Podcast Questions!

Well fat PS3 is clearly better not just for its backwards compatibility but because, in at least my case, it also served as a very effective space heater for warming up my bedroom... On the other hand it did try to eat Mass Effect 2.

ChocolateRob

Wow, what a fun and challenging topic to cover! I have a few questions about this. I’m sure you are planning to cover a lot of them already as part of the discussion, so feel free to skip any you already cover. First, I’m going to assume that having exclusive games and backward compatibility are factors in determining what makes a console truly Great. (If not, well… feel free to ignore some of these questions lol) 1. Exclusive Software: Does losing a once exclusive game to another console (by port or remaster) make the original console any less great in hindsight? Example: Does the DS version of Chrono Trigger being released 13 years after the SNES version hurt the SNES’s greatness now that a superior version of the game is available? Is the DS’s greatness increased for having the best version of Chrono Trigger? And finally, if the steam version of Chrono Trigger became better (through patching) than the DS version someday… would the SNES and/or DS’s greatness value be decreased? Example #2: OK, 13 years between releases is a long time. But what about 13 Months? The Last of Us was exclusive to the PS3 in June of 2013, but then The Last of Us Remastered came out in July of 2014, exclusive to the PS4. How much does exclusivity of The Last of Us, for just over a year, boost the PS3’s greatness? (If it doesn't hurt the SNES's legacy to lose Chrono Trigger to the DS, but it does hurt the PS3 to lose The Last of Us to PS4, what is the cut off for considering a game to truly "count" as exclusive for the original console when considering a console's "greatness"?) 2. Backwards Compatibility: How much does backwards compatibility boost a console’s greatness? And if it does help, how much? Does it change if a console adds or loses backwards compatibility over time? Example: The Xbox One is patching in backwards compatibility on a game to game basis for both Xbox and Xbox 360 games, but at launch it had no backward compatibility at all. Is this helping the XB1 to slowly become a greater console? Or is it more important for a console to have close to full backwards compatibility from the start? Example #2: The original Fat PS3 (2006) has backward compatibility with most PS2 and PS1 games. The Slim PS3’s (2012) can only play PS1 games. If backwards compatibility is a factor, is the Fat PS3 greater than the Slim version in that regard? Or would you say the PS3 console became generally “less great” when it lost BC on later models? Thanks for reading and for answering however many questions you have time to reply to. Looking forward to your thoughts on this topic overall!

Hello again! My question is regarding a film/TV series adaptation of Final Fantasy VI, my personal favorite in the series. Who would you make the central character of the adaptation? While it’s definitely an ensemble story, even films or TV series with large casts can have a central character. Perhaps there’s one character whose personal arc we follow most closely. Early in my writing days, I conceived of a novelization of FFVI. Somehow, Terra (“Tina” to me, since I first played the Japanese version) ended up being the central character.

Christopher Kowalchuk