Why didn't you use a phoenix down?

[MCDeltaT]

Ok i would use a spoiler tag but this isn't a spoiler because if you don't know that aeris dies you must have been living in a womb for the last 9 months.

Anyway I like many of you (I assume) enjoy videogame humour, and the more I love a game series the more I love seeing webcomics or jokes about it. There is no game series I love more than Final Fantasy but today I say enough. Not to all jokes but to 1 in particular (If you haven't guessed which one by now.....well I don't know what to say)

Today I saw another Webcomic that depicted Aeris' death and questioned "why not just use a phoenix down?" Because that isn't the point. I doubt that moment or even Final Fantasy VII would be remembered so vividly if you could simply revive Aeris and skip happily into the sunset holding hands and picking flowers.

Anyway I know I am not the commanding authority of the internet but I feel I deserve my say. This "joke" has been used far too much. I suppose I should have a point or at least something to provoke discussion. Does anyone agree/disagree? Or is there another piece of videogame related humour that isn't funny and needs to wiped from the face of the internet?

 

[Trolldor]

It was funny at the time. Over a decade on? Not so much.

 

[migo]

It shows a problem in general with cut scenes. There are two things that suck with cut scenes - one, having all the awesome stuff happen in them, and be unable to do them in game, and two - have the characters not do some basic stuff that you can do in game.

The joke might be old, but it perfectly encapsulates the problem with video game narratives, and that the good ones tell you a story as you play. Of course Final Fantasy VII was released before Half Life, but nonetheless, the way HL presented the story as you played worked much better. Of course there's annoying stuff, particularly in HL2, where you have Alyx able to climb up onto a ledge while you can't (incidentally, that's likely one of the reasons she's so popular), but in principle having the story go on around you, while you can still take action is much better. Dead Rising is another example of it. You can just hide for the whole 72 hours if you want, or you can go do things. If a mission fails, you just keep going. Again, some issues with the design there too, but it actually makes you feel like what you're doing makes a difference, and that your actions have consequences.

With most of the Final Fantasy games, your actions don't matter at all.

 

[J-Do]

Well, I always just kind of assumed that when you die in battle you're just kind of knocked out, whereas at that point Aeris gets properly killed. So a phoenix down helps you regain conciousness, but can't bring you back from the dead. I know that's not the point of the phoenix (or this thread for that matter) but to me it makes sense.

As for it not being funny anymore, I don't know, probably depends how it's done. I haven't seen anything recentley that makes fun of aeris' death.

And for things that need to go away... I'm sure most will agree that the whole "The Cake is a lie" thing has been done to death.

 

[JediMB]

Well, I always just kind of assumed that when you die in battle you're just kind of knocked out, whereas at that point Aeris gets properly killed. So a phoenix down helps you regain conciousness, but can't bring you back from the dead. I know that's not the point of the phoenix (or this thread for that matter) but to me it makes sense.

This is correct. Phoenix Down cures the KO status.

Falling in battle being referred to as "dying" is in the context of RPGs a remnant from the times when the games didn't really have any narrative worth speaking of.

Same for item and spell names.

 

[Zaik]

People have been getting to the party late ever since the party happened. It's nothing to get worked up about.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

The reason for the joke is because there is a glaring inconsistency in the logic. In general, a game cutscene operates under different principles than the gameplay (and these in turn generally deviate from reality). Such inconsistency is certainly grounds for humor, but like most jokes timing is everything. It might have been amusing years ago but now, well over a decade after the fact, it isn't.

 

[Ice Car]

*cough*alreadypostedthetopic*cough*

OT: Yeah, that "joke" is WAY too overused. It was funny the first time. The next 20 times? Not so much. Annoying as hell is what all overused jokes are.

 

[L3m0n_L1m3]

It's something I like to call "cinema bullets."

No matter how many times a person was shot, downed, revived, etc, if they get shot in a cutscene, it is almost ALWAYS fatal.

 

[Varya]

You know, I didn't think it was funny even the first time. Yes, the joke hits a valid problem in videogames: That sometimes the character can't or won't do something you are perfectly able to do normally. However, since the point doesn't actually apply to it's own example, I don't find it funny. As said, the Phoenix Down represents bringing someone back from KO, not death. I think it's kind of obvious from the start, not least form the lack of NPCs saying things like: "I used to be afraid of dying, but since i got this Phoenix Down, i fear nothing"
If this still has eluded people, the fact that one of the main characters die and is not resurrected instantly should be the evidence that was missing.
As a joke, it is simply boring and overdone, however, when people use it as an example to hack on FF it gets frustrating.

 

[Cogwheel]

Well, I always just kind of assumed that when you die in battle you're just kind of knocked out, whereas at that point Aeris gets properly killed. So a phoenix down helps you regain consciousness, but can't bring you back from the dead.

This is what I always assumed. It revives people from being knocked down/too crippled to fight, not death. Misnomer, really.

That said, Arcanum has a case of being able to raise a story-dead character by the means you would normally use. It changes the story in quite a few ways, too.

 

[Defense]

Actually, I rarely see that "joke" being thrown around anymore, considering how old the game was. I see horrible Portal references being thrown around much more, to the point that I feel like bashing my head against a wall whenever someone thinks they're clever by calling the cake a lie whenever cake is mentioned.

im sorry. The Cake is a Lie term is used more then aeris death.
Ya know what? Screw that worthless team member, Never used her, never will. I WAS GLAD SHE DIED. I was happy! I just wanted to end that game of torment. The whole game was crap!
1/3/4/5/6/8/9/10 were all better.

I like how you called VII crap and said III, V, and VIII were all better. At least you didn't say that piece of shit II was better.