GIVE ME META! (FFX HD edition!)

[auronlu]

 owlmoose suggested Meta December, and I'm all for it. But having not played Dragon Age yet (woez!) I'm still stuck back in my old fandumbo. 

Which means...FFX. And since I'm flailing at ideas for meta, here's a thing. Squeenix is going to re-render FFX in PS3-quality graphics, RealMYST-ish, so that we can wander around a lot more freely (camera control, yes, please!) and brainwash a new generation of fans.

Spira is by far and away my favorite rendered virtual world, despite its now out-of-date graphics; I love its supersaturated colors and wild landscapes with great love. It's the sort of world Catherine of MYST would've written, in contrast to her analytical lab experiment husband, who would've come up with Cocoon/Pulse. People who read my fanfic know I wallow in FFX landscapes like Tolkien getting all purple prosaic on Helm's Deep. So I will buy HD FFX just for the sake of exploring, although I love this game for many other reasons.

I'm not sure what kind of gameplay tweaks will be added to FFX HD. But here's my question. What would you love to see in the upscaled version of FFX? New gameplay? New graphics? New...um? 

And what do you hope they'll leave alone?  Or do you not care? And, for that matter, would you bother to get FFX in PS3/Vita quality graphics, or is it "been there, done that?" 

Personally, I'm hoping against hope they will remaster the sound. There was a lot of clunky editing to synch voices to lip-flaps and (I'm guessing) file sizes. Some of it was actors trying to lip synch, with ghastly results, but some of it was processing, and that could (and must) be fixed. 

Of course, voice junkie that I am, I also wish for an original-Japanese option. Except then we'd lose Matt McKenzie, and the original-Auron voice isn't as good. And the original-Rikku has a scream that could shatter glass -- one would have to play the Thunder Plains with the sound muted-- so whasername Bubbles the PowerPuff Girl is a definite improvement. But the original Yuna and Tidus are infinitely better (except, sadly, in the laughing scene), Elma is sooooo much better, and Lucil's is also one of those catnip voices that makes me roll around in a puddle (unlike poor Elma, her American dub is excellent, but different). 

Fooey, here I am talking about superficial things when I really want to pick people's brains about what they liked, or don't like, about FFX enough to want to play a new version of it.

(Let's set aside "Squeenix should make new games instead of rehashing old ones," please. I believe they just lost tons of money on XIV and are struggling to do something to refill the coffers. As much as I love X, I'm quite happy for them to do a 10 anniversary remake.) 

Comments

[owlmoose]

I would totally play an HD remake. And I'm really glad they're doing it for the PS3, because I have no interest in the hand-held.

My top wishlist item would be for them to re-record the English dub with the same actors -- yes, yes, I know, everyone hates the Tidus and Yuna VAs, but I actually think the voices suit the characters, and they could do a fine job with some better directing. Heddy Burgess, particularly, improved *immensely* in FFX-2. But if it's a choice between reusing the old vocals and re-recording with new actors. I will pick the old vocals, clunky lip-synching and all.

[auronlu]

I agree with you, actually; I think both of them would be perfectly acceptable if they had better directing. I don't like James whoosit quite as much as his Japanese counterpart, but he's fine. He did an amazing job with the "bluescreen of death" sequence (Tidus' meltdown in Home).

Hedy Burgess is great when she's not trying to lip-synch. That was giving her a bad case of Shatner.

I am all for a new recording -- and get some child actors for Pacce and young Tidus -- especially if they can give Julie Fletcher (Yunalesca/Elma) enough caffeine and sugar to voice a girl 40 years her junior. She was rather better in X-2.


Voice actor trivia.... Elma in RL is married to Barthello, while Dona/Lucil is married to Luzzu. *head spin* Isaaru is Axel/Reno. And you probably know that Gippal and Baralai are RL brothers, and Nooj is Sephiroth. If only I could stand RPF, there would appear to be some amusing crackfic possibilities.

Random: I fed DSHND into my text-to-speech box tonight to listen to while I do mindless grinding. Good to get it all again.