After playing the remastered edition of FFX, it strongly reminded me of two other games.
When word got out that Square Enix was going to release a remastered edition of Final Fantasy X and its sequel, I honestly did not intend to buy it. I always believed that old games should stay in the past and I wouldn’t enjoy it as much. However, I elected to buy it when I had spare cash and I fell in love with it like it was the first time I played it. I felt like a nine year old kid again.
I’ve been playing the game for quite a long time and then I started to notice something near the end. There were moments when I would tell myself that this game reminds me of a storyline or aspect from another game. It’s not that they copied it since the games I am reminded of are ones that came out way after FFX was released.
Did you ever get the feeling that the story reminded you of Mass Effect 3? Alright, it’s safe to say from here on out that there will be spoilers on this article. Anyway, Final Fantasy X has this creature called Sin that attempts to obliterate everyone in cycles. In addition, the similarity only drove home to me when I was fighting Seymour for the very last time. He was trying to convince the protagonists that he could control Sin from within, but that’s obviously not true since something’s not right with him.
Sound familiar enough to you? If it doesn’t then you probably did not play Mass Effect 3. In the game, you have the Reapers who also destroy civilizations in cycles. Not as often as Sin does but it does pretty much the same thing in addition to the whole harvesting aspect. Seymour’s deterioration and last stand is closely similar to your last stand off with the Illusive Man. He also wanted to control instead of destroy. While Seymour wasn’t right in the head because of upbringing, the Illusive Man was possibly driven to this because of indoctrination.
The whole idea of a person living inside Sin or is the actual being like Jecht felt quite like the control ending too to a certain degree. In Mass Effect’s control ending, Shepard is a being or his essence is what controls the Reapers. While Jecht is still intact and alive, he sometimes cannot control what he does. However, it is the same in some way where there’s a person inside of these beings.
When I put these two together, I also recalled the time when people said that the ending to Mass Effect 3 was quite similar to Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I do see the similarity in those two but I think it’s a lot more obvious in Final Fantasy X.
As for BioShock: Infinite, it has nothing to do with any of its glaring aspects. However, I am open to suggestions if you do spot any obvious similarities.
When Final Fantasy X came out, I remember talking to my family and friends who played it and they all expressed confusion towards the ending. They didn’t know if they understood the story or what had happened in the end. I think that this was a time when Wikipedia did not exist or was not that widely used so people didn’t have a go-to website for information. Interestingly enough, FFX is well-loved by gamers no matter how confusing people think the story is. Perhaps, it was complex in a good way. Now that I’m older, I finally understood the story of FFX after playing it for the second time and I loved it.
I felt like it was largely similar to what happened with BioShock: Infinite. There were a number of heads scratching and there were a plethora of articles that were trying explain what the story was. However, it was complex in a good way too since it was met with critical and fan acclaim. I’m sure that there are many other games with this phenomenon, but this is what stood out to me as I was playing FFX.
5 comments
I don’t think I have ever understood the story of a Final Fantasy game. I’ve always played them for the characters and their individual story arcs.
I agree on the FFX – ME3 comparison. I had a flashback to the Illusive Man when Seymour gave his pre-battle speech about the power he could gain from becoming Sin.
I’m curious. In the game, you have to beat Seymour a couple of times. Which one was the easiest and hardest for you? The one inside Sin was pretty easy to me. Perhaps,the hardest one for me was in Mt. Gagazet. That was where I stopped when I was younger because I didn’t upgrade my characters well.
Agreed. The one inside Sin relies too much on elemental attacks, so it is easy to prepare by customizing your armor with all the loot Rikku has stolen. Plus you have the airship and can quickly level up roaming the Omega Ruins and inside Sin. I usually start the fiend taming quests before making my way through the final half of Sin, so am usually over powered by the time the final battle with Seymour and Jecht take place. Yunalesca is the toughest required battle in the game.
Oh yes, Yunalesca was so damn challenging. I hated it when she casted zombie on me. I would use reflect, but then that meant that I couldn’t use curaga.
Another parallel between Mass Effect and FFX is that both societies rely on technology from the past, developed by others. There’s also a similarity with the level of technology factoring in. The reapers attack when civilization reaches a certain technical level. Sin was created when society relied to heavy on machina. Or was that a myth spread by Bevelle?