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Chapter 1 is complete. Had to call it night because the game is starting to get under my skin.
Pros:
- So far the Gun Mage might be the best class in terms of raw power. My Warrior has gotten better but it required some heavy stat manipulation with accessories and exploiting the combo system, but even then it can't quite reach the same consistent level of bulltrout as Fiend Bullets. It's a shame so many of their Blue Magic spells are locked away until later chapters. Like White Wind is technically available, but I don't have any means of using Confusion to get the enemy to cast it on me.
- With hindsight activated, it's now really obvious to see that Paine has a connection with the male trio. Just paying attention to her actions when you meet them makes it obvious.
- The one treat of the Spira entries is just listening to all the voice actors I grew up with. Like it's scary how many of the VA people in this game are associated with either anime I grew up with or games I loved on the PS2.
- While some of the outfit designs (like thief) are questionable. I appreciate the fact that SE went the extra mile and actually designed unique outfits for each character.
- I stlll laugh about the pregnant Lulu model just being her old model.
- I still chuckle when I see Kimarhi and remember how in my first playthrough, I had completely forgotten about him being in FFX.
Cons:
- Man what is it about FFX and it's hatred of Mages? The one aspect I always felt hurt Lulu and Yuna was the fact they couldn't multi target their magic outside of Lulu's limit break or using doublecast. Now I let it slide a bit in FFX because the new matching game gimmick required it since Lulu can potentially just throw the whole system off its axle with multi-targeting. But X-2 isn't restricted by this constraint, so why nerf the poor Black/White mage like this? It's bad enough they have to deal with casting times again, in addition to just their painfully low HP and defense stats. Why does SE hate mages?
- Okay, so why does Warrior get Sentinel but not Cover? Like the best aspect of the Warrior is that its an HP sponge and gets a purely defensive skill, so why no innate cover ability?
- It looks like X-2 OG has the same Queue Issue that XII has where the game has a difficult time loading complex spell or ability animations. It makes the combo system hard to utilize, especially with mages since the queue can often delay the spell effect long enough to miss the combo timer window which seems to continue on even when the game chugs through trying to animate all the effects at once. I would be curious to know if the HD release removed this issue like the XII HD one did.
- Holy hell are the requirements for the Trainer class counter-intuitive. No wonder I didn't get it in my first playthrough. I can't see Yuna talking like that to the Ronso.
- Ugh, I hate the PR campaign. Hell the mini-games on the Calm Lands are even more garbage than the ones in FFX.
- I love how the game just keeps throwing Garment Grids at me, and here I am sticking to Vanguard (the second one you get) because it gives you some minor offensive bonuses and has the second highest dressphere slots behind the starter one.
- I feel the final mission of Chapter 1 in Kilika is a wonderful example of this game's inability to balance the contrasting tones of its various plots. The first chapter overall hits a strange roller coaster of wacky, goofy, bittersweet, political drama, charming, serious, and romantic. I'm getting serious mood whiplash here. The final mission of the chapter starts with an uplifting moment, plunges into a serious political issue, the girls are helped through a wacky puzzle, tries to turn dark, and then gets resolved in a comical way that winds up having some long terms issues in the later chapters. Like what the hell is going on here?
Job Class Analysis
Starter Classes
Warrior
Not a bad class, just underwhelming. You really need to gear the characters accessories to the class to get the most out of it which may limit what classes you can switch to since pure mage classes can't physically attack out side of the Berserk status. Sentinel is a decent skill of whom the main draw for it is that it allows you to farm AP for skills while also prolonging the fight. Sadly, without Cover or using a full warrior team, the skill is less useful except for situational purposes. Their swordplay skills are a mix bag as well. The Stat lowering skills are pretty useful when they work. The elemental skills don't do as much damage as I would like though and the charge time for all of these skills makes it a pain to time them into combos. Assault is amusing but hardly useful unless you're rocking a full melee team and just fighting random enemy fodder. The Delay attack confuse me a bit because they were tailored made for the CTB system. I can see how they could still work in this entry, but like the original, they sound more useful than they are in practice. The classes best aspect is the high physical defense and HP pool, meaning it's usually the last one standing in a bad fight. The costume designs are also swanky.
Thief
Way more useful than I would think. They'll stock you up on potions until you get the White Mage and Alchemist classes unlocked. The double attack makes up for their lower physical damage from warrior and with the combo system, I find they often do comparable damage. Thieves best aspects are their good support skills like Initiative and raising the enemy item drop rate.They also have some useful status magic protection and they can heal themselves. They're surprisingly self sufficient. My main gripe with them is like their awful design and the high cost of their skills. It's hard grinding AP for them at the beginning but eventually they become one of the best classes for drawing out battles.
Gunner
Easily the best of the starting classes. Gunner really shows off how the combo system is suppose to work. Trigger Happy is a broken skill and only gets better as you find means to crank up the attack power. I can't wait to find Cat Nip and trivialize everything that isn't an optional boss. Their special skills are also quite useful with a whole slew of abilities to deal with any enemy type. They have good HP and decent stats outside of an abysmal evasion stat. The class is also classy in how they dress. My only gripe may have to do with the fact the class is so good that it makes it hard to pull them from the roster and see what other class combos can do for you.
Songstress
The weird Tactics Bard/Dancer combo that people love to hate, want to hate, but is ultimately a great support class with their awesome stat buffing skills, great status debuffs, and some quirky abilities to have fun with like doubling HP or making all attacks critical hits. The main beef I have with this class is that all the awesomness is that gaining AP for this class seems more difficult than other classes. Partly because Dances take up a huge charge time limiting your overall actions and the step costs for the better skills. Even worst, two skills are locked behind quests making this class a pain to master. The costume designs are also fugly but the class is pretty great.
I'll do the Chapter 1 class assessments next time.
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