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

[Dr. Acula]

I think that FF changing is a good thing. It's nice to not get into a battle every five seconds for a change. Squeenix was just experimenting with new gameplay styles to see how the fans would react before deciding what to do for the next game.

One thing bugs me, however. Just like champagne supernova said, sometimes there would be hours at a time before the story progressed. Then, by the time you got to wherever you were meant to be going, you'd forget why you were there in the first place. But I still think FFXII was a step in the right direction.

[Formalhaut]

Id have to agree with Dr Acula, Oft Id find myself heading to, say Jahara and totally forgetting why I need to go here. It just goes to show How weak and feeble the storyline was.

However, I did think the battle system was great, Its more realistic and for people saying that the monsters was small, well they had to to fit them all in one area. You can't have hulking great monsters 5 times the size of a person in an area the size of a Baseball field.

The music was a bit naff, but it wasn't composed by the great one (You know who he is)

All in all, some aspects are rubbish compared to past games, but it did introduce us new elements need to make the series become fresher and newer.

[Cloudane]

I noticed that too. And there lies one of the interesting problems - they turned it into like an MMORPG, too much so. Whilst they got rid of random battles, which can work out great (see Chrono Trigger) they still managed to put far too much emphasis on wading through tons and tons of monsters (in extremely bland zones) between fragments of the story.

I prefer fewer but more challenging battles to hacking through seas of monsters. The thing is, for a battle to be challenging it can either require thought, or levels. Levelling up just means wading through easier monsters until the hard ones become easy, so it's all much the same thing. Gambits added some thinking to it, thankfully, but IMO the best thought-based challenges (which is what I prefer) are achieved with turn based combat.

What you're wading through also makes a difference. I thought the monster zones in FFXII were mostly boring as hell, just variations of the same 'maze' theme with a few plains thrown in. Contrast with FFX: there were far too many random battles (every few damn steps!) but every location you went through had its own charm and character. (MMOs are guilty of this too - EQ1 had the 'all zones are special and unique and someone must've put a lot of thought and love into each one' feel whilst EQ2 had the 'bland cookie-cutter zones' feel)

[Egami]

I too felt that the pacing of the game, as far as it's story goes, is not its strongest point. That is very much it's weakness, the flow of the story is bogged down by the large amount of exploring/fighting that one has to do between the different scenes. It is not that the story is weak or uninteresting; it is that it is spread too thin. The game could have been a bit more balanced in that regard. When compared to the pacing of other FFs like VII and X, the pacing of this game feels quite slow and as a consequence, as others have already pointed out, people tend to forget why they are going to wherever it is they are headed.

As far as the locations go, I think that what happens in XII is not that it lacks interesting locations, of these there are many: The Feywood, Giruvegan, The Pharos, Eruyt, Bur-Omisace, Sochen Cave Palace, The Stilshrine of Miram, etc. What happens is that just like the story, they are spread too thin and you must first go through a lot of areas like beaches, forests and wastelands, which don’t have much of a distinctive feature before you get to them. As far as the different cities goes, I found these to be quite interesting and lively, begging you to explore and interact with everything around you. The floating city of Bhujerba in particular reminded me of Zeal’s Palace in Chrono Trigger.

[Cloudane]

I suppose if you think of the forests and wastelands and such as the "world map" of the old days it's not so bad.

[Xalioniaf]

You know what I hated about XII (and to some extent, X)?
No Chocobo Breeding.
One of the best sidequests from the PS1 games, and they felt the need to take them out and replace them with chocobo rentals. Not cool.

[Egami]

Yes, XII simply had no chocobo mini-games, at last X had a couple, such as the race with the champion chocobo in Remien Temple.

[Raebus]

Urgh, I hated the chocobo breeding mini games.

[Cloudane]

I liked the chocobo stuff in VII (the best), XI and X. Although VIII's was rubbish (go figure!)

[Formalhaut]

Yes I liked choco breeding. Infuriating sometimes I admit but It was fun finally getting the gold.

Im agreeing with cloudane, every map was the same old same old it never really excited me, oh god Giza plains was the worst, there was no feel or atmosphere, no in past FF games like in X every object and the scenery was unique, every waterfall and ruin had its own vibe to it.

I felt like this as a test the water game, the developers thought "hmm lets try a open battle system when you aren't constantly breaking out of the environment"

They focused solely on that to see if the fans would like the new change to the game. And then left everything else to the last minute. Thats what I felt.

[Hyperion4444]

While I agree to the above start, it's not the only reason why I didn't liked it.
Where were the summons, GF, Aeons, Espers?
The old ones were named after the ships.
And the new ones you needed to find them out by yourself and none were really familiar besides Belias and Maetheus .

So lack of that didn't helped.
It's sad really because some of the character were well drawn and had a fantastic beautiful world, but were completly wasted potential on some more-than-irrelevant story (like the fact that there theifs and pirates) and the pointless final boss.
If it would have had been done by another team and added traditional RPG and Final Fantasy Elements, it would have had been avoided.

Possibility that if you confronted a Esper here is simply because you got lost somewhere and ended up there.
And the action here was bassically non-existing since the game constently pause itself when pressing X, giving you time to plan the next couple of moves and it just stalls somewhere down the line.

[Xalioniaf]

Possibility that if you confronted a Esper here is simply because you got lost somewhere and ended up there.
And the action here was bassically non-existing since the game constently pause itself when pressing X, giving you time to plan the next couple of moves and it just stalls somewhere down the line.

Only pansies played in Wait.

[Wolf Kanno]

The implementation of the system was also not perfect. I think the gambits were useful, as long as they weren't overused (which some people did, and then complained that the game played itself). But, I also don't believe gambits should be the way forward for the series. A game should be fun, not involve programming moves in (which basically is what gambits are).

I agree and disagree, though I feel this comes down to personal taste so arguing this is kind of a moot point. I agree that the system requires a balance approach, and I also agree it shouldn't be the permanent way to go for the franchise. I felt it was an experiment that for the most part went well, and I wouldn't mind seeing the system as a support system in future titles such as programming an auto attack strategy when you're blasting through normal monsters on your way to the boss. You could even have system that allows you to micro-manage minor affects like buffing spells or last minute healing; while normal attacks and magic are still left in the players hands.

I feel the system has many applications, and to be honest I enjoyed planning strategies ahead of time and seeing how they work. Like many RPG battle systems, I felt XII's only really shined during boss battles. Granted for me, it made wading through minor monsters easier, especially since I haven't played an RPG in years where normal monsters required more strategy than hitting X a bunch of times :rolleyes2. For that, I guess I can't fault the system for taking the guess work out of normal monster encounters. Yet I would argue that the system deserved better and normal encounters should have required thought but I've been making this arguments since VI came out.

The License Board is in my opinion the Sphere Grid v0.5. You still level up normally, but you get to basically move your character in any path from the start of the game. Vaan starts off as a thief, but within a few hours, he can become a spell-casting monk. And Fran starts off with a bow, but from the go, she can become a knight in shining armor.

I always felt it was a broken down version of V's system, while Sphere Grid was a terribly broken down version of IV's system with minor class blending at the end of the game.

Agreeably, at the end of X, many abilitites started to merge. But, Yuna played a white mage through most of the game for me, and Lulu a black mage, etc. I couldn't decide at the beginning of the game that Wakka should be a blue mage, and Auron a healer. Also, the license board was so easy to complete, unlike the Sphere Grid. To get a player to have every single ability in X would take forever. Not so in XII.

I prefer the License board for the exact reason you stated, I liked figuring out who should do what but then, I've always been a fan of the Job Class system so having the ability to control what every characters role in my party was fun. I knew going into the game I would have to figure out what everyone did. I personally liked it but we all have different tastes. For instance, I hate X's system cause most of your party was stuck in their respected roles and customization only occurred at the end of the game when it wasn't really necessary for finishing the story. I always felt Sphere Grid only gave the player the illusion of control and customization, but that is just my opinion.

IMO, the best modern FF battle system was in X. It was a lot more strategic than the one's before, the underlying leveling mechanics required thought (unless one used the Tonberry for massive leveling), and it was fun. I'd have preferred it if they had managed to make it non-random battles, but I still prefer it to XII.

I definetly disagree, X suffered from such terribly nerfed difficulty that strategy seemed non-existent. Having each player able to practically 1 hit kill specific monsters made random encounters tedious, especially if you tried to get everyone a turn so they all get exp. The game offered a good system but poor design choices and a nerfed difficulty makes most of its strengths irrelevant for me. The game was terribly easy, probably the easiest in the series.

But I don't dislike because of the battle system. I disliked it because the story was unfocused and the characters were uninteresting. When I walk through the entire Sandsea without the story moving forward at all, I am worried. Or when I walk from Mt Bur Omisace to Archades (or whatever the capital is), and there is one piece of dialogue the entire way, I am worried. Both of those "walks" would take most gamers an hour or two. Can you imagine having to wait two hours for the story to move forward in any other Final Fantasy, unless you were deliberately messing about?

I agree and disagree once again. While I agree that the main fault with the story was due to pacing issues like you mentioned. I found the story interesting (I love politics) and the cast far more interesting than its predecessors. Next to VI, I've never played an FF where I can honestly say I like the whole cast and their relationships.

Another thing I would like to point out and I really wish I didn't have to bring this game up again but its my poster child for everything wrong in an FF and that's FFX. I actually, enjoyed not tripping over cutscenes every five minutes. XII lets you play it while X is so in-love with its lame and unoriginal story that it refuses to let you play. In XII, though the cutscenes are few and far between, they were at least important and didn't involve pointless cutscenes either trying to convince you the party is deep or giving you the same piece of info over and over again. X's story and pacing treats the player like they are retarded and suffering from terrible bouts of ADHD.

Yes I liked choco breeding. Infuriating sometimes I admit but It was fun finally getting the gold.

I like Chocobo Breeding as well, but I can't say I care about the game lacking a Chocobo mini-game. VII and IX had fun ones but VIII, X, and X-2 were just terrible. I don't really care for Chocobo's, I prefer moogles. Where was my Mognet minigame?

Im agreeing with cloudane, every map was the same old same old it never really excited me, oh god Giza plains was the worst, there was no feel or atmosphere, no in past FF games like in X every object and the scenery was unique, every waterfall and ruin had its own vibe to it.

I liked XII's world, it was more realistic and the open environments actually stressed exploration which had been seriously lacking in the series. I felt the world design was perfect and allowed the player to not only understand the scope of the world. But make it feel more real despite some of the places being supernatural. Granted, I could have done without the Crystal dungeon but overall I felt the enviroments were top notch and blew previous FF worlds out of the water in terms of depth and beauty.

While I agree to the above start, it's not the only reason why I didn't liked it.
Where were the summons, GF, Aeons, Espers?
The old ones were named after the ships.
And the new ones you needed to find them out by yourself and none were really familiar besides Belias and Maetheus.

This is where I felt XII really did throw an experimental curve ball at the fanbase. Course my opinion is a bit bias considering FFT is my favorite FF and I've always felt summons were overrated and generally useless. I probably used summons more in XII than in previous installments except for IV. I can't say not seeing Ifrit or Shiva bothered me, while the opportunity to use Belias and Zeromus excited me more since they both kicked my ass in the past.

So lack of that didn't helped.
It's sad really because some of the character were well drawn and had a fantastic beautiful world, but were completly wasted potential on some more-than-irrelevant story (like the fact that there theifs and pirates) and the pointless final boss.
If it would have had been done by another team and added traditional RPG and Final Fantasy Elements, it would have had been avoided.

I felt the story touched on the characters fairly well. Vaan is more of a street urchin than a master thief. Pickpockets are pretty boring (unless they are Lone Wolf the Pickpocket ) I felt the plot was quite deep. Focusing on kingdoms clashing and one person's internal struggle to decide whether to save her kingdom or get revenge. I feel the human element was much better represented. Fran may have been a bit of a miss but I always felt its odd few RPGs ever further the plot through NPC's like XII did.

Possibility that if you confronted a Esper here is simply because you got lost somewhere and ended up there.
And the action here was bassically non-existing since the game constantly pause itself when pressing X, giving you time to plan the next couple of moves and it just stalls somewhere down the line.

I actually enjoyed looking for the summons like you had to in old-school FFs. As for the battles, did you play in Wait mode? I don't remember that ever happening to me. Hell, I needed my Gambits just keep up half the time with the enemies.

[champagne supernova]

I wasn't bemoaning the lack of cutscenes, I was bemoaning the lack of dialogue between main characters (not the NPCs though, that was good). Honestly, in your next playthrough, count how many lines of dialogue there is between Mt. Bur Omisace and Archades.

I'll spare you the trouble. The only meaningful dialogue is as you enter the Phon Coast. And what about the Sandsea (Boredomsea)?

That is truly irritating. By the time I got to Archades, I had completely forgotten the awesome scenes at Mt Bur-Omisace. And that is another issue I have with the game. There are only three moments that make you go WOW! The first is the game's opening, the second is the events at Mt. Bur-Omisace (this includes the events simultaneously occuring in Archades) and the final one, the boss battle at the top of the Pharos. When I play a FF, I want to be WOWED! I want to be amazed. And with XII, I felt that it was good, but not excellent.

[Wolf Kanno]

I wasn't bemoaning the lack of cutscenes, I was bemoaning the lack of dialogue between main characters (not the NPCs though, that was good). Honestly, in your next playthrough, count how many lines of dialogue there is between Mt. Bur Omisace and Archades.

I'll spare you the trouble. The only meaningful dialogue is as you enter the Phon Coast. And what about the Sandsea (Boredomsea)?

That is truly irritating. By the time I got to Archades, I had completely forgotten the awesome scenes at Mt Bur-Omisace. And that is another issue I have with the game. There are only three moments that make you go WOW! The first is the game's opening, the second is the events at Mt. Bur-Omisace (this includes the events simultaneously occuring in Archades) and the final one, the boss battle at the top of the Pharos. When I play a FF, I want to be WOWED! I want to be amazed. And with XII, I felt that it was good, but not excellent.

Different taste I feel. I don't see the point in senseless dialogue it annoyed me in X when I couldn't walk a couple of feet at Mt. Gagazat without tripping over a pointless dialogue scene that kept telling you the same thing over and over again. It broke up the flow of the plot and the game for me.

XII wowed me, if not just its story and characters but also its world design and battle system.