Is it just me, or do the enemies lack variety?

I mean, I could swear that the variety of enemies was much more vast in previous FF's. In this one the enemies are pretty much the same all the way through. Behemoth, dog, soldier, flan, pulsework soldier, dragonbird, owlbatthing, etc. Sure, there were a lot of types of each species, but overall I can't think of more than 20 or so different species of enemies that easily, at least not off the top of my head. Didn't previous FF's have so many more? Or is it just me?

EDIT: Admittedly these ones were a lot more realistic. No ghosts, no floating cards, etc.

They had a bit of both really. The older ones had a lot of variations of the same...but they had a lot of species to variate from. FFXIII does lack variety in its enemies, but there are very few location changes, and its the same enemies throughout each location, so it's easy to see why.

They should have added more though

XII didn't have very many either.

However, unlike XII, XIII's bosses aren't repeated over and over. In XII many of the bosses were either recycled from a previous boss, or a regular enemy, or both.

Its not so much the lack of variety that bothers me its the design of the enemies. Some range from passable to downright ugly. The Behemoth is the only one I'm truly impressed with. The rest should have been scrapped.

This is nothing new for the FF series! FFX was also heavily guilty of this.

Yeah, it seems like there is about 20 slight variations of only a dozen or so main types of monsters. It sure seems like some other FFs had a bunch more variety.

Pretty sure there's a dozen palette variations of FF6 enemies too.

This has always been the norm really but what's changed is the number of enemies. there are usually something like 200 hundred different enemies in older titles but starting with the 3D ones, that number has dropped significantly. I think X was the first one where I really noticed how there were only something like 20 designs and about 5 to 6 variations between each design. Mostly because the monster arena makes you go looking for all of them.

I make it a variety of about 51 different monster species in FFXII

I won't stop until everyone <3 XII :D

I was just thinking this while I was playing last night. I wish there was more variety in enemies, I mean I know FFX was definately guilty of recycling enemies and stuff but I don't think it was anywhere near as bad. Like in FFXIII you come across several different groups of the same enemy consecutively, which can be quite tedious :(

I just took a quick look through a FFVII bestiary and I got to 100 distinct enemies, and I am only half way through.

It is always so disappointing to walk into an exciting new area and stumble into a recycled enemy you have already killed dozens of times before.

I was expecting XII to have significantly more, but flipping through the bestiaries of the XII and XIII official guides, the two games actually have a comparable number of physically unique "base designs" for generic enemies, somewhere in the 50-60 range (depending on how you count the PSICOM/Sanctum/Corps and Imperial soldiers in the two games).

EDIT: XII has significantly more uniquely named enemies because of the marks.

As a personal observation, the way the base designs could be grouped might make XIII feel like it has fewer. XII is oriented more toward wild creatures which can vary greatly as far as their combat styles and roles go, whereas XIII has a lot of enemies that serve the same thematic purpose: soldiers, mechs, C'ieth, Pulsework constructs, etc.

XIII's enemies also came off to me as less diverse in terms of combat styles, though perhaps the fact that the AI was handling most of the load could have obscured things a bit.

I agree with the lack of variety! Looks like they had several different versions of each creature, each one more powerful than its predecessor. I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing though, I really like fighting the different kinds of Behemoth :D

I agree with this thread to a point. FFX and XII both had this problem, but I really noticed it in X. XII and XIII were hardly noticeable to me, but I know it was there. I guess what I'm saying is we need to bring back random battles with a great variety of enemies. No "two games in a row where the main sidequests are Hunting missions."

I just find non-Random battles to be more annoying than anything.

I actually enjoy Mark Hunts, my problem with how they've been dealt with is that SE has made them the primary "optional" content. A few optional dungeons, an annoying mini-game to belittle or two, as well as just a bit of extra content to spice things up should go hand in hand with the Mark System. The Mark Hunt system only feels weak when its the games main attraction. Yet I still feel its a good system cause genuinely these optional boss battles allow the player to really play with the battle system more and get the most out of it.

My other issue with the Mark System is that I feel if your going to have it, don't leave it until the end. I feel it worked well in XII cause I could sign up for some optional battles and do them on my way to the next story point. Leaving them til almost the end like X and XIII did just makes the system feel tacked on and I generally feel cheated cause I have to wait 30+ hours to get to the major game content.

I totally agree with the need for more variety in minigames / sidequests.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

My other issue with the Mark System is that I feel if your going to have it, don't leave it until the end. I feel it worked well in XII cause I could sign up for some optional battles and do them on my way to the next story point. Leaving them til almost the end like X and XIII did just makes the system feel tacked on and I generally feel cheated cause I have to wait 30+ hours to get to the major game content.

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This is my problem with the way it was handled in X and XIII, as opposed to XII.

SE has tried hard with both X and XIII to say that (paraphrased from the XIII official guide): "Spending hours leveling and killing some really tough enemies is even more fun and exciting after the game!" as if this were some sort of absolute truth, but in both cases I've found myself very annoyed with it once I got several hours into this post-game grind.

Perhaps such a setup could be done well, but my personal feelings are that what is left for the post game in X and XIII offers to little reward/satisfaction for the time invested. If I'm going to double the amount of time I spend on the game after the main story is done, then I'd like the second half of that time to be as entertaining as the first half, and for me it's not even close.

With XII [as well as VII (chocobo racing et al), VIII (card game), IX (card game)] the ability to do the sidequests during the story may dilute the experience, but at least it presents some consistency rather than having 95% of the fun packed into the first 50% of the game.

ALSO: I was disappointed in the variety of the Marks in XIII. XII had "unique" marks, which, even if they used the same models as other creatures, usually had stats and abilities that made them special in some way. It seemed a majority of XIII's marks were actually just regular Pulsian baddies, most of which you would have outleveled had you only just started hunting Marks in the post game.

The enemies are about as variant as FFX's were...

It would be nice to see more monsters, but it doesn't really bother me.

This has nothing to do with the topic, but is still of high importance.

What the hell Omni-odin? You never beat IV?! Blasphemous! Go. Right now. Download a rom or something.

They do lack variety! I feel like I've been fighting the same monsters more or less throughout the game, though...it doesn't really bother me too much.

But it made me laugh that in Chapter 11 (SPOILER)the flan upgraded to pudding with more teeth, that was just amusing :lol:

The only two games where I've noticed this is FFX and FFVI.

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Originally Posted by Loony BoB

Admittedly these ones were a lot more realistic.

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Yeah, like gooey flan things with sirens on their heads, they're totally believable as a... some sort of.. cyborg dessert (cyborg dessert janitors no less!) :D

I think it's just your typical "HD game" issue that the developers have been talking about, where game development is just so complex now that they can't go into that level of detail any more. It's taken them so long to get just this far, that if they'd spent even more time creating a huge variety of monsters, cities, having an airship etc etc then we'd still be waiting for it in 2015.

More realistic than being attacked by a gun-toting house.

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Originally Posted by Loony BoB

More realistic than being attacked by a gun-toting house.

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I saw one of those on the way back from work the other day. I just ducked my head and kept walking by, luckily it wasn't interested in me.


Sure a lot of models they used in the older games were less physically feasible, but in a game with 'fantasy' in the title I don't think realistic should be a selling point. I remember back when they weren't afraid to stick a little fun and levity into their games.

Something I'm not against if it's the only difference between variety or, well, distinct lack of variety. I don't see why they can't find a happy balance between realistic and varied, though, rather than recycling so many enemies throughout the game. I can understand a few enemies having variations and all that, but all through the game? Urgh. There were enemies I was fighting in the early stages that were pretty much identical to the ones I was fighting right at the end of the game, and that, to me, isn't good enough. Not saying it makes the game bad, but it is something that I feel they should have done better on. I don't think designing the mere look of a few enemies (even if the overall end result was the same) to replace "recylced" enemies would have caused a full year's delay.

I totally agree with this one. It's like the next level and I'm like... I'm fighitng this gooey things again? I'm fighting these soldiers... again? etc. etc. The game would have been more interesting if the monsters were different. If this is the price for HD, then I'd rather go back to the crappy graphics, lol.

And that's an interesting point - I bet if they did something based around the FF7/8/9 era (or even the SNES era) and didn't worry so much about epic graphics, it'd be awesome. Come on, let's have an FF Classic series of games, and I don't mean yet more remakes or half-arsed efforts like the modern Nintendo stuff.

Just wait, FFXIX will be released in Mega Man 10 style.

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Originally Posted by Cloudane

And that's an interesting point - I bet if they did something based around the FF7/8/9 era (or even the SNES era) and didn't worry so much about epic graphics, it'd be awesome. Come on, let's have an FF Classic series of games, and I don't mean yet more remakes or half-arsed efforts like the modern Nintendo stuff.

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That is totally true, but sadly a lot of people nowadays go for graphics and magazines would round on it for that very reason. It is a sad state of affairs when Graphics are rated as high as gameplay or story.

Yes indeed :(

I don't care much for realism either. It's a fantasy. "Oh we don't do an overworld map and steerable airships any more, the scale is unrealistic" - who cares?! It worked for 9 Final Fantasies before it! Gimme!

I noticed there are a few interesting enemies dotted through cutscenes that would have been nice to fight.

I for one am sick of fighting flans and wolves, and though i <3 behemoths, even these are massively over-used. There used to be inspiration in their enemies, now the lazy buggers are spending too much time on decorating rocks

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Originally Posted by Shin Gouken

I noticed there are a few interesting enemies dotted through cutscenes that would have been nice to fight.

I for one am sick of fighting flans and wolves, and though i <3 behemoths, even these are massively over-used. There used to be inspiration in their enemies, now the lazy buggers are spending too much time on decorating rocks

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Yes, I hope they learn for the next Final Fantasy