Just Beat: Final Fantasy XIII

In middle school, I borrowed Final Fantasy VI from Ryan Bristol, and fell head over heals in love with it.

Doesn't Count.

For the next few years, I played it constantly. Having entered the Final Fantasy scene a bit late, VI was the only game of the franchise I was able to get my hands on (well, except for FF Legends and Mystic Quest, but those don’t really count). Consequently, when I discovered that Final Fantasy VII was coming out for the PS1, I had my first chance to play a sequel to one of my favorite games.

Realize that I had never played another Final Fantasy and didn’t understand that each of the games was wholly unique. My view of sequels was based on growing up in the 8 and 16-bit areas when a sequel was nothing more than better levels, cooler power-ups, maybe a bit more story. To us, sequels like Mario 3, Super Metroid, Mega Man II+, and A Link to the Past, where the same game we fell in love with, just with more awesome.

And yes, there were sequels that didn’t fit this mold. Mario 2 and The Adventure of Link were drastically different than their originals. But in the gaming circle I grew up in, these games were universally shunned for not being what I described above.

Anyway, my point is, I expected that Final Fantasy VII would simply be a larger, more awesome, evolution of VI.

Instead, Final Fantasy VII completely blew my mind. It was not my SNES Final Fantasy. Sure, there were nods to previous games. The names, items, and spells were similar, but this merely created a Final Fantasy atmosphere, more than anything else. It was neither a continuation of the story, nor a simple evolution of the previous game. Final Fantasy VII was something entirely unique.

Let me (finally) get to the point.

At the start of Final Fantasy VII, you are confined to a relatively linear and restrictive setting and plot. The story takes you from one point to the next, with no possibility to break from the point A to B map sections that link the various plot locations. The setting is a mega city named Midgar and is powered by eight huge Mako reactors. Right off the bat, you destroy one of those reactors and soon thereafter take out a second.

Given the story makes it absolutely clear that there are eight such reactors, I naively assumed the rest of the game would center on the destruction of the remaining six. Although I really do enjoy this part of the game, my first time through, I missed the exploration component inherent in an expansive overworld, like the one I experienced in FF VI.

FF VII disappointed me by removing one of the primary tenants of Final Fantasy that I found really attractive: the freedom to roam the world and explore regions that may or may not take me to the next objective. I loved being able to see what would happen if I went to a town that didn’t enter into the story until much later, or go to some remote location to find items significantly more powerful than my current stock.

So, imagine my disappointment, when I thought that Midgar was the entirety of my world in FFVII. Then imagine my undeniable awe in discovering that; after hours confined in a restrictive, dark, and imposing city; I emerged onto a sunny and expansive overworld.

‘Holy Balls! This game is effing huge!’ I said (well something along those lines).

Holy Balls! That sword is effing huge!

Okay, so why do I tell this long-winded, meandering, and mostly useless story? Well, the last time I posted about Final Fantasy XIII, I had just landed on the lower world of Pulse. I had given a fairly glowing report of the game to this point; contrary to the nearly universal distaste for the game. Understand that I had just played 20 to 30 hours of a completely linear (and somewhat enjoyable) game and had finally gained access to Pulse. An entire planet awaited my exploration.

I was thrilled at the possibilities Pulse offered. I had spent hours witnessing the fear Cocoon’s citizens had of a Pulse invasion. During my time on Cocoon, I was constantly ostracized and pursued. As something called a ‘Pulse L’cie,’ my party was tasked by meddling god-like beings known as Fal’cie with the utter destruction of Cocoon. Despite rejecting this tasking, Cocoon’s populace, justifiably, wanted my party dead. Having finally fled Cocoon, I was convinced that, during my exploration of Pulse, I would see the other side of the story.

I imagined a host of possibilities, each having sprawling ramifications on the story. Maybe the citizens of Pulse would welcome my party as saviors because of their status as Pulse L’cie? Or on the other hand, maybe Lighting and her friends would be hunted down for swearing off their mission to destroy Cocoon? Do the citizens of Pulse even reciprocate Cocoon’s fear, hatred, and distrust? Do the citizens of Pulse even know Cocoon believes the two worlds are still at war? Perhaps Cocoon is the true evil power and has been subjugated Pulse since the previous war? Maybe there is a true Cold War and arms race brewing between the two worlds and my party is sending both of them dangerously close to an all out apocalyptic war?

I was eager to get this side of the story. The possibilities were limitless.

With the planet of Pulse awaiting my exploration, I felt the same as when I first stepped outside Midgar and had to shield my eyes from the bright sunlight. I couldn’t wait to see where exploration and the story took me.

My enthusiasm was quickly and brutally crushed. I learned that there were no cities, no people, no war, and definitely no world to explore. Yeah, I know: spoiler alert. Deal with it.

That’s right, after finally ‘opening up,’ there is jack shit to do. Pulse is a world of several huge areas linked together and populated by a bunch of monsters. That’s it. End of story. Oh sure, you can take on the different sidequest hunts, but these are relatively boring, and apart from unlocking some log entries, truly don’t contribute to much.

Even Vanille is shocked at how lame Pulse is.

Pulse should have been the real meat of the game, where player driven exploration could have resulted in an astonishing amount of depth. Instead, it’s merely a brief diversion before the game’s final conclusion.

If Pulse is where my enthusiasm ended, then my return to Cocoon was where it turned to outright hostility. Usually, I don’t complain (much) if the story component of a game is weak. I truly value gameplay, pretty graphics, and awesome music more than the story. Perhaps I’ve just come to terms with the fact that video game stories mostly suck, but FFXIII crosses the proverbial line.

(I suppose Spoilers are ahead, but they don’t make much sense anyway, so it really doesn’t matter).

Upon returning to Cocoon, I discovered Cid had been appointed Prime Minister (or Chancellor, or whatever). This made little to no sense for several reasons. First, I had already killed Cid. I watched him die. Granted he turned to crystal and, I suppose a Fal’cie could bring him back, but it still seemed sudden and contrived. Second, Cid’s appointment was designed to destabilize Cocoon and essentially lead to civil war.

Um, What?

How does that work?

I understand that Cid and his cavalry were fighting against Fal’cie dominance over Cocoon, but wouldn’t his followers be happy that he was made Prime Minister? I understand that his position only put him under closer scrutiny from the Fal’cie, but I feel that from this position, he could orchestrate large, sweeping changes that could unify the people and eventually cast down or mitigate the Fal’cie.

Then, in the midst of this confusing plot revelation, I witnessed the most ridiculous cutscene and ‘plot development’ ever conceived of by man.

Cid gives an inaugural address where he promises to keep Cocoon safe and blah, blah, blah. He then shows his resolve. Much like a nation that is under the constant threat of invasion, he holds a military demonstration to showcase the strength and might of Cocoon’s armed forces, and…

Wait.

He doesn’t do that.

He holds a motorcycle race.

I’ll let that sink in.

A motorcycle race. That’s like holding a Nascar race in Washington DC after a newly appointed President makes his inaugural address.

Nascar: how the U.S. won the Cold War.

Then your party comes crashing into said motorcycle race and activates their respective eidolons and start wrecking shop. Then Pulse attacks… I think. Well, a bunch of monsters from Pulse start roaming around. And, I guess this started a civil war? Hell, I don’t know. This ended it for me. I had no idea what was going on, and just pushed onward to beat the game.

What the hell happened? In the last eighth of the game, I completely reversed from ‘having a blast playing it’ to ‘screw this shit, let’s just get it over with.’

Ugh.

Having said that, I still rank Final Fantasy XIII as a game I’d play again. Someday. In the far, far, future. It has some challenging bosses, mainly due to the imposed ‘limit caps.’ Likewise, I enjoyed the (controversial) battle system. I really, really liked the music (except about four exceptions, which I hated). And, for the first time in a long, long time, I actually like the main character, Lightning. Hell, even Hope and Vanille, who I started out despising, grew on me (a little). On the one hand, FFXIII is good enough to warrant another playthrough someday. Yeah, someday when the only games left are casual Kinect and Move games that I stubbornly will not play, and I’ve gone through the majority of my backlog. Yeah, I might replay it again. However, on the other hand, it’s definitely not good enough for me to really recommend to anyone.

Currently Playing: Final Fantasy XIII

I’ve been hitting Final Fantasy XIII pretty hard lately and have come to a rather startling hypothesis.

I think I may actually be enjoying this game… and I have no idea why.



I definitely approached XIII with a very negative bias. I read the generally poor reviews from sources I (for the most part) trust and, combined with the gameplay footage I saw, I was not looking forward to the game.

Then I started playing and, guess what? I did hate it. The first few chapters were garbage. I had no idea what was going on. Combat was too fast for me to understand what the hell was happening. The story was all Tarantino with massive out-of-order flashbacks and a confusing mythos that would only be adequately described later. I felt as if the game was driving itself and I was just along for the ride, aimlessly pushing the x-button along the way.

Then at about chapter 6 or so, I found myself playing for 6 to 7 hours on end. In all seriousness, I haven’t played a game consistently for huge chunks of time like this in over a decade. I’m a 2-3 hour at a time kind of gamer, mostly because I end up only marginal liking most games I play, so 2-3 hours is about all I can handle. But, with XIII, something is markedly different. Yeah, I can’t stand that most of the shit that comes out of Vanille’s mouth aren’t so much words, but rather squeaks, sighs, and whines. Yeah, the ‘levels’ are linear as fuck. Yeah, the Crystarium isn’t a customization system, but rather a thinly veiled linear level-up system. But, for some reason, I can handle all the (massive) negatives and am really having a pretty good time.

While playing yesterday, I mulled over this phenomenon and came to the realization that critics (myself included) have a tendency to compare any Final Fantasy to the rest of the games of the series. And, honestly, there is nothing wrong with that. Final Fantasy, has often been a hallmark game of whatever system it was on and should be a litmus test for the rest of the series. Unfortunately, I firmly believe that the Golden Age for Final Fantasy has long since past. The SNES and early PS1 days set a bar so high that Square-Enix may continue to produce quality games and never again reach that level.

With the above realization, it occurred to me that I had, not once, made a comparison between Final Fantasy XIII and any other game of the franchise. As a staunch Final Fantasy supporter for nearly 2 decades, why was I totally cool to let XIII slip through my pessimistic criticism of anything made after 1998?

(Here’s the part where I’m not going to make any friends.)

Final Fantasy XIII isn’t a Final Fantasy.

Watch Out, Steke! Don't piss off the Fanboys, or Cardboard Cloud will come for you!

Okay, let me explain. I know that since the days of FF VII there have always been critics that say this, but they are using it as a negative, whereas I am not.

Until XIII (and to a lesser extent XII), every Final Fantasy has possessed a familiarity about it. I could link the design, mechanics, and essence of the game to the rest of the series. Pressing start on any Final Fantasy, even including those I despised, was like coming home from a long trip.

But, when I turn on XIII and I don’t feel that familiarity, the comfort of something I’ve already done 12 freaking times… and it’s goddamn refreshing. It’s different. It’s new. Really, XII was the same way, it just took me 40 hours to realized that I was hating on a game simply because it wasn’t Final Fantasy VI. XIII earns mad points from me because Square-Enix took it in a new direction, it’s innovative, and it makes me want to play it.

Yeah, it’s not awesome like we’ve come to expect from Final Fantasy. Yeah, it has some... okay, many problems. But, the production value is still through the freaking roof, the music is incredible, the combat system allows for boss fights of grand scale, and it’s nothing we have really seen before. It won’t go down as my favorite of the franchise, but it sure as hell is better than X.

(Probably not making any friends with that last sentence either.)

Anyone who talks to me about videogames for any length of time will soon learn that one of my favorite games of all time is U.N. Squadron for the SNES.


I freaking love this game and due to the excessive amount of time I’ve spent playing it, I’ve gotten ridiculously good at it. No kidding, if I had to point to one game that I can legitimately say I’ve mastered, it would be U.N. Squadron.

Heck, it’s even gotten to the point where I add restrictions to myself to make it more challenging. Why not trying to beat the game on Hard with only using the worst plane? How about beat it on Gamer mode? Okay, now beat it on Gamer mode without using Greg? Okay, now beat it on Gamer mode without using Greg AND without Special Weapons? And now, beat it on Gamer mode without using Greg, Special Weapons, or getting a single weapon powerup?

Alright, you caught me, I wasn’t able to complete the last two of those challenges. I honestly don’t think it would be possible to do those last two. But, you get the idea.

Because of my love for U.N. Squadron, the Arcade version has been sort of my own personal Moby Dick. I vaguely remember playing it a few times at the arcade in the mall, but that was before I was even in middle school. My only recollection was of how much harder (and how different) it was from the SNES version.

Since those days, I’ve always checked every (increasingly rare) arcade that I run across to see if they have the cabinet, but alas, they never do. I have seen a few clips of people playing online, but they are almost always using an emulator.

Needless to say, I had pretty much resigned myself to the realization that I would never really be able to experience this game on my own.

...Until I found someone asking way too much for one on Ebay! So, I did what any reasonable person without a job would do, I bought it - and it is glorious!

Shooting in the Dark

Destructoid recently posted a job opening for a paid internship for a video game reviewer. Each applicant is required to make a short 1 minute video about a new game he loved or hated, or on a recent video game topic posted on Destructoid.

Despite high chances of being the one video that the good folks at Destructoid use as the example of what not to do, I decided to enter. I fully expect that I am not they type of person they are looking for.

Because of my non-existent chance of even being considered for the job, I took a bit of artistic liberty with the video requirements and decided to give a little rant about something that has been on my mind for a while.

Since E-3 there have been some journalists praising Bungie for making Halo: Reach cross genre with the inclusion of a Space Combat section. Check out the (shoddy) video here.

Unfortunately, one minute is not nearly long enough for my rambling self to fit in everything I wanted to say on the topic. For example: is the rest of humanity's Armed Forces entirely incompetent? I mean seriously, do we really need a Spartan to do everything? Wouldn't there be, I don't know, PILOTS to do this sort of job. Additionally, do you really expect me to believe that Spartans somehow know how to fly a Space Fighter? That's not something you exactly 'just pick up on' during a weekend class. That's the equivalent of a modern day Navy Seal knowing how to pilot the freaking Space Shuttle.

Just like riding a bike...

Just Beat: Tactics Ogre

Allow me to apologize in advance for any typos I make of the name ‘Tactics Ogre.’ Apparently, my brain continually wants to go all dyslexic on it and make it Ogre Tactics. Doesn’t that make more sense, fit better with the general ‘Ogre Battle’ series, and just plain roll of the tongue better?

Perhaps my continual inability to get the game’s title correct was a sign that pretty much nothing about this game would sit well with me. My overall feelings towards Tactics Ogre are neither positive nor negative, but conversely I am definitely not ambivalent nor neutral about it. Maybe it would be better to say that I am both strongly positive and strongly negative about the game.

Flip that coin, TwoFace, and tell me if I like this game or not...

Ugh, now I am just confusing myself. I guess my feelings about Tactics Ogre can best be put that they are like a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.

Points to those who know why this picture is here!

Why such a conflict of emotions on this game? We may as well start at the beginning…

Knowing that the choices I made throughout the game would have a profound impact on the story, I chose not to do any research before starting my playthrough. While I’m not a huge stickler about spoilers, I wanted to go through this one cold, with absolutely no preconceived notions.

Consequently, I was left scratching my head early on with the Tactics Ogre’s plentiful and overarching similarities to another ‘Tactics’ game of the Final Fantasy variety, that I happen to know extremely well. As I played on, I began to get a very sour taste in my mouth: I was playing a crappy clone of Final Fantasy Tactics! How dare the Ogre Battle series rip off one of my favorite games of all time! This would not do!

With my initial impression one of building hatred and anger, I decided it was time to go to the internet and thus I received an education in what I should have already known as someone who considers himself a Gamer with a Masters Degree in Tactical RPGs. First Tactics Ogre was a PS1 port of the original Super Famicon game, so it predated Final Fantasy Tactics by a good number of years. Second, the game was the brainchild of Yasumi Matsuno, who would later go on to direct Final Fantasy Tactics.

In the time it takes to read a Wikipedia entry, my opinion of Tactics Ogre changed 180 degrees. Instead of a poorly done clone, Ogre Tactics (doh!) was revolutionary and implemented (albeit in unpolished forms) mechanics and ideas that would later be perfected in Final Fantasy Tactics.

Given the startling similarities between the two games, it would not be surprising if Yasumi Matsuno didn’t think of Final Fantasy Tactics as a remake of Tactics Ogre and an opportunity to fix any problems from his original masterpiece.

Apparently, 'Poor Translation and Localization" was something Matsuno felt he got right the first time around.

Even with the knowledge of Tactics Ogre being the ‘spiritual predecessor’ to one of my favorite games, I still have a hard time determining how I feel. Every major positive has a rather glaring negative just sitting there staring at you. Similarly, major faults also seem to contain profound positives.

Want Proof? Positive: a guy named Boner. Negative: there are Boners all over the place.

For example, I enjoy the difficulty of Tactics Ogre. When playing at or near the levels of the enemy, the battles are challenging and require more than a bit of tactical thought. Most story battles cannot be won be simply conducting a mass charge with melee weapons.

The flip side is that, since the ability to revive dead characters only becomes available late in the game, when a character is killed, they are more or less gone for good. Thus, when a party member died, I hit the reset button. Given the above mentioned challenge, I ended up hitting the reset button a lot, which began to get increasingly frustrating. This frustration was compounded by the AI ganging up on wounded characters (a positive, as it’s a sound tactic that anyone with half a brain would use) and also seem to possess increased stats compared to my characters of comparable level and equipment (a negative, as well designed games don’t need to rely on cheating AI).

My resulting frustration would either lead to getting fed up and not touching a controller for five days or, ultimately leveling up way beyond the AI level, and consequently removing the afore mentioned challenge.

Another example centers on the job system. The character customization process is very diverse and allows quite a bit of flexibility. Want your Wizard to be equipped with a sword and shield? Go for it. There are no ‘this character can’t equip that’ messages here. Naturally, equipping a sword would reduce the Wizard’s magic power and he would still suck as a melee fighter, but if you wanted to do it, you could.

The down side however, after the first four or five hours of gameplay, I found a team that worked for me, and I never changed it the remainder of the game (with the exception of equipping some new weapons here or there). In fact, in order to prevent my characters from dying, almost all my characters were indirect attackers: i.e. archers. You see, an indirect attack, whether by bow, crossbow, shuriken, etc does not let the enemy counter attack, whereas a direct (melee) attack does. And, remember that I’m trying to prevent characters from dying, so keeping my distance and limiting the amount of damage by not giving the enemy the opportunity to counter attack seemed like a pretty solid plan.

In fact it was such a solid plan, that my party of 2 Archers, 2 Valkyries (with bows), Canopus (with a bow), 2 healers, a Wizard, a Swordsman, and a Bezerker (crossbow), were able to handle anything the game threw at them, with maybe two exceptions. Remember, I hit upon this combination at hour 5 of a 50 hour game. That’s 45 hours of essentially the same battle set up over and over and over…

The above examples are just the tip of the iceberg for the two-sided aspects of the game. Consequently, it has been hard to determine how I exactly feel about the game. On the one hand, I would replay this game in a heartbeat. If it were not for my ever increasing backlog of unplayed games, I would start a new game of Tactics Ogre today. The branching story and bonus dungeon that I only started exploring, plus all the abilities and items that I didn’t get or experiment fully with, all call me back to Tactics Ogre and make it a game I want to play.

But, on the other hand, I’m not sure I recommend it. I suppose if Tactical RPGs are your bread and butter, than yeah, go find a copy. But, even for Tactical RPG buffs, there are plenty of much more refined tactical games out there (to be fair, there are a lot worse too – Eternal Eyes anyone?). Likewise, Tactics Ogre has not aged well when compared to other Tactical RPGs of the past few generations. While Japan has a huge Tactics Ogre fan base, here in the US, the game has (at best) a cult following. Go ahead and count me as one of the members of that fan base, but I think those numbers are quite thin.

Pure Awesome

Late last night, during a marathon session of Tactics Ogre, I encountered something quite unexpected.

While, fighting through the outer fortifications of the enemy's capital city, I chose to attack from the rear, because, er, well... Wait, that's not what I meant. Rather, I came from behind to better sneak up on my target... uh, erm...

Damn, there isn't really any way to make that sound dignified.

Anyway, it's two in the morning, I'm tired, I'm grumpy, I just want to get through this series of battles and save... Then one of the enemy wizards takes his turn and I see:



That's right, the Wizard's name is Boner. That my friends, qualifies as Pure Awesome.

Catching Up

Holy Nuts have I been super busy with a bunch of nonsense the past few weeks. But, some free time finally opened up this weekend, so I can get a few updates on what I’ve been up to.

Let’s start off with the Halo LAN party I went to. Or as I have come to call it: Halo 3: Noob Nooberson gets Pwned. Unfortunately a bunch of the people who were going to show up were simply too intimidated by my FPS prowess, so they bailed. Ultimately we ended up playing 2 on 2 - first to 50 kills. Below are my stats for each of the 5 rounds that we played. Go ahead and bask in my undeniable dominance.

Round 1
Map: Valhalla
Kills: 11
Deaths: 25

Round 2
Map: Snow Bound
Kills: 7
Deaths: 31

Round 3
Map: High Ground
Kills 10
Deaths: 24

Round 4
Map: Epitaph
Kills: 13
Deaths: 34

Round 5
Map: Pit
Kills: 15
Deaths: 29

Pretty ugly, huh. Seriously, the most kills Noob Nooberson had was 15? That's just sad. The really amazing thing was how incredibly awesome my teammate was. We won two rounds and only lost the other three by one or two kills. Now take a look again at my above stats and imagine how kickass he was to overcome such a horrible partner and accomplish that.

Despite being unable to aim, I was able to help my teammate in other ways. By positioning myself in the open and then spewing a steady stream of smack talk, insults, and questions of manhood at my opponents, I was continually able to lure them in to the open to slaughter me. Meanwhile, my teammate was hiding nearby to then come in for the kill. You’d be surprised how long it took the opposing team to figure out that we were doing the same trick over and over. Sure they would kill me, but my partner would usually get two kills on them.

Next Up, I have a few New Acquisitions.

I fell hard into an advertising trap the other day. I saw that Amazon had Final Fantasy XIII for pretty cheap on a ‘one day only’ deal. Deciding that this was the lowest I would see FF XIII for a quite a while, I decided to go for it. And, 'click' it goes into the cart. Well, while I'm here, I might as well check out some other things as well... So, I also ended up buy the Gradius Collection (PSP), Gradius III/IV (PS2), and Metal Slug Anthology (PSP).

Additionally, I recently picked Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles and Puzzle Quest for PSP; Suikoden III and Persona 4 for PS2; Castles of Shikigami III for Wii (so cheap it was almost free).

Oh, and I also got a second copy of R-Type Final, so I can just leave it upstairs at the TV and PS2 by my bed. Yeah, I’m a loser, I own multiple copies of my favorite games so I don’t have to walk downstairs to get them if I want to play them on my TV upstairs.

Should have some stuff up on Ogre Tactics soon. I’m pretty sure I’m nearing the end and I think I may have a lot to say about this one.