possibly a few more I’m forgetting )

If there’s a top ten list of superhero shows that doesn’t have the Batman animated Series, then it was probably disqualified for being too awesome.

Justice League Unlimited: Everything Batman was but with a bigger cast. Minor heroes got a place to shine. While still shown as being important to the larger plot, and oh those plots. The Legion of Doom, Doomsday, Brainiac. As much as the hero’s got to shine so did the villains.

Keep in mind a lot of these characters (on both sides) hadn’t been portrayed on screen before this, and for a lot of the lesser known ones the portrayal here is still what people who don’t read the comics think of first.

Batman Beyond: It was my first fandom, so yes, I’m biased. My first multi-chapter fic is still up on ff.net.

Batman is a huge character. He’s the bread and butter of the DCU, so much so that people don’t treat him like he’s human. This show not only admitted he was human, it started asking questions, and opened a whole new world of possibilities because of it.

The first scene still gets me every time, the gun, and shutting down the cave.

Add to that that this was not only in the same world but created by the same team that did the batman animated series and you get a wealth of history that other shows can only dream of. The costumes in the cases, the trophies, they’re all the same ones from the other show. When Terry finally meets the Justice League, Superman references thing that happened in the Justice League show. And you can’t get the end of Mr. Freeze’s character arc unless you watch Batman Beyond.

Not that it’s tied down. It has a history, but with a new Batman it’s a whole different ball game. And Terry is a different Batman. He’s not dark and brooding. He sasses back to his villains like Dick. He’s got street smarts like Jason. He’s got the drive like Bruce. He may still be figuring things out but it’s clear he’ll be just as impressive.

[abandonedshoppingtrolley]

My Thoughts on Final Fantasy XV

 This is a little late to the game now but it’s a long time coming for me to write my thoughts on it and I’ve decided to do it now because of well recent developments and announcements of future patches etc.

I made this a read more because it’s a little bit longer than I intended but yeah hopefully this is easier to read and stuff but there you go for those who care?

First off I want to note that I enjoyed Final Fantasy XV to me it was a pretty good game. Overall I’d give it 7/10 maybe 8/10 tops?? It really doesn’t deserve anything higher than that for me though I’m afraid mostly because it’s not incredibly groundbreaking. They haven’t incorporated anything hugely new to it? Everything within it has already been done, albeit in a different form but yeah.

First of The Characters:

Overall I have to admit I think the four guys were pretty awesome characters.

Noctis -  The sleepy, moody prince who wasn’t too into his duties as a prince. It sometimes felt like in the undertone that he had a feeling the only reason his friends were around (Mostly Gladio and Ignis) were simply tied to the fact that he himself was a prince, sadly that wasn’t explored... At all. His character through the story was admittedly written quite well, he starts off a mega sleepy prince, becomes enraged and continuously fueld by his emotions of wanting revenge and also being unable to cope with the loss of those around him. This doesn’t stop him from enjoying himself but it’s a big influence.

Gladiolus- He’s the big tough guy of the group, masculine, muscular the kind of guy who’d wear shorts during winter to prove how straight he is. Honestly I don’t have any qualms with his character! I think he was well written in remaining a good friend, bodyguard, true to himself and also unable to hold back his emotions, which was particularly made known when he became increasingly angry over Noctis’ self anguish over Luna’s death and how he became frustrated over him not showing any care towards Ignis becoming blind. The only problem I really have to find is his relationship with his sister. He worried over her situation, how she was etc when Insomnia was attacked and over the course of the game showed increasing concern over her well being EXCEPT the moment they met. There was almost nothing between them. He had a stronger relationship with his group of friends than he did with his little sister which they built up so much of.

Ignis - Being the calm and collected guy of the group he was mostly a tactical advisor and almost like a caregiver of sorts to both Noctis and Prompto, constantly advising them, cooking and being the most “adult” one of the group. Like with Gladio I really don’t have any qualms over his character? It was definitely interesting to see him go blind and how he coped with that situation too since that was something Final Fantasy hadn’t done before either.

Prompto - Good ol’Prompto! He felt like he was going to be the annoying character of the group with his witty one liners but honestly? He’s really just as awesome. I didn’t find him annoying one bit during the entirety of the game which was good. He’s a well written character who seemingly helps keep Noctis grounded since he doesn’t treat him like a prince but rather like a best friend which is both good for Noctis of course and good for us to see another side to them both. The only dig I have to make about him is his relation to magitek soldiers/demons. It wasn’t explained... At all? It felt like it was just thrown into the game for shock factor and then IMMEDIATELY dismissed and never brought up again? Maybe this was implied in the Brotherhood anime or Movie but regardless it should’ve been explained in game? I shouldn’t have to watch the anime or movie to really understand the story of the game itself, it should explain itself fluidly and properly without the need of extra content, because that’s there to be well just extra content?

Other Characters - You’re probably thinking “But Sam there are so many other characters you can’t shove them all into one category” well sadly I can because none of them are really fleshed out characters I’m afraid, dismissing Cindy and Cid of course who are for a better part of the game quite important. Sadly the others aren’t even though some of them should be. (looking at you Luna and Ravus). None of the extra characters have really been given much to them, they’re all rather 2-dimensional? Iris, Gladio’s sister who was given a good chunk of dialogue did interact quite well with the part and it was implied she liked Noctis and that she was a good friend to everyone within the 4 main characters HOWEVER it wasn’t fully explored? There were just underlying tones of what kind of relationship she has to everyone, as well as her feelings for Noctis sadly.

Luna, who is supposed to be an INCREDIBLY RELEVANT CHARACTER almost the same amount of importance as Noctis well what can I say, She seems strong, She seems defiant, She seems brave and She seems like she’s a kind and caring person who obviously cares deeply for both her family and close one’s. Do you see the problem here, if not re-read that again. Everything about her all I can really say is it SEEMS like because we don’t know her. We know parts of her through other people, JUST BARELY, but even then it’s not enough. We weren’t given the chance to truly get to know Lunafreya as a character and that honestly disappointed me because by the time we got to meet her she died. Her death had no impact on me what so ever. The only reason I was sad was because it made Noctis sad, and that’s not enough. That’s not good story telling because FFXV isn’t JUST about Noctis.

The same situation with Ravus he was actually supposed to, as you find out old some strong respect for Noctis he was just frustrated with what was happening to Luna (There were some documents I believe you had to find to find this out or something?). I honestly wish I could’ve felt more emotion for him because from it sounds like he seems like a caring older brother figure who also cares deeply for Noctis, sadly all we really see is an older brother who betrayed his nation, his sister and all those around him and stole Regis’ Armiger. I don’t feel sad about his end, he was forced to become a monster, a demon but I didn’t know him enough to well actually care? It disappointed me because I didn’t get that chance to build as strong a connection with him.

Moving on from Characters:

Overall the gameplay mechanics were really fantastic, the controls weren’t clunky everything flowed quite nicely but there was nothing that hadn’t really been done before if I’m honest? The graphics however to point out were ASTOUNDING They really outdid themselves the game is absolutely gorgeous there’s no denying that! The soundtrack too I found was a perfect fit for the game, they really outdid themselves on that ESPECIALLY Florence and the machines rendition of Stand by me, it fitted perfectly with the characters and the theme they were going through it truly, honestly impressed me.

The magic, elemancy as it’s called I did enjoy. I loved seeing how my magic affected my surroundings as well as having to think tactically since it could also affect my teammates especially in some closed off areas. I liked it, however it felt kind of boring apart from that? To put it simply magic in this game (casting aside the Luciis ring which is USELESS) is basically just a bomb. A bomb infused with magical energy that anyone can then use a set amount of times. It’s like an action game with grenades with different affects, some causing more fires or others being cryo related. So it kind of felt bland in that aspect, although the merging of elements for spells with items as well was quite enjoyable especially the way you could fuse in status effects. (Although let me tell you Quad/Quintcast is the way to go just saying). My second dig has to be the amount of elements available. There were three, Fire, Ice and Thunder WHICH has always been prominent within Final Fantasy so I can see why they’re there. But Final Fantasy 13 had not only those 3 included but water, earth and wind elements as well with the spells, water of course, aero and quake. So honestly I was sad to see them not throw them in too, which would’ve increased the amount of tactics at hand and the amount of elemancy fusing you could do, considering they had 2 astrals which were of earth (titan) and water (Leviathan).

Okay so moving on from that let’s get into the most important part of Final Fantasy XV, THE STORY, and whether that was good and concise or just random gibberish. Well honestly The story wasn’t too bad, you’ve got princey boy and his band of merry bro’s off to get him wed to the hot chick who’s loved by everyone for saving the world and speaking to the godly gods, but shit hits the fan when Insomnia falls to Imperial fleets and now the prince and his broski’s are on the run still aiming to be wed? Lots of things happen and they go on a quest for revenge reclaiming the old kings powers and the astral beings in order to gain the strength to smash those imperial asshole faces in. Sadly his father of course died as we find out AKA his prime reason for revenge but Luna dies too which cause even more tension in the group, Ignis goes blind, Gladio gets made, Prompto’s a magitek demon soldier boy??? And then there’s the weird guy who just keeps appearing every who “Surprisingly” Turns out to be the main antagonist. But of course before you can smash his face in Noctis gets eaten alive by the crystal, his friends have to flee from the demon spree and ten years scroll by. Out pops princey boy on an abandoned island which just so happens to have a boat docked, he sails off back to the once sunny resort reflecting on how the land itself has been blanketed by eternal night. He meets up with old pay’s at Cindy’s hammerhead garage place, meets the broski’s forges a plan, charges into Insomnia, kicks ass and saves the day by giving his life to the crystal or whatever and boom the sun comes out.

On a more serious not it was really kind of... clunky. There were moments it felt awkward and you questioned some of the choices the group actually made? There were also themes that felt too forced, like Prompto’s apparent super soldier ser- i mean demon serum birth thingy that again WAS NOT EXPLORED, was just thrown in for shock factor. I’m not gonna say it was all bad because I enjoyed it and they did very well in forging a strong bond between 4 friends who stuck through thick and thin with each other HOWEVER that’s all they did well story wise. They needed to fit more in, more explanation of the characters, more things to do with Iris, Cindy, Cid, Luna ESPECIALLY LUNA AND RAVUS. Cor was tossed to the side after they were through with him and then brought him back for one final hurrah in the middle. Aranea Highwind was given the bare minimum of an explanation but honestly we don’t know her, her story or who the hell she really is, she’s just a lady with a lance and lot of people who know she’s a buff bad bitch. The story felt empty, incomplete almost. I wanted more for the characters, I want more from chapter 13/14 I wanted to explore that ruined world. I didn’t want to just have my teammates just HAPPEN to get to me at the exact moment I’d appear. Why couldn’t my new mission have been to find and reunite with them in different parts of Eos, having to explore the world once again except ten years later after being covered in darkness, seeing places I once loved and thought were gorgeous covered in darkness, destroyed by demons. People I’d previously met who’d gone crazy, been killed changed etc. I wanted to see this “Iris the demon slayer”. There was still so much that could’ve been put in to Final Fantasy XV to not only make the story more concise and a more enjoyable experience, but to also add in more content to enjoy.

And finally moving on to the last bit DLC:

Okay first of all it’s nice to see them become active in making dlc content for this game it’s really good. I love the idea of the moogle carnival it was a great thing to throw in. I like the items they keep putting in too, new equipment etc which is honestly a thing most games do anyway. I’m also excited about the apparent Character chapters they were going to release for Gladio, Prompto and Ignis, having the chance to not only play as them but also learn more about them.

But... Some striking rumours, which are apparently confirmed have both shocked and horrified me. They’re working on patching into the game a better storyline... a better chapter 13 etc. WHY???

Stop beating a dead horse. The story has been told you CANNOT just change it on a whim because you want it to be good, that’s like an author publishing a book and then telling everyone who bought it it’s not good enough and he wants to rewrite a few chapters. If you do that whatever I’ve played right now, is basically irrelevant because I don’t know what you’re planning on changing?

The stories been told, leave it at THAT. The point of dlc is to bring in EXTRA CONTENT, extra chapters, items, sidequests etc NOT TO CHANGE THE ORIGINAL STORY BEING TOLD!!!!!!!!!! Regardless of whether it’s not changing it but rather just trying to “improve” it, it’s already been told END OF STORY!!!

Rather than focusing on FFXV’s story, which has already been done, either focus your efforts on the dlc content, other games square enix has in the works OR even more importantly how you’re going to improve your content IF you decide to make a Final Fantasy XVI. The last comment, what I mean is just understanding what they did right and what they did wrong with XV and making sure not to make the same mistakes with future games. That’s what’s important to me right now, that’s what I’m committed into as a person who loves Final Fantasy and the many world’s and characters it holds. I want to see the developers, the content creators committing themselves to bettering their own abilities and making sure not to cause the same mistakes, the same crap that happened in XV. That’s what’s important to me after this, not some changing in story crap.

Side Note: It’d also be great if, I know they like having super complex story lines but if they went back to basics, have a basic story line that’s easy to follow and not too complicated. A game can be amazing without a hugely complex story line, just look at some of the indie games that have had break throughs too!