The Ending [SPOILERS]

[Apelila]

So I just beat this last weekend and after letting everything settle in my head for a week this is what I've come up with.

1: The entire story, start to "Wake Up" is a flashback. That's why Vanille narrates from the past tense - it has already happened to her. The characters having turned to Cyrstal are reliving the events. This is why the backstory is fragmented instead of linear(1), the characters are replaying it to the audience. This also explains why Vanille and Fang are with the party once you save after 'beating' Orphan, though the extended play save can also be explained by developers being lazy with new game plus. Personally, I like the flashback scenario. It makes the the fact that you are being 'told' the story much more palatable.

2: Ragnarok - Here's where the Analects provide back story and also confuse things a bit.

During the War of Transgression Fang became Ragnarok and broke cocoon open. A goddess named Lindzei saw this and turned Fang and Vanille to crystal. (Analect 4). This is also the same goddess that created Cocoon. We know that the people of Gran Pulse knew the name barthendalus. It's in the text of the marker at the end of chapter 11. So who's this other bitc, and if she loves Cocoon so much why does she let a sociopolitical demigod keep running the place?

There's honestly not enough about Linzei to be sure of anything. Maybe Versus will explain it more - the point is that she is mentioned separate from Gran Pulse in the same manner - a creator who abandoned her people. Maybe she is Barthendalus as the special edition guide suggests - but then we have to again wonder what stopped Fang and Vanile from destroying Cocoon the first time? This is the biggest plot hole in the game and I have a hunch that Versus or Agito will resolve it.

3: My take on the end after the death of orphan is this. Their focus complete (Orphans death means cocoon will be destroyed) they all start to turn to Cyrstal. By becoming Ragnarok Fang and Vanille avoid this, create the pillar to hold cocoon and then transform back. Their transformation into crystal expands to the matter around them, 'saving' the world. The reason that the other 4 brands are gone is because the original Fal'Cie is dead and cannot sustain their crystal form. Fang and Vanille never revealed which Fal'Cie branded them, and since Orphan only powered the Cocoon Fal'Cie their stasis remains.

1: The game is linear. The backstory itself from Day 1 to 13 is told in fragments.

I'm going to bed, i'll reread that in the morning and correct any silliness. My biggest "wow" moment was realizing that the whole game was a flash back. It allows for sillyness like Dysley using as much as he did.

[Kyo]

I think the fact that the boxart was a spoiler, was kind of a troll by SE, lol.

[Tulun]

I'm pretty sure Anima branded Fang + Vanille, because Anima was the local Fal'Cie of Oerba (it says this somewhere).

[Souj]

There's honestly not enough about Linzei to be sure of anything. Maybe Versus will explain it more - the point is that she is mentioned separate from Gran Pulse in the same manner - a creator who abandoned her people. Maybe she is Barthendalus as the special edition guide suggests - but then we have to again wonder what stopped Fang and Vanile from destroying Cocoon the first time? This is the biggest plot hole in the game and I have a hunch that Versus or Agito will resolve it.

Yeah, I assumed they left a lot of stuff out of 14 so they could throw it all into Versus and Agito just so they could link the 3 games together.

[Apelila]

I'm pretty sure Anima branded Fang + Vanille, because Anima was the local Fal'Cie of Oerba (it says this somewhere).

Do you remember whereabouts? Under Fang and Vanilles data log it doesn't mention a specific Fal'cie and under Anima it just mentions the Cocoon residents.

All I can find is that once Fang and Vanille were turned to crystal, they were placed in the Bodhum vestige. It's entirely possible that this was done so that when they were awakened they would cause Panic on Cocoon, the whole bit about Bath expecting a group of people to wander inside is total BS. He just got lucky. This is also a pretty vague area - why keep them asleep for so long? What specifically caused them to wake up, and if it was Anima what significance did the this Fal'cie play in the past?

I actually just looked up information, and Versus will be completely unrelated to XIII outside of being set in the same Universe per Squeenix. Agito looks like a prequel. I hope I'm wrong and Versus is somewhere in the middle, but the trailers suggest either its set inside Cocoon before the War of Transgresion or on Pulse before Cocoon was formed.

Edit: AAAAAAnd I'm right - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabula_...l_Fantasy_XIII. 3 seperate games with a similiar 'ideology'. Translation: Completely unrelated plot wise.

[Souj]

Edit: AAAAAAnd I'm right - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabula_...l_Fantasy_XIII. 3 seperate games with a similiar 'ideology'. Translation: Completely unrelated plot wise.

yeah, but that still doesn't mean versus and agito can't answer questions that were left vaguely unanswered in this game. Linzei could have a huge part in one of those games without relating to the plot of the others, but could answer some of those questions.

edit: maybe not.

and there is no cooperation between the teams of the various titles

missed this part
Idk, I still hope that there's something, no matter how small it is that links them all together aside from them being on the same planet, otherwise that would just be retarded.
Didn't the Agito pics have Eidolons in them? like the same ones from this game that change into vehicles?

[Plow]

but then we have to again wonder what stopped Fang and Vanile from destroying Cocoon the first time? This is the biggest plot hole in the game and I have a hunch that Versus or Agito will resolve it.

We know the answer to this, it's because it takes both of them to make fully powered Rag, and they tried to just have 1 do it, even the Fal'cie didn't realize it took both.

[Apelila]

Didn't the Agito pics have Eidolons in them? like the same ones from this game that change into vehicles?

From wiki: Agito is Latin for "to put in motion". From what very limited footage has been released it looks like it could be set in Cocoon. It might at least explain the war.

@ Plow: Thats an interesting thought. It explains why Fang failed the first time. It doesn't resolve the difference between what Dysley and the Analects say though. All things equal, I'm willing to bet that the difference there is due to a plot rewrite than anything else, seeing as they cut so much from the final game.

[Gethsemane]

Just beat the game myself and don't know why so many people think this had a weak storyline. If you read the entire Datalog, it explains everything from beginning to end throughout the entire game. While it may have seemed linear, there's not really much open world they could have done honestly. The entire continent of Gran Pulse was all ruins and I guess you could argue that they could have let you explore old ruins and learn more history. But perhaps these next two games will have some kind of relation to this game, if not I am not disappointed.

Totally loved this game from beginning to end and will be replaying it again sometime soon to max out everything, complete all my trophies. The song by Leona Lewis was actually pretty perfect for where they put it in the end.

I don't know how no one could play the game without emotions though. Hell what happens in the beginning is pretty detrimental one character already. Regardless, loved the game. Glad they went the storyline, linear route for this certain game. It was perfect. Hope everyone else enjoyed it. Now to move on to Resonance of Fate, already beat WKC though never did any of the online stuff.

[Draxyle]

Reading what a lot of people said have given me a bit more faith in the ending. I didn't understand it one bit and now that I do, I can appreciate it a little more. Still though, you can tell that they had to cut a lot of corners to finish it up. Too many things just *happen* all at once without enough explanation or transition. Serah and Sahz's son showing up at the end for example, I had too many questions such as, "Where the hell did they escape from?" "How did they unfreeze?" "Why are they both showing up at the same time?". It's just not in FF's style to leave loose ends and unanswered questions at the end of the game.

And for the rest of the game, it left way too much story in the background that should have been provided to us in the actual game. It's just bad design to force us to read the compendium to get a full picture of the story.

I still enjoyed the game. I really need to give it another try to see if I can enjoy it a bit more this time. Disappointments aside, I was just glad to see it deviate itself from FFXII in many ways. Maybe a bit too much in the other direction though. Here's hoping that verses XIII will be a happy medium.

And a note to SE, stop making things look pretty for the sake of looking pretty. Takes too much from other fields.

[Tekoa]

Joining the others who have just recently beat the game. I felt the story was poor in some area's and excellent in others. I actually began to enjoy the game when I first saw Snow break down and doubt himself in front of Hope.

As for the game being linear, it goes well with the story. The l'cie are on borrowed time. They wouldn't have the time to go through a whole slew of side quests knowing that at any moment, something could happen to trigger their transformation into C'ieth.

[Tonks]

I'll agree with Tekoa that the plot of the game didn't really allow for sidequests. But really that's just sugar coating it.

There are ALWAYS time for sidequests. I remember in FFVIII, when you were up in that space station and Rinoa got sort of possessed. You ran off to chase her as she went berserk but you still had time to stop and play some cards with about half a dozen people you passed. haha

VII is like that too, as you can stop and set up a whole goddamn farm full of Chocobos before taking care of business.

But XIII set it up a little bit better in that at any moment, they could turn Cieth(sp?). So if you're really trying to get into the story, like I was, I didn't mind the lack of sidequests because I was focused on the plot.

But I DID like being able to come back out, after you've beaten the boss to keep on playing. They should continue doing that with future games, except maybe have more to do than just mark missions.