Cool News
New FINAL FANTASY footage!
Greetings, citizens! ROBOGEEK here helping hold down the fort with a cool tidbit to pass along.
You may have already heard from Dark Horizons or Gamespot, but in case you haven't, Sony's FINAL FANTASY web site is shifting into high gear (and sporting an excellent use of Flash). Even though the groundbreaking computer-animated film (featuring the voices of Ming-Na, Alec Baldwin, James Woods, Donald Sutherland, Ving Rhames, Steve Buscemi, and Peri Gilpin) doesn't come out until next year, the site now features two new (but short) clips of footage from the film in QuickTime 4 format that will be regularly replaced. The site also features some pretty groovy designs.
Sony knows what it's doing here -- mostly. My biggest critique of the site is that the body copy is set in a type way too small to read if your monitor resolution is 1024x768 or higher (like mine). I mean, think about it: a.) this is the 21st century, and b.) anyone who has this movie on their radar this early is probably technologically inclined (and has a 17" or larger monitor). The other thing the site could use are desktop pictures and screensavers, which I assume are coming. And if I were Sony, I'd go ahead and start offering merchandise on the site, too.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD "SHORT TRAILER #01" (updated monthly)
("SHORT TRAILER #01" mirrored HERE.)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD "SHORT TRAILER #02" (updated weekly)
("SHORT TRAILER #02" mirrored HERE.)
Enjoy!
- robogeek@robogeek.com
P.S.: Check back later today for another piece of video game movie news...
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another video game movie!! this movie is going to rock!! i hopes it is as good as super mario bros. starring john leguizamo
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After years and years of waiting we get a FF movie...but it takes place in the future, so no castles...oh well, can't have it all. Fantasy Becomes Reality: 2001!!! Oh, and I'm first. ;o)
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Why no castles? Are you saying there are no castles in the future? How come? This is the world of Final Fantasy, a world where kings were living in castles while HUGE FREAKING ROBOTS were walking around towns using steam power and electricity, whose castle was capable of submerging itself beneath the desert and TRAVELLING UNDERGROUND to another location...technology that does not currently exist, to my knowledge. So, who says there can't be any castles? Hell, 7 and 8 both had protagonists wielding SWORDS in a clearly anime-futuristic environment...now I'm not saying this movie will have castles, I'm just saying it's not IMPOSSIBLE as some posters would like us to believe.
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THIS is the flick that will change the face of the animated movie forever. If they manage to get one tenth of the story depth they have put into ANY of the Final Fantasy RPGs into this movie, and top the visuals of FFVIII, this movie will rock so hard the planet will shake.
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Just watched the footage...wow. I mean, the skin on the blinking girl's face didn't look 100% photorealistic, but it's light years ahead of anything else we've seen. And the motion on that eye...the hair follicles of eyelash and eyebrow...sublime. Finally, that scene of the lights raking through that office...if I didn't know any different, I would have assumed that was live footage. Amazing. Kudos Sony. This project is right behind LOTR on my "projects I'm so excited about, I might die from it" list.
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FF may ba a brill game, I don't know I never played it but if it translates to film like Super Mario Brothers or Street Fighter rather than Mortal Kombat, A game I played too often, then it will go straight to video here in the UK. No matter what stars provide the voices if movie bosses decide that it might not do well here then they will pull it from cinemas even if fans want to see it. That is the one benifit in living in Europe rather than the US, we usually get reactions to movies long before, Usually six months or a couple of years later despite the fact you don't need to translarte movies in American English into Queens English. I hope it does well but the fact it's animated will mean that they will be a cute wee caracter to play to the kids. P.S. Please remember Previews and Trailers show only the best bits of movies no matter how bad they are so you usually can not tell if a movie is good just from the previews.
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Mar 07, 2000 3:12:12 PM CST
I can't wait for FinalFantasy to be released in the UK!! :p
by darthpsychotic
can't wait for the hijinks and the copycat crimes to occur!! PSYCHOTIC!! you recall what happened before do you? a man, who may have watched braveheart, became "butt-naked man" and with a sword, went to a church and started to hack people. :p
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The site appears to be down - can anyone mirror the trailers please?
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I don't think the Final Fantasy movie will be bad or if it's bad, it most certainly won't be because it isn't faithful. Super Mario Bros, Street Fighter, Double Dragon, those movies are bullshit. You can tell that directors who make live-action film versions of video games are either the most untalented, unintelligent directors alive or they just don't have passion in making films (also known as making films for the money, not the creativity). Final Fantasy the movie is animated, not live-action. The latter games (such as FF7 and FF8) had more animated cinematics in the cutscenes, so the transition to the big screen is a lot easier for Final Fantasy than Super Mario Bros foresay (although I would have liked there to have been a SMB animated movie).
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Right click (assuming windoze here).
Choose "Zoom In".
All of a sudden everything's bigger and you can put your reading glasses away. -
I can't get on the site, and I'm on a T1+ line at work. Please, somebody make a mirror site! This is frustrating. grr...argh.
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Regarding the one in the office with the blue light shining through. Have any of you noticed the skeleton sitting in the chair as the light goes by? In the fist second or so the light shines on a chair that appears to have a body in it. The part of the body that is clearly viewable is the ribs. You can kind of see the skull, but the legs are mainly in the dark. This detail of course isn't all that important, but it's still a nice touch.
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Keen... This is my first post ever.
I'm completely impressed. Any words I can say about what I've just seen are not eloquent enough to match them thar purdy pictures. The brief plot summary that's on the official FF Movie website seems very promising. A movie about life, death, adventure, love, and friendship. Hmmm... Seems to parallel the last couple FF games, huh? I can't wait! -
Well, Time to jump on the bandwagon. I've been a huge FF fan for years. I think all of the titles have been well written and made, though my personal favorite is FF6. While I think it would be awesome if it did have a similar style to FF6, as someone above said, we can't have everything we want. Square does have to appeal to the mainstearm audiences to make this movie a success. I'm sure square will come up with a absoultly fanatistic storyline. They are afterall the best in the bussiness as far as RPG's go. Everyone else is crap(that includes enix).
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Mar 07, 2000 5:27:47 PM CST
Wow this looks incredible; and I guess the definition of "traile
by niiiice
Ok so there was a fuss over in X-Men about a 56 preview actually being a "teaser" instead of a "trailer", but uh, I don't think 2 second shots count as either. But the stuff we did see looks fantastic, especially the office shot with the car headlights passing by or whatever it is. If the Final Fantasy games are anything of an indicator, the storyline should be intricate and involving as well. I hope this film makes Dinosaur, with its contrived plot and made-to-order "dumbing-down", look like the shit it really is. I'm afraid it still won't make more money though....it's a cruel cruel world. Down with Disney!
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All too often are decent films condemed to video here in the UK. Does anyone in the UK remember going to see Deep Rising, Soldier or even Wing Commander in the Cinema? I doubt it. All too oftern movies that don't do well in the USA are not released to the cinema here in the UK. We Europeans are not Americans we have slightly different values and ideas, for example look at the response to Mars Attacks, it did better in Europe than it did in the USA, I bet some one at the company suggested that it only be released on video. I do admit I fear for the Final Fantasy Flic and any other video game based movies, after all look at the sucesses: Mortal Kombat (1) and err ????????
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Are you TRYING to make me cry,Harry?This will no doubt be one of the greatest animated movies of all time.It'll definitely be better than Titan AE.I just can't imagine the "next generation of animated cinema"coming from the guy who made Rockadoodle.This has been an Anxiously Awaiting Jim Varney's Reincarnation Moment with User ID Indeed!
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Nice-looking though. Put me in the same camp as the others who cite Final Fantasy 6 as the pinnacle of the series. That was the most intense, funny, melodramatic storyline I've ever seen in a game. Geez, the ending was like 20 minutes long too! What a payoff! I was disappointed to learn that the Final Fantasy characters never carry over from one game to the next (aside from gag guest spots). People love the characters - why dismiss them to create YET ANOTHER world of magic and high technology? Slight tangent there. Final Fantasy 7 really disappointed me. Sold it after finishing the first disc. Movie could be good though, a nice bridge between the brilliant "Toy Story" movies and CGI movies actually geared for teens and adults.
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The only reason Harry's bellyaching about the fonts being so small is because he's been using these Billboard-size fonts on his own site for so long! Remember the older incarnation of AICN - much more civilized! When he went to this new look I had to move across the room to read the damn thing! -Finally to those without 21" monitors - sucks to be you!!!
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Short but sweet. Think I'll move to Hawaii and learn the Avid and all that cool shit so I can work on this stuff.
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talking about video games this way. Oh well, at least I'm not alone... The movie definitely shows promise, although I'm not going to get worked up over it. After all, like many of you I never quite, well, fell in love with FF7 and FF8 quite like FF6. THERE, with those squat 16-bit graphics, you had interesting characters you actually cared about; I suppose the clean, sleek worlds of the last few games never felt as natural. Too bad the Square felt like it was time to update the series with a cold sci-fi feel...okay, I'm done rambling.
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This is what they've accomplished NOW, which probably means a few months ago. As time goes by, and the graphics get better and better, by the time the movie comes out... Magnificent.
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Why bother spending a billion dollars and rendering frames for 40 zillion hours just to get a lifelike human character to blink? Wow, it's almost like the real thing!
Well christ, just film ACTORS. I have a problem with CG movies that do nothing but try to recreate what you can already do with live-action. How boring.
I can't wait to see the rambling incoherent stories of the Final Fantasy series brought to the big screen. I bet in 6 months they will have rendered all the frames of the super-lifelike character opening her rectal orafice. It will look just like Lifetime Medical Television! -
Chop city on my 14.4 modem. I doubt it could be anything to do with my 486, so I'm guessing the game programing is to blame..
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I was one of the few people lucky enough to see the full trailer (a the Amano exhibit in New York, wow) and was totally blown away from it. I could barely describe what I saw... and I still can't. But the longer they take to release the full trailer the longer I have to wait to get other people's reactions on it. This thing was f*cking fantastic. True, more work needs to be done, but this was absolutely gorgeous. Dammit Square, don't torture me this way!
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How in the world can anyone even compare this movie to stinkers like Super Mario Bros., Street Figheter, and the Mortal Kombat movies?!?! The reason those movies bombed was because they were tied down with too many aspects that they had to keep true to the game. Trying to cram in 3 games' worth of Super Mario Bros. lure into a shotty hour and a half is what did it in. Same goes for the others. The big difference here is FF's non-continuity of characters. They can pretty much make up whatever they want and still please the fans of the games (so long as they at least have Chocobos in the flick and a cameo from Vicks and Wedge). As for why did they use CGI instead of live action characters? Because the backgrounds, vehicles, and even the tiniest objects will be unbelievable! Live actors would basically have to have been shot in front of a blue screen for most of the movie. Plus, they're breaking ground in the 3D animation field with this stuff, and already earning recognition for it. I think this movie's not only going to be the best ever, but it's going to surprise the hell out of skeptics who'll just see this as another upcoming video game movie that'll bomb at the box office. This movie's already number one in my book. I'd go so far as to kill a man just to own a single frame of this film. I CAN'T WAIT, I CAN'T WAIT, I CAN'T WAIT!!!
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Does anyone think it is nigh time for AVATAR to be given the green light? Looking at this and keeping in mind the continual advancement of computer graphics and hardware plus the skill of those using it Avatar could be a whole lot closer than we think. I suppose we have to see this up on the big screen first and see if it can emulate the subtle translucent Mottled color of skin and that really fine hair on the face.
Just a thought -
I am officially jumping on your bandwagon, because I too think this movie will be bigger than Greek God Pan! Me thinks peace shall overtake the Star Wars. For the new generations king will be Final Fantasy.
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In the years of going to movies I have seen many great films and many Turkeys and some films that lie in between, these are the films that often get put straight to video. The reason I have doubts are two fold:
1. The film is animated, oftern a genre overlooked here in the UK by most people except anima fans.
2. The film is based on a video game, after the succession of failures will studios really trust another, easpecialy animated.
I recently caught Deep Rising on Satellite TV and I liked it, it did get a release at the cinema, at 1AM on ONE Saturday. Other films that shared fates like this (at least in Glasgow,Scotland), The Cube and Dark city can find an audience on video after a minor release of a few cinema, probably around London. I still haven't seen The Cube but I did see Dark City, again on Satellite TV, and I admit that I liked it but that doesn't make it a hit.
Time and again I have gone to cinemas to find out when a film is being released and time and again the information changes daily. A couple of film like this were Soldier and Universal Soldier 2. I didn't think they would be Major Hits but I would like to have been able to see them in the cinema, where Most Sci-Fi films play best. -
Mar 08, 2000 5:22:02 PM CST
Anyone bitching about the faithfulness of the story is obviously
by vegas
As anyone who has played more than one FF game knows, the characters and storyline NEVER carry over from one game to the next. Why? So we can get a whole new batch of wonderful characters with each game! Isn't this in at least some ways a plus? If the movie didn't create a new story and new characters, it would have to be picking one game over the others, and I am glad it is not. As a big fan of the series (I have loved and beaten them all, and I thank them for killing the many hours of my youth when I had no money for gas or food, as they took my mind off of the need for social interaction or sustenance), I cannot wait for an entirely new world to open up before my eyes, and this time I don't even have to blow twenty bucks on a strategy guide (I'm a cheater by nature, and plus my gaming skills suck)!
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A lot of people here are talking
about this as if they're trying to
exactly duplicate the look of a
real photograph... that's not what
they're doing, if you read
interviews with the animation
staff etc. talking about the
project, they know that they won't
be able to achieve a 100% real
life look but they hope that by
approaching it they can create a
new style of animation.
BTW the budget for this project is
around $70 million (at least that
was the original estimate, I guess
it could have gone over), while
that's certainly a ton of
money it's not as much as some
other high profile movies with
ambitious production values. -
Looks great but man, I wish they could impart that same magical feel I got from FF6 onto the screen. Lets hope the next game in the series is better than the craptacular FF8.
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Besides, each game story is completely nonlinear and unrelated to the next game, and the movie isn't based on any one of the 8 different storylines. Another flaw is that video games usually don't have any stories involved, something that you could never say about Final Fantasy. Now if I had any concern, it would be the track record that non-kiddie animation has had in America. But maybe this will be the film that will change all those stereotypes about animation being just for kids. Then again, Mononoke Hime was supposed to be that film.
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I began wondering ever since I heard rumors a year or two back about a FF movie if they'd base it on one of the games. Well, okay, for the movie they've got an entirely new story that exists outside the games and new characters, but you can probably picture my geeky excitement assuming they'd base it off of FF6. An epic film, ambitious beyond belief. The score done by original composer Uetmatsu, budget of a bajillion dollars, all the melodrama and action brought to life. Terra marching into Narshe in magitek armor, the rising of Figaro Castle from the desert, the death of Cyan's family, the opera, Setzer and Locke both having the hots for Celes, Shadow being a bad ass, Mog walking aroud all CG rendered, the world of ruin, airships and espers and mechs (oh my!), a climactic final battle that could not be matched and a an awe inspiring ending... Perhaps it's too ambitious a film to be made, but we can all imagine, can't we? A Final Fantasy Duology or Trilogy based on FF6... Only in a perfect world, I guess. Mr. Sartre, over and out and pondering the absurdity of life...
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The visuals are absolutely amazing, but then again I wouldn't expect anything less from another final fantasy production, and it's so satisfying to see one of the most beloved RPGS of all time finally make it to the big screen. However, upon reading the summary they had up on the official ), I could not help but feel a little... skeptical. Is it just me, or are they trying to achieve a rich, elaborate story, densely packed w/ all those themes of courage, love, frienship etc. into only two hours (or possibly less) of viewing?
Granted the way I say it it doesn't seem like much, but if you think about it the approach sony/squaresoft will take presenting the storyline is going to make all the difference. My main worry is that this film will eventually lack substance and focus more on 'eye candy' as with what happened in FF8. -
Just in case you haven't heard yet, check out www.staytooned.com for a 2-minute long video (in japanese) that shows the character modelling.
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...and compelling characters. The "look" is cool, but LOOKS cannot sustain a feature. Blade Runner came periously close to proving that--but managed to come around and prove us wrong. GOOD LUCK FINAL FANTASY!
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Wow...I watched these clips last night and I'm still impressed this morning. I kept running that winking eye back and forth. We are truly lucky to live in these times! Can you imagine what it was like when "Heckle & Jeckle and Deputy Dawg" were state of the art?! Forget "Dinosaur", this is the one I can't wait for!
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You can view a one-minute clip that ran on Japanese tv at:
http://www.thegia.com/features/ffmovie/ffmoviemedia3.html -
That's what I'm left here wondering. According to Sakaguchi (Sqaure head-honcho) himself, the Honolulu offices had a working trailer they completed ages ago. I was lucky--*VERY LUCKY*--to see 2 minutes of actual footage at Yoshitaka Amano's (image illustrator for FF) most recent show in New York back in late October. I was in shock! BTW, don't expect a word-for-word description of the trailer from me. I don't remember breathing the entire time the footage was being played. I sure as hell don't remember writing anything down. Still, I'll just pass along a few bits I can remember and be on my way:
- The scene with the lights passing through the windows is a cut from an earlier shot showing an entire city that's been decimated (incidentally, the light comes from a team of helicopters patrolling the area)
- There were plenty of voice-overs in the footage (mostly from Ming-Na) that *seems* to establish her as the central character. Also, there was one line from Ving Rhames at the very end before the footage cut out of him saying "Are you all right?"
- There were scenes in the decimated city of 'PREDATOR-like' aliens approaching the screen
- Plenty of "above-orbit" shots of Earth, a gorgeous scene of a space station exploding and plummeting into the Earth's atmosphere.
- A *GREAT* scene of Aki, voiced by Ming-Na, floating out of a chair and pushing herself away from it; I keep reflecting back to that one scene because it *nearly* looked like they used stock footage of a live actor.
- The impression, albeit a little vague, is that the film feels like a combination of ALIENS, EVEN HORIZON, and STARSHIP TROOPERS; I think this is a little bit of Carl Reiner's influence here.
- Yes, the shot of the blinking woman was included. It came right before Aki turns around and chews out an off-screen character (who is not revealed); the anger coming from the character was very convincing and didn't sound forced. Sony may have gotten their money's worth with Ming-Na.
- No shots of any characters walking. Not one. No walk-cycle, or *any* moving feet. This would've sealed it for me, had they included this in the footage (and if it turned out to be be very convincing)
I apologize if I couldn't be more specific. It was only shown once, and that was it! Lord knows, I'd love to see it again. -
This is to you lucky folks who, firstly, went to go see art by Yoshitaka Amano and then, secondly, saw the two minute FF trailer. Darn it. I wish I had seen that stuff. If I'm not mistaken, a majority of Amano's coffee table-type art books are out of print. It's a shame. I've loved Amano's art ever since it was first exhibited to me in the form of video game art in FF6 (3 for all y'all 'Mericans) and have tried to find his work for some time. The Hero exhibit looked excellent. Maybe, just maybe, the FF trailer will be out during the summer time and I can powerfull soil myself in delight. Mr. Sartre, over and out and pondering the absurdity of life...
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Roborob you seem to be mis-informed on so many topics it's astounding!
Firstly in one of your postings you say that animation is often overlooked - I can't believe you actually posted that after the enormous successes Toy Story and it's sequel were, add to the list the Lion King, and every other Disney film - that's before we get to the insanely popular Wallace and Gromit whose creators are about to deliver us 'Chicken Run. Animation overlooked - you must be kidding, we love the stuff!
Secondly you talk about films such as Deep Rising, Soldier and Wing Commander as being "decent" - I'm sorry but these are some of the worst atrocities commited to celluloid and fittingly went straight to video (should have been straight to dustbin). Cube, which was an interesting film only got a limited release because it was a independant canadian film which didn't have a multi-million dollar studio pushing it into every multiplex in the land, same goes for PI and many other brilliant sci-fi but that's the fact of the cinema business.
You also lament that previous video-game films were rubbish and hence FF will be too. These previos films suffered due to the fact that they had no plot to go on - just like the games on which they are based. FF on the other hand has always been about plot - it's what drives the play forward; so if any franchise stands a chance of making it as a movie FF is probably the best.
Loser complaions that they should have just used real actors - fair point until you realise the way that media is heading. As technology converges (you know e-mail through the tele, MP3 player in you mobile etc) cinema and games will begin to merge - why on earth do you think the Playstation 2 is DVD compatible -just you wait, modelling done for FF will make it onto consoles within ten years but it will be fully interactive - Sony are just limbering up. -
Well firstly, how can you say "use live actors" I personally dislike live acting when it comes to making movies based on something. You have to look for the perfect face, which of course will be hard, or if you can't find it use the next best thing. The next best thing isn't good enough when it comes to FF (at least I hope not). With CGI, you can let your imagination run wild and make people and things look however the hell you want. And I think it kinda sucks that whoever controls cinema stuff in England would make decisions for the people. couldn't they let it release, even for a short while, and let people who want to watch it see it? Anyway...that's all for me :) Bye.
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final fantisy has had a new cast in each game but there have been a few things that are in every final fantisy game. I will not go see a final fantisy movie or buy a ff game if that movie/game doesn't have a few key items:
first of all you must have
cid highwind, second you must have the masamune, it must also have an airship (think of a ff game without an airship, ha)
and all ff game have a set of caractors based on the basic ff1 set you, you have your main fighter, you have your trusty side kick (either the theif or the bbelt), and you have one of each mage. tradional the mages will be girls, the other two males, and tradionaly these four are you first party members.
the list of items I can name, not only me, there are newsgroups where i saw a question about the ecaxt # of bats on the screen i in matoya's cave on ff1. if the story is bad or there are inconsistancys with the spirt of ff, than thousands of lifeless people will come down...
my father calls the ff games japinese soap opera, because every game is the same with just a tweeks a new plot and caractors but they are always the same thing.
final fantisy rocks, but, if they change it, no one will come...
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