This reminds me of the last time I took a plane. I was at Newark airport, the day after the "liquid b0mbz" scare this past summer. They lost my luggage, which I passed off as understandable given the stress of the situation. Less understandable was the fact that the TSA employees were scanning _each other_ with the handheld metal detectors and having each other walk through the checkpoint. While this in and of itself isn't necessarily bad (they could have been testing the equipment) they were also laughing and joking around, and holding up a long line of people waiting to get through the security checkpoint. The impression that I got was that they were _playing_ with the equipment. Needless to say, I was pissed. Of course, if I said anything then and there, judging by this article, I probably would have been detained.
This is the kind of incompetance that passes for security nowadays. In some ways though, that incident was useful. Nowadays I take "security threats" and "failed plots" about as seriously as those TSA employees did.
I agree that Kefka and Golbez/Zemus (and even more so X-Death) aren't especially deep characters. Their motivations for doing what they do are pretty simple, but the characters can be interesting if they do interesting things, regardless of how simple or complex their motive for doing so might be. Iago from Othello is a classic example of this. The guy was just passed over for a promotion in lieu of an untested lietenant... but becomes the evocation of pure evil and deceit. His motive is simple: revenge, but his method of carrying it out is interesting.
OTOH, none of what these villains do is really that interesting, either. The storyline and characters of both is relatively simple compared to FF7, 8 or X. FF4 and 6 are still fun games from the standpoint of gameplay challenge (FF4 to a much greater extent) and of presentation, (FF6 to a somewhat greater extent) however.
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Google is failing me. Where in Portland is this located? I don't watch the local news and usually don't read the Oregonian, I just listen to KOPB.
This reminds me of the last time I took a plane. I was at Newark airport, the day after the "liquid b0mbz" scare this past summer. They lost my luggage, which I passed off as understandable given the stress of the situation. Less understandable was the fact that the TSA employees were scanning _each other_ with the handheld metal detectors and having each other walk through the checkpoint. While this in and of itself isn't necessarily bad (they could have been testing the equipment) they were also laughing and joking around, and holding up a long line of people waiting to get through the security checkpoint. The impression that I got was that they were _playing_ with the equipment. Needless to say, I was pissed. Of course, if I said anything then and there, judging by this article, I probably would have been detained.
This is the kind of incompetance that passes for security nowadays. In some ways though, that incident was useful. Nowadays I take "security threats" and "failed plots" about as seriously as those TSA employees did.
I agree that Kefka and Golbez/Zemus (and even more so X-Death) aren't especially deep characters. Their motivations for doing what they do are pretty simple, but the characters can be interesting if they do interesting things, regardless of how simple or complex their motive for doing so might be. Iago from Othello is a classic example of this. The guy was just passed over for a promotion in lieu of an untested lietenant... but becomes the evocation of pure evil and deceit. His motive is simple: revenge, but his method of carrying it out is interesting. OTOH, none of what these villains do is really that interesting, either. The storyline and characters of both is relatively simple compared to FF7, 8 or X. FF4 and 6 are still fun games from the standpoint of gameplay challenge (FF4 to a much greater extent) and of presentation, (FF6 to a somewhat greater extent) however.