FF XII

[Pulling Teeth]

Its a great game. Different to the previous FF games and feels like a MMO.

And in one fell swoop you kill my interest.

I'm trying to give Persona 3 a fair chance right now anyway. Seems to be the most untraditional jRPG in ages.

Hahahaha yeah, If you don't like MMORPGs than you probably won't like FFXII (because it plays like one) but it definitely is challenging.

[Gamerforlife]

I've pretty much made FF 12 my bitch. Finished just about every challenge in the game. So here's my two cents.

Pros:

The most realistic environment and enemies of any FF game ever. One of the game's greatest accomplishments. You'll even find random NPCs in some areas that will help your party

I love the various levels of the enemies in every area. Some enemies will be easy to take out and others will have to be avoided because there are FAR more powerful than your party. This means that you have to pay attention and not just take on every enemy you see. Generally, if you see an enemy that is very large, STAY AWAY. Of course, one of the fun things about the game is learning how to take out enemies that are at a much higher level than your party. Great way to gain some levels. The mix of low to high level enemies means that every player can get as much challenge as they want out of an area. Oh, and most areas have SECRET enemies you can find by meeting certain conditions, which is another cool feature of the game.

Going hand in hand with the above, is a very flexible, more realistic combat system than previous games. I love that running away is handled realistically. It's not random, if you want to run away you can, but don't think that enemy is not going to come chasing after you. There's strategic value in running, since the game usually remembers whatever damage you've done to an enemy so you can try to go back and finish him off after you've healed up.

TONS of optional, challenging enemies to seek out and fight including bosses that will take you over an hour(at LEAST) to defeat. There are enemies in this game that will absolutely destroy you unless you have a precise strategy and proper preparation. Even then, you may still need a little luck. I'm not kidding when I say that some of the optional bosses are fucking HUGE and have OBSCENE amounts of health. It makes you wish that the damage cap didn't stop at 9,999(FF X's max damage was 99,999)

Gambit system rocks. Takes out some of the more tedious and annoying aspects of handling your party. It's not auto-pilot though, as there are situations where you'll need to take manual control or switch up your gambits. You have to stay adaptable in this game. Hell, there are battles in this game that are so tough you'll have to keep switching your equipment in mid-battle to deal with the enemy's various attacks.

Cool characters. Everyone seems to love Balthier

There's something they put into the game that is very similar to the Xbox 360's achievement system, giving you various badges of honor for completing certain tasks. There's TONS of optional stuff to do in the game. Most of it involves combat so you'll be spending a lot of time beafing up your party. Don't play this game is you don't like grinding.

You can have three characters in your party at a time, but you can switch in inactive members to replace KOed active members. I FUCKING LOVED this system. I've had so many battles pulled from the brink of defeat by bringing in my under-levelled back up characters just to have them QUICKLY resurrect my main party before getting destroyed themselves. This makes for very tense moments and you really feel as if your ENTIRE party is a part of each battle. You can theoretically keep your party going forever this way, but only if the boss doesn't quickly knock out your reserve party, which does happen often if you're not careful or just unlucky.

Cons:

The story is by no means bad, but it's one of the weakest in the series. It just lacks a certain amount of emotional impact that other FF games have had. On the plus side, it is nowhere even close to being as bad and as laughable as FF X 2's pointless story was.

Like the story, the music is certainly of high quality, but again not one of the series' best entries.

The game has one of the worst treasure systems of any game EVER. Many useful and powerful items are RANDOMLY found. One of the most powerful weapons can be lost PERMANENTLY simply by a player opening certain chests early in the game that they weren't suppossed to. You WILL need a faq and A LOT of resetting, and A LOT of luck if you want to get all the items in the game(and the game does keep a list every item and weapon you're missing). I assume that this HORRIBLE system is due to the MMO influence.

I don't know if this is a pro or a con, but the game has a weird system where characters need licenses to do ANYTHING. Weapons, magic, techniques, equipment. YOU MUST HAVE A LICENSE FOR EVERY SINGLE THING YOU WANT YOUR CHARACTER TO BE ABLE TO DO. Your character can't even equip something or use a spell if they don't have a license for it. That means levelling is not just about getting experience points, but license points as well. This means you have to put A LOT of thought into every spell, weapon, item, technique, armor, etc, etc, that you want to use. Even limit breaks must be purchased. It's adds a lot to the game's challenge, but can be frustrating.

Summons are not quite that useful. I mean some players have learned to make good use of them, but generally a strong party with good weapons can do better than the summon creatures. Square has been toning down summons since FF 7(where Knights of the Round destroyed everything with ease)

As I mentioned before, combat is a bit more realistic, which means the game is lacking a bit of the over the top insanity that some people love about this series. There are limits breaks that are pretty exaggerated, but overall combat is not as flashy as previous games. In a way, this makes FF12 a bit more old school I guess

Overall, the best thing about this game(or the worst thing depending on your point of view)is that it is arguably the most hardcore FF game since the 16-bit days. Lots of tough challenges for players who wish to go off the beaten path. There's Obscenely powerful optional enemies and bosses to fight, secret enemies to find in almost every single area of the game, and item collecting is a real test of patience. Plus, you'll find some depth in learning to properly use chains to get the best loot, making proper use of gambits, and learning how create long limit break combos

[RadarScope1]

GFL - thanks for the thoughts. After reading it, I'm thinking I'll give it a try -- if I can find the time.

Your last paragraph especially convinced me I want to play this. Though I loved 7 at the time and never really played 8 or 9, I thought 10 sucked hard. It just didn't feel like the "game" part of the game was there anymore. Sounds like 12 gets that part right.

[Gamerforlife]

GFL - thanks for the thoughts. After reading it, I'm thinking I'll give it a try -- if I can find the time.

Your last paragraph especially convinced me I want to play this. Though I loved 7 at the time and never really played 8 or 9, I thought 10 sucked hard. It just didn't feel like the "game" part of the game was there anymore. Sounds like 12 gets that part right.

Yeah, it's at least worth a try. Maybe you can rent it. I liked FF X personally(you wouldn't believe how unbelievably, insanely, ridiculously powerful my party is), but I get why some people didn't enjoy it. FF12 is a very different game. It doesn't have much in common with FFX at all.

I lOVED some of the bosses in FF12. Intense battles. I won't spoil anything, but there is this one OPTIONAL boss that is a HUGE dragon that you fight inside a large gladiatorial like arena. Average time for beating him for most players seems to be four hours, though some people have figured out how to take him down in one hour.

Here's the interesting thing. You can leave the fight at any time to save your game and heal BUT if he happens to be healing when you leave he gets ALL his health back, which could mean an hour or more of your life you've just lost. What's even cooler is that a counter appears on screen if you leave the arena and come back. It goes up by one each time you leave. Essentially Square is pointing a finger at you for each time you wuss out and leave to save and heal. LOL. That's hardcore. I'm ashamed to admit I did this multiple times, but I did beat the bastard.

Beating him in one go is one hell of an endurance test. Not only is it time consuming, but he can bring your party near death multiple times which really will make you sweat bullets if you've been fighting him for over an hour already. He also gets more powerful when his health reaches certain levels. In his last stage his defense increases A LOT. After all the time it takes to take him down that low and suddenly your attacks start doing EVEN LESS damage.

There's another optional boss fight I love which involves a certain recurring fan favorite FF character with multiple arms who first showed up in FF 5. He is EXTREMELY COOL in this game and fairly tough is you aren't prepared for him. You can fight him twice. The second time being after a long and painfully difficult dungeon, and if I remember correctly you DON'T get to save before you face him. As if beating him isn't tough enough, he has some great, one-time only items that you can try to steal from him(while also trying to survive his onslaught

[kinn]

Its a great game. Different to the previous FF games and feels like a MMO.

And in one fell swoop you kill my interest.

Mozgus just give it a try. As you can see most people here don't see it as an MMO like I did.

Best to try it yourself and form your own opinion.

[Mozgus]

Its a great game. Different to the previous FF games and feels like a MMO.

And in one fell swoop you kill my interest.

Mozgus just give it a try. As you can see most people here don't see it as an MMO like I did.

Best to try it yourself and form your own opinion.

I fully intend on doing that once I have time.

Anyways 7 hours into Person 3. Is this what the entire game will be like? Doing homework? Hanging around annoying people just to lvl up social skills? Going to the bathroom? Um, I played this game back when it was called The Sims.

[kinn]

And in one fell swoop you kill my interest.

Mozgus just give it a try. As you can see most people here don't see it as an MMO like I did.

Best to try it yourself and form your own opinion.

I fully intend on doing that once I have time.

Anyways 7 hours into Person 3. Is this what the entire game will be like? Doing homework? Hanging around annoying people just to lvl up social skills? Going to the bathroom? Um, I played this game back when it was called The Sims.

Now your putting me off Persona 3! (kidding)

[Mozgus]

Now your putting me off Persona 3! (kidding)

Well, before getting totally raped from a simple random battle, where the enemy spamed my weakness and got 20 something turns in a row before I could even enter a single fucking command, causing me to lose yet another hour or so of progress in the dungeon, finally convincing me to give up on this game.....I captured this clip. Enjoy:



So I moved onto FF12, and so far it's freaking amazing. It's like Vagrant Story 2, but with some chocobos and mogs thrown in. They probably slapped the FF brand on it just for sales.

[ott0bot]

Now your putting me off Persona 3! (kidding)

Well, before getting totally raped from a simple random battle, where the enemy spamed my weakness and got 20 something turns in a row before I could even enter a single fucking command, causing me to lose yet another hour or so of progress in the dungeon, finally convincing me to give up on this game.....I captured this clip. Enjoy:



So I moved onto FF12, and so far it's freaking amazing. It's like Vagrant Story 2, but with some chocobos and mogs thrown in. They probably slapped the FF brand on it just for sales.

Wow...thats some great voice acting.
I spent 50 bucks on this game......Well I guess the good thing is that you can sell it on ebay for 80 bucks already!!!

[Mozgus]

I spent 50 bucks on this game......Well I guess the good thing is that you can sell it on ebay for 80 bucks already!!!

Sounds like the game's best feature to me.