ffspiritswithin | Entries tagged with !discussion(s)

So you know that malarkey that always comes up with regards to Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within being the sole "demise of Squaresoft" when Final Fantasy and Square Enix fans like to bash the film? Welp, as perfected, its flat out wrong:

As brought up in most stories relating to Squaresoft's demise and the reason for Square Enix's merger, the popular conclusion seems to rest solely and inaccurately on "Sakaguchi bringing the company to bankruptcy therefore forcing Square and Enix to merge."

While The Spirits Within was a financial failure and played its role in hurting the company, it did not destroy Squaresoft nor did it force the company to merge with Enix. Sparking the interest of others and myself, a few select gaffer's provided fascinating and lesser known details that seemed to add up and make a ton of sense considering the general structure and output in the last decade. Through LevelNth and Drek's posts on the subject, here is Cheerilee's simplified summary of their posts touching on some issues that never seem to be recognized [READ THE ENTIRE THREAD]

Check it out on NeoGaf.com, because its long, involved and incredibly in-depth.

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NeoGAF's currently abuzz with discussion about the capabilities of the PlayStation 4. Naturally, Spirits Within and Final Flight of the Osiris are being brought up as measuring sticks as things to graphically succeed. Surprisingly, someone posted a character render/model of Jue from the latter film:

SOURCE

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Despite the torrid history of Video Game Adaptation's (helmed by their creators or otherwise noted), do you think, if Spirits Within had been produced and released during the advancement of Computer Generated films and the 3D/IMAX craze that the movie would be any better received, or worse given the implications attached to the latter two categories above and so forth?

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Its been a common misconception of mine, ever since watching Advent Children, that since all those involved with Square [Pictures] animated and directed The Spirits Within, that there would be an option for a Japanese audio track on the DVD release(s). Well, there is one, but its the Japanese audio commentary for the co-director and animators, which, for the life of me, continues to surprise me whenever I pop the disc into my player and I'm dying to hear this film dubbed in Japanese.

(The problem is further reinforced whenever visit the Final Fantasy Wikia and see list of Japanese VA's next to the English ones. My brain automatically assumes "Oh, cool, I'll watch TSW in Japanese today.") To my disappointment the only language options are the default English and French --- French! --- audio tracks. Another funny thing about the DVD release is the option of Spanish subtitles but no Spanish audio track (and this is something I've seen often in other DVD releases).

With that said, has anyone ever found out if Spirits Within was ever released on DVD overseas in Japan with a Japanese dub option at all --- or did they just provide Japanese subtitles and maintain the same audio options on the North American release?

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Strange Enough this is an idea I've never been too keen on because the mere concept of it seemed to always translate into = "More Like The Games" and "Less Like It Is". I always loved Spirits Within being the exact opposite of the Final Fantasy Game(s), which makes for an enjoyable interactive experience, but less of a watchable one (particularly if you watch it on YouTube. I suffer itchy fingers and develop burning rage toward my empty wallet).

That aside, last night I started watching a ton of video reviews for what appears to be a seemingly disliked FF Game, Final Fantasy XIII which was released last year if memory serves. I've heard an awful alot about how terrible this particular entry in the franchise was and how "burnt out" or "non-event" Final Fantasy had become in and of itself with its side sequels and sequels to sequels, which "constantly delayed" entries such as Kingdom Hearts III (contending with Duke Nukem [Forever] for some type of award) and Final Fantasy 15 (I'm wondering when 14 came out, however... or did I read that numeral wrong?).

From the audio reviews alone, I'm surprised to hear the exact opposite of dislike from all the major gaming outlets and anyone with a camera/pod-cast. In fact, despite one or two flaws, they love[d] this game and recommend it to anyone with an "open mind" about the "changes" SE applied to the battle system mechanics and lack of open world exploration. The game certainly looks gorgeous (its environments are reminiscent of the scenery AVATAR loved to display throughout said film) and the aesthetics's remind me of Spirits Within quite a lot.

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