The very first video game I fell in love with was Final Fantasy VII. It's one of the very vivid memories of my childhood. I was maybe twelve or thirteen, and I was over at a friend's house and he happened to be playing it. I had played video games before, had owned a NES and a Sega Genesis and played the basics: Sonic, Mario, Aladdin, Lion King, etc.
Now, see, I didn't have an SNES, and one of the things the video games of the Super Nintendo introduced was storytelling. Look at Star Fox, at Final Fantasy IV and VI, just for a trio of classic examples. These games brought plot into video games in a more real way and I had missed it. I was probably playing soccer.
More after the jump.
So, to get back to the story, when I watched my buddy play Final Fantasy VII, I was kind of enthralled. It was the first time that I saw video games-- something I liked-- mixed seamlessly with storytelling-- something I also liked. Put together, I became kind of obsessed. I actually sat there and watched a Final Fantasy game, something that many people will tell you is one of the most boring activities a person can engage in. I have logged literally hundreds of hours playing that game over the years.
I still play the Final Fantasy games, even as they've progressively become very hit-or-miss both thematically and in terms of gameplay. Some of it is nostalgia; the ridiculous epicness and overly complex leveling systems still bring me back to saving the world from Sephiroth while trying to level up Ultima to Master level (for fuck's sake I still haven't killed Ruby WEAPON). And some of it is because I still do enjoy at least a portion of all of the single-player Final Fantasys since.
But I've noticed a curious consistency of the last few Final Fantasys, and for clarifications sake, I am only referring to the single-layer games, I have never played XI or XIV, the multi-player games. The constant thing has been in the themes of these games.
Final Fantasy IX, X, X-2, XII, and XIII have all framed the idea of fate as a malevolent force.
In all of those games, the main character has had to fight against fate in some fashion. In IX, Zidane had to fight his fate as a destroyer of worlds. In X, Tidus had to fight the fate that summoners and their guardians were destined to. In X-2, Yuna had to fight history being fated to repeat itself. In XII, Ashe had to fight the gods, who determined the fate of people's lives, and in XIII Lightning had to do essentially the same thing. In all the cases, destiny and fate were presented as chains that shackle our choices, chains that must be cast aside despite their consequences.
Final Fantasys utilize Eastern storytelling; they're written in Japan. And, when I spoke with other video game fans about this phenomenon, they told me that many Japanese animes and other Asian movies portray fate in much the same way. So this difference, it's interesting, not least of all because of how fate is often portrayed in exactly the opposite fashion in Western storytelling.
Fate in American movies is usually a communal force. It brings people together. Look at any romantic comedy and you see this in the form of a deux ex machina bringing the two main characters together at the end. The interjection of action by a God or gods is often treated in a similar fashion, where they intercede in a way to save or protect a character.
This implies a certain different viewpoint of fate in Eastern and Western cultures, and it's one of the boldest dividing lines I think I've come across in society. I've traveled to a small handful of places in the Western hemisphere, and the one thing I've noticed is that for the most part people view the world in very similar ways, and that they work toward the same goals. About the Big Things, they often view them the same way. But this view of Fate is such a fundamental difference that it's kind of shocking to me. I am amazed that such a large portion of people could be so divided on such a major idea.
These are the things I learn from video games.
Weird.
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