Loony BoB
06-28-2023, 02:38 PM
Protagonist: Clive doesn't stand out compared to other protagonists in my mind as iconic in any way whatsoever. But the more I think about him, the more I feel he was done so very, very, very well. Perhaps he is one of the best of all time, like some are saying? For me, I value there being something that sets a character apart and makes me remember them, and I'm not sure Clive really has that. His troutty name doesn't help (I loved it when he was mocked for his name by a character, I feel like someone out there was acknowledging how generic it sounded compared to the dramatic names of the past). xD But genuinely, he was well done. His voice actor was excellent, his dialogue was excellent. He didn't have much that made him memorable, but perhaps that is a little mastery from the writers in their own right in some way. Very generic, in so many ways, and yet the generic was done so perfectly.
NPCs: By which I mean the random ones scattered around the world. They all evolved with the storyline and had minor development given to some of them, too. It was really well done. This was the best payoff for exploration in the game, discovering NPCs and finding out what they had to say at one moment, and then what they said next time you walked by. Impressively done. Every time I did anything in the Hideaway that involved the progression of the MSQ, I'd walk around the Hideaway listening to what every NPC had to say. I did similar in the various towns when things relevant to either the entire world or the specific town happened. It was always worthwhile. I honestly feel like of all the parts of the game, this was actually the most well done. Not as important? Sure. But nailed it? 100% score for me. Effort was given and it shows.
Dialogue: For the majority of the game, the writing was superb. The characters felt real, they spoke like real people do, they flirted, joked, swore, got nervous, got excited, expressed all their emotions, it was generally well done. Notable characters had their own personality/background and they spoke accordingly to it.
Overarching Plot: I liked this. I felt like it worked really well. There might have been moments I felt it lacked but overall, the world plot was excellent.
Major Battles: Titan vs. Shiva, Phoenix vs. Ifrit, Clive/Ifrit vs. Benedikta/Garuda, Clive/Ifrit vs. Hugo/Titan, Brothers/Ifrit/Phoenix vs. Bahamut.
All of these battles will, without doubt in my mind, go down amongst the very best battles in FF history. They go up there with Bahamut vs.Louisoix, Bahamut vs. Alexander, FFVII Protags vs. Sephiroth and the final battle in Crisis Core for me.
Battle System: Simple and complex at the same time, and with room to play it how you like it. It was a bit easy the way I played, because I didn't feel the payoff of removing auto-combo and auto-dodge offered enough change and excitement to qualify the loss of cinematic value, but over time the fights did indeed get tougher and there were even a few times I carelessly died (comet chocobo, behemoth, and stupidly to the big dude right before Ultima warps us away in Stonehyrr he was at 1% HP because I stubbornly resist using consumables in - well, pretty much every game I play, really.
Some Villains: Benedikta, Hugo, Annabelle, even the Emperor were all really, really good villains. Ultima was okay. Barnabas was severely lacking. But the good ones outweighed the bad ones for me, I loved them or hated them and both options are excellent in my opinion. Give me a villain I want to either fix or kill and I'm a very, very happy gamer. As opposed to thinking "oh well, the game says I have to fight this guy, let's get it over with." Barnabas was that for me, and Ultima had moments of it, but the others were all people I genuinely wanted to bring down and I really appreciate that.
Companions: For most of this game I was thinking this was really, really lacking - and in some ways when I compare it to other Final Fantasy games it still is. But that's because Final Fantasy's strongest points in many of it's games are the companions we travel with, so it's a very, very high standard in my mind. But comparing the game with some other FFs and many other games, I feel like overall the companion cast did well. I think they could have done a lot more with a couple of them (hi, Jill, who was seemingly cast purely as a love interest and little else by the end of the game), but I still liked them. And the others were genuinely great. Even the minor companions, for lack of a better word for them - from Tarja and Charon through to very minor part players in Edda, Medicine Girl (I forget the name, starts with K) and Ember... they all still worked nicely.
Sidequest story content: Very specifically the story value, not the gameplay value. The story value of the sidequests for me was top tier, although a few naturally ended up not being as good as the others, overall they offered notable lore/character value when going through them, and that's what I really want from any good sidequest.
Music: I'll admit, I don't remember any particular tunes in the game. It doesn't win for iconic value there. But it does win for never feeling out of place or off, and I do remember the music quality being excellent regardless of whether or not I remember any songs off-hand. I stand firm in the camp of "voice acting lessens video game music" but it's a price I'm happy to pay for the quality voice acting we got throughout. Speaking of...
Voice acting: Perfect. Everyone. Never felt out of place.
Grit: Damn, man, they only shoved our face into the mud and dragged us through it for 30 hours before we got a single ray of sunshine. This was Game of Thrones level of grit for sure.
Graphics, cinematics, etc: Goes without saying, really. But I'll put it in anyway.
Tomes/Vivian: The ability to watch how things progress over time and to read up on the lore. There was a lot to take in at times, and this was an excellent way to go over things without having to have the game shove it down my throat (although they did that anyway with a lot of things, ha). The state of the realm thing was also superb in helping people see the big picture. Both of these character-driven systems deserve a lot of credit. Bonus points for the little sprite animations as Clive tells Tomes about the latest happenings. :D
NPCs: By which I mean the random ones scattered around the world. They all evolved with the storyline and had minor development given to some of them, too. It was really well done. This was the best payoff for exploration in the game, discovering NPCs and finding out what they had to say at one moment, and then what they said next time you walked by. Impressively done. Every time I did anything in the Hideaway that involved the progression of the MSQ, I'd walk around the Hideaway listening to what every NPC had to say. I did similar in the various towns when things relevant to either the entire world or the specific town happened. It was always worthwhile. I honestly feel like of all the parts of the game, this was actually the most well done. Not as important? Sure. But nailed it? 100% score for me. Effort was given and it shows.
Dialogue: For the majority of the game, the writing was superb. The characters felt real, they spoke like real people do, they flirted, joked, swore, got nervous, got excited, expressed all their emotions, it was generally well done. Notable characters had their own personality/background and they spoke accordingly to it.
Overarching Plot: I liked this. I felt like it worked really well. There might have been moments I felt it lacked but overall, the world plot was excellent.
Major Battles: Titan vs. Shiva, Phoenix vs. Ifrit, Clive/Ifrit vs. Benedikta/Garuda, Clive/Ifrit vs. Hugo/Titan, Brothers/Ifrit/Phoenix vs. Bahamut.
All of these battles will, without doubt in my mind, go down amongst the very best battles in FF history. They go up there with Bahamut vs.Louisoix, Bahamut vs. Alexander, FFVII Protags vs. Sephiroth and the final battle in Crisis Core for me.
Battle System: Simple and complex at the same time, and with room to play it how you like it. It was a bit easy the way I played, because I didn't feel the payoff of removing auto-combo and auto-dodge offered enough change and excitement to qualify the loss of cinematic value, but over time the fights did indeed get tougher and there were even a few times I carelessly died (comet chocobo, behemoth, and stupidly to the big dude right before Ultima warps us away in Stonehyrr he was at 1% HP because I stubbornly resist using consumables in - well, pretty much every game I play, really.
Some Villains: Benedikta, Hugo, Annabelle, even the Emperor were all really, really good villains. Ultima was okay. Barnabas was severely lacking. But the good ones outweighed the bad ones for me, I loved them or hated them and both options are excellent in my opinion. Give me a villain I want to either fix or kill and I'm a very, very happy gamer. As opposed to thinking "oh well, the game says I have to fight this guy, let's get it over with." Barnabas was that for me, and Ultima had moments of it, but the others were all people I genuinely wanted to bring down and I really appreciate that.
Companions: For most of this game I was thinking this was really, really lacking - and in some ways when I compare it to other Final Fantasy games it still is. But that's because Final Fantasy's strongest points in many of it's games are the companions we travel with, so it's a very, very high standard in my mind. But comparing the game with some other FFs and many other games, I feel like overall the companion cast did well. I think they could have done a lot more with a couple of them (hi, Jill, who was seemingly cast purely as a love interest and little else by the end of the game), but I still liked them. And the others were genuinely great. Even the minor companions, for lack of a better word for them - from Tarja and Charon through to very minor part players in Edda, Medicine Girl (I forget the name, starts with K) and Ember... they all still worked nicely.
Sidequest story content: Very specifically the story value, not the gameplay value. The story value of the sidequests for me was top tier, although a few naturally ended up not being as good as the others, overall they offered notable lore/character value when going through them, and that's what I really want from any good sidequest.
Music: I'll admit, I don't remember any particular tunes in the game. It doesn't win for iconic value there. But it does win for never feeling out of place or off, and I do remember the music quality being excellent regardless of whether or not I remember any songs off-hand. I stand firm in the camp of "voice acting lessens video game music" but it's a price I'm happy to pay for the quality voice acting we got throughout. Speaking of...
Voice acting: Perfect. Everyone. Never felt out of place.
Grit: Damn, man, they only shoved our face into the mud and dragged us through it for 30 hours before we got a single ray of sunshine. This was Game of Thrones level of grit for sure.
Graphics, cinematics, etc: Goes without saying, really. But I'll put it in anyway.
Tomes/Vivian: The ability to watch how things progress over time and to read up on the lore. There was a lot to take in at times, and this was an excellent way to go over things without having to have the game shove it down my throat (although they did that anyway with a lot of things, ha). The state of the realm thing was also superb in helping people see the big picture. Both of these character-driven systems deserve a lot of credit. Bonus points for the little sprite animations as Clive tells Tomes about the latest happenings. :D