<span style="font-size: 11px; color: #959595;"><a href="/forums/profile/11">Fincher</a> said:</span> Yeah, I got nothing.I mean, I wouldn't say it sucked, but it wasn't good. It was certainly pretty, and I liked Fang, and there were some good ideas bouncing around in there, but it didn't coalesce into something good.Take Stagger, for example. It's not a bad idea at all, and there is some satisfaction to putting an enemy over the limit and then wailing on him. So I get that. I get balancing paradigms to Stagger and cause massive damage on bosses and marks...but there's also minor little enemes. I'll be fighting someone I'm overleveled for, someone I could kill in my sleep, and it'll still take minutes because I have to get that goddamn chain up. There's one regular enemy in particular that took two Staggers to kill. Even when I would be passing through a long time later, two Staggers.This is not fun, because it makes it obvious that you can only control one of your characters, and you have a small number of abilities per paradigm, and yet somehow, inexplicably, this is not an action rpg. They're trying to make Final Fantasy more like action games here...but without the action, even though that's something RPG's have had since the NES days. It's stifling and boring.The visuals, the best aspect, are undermined for two reasons. First, once you leave some of the best looking locations in the game, you can't go back. That crystal lake was gorgeous, and it would have been nice to revisit it, but no. Second, unlike Final Fantasy X, you don't have the ability to rewatch FMVs. I didn't care so much in FFXII because the FMV's weren't the highlight, but here it's a oversight. I'm not replaying this game.Oh, and the developers hate choice. They resent our liberty and want to take it from us. Before the game's release, people were defending the tunnels by saying that FFX was the same way. FFX was not this linear, but it's not just the tunnels. It's a comprehensive lack of choice. You can't wander off the beaten path for most of the game. There's a distinct lack of towns. You can't control who's in your party for a large part of the game, even when the other characters are right there. Yes, FFIV never let me choose my characters, but there was always an in-game reason for it, and FFIV's characters were actually good for the most part. Having to use Yang was not a problem. Having to fight as Snow and Hope is a problem.The Crystarium is linear, and there are level caps until the end of the game, and you don't get all of the roles at first, and the roles you get later on cost more points to raise. I wanted Sazh in my party once the game let me "choose", but the game really said no. I had Vanille until the end, because I needed a medic, and it cost way too many points to make Sazh an effective medic even when the game let me use the points. The developers are secret Communists.Oh, wait, I was supposed to be defending the game? Well, there's hunting marks, so that's cool. There were some sweet monster designs. Battle animations were nice. They sprung for Australian accents. Serah was likable and hot.
<span style="font-size: 11px; color: #959595;"><a href="/forums/profile/60">Magicjewel</a> said:</span> I actually liked Lightning, but then again I'm attracted to moody characters with swords.I didn't like how you couldn't choose your party for the longest time. I detested Hope and Vanille but everyone else was too expensive post-wise to train as a good dedicated medic (or even red mage figure).I wanted to like Snow but he got on my nerves by acting like an idiot most of the time.I felt like the "focus" bs was weak.Pulse is GORGEOUS. Almost too big and expansive. I really wanted to be able to explore Cocoon too.
