Post by: TMW on November 23, 2005, 10:35:25 PM
And...I have to say....I'm gonna break down and buy a PS2.
At first, I was a little concerned about the newest in the FF series. "Simulating an MMORPG you say? Returning to Ivalice for the THIRD TIME? The male lead being prettier than the female lead?"
Well...its not all that bad. The battle system has been majorly tweaked so it "resembles" a MMORPG of sorts...but, I realized at its core, its still an ATB system like the previous FF games. You walk up in the aggro range of the monster, and the battle starts (although you can start a battle outside of the aggro radius, if you so desire). You tell your character to attack, and a little meter goes up, and once it's full they do whatever you told them too, kinda like ATB in reverse. Now, the only thing I could say against it is that once you confirm you want to melee attack, your character will keep attacking. Like, you hit attack once, the meter fills, Vaan attacks, and then the meter starts to fill again with no further action from you, and will continue to do so until you tell it otherwise.
However, you can cancel any command and change it out at any time...say, belay the attack order and use a potion.
There are also two modes...active and wait. Wait bascially pauses the game when you open the command menu and gives you time to think, and active does what you'd think it does (namely, not wait). I don't really have a preference between the two, although Active is more fun, I'd say.
The other two characters in your party do pretty well by themselves. They attack what you attack (mostly), heal you when you need to be healed (mostly), and can heal themsevles when they need it (mostly). You can butt in and give them a command at any time you wish, but they do pretty well by themselves.
All in all...I liked it. The measly two "missions" just barely whetted my appetite, and I found myself playing throught the demos a second time. And, I'll probably play them a third when I go back to my friends house.
But, it may not be for everyone. Tycho at PA had some strong words against it, in his "If you don't like what I like, you must be broken" way of speaking...and actually thats all I've heard about it from elsewhere.
What are your thoughts? Also, if anyone else has played it, I'd like to hear your impressions as well.
Post by: Artimus on November 24, 2005, 03:29:10 AM
Post by: KDR_11k on November 24, 2005, 04:29:39 AM
100 Hours doesn't sound good in this case, it's supposed to be very NES-like, i.e. include a LOT of levelgrind. Play Baldur's Gate or something, just as long but no stupid grinding.
Post by: KnowsNothing on November 24, 2005, 05:45:31 AM
Post by: KDR_11k on November 24, 2005, 08:41:51 AM
Post by: couchmonkey on November 24, 2005, 10:52:45 AM
Post by: ruby_onix on November 24, 2005, 01:16:02 PM
That's just wrong.
Post by: TMW on November 24, 2005, 01:25:55 PM
Heh...don't mind me. I'm just being obtuse.
===
I dunno...Thats kind of the reason I got Dragon Quest VIII. Its old school RPGing at its finest, you know? Grinding is a part of that equation, man.
Post by: KDR_11k on November 25, 2005, 04:12:38 AM
couchmonkey: How long do "a few levels" take? You could play Diablo 2 for hours without gaining a level.
Post by: couchmonkey on November 25, 2005, 04:32:11 AM
My wild guess is that the worst section of the game required an hour or so of grinding, and a typical section required maybe 20-30 minutes. I do agree that grinding is a bad thing, and by today's standards you shouldn't have to do it very much. But if it comes down to spending 20 extra minutes to get into a new cave, I can handle that. Well, kinda - I don't really have time for 100 hour games anymore, so even if I don't mind the grinding, it might stop me from ever finishing the game.
Post by: TMW on November 25, 2005, 06:11:33 AM
If you really want, go start a topic elsewhere about the evils of level grinding, and you can bitch there.
Post by: Galford on November 25, 2005, 07:29:29 PM
Dragon Quest sells a million+ copies each sequel because it has the name Dragon Quest attached to it.
One could say the same about Final Fantasy, but at least FF changes it's battle system each time around.
Post by: nitsu niflheim on November 26, 2005, 03:54:22 PM
I want to be able to run away from the enemy and stay where I go when I let go of the stick (where no action has been taken) so I can "safely" use an item. Sort of like the way it was in Star Ocean: Till the End of Time.
Because trying to select a phoenix down to revive a character and your character just runs back to the enemy to be killed is kind of not fun. I'm all for a system that is fast and free but I don't want poor design to make a game difficult because of it.
Post by: Pale on November 28, 2005, 10:57:21 AM
Post by: Darkheart on November 28, 2005, 11:52:27 AM
Post by: BlkPaladin on December 01, 2005, 01:23:08 AM
).
Post by: Pale on December 01, 2005, 04:43:56 AM
This has been discusses quite a bit at places and many are holding out hopes that the missions were set up only for sake of the demo. We'll see what happens when it actually comes out.
Post by: vudu on March 08, 2006, 11:06:21 AM
Post by: stevey on March 08, 2006, 11:25:17 AM
100+ hour of gameplay
40/40
come out right before next-gen sytem release
What dose that sound like...
Post by: capamerica on March 08, 2006, 01:11:43 PM
Hopefully Zelda will come out well before it so as soon as I'm done with Zelda I can look forward to FFXII.
Post by: KDR_11k on March 08, 2006, 07:25:24 PM
Personally I don't give much of a damn about Final Fantasy, the battle system is usually pretty boring and stupid.
Post by: Pale on March 09, 2006, 03:20:11 AM
I have since played the demo and I had no issues with it other than the fact that it was mission based. The battle system was quite interesting. The best part, imo, was the scale of the bosses. The fact that you are actually standing at their feet makes such a big difference. So many doubters, I just don't really get it. Change isn't always bad.
Post by: KDR_11k on March 09, 2006, 05:01:46 AM
Post by: mantidor on March 09, 2006, 05:42:17 AM
Post by: KDR_11k on March 09, 2006, 06:41:23 AM
Post by: vudu on March 09, 2006, 08:01:24 AM
QuoteAren't you the guy who likes FFXI?
Originally posted by: Pale
The battle system was quite interesting.)
Post by: NinGurl69 *huggles on March 09, 2006, 08:21:28 AM
