Final Fantasy - James Bond Of The Gaming World

A multi-million pound franchise with a massive international following. This would aptly describe both the Final Fantasy and James Bond series. However, you could also describe them both... as "boring".

Naturally, facts and figures can be used to refute this claim outright. Both these brands have entertained hundreds of thousands of people around the planet, if not more! However, if you move past all the superlatives and lavish praise, they can be seen to be guilty of:

• Recycling the same basic story
• Repeatedly using the same character types
• Repacking the same themes of love, violence and fantasy.

Arguably, there is very little to find in them which is distinctly different. Every new entry may bring things that have not appeared before but they are very rarely off in completely another direction. Those who were disinterested before remain disinterested now.

Having said all this, it is irrational to simply dismiss these products simply for being iterative. We don't begrudge our favourite types of food for being "the same" every time do we?

The problem lies in balancing the things we consume. Whilst it is fine for Final Fantasy to be the stereotypical "JRPG", we don't want every other game out there to be imitating it. Conversely, we shouldn't despair at great games producing better sequels.

Final Fantasy and other franchises we have grown up with are akin to our childhood heroes. If they change with us and continue to entertain us, then we can happily grow old with them.

Pray the day never comes when the things we love fail to excite us.

~ TheArkAngelOfKaos ~

Let the games begin

I've created this mainly as a forum for discussion of games, talking about the concepts and theories behind games, as opposed to rating or slating individual games. There's a few main contributors, who you will hopefully get to know as you read what we think, but we're always open to new opinions and views.

Anyway, here's to a long and hopefully interesting future