Why a lot of fans don't like this game *SPOILERS*

[Cloudane]

Seems I'm late to this party, as I lacked the enthusiasm for this game sooo much that it took me an entire year to play it to the end. I finally finished it earlier this week. This is Final Fantasy we're talking about here, even FF8 was worthy of my usual week-or-so finishing time, yet this took a year I was that unexcited by it??? Anyway.

I haven't read through all 10 pages yet, so apologies for any replication of things already said!

I'm not actually ranting about FFXII here... in the very very end when the story and character development started to appear (far too late) I loved it. Next playthrough, who knows. But following is my take on why I was less than enthusiastic, referencing Mr Cactuar's thoughts.

1. The music.

Normally I would hesitate to put this at number 1, but now that you mention it I don't know, maybe it does deserve top spot. I observed the lack of decent music myself. Music is a HUGE influence, especially in emotional scenes, which is a lack that we'll get to shortly.

I gave FFXII a mention for this exact reason on the Narutofan forums as a reason for Naruto Shippuuden not being as well received as Part 1. This won't make sense to most people I guess, but my point is the power of music applies everywhere not just FF, and is very well known for the effect it can have on a storyline as it unfolds.

Losing Uematsu was the stupidest thing they've ever done IMO. I got the impression he left out of poor treatment (or put it this way, if they really wanted to keep him they would have tried harder), and you just don't do that to someone who injects pure love into your game.

2. Random Battles. If it ain't broke, don't replace it.

Urgh, yes and no. Doing away with random battles doesn't have to be a bad thing - Chrono Trigger did it well. What made it annoying for me was that it reminded me of MMORPGs. I play single-player games like Final Fantasy to get away from World of Warcraft grinding, and this just reminded me of it and fed me with more. I've had enough of grinding dammit!

I kind of get your point here. FF is FF, people love it for what it is, or hate it for what it is. People hate Marmite, but do they turn it into chocolate? No, they continue making Marmite, as they should, because even though some people hate it, they have a very loyal fan base and will be in business forever. Same with FF. Once they turn it into Offline WoW, it just becomes another erm.... Solo MMORPG.

3. Where is the love?

Where is the character development come to that?! That was my biggest disappointment. I did not GIVE A TOSS about the characters at all.

I assume everyone has played FF7 by now but do edit my post if the lack of spoiler tags is inappropriate... anyway the death of Aeris hit me. Hard. How can a person feel so much impact over the death of a fictional character? Because you'd gotten to know her and care about her and "your" character had had fun with her.

In contrast, I kept thinking "you know, if any of this lot were to die I wouldn't bat an eyelid". I didn't know them, didn't care about them, and this continued for 99% of the game. They didn't even talk to each other most of the time! Sometimes they would have a little bit of dialog in a new area: Balthier would make the occasional cold, snide remark, Ashe would bark angrily about revenge like she had a very bad case of PMT, and the two pirate kids would giggle together which I already knew about from the existence of Revenant Wings. (And I can't think what the point of Vaan and Penelo's existence was, other than to introduce Revenant Wings, to be honest)

It did happen eventually. Towards the end of the game we found a little more about them, got a hint that they were actually friends (I wasn't really sure!) and that they cared about each other etc. Shame it was too little too late!

There was love - Balthier and Fran. I didn't even realise until the ending though (from the Bahamut scene onwards) - up until then I thought they were just buddies.

Character Development was #1 failure for me. I think on second playthrough I'll feel better about it, but the first time I just felt like a stranger amongst strangers.

4. Whacky doodly piddly pop.

That made no sense to you? Really neither does the story off FFXII.

I don't know.... I think it made very good sense. Older FFs have been weirder.

What didn't make sense was the Shakespeare language, which is something I'm rubbish at following. I lost count of the number of times I had to pause the game and re-read what was said (subtitles are a must) to make sense of what just happened, and often these were epic moments. What should've been an epic moment was ruined by "WTF did he just say?" /google ffxii game script


Edit: Here's my "Point 5":
You're not really given any reason to care about the cause you're fighting, IMO. You're plunged into a war between two nations with no real "good" or "evil" side just, one slightly more evil than the other. For most of the game (right up until the sun cryst decision i.e. the start of the endgame) I felt like I was playing the villain. I was following this PMT-filled bloodthirsty wench on her crusade for revenge, I didn't like her and half hoped someone would smack her upside the head and tell her to stop being so spiteful.



It was ok, but if I had to pick a "worst Final Fantasy", XII would be it. I hope and pray XIII is as VII-like as it looks.