Final Fantasy VIII
May 10th, 2008I just bought my own copy of Final Fantasy VIII.
I’ve played the game through once, almost throughly (save for beating some weapons and getting some of the best equipment), but I think I’ll try to get them all this time. That is not the point of this posting, however.
The point is I almost shed a tear just watching the first introductory cut scene.
I can remember the joy of meeting Rinoa for the first time. I can remember the delight of beating the Omega Weapon. I can remember the frustration of getting to Omega Weapon. These are all really strong feelings, and all of them were evoked by a game.
So?
There’s been a lot of yapping that games should become an art form. That games should try exalt themselves somehow. Well, I feel that I have a stronger bond with this particular game that I have with any book, movie or painting. Just listening to the game’s music in the background makes awakes emotions far stronger than almost any movie can.
So?
So quit bitching about games growing up. They already did. We just missed it. We were just too ashamed of ourselves to see it. We claim that games are much more that just complex toys, but judging from most of the writing about games, we don’t believe it ourselves. We want to see games as art, but we don’t want to look in the mirror. We want to wait for a “perfect game” to come and “prove our point”. Hell, it already did.
I almost fell in love with Rinoa the first time I played this game. And I’m sure I’m not the only one. If that’s not proof of a strong, real character in a game what is?
I know that the story in Final Fantasy VIII is linear, and many forms of storytelling have been taken from other media such as movies, but that does not make the game, or its story any weaker. It’s not the mechanics of the storytelling that make the story good or bad, it’s the feelings it evokes in the person that experiences the story. And if a game can evoke such strong feelings in me, and probably in thousands of others, well,
as Richard Bartle recently put it,
we’ve already won.
Final Fantasy VIII is the game that proved that for me, what’s that game for you? Why?