2 SR13

Ah, the mainstream. Thanks to Sony's entrance into the videogame
market with the original Playstation, the mainstream is what rules the
industry. Now, bringing videogames into the mainstream isn't entirely
a bad thing. It's turned the videogame market into the biggest money
maker in the entertainment industry---finally displacing the long-time
king, the movie industry. Companies have enjoyed massive profits, in
fact, the Playstation accounts for the majority of Sony's annual
revenue--an impressive fact given Sony's multi-faceted approach to
and long-time success in the electronics industry.

But bringing gaming into the mainstream definitely has its down side.
It has turned gaming consumers into brainwashed fools, consumer
slaves who continually buy up countless rehashed sequels because
they are too scared to try anything new. Thus, companies like EA and
Sony thrive by releasing mediocre and unimaginative follow-ups to
already established (and long worn out) franchises, while companies
like Sega suffer by attempting to innovate and create fresh material.
And no one notices except the hardcore gamer.

One of my most despised examples of worthless, yet successful,
franchises (other than EA's Madden, of course) is the Final Fantasy
series by Square (yes I know they're Square*Enix now, but don't even
get me started on that one). Now don't get me wrong, a few of the
games in the Final Fantasy series are some of the best ever created.
The problem, though, is that the majority of them are uninventive
garbage. Yet they still dominate the sales charts while better RPGs
are ignored. Why? Because the mainstream control the market and
the mainstream are too naive to know better.

Take FFVII as an example, in my opinion it is the best in the series
and one of the best RPGs ever created. And the mainstream ate it up.
However, there was another RPG released only a year later that no
one noticed, despite the fact that it won RPG of the year from
numerous publications, because they were too busy waiting for
FFVIII (which was nowhere near as good and PDS) and Chocobo
Dungeon. Yes, I'm talking about Panzer Dragoon Saga, a gem that the
mainstream ignored because it didn't have a number after it (and
because it was on the Saturn). And what has Square done with the
series since FFVII? Nothing. Every game after that was just more of
the same. All they had to do was toss in a minor addition here and
there and suddenly it was a ground-breaking title----for the
mainstream anyway. Hardcore gamers saw right through it.

Even Square themselves created better games (Xenogears, Chrono
Cross) but no one really cared. They just wanted their next Final
Fantasy, and Square kept on giving it to them. Just look at how many
FF games there are. And how many of them are that amazing? Not
many. Square could have done what Sega did with the Phantasy Star
series (one of the best RPG series ever): stop at four. It's not that
difficult. Sure, I would have loved to see another Phantasy Star
sequel, but Sega knew better. What did they do instead? They used
almost the same developers that were on the original PS team and
created a brand new RPG: Skies of Arcadia. The game was fresh, new,
and innovative. What else did Sega do? They actually innovated their
beloved PS series---but I'll get to that in a second. What did Square
do? They milked the system, ignored the ethics of gaming, and got
filthy rich. They took the same game, changed the characters'
names, added a number to the title, and were praised as gaming
gods.

Eventually the PS2 came along and Square picked right up where
they had left off, but this time they could hide their lack off innovation
behind improved graphics. The mainstream always fall victim to eye-
candy, thush, they continued to swallow up every installment. I
yawned, rolled my eyes, and shook my head in disgust. But what
really vexes me is the recent domestic release of FFXI because the
mainstream are tagging it as a ground-breaking title, an amazingly
innovative game, all because it is the first Final Fantasy to go online.
Well, I've got news for you mainstream gamers: Sega brought a better
RPG series online years earlier in Phantasy Star Online. But look at
the amazing bargain you get if you want to play FFXI:

Assuming those FF fanboys bought their PS2's at launch, they'd have
shelled out $300 for the system, $100 for the game/hard drive combo,
$40 for a network adapter, and $30 for a USB Keyboard (in addition to
$12 monthly subscription fees). Yeah, $470 sounds like a great deal
for a game that's receiving mediocre reviews. Yet, it'll sell because it
says Final Fantasy on it. This "highly-innovative" online RPG was
announced back in January of 2000 to steal Sega's thunder after
they announced that they were going to bring the first online RPG to
the console world. Yet here we are over four years later and they are
asking us to shell out that much money to play it. It doesn't even
have headset support, something Sega did on the X-Box version of
PSO over a year earlier (and you didn't even have to buy your network
adapter and hard drive separately---amazing).

Now, the game did come out in Japan in 2002, but that makes it even
more frustrating that Square couldn't fix the problems with it in the
two-year span it took them to release it in the States. There isn't
even a player-versus-player mode, battle attacks are automatic, and
get this: they charge you extra fees to download new features and
for every new character you create. Brilliant. You are also lucky
enough to get assigned to specific servers, making it a major pain in
the ass if you want to meet up with a friend online. And the
downgrade in graphics from the PC version is always a plus.

FFXI does nothing to set it apart from other MMORPGs, but it will still
sell and FF fanboys will claim it's the greatest game in the world, and
that is why I hate the mainstream. Only Sony and Square could force
you to take out a second mortgage just to play a mediocre game and
get away with it. Oh the injustice!