Designated Protagonist Syndrome

[HHammond]

So I was thinking a bit about Final Fantasy XIII and reading a little bit about the development and I came across that at some point the developers had considered making Vanille the lead character but changed their minds as they had already released trailers with Lightning. I know a lot of people hate Final Fantasy XIII with a fiery passion but I'm a fan of it. It's not perfect, but it's enjoyable.Anyway, this got me thinking about how XIII really was Vanille's (and arguably Fang's) story and told from her point of view I think it really could have been a much more interesting game. While I do like Lightning, her broodiness can be... wearing and I suppose Vanille's over perkiness can be also but I never really minded it.

Spoiler

The story follows these two women (Vanille and Fang), sent on a mission from a higher power, to this land where they are hunted as criminals. They get separated and along the way Vanille runs into a ragtag team of misfits (the rest of the cast) and ends up being with them when they're "branded" as l'Cie (this can be played as either we don't know she's already a l'Cie yet, like in the released game or we know from the get go), the game more or less continues as we know it (maybe with some adjustments to the linearity and pacing...) and there's a subplot about some girl called Lightning, her sister and his fiance.

I think that sounds much more interesting than what we got.

Final Fantasy seems to have this problem with the player character not really being the main character; Final Fantasy X was really Yuna's story, despite how much Tidus claims it's his and ANYONE else in the cast of Final Fantasy XII had more claim to the lead role than Vaan did.

TL;DR
Final Fantasy (particularly X, XII and XIII) seem to have issues with the player characters not being the main character. Any other video games you can think of with this problem?

 

[sXeth]

Yeah, convoluted "watch the game play" combat systems, and giant corridors were more FF13's problems. And having their pretty looking visuals with absolutely no world building behind it (barring spending hours reading the wiki thing ingame), or really much in the way of NPCs.

As a series, FF's kind of had protagonist confusion for awhile (since 4 or 5). You had Terra in 6, but Locke drives most of the plot in the first world, and Celes takes over in world 2 (with Terra being an outright optional character). Cloud is the designate in 7, but you spend a lot of time with Barret's mission against Shinra, they all kind of wander aimlessly after Sephiroth, then it turns into Aeris mission. Cloud only real solidifies himself in any protagonist fashion for the final bits to set up a duel ending. Eight is just a mess, but could easily be argued to be Rinoa's story, with Squall and his team as tacked on support squad. Zidane s probably the most solid protagonist designate for the 3d era, though a lot of the characters get heavy screen and leadership points to the point of being an ensemble of main characters+Quina.

 

[Delerien]

I think it kinda worked in FF:X because you as the player were tossed into the world as much as Tidus was. So playing as the odd one out was fitting, even though basically Yuna was the main character.

 

[Little Gray]

The thing is though that is what the final fantasy series is basically all about. The main character is almost always lending themselves to help somebody else. You had a couple exceptions in there but really thats how the series has always been.

Its a different type of story telling and I believe they are designed that way to try and help with the "immersion." Since the protagonist is basically a third party it creates a good excuse as to why they dont know about the back story and a way to explain it without it being rather idiotic.

 

[Sack of Cheese]

I thought so too. Lightning was one of the most boring characters in the game. I heard the only reason she was the main character is because they wanted a female Cloud.

Fang is arguably more exciting and has more characters, the second half of the game seems solely devoted to Fang and Vanille's story. Plus:

Spoiler

Fang commands Bahamut! That's pretty badass in my book!

 

[RevRaptor]

I'm guessing you don't know much about Final Fantasy its a party based game every character has a big part to play and more often than not the biggest part is not played by the central character.
It's meant to be that way and is deferentially not a problem.

Cecil could not have won without Rydia.
Cloud would be dead If Tifa didn't save him Same goes for Squall and Rinoa.
Nine revolved entirely around Garnet,Zidane got swept up in her battles.
10, 12 and 13 are just following the rest of the series.