Balthier Truly is the Leading Man
So, I’ve recently been on a huge Final Fantasy XII binge; most of my time outside school and college applications have been dedicated to exploring the vast and expansive world of Ivalice and reworking myself through the story of Princess Ashe’s reclaiming of Dalmasca and its independence from Archadia. It’s a good thing I hadn’t done a review of this game to this point, because up until now I would have had hardly anything positive to say about it; frankly, the game annoyed me more than Final Fantasy X, which is hard to do. However, over the years the game has really grown on me and is now probably my favorite of the series, next to Final Fantasy IX. I can get onto a whole tangent about why this game is awesome (which I may do in another essay), but that’s not what this rant is about. No, this rant will be about a something a little more specific.
Now, those of you who played FFXII, you probably found yourself a little annoyed with the awkward placement of two certain characters: Vaan, the lead protagonist who seems to just be there for the ride, and Penelo, who seems to just be there for Vaan. It’s true; other than Vaan’s loose association with the plot due to his brother Rex, these two characters seem to be of no consequence to any real end in this plot and are rather vestigial. You’ve probably also heard rumors suggesting something along the lines that Captain Basch was supposed to be the lead, but was pushed into the side so that Vaan could bring about a bishounen, teenage icon aspect to the story. If true, that would have totally been awesome and much better than what we ended up with. But this, too, doesn’t matter, because it turns out that another character is actually the lead, and that character is Balthier. (More …)
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