Update Time!

We've reached Macalania Temple, technically. I haven't gone to the the actual temple yet. Once the Jecht Sphere's unlocked I decided to head backwards and collect them before the Dark Aeons appeared and make this sidequest a chore. We're now thick into the Seymour Guado subplot, and as I feared, my goodwill towards Yuna is beginning to evaporate as she drags the party into this nonsense. We did get some fun with the Thunder Plains and the Macalania Woods, which are two of my favorite locations in the game. I stopped just before we get to the roller coaster ride that is trying to get out of the Macalania Temple.

Pros:

  • While I know a lot of people don't care for the Thunder Plains due to its various gimmicks, I've always liked the place. Tha Quactaur lore is amusing, I like how the lightning keeps you on your toes, the area just looks cool. It's also rare to have a Thunder elemental themed area in this time frame of the RPG landscape.
  • The whole thing with Rikku being afraid of it was also amusing, especially since her reasoning wasn't some heavy story reason but really just a simple mistake.
  • I love the Jecht Spheres, I never felt like FFX needed a sequel, but a prequel about Braska's journey would be something even I would check out. The chemistry between the three is amusing and really helps you to like Jecht since up to this point we've only seen Tidus' subjective view of him. Even more amusing is that going backwards from Macalania Woods and picking them up in the reverse order you came to the location back to Besaid gives you a fairly good timeline of events, with only Auron's Sphere likely happening before most of the events.
  • I also appreciate the fact the NPCs still have unique dialogue for backtracking, because depending on where you are, either you're hearing about the wedding between Yuna and Seymour, the failure of Operation Mi'hen, or surprisingly the sheer disbelief that the Aurochs won the Blitzball Tournament.
  • Despite being my newest recruit, I've already managed to get Rikku's stealing achievement. Told you I liked thieves.
  • Yeah, this is definitely my favorite incarnation of Ifrit. Amusing that his Meteor Shot move is essentially a toned down version of his fire attack from FFVIII and his actual Hellfire Overdrive is just brutal. Valefore's Overdrives are also neat, but her form and their animations really remind me of BoFIV'S Aura and Astral Dragon Forms.
  • I forgot to mention that FFX's Chocobo Theme is pretty good, especially the arranged version in the HD version that sounds more like a proper Big Band rendition.
  • Auron is definitely the best character in this game so far.
  • Did I just get a Macarena reference? Would probably annoy a purist, but I laughed, especially when Tidus even did the Aye part.


Cons:

  • This whole sequence concerning Seymour and Yuna sort of reminds me of this anime Fushugi Yugi I watched back in the day, which also entails a young girl with guardians going on a journey to save the land, and this girl Miyaka also made the most stupid decisions based on acting on her feelings which ultimately caused like 80% of the plots problems and drama. Now Yuna is not nearly as bad as Miyaka is since she only really does this once (though Yuna definitely falls into the "go big or go home" attitude in terms of scale), but unlike Miyaka, who is technically more of the Tidus character in that show and thus is just a fifteen year old school girl who is completely out of her depth in the fantasy world she found herself in. Yuna has lived in this world her whole life and should smurfing know better. Which is why it still irritates me. I'll leave my thoughts on Seymour until we reach Mt. Gagazet.
  • I am not a huge fan of the game's equipment system. I really get a nice dopamine fix from going out of my way to find a hidden treasure with cool loot, or grind a certain enemy to get that rare drop, and this game's ability system sort of just undermines all of that. I can't tell you how excited I will be to get back to a more traditional treasure/equipment drop system in IX, before I have to deal with this nonsense again in VIII.
  • I am a little annoyed that switching equipment is no longer a free action. Learned this the hard way when I realized Tidus was doing crap for damage because I have him still equipped with the Brotherhood and everything in the Macalania Woods is water resistant.