Me and my bro is 26 hours in the game and the trip to this point was not like the FF we know but the last few hours have realy made the game better. The problem in the begining is that it is far to easy and you only have one way to go with no options on what to do and how to do it. But we are finaly starting to see a change in that. My guess is that it is about 50 hours left in the game.
Yep. I've finished playing for today, got in about an hour or so, and it really is just single minded bashing of the X button. X X X X X X X X for every battle, no fun at all really so far. I'm just after the part where
you find Lightning's sister, Serah, and she's turned to crystal.
The story is actually picking up a bit at this point, it seems like something exciting is about to happen any moment now ...
It's too early for me to make anything of the game so far, really, but there are a couple of things that come to my attention.
Firstly, the synopsis feature is a long-overdue yet welcome addition (resuming FF games after a hiatus is a nightmare, you forget everything that's happened), but it does an awful lot of repeating itself. I think every single entry so far (about 20 or so) all mention the little backstory of the Purge and the fal'Cie curse. I'm not sure why; it might be that Squeenix think constant repetition is going to help you remember the whole thing. It just strikes me as annoying.
Secondly, the voice acting is worse than ever. The graphical enhancements mean that facial emotions and word-mouthing have become pretty much bang on (with the Japanese dialogue), so trying to fit English words is a little harder now than back in the days of Tidus's vague jaw movements which could mean anything. Sometimes the characters (particularly Vanille) come out with these awful lines that make me shake my head. It's not all bad, but it's the kind of rubbish that makes me turn the volume down so my parents don't hear and think to themselves 'what the fuck is that shite he's playing now?'.
Thirdly, the combat is, up until this point at least, a real letdown. Although you lot were all rejoicing 'whoopee, back to ATB again', it really isn't at all. It falls somewhere between FFXII and FFX, but isn't as good as either of them. You can only control the main character of the party (and even then, in an indirect fashion), the rest pretty much act of their own accord. Although it is possible to select individual commands for the party leader (at the moment, I have the generous choice of two types of attack), the battles do move along at a fair old pace, and so it's usually best just to hit the auto-attack command. I can see my X button wearing out fairly quickly.
What also puzzles me slightly is the way that the positions of your characters on the battlefield can have a considerable impact (like, clumping them together makes them susceptible to AOE attacks, and you'd like to keep characters with ranged attacks to the back) but you don't have any control over where they go. At least having the party leader mobile, by way of the right analog stick, would be halfway decent.
Presentation wise, it's also a bit hit-and-miss. As expected, the graphical polish is without compare - absolutely stunning characters set in mindblowing environs, with the odd scalpel-sharp CGI animation filling in between. Unfortunately, the art style is tending more toward futuristic FFVIII than the series' humble cheery-Medieval roots, which (in my book) is a bad thing. FFX was alright, FFXII was toeing the line, but I'm seeing a bit too much of this techno mecha-magical fusion decor in RPGs these days. Also, and although it sounds a bit daft, the menu facade irks me a little as well. It's a bit too clean, simple and bare for my liking - it actually reminds me a lot of Lost Odyssey's menu screens. A nice, flowy font and a more stylised background would make me feel more drawn into the world than a standard arial font on grey.
Now onto some things that give me hope for the future. The music has been really good so far - some excellent mellow piano ambience for the emotional bits, but then some rock fusion for battles and scenes of peril/action/chaos. Music plays a really important part in RPG enjoyment, for me, so if the rest of the game improves later on then it'll definitely have a soundtrack to go along with it.
The characters endear themselves to me instantly, even if their personalities sometimes go a little polar-extreme. For starters, Lightning, the female lead, is an absolute (apologies for using this word) badass. She just exudes cool, like she's in total control of everything around her, but still manages to show little cracks of humanity in there to help you empathise. I'm looking forward to seeing how her character evolves throughout the story.
Snow, the resistance leader, is also quite a likeable personality - a typical sort of good-guy with that penchant for saving everyone, no matter what the cost.
Though I actually (actually) love Vanille, her overly-sweet cutesy-Japanese personality (odd arm movements and poses, making a lot of 'ooos' and 'uhhhhs' and 'aaaaaahhhs') kind of makes me feel uncomfortable a bit. Especially when she feels it necessary to get into intimate touchings and hugs - in an apparently motherlike fashion, but with a bit too much, uh, 'zest' - with the other main character she's accompanying, Hope. You shall see what I mean.
Hope, incidentally, is pretty much a carbon-copy of Vaan from FFXII. In fact, the Vanille-Hope partnership sorta reminds me of the Penelo-Vaan partnership a bit. He's got potential, especially since the revelation that occurs shortly after meeting him, but his character hasn't really been explored much yet.
Finally, there's Lightning's fateful companion, Sazh. He's the comic-relief sort of character, cracking a few dodgy jokes here and there with a little bit of slapsticky foolishness. He's also got a mysterious side, though - and a pair of pistols - which gives him a points advantage from the off. I would have to say that, so far, he's the least interesting, though, as he lacks an involvent with the story that the other characters have.
Whoops! I didn't mean for this to turn into a spiel It's a bit silly, having all these impressions based on an hours worth of gameplay. That's why you're gonna get it all again in about 20 hours time!
Yep. I've finished playing for today, got in about an hour or so, and it really is just single minded bashing of the X button. X X X X X X X X for every battle, no fun at all really so far.
Given where you are, I'm not surprised that the combat is fairly boring. They're pretty slow at introducing the basic elements of the game system. I think you've got Paradigm Shift...? But even if you do, the combinations are pretty basic so far.
They're introducing a layered system and they'll not be done with that yet. I'm not more than a few hours ahead of you, though I tend to play slowly, and they're introducing combat that requires some tactical thinking. It's still fairly basic, but you can start to get a sense of where they're going with it all. It's certainly more interesting than X bashing.
It's one thing expecting the combat to be basic at the start of the game, but this is just an hour's worth of mindless X mashing that isn't even fun. At least it's filled with enough cutscenes and movies to keep my interest going.
Yer the start of this game is boring as hell but once you get past it its awsome. Im a FF fan but i give an honest opinion. Lets start with the graphics ... how sick are they! ... The gameplay can get a little bit samish and as of yet i havent found a free roam zone which is a bit dissapointing seeing as im on chapter 9. i do like the fact that you play as one set character at certian times however can be annoying if you wanna use other characters abilities. I also think the set class thing is pretty good but with it i tend not to use some classes as there really not needed apart from on bosses at some points... and lets be honest how annoying was hope at the start of the game!
Right. Bringing back this thread for the final conclusion.
Finished it on my PS3, after about 55 hours of playtime?
The game starts off very slowly, with very basic battles, and nothing really to worry about, except using a potion every now and then. You're healed after every battle, which, looking back now, isn't that bad a system. (Even if I can hear the 'oldies' turning in their FFFanboy graves.) The big change is that you only ever play as a single character. Again, oldies will be rolling, but after playing for awhile, you'll begin to recognise why.
The battle system begins to get interesting when the Paradigm system comes in, along with other features, including your general magix and stuffs. The paradigms are a quite well-designed 'class' system, where you choose up to 6 combinations that you want available in battle. Obviously certain classes play different roles, for instance, a Ravager will rack up the chain gauge (the main damage-dealing mechanic of the game) whereas a Commando will help to keep the chain gauge up, before it all disappears.
Likewise, you have your Medics (obvious use), your Synergists (Buffers) and your Saboteurs (Debuffers), and finally your Sentinels (Tanks). This offers a wide choice of Paradigms.
The only sad thing is, essentially, you are just hammering the 'Auto-Battle' button. A lot.
The 'character evolution' system is quite well done; known as the Crystarium. It's very very similiar to the Sphere Grid from FF10, just a bit more sparkly. Exp has been ditched completely, so attributes are gained from this Crystarium grid (where you can gain attribute points, abilities, and extra accessory slots etc.) and weapons, which are levelled up into higher forms, using components picked up from enemies.
The story is, in my opinion, very good. Again, Squeenix have pulled quite a marvelous, drug-fuelled rabbit out of their hat. I'm not going to say much, as it'll spoil it, but... It's good.
The graphics are obviously subjective, but with an HDMI cable on the PS3, are stunning.
The voice actors... there could have been better choices I'm sure for a couple of characters; Vanille's voice irked me the most, but this didn't do much to detract from the overall splendour of the game.
The end-game stuff really doesn't do much for the game. You're just playing to get Trophies/Achievements on your respective consoles tbh. It is nice to see an 'open-ended' Final Fantasy, but with the grinding of certain monsters to get the best weapons, and lots of money, and filling the Crystarium... It all begins to get reminiscent of a certain famous MMORPG. (Especially with such low drop rates on some of the nicer items)
TL;DR :Good Points: Battle and Levelling System works very well, could do with a bit more involvement though. Graphics are stunning. Story is good. I liked the weapon upgrading system myself.
Bad Points: Voice acting could be better, end-game grinding doesn't bode well, and there is still less actual involvement in the game than there used to be.
All in all, a very good game, and a big comeback from their more recent titles. I'm actually quite excited for their future releases, as they seem to be finally catching on to what we want.
Did anybody else manage to finish this game? Ronin? Astroid? Does it redeem itself later on? I completely stopped playing it at the bit where
they are all rooting about in the junkyard place after the Fal'Cie gives them their focus ... mission ... thing. Or was it L'Cie?
I just got FF9 off of PSN, and I have to admit that playing through that again for the billionth time is an infinitely more exciting prospect than resuming FF13.
I got a little further than that, but really not much. There's a Penny Arcade strip that covers it well. I think if you fancy a nicely animated Anime punctuated with fairly routine battles then it could provide a fair entertainment for a while.
I have a feeling that I'm missing some of the best bits by quitting out now, but I haven't had the space to get back into it.
I finished the game and to my mind it didn't really redeem itself. In fact the only reason I finished it is that I tend to be a bit of a completionist and very stubborn with it.
The storyline throughout the game was no better than average - so much so that I can't actually remember how it ended.
Also the battles have absolutely no variety to them. It seemed like the only way they increased the difficulty later on to maintain the challenge was to give most of the enemies an instant kill move which just got irritating. Again, it was really only stubborness on my part that got me through it.
On the whole I'd say that you won't get any more out of the game by going further than you already have.
I did quite like FFX, along with FFVIII, although VIII more. But each to their own. I think it's not a bad game, but again, each to their own. IT's all subject to what people want in a game.
It's a bit silly, having all these impressions based on an hours worth of gameplay. That's why you're gonna get it all again in about 20 hours time!
