Three Reasons Why Squaresoft Is Better Than Square EnixNovember 29, 2010 by

Squaresoft defined the RPG era of the Playstation with its captivating game called "Final Fantasy" that has reached its 14th installment and the franchise is going strong. The Playstation era is long over now and with the release of consoles like X box and the Wii, the playstation is being beaten by graphics over content. Thats when Square Enix emerged and gave RPG games its long awaited revival.

Square Enix is not shy of giving us crisp graphics that will make you drool while watching. They are certainly talented. After all Square Enix broke the barriers and released the Final Fantasy franchise and turned it MMORPG. Though it takes a little getting use to, it is still a great innovation that propelled other RPG games to step it up a notch.

Square Enix also eliminated the ATB (Active Time Battle) meter and made their RPG games real time. I am a master at turn base RPG so it certainly was a new ground to me when I was being beaten to a pulp by Neo Bahamut at FF7 Crisis Core.

Perhaps Square Enix's greatest achievement is combining real time battle with old school RPG in the super nostalgic game that was Dissidia which was Square Enix's thank you to die hard fans.

But lets face it, Square Enix is nothing like Squaresoft. While the company is still the same, you can tell that Square Enix is not Squaresoft. Its kinda hard to explain to people who didn't experience the transition but deep down in your gut you could sense it.

So as a bitter fan who could not let go of the playstation era, I give three reasons why Squaresoft is better than Square Enix. A bunch of these points maybe biased but I kinda did that intentionally. You do not screw an RPG grinder.

1. A ground breaking original game. Squaresoft gave us Final Fantasy that instantly exploded and made Squaresoft a legendary company. What's the last original game Square Enix released? Seriously, I don't follow that company anymore so I have no idea. Even Kingdom Hearts was a Squaresoft original though I could see Square Enix emerging from that game. That was the first real time strategy game I ever encountered. Valkyrie Profile is also a Squaresoft original.

It seems to me that Square Enix has been riding Squaresoft's coattail for a long time now. They fixed FF1's heavy flaw, released FF3, 4, 5, and 6 on the Nintendo console but what else? What's the game that Square Enix can call their own?

I dunno, but I guess I can still wait.

2. Story over Graphics. You have to look at Kingdom Hearts for this one. They need to release a novel about the entire story of KH after the whole ordeal is over. Basically at KH1, you have a guy who have a key jumping from world to world defeating Shadows. Easy enough. In KH2, there was suddenly a bunch of guys with those keys and for some odd reason a bunch of them are using shadows as minions. Then in Birth by Sleep you just chase one character after the other. Oh my god, the story is slowly dissolving.

I bet they think that their fans are all gamers who loves graphics. It makes sense since gaming companies are trying to out graphic each other. Some fans are just too good to even touch a 64 bit game released in 2009. They don't notice that they sacrifice story for that.

Final Fantasy Crisis Core had such a weak story that the side missions were more important than the main story. It was nice to see Aerith and Zack's romantic past revealed but even the other characters were over bearing. Genesis was such a weird character it was like Square Enix was telling us that they were better than us. If you don't feel that in Crisis Core then go play FF12. The Shakespearean dialog was so confusing that I had to stop at the middle and play the game again. If that means I'm dumb then so be it. I just think that they over exaggerate a simple concept. No one will play a game with a crappy story so they stuff it with a bunch of side quests and boss that literally have 7 million life points.

And lastly, no memorable in game moment. Aerith dying was a super incredible moment that people still remember it today. What memory did Square Enix ever leave us? I may be clearly biased on this point but I was craving for one memorable moment for a long time now.

Zack dying? I smelled that 70 seconds after seeing that the game cannot cut any scenes. The only thing I remember from FF12 is the crappy summons. The Zodiac summons are weaker than the player's mist specials. The summons were weak. Come on. They need to meet Odin and his Gantetsuken.

Sora appearing in KH2? You play the game wanting to see Sora and you get welcomed by Roxas. Screw that. I wanted to see Sora and I had to play this crappy blond for a long period of the game?

Cloud's geeky appearance in Crisis Core? Argh, I give up. The comment box is below so please entertain me. Anyways, I do hope Square Enix focus or at least realize this key faults because honestly, I am 3 days away from deleting my FF7 PSX data and grinding the game all over again.

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The Legacy of SuikodenNovember 28, 2010 by

suikoden 2

I am a huge fan of Suikoden ever since I played Suikoden II on the Playstation. It was a nice change of pace after I got bored of playing Final Fantasy. The game no longer challenges me. One dark morning, I finish FF9 and I was empty. I was like "meh", need to buy a PS2 to play FFX. I was about to put my PS1 to dust on my shelf when I saw Suikoden II on a bargain bin in a mall. It was cheap so I bought it and oh boy, I never turned back.

I was so addicted to the game that I played it fifteen times just to complete the 108 stars of destiny. No cheat or walkthrough. When I played the game, I actually laughed at how cheesy the graphics and the typical "Joey" character is to me but then it blew up. Suddenly, I was loving Nanami, then hating her, then loving her again. I was sucked in to this unbelievable story that I finished the game in one sitting. I thought Shu was brilliant and that Lucas Blight is the next best villain besides Sephiroth. The story is so original that I wanted to play the first installment.

The battle system is something original too. Konami must be damn proud of producing a game that has six characters usable all at the same time. The one on one face off against Luca and Amada was brilliant too. I never had a hard time though because, being a grind lover, I easily fold any opponent.

There was so much going on in the game that I never got tired. So I played Suikoden 1. It was probably a bad idea for me since all the bad things in Suikoden 1 was improved in Suikoden 2 so I was laughing at how easy that game is. You finish the game at level 64 in less than a day.

What I love about Suikoden 1 was the true rune of the game. The Soul Eater rune is the best rune ever.  I was instantly sucked into the Suikoden world. The elves, the dwarves, the kobolds, the dragon tribe and the ninja tribe. I was looking them up in wikipedia and I couldn't stop. Suikoden 1 and 2 was the last games I ever played in my ps1.

My ps1 is old and makes a funny sound now. The white casing of the console is already yellow white and there is dust in ever corners. My Ps1 retired at 2000.  Then the PS2 came and so did Suikoden 3.

There was a lot of buzz and hype in FFX but screw that. I wanted Suikoden 3.  A lot of people say that the franchise went downhill after Suikoden 2. They maybe right. I applaud the game for its trinity system but when I heard of it, I thought it was three separate group of 108 stars of destiny along with three main characters and three stories. It was a let down. The characters were still interesting though, especially Mel and Banky, and the story is solid enough but there other points to hate the game. First, the game play. It was ridiculously easy at first then got brutally hard after changing dungeons. So you are required to grind and grind that it gets boring. The gameplay during the war scenes was awful too. In the previous game it was a tactical strategy game. It Suikoden 3, it became nothing but fighting.

Secondly, the appearance of little Viki. Viki is this mysterious character that appeared in Suikoden 1 and 2 with her background never revealed. I had my theories but it just became more confusing with little Viki's appearance. I like Viki. I rank Viki number 3 in my list of favorite female characters, next to Tifa and Popuri (Harvest Moon). Little Viki just didn't do it for me.

Yuber's appearance is a little bit frustrating too. He's suddenly a good guy and Pesmerga is no where in sight. It hurts the most when fans never saw the dysfunctional couple in any Suikoden game again.

Lastly, Suikoden 3 showered us with a bunch of true runes. The true Earth and true Wind already appeared in Suikoden 2 though but they were never part of the main story. In Suikoden 3, they just gave us too many that I never got in to it.

I finished the game though. It was satisfying, to say the least but not what you expected after playing Suikoden 2. I decided to play FFX after this whole encounter.  I actually played a bunch of games just to rid myself of Suikoden 3. I wanted Suikoden 2 to stay in my head forever. Then after some year pass, Suikoden 4 came. I look the trailers and got excited. For the first time, the game was in 3D.

Some causal fans may dislike the game because, honestly, it was horrible. The game appealed to me though. The main fault of Suikoden 4 was the one sided story. We know why Joey defected to the Highlands, we know why Luc a bad guy, we even knew Barbarossa's intentions but Suikoden 4 had nothing. It was just an army growing in the sea. The characters were all similar too. No one stands out and they all look the same when you play them in battle. Eleanor Silverburg is a disagree on the lines of Silverburgs that proceeded her. The rune is god awful too.  The rune of punishment is a parasite while other runes chooses it owner so it gives you an idea of how great that rune is. Still, I had a liking to it.

I saw Viki n 3D so A plus for that. There were a lot of characters that appealed to me. I enjoyed Snowe's stupid antics towards the course of the game.  Ted's appearance is just unbelievable. Surprisingly, he is more useful, with his Soul Eater rune, than the main character.

The setting is also a plus for me. It was in the sea and Suikoden has never ventured on it. The lack of islands is a bit sad but painting the world map is fun. Tedious, but fun.

Suikoden 5 came not long after that. I can tell that Suikoden's fanbase is slowly dying. A lot of things were riding in Suikoden 5. They need to make it shine. Thankfully, it did but deja vu? It was Suikoden 2's story all over again. Notice Lyon's similarity to Nanami in terms of always being the hero's voice and the whole "pretending to be dead act". The children rune of the Sun rune is like the rune'sin Suikoden 2. In fact, the Sun rune is only thing different in Suikoden 5.

I look at Suikoden 5 as literally as combination of Suikoden 2's story and Suikoden 3's gameplay. The recruitment of the SOD's are so hard that I was dumbfounded to hear how many things I need to do to recruit Alhazred.  They reverted back to the fixed camera view like in Suikoden 2, not adopting 4's 3D environment.

The story is still engaging though. It was really a great comeback for the franchise.

Years later and I am now twenty years old. I still Google "Suikoden 6" whenever I log in the internet. It was a fun ride for me and I wanted the next installment as soon as possible. I heard a Suikoden game came out of the DS and it got me worried. I already saved money for a PS3 and there are rumors they will move the game to the Xbox or Wii. Screw that.  I grew up on that game and they'll move it to a console I never even try. God, I hope not.

I do hope they stick to the PS and I hope that they still deliver a more solid story than Suikoden 5. I need to see Viki one more time. Whether the game is a dud or not is no problem for me. It can't end on Suikoden 5. Damn it Konami, you gave us Metal Gear and Castlevania. You can try giving this game one more time to shine.

Anyways, I do hope they make Suikoden 6 in the next two years.  It's my childhood at stake here or, something less exaggerated, Suikoden's legacy.

By the way, anybody noticed the trinity system adopted by Kingdom hearts Birth by Sleep. What's up with that?

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