The Last Remnant

The Last Remnant is the poor man's Final Fantasy 12. It shaggily apes FF 12 in setting and style. But within Remnant's slip shod universe beats a quirky heart. It isn't half as bad a game as it has any right to be.

...but goddamn does Last Remnant botch the beginning.

The game opens on the protagonist, Rush, and his sister, Whatsherface receiving a message from their parents. The message comes in the form of a freaking holo-cube, that old stalwart of medieval fantasy settings. Whenever I see a holo-cube I always prepare myself for a tale of knights and castles, lords and princesses. That may sound sarcastic but I've played enough JRPGs that my statement up there is pretty accurate really. JRPGs never met a faux-historical setting that couldn't be improved with some laser swords and robots. Which is as things should be, honestly.

Er, anyways, the children listen to their holo-dad explain that they are very busy doing some extremely ominous research and thus won't be able to visit them anytime soon. This raises some questions, questions that will never  get answered. So Rush and his sister are just living alone I guess? On an island with no visible signs of civilization (although apparently a working postal system). None of this seems like good parenting. Were Rush and McGuffagirl really so annoying that their parents couldn't get any work done and had to maroon the terrible twosome on some lonely island? As we get to know Rush over the course of the game it is quickly clear he is terribly annoying. Still.

Unsurprisingly, leaving your teens unattended on a remote island for years backfires and Rush's sister is kidnapped by a Sephiroth knockoff.

This is what a Sephiroth looks like

So Rush rushes off to save his sister, despite the fact that she is being flown across the world by a creepy bug thing. When we next see him he is no longer on the island I guess and he stumbles upon a massive battle. Upon seeing this epic confrontation Rush loses his shit and runs down into the middle of it shouting his sister's name. At which point a glowing Gatling gun blows everything up. In the aftermath of this magical holocaust our hero falls down a hole.

That's how the game begins. It just keeps raising questions and is never interested enough in it's 'main' character to answer them. The whole thing plays out like a dream- locations shift, events and creatures pop up out of thin air, and while the whole thing seems to follow a kind of logic it all falls apart if you start thinking about it. It's actually kind of fun. But not an example of good writing.