- Sparse to no story, and what little story there is, which is a Star Wars ripoff minus any plot movement, it doesn't bother to tell it. I wasn't fond of the stories from some past FF games (namely FFVIII) but at least those games bothered to tell them. FFXII moves on like it knows it has no substance and is trying to be dishonest about it.
- I was expecting License Grid to be a refinement of FFX's excellent Sphere Grid. What I got was a system that was even more abuseable and broken and made characters even more samey than FFVII's Materia and FFVIII's Junction.
- No character development. Half the characters make you wonder why they're even tagging along. The other half are just boring or ripoffs of Star Wars characters.
- Sparse to no story, and what little story there is, which is a Star Wars ripoff minus any plot movement, it doesn't bother to tell it. I wasn't fond of the stories from some past FF games (namely FFVIII) but at least those games bothered to tell them. FFXII moves on like it knows it has no substance and is trying to be dishonest about it.
- I was expecting License Grid to be a refinement of FFX's excellent Sphere Grid. What I got was a system that was even more abuseable and broken and made characters even more samey than FFVII's Materia and FFVIII's Junction.
I almost had a heart attack as I originally thought you were laying the hate on FFVII. Then I realized you have maximum respect for VII and X so you are clearly a man of honor.
I geuss it is really how you choose to look at it.
'Course, I like Final Fantasy in general (VIII being the least good I think), along with Star Ocean 2-3, KotR 1-2, Moo3, Naruto and Pokemon. And I think FFX is still my favourite out of the various FFs. So what do I know?
Still got a long way to go to beat Torment, though.
(Or TIE Fighter.)
You had me at "Final Fanatsy Sucks".
Wow. Way to go. Come into the tavern and start trashing on something that plenty of folks round here like. No discussion. No rhyme. No reason. Just trolling.
Class act, you are.
Wow. Way to go. Come into the tavern and start trashing on something that plenty of folks round here like. No discussion. No rhyme. No reason. Just trolling.
Sorry. Once again I made the mistake of assuming people would get that I was being dryly ironical without needing a smiley laugh-track. My bad.
Class act, you are.
Anyone ever notice that nowadays the word "class" is only ever used in a derogatory fashion (see above) or in referencing things that are utterly lacking in any sort of taste or class like stretch limos and strip clubs?
Wow. Way to go. Come into the tavern and start trashing on something that plenty of folks round here like. No discussion. No rhyme. No reason. Just trolling.
Sorry. Once again I made the mistake of assuming people would get that I was being dryly ironical without needing a smiley laugh-track. My bad.
Honestly, I really don't give flying rat's ass what "plenty of folks round here like". Whether I like something or not is entirely my own prerogative. Were I posting this to a FF message board, or in a "FF is great" thread your argument might have some teeth, but considering that the topic of the thread is trashing a Final Fantasy game it's a little late to play the wounded party on this one. You knew coming in what you were getting into.
You want "discussion, rhyme and reason"? Fine. The characters are insipid clichés, the dialogue is embarassingly cringe worthy, the plots are nonsensical rubbish, the game play is excruciating, the music is dire, and the graphics are ass (apart form the most recent one - it was gorgeous).
I keep trying to give it a fair shake, thinking perhaps my previous negative experiences were situational rather than the game itself but I just can't stand a single thing about any of the games in the series. I've even tried to play much-lauded FFVII on no less then three separate occasions but I simply cannot get through it. I put more time into Beyond the Beyond, and that game was garbage.
Class act, you are.
Anyone ever notice that nowadays the word "class" is only ever used in a derogatory fashion (see above) or in referencing things that are utterly lacking in any sort of taste or class like stretch limos and strip clubs? ;)
Sorry. Once again I made the mistake of assuming people would get that I was being dryly ironical without needing a smiley laugh-track. My bad.
Dude, I don't know you. I'm not a psion either. Really friend, I'm sure you can see how your post could be interpreted.
Honestly, I really don't give flying rat's ass what "plenty of folks round here like". Whether I like something or not is entirely my own prerogative. Were I posting this to a FF message board, or in a "FF is great" thread your argument might have some teeth, but considering that the topic of the thread is trashing a Final Fantasy game it's a little late to play the wounded party on this one. You knew coming in what you were getting into.
Fair enough, thats your right. However the OP clearly has regard for the games in general, and is talking about a particular instance of fail. To come into the tavern, which is supposed to be the friendly place on these boards, and just slam FF in general with a thoughtless comment really isn't needed. I'm not playing the wounded party. I have no regard for the subject matter one way or the other. But really, is it that hard to see how you were out of line on this one?
You want "discussion, rhyme and reason"? Fine. The characters are insipid clichés, the dialogue is embarassingly cringe worthy, the plots are nonsensical rubbish, the game play is excruciating, the music is dire, and the graphics are ass (apart form the most recent one - it was gorgeous).
I keep trying to give it a fair shake, thinking perhaps my previous negative experiences were situational rather than the game itself but I just can't stand a single thing about any of the games in the series. I've even tried to play much-lauded FFVII on no less then three separate occasions but I simply cannot get through it. I put more time into Beyond the Beyond, and that game was garbage.
There we go. In fact I largely agree with this.
Sorry. Once again I made the mistake of assuming people would get that I was being dryly ironical without needing a smiley laugh-track. My bad.
Honestly, I really don't give flying rat's ass what "plenty of folks round here like". Whether I like something or not is entirely my own prerogative. Were I posting this to a FF message board, or in a "FF is great" thread your argument might have some teeth, but considering that the topic of the thread is trashing a Final Fantasy game it's a little late to play the wounded party on this one. You knew coming in what you were getting into.
You want "discussion, rhyme and reason"? Fine. The characters are insipid clichés, the dialogue is embarassingly cringe worthy, the plots are nonsensical rubbish, the game play is excruciating, the music is dire, and the graphics are ass (apart form the most recent one - it was gorgeous).
I keep trying to give it a fair shake, thinking perhaps my previous negative experiences were situational rather than the game itself but I just can't stand a single thing about any of the games in the series. I've even tried to play much-lauded FFVII on no less then three separate occasions but I simply cannot get through it. I put more time into Beyond the Beyond, and that game was garbage.
Anyone ever notice that nowadays the word "class" is only ever used in a derogatory fashion (see above) or in referencing things that are utterly lacking in any sort of taste or class like stretch limos and strip clubs? ;)
That pretty much sums up my feelings about the entire series too. Well put, better than I could have expressed my thoughts about it.
I'll never understand people's obsession with that game. I only finished it out of spite.
What did you dislike?
No worries though, not everyone is the same, so of course people will have different opinions.I personally think FFXII is decent at best, but I think that VII is the best one, followed by X, and then VIII.
The characters, the plot, and the fact that you had to force chocobo inbreeding if you wanted the best summon (seriously, there's something wrong with that).
I never understood why people complain about this. Someone complaining about animal inbreeding obviously knows very little about the process of breeding. When the term "purebred" is used to refer to a dog or cat, it pretty much means "it is the product of many generations of inbreeding". Gold Chocobos have a much bigger gene pool than your typical store bought dog or cat.
Besides, if you don't like Chocobo breeding then don't do it. Knights of the Round breaks the game in half anyways. I ended up not using it after I killed a boss with just a single casting of that spell.
As for the main topic, I agree. Final Fantasy XII is easily one of the worst games in the series. I am a big fan of the series, and I couldn't bring myself to keep playing it after a while.
I'm amused by the number of people that jumped at defending Final Fantasy VII when they heard any complaint about Final Fantasy.
I'll never understand people's obsession with that game. I only finished it out of spite.
I hated FFVII, FFVIII, liked the begining of 9 but thought it was really dumb during the second half, but loved 10.
Still, I can't imagine how any fan of the RPG genre could possible hate FFVII. That is the game that completely transformed the genre, particularly in the way it popularized the genre in the US. It is thanks to that game alone that the days of wondering whether a great A-list Japanese RPG would even be translated for the US market are a thing of the past. It also did a lot of work to innovate and advance the genre, and even the videogame industry as a whole. There were other great (or even better) games made around the same time and in the following years, like Xenogears, FFT, or Suikoden 2, but I don't think these games would have been able to change the industry in the same way that FFVII did.
Of course, I think that FFVII is a great game even on its own merits. The Materia system could have used a little work, but it was a lot of fun and had a fun cast of characters and a very involving story. It was completely unlike anything that came before it, a fact that tends to get lost somewhat these days since half the RPGs made since borrow heavily from ideas first introduced in that game.
For the record, my favorite Final Fantasy game is probably FFV.
- No character development. Half the characters make you wonder why they're even tagging along. The other half are just boring or ripoffs of Star Wars characters.
- Sparse to no story, and what little story there is, which is a Star Wars ripoff minus any plot movement, it doesn't bother to tell it. I wasn't fond of the stories from some past FF games (namely FFVIII) but at least those games bothered to tell them. FFXII moves on like it knows it has no substance and is trying to be dishonest about it.
- I was expecting License Grid to be a refinement of FFX's excellent Sphere Grid. What I got was a system that was even more abuseable and broken and made characters even more samey than FFVII's Materia and FFVIII's Junction.
It was based on FF Tactics. Not the reg FF series. From what I heard anyway?
My favorite Final Fantasy is FF I. I still break it out from time to time. I never really cared for FFVII either. I guess I don't see what all the fuss is about all these yearrs later.
I've played almost all of the Final Fantasy games. I havn't played X-2, XII or XIII.
I would be suprised if you actually have played FF XIII. :P Most of us are still trying to interpret the trailers and Famitsu magazine scans.
I'm actualy not a big fan of any of the newer Final Fantasy games. They need a "skip" button, so you can skip past the talking. Granted the cut scenes add to the plot and are good the first time around. If you're close to the end of the game and your son accidentally wiped the memory card, I really don't want to sit through all those cut scenes again.
Final Fantasy X (and just about every other modern RPG) does have a skip button. I use it whenever I die during a boss fight and have to get through the preceding cutscenes on my retries. To be honest though, I wouldn't list this as a big problem for FF XII. FF XII suffers from having almost no plot. Huge tracks of the game are made of large dungeon/field areas strung one after another without any story scenes of note.
Besides, Final Fantasy games barely suffer from overly long cut-scenes at all. If you really want to see a game with long cut-scenes, play Xenosaga. Getting to a boss fight in that game is a lot like sitting down to watch a feature length film.
My favorite Final Fantasy is FF I. I still break it out from time to time. I never really cared for FFVII either. I guess I don't see what all the fuss is about all these yearrs later.
The original NES version of FF 1 or one of the numerous remakes? I played the Dawn of Souls version and thought it was decent, but I think it took until Final Fantasy IV for the series to really hit full stride.
Lone Red Mage playthrough!
It was based on FF Tactics. Not the reg FF series. From what I heard anyway?
Final Fantasy XII takes place in a world named Ivalice, which is populated by numerous strange races and dominated by advanced magic technology. Final Fantasy Tactics takes place in a country named Ivalice, which only has humans and is modeled on real world medieval Europe. While FF XII supposedly takes place in the distant past of FF Tactics (an ancient age of airships is referred to in that game), there isn't any direct connection between them. The only element they do have in common are a set of powerful spirits called the Lucavi in FF Tactics. However, they were a group of manipulative demonic masterminds in FF Tactics, and merely a bunch of summons the good guys use in FF XII. They didn't even keep the name Lucavi, and just stole FF VI's name for summons: Esper.
In the end, the only thing that really links FF Tactics and FF XII is that FF XII used the name Ivalice in the same way FF Tactics Advance did in an attempt to use people's nostalgia for FF Tactics.
Having to unite all of your characters in the last half of the game (doing quests to get every member back) has always been one of my favorite moments of video game history.
If I had to put my favorite RPGs into list form I would say my top five were
FFVI-As said above
FFVII-Absolutely amazing story and game-play but a tad bit overdone.
Suikoden II-The part at the last battle with your best friend joining you again and your sister dying almost made me weep. (I know the good ending has her come back but that took a lot of the emotion out, so I prefer the bad ending, I'm a sadist!)
FFX-Probably has more character development then any other RPG I've played.
FFV-Jobs FTW... That is all.
I am actually impressed by the amount of people who disliked FF-XII. I thought it was a nice step away from what the series always does. Instead of 1-stopping an evil empire/company/kingdom, 2-becoming uber-powered then 3-saving the planet you 1-try to stop an evil empire, 2-become somewhat stronger but still within human bounds, 3-defeat said evil empire!
Okay, okay! It has a lot of similarities! But everything they went for was such a change and it still worked! The whole game is based more within mortal bounds. You never really become unstoppable killing machines, you stay fairly human the whole time. The combat system was very different, it was obviously modeled after FFXI but they had a great system for giving commands to your allies. Throughout the whole game I felt as though Vaan was a secondary fiddle (which Balthier enforced) and it was good. Your character always had some form of motivation to proceed on with the story but he was never really the "hero." Up until the end of the game he's mostly just following Balthier then Ashe, which I found a pleasant change. The game had a lot of side quests too, as most RPGs do. However, I found the quests to be quite varied, you hunt, trade items, do errands, find... Have any of you played WOW? Okay that's what the quests would seem like as you read them. They are actually very fun! Placing the game on one country as opposed to covering the whole globe was also awesome (yet they managed to fit a snow area in still...).
Anywho, everyone is entitle to their opinion so the things I liked about FFXII may have been the bane of the next person's existence.
PS- FFXII may not be in my top five, but it's in my top ten.
And it was only half the game to start with. You don't want to get to the end of a game and then hear. " To Be Continued."
Overall FF7 was my favorite. FF6 was good but overrated.
But yeah, from what I've heard, they weren't terribly great as main characters in FFXII.
I like FFX the most. It has a great story IMO.
I still haven't played FFVII so I can't really comment on it.
Although, I'll agree that, from FF-VIII onwards, every FF is an excellent techdemo for what computers can do today.
I hate this game's story. It sucks. It's just an MMO that you play by yourself
*almost hugs boe* Someone else agrees with me!
Still, I can't imagine how any fan of the RPG genre could possible hate FFVII. That is the game that completely transformed the genre, particularly in the way it popularized the genre in the US. It is thanks to that game alone that the days of wondering whether a great A-list Japanese RPG would even be translated for the US market are a thing of the past. It also did a lot of work to innovate and advance the genre, and even the videogame industry as a whole. There were other great (or even better) games made around the same time and in the following years, like Xenogears, FFT, or Suikoden 2, but I don't think these games would have been able to change the industry in the same way that FFVII did.
Of course, I think that FFVII is a great game even on its own merits. The Materia system could have used a little work, but it was a lot of fun and had a fun cast of characters and a very involving story. It was completely unlike anything that came before it, a fact that tends to get lost somewhat these days since half the RPGs made since borrow heavily from ideas first introduced in that game.
For the record, my favorite Final Fantasy game is probably FFV.
Ok I'll give you that FFVII might be responsible for popularizing RPGs in the America(I didn't start playing till shortly afterwards, so I can't say). However I don't see it having done anything toinnovate the genre. The battle system was still the RTB system of at least some of the previous FF games. I'm fairly certain it wasn't the first RPG to go for 3-D graphics. I really can't think of anything about it that was new and different that has stuck around with the RPG genre. It was an okay game that got overhyped, and that hype happened to help the RPG genre. That is really it.
It's just an MMO that you play by yourself
So it's the best kind of MMO imaginable?
So it's the best kind of MMO imaginable?
No that would be The World: R2.....or at least the game it came from.
- No character development. Half the characters make you wonder why they're even tagging along. The other half are just boring or ripoffs of Star Wars characters.
Well, at some point they decided that they needed to put in a bishounen (Vaan) as the main character, rather than Balthier; Penelo was the result of the same decision. And yes, both are entirely extraneous.
- Sparse to no story, and what little story there is, which is a Star Wars ripoff minus any plot movement, it doesn't bother to tell it. I wasn't fond of the stories from some past FF games (namely FFVIII) but at least those games bothered to tell them. FFXII moves on like it knows it has no substance and is trying to be dishonest about it.
Yeah, this was a major suck-factor for the game. FF games typically have rather mehish gameplay (honestly, Final Fantasy X was probably the only one with gameplay which was really worthwhile as a game) so take out the story, and you're left with a mehish game.
- I was expecting License Grid to be a refinement of FFX's excellent Sphere Grid. What I got was a system that was even more abuseable and broken and made characters even more samey than FFVII's Materia and FFVIII's Junction.
Yeah, it was terrible.
The biggest problem, though, was that it basically felt like a single player MMO, and not a very good one at that. The gameplay was very bad, and there were huge, pointless areas you had to run across.
The biggest problem, though, was that it basically felt like a single player MMO, and not a very good one at that. The gameplay was very bad, and there were huge, pointless areas you had to run across.
Only really in the beginning. After that you just kind of teleport everywhere.