Most unreasonably disliked FF title! Now with 33% more fan bias!

[Karellen]

It's sort of still on topic in that a lot of people here are seemingly under the impression that FFVIII is unreasonably disliked. The above explanation demonstrates that there is indeed a genuine problem.

That being said, I'm quite fond of FFVIII and thoroughly disagree with those that consider it to be a particularly bad game.

[Goldenboko]

You can get high-level magic pretty early in FFVIII. The boss Granaldo that attacks Elone in the training center on disk one drops 8 wizard stones (which can be found as drop items from Bite Bugs), which can be refined into 5 firagas/thundagas/blizzagas a piece with their respective refineries. Tents can be refined into 10 Curaga's a piece as soon as you learn Siren's Life magic refinery. It is extremely easy to become uber powerful very early on with almost no effort.

wizard stones are a high level drop for bite bugs.

those 8 you get can absolutely make a difference if you stock 40 high level spells on one stat on one character but i don't believe that constitutes breaking the game.

also you're absolutely right about the curagas, they can have dramatic effects on life/spirit, but you're forgetting how costly they are in the beginning of the game. Even if you go through the SeeD exams with a cheat sheet that alone still takes a little bit of time, not to mention intervals between receiving your salary. Which is my point, you're still spending some time to do that.

You're also forgetting that it takes time to get those refinery abilities, there's about 30 AP each, but that means you're foregoing more status-j's, and being that each GF starts with 2-3 you're not really making much use of your stock anyway. Granted you can fight the fish at the shoreline for like 6 ap in the beginning of the game but you're still spending time regardless doing that.

Which is my point - if you could give me an approximate minute count i think you'd see what i'm saying. I recently spent not even a half hour level grinding before the floating island in FFVI and that section, which is the most challenging part up to that point, was a breeze.

Curaga? Costly? No way, I got them from buying a few tents. I never had to train in FFVIII until I felt like going to level 100 (which was uber easy thanks to my uber junctions). The entire game is abusable in 10 minutes I figured out how to get Curagas, Quakes, etc, right after getting Siren, so I could've played a lot of the rest of the game without needing to stop to train for a while.

[Hazzard]

The game's so damn annoying when you actually don't indeed to defeat an enemy so quick. A few hours I attempted to draw Eden from Ultima Weapon, he lessened my HP with Graviga and I instinctively used Squall's limit break, accidentally opening way for his finale Lion Heart move. I killed the thing so easily, I felt like crying, I know I can get it later but meh...

Anyway, I think FF8 can be disliked because of it's easy capability of mastering the broken junction system, but it takes time to accumulate all the items needed and so on. The game can really be conquered over the matter of hard work and resilience, because if you want an easy ride without drawing magic or refining items, then your in for a rough one!

That's what I think anyway.

[ReloadPsi]

I'd say Tactics Advance is the most reasonably disliked. I wanted FF Tactics, not flower-picking and snowball fights! And the judge system was plain retarded: Puts you up against Flans and says "No Magic". What are we supposed to use man, harsh language?

It could be said that FFII is unreasonably disliked for one simple reason: People only slag it off for its difficulty. If just one person would say what I do (boring level grinding for hours on end just to tackle the next dungeon) then I'd feel differently about the matter, as FFII certainly lacked a certain sparkle anyway, mainly the fact that you'd keep forgetting what the plot was because you spent so much time level grinding.

[Hazzard]

I'd say Tactics Advance is the most reasonably disliked. The judge system was plain retarded: Puts you up against Flans and says "No Magic". What are we supposed to use man, harsh language?

True, true, I had to reset the game many times before I entered battle, I didn't understand the counter card rule ever, which that Ezel guy gives to you for a fee.

[Disco Potato]

Haven't played II so I can't comment on it, but after the second chapter X-2 really isn't as bad as everyone says. It's not as good as a lot of the other FFs, but I don't think it's so bad that it can't be counted in the main series. Though it does ruin the poignancy of X, and Rikku sometimes makes me want to tear my ears off

The game's so damn annoying when you actually don't indeed to defeat an enemy so quick. A few hours I attempted to draw Eden from Ultima Weapon, he lessened my HP with Graviga and I instinctively used Squall's limit break, accidentally opening way for his finale Lion Heart move. I killed the thing so easily, I felt like crying, I know I can get it later but meh...

I don't like that fight with Ultima Weapon. Actually, I don't even like getting to the place where you battle it. I just got Bahamut and drew Eden from Tiamat the last couple times I played and spent a while at Cactuar Island

[Hazzard]

The thing about X-2 is that it's so...corny and cheesy. I think it was just to fill a gap for the perfect ending for X fans, and I'm a major one, but it came up short and disappointed me. I'll never adjust to anything in that game, I actually got to the final dungeon but was too under leveled for the first time. Ever. I couldn't be bothered to even grind for a few hours, cause the game means naught to me really.

I understand why people wouldn't like II, it is the most broken FF game till this day. The battle system can either be ridiculously difficult or simply easy to overcome, just through beating yourself up with a shield, or weapons; gaining HP, strength, stamina and various attributes from doing so. Great storyline though, and the rebel music is a firm favorite for me as "one of the best FF tunes" so yah, that's it really.

[Wolf Kanno]

I'd say Tactics Advance is the most reasonably disliked. I wanted FF Tactics, not flower-picking and snowball fights! And the judge system was plain retarded: Puts you up against Flans and says "No Magic". What are we supposed to use man, harsh language?

You see, it's this comment alone that meakes me feel it deserves to be here. So it's not Tactics 2... Big deal! It doesn't change the fact it had a well developed and controversial plot and expanded on so many things that Tactics had done before it. You're a kid who's trying to end the world so he can save his friends from their own self delusions and escapism... I don't know about you but that's pretty damn deep considering it's marketed towards a younger audiance.

I have issues with the game mechanics (let's fix the broken job classes by making every class broken! or borrowing IX's system of learning abilities through items still irk me...:rolleyes2 ) but it doesn't make the game unplayable. It's actually pretty damn fun even if it doesn't offer the same level of customization as Tactics did. The Judge system is well implemented, in fact to more suave gamers it's almost a non-issue. A luxury way to make the battles more challenging without seriously trying.

Tactics was a fine game and is my personal favorite in the series but I don't begrudge Tactics Advance just because it wasn't the sequel I wanted. I accept the game for what it is and that's how I am able to enjoy it.

[ReloadPsi]

So it's not Tactics 2.

It's not like I was after a Tactics 2. It's more like I was after a game that didn't make me feel sick to my stomach with its overwhelming cuteness and still take itself seriously with said cuteness (at least FFX-2 was clearly meant to be having a laugh). Keep in mind I live in the UK where so, so many of us didn't get to play the original Tactics, so for someone who only played the original very briefly and enjoyed it, this Disney-esque disaster was a gargantuan disappointment for me. Remember when we were waiting for F-Zero X to be released on the Nintendo 64 and in the meantime a developer named ASCII released a similar, much more awful game named Aero Gauge? That's how this felt, only ten times bigger because this wasn't intended as a placeholder for the real thing, this was the real thing, and it was all we were getting. Thank god I only played the ROM.

Just today, someone told me one of the random rules that Judges will impose is "No damage is allowed to be inflicted on enemies". Come the smurf on! What were Square THINKING?! Imagine if in Super Mario Bros., a judge appeared and said "No jumping". That's what that's like.

[Wolf Kanno]

So it's not Tactics 2.

It's not like I was after a Tactics 2. It's more like I was after a game that didn't make me feel sick to my stomach with its overwhelming cuteness and still take itself seriously with said cuteness (at least FFX-2 was clearly meant to be having a laugh). Keep in mind I live in the UK where so, so many of us didn't get to play the original Tactics, so for someone who only played the original very briefly and enjoyed it, this Disney-esque disaster was a gargantuan disappointment for me. Remember when we were waiting for F-Zero X to be released on the Nintendo 64 and in the meantime a developer named ASCII released a similar, much more awful game named Aero Gauge? That's how this felt, only ten times bigger because this wasn't intended as a placeholder for the real thing, this was the real thing, and it was all we were getting. Thank god I only played the ROM.

Just today, someone told me one of the random rules that Judges will impose is "No damage is allowed to be inflicted on enemies". Come the smurf on! What were Square THINKING?! Imagine if in Super Mario Bros., a judge appeared and said "No jumping". That's what that's like.

Now I can sympathize with your expectations being betrayed (Do you have any idea what it was like to finish FFIV in the States and while being promised FFV, which never got released for the SNES over here, we got Mystic Quest instead? ).

Now I am going to try my best to be as civil and non-insulting about this as I can...

Psi... before attacking a game, make sure you've really played through the entire game. The story is actually quiite dark especailly cause the cast is mostly children. The theme being "escapism". We are talking about a game where a boy is trying to save his friends and his own world (by destroying this fictional world) from the fact his other three friends want to live in a fantasy world cause they can't deal with the real world anymore. How is that "cute and childish"?

The scenes where Marche confronts Doned who is no longer sick and can walk or when he meets up with Mewt whose mother is alive in this world and his father is no longer an alcoholic bum but a well respected judge are just emotionally strong and well written scenes. The premise seems cute but the execution is pure Matsuno who places the player in a morally ambiguous situation. I have a friend who stopped playing only because he was against what Marche was trying to do. Later you get to watch Mewt slowly lose his mind to his self induced illusions he has created for himself. A mere child becoming a puppet to the fictional world he created...

As for the Judges, the game gives you several easy ways to get around them so they are not much of an issue. You can find out what the laws are by checking the map, you get law cards that allow you to really screw with them and later you can acquire a Judge that allows you to break the laws without fear of consequence.

There is also no law in the game Called "No damage" so your friend is either mistaken or confusing it with the race specific rules (No damage to Bangaa or monster ect.) or the "No Fight" rule which prohibits the use of physical attacks (but not skills or magic ). The laws are hardly ever a handicap half of the time and only change your strategies (it is an SRPG anyway) so I feel they are overall a good system in the game.

I don't really care if you hate Tactics Advance out of personal taste (I don't care for X and X-2 myself) but to say it deserves to be attacked for ill-informed reasons or hastily made assumptions is something I can't stand for. I'm terribly sorry if I offended you but I can't let you bash a game for silly reasons in a thread about games that get bashed for silly reasons

[ReloadPsi]

I think I get what you're saying, but what I'm hard-pressed to understand is why a person should have to play through an entire game that they don't like purely to have the divine right to say they don't like it? I did the same thing with FFX: I played it up until about when I had to help Rikku salvage the airship, decided I didn't like it then sometime later played through the entire game to shut my friends up about how I "wasn't giving it a chance" and my opinion stayed the same anyway... plus they were now even more annoyed with me because I'd given the game all the chance in the world and still wasn't swayed. With FFTA, I played up to the point where my clan (FearySpies) had completed their first mission: Pick some flowers, but kill the goblins blocking the way first. By then I was very switched off. The fact that I found nothing to like about the game is a perfectly good reason to dislike it, and not silly at all, and "You didn't play the entire game" is far and away the single worst defense of all time. Well, never mind.

Ultimately then, "unreasonably disliked" basically means "Disliked by a person who was so repulsed by the game that they didn't play it to death like they would a game they genuinely enjoyed". , will that fit in the title of the thread?

[Wolf Kanno]

Alright...

Now that I have time to cool down a little and reflect on all this I relaized I was being quite childish... I'm sorry Psi.

It was not my intention to devolve this into a stupid fanboy argument and I do feel I may have gone out of line a few times and for that I am sorry. I've removed my last statement and having it replaced with this apology. So sorry about letting this get out of hand. But it just seemed like we were arguing over the very same kind of things that inspired me to make this thread.

Once again I am sorry to you and anyone else I may have offended.

[Hyperion4444]

I'd have to say it's FFVIII that's being detested the most by some people for no reason what-so-ever.
FFVIII is a great game, Loved by many with a huge Fan Base.
But there's still some low-life that comes in and complains about the game for really silly and stupid reasons.
"Oh, the junction system is too hard and confusing"
or even...
"This game is bad. Why? Because. Because what?"
That's really a poor excuse for a reason for complaining.
Go get yourself a brain.

[Levian]

I'm thinking FFVII, some people seems to dislike it because of its popularity. I can partly understand that, since it's pretty annoying when something is constantly shoved up in your face. The natural reaction to something like that is to distance yourself from it. Same thing with certain celebrities you see everywhere, popular movies, popular music. Aeris would be a good example too. Some people always goes on and on about how much they hate her and that they laughed when she died etc. Probably because you get shoved up in yer face that this is supposed to be a very sad moment.

[Slothy]

I'd have to say it's FFVIII that's being detested the most by some people for no reason what-so-ever.
FFVIII is a great game, Loved by many with a huge Fan Base.
But there's still some low-life that comes in and complains about the game for really silly and stupid reasons.
"Oh, the junction system is too hard and confusing"
or even...
"This game is bad. Why? Because. Because what?"
That's really a poor excuse for a reason for complaining.
Go get yourself a brain.

Most of us who dislike FFVIII already have a brain and have valid arguments for disliking it. Arguments we already covered on page 3 and part of page 4 of this thread.