Criticize this game!

We've got this sort of thread going in some other FF subforums so I thought it was high time we had one for the single most overrated game in the entire FF franchise, FFTactics!

Let's discuss how thoroughly mediocre it is, how SRPGs were better off without it, how completely boring and unfun it is, and why so many deluded people think this is a good game when they could be playing Vandal Hearts or Tactics Ogre or Front Mission or anything by NIS or anything on the PC side of things like X-Com or Jagged Alliance or who even knows.

:jess:

I am MILF. I live in a Bizarro World in which FFT and IX are crap and FFX deserves to have its dick sucked constantly for being such a masterpiece of gaming achievement. :colbert:

I'll be honest, I've never actually played Tactics - much to my dismay, as I completely trust people like Del when they say it is awesome - but knowing that you dislike a game makes me assume you are wrong. ;)

So sod off, Hux. :colbert:

I've never played tactics, but I'd love to play it.

My two issues with the game is some of the game balance is off, the fact monsters and random encounter humans level with your party but storyline ones don't ultimately means that just trying to grind for a few high skills will have the untimely consequence of making the game both ridiculously easy and harder at the same time if you don't know what you are doing.

My second issue is that the game suffers from the same problem with any game that has huge amounts of customization, which is that often simplicity is way better than more elaborate builds. The game isn't terribly difficult once you know what you are doing and equipment and levels can often prove to be more important in turning the tide of battle than specific skillset builds. Why bother with the Ninja class when the early Knight class is pretty damn lethal throughout the whole game? Why should I stat min/max when just trying to farm some Excalibur's is more than enough to make everything in the game my bitch? This all comes back to some of the balancing issues I mentioned, and I will freely admit that I don't play the late game meta game of trying to build ultimate parties cause who cares when there is nothing worthy to give it a challenge? If there was a ever a game that seriously needed online versus mode, it was this game.

Other than that, I love the game and Milf... You're just crazy.

Where to begin...

Well, let's start with something I haven't criticised recently. The graphics. This game is aesthetically dull. It's not "dark", it's not "serious", it's boring. Oh, it can do dark and serious at times, and do it quite well. Usually in a one minute cutscene of the villains. But, for the majority, it's just brown and grey and more brown. There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless. Colors are muted and landscapes are dull. There is no hint, anywhere, that anyone actually lives in this bloody world.

And it's not a result of war, don't give me that lame excuse. Go back and take a look at the War of the Roses, and you'll see that those people used color all the damn time. Outfits, banners, signs... Armies were things of vibrancy and life, even as they were slaughtering each other. Even the bloody spells in this game looked muted. Lightning is pretty much the only thing that has any glow to it, and I'm convinced that's only because they couldn't find a way to make it brown. It's hard to believe that there is anyone living in Ivalice when the entire world, even the bustling cities, looks like something lifted from Call of Duty or Quake.



Next up, the JP system. My gosh is this thing horrible. The amount of JP rewarded per the amount required for most abilities even in a single job is absolutely ridiculous. The absurd rate of acquisition practically forces grinding, and doesn't at all suit either the progression of the story or any natural progression for characters.

It also doesn't help that the game's balance and progression are all out of whack anyway. Getting more gear is far, far more important than gaining levels or abilities, due to the way level matching is done. The Charge system completely breaks magic use up until you get Calculators (which are pretty game breaking themselves).


The Zodiac compatability system is ridiculous and does nothing to aid strategy.


The Faith/Bravery system is too easily min/maxed, and extremely overcomplicated.


Since you guys have read some of my recent posts on those issues, I left them brief. Plus its getting late. But I'll get back to you with more of this game's many, many flaws later.

There's also the mentioned factors like availability and knowledge. Had people did this, bought that, found out about this or that?

What they were doing at the time in general. Every person had their own tastes too and we can appeal to only so many. I hate to be generalistic but I know people who don't like Goldeneye because you could only play it in first person. ;)

I'm going to disagree with you on the graphics I loved the way the game looked and it's associated color pallet Seeing as this is personal preference I don't think this makes a good debate point, but I will throw that out there.

As for the JP system forcing 'grinding', I think that is a matter of semantics. In a game like FFT the battles are the meat of the game, and I would argue that fighting random battles is considered part of the gameplay. It only becomes grinding when you are using extremely repetitive strategies to maximize JP earned. (Which people do do, but they also grind in every other game.) I don't think that the game forces you to fight several random battles for every story battle is actually a knock against the game though, I see these random battles as just as much gameplay as the story ones.

I'll leave the others points that have seen discussion at greater length.

BAD GRAPHICS! HOW COULD ANYONE PLAY THIS GAME? COD IS MUCH BETTER.



But to be serious, I have nothing bad to say about this game.

Okay, I know I said I wasn't go to comment on anyone's actual criticism cause that's the whole point of this thread, but I just can't help pick out this point...

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Where to begin...

Well, let's start with something I haven't criticised recently. The graphics. This game is aesthetically dull. It's not "dark", it's not "serious", it's boring. Oh, it can do dark and serious at times, and do it quite well. Usually in a one minute cutscene of the villains. But, for the majority, it's just brown and grey and more brown. There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless. Colors are muted and landscapes are dull. There is no hint, anywhere, that anyone actually lives in this bloody world.

And it's not a result of war, don't give me that lame excuse. Go back and take a look at the War of the Roses, and you'll see that those people used color all the damn time. Outfits, banners, signs... Armies were things of vibrancy and life, even as they were slaughtering each other. Even the bloody spells in this game looked muted. Lightning is pretty much the only thing that has any glow to it, and I'm convinced that's only because they couldn't find a way to make it brown. It's hard to believe that there is anyone living in Ivalice when the entire world, even the bustling cities, looks like something lifted from Call of Duty or Quake.

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You do realize that the flashy colors and the outfits proved to be a detriment to the French right? The flashy outfits easily allowed English Longbow men to spot Captains and other high ranking officers easily from their troops and be targeted and killed. I mean the War of the Roses is partially why military uniforms changed to be more universal and bland. Hell, even the Revolutionary War had the British Redcoats having trouble not getting easily spotted by Rebel forces and sniped. So flashy exotic colors are not exactly a plus in a military setting.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Where to begin...

Well, let's start with something I haven't criticised recently. The graphics. This game is aesthetically dull. It's not "dark", it's not "serious", it's boring. Oh, it can do dark and serious at times, and do it quite well. Usually in a one minute cutscene of the villains. But, for the majority, it's just brown and grey and more brown. There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless. Colors are muted and landscapes are dull. There is no hint, anywhere, that anyone actually lives in this bloody world.

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Two words, Akihiko Yoshida.

So we aren't supposed to discuss any of the criticisms? I feel that something like that should have been mentioned in the OP. My bad.

Oh feel free to discuss the criticism, I'm just going to try and avoid discussion cause I'm not terribly in the mood to write walls of text defending a position. Though in terms of the IX version of this thread, I haven't had a chance to do my yearly "why FFX sucks" rant in awhile so that's more theraputic. Feel free to dig in, I'm just telling people I'm graciously bowing out before it gets ugly unless someone says something truly stupid and wrong, then you know damn well I'll be there to rip you a new one... :shifty:

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless.

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You missed the point of the entire game.

J/k, i get it.

This is one of the games me and Wolf more or less agree on, so again, I don't have much to add to myself other than reiterate the balancing is shot to hell.

Also, Matsuno repeated his blunder from Ogre Battle, where he wanted to make a game about complex moral dilemmas but once again ended up being all about zodiac stones and demons. Personally, I think the ending works on the earlier themes beautifully with Delita's path contrasting Ramza's, but I understand why some don't like the ending.

Lastly, I don't think Sakimoto was as successful creating a soundtrack you could tolerate for hours upon hours each play session, unlike Final Fantasy XII.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

You do realize that the flashy colors and the outfits proved to be a detriment to the French right? The flashy outfits easily allowed English Longbow men to spot Captains and other high ranking officers easily from their troops and be targeted and killed. I mean the War of the Roses is partially why military uniforms changed to be more universal and bland. Hell, even the Revolutionary War had the British Redcoats having trouble not getting easily spotted by Rebel forces and sniped. So flashy exotic colors are not exactly a plus in a military setting.

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This didn't change for most people until the early 20th century, really until World War I, and even then there were almost riots in the French Parliament when the discussion of abolishing les pantalons rouge was underway. In the setting FFT equates to there really would need to be a justification for colorless drab armies, because knights and dukes and so forth really really loved their banners and colors and heraldry (and with good reason; when battles descended into melees you needed to be able to tell who was on your side). Furthermore massed archer attacks didn't tend to have the accuracy needed to target individuals (and in this age in many battles the important people were at the front of the charge anyway), though I suppose if you saw a chap who was clearly important you might be inclined to fire in his direction. I don't actually mind FFT's graphics or aesthetic myself but that's one particular issue I wanted to correct. Again it could very reasonably be justified but that doesn't happen, and it really does need to given real-world historical context. Also the War of the Roses was an English civil war, not a fight with France - you may be thinking of the Hundred Years War, where the English with their Longbowmen did indeed annihilate the French knights more than once (Agincourt, Crecy, and Poitiers).

:milsperg:

Also there's nothing wrong with grinding in and of itself, it depends on the gameplay. Grinding in a fun game is still fun, grinding in a boring one is not. This is a boring one.

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

Okay, I know I said I wasn't go to comment on anyone's actual criticism cause that's the whole point of this thread, but I just can't help pick out this point...

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Where to begin...

Well, let's start with something I haven't criticised recently. The graphics. This game is aesthetically dull. It's not "dark", it's not "serious", it's boring. Oh, it can do dark and serious at times, and do it quite well. Usually in a one minute cutscene of the villains. But, for the majority, it's just brown and grey and more brown. There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless. Colors are muted and landscapes are dull. There is no hint, anywhere, that anyone actually lives in this bloody world.

And it's not a result of war, don't give me that lame excuse. Go back and take a look at the War of the Roses, and you'll see that those people used color all the damn time. Outfits, banners, signs... Armies were things of vibrancy and life, even as they were slaughtering each other. Even the bloody spells in this game looked muted. Lightning is pretty much the only thing that has any glow to it, and I'm convinced that's only because they couldn't find a way to make it brown. It's hard to believe that there is anyone living in Ivalice when the entire world, even the bustling cities, looks like something lifted from Call of Duty or Quake.

---

You do realize that the flashy colors and the outfits proved to be a detriment to the French right? The flashy outfits easily allowed English Longbow men to spot Captains and other high ranking officers easily from their troops and be targeted and killed. I mean the War of the Roses is partially why military uniforms changed to be more universal and bland. Hell, even the Revolutionary War had the British Redcoats having trouble not getting easily spotted by Rebel forces and sniped. So flashy exotic colors are not exactly a plus in a military setting.

---

You do realize that brightly colored uniforms stayed in use for several hundred years, well beyond the death of the feudal age, don't you?

You do know that the American Militia, with its lack of brightly colored uniforms, was considered a dishonorable outrage in Britain at the time of the war, even though it made the militia's sniping and hit and run tactics extremely effective, don't you?

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Originally Posted by VeloZero

As for the JP system forcing 'grinding', I think that is a matter of semantics. In a game like FFT the battles are the meat of the game, and I would argue that fighting random battles is considered part of the gameplay. It only becomes grinding when you are using extremely repetitive strategies to maximize JP earned. (Which people do do, but they also grind in every other game.) I don't think that the game forces you to fight several random battles for every story battle is actually a knock against the game though, I see these random battles as just as much gameplay as the story ones.

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Unfortunately, the random encounters are boring, repetitive, unbalanced, and tedious. FFTA and FFTA2 had just as much non-story combat as FFT, except those games did all they could to make it intereseting and fun, instead of just "here's five mobs, go kill". They actually included stories and objectives that made combat outside of the main story something other than a simple, boring, gridfest.

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BAD GRAPHICS! HOW COULD ANYONE PLAY THIS GAME? COD IS MUCH BETTER.

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I love this because I specifically compared this game to COD, as I feel they both draw from the exact same color pallete.

It was incorrect of me to use the word graphics, however, as the term for what I was criticisizing is "aesthetics". The aesthetics of this game were horrible. The graphics were actually brilliant, and served the aesthetics really well. It's just a lousy aesthetic choice. I apologize for my poor word choice. I also puzzle as to why I use it in the first place, when I clearly know it's wrong as I use the correct term, aesthetics, in the very next line. I will blame it on my posting very late at night.

Actually, I do have a graphical complaint, but it is related to the rereleases of the game, rather than the game itself. Why the hell do they ruin the game's aspect ratio by stretching it to fit the screen in War of the Lions and the PSN verison of the game?!

The story is dull, the battle system is dull and the characters are dull.

I don't really understand the hype around the game to be honest with you all. :-/

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Originally Posted by ShinGundam

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Where to begin...

Well, let's start with something I haven't criticised recently. The graphics. This game is aesthetically dull. It's not "dark", it's not "serious", it's boring. Oh, it can do dark and serious at times, and do it quite well. Usually in a one minute cutscene of the villains. But, for the majority, it's just brown and grey and more brown. There is no vibrance in Ivalice in this game. Everything feels washed out and lifeless. Colors are muted and landscapes are dull. There is no hint, anywhere, that anyone actually lives in this bloody world.

---

Two words, Akihiko Yoshida.

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Irrelevant.

Attachment 38972Attachment 38973

There we go. The first two gameplay screenshots of War of the Lions and FFTA2 I found with Image Search. Notice the difference? FFTA2 has COLOR. Grass is actually green. Plants look alive. People don't look like they're dressed for a funeral.

And he was FFTA2's artistic supervisor.

Attachment 38975

Picture 3 is about 2 minutes of editing with Microsoft Office color saturation and midtone adjustment. It almost looks like a world which has a sun (although admittedly it washes out the few light tones of the pic).

@Skyblade.

Yes, people used colored uniforms for ages. And the revolutionary's were scoffed for not doing that.

Guess which way won out for it's vast superiority? :p

On a serious note, even of your screenshots I think FFT looks better. The TA look fits it's less serious story (Not to say that it's a story that can't be taken seriously mind you.). Even with the more uniform look, I find there is plenty of Variety. Mostly in the NPC's mind you. I love the designs of guys like Wiegrahf and the Heaven and Hell Knights.

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Originally Posted by I'm my own MILF

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Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno

You do realize that the flashy colors and the outfits proved to be a detriment to the French right? The flashy outfits easily allowed English Longbow men to spot Captains and other high ranking officers easily from their troops and be targeted and killed. I mean the War of the Roses is partially why military uniforms changed to be more universal and bland. Hell, even the Revolutionary War had the British Redcoats having trouble not getting easily spotted by Rebel forces and sniped. So flashy exotic colors are not exactly a plus in a military setting.

---

This didn't change for most people until the early 20th century, really until World War I, and even then there were almost riots in the French Parliament when the discussion of abolishing les pantalons rouge was underway. In the setting FFT equates to there really would need to be a justification for colorless drab armies, because knights and dukes and so forth really really loved their banners and colors and heraldry (and with good reason; when battles descended into melees you needed to be able to tell who was on your side). Furthermore massed archer attacks didn't tend to have the accuracy needed to target individuals (and in this age in many battles the important people were at the front of the charge anyway), though I suppose if you saw a chap who was clearly important you might be inclined to fire in his direction. I don't actually mind FFT's graphics or aesthetic myself but that's one particular issue I wanted to correct. Again it could very reasonably be justified but that doesn't happen, and it really does need to given real-world historical context. Also the War of the Roses was an English civil war, not a fight with France - you may be thinking of the Hundred Years War, where the English with their Longbowmen did indeed annihilate the French knights more than once (Agincourt, Crecy, and Poitiers).

:milsperg:

Also there's nothing wrong with grinding in and of itself, it depends on the gameplay. Grinding in a fun game is still fun, grinding in a boring one is not. This is a boring one.

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My bad, I always get The War of the Roses and the Hundred Years War mixed up, blame the American educational system (it's hard to even say those two words together without smiling) since every World History class I've taken they tend to stay ethnocentric and focus on elements that attribute to the founding of the good old U.S. of A. :roll2 So not much about British politics and wars after the Magna Carta.

Also Skyblade, Ivalice actually is more of a drab world than you think it is, considering



Tactics
Attachment 38978

Vagrant Story
Attachment 38979


and FFXII
Attachment 38980

all share the same color pallette (a heavier emphasis of earth tones, but I do like how it makes blues, reds and purples stand out, hell even the original FFTA feels "washed out" in its color scheme.

Attachment 38981

I completely disagree about the magic not being colorful, of anything I felt the color range of the world made them more vibrant whereas I got the opposite effect in the TA series since everything is colorful rainbows in those worlds, I mean the summons are pretty underwhelming beyond the Totema, and even the Espers in FFTA2 feel really out of place due to different graphics styles and the DS' limitations of doing high quality 3D graphics.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

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BAD GRAPHICS! HOW COULD ANYONE PLAY THIS GAME? COD IS MUCH BETTER.

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I love this because I specifically compared this game to COD, as I feel they both draw from the exact same color pallete.

It was incorrect of me to use the word graphics, however, as the term for what I was criticisizing is "aesthetics". The aesthetics of this game were horrible. The graphics were actually brilliant, and served the aesthetics really well. It's just a lousy aesthetic choice. I apologize for my poor word choice. I also puzzle as to why I use it in the first place, when I clearly know it's wrong as I use the correct term, aesthetics, in the very next line. I will blame it on my posting very late at night.

Actually, I do have a graphical complaint, but it is related to the rereleases of the game, rather than the game itself. Why the hell do they ruin the game's aspect ratio by stretching it to fit the screen in War of the Lions and the PSN verison of the game?!

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Not sure if serious... I was just being sarcastic. :|

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

I love this because I specifically compared this game to COD, as I feel they both draw from the exact same color pallete.

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http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__...creen_BOII.png

Hold your tongue before you speak about the smoothest running, content-overflowing, undisputed leader of console gaming.

Skyblade, I respect you, I admire you, but I really have to question where you're coming from on this one. OF COURSE IT LOOKS BLEAK AND DEPRESSING!!! Read the news reports and rumors at the pubs, they had just lost a war, there's a famine going on, out-of-work soldiers are forming revolutionary groups and waging open warfare against the nobility. Of course it looks like no one would want to live there, no one does.

And of course the TA games look colorful and fluffy and magical.

They're children's games. :jokey:

I will respectfully leave Call of Duty out of the thread, it has been far too long since I played one (and the game I was actually thinking of was Medal of Honor, not Call of Duty). Once again, my bad.

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Skyblade, I respect you, I admire you, but I really have to question where you're coming from on this one. OF COURSE IT LOOKS BLEAK AND DEPRESSING!!! Read the news reports and rumors at the pubs, they had just lost a war, there's a famine going on, out-of-work soldiers are forming revolutionary groups and waging open warfare against the nobility. Of course it looks like no one would want to live there, no one does.

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My problem isn't that it looks as though no one wants to live there, my problem is that it looks as though no one lives there at all. The world feels more empty than FFXIII's world, and that takes some doing.

It's not strictly the color pallete, it's how those colors are used. FFXII and especially FFTA did a far better job, even using the earth tone pallete, than Tactics did. Tactics almost never used color, light, or tone. The only variation is when they make things even darker during the scenes where they show the bad guys plotting and schemeing in dark rooms with thunderstorms going on outside.

FFXII, FFTA, and FFTA2 made phenomenal use of both color and light. Yes, I used an extreme example of a bright and colorful scene. But those games all use both extremes. They have dark, serious, and sombre scenes, and they have things that balance it out, that show a lighter side to things, that show life in the world.

Ivalice in FFT looks like a place that's been burnt to the ground several times over, and always has a cloud of ash covering the sun. There's no sign of life or civilization in the entire place, and the choice of such an incredibly dark aesthetic only further reinforces that thought. Why would anyone fight over Ivalice? After the fifty years war, it's a run down country with no military might, zero international political standing, and, from what we can see in the game, no decent infrastructure and no population.


Ivalice feels dead. Not dying, not hurting, just dead and lifeless. When I first entered a Jagd in FFTA and saw the ruined buildings and lifeless courtyards, the first thing I thought of was Tactics. That's what everywhere was like in Tactics. In FFTA, it was used to great effect to adjust the game's tone, to show the benefits of the Laws, to build up tension. In FFT, that's just how the world is. A barren, lifeless wasteland.

It's pretty hard, both in level of difficulty and learning curve. Or at least, I thought so.

I got to the battle where the black mages are burning a city down and I gave up.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Ivalice in FFT looks like a place that's been burnt to the ground several times over, and always has a cloud of ash covering the sun. There's no sign of life or civilization in the entire place, and the choice of such an incredibly dark aesthetic only further reinforces that thought. Why would anyone fight over Ivalice? After the fifty years war, it's a run down country with no military might, zero international political standing, and, from what we can see in the game, no decent infrastructure and no population.

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1.FFT is supposed to be a dark game looking at its story.
2.There were sunny moments in that game.
3.There are people actually everywhere, but it is just not necessary to show them, besides a few cutscenes.
You have to play the game with open mind. :colbert:

MILF may have the worst taste in Final Fantasys of anyone on this board. It's almost pitiful.

And I thought FFT's graphics and colors were great for the game. Of course it's earthy -- FFT put more emphasis on feeling real than most FFs, where the story is all about saving an entirely evil Big Bad from destroying the world with magic. This was a more serious game with a more mature, politics-oriented plot. The colors suited the atmosphere.

Of course there are still some things worth criticizing in the game. Some of the jobs have only very niche uses, certain jobs and characters are crazy overpowered, and regular enemies level up with you in a way that can make it rather difficult for you if you're not paying attention.

I don't many flaws about this game, but....The story is a masterpiece. The way the story has been told is a little lame.

Why do Mediators equip guns? It doesn't fit the job. :p

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Originally Posted by qwertysaur

Why do Mediators equip guns? It doesn't fit the job. :p

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Anyone else want to negotiate?

What else would they equip? Katanas?

I mean, Atticus Finch was a lawyer, and he could shoot any mothersmurfer he wanted.

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Originally Posted by Laddy

What else would they equip? Katanas?

I mean, Atticus Finch was a lawyer, and he could shoot any mothersmurfer he wanted.

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Books. :p

Fair point there. I mean, I imagine tossing a copy of say...Atlas Shrugged at someone is sure to do some damage.

True, but can you imagine carrying out 99 copies of Atlas Shrugged? The Knights' armor would be light in comparison.

It's the Ninjas who have to lug around the copies to throw, the Mediators would just brain people with them (much as they do in FFTA2).

"I am a Ninja. I walk unseen. None know who I am, for none can see me. To them, I'm just a bookshelf."

The combat isn't as polished, interface-wise as I am used to from more recent SRPGs that I played before trying FFT, so it feels really awkward to play it.

Only issue is in which it's grind heavy. I don't even have an issue with the grinding part, as most games have grind, but the manner in which it's done. I don't care for the monsters leveling with you. The battles where you fight the same level monster should reward much higher xp and jp than it currently does, and slowly lower the amount the more you out level that battle field or something. Other than that, it's a great game.

But if the monsters don't level up with you wouldn't that only make it feasible to play the last map you just went to in order to level? In a game that has combat as it's meat and potatoes it seems like that would narrow the scope quite a bit.

>>> Charge time..:luca:

Yeah, I think Charge time was on of the biggest flaws in the battle system. Not that it existed (I liked that a lot) but the fact that as the game went on and character speeds increased spells constantly took 'longer' to cast, completely changing the game balance.

Long time since I played any of the games and I don't know which specific game you guys are talking about but here I go anyways. FFT, the light story was just ugh, I mean, I liked it and all, but I like almost anything I play. Not particularly inspired or epic. The soundtrack was tolerable and on theme with the light setting, but no masterpiece. None of the characters were memorable. I generally liked the gameplay, but I agree with all who say that leveling outside of the main story made the story too easy once go got back to it. I don't any suggestions on fixing that.

I'll say pretty much the same thing for FFTA2. Once you reach a certain level everything is dull and no challenge left. Online mode would greatly have helped this games out, I still hope some day it happens.

WofL I liked the story, but disliked much everything else.

It was pretty damn easy, especially when you got Calculator. At that point you could destroy an entire map with one character without having to move a square.

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Originally Posted by LFC

Long time since I played any of the games and I don't know which specific game you guys are talking about but here I go anyways. FFT, the light story was just ugh, I mean, I liked it and all, but I like almost anything I play. Not particularly inspired or epic. The soundtrack was tolerable and on theme with the light setting, but no masterpiece. None of the characters were memorable. I generally liked the gameplay, but I agree with all who say that leveling outside of the main story made the story too easy once go got back to it. I don't any suggestions on fixing that.

I'll say pretty much the same thing for FFTA2. Once you reach a certain level everything is dull and no challenge left. Online mode would greatly have helped this games out, I still hope some day it happens.

WofL I liked the story, but disliked much everything else.

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FFT and WotL are the same games.

From the context I'm guessing the first FFT is a typo that means to read FFTA.

FFT is incredibly good in almost every aspect. The gameplay, the art, the character and class design, the story, the plot, etc.

I don't think it's fair to compare it to other games to define its shortcomings. Yes, it could have had a lot more sidequests, hidden characters, branching plots, and challenges like Tactics Ogre: LUCT, but I think FFT felt properly balanced in length and engagement.

The writing (dialogue) in the original is pretty bad and obscures some of the finer points of the drama, but the updated text in WotL is really amazing. I was blown away when I played WotL, and it definitely moved FFT to the top of the list of my favorite Final Fantasy games. (Except for that damn lag during skills.)

The only complaint I can think of was that there were a few ways to hijack the job system into making battles too easy. Some characters were just overpowered, and yeah, if you grind too much, the challenge basically disappears and the battles become easy and repetitive. Oh, and needing to teach Ramza certain skills in order to not get stuck at a certain part is just broken game design, I think. They should have fixed that somehow in WotL. Maybe had a warning before the dungeon like they do before the Hanging Gardens in LUCT.

I have an issue with the storyline of the game sidelining characters after they join your party. The remake does address this somewhat in the form of sidequests, but...

the difficulty curve in this game Is really really weird. When one of the first five levels takes 10 tries to beat then you can beat the final boss on Your First Try 5 play throughs in a row you have a problem.

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Originally Posted by Hypoallergenic Chie

the difficulty curve in this game Is really really weird. When one of the first five levels takes 10 tries to beat then you can beat the final boss on Your First Try 5 play throughs in a row you have a problem.

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It is difficult at the beginning, more difficult at the middle and from there it slowly get easier. :lol:

Story. Battle. Story. Battle. Battle. Story. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Story. Story. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle. Battle...

No. I shall not.

There isn't a single reference to the princess bride in this game.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Hypoallergenic Chie

There isn't a single reference to the princess bride in this game.

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Inconceivable!

I really enjoyed playing this game on the PS1, the only thing I disliked was the ending. No spoilers here, but let's just say, it ended with a..."bang" XD

The system is too weak to make the game really open up. The battlefields aren't large enough and there aren't enough characters or spaces on the board possible to really have a big fight on your hands.

Perhaps a system similar to Suikoden would have worked well?

PS - As far as the ending goes, they've twisted reality around my head for the last time, and I'm sure everything's fine for a sequel.