Is it any good? Very FF-ish? How does it compare?
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Is it any good? Very FF-ish? How does it compare?
Apparently it's good, but I lack the EGGS BAWKS to back up that claim.
It's a pretty solid game. I enjoyed the storyline more than most RPGs these days and it's superior, in my eyes anyway, to recent Final Fantasy games. The game itself is beautiful to look at and the voice acting is actually pretty good. The writing is simply amazing, especially all of the dream sequences. The ending was also satisfying, unlike most RPGs in general.
Overall, it is worth playing if you're into RPGs and you have the Eggs Bawks.
I have it. I havn't put much effort into playing it though. I'm about to list it on ebay.
I'm actually working on playing through a second time right now. It's easily one of the best RPGs I've played in a good long time, and I recommend it above almost any other RPG on the market right now.
I never felt as if the game was too much like any particular Final Fantasy. It's missing a lot of the staples of the series, obviously, but there will inevitably be similarities. It still is, after all, a Sakaguchi game. The setting is certainly what you'd expect of Sakaguchi--the steampunk blend of technology and magic which permeates through much of the Final Fantasy series. The music is some of Nobuo's best, and to hear many of the tracks of orchestrated (as far as I can remember, this is the first Nobuo-only soundtrack to received such treatment) is wonderful.
Bunny has pretty much covered the other aspects of the game. Some people don't seem to like A Thousand Years of Dreams because it can be a bit of reading, but I found that it was fantastically well written (or in this case, translated), and added an emotional depth to the game that almost every other one lacks. It also manages to deal with a lot of questions that stories frequently try to address; what does it mean to live and die being the most relevant as half the cast of playable characters are immortal. I believe A Thousand Years of Dreams shows the evolution of the characters without forcing in-your-face character development moments which more often than not come off as contrived and cheap as a result.
That's not to say it's not without its faults. The battle system uses a new method of enforcing the use of a front and back row which has been accused of being imbalanced in favor of the enemy. That's never bothered me too much, but the inability to remove enemy buffs before they cast them can become extremely frustrating during certain notable boss fights. Commands are inputted at the beginning of each round, and you can't remove buffs that don't exist, so even if you know the boss will open up with a certain ability which will grant him annoying protections, you can't have one of your characters ready to dispel the effect in question ahead of time (as your casters are invariably slower than the enemies). There's other minor frustrations, but nothing that I can think of as coming close to breaking the game.
Anyway, it's hands down the best JRPG on the Xbox 360. At this point, I'd say it's hands down the best JRPG this generation--not that it has an awful lot of competition at this point. I really don't expect either Last Remnant or Eternal Undiscovery to top it. I don't have the highest hopes for FFXIII, either, but I'll reserve judgment on that for now. If you have the Xbox 360 (and I assume you do, otherwise there wouldn't be much reason to ask the question), you'd be doing yourself a huge favor by getting it.
I absolutely loved this game. It has some aspects of it that are very reminiscent of the older Final Fantasy games. Two of the characters are almost exact replicas of Palom and Porom, but they have enough of a variety to make them stand out and unique as well. Also, the being immortal aspect of the game really makes things interesting, as well as being able to learn abilities from all the mortals in your party. I really recommend picking this up if possible.
yozwers! It sounds like I'm GOING to have to get an EGGS BAWKS soon!
(Hillariously, I had no idea what an "eggs bawks" was the first few posts and assumed it had something to do with Chocobo eggs!)
Oh yes, that bit, too. Mortals learn skills as they level up, and immortals learn skills by linking to a mortal and learning a skill that mortal already knows. Immortals have higher base stats than mortals, so once they learn a skill they can usually put it to better use than the mortal they learned it from. Alternatively, they can learn skills from accessories. I loved this part of the game because it allowed customization of your characters without ever feeling completely broken and while maintaining something of a pseudo-set job system (the variation in stats amongst the immortals are good enough that although you can teach the main character all the magic in the world, he'll usually suck with it). It does begin to lend a bit towards micromanaging, especially in the latter half of the game when you'll be learning a new ability almost every battle and have to switch accessories/links repeatedly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Magixion
YouTube - Nintendo sarsaparillacube Review
Where it stemmed from. @ 0:51
lawl,just got changed in the swearfilter.
It's fun. I enjoyed it far more than FFXII, that's for sure.
The only real flaw is how far it pushes the console. The load times are ridiculous, including battle load times (I'm talking in the 20 second range at times), the cut scenes framerate drops severly quite often (ala MGS3), and every now and then it'll decide to freeze on you during a loading screen right after an epic battle. I know it wasn't just mine either...just google about it and you'll find hundreds of pages of these complaints about it. Oh, and it has the worst packaging of any game ever (three discs shoved on top of each other then the fourth shoved in with the booklet).
But aside of all that, the game itself is great.
Odd, I never had any of the problems you described. I can agree with the packaging thing though, that was kinda lame of them.
I watched it played over a friends house and I was in love with it the second I saw 5 members in the party. Hell 4+ would have had me hooked, 5 won me over completely.
Now I just need an X-Box so I can play this. Oh how I've longed for a true Sakaguchi game.
I don't really have much interest in it. Aside from being on a console I really don't want to buy, I haven't heard too many things about it that thrill me.
Still, I have to give Sakaguchi props for making the exact sort of game that he wants to make on the console he wants to make it on when changing both would probably have resulted in higher sales. It's refreshing to know that there are some developers that still have extensive creative control like that.
EDIT: Yes, I am aware that this line of thinking is exceedingly naive and that the much more likely reason for developing solely for the 360 is that M$ is footing the bill. A man can dream.
I've got it, haven't played much yet... most likely because I've... I donno, been there done that.
So until I get tired of DMC4, GTAIV, SSBB and SCIV... I'll pick it up some more when I feel like it =]