We need some more of it…
Hello everyone I am Jmulls of Jmulls Gaming and welcome to my little corner of the internet!
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In today’s video, I talk about the concept of killing characters, how it can be used excessively or effectively and I argue how Final Fantasy 14 needs to make better use of it !
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Yes, Lamat. Get her out of the story pls
Yes…. there is no danger, no threat… no matter the enemy you know how it will end. It's like watching power rangers each episode is the same. They wont kill them ofc, thats why scions and overall this.. "adventure" is so f boring.
DT spoilers…
We did see Gulool Ja Ja die, but it was one of the stupidest character deaths, and I felt nothing. All I saw was that clearly something was not right after Gulool won the first duel and Zoraal got revived with that mysterious hi-tech headpiece. And we, the most op and combat experienced character, decided to just stand and watch?
If this is the way they will handle character deaths, I have little hope for improvements in quality. The last meaningful non-enemy character death we witnessed was Tesleen in the beginning of shb. You can aaaalmost count the Crystal Exarch, though his memories still live on in our present day G'raha.
Sorry but my opinion I cried for everything in these game am a cry baby I guess ❣️
tbh i don't understand the obsession with characters death
This is part of the reason I just can't take some of the stuff now seriously lol
The stakes are so low now. Like, I'm not emotionally as invested because i know everyone will be so safe to begin with. I feel like a toddler and my hand is being held. Like, I want major character deaths. Doesn't mean kill everyone or something but i just feel it's just…
''meh'' with always having the heroes be ok and only side characters and villains always seem to just die. they playing it too safe and it's honestly tiring for me personally. it's more of the same.
A sacrifice means nothing if nothing is lost. Its a cheap emotional response.
The ultimate Thule fake out wad so stupid. I didn't want them all to die there but they shouldn't have faked the deaths either. The second the second person died I knew none of them were dead and the whole zone lost its mojo
I am still genuinely shocked that Thancred didn't die in Endwalker. I fully expected he would.
I am glad they didn't take him out the way they almost did in Ultima Thule, however. He deserves to go out in a blaze of glory.
I'm reminded a bit of Fairy Tail Acnologia+Zeref arc there were maybe a dozen episodes in a row where characters "went out in a blaze of glory" but then the next episode it was revealed they survived.
That bait and switch was way overused and just felt insulting very quickly. I would rather one of them had died in a meaningful way. And Ichiya's moment would've been the perfect time for a permanent death.
Yes we do. 😅
Starting with Wuk Lamat 😂
yes, 100%
My favorite "death" was the character assassination of the wol just before heavensward.
Almost halfway through endwalker 6.0 when zenos changed his appearance I got excited hoping something like that was happening again…
It may be an unpopular opinion but I don’t like main character death in the things I enjoy. Don’t get me wrong if the character hasn’t been in the forefront of the story like papalymo, haurchefant characters that are important but are far to the side of the main scions characters. It feels like a huge cop out way of story telling and I think the game would be worse off if some of our hugely important friends had died. Like I would not have the same interest if Y’stola was killed to fill in the character death box. And I feel the same with any of the scions. We have invested so much into these characters and that’s a lot for us to just dump down the drain
I'm not taking FF writing serious anymore it's an ok story but that's about it.
G'raha and alphi should have died to zenos in garlemald that would have been way more impactful. Maybe you bring back Estinein, Alisaie, Y'shtola and Urianger in ultima thule
Dear Yoshi-P, please kill Wuk Lamat. Thanks.
I think that Wuk Lamat having to sacrifice herself for the nation she came to know and love deeply could actually be a good way for her to go by the end of DT
We've already shoved the WoL and the Scions so far into the background they might as well be figures of nostalgia or callbacks. I'm not sure how killing any of them would improve the situation.
I don't think it is so much character death as much as it not letting a characters story fully end. Like I love the scions but at the very least Thancred, Urianger and Yshtola should probably be retired to very minimal supporting roles for an expansion or two. I love all the scions but they have had MAJOR development, especially Thancred, shadowbringers did literal miracles for his character development. But I would love to see the older scions do something like trek off to try and find a way to reverse engineer Alexandrian tech to find a way to get between the source and both the 1st and 13th, completely man made. Make that demand their entire undivided attention. I can kinda of be fine with the twins staying around a little, though more Allisaie than Alphie. I kinda wanna see the Scions segment into the adventurers and scholars. Like alphie should be getting back to Sharylan and making good on the joke Estinien made to his father about gunning for his seat. The older Scions as I said can basically go off to try and get back to Norvrandt naturally (Thancred and Yshtola have HEAVY reasons for wanting to get back, though I could see Urianger also wanting to help his freinds and maybe a little wanting to see the fae again). Let Estinien keep playing his fellow adventurer role, he has been kinda like our Lancer (the trope not the class, but pun intended). As for Allisaie and Graha, they actually have much more direct drive to stay with the WoL, Allisae because she has directly hates leaving things to the WoL alone, even getting another of those moments in DT, and for Graha he literally has stated only wanting to go on adventures with us. So going forward id just like to say maybe build a new group but only with those 2 at the start and scatter the rest of the scions.
TL:DR Let the scions go do other things, though maybe keep like 2 to restart a new adventuring group, namely Allisae and Graha.
I really disliked Endwalker because of this. The entire zone of Ultima Thule felt utterly flat to me, because of the rapid and obvious fake "deaths" every scion did was not warranted at all, it was so obvious that it's not permanent and rather illogical. When the lyrics started playing after Graha's "sacrifice" I had to stop playing for half an hour, because him using his "please take me on an adventure"-speech copy-pasted from the post-Elidibus fight was not warranted, instead it felt so blatant and dull, I was yelling at my screen "We're at the edge of the universe fighting the being that is causing the end of the world, we're having the ultimate adventure RIGHT NOW! What more do you expect an adventure to be?", and the song with the lyrics just felt like an artificial slap in the face "feel something!". That, and all of them "died" with a smile on their face, there was no sense of urgency nor logical reason why they had to sacrifice themselves. Yes, they sacrificed themselves to build the bridge to the next zone, but why did Thancred, when he created this zone, not create the bridges in the first place? Kind of an oversight. Heck, we do have a space ship parked at the start of the zone with bunnies capable of creation magics, we could have just flown to the next area, no need for any scion to sacrifice themselves!
I think Endwalker could have hit a lot harder if the scions "deaths" were spread over the entire expansion and treated in a way that appeared to be more permanent: Have one die in one of the towers during a summoning, some getting consumed by the Blasphemies, one dies to Zodiarc, have one die by the hand of Zenos because Zenos is disappointed by our performance during the Zodiarc fight, so at the moment of victory he kills one of them and provokes us with a one-liner, encouraging us to give in to our anger to fight him. Urianger dould have "died" durnig the Aitiascope dungeon, only shortly after having his scene with Moenbryda's parents and Moenbryda's spirit in the dungeon. Either way, over the entire expansion all of the scions should have sacrificed themselves to let us survive and move on (not just the last zone), until Thancred, being the only scion left, makes the last sacrifice to create the zone of Ultima Thule to let us live. Then let the entire last zone be us and us alone, emphasis that everyone else died for us, no one left to help us, no one to accompany us, the last walk with the dead spirits would have hit so much harder if we had been alone for the entire zone. Having the "deaths" spread out further throughout the expansion would have felt much more realistic and with a sense of permanency.
Emet could have a moment where he'd say something akin to "I tried to take the burden on me alone, but it is clear to me that you as Azem, the traveler, need your companions, be it us from the Congregation, or your scions." Cue a flashback to cutscenes of Emet over the expansion in the aetherstream carefully and desperately saving every scion during their death, keeping everyone's soul save in order to help Azem once we reached Meteion, then a small remark "Just as you have saved me once in Ktisis Hyperboria, I have been keeping your companions save. Mind you, due to my status as a spirit about to face its ultimate peace this is the last time I'll be able to help you saving your companions. While I do encourage you to travel and see the world, please try to take care of yourselves from now on. You can't always count on an immortal being to help you out." Even though you'd get most/all of the scions back, having been without them for most of the expansion would have hit a lot deeper, compared to the actual Endwalker questline where it's maybe 30 minutes, a few hours tops.
I don't mind the scions coming back from the dead due to summoning magics and Emet helping us out one last time, but at least make it plausible, make it matter and make their absence last longer than just 5 minutes so there might be a slight feeling that it might be serious.
Don't you dare put g'raha in the thumbnail…
Dawntrail has a myriad of narrative and character problems. The scions were homogenised and lost most of their personalities, the WoL is a smile and nod machine with zero agency, and the villains were rushed into the scene and did not get the proper development they needed to stick their landing. Their deaths are devoid of emotional impact.
Istola should have died three times over. And if not die then definitely have another major consequence for her using Flow again.
Thancred should have died in Shadowbringers.
All of the Scions should have consequences for sacrificing themselfs in UT or half give thier life for the other half to live.🤷🏽♀️
If FF14 is not going to kill one or two of these guys I think its time to bench the Scions for an expansion cause i just dont feel like there are any stakes for them beng around 🤷🏽♀️
Time for new long term characters.
All I ask is that WE get get to dust Wuk.
I do think under the right circumstance, yes, the story needs to commit to deaths more than it has. For a long time now, there have been moments that would have been very powerful and emotional if they had committed to the character(s) dying. That said, I don't want death for the sake of shock value because that never lands right. Like DT, when Dad died, it has no emotional weight because it was so obvious and the way they set the scene with everyone just standing watching, made it weak. Same with Otis, we barely met him, he was technically already long dead and he was protecting someone that could not be killed in that scene anyway. They need the right time and set up.
I find it bizarre that people are specifically asking characters to die. I blame Game of Thrones for giving this perception that character death = good writing and even they fucked that up. If you kill characters left and right, the audience would have no reason to be attached to anyone
Agreed.
Wuk should've die.
(And ysthola and graha too 😏)
i never understood why Ilbert fought us in the antiascope. he should have showed up and snarkily thanked us for giving him exactly what he wanted. the all my birthdays guy should have been the one there.
as for most meaningful death, that would by far be Ardbert rejoining with us.
Lets kill off Alphina..alpha… Male Alisaie.
with how powerful the WoL and the Scions are at this point, i see it hard to sell one of their deaths in a meaningful way after Endwalker, what threat of death is able to top the end of the universe? i wouldnt have minded if they were all relegated to stories out of the MSQ, a new cast wouldve brought the power levels down for more grounded dangers to be tackled even with the WoL in the middle
Death for the sake of it? No, not necessary at all. If it's because it makes sense, the character's story is near complete, and it's well planned out and executed, then sure let them kill someone off.
(Side quest spoiler)I think a scion should have been trapped in the dome. That would have been impactful. I cared more about the ironheart sibling than I did some of the story that was being served to me.
😮💨 dude… I don't see it, I don't see how Living Memory is like Ultima Thule! Everybody is saying living memory is a rehash of Ultima Thule. but Ultima Thule was a messed up looking place!! Living Memory is beautiful and had people around. The only similarities it had was you had to do few things before going to the next area. But that's with EVERYTHING in the entire game for example in uqupacha you had do the whole pelo pelo thing before going where the yak hue was in stb at the fringes you had to do some quests stuff before going to the peaks side it's all throughout the game. I'm confused…. 😵💫😕
Galoo Ja Ja’s death was ridiculous – we should’ve saved him but he got a big injury so he died afterwards
Don't touch my cat girl! But you can have every other scion.
The only death I wanted was Wuk Lamat. She might have been an ok character if she sacrificed herself for her people and left Koana to lead.
I'd feel nlthingg but joy for koana to go by far the least interesting new character.
so, regarding the Ultima Thule part you mentioned, Personally I don't think they should have just outright died there either, but i do think they should have waited a little longer to bring them back, like instead of brining them back right before the Endsinger trial, let their "deaths" linger with the player, so that when Meteoin tries to end us, we hear our friends voices who we thought were gone forever, giving us strength to beat her. Give the loss some time to build tension, the entire theme of Endwalker was Despair, what evokes despair more than having to face something universe threatening while alone?
I think people overstate how much "major" character death there was in the early expansions. Most characters killed off were only introduced within one expansion of their death. Think about it. The only real exceptions have been Papalymo and Minfilia. FFXIV has never been a story that kills of long-standing characters.
Scions have no more character dev. It makes them so empty. Every interaction during the whole golbez saga felt useless. They are here for lifestyle scenes or to facilitate the scenario thank to their knowlege (yasthola that one if for you). Forcing their prensence for the sake of fan service is so boring imo… May be we should kill the wol not to depend on scions again xD
Imagine the first dawntrail dungeon, second boss is thancred instead of that random sleepy thing. We go a bit too hard and accidentally kill him.
Killing characters is an easy/cheap way to establish stakes. With good enough writing, you can set up situations that feel perilous without actually writing out what might be many fans' favorite characters.
So long as its not like Akame Ga Kill, I'm fine with characters dying. There needs to be a reason behind it rather than for the sale of character's dying. A safe story isn't a good story, but spreading out character deaths is a good idea to make it more unexpected. Akame Ga Kill is a good study on how not to do character deaths. Once Susanoo and Chelsea were introduced, the anime started killing off characters every episode (even Tatsumi and Mine died, yet they lived in the manga). The anime also skipped major plot points like the Wild Hunt arc(?) which saw a character who survived in the anime die in the manga to get revenge on a character who killed his students, that shocked me because that character didn't mention being a teacher in the anime (and if he did, it was in passing).