Originally Posted by Tonberry Time
I actually really liked Noel. He's the first male protagonist in a long time that is neither aggravatingly whiny and / or insignificant, and also not depressingly sour all the damn time. I really like Noel and I hope he's in Lightning Returns.
As for Serah, I don't like her as much as Noel, but I don't dislike her. She's as stubborn as her sister, but lacks the initial "piss off" attitude Lightning did have in the first half of XIII. She's okay I guess, not the best protagonist ever, but certainly not the worst.
Not only that, but the combat system is a poor version of XIII's
Really? I think it's a slightly better version of XIII's system. The main reason is because you can change your leader mid-battle, and the death of a leader isn't an automatic game over (Unless the other member is fallen, obviously). That's a good start. There's also a wide variety of customisation in the levelling system! Unlike XIII, where the character's base stats are fixed, the modified crystarium system have role bonuses on those large nodes, which affect your stats quite widely. This involves some degree of forward planning, and I again loved that.
The monster system appears strange, but once you get used to it you can spend hours building the perfect monster. Hell, whole walkthroughs have a dedicated section on suggested monster builds. Plus, the ornament collectables are cute, sometimes self-aware accessories that just add something to the game.
the time travelling is a cheap gimmick(let's travel 20 years into the past! The only difference? It's NIGHTTIME) and I'm not particularly fond of the setting.
I both agree, and disagree. I disagree in so far that a mere twenty years isn't exactly going to change much, short of a nuclear fallout. You would be surprised even in real life how little twenty years actually does aesthetically. On the other hand, when locations have wide gaps between visits, for example 200AF and 400AF, I do expect more than just a change of time. Half the time, routes are blocked off by simple debris like in the Vile Peaks, rather than some more dramatic landslide or something. I'm not sure what I was looking for, just something more than a straightforward obstacle.
As for the settings, it depends on what your talking about. I found New Bodhum quite a quaint starting location, and it's very stark change in 700AF is very gloomy. The Bresha Ruins are featured a full four times, and it's okay I guess, if slightly boring after awhile. The Sunleth Waterscape has very good music and is incredibly different from XIII's incarnation of it, though I do wish you could explore abit more. Meanwhile, the Archylte Steppe unfortunately shrunk in size. Another disappointment was Augusta Tower. The world was just flat for me. Thankfully Academia 400AF and 4XXAF was very good, and surprisingly large. The locations aren't huge, but their more bitesized chunks, while in XIII the world maps was huge, but linear. That's what I think anyway.
Oh, and let's not forget Serendipity, the trouttiest theme park ever conceived. There's slot machines and chocobo betting and... Wait, that's everything. I had to turn on my FFVII save and spend a few hours in Gold Saucer just to cleanse myself of that traumatic experience.
Now this I can agree with. I'm sorry, but Serendipity had so much potential, but just fell flat. I kept hearing the assistants saying "There's a brand new attraction that's being built", and I downloaded Sazh's episode, and when I came back, their still saying the same damn thing. At the end of the day, you had:
Chocobo Racing: You were more a manager, but I liked it. The track was dull however and you just went round and round
Slot Machines: I wanted to grab a baseball bat and smash them. Getting 5000 coins to get the Lucky Coin Fragment damn near killed me. I just wedged the controller against something and read a book
Poker: Eh. I didn't much care for it.
Chronobind: I actually never played it, it looks convoluted.
The only redeeming feature was that I could have a tonberry as a party member.
The Tonberry is actually a very good commando. Good choice sir!
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