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I always thought that since Shadow looks like a ninja, and has the throw ability, that he was a true ninja. Turns out that he's not really, after all. The first thing that got me wondering was the fact that Edge from FF4 is a ninja, and he has the ability to attack with two swords. The ninjas on FFT do also, but shadow is stuck with one measly sword unless he gets a relic to allow him two. I was wondering about this, so I did some looking into his character profile, and it turns out he's listed as an "assassain". Why, Square, why?? He looks and acts like a ninja (a lot more than Edge does, that's for sure!), and if he'd had an inherant "two swords" ability to go with his other skills, he could have been the height of coolness, and probably my favorite character. As it is, "throw" can be costly after a while, and most of Shadow's early swords are good, but not great, so in the end, he looks like a bad @$$, but gets less use from me than he could. Anyone else ever notice this about him?

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

True, true. That would have been a nice touch.

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Lou: There's a couple of guys fighting down at the aquarium, Chief.
Wiggum: Do they still sell those frozen bananas?
Lou: I think so.
Wiggum: Let's roll.

"He looks like a ninja" - assasins are notorious for wearing dark clothes to conceal themselves in the shadows and generally look cool.

"He has the throw ability" - maybe its his style of assasination. I've heard of a few assasins in many different films and books which throw their weapons and hone this skill so they can kill their target from the shadows without being heard.



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Well, I'm not denying he still kicks butt, or saying his skills he does have are out of place...I just thought perhaps they could have taken it a step further...I don't think there's anything wrong with him being an assassain instead of a ninja, though. I'm not from the East, but considering the life long committment and training involved in becoming a ninja, it seems like games (mostly NES games in the 80's since just about every one that came out had ninjas in it) use ninjas a little too abundantly. I always thought a ninja was someone who practiced a certain way of life and discipline, not just someone who knew some certain skills, and since Shadow started out as a train robber, and from what I could tell, learned his skills himself, it makes more sense to call him an assassain than a ninja in my opinion.



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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

Real assassins only need one knife and the weapons Shadow uses are very assassin-like. The assassin weapon randomly kills. Plus in general special character abilities seen in previous FFs were left to relics and espers in FF6. This includes dual swords, jump, white mage and black mage. Why? Because all FF6 characters already have innovative new abilities (Blitz, Rage, Tools, etc). Square gives you the best of the old along with all the new. You get the versatility of being able to choose which of the older abilities go on what characters. If you want Shadow to have 2 swords, equip a Genji Glove.

Quote (Majik Monkee)

As it is, "throw" can be costly after a while, and most of Shadow's early swords are good, but not great, so in the end, he looks like a bad @$$, but gets less use from me than he could. Anyone else ever notice this about him?

The various ninja stars and skeans are cheap and powerful. Buy 30 of each and you won't be running out of anything for a long time. Shadow's stats are well above average, plus the addition of Interceptor makes him a great fighter. Few characters are better performers, and if you disagree with that statement feel free to explain your position.

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FFXI (Siren server)
Tauu the Windurstian Tarutaru!
White Mage & Paladin

I'm not meaning to imply I think Shadow is a loss...I don't by any means. You're right about the characters of FFVI having a wide range of very cool abilities. I think in my case, some of the other abilties, like "Blitz", "Sword Technique", and "Tools" steal the show for me, since I'd used "Throw" before in FF4. I do take advantage of the ability to equip relics to apply some of my old favorite abilities, I guess I just figured they could have stuck "two swords" in there already on him to make room for two other relics on him. To all you shadow fans out there (I know there are a lot), I'm not calling him useless or overrated, because he's not...please don't kill me...

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

i think of shadow as an ninja mre of an assassin. a ninja wears 2 weps, but and assassin wears a dirk. ninja use katanas...

i always though ninja's and assasins were one of the same?
historically speaking, weren't ninjas just hired as assasins of the samurai?
also, i thought ninjas normally use weapons like knives, throwing stars, and blow darts.

''ninja use katanas...''-l)arkShadow (Sorry I don't know how to quote).

Ninjas do not use katanas. They use a Ninja-To.

Shadow is not a ninja because he was not raised in a ninja clan, nor was he trainsd by anone like that, that we know.

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Love and Peace- Vash, the Stampede

If Life kicks you long enough, eventually he'll get tired and walk away- Drew Carry

yea, it is kind of cool to equip two weapons at the same time.
and don't forget Yuffie, she is also a ninja too.
but unlike most ninjas, she can equip Shurkens as her weapons instead of katanas.
she throws her weapon and it returns to her.
any other ninjas can throw shurkens, but they don'y return to their throwers.

As to the Throw command getting costly- I was able to fill up on pp shurikans which do just fine, at the beggining of the game. Its cheap, and a good way to clear the trash items.

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If you've been mod-o-fied,
It's an illusion, and you're in-between.
Don't you be tarot-fied,
It's just alot of nothing, so what can it mean?
~Frank Zappa

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I guess you might say that not all assassains can be ninjas, but all ninjas could be assassains if they wanted to...there is a lot of tradition behind being a ninja (take it from a guy who's never lived in the East and knows nothing about the specifics)

As for the "throw" command costing a lot, apparantly you don't understand how poorly I manage GP...when it comes down to a choice of armor for the rest of the gang or shurikens and dirks for Shadow, armor always wins out...till later in the game when I'm loaded with GP and he sticks around for good...then it pays off!

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

Ninja or assassin, Shadow is still the coolest FF character IMO.

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<Nealio> Seymour sounds like evil Winnie the Pooh

I give him a very high coolness rating too, based on character merit, not how much I use him. Funny...the first time or two I played through the game, I thought he was a very one dimensional character with no back story to him...but this was in part because I managed to avoid seeing any of his dreams, and didn't wait for him after the floating continent. In reality, his is quite a complex individual, and he's anything but one dimensional...glad I played the game more than once!

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

Quote (Majik Monkee @ 4th March 2004 08:02)

He looks and acts like a ninja (a lot more than Edge does, that's for sure!)

You can't really say whether or not Edge acted like a ninja or not, since the silent/serious stereotype was started by Shadow (and the silent/serious attittude of ninjas in the NES games exist because a vast majority of NES characters had that personality).

As for whther or not he's a ninja - it's all opinion. I give out job assignments other than what FFVIj had.

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

Shadow is a strong character, but I never used him much. His natural evade% doesn't factor in cause of the bug, right?

I always found that when I used him, his attacks just weren't as powerful as most of the others, but then again, I am more of a 'fight' kinda guy. Never really threw much except during boss fights.

I never thought of him as a ninja, though he is very ninja like. I just thought of him as a loner/assasin who kind of modelled himself after a ninja.

I think now matter what they labled him Shadow is a true ninja. So what if he has no ninja skills like flood or blitz but he has the ability throw and he also acts and looks like a ninja. So I myself will lable him a ninja!

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Shadow has most of the abilities Edge has except for ninja magic. shadow can throw, and steal. and do assassins go to cafes? just curious so in my opinion, shadow is a ninja. i think i put assassin down there but i cahnged my mind

As a matter of convention, I always refer to Shadow as a ninja, regardless. That being said, the in-game evidence doesn't really support or deny his job class, and though he is technically classified as an "Assassin" it doesn't take much imagination to guess where Square was going with this one. He does throw shuriken and magic scrolls after all.

I think it all has to do with the setting of the game. Much of the game's world is distinctly European and medieval, like the majority of the weapons and locations (Figaro, for example). Yet there are also distinct influences of Asian culture interspersed throughout, from weapons like the Kotetsu and the Kodachi to the distinctly Japanese job classes maintained by Cyan (who closely resembles a Samurai) and Shadow (who closely resembles a Ninja); also, the Kingdom of Doma, despite the bizarre accent ascribed to its indigents by the translation, maintains an unmistakably Asian feel.

Basically, I'm saying that the creators made Shadow as close to a Ninja as they could without outright saying that he is in fact a ninja. Because of this, he's a ninja to me.

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"I always have a quotation for everything - it saves original thinking."
~Dorothy L. Sayers

"The truly remarkable thing about television is that it allows several million people to laugh at the same joke and still feel lonely."
~T.S. Eliot

"Defeat is not defeat unless accepted as reality - in your own mind!"
~ Bruce Lee

Shadow in my opinion is more of an assassin, due to his focus more on quick kills, e.g. the Striker. Also, Shadow didn't get ripped off as he has a fair chance to wear the Genji Glove.

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I'd say the silent, serious ninja image was begun long before FF4 came out...heck...I remember seeing ninjas on the old "Mr. T" cartoon back before I could even spell ninja, and well before any video game system had even been conceived. I'd like to credit Shadow with that, but I'd say that the image of the silent, serious assassain have been a part of the ninja/assassain image since the first one accidentally stepped out of the shadows and proved their existence to the rest of the world.

I know Shadow's skills can be enhanced by the Genji Glove, but as I said before, he shouldn't have to rely on the glove for the same skill similar characters in FF games before and after FFVI had inherently. Someone mentioned that all the characters in FFVI had larger than life abilities, and this is true in large part, so Shadow just having the "throw" ability (and Interceptor, of course) seems like kind of a rip...especially since Genji Gloves aren't that easy to come by...

This post has been edited by Majik Monkee on 8th March 2004 12:45

--------------------

You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

I'd also like to point out that if you're talking about "ripped" in the sense that he's not as powerful as comparable ninjas from other FF games, then I'd have to disagree with you. Shadow's Throw is hilariously over-powered in Final Fantasy 6, allowing you to hit straight 9999's as soon as you get him on the Floating Continent. I think the loss of the Two Swords ability is fair enough, considering just how easy it is to crush the enemy with Shadow on your team, particularly when you factor in Interceptor's random counters and his solid starting statistics.

Ninja or not, Shadow's definitely one of the coolest and most useful RPG characters ever.

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"I always have a quotation for everything - it saves original thinking."
~Dorothy L. Sayers

"The truly remarkable thing about television is that it allows several million people to laugh at the same joke and still feel lonely."
~T.S. Eliot

"Defeat is not defeat unless accepted as reality - in your own mind!"
~ Bruce Lee

I will definitely admit to the fact that "throw" is a much more powerful tool in FF6 than in FFT, and the accuracy of the hit % is much greater as well. I barely used it at all in FF4, except to throw all my best swords at Zeromus, so I can't really speak comparitively in that respect.

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

Quote (l)arkShadow @ 7th March 2004 11:30)

Shadow has most of the abilities Edge has except for ninja magic. shadow can throw, and steal. and do assassins go to cafes? just curious so in my opinion, shadow is a ninja. i think i put assassin down there but i cahnged my mind  

Well, in all fairness, Edge is the only ninja in all of FF to have special magic.

Quote (Majik Monkee @ 8th March 2004 07:42)

I know Shadow's skills can be enhanced by the Genji Glove, but as I said before, he shouldn't have to rely on the glove for the same skill similar characters in FF games before and after FFVI had inherently.

Well...
FFI: the Ninja could only equip one weapon
FFII: There were no ninjas
FFIII: All characters could equip two weapons
FFIV: Two weapons
FFV: Two weapons
FFVI: One weapon
FFVII: If you count Yuffie as a ninja, then one weapon
FFVIII: Rinoa and Selphie are sorta kinda close to ninjas. THey can only equip one weapon
FFIX: Amarant could only have one weapon
FFX: Haven't played it, but I think everyone was restriceted to one weapons
FFMQ: The dude who threw ninja stars could only throw one at a time
FFT: Two weapons

Three out of twelve isn't really a good record.

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

Quote (l)arkShadow @ 7th March 2004 11:30)

Shadow has most of the abilities Edge has except for ninja magic. shadow can throw, and steal. and do assassins go to cafes? just curious so in my opinion, shadow is a ninja. i think i put assassin down there but i cahnged my mind  

Hmm, yes a ninja or an assassin could go to a cafe. But would a ninja go into a cafe still wearing a disguise?

On the difference between the two . . . well all ninjas were assassins, as well as intelligence gatherers (spies), and basically a sort of "feudal special forces" for conducting night time raids and other stealth missions. They were trained in specific martial arts and stealth techniques from a clan. They were usually in the service of a local warlord. They're true identies were kept secret.

I think those are the main qualifications, but hey, if you are a skilled martial artist who can be really sneaky and wear a feudal ninja costume. Knock yer self out, thats close enough for most people these days, I'd say

Now an assassin. . . . an assassin is anyone who kills by use of a surprise attack. It could be any weapon. A bomb, a knife, poison, anything . . . It could be any method. Pushed off a cliff, drowning, whatever . . .

I think Shadow is a ninja like assassin. He's a skilled fighter, he allways hides his identity, he uses knives and throwing stars, he'll also throw just about anything with an edge plus some other items, and he's a mercenary.

On the main topic. Um, I don't necessarily think Shadow was robbed by not being able to use two weapons right off the bat. He's still fairly strong and "throw" isn't as glamorous as some other abilities, but it still has its uses. On the other hand if he did have the ability to use to weapons right away that definitely would have kicked him up a notch on the power level, especially early in the game. It also would have given him a bit of a "wow" factor when you first got to use him.
...

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I guess I should have clarified myself...by ninjas, I meant any character who's class is referred to specifically as "ninja"...so while there are characters in these other games who can throw, since they're not given the official "ninja" class, I didn't really count them...if you do, then yes...two swords is definitely not the norm. For the pure "ninja" class, though, which I've only experienced in FF4 and FFT, it's an inherent characteristic of the job...

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

No self-respecting ninja goes into battle without a spoon to throw and that's final.

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"That Light has bestowed upon me the greatest black magic!"

He sure does look like a ninja, but he could also look like an assassin in those clothes.

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

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That spoon comment went right over my head...must not have found the spoon yet... Guess I better go do some more searching!

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You know me, you just wish you didn't...

"Uwee hee hee! Don't tease the octopus, kids!" -Ultros-

"Don't let the smooth taste fool you..."

The "spoon" (technically a dagger) is a throw-only weapon from Final Fantasy IV (NOT VI) that deals a guaranteed 9999 damage when thrown.

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

You can find me on the Fediverse! I use Mastodon, where I am @[email protected] ( https://sakurajima.moe/@glennmagusharvey )