Square-Enix destroys cool Final Fantasy VII figures with NFTs
When Square-Enix, one of the most famous game publishers in the world, announced that it was going to do it delve into The NFT world – even as the NFT world crashed and burned around it – players were worried about how their games, ranging from Final Fantasy to, uh, *checks notes* Different everyday life, may be affected. It turns out that the first steps are infinitely more stupid than possibly imagined.
Square-Enix’s first tentative attempt at NFTs hasn’t begun with its game, but it is goods, starting with three Final Fantasy VII collectibles i “Bring Arts” line with posskilled action figures. Sure, Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith have had one zillion cool toys before, but these they’re actually trying to directly translate the iconic concept design work of Tetsuya Nomura for the original PlayStation game, in 3D form.
They are perhaps all the more annoying given the circumstances, incredibly cool. It’s pretty amazing how much like Nomura’s art they look, and rendered in a complete form it is almost like a fascinating mixture between classic, spiky, chunky polygonal aesthetic the first PlayStation was able to in 1997, and the more realistic renderings of them we have seen in VIIis recent Re-recording. As one who loved FFVII as a kid, grew away from it, and then realized how special it is for me to play again Re-recordingI would buy these in a heartbeat.
Except for the fact that they all come with a “Digital Certificate of Authenticity”, which is actually just an NFT. The system requires collectors to sign up for a wallet with the Enjin blockchain network, and there’s even a “Digital Plus” version of each figure you can get that, for an increased cost, lets you redeem an NFT that gives you access to a 3D replica of the figure visible in the real world through an augmented reality website. You can’t just buy the figures themselves – both versions come with NFT. And if you buy the figure and simply choose not to sign up for a wallet, not only does the token for that figure exist in the first place, you’re also paying a lot more for nothing—every FFVII The Bring Arts figure costs $130, while typical releases prior to this have cost around $85-$100. That’s a lot extra for something you don’t want!
The absurdity of it all or the dirtyness of the mandatory token itself is one thing, but so what makes this even more bizarrely stupid as Square-Enix’s first attempt at the blockchain hypewagon does so with characters from Final Fantasy VII. It is a game about a group of radical eco-terrorists, Avalanche, and their allies who rise up against the meglomania mega-corporation Shinra, who go around bombing their power plants because they are literally over-reaps life itself the power of their planet as an energy resource, accelerating the rapid deterioration of the world. Sure, sure, eventually VII goes around most RPGs and you have giant meteors summoned to destroy the world and what have you but at its core, it is fundamentally a story about the environment, and the people angry enough at the systems and structures around them to fight to save it.
Cloud, Aerith and Tifa would tell you to stop wasting Gil and shove that NFT where the sun don’t shine. Or they would, when those numbers finally come outbefore 2023. Guess you’ll just have to hope that Enjin still exists at that point, which given the current state of the crypto market, might not exactly be the surest guarantee.
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