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Lightning - "Why the hate?"

MagiusNecros

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
Rule Valhalla? More like protect some chair in some backwater shrine. Great rulership. Can't wait to meet the royal subjects.

:/
 
C

cafemomo

Member
Lightning should be the mascot of Squeenex.

She should be in every Final Fantasy game from here on out. Hell, she should be in other Squeenex games like Dragon Quest, Hitman, etc...
 
R

rataven

Member
Espada said:
There's a whole host of reasons why Lightning is disliked by so many. The character herself fails to be particularly interesting or entertaining. The game she debuted in is awful. The FFXIII games have become the "Lightning Saga" so she represents the weak XIII games. Square-Enix have made a special effort in giving Lightning exposure levels reserved to folks like Cloud, Mario, Master Chief in making her a mascot for the series.
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I definitely think some of the resentment fans have towards her is because of SE's push to make her the FF mascot. Previous characters, like Cloud, Seph, Yuna, all reached huge heights with fans naturally, because they had great stories, great development, were part of great games, or any combination of that. And we ended up getting more of those characters because we demanded it. Fans helped make Cloud/Yuna the icons that they are, not SE. Whereas with Lightning, it's entirely reversed. They started out thinking they were giving us the Next Great Thing, but forgot to give us a reason why we should feel that way.
 
N

Narolf

Banned
Folstern said:
I'm not a fan of XIII but I'll never understand the hate towards Lightning. I'm not naming names, but there are at least 4 other characters in that game that annoyed me.
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Definitely FFXIII being deemed to be a bad game accentuated the disliking towards Lightning as a whole. Without resorting to comparisons, she does feel like a water-down persona of Cloud and Squall.
 
E

EMT0

Banned
I hold a mild disdain towards Lightning, similar to how I hold some mild disdain towards Vaan, but unlike FFXIII, I actually enjoyed and liked FFXII.

The fact that Lightning is the primary representative of FFXIII to just about everybody means that it's incredibly easy to dislike her with prejudice, because FFXIII was in and of itself a terrible game. Looking at Metacritic scores, it's also a giant waving neon sign of the disconnect between journalists and their audience, which makes it even easier for me to dislike Lightning for being the avatar of FFXIII.
 
L

LuuKyK

Member
suppaspicasm said:
Lightning should be the mascot of Squeenex.

She should be in every Final Fantasy game from here on out. Hell, she should be in other Squeenex games like Dragon Quest, Hitman, etc...
Click to expand...

I agree. Like Cid, but she is the same in every game. Just change her clothes or something.
 
F

Femmeworth

Banned
TheFLYINGManga_Ka said:
I like Lightning. I think she's kind of hot. But aside from that, I think she's one of the better FF characters in recent years. That's just my opinion.

So just wondering why the hate going on? Let me guess, is it NOT her as a character but more about what she represents with current Square-Enix's tumultuous times: like how they push her into every game, FFXIII's disappointment, Dissidia, ios, etc.

I don't think she's that bad as a character. As for the games she stars in...that I can understand, give or take.
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You are correct, it's more about fan politics. Her being a mediocre to poor character doesn't help.
 
N

Narolf

Banned
Ghost_Protocol said:
Why the hate? Because the kind of character she represents is totally indicative of all that is wrong with FF (and a lot of other JRPGs & anime) today. All style. Zero substance. The same overly melodramatic, angsty, shallow, generic "animu" tropes that have been run into the ground repeatedly by the genre. God, we JUST had an incredibly well written JRPG starring an entire cast of teenagers that proved that it IS possible to sidestep every single one of those awful stereotypes and tell a great story in the process (Persona 4), but FFXIII just went ahead and jumped headfirst right into the pit again.

What's even more upsetting though is that the previous game in the same series had a great cast of well written, mature, intelligent, nuanced, and respectable characters that didn't appeal to terrible anime stereotypes and treat the player like an idiot. Heroes and villains alike. They didn't throw temper tantrums and whine about their lives in every other cutscene. It's a shame that somehow that those characters managed to worm their way into 3 games while characters like Baasch, Gabranth, Vossler, Balthier, & Reddas are totally forgotten.
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First paragraph is well-written and sums it up. Besides, don't forget XII had a few spin-offs and you can find characters akin to Balthier & co. in Tactics and Vagrant Story.
 
C

Comet

Member
Her visual design is fine, but her character is soulless, boring, and hard to care for. People compare her to Cloud, but at least Cloud had character. He was charming, funny, and insecure. There were dimensions to his personality, regardless of what you may think of FFVII. Lightning though... Jesus there's nothing there. Someone said she was a sexy action figure, that's a perfect way of putting it.
 
R

Relaxed Muscle

Member
MagiusNecros said:
Rule Valhalla? More like protect some chair in some backwater shrine. Great rulership. Can't wait to meet the royal subjects.

:/
Click to expand...

She has to protect Valhalla because her beloved goodess was stupid enough to give inmortality to one guy and expected that would never backfired...

...that's lame. And she appears in like....20 min in the whole game? (not counting DLC)
 
T

Trigger

Member
suppaspicasm said:
Lightning should be the mascot of Squeenex.

She should be in every Final Fantasy game from here on out. Hell, she should be in other Squeenex games like Dragon Quest, Hitman, etc...
Click to expand...
LuuKyK said:
I agree. Like Cid, but she is the same in every game. Just change her clothes or something.
Click to expand...

These awful opinions.....
93iIr.gif


When The Lightning Saga Episode VI comes out I know who to blame.
 
F

Femmeworth

Banned
Comet said:
Her visual design is fine, but her character is soulless, boring, and hard to care for. People compare her to Cloud, but at least Cloud had character. He was charming, funny, and insecure. There were dimensions to his personality, regardless of what you may think of FFVII. Lightning though... Jesus there's nothing there. Someone said she was a sexy action figure, that's a perfect way of putting it.
Click to expand...
Advent Children Cloud retroactively erased the Cloud that was in VII.
 
W

WatTsu

Member
TheFLYINGManga_Ka said:
So just wondering why the hate going on? Let me guess, is it NOT her as a character but more about what she represents with current Square-Enix's tumultuous times: like how they push her into every game, FFXIII's disappointment, Dissidia, ios, etc.
Click to expand...

...wait a minute, Dissidia is bad?

For me, Dissidia 012 is the second-best game with the Final Fantasy name on it in the last decade (the first is Theatrhythm).
 
MagiusNecros

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
WatTsu said:
...wait a minute, Dissidia is bad?

For me, Dissidia 012 is the second-best game with the Final Fantasy name on it in the last decade (the first is Theatrhythm).
Click to expand...

The story is still asinine. And Duodecim segments were the only improvement. Due to actually being well animated instead of the majority of bobblehead mania.
 
Z

Zeal

Banned
Because in the words of Adam Jensen, we didn't motherfuckin' ask for this shit.

What did everyone ask for? Versus.
 
E

evangd007

Member
Lightning is the quintessential video game example of Creator's Pet: She's a cheap, rule 63 copy of Cloud, but Square Enix and Toriyama think she's far interesting and shove her down our throat.
 
L

Lothar

Banned
TheFLYINGManga_Ka said:
I like Lightning. I think she's kind of hot. But aside from that, I think she's one of the better FF characters in recent years. That's just my opinion.

So just wondering why the hate going on? Let me guess, is it NOT her as a character but more about what she represents with current Square-Enix's tumultuous times: like how they push her into every game, FFXIII's disappointment, Dissidia, ios, etc.

I don't think she's that bad as a character. As for the games she stars in...that I can understand, give or take.
Click to expand...

How old are you that you find a video game anime character to be hot, first of all? I think that's the more important question of the thread. I think others here might be evaluating Lightning from a mature perspective. She's a bad character because she has no personality.
 
G

Gintoki313

Banned
The only reason I didn't like her was because she was angry almost 80% of the time in XIII. She also punched Snow, kicked Sazh, and slapped Fang. I think if the game would've continued she would've been the 1st FF protagonist to hit all the party members out of anger lol. Even in times of rest and relaxation when everybody else is joking around she's still serious. I still remember the party were having a fun conversation and she's only their to say let's go.

Not only that but I don't have a GOOD memory of her like I do for other FF protagonist's, I remember Cloud dressing up like a girl, Squall trying to dance with Rinoa, Zidane's funny comments through the game, and Tidus's infamous laugh with Yuna. When I remember Lightning though, all I can remember was that she hit people. I do remember Sazh though with his funny comments and his love for Chocobos.

This is mostly my reason so don't take it too serious here.
 
F

Femmeworth

Banned
ChocolateCupcakes said:
Is someone really stanning Lightning? Really?
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Not even the ironic stanning either.
Gintoki313 said:
The only reason I didn't like her was because she was angry almost 80% of the time in XIII. She also punched Snow, kicked Sazh, and slapped Fang. I think if the game would've continued she would've been the 1st FF protagonist to hit all the party members out of anger lol. Even in times of rest and relaxation when everybody else is joking around she's still serious. I still remember the party were having a fun conversation and she's only their to say let's go.

Not only that but I don't have a GOOD memory of her like I do for other FF protagonist's, I remember Cloud dressing up like a girl, Squall trying to dance with Rinoa, Zidane's funny comments through the game, and Tidus's infamous laugh with Yuna. When I remember Lightning though, all I can remember was that she hit people. I do remember Sazh though with his funny comments and his love for Chocobos.

This is mostly my reason so don't take it too serious here.
Click to expand...
Lightning's reliance on physical assault was never really called out by anyone in the game, unfortunately.
 
L

LuuKyK

Member
Gintoki313 said:
The only reason I didn't like her was because she was angry almost 80% of the time in XIII. She also punched Snow, kicked Sazh, and slapped Fang. I think if the game would've continued she would've been the 1st FF protagonist to hit all the party members out of anger lol. Even in times of rest and relaxation when everybody else is joking around she's still serious. I still remember the party were having a fun conversation and she's only their to say let's go.

Not only that but I don't have a GOOD memory of her like I do for other FF protagonist's, I remember Cloud dressing up like a girl, Squall trying to dance with Rinoa, Zidane's funny comments through the game, and Tidus's infamous laugh with Yuna. When I remember Lightning though, all I can remember was that she hit people. I do remember Sazh though with his funny comments and his love for Chocobos.

This is mostly my reason so don't take it too serious here.
Click to expand...

Why would she be happy if her parents are dead, her sister is crystalized (pretty much dead), they are cursed to follow a similar path if they dont discover what is their focus, and are being followed by the army/trying to be killed all the time? Basically you are saying that for a chaarcter to be likable it has to be nice to everyone, have funny moments and be happy all the time. Thats not how things work.
 
MagiusNecros

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
Lightning's designs gradually get worse with each installment. At least I think they do.

Didn't they name her main red sword like Red Custard or something?

XD
 
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