Today I came across a meme in a Facebook group where the original poster said he loved the Playstation’s Final Fantasy games, except for Final Fantasy VIII.

This was the meme:

What was unexpected to me is that a lot of people in the comments came in defense of Final Fantasy VIII, unexpected because most people tend to care about what’s socially accepted, and what’s socially accepted about Final Fantasy is that Final Fantasy VII is the best title ever released in the franchise and that Final Fantasy VIII is bad. This is a converstation between 3 individuals, including me, so let’s give them nicknames:

Gigachad: FFVIII is better than FFVII and IX, though.
Chad: I agree even though its the minority.
Gigachad: That’s irrelevant The mass of people tend to like what the popular opinion tells them to.

And that’s where I came in:

“Same here. That’s what I’ve always said. It’s better to like the revolutionary “Greenpeace” games like 6 and 7, than understanding the plot’s complexity of the 8. The 8 talks more about character development than playing the hero to save the day against the evil villain.”

Gigachad: Indeed. And it says a lot that the average lemming usually hates Squall for being “bitchy” or “a terrible person”. He’s an actual complex character that behaves as a scarred human (due to his backstory) rather than a cheery, shallow, “heroic” type that people tend to love (something like Naruto comes to mind, lol). At the end of the game, if you paid attention, you understand his personality, the way he acts and the struggle he’s slowly overcoming and it all makes sense. He reflects the nature of the game.

Me: As a teen I could relate a lot to Squall Leonheart, I would see how rotten people were around me and the need for self preservation that I had, I also had a few problems with my parents that often made me feel like abandoned, they were too cold and distant emotionally, so I had to forge my personality in a way that I couldn’t count with anyone, but myself, it was like that until my real friends came along, and funny enough it was not my childhood friends and school friends, as they were all assholes (and part of the problem too) and one of them even died, it was as an adult that I started having real friends that have shown me that life has good people too.

So Final Fantasy VIII for me was a game that I could understand from personal experience were it came from. While Cloud was more like a depressed personality with an identity crisis, more like an emo, Squall was someone that had to be arrogant and aggressive to avoid assholes, but had his friends to show him what life could be without all the barriers he had created to avoid people.

And look around you, today we are surrounded by these average lemmings, they use masks and want everyone to pretend that everything is Ok and that we should just play the game according to their rules; you’re absolutely right, people who criticize FFVIII are usually idiots who wouldn’t do better, but I need to add one thing: most of them haven’t even played the game, and the ones that did, didn’t even play past disk 1. They just hate the game because of romance, some of them even use the debunked “Squall is dead theory” to criticize de game, but that’s just that: they haven’t played the freaking game.

I remember a cousin of mine saying that the game was horrible and that FFVII was great, a few “friends” too did the same criticism, all of them didn’t even play FFVIII, the ones that did, they just started it and dropped because Squall “was too much of an asshole” and there was romance too, because of other people’s opinions, and also because the characters looked like real life persons (what the hell?), they said they wanted the old chibby style back. All this were just excuses, cause I’ve never seen any of them complaining about FFX, which in my opinion deserved all the criticism that FFVIII had (Although I like the game) but didn’t get. FFVIIi was the black sheep, it was a game ahead of its time in terms of gameplay, CGI, music and even mechanics, and thats why it was hated, and people will never admit it, they WILL NEVER admit that they hated the game because it was a revolutionary Final Fantasy title.

Look what we had before FFVIII, there was nothing in the franchise that would even get close to the audiovisual experience that Final Fantasy VIII brought us, not to mention the rest of aspects that I’ve just talked about, like CGI and mechanics, and the storyline too was too profound with a deep characters development, characters, in plural, not just Squall.

The reason why people hated FFVIII was because it was not a “spinoff” of FFVII (between quotes), like the VII was a “spinoff” of VI. Look closely, FFVII basically basically have the same type of plot as FFVI, only in a different universe and context, it’s like comparing Sega’s Yakuza to Shenmue. The haters wanted a game that looked just like Final Fantasy VII with a different story, characters and universe, but using the same type of plot. That and only that is the solely reason why people keep making excuses to hate Final Fantasy VIII, it’s not because of Squall’s personality, not because of romance, not because of characters that looked like real life persons: IT’S BECAUSE IT WAS NOT FINAL “FANTASY VII-2”.

FIN

And that’s why some people hate Final Fantasy VIII, it’s not because it’s a bad game like they say, it’s because they wanted it to be like Final Fantasy VII.

Honestly, I don’t get it how people won’t give Final Fantasy X and XII the same criticism that they’ll give to VIII. Everyone loves to hate Squall for being “cold” or “a jerk,” but at least the criticism is grounded: you can understand why he acts that way if you actually play the game. Now look at FFX: Tidus? Linear story, scripted “tearjerker” moments. You follow a script, your choices barely matter, yet everyone calls Final Fantasy X a classic and forgives those flaws.

Then FFXII… Vaan………………… supposedly the hero, wanders through Ivalice like a tourist in his own kingdom. The political intrigue is clever, the world massive, but narrative feels stuck in slow motion, the characters beyond a few are almost irrelevant emotionally, and the story spreads so thin it’s hard to care. And again, fans praise it.

Meanwhile, VIII got roasted for being “weird” or “Squall is mean” or for romance people didn’t understand. X and XII have the same, if not worse, issues, linearity, pacing, shallow focus, and yet no one complains about that. VIII was hated because it dared to be deep, complex, and emotional, because it wasn’t a VII redux. X and XII should have faced the same criticism, instead, fans forgive them because they’re pretty, ambitious, or “innovative.”, well, so was the VIII.