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kenister's Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
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| [January 25, 2008 11:25:25 PM]
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GAMEPLAY:
So basically now I’ve gotten a little bit further into the game where I gained a few party members and am now going the Bhujerba mines to rescue Vaan’s girlfriend Penelo. I’ve got few more things at my disposal now. I am now able to use gambits which are like scripted actions for my party members during battle. Say when I enter battle, if I originally put Vaan’s gambit to “attack nearest foe” then that’s exactly what he will do. I can also have another gambit where Ashe will “heal” an ally when they are below 70% hit points. And we can basically prioritize the gambits so that the character will heal first instead of fight. This whole system is very intuitive and I was able to fight battles without having to waste time selecting an action and pausing the whole flow of the game. What’s also a neat trick that I can do is change the party leader in enemies, in the previous Final Fantasy’s you’d be stuck with the main character throughout the whole game but in this game that’s not entirely the case. It’s a minor thing but it’s a welcome change of pace to the traditional RPG game.
So as I was on my way to the Bhujerba caves, my party met with a character named Lamont and he for reasons not entirely clear he needed to go there as well. This was also neat aspect that I saw, usually a party can only consist of three party members, but Lamont entered my party as a guest. This means that he entered my party and will fight along side me but I can’t control him. This makes part of the battles easier as another character who can damage enemies and heal your characters is always a welcome addition. As I entered deeper into the cave, my party eventually met with the kidnappers after a small argument, my party was forced to run out the cave with the giant lizard humanoids on our trail. This was an interesting event because the I was in direct control of my character and the game gave me a choice to fight or run. I could’ve fought them but I didn’t save recently and I didn’t want to lose my progress. I should probably stop at this point because I could potential just lose track of time playing this game.
DESIGN:
The game sets a good level design and this provides a nice mood for the game. Take Rabanastre for example, the city is overflowing with life, the market place has people in stands talking and trying to sell their products other traders and merchants. In the gutters below the city, there are many, many people sitting around and living the poor man’s life. And if you leave the city gates, you see a long strip of desert and sand all around with the strange wild life walking around. This creates a sense of desolation that contrasts with the city’s vibrant life.
The game also has a bunch of innovations over the previous Final Fantasy’s . The new battle system that removed the use of the battleground speeds up the game play, no longer will the player have to run and get into a fight randomly and load to the battleground unintentionally. The use of the gambit system helps to speed game play and allows the casual gamer to set up his battle plan as he sees fit.
The license point system was also a good move by the developers, besides the traditional kill and gain experience/level up system. The license point board allows the player to customize their party members and so the characters who were originally meant to weild a sword and shield can be magic caster, and it's a great way to give freedom to the player and his characters.
As with all Role Playing Games, the story and character development also contributes to a good RPG. The story in this game about the war torn country to trying to redeem itself is pretty good and can almost rival a script written by Peter Jackson! Well not really, but it’s decent enough to keep the player interested in the game and helps motivate him to progress further.
This entry has been edited 1 time. It was last edited on Jan 25th, 2008 at 23:34:11.
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| [January 25, 2008 03:41:21 PM]
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SUMMARY:
In Final Fantasy XII the player controls a main character Vahn, a gutter boy who lives in a city Rabanastre recently occupied by a warring nation Archadia. The other nation locked in a losing war with them is Rozarria and the princess of that nation Ashe is slowly building a resistance to fight back. Vahn eventually meets with Ashe and gathers a band of adventurers, a sky pirate, a viera (humanoid rabbit),and an ex-captain and travels the world of Ivalice to find a way to defeat the armies of Archadia.
GAMEPLAY:
As soon as I selected "New Game", I was greeted with a beautiful computer generated video depicting the recent history of Rabanastre, where Lady Ashe gets married to a prince, Rasler, who leads the war against Archadia. As the cutscene unfolds Rasler is killed and the ex-captain I mentioned earlier, Basch, brings his body back to the country of Dalmasca where Rabanastre is. As the cutscene ends, the in-game engine takes over and I control a character named Reks, who is evidently Vaan's older brother. This is where the “tutorial” part of the game begins and the player is then forced to read text on how to operate Reks and how to interact with the environment. This is also the part in the game where it teaches you how the battle mechanic works. This is quite interesting because in previous Final Fantasy games and other RPGs there would be a game world with enemies, but as soon as you make contact with the enemy, the game would change “modes” and the player would be transferred to a battlefield where the main character draws his weapon and fights his enemy in this field. In this game, they completely remove the battlefield and you can fight the enemies in the game world that you are already in.
As I defeat my first boss fight, where the enemy has a larger amount of hit points than ordinary minions and can execute special attacks, the game’s story unfolds during this tutorial with Basch assassinating his king and killing Reks in the process. The game then tells the story of how Dalmasca falls under Archadian rule and Lady Ashe takes her life. The game shifts over to Reks brother Vaan, and I am then tasked with cleaning the sewers of rats using the new battle system I just learned. At this point the game keeps going in and out of cut scenes explaining how Vaan is sick of the gutter boy life he lives and one day wants to become a sky pirate. I basically kept running around town enjoying the scenery and did my first hunt, which is basically like being a bounty hunter where I look for a specific animal, which will turn out to be a boss, and kill it to gain a reward from the person who posted the bounty. I think this is a good point to stop for the first session and next log I will try to get as far into the game as possible.
This entry has been edited 1 time. It was last edited on Jan 25th, 2008 at 21:50:10.
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kenister's Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Friday 25 January, 2008
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