Friday 19 January, 2007

Played some more FF XII today. I'm beginning to like my party members. The main protagonist, Vaan, is still somewhat annoying, but the rest of the characters each have an interesting story attached to them. Balthier, for instance, is a very complex character. It is not clear yet what his true motivations are for joining the party. He is a rogue pirate, a charmer, and a clever man. Other characters' motives are kept secret as well. This has always been the case for RPG games, especially so of one of Final Fantasy's caliber. The story is wrapped in intrigue, with twists and turns, people seeming to switch sides, and so forth. I have played about a dozen hours overall, and I still have not learned that much. This is not a fault of the game, however. The mystery is one of the major factors that drives me to play more, to discover how the pieces come together. This franchise is known for its good storytelling, so I am looking forward to surprising revelations, backstabbings, and an epic conclusion. Of course, even a good story is not enough to keep someone playing if the game play is not fun. Fortunately, FF XII is fun to play - the removal of random battles is wonderful in my opinion, as I never liked walking ten paces only to suddenly be drawn into battle. The ability to avoid enemies when I want to is great, and the when I want to fight, I don't even have to push any buttons. I suppose the gambit system does not immerse you in the fight the same way as pushing buttons, but it is nice for the weaker enemies not to have to keep hitting 'attack', 'defend', etc. And if I really want to, I can manually control their actions. This is a wonderful move for the FF series I think, giving people a choice between letting the characters just go at it, or allowing you to control all their actions. The only thing that would improve the battles would be the inclusion of more diverse magic attacks. Perhaps it is because I need to open up more magic possibilities with the license board, but I do not have much besides being able to cure ailments and one summon spell. Using the same strike over and over on a monster gets tedious and boring to watch, and it seems strange that an RPG such as this one does not have more in the way of magical attacks, or at least makes it a chore to obtain them. This is a small problem though, and it does not affect the game as a whole.

Try and get some more magic. I said the same thing in the beginning but once I unlocked some of the magic, Quickenings and got more espers...wow this game starts to shine lol. I think a lot of people get bored of the same attacking at first because they haven't unlocked a lot of the license board. Trust me though when you do, it will be worth it ^^. I hope you enjoy the rewards of the license board later in the game but also enjoy more of the story as well.

~Naroku