Final Fantasy XII Retrospective
 

I started playing FFXII about a week and half ago and I'm getting pretty close to completing it with every sidequest that I care about done. Working on getting the Zodiac Spear the hard way, then I just have to kill Omega XII, Behemoth King, Zodiark, and Yiazmat. Then I can beat the game and not feel lame.

Anyway, this made me want to see what everyone else's thoughts were on the game, what they liked, what they didn't, what was interesting. That sort of thing.

For me...

Like

The combat borrows heavily from MMOs and the gambit system is a unique way of allowing the player to set up a strategy and battle plan ahead of time.

The characters are interesting, funny, and the Cid for this game is pretty much the best ever.

The villain actually managed to convince me that he wasn't the villain early on, and seemed like a perfectly likable fellow, and Vaan's bias against him annoyed me. Then it turned out he was the villain.

The hunts are awesome, and the sheer number of sidequests and the like allow you to play for long after you could have beaten the game.

The different weapons all have their own strengths and weaknesses and seem fairly balanced. Except guns. Fuck guns.

The quickenings are a good application of the limit breaks, and although there is a period during the game where you end up spamming quickenings for bosses, they soon reach a point where you generally only use them for a finishing blow as MP is more valuable.

The buffs, debuffs, and status effects are important to have on your characters, and actually work on a surprising amount of the bosses.

The voice acting is pretty solid, though some lines are spoken a bit too fast due to timing.

Gilgamesh


Dislike

Randomized treasure chests.

Some of the run around and do boring shit things the game occasionally makes you do to advance the plot.

The weather element, while unique and generally well used, can be a bit of a pain at times.

Lack of a World Map and, as an extension of that, not having the option to fly the airship myself all over the goddamn place.

Summons are, for the most part, useless.

The goddamn International version, aka "Fuck you everyone else, we get the good version."

The license board at times.

Action lag when you have a large number of enemies on the screen and it's everyone's turn.

The fact that, except for the different looking quickenings, none of the characters are really any different in battle, except to the extent that you made them different by what you equipped them with.

The requirements for getting the Zodiac Spear.

Fran's thong in my face every time I go down a flight of stairs.

The only thing I could say I truly dislike about FFXII is how the story fell apart because of Matsuno's departure:

Despite that, the gambit system makes the game my second favourite of that generation (the first is Melee).

You are likely using them wrong: Espers are not meant to be WMDs that cost a shitton of MP (that's what Quickenings are for), but rather as meatshields and manafonts. What you should do when summoning a Esper is to divert the enemy's attention to them while you syphon their mana pool like crazy. That way you prepare yourself in order to unleash Quickenings and Concurrences or to buff yourself up with extra status upgrades.

Forty year old gruff war veteran would have been amazing. The lack thereof fills me with sad.

Hint: It's Basch. He was supposed to be the main character originally.

Guns ignore defense and player attack power always doing exactly the same amount of damage. This makes them the best weapon on a low level play through, and allows Balthier (if you leave him with them) to do more damage than the rest of the party for a few levels at every shopping trip. In general, though, I agree.

They actually all had pretty different base stats, and if you're just using them with no attention paid to those base stats, you really aren't doing them service.

For instance--Basch should never ever ever be a mage, as his magic stats are gorram terrible, and Fran should only melee with a katana, as that katanas rely on magical attack power for their damage. Speaking of, don't give Basch or Balthier a katana.

You had a lot of room to alter things, and you really COULD make anyone a mage or warrior, but to do so and ignore their inherent stats and what they're best at just ends up making you weaker in the end.

Edit: Fuck Basch and Vaan. Balthier is the only main character forever and ever.

This.

Everyone keeps saying FFXII had a terrible main character, and I just end up telling them they're confused as to who the main character is.

I actually like that everyone can learn every magick. This way you have more flexibility regarding healing.

The Fomalhaut (best gun in the game) can be pretty devastating even during the endgame. The only reason guns may be looked as bad is that the number of armourless enemies ramps up a little during the later dungeons, which hinders their inherent abilities. That's why your gun-user, if you have one, should probably multitask as a support unit.

Let's not have this discussion again, please. Balthier should get his own spin-off!

Nah, man, we need "The Adventures of Cid and Venat", detailing all their craaaaazy hijinks.


Actually, now that I think on it, I have another problem with the game. The English version replaced Matsuno's Queen reference with internet slang. I mean really, what the fuck.

It did bug me how I thought, I should specialize them! Then I got all the license for everyone anyway. Also, Balthier was kinda like Snake to Vaan's Raiden. He was so awesome it hurt.

You know that's funny, it's pretty clear to me that Vaan was there as a kind of obligatory young dude, and as soon as you meet Ashe he fades into the background and Ashe becomes the main character. All this talk about Basch and Baltheir is totally missing the point - it's Ashe who has the special destiny and makes the decisions that Change The Fate Of The World. Whenever Vaan talks I'm thinking "dude you're still here? Okay then." or "Please don't have a forced 'n formulaic romance with Ashe please don't romance please please please" AND HE DOESN'T! THANK GOD!

I really liked it and no Vaan/Ashe impressed the hell out of me.

Also, those dudes who speak in meter? I loved those dudes.