Ok ok ok I understand that Toriyama wants the game to focus on the story telling by restricting the player's freedom, that's fine and good and I understand that. I was prepared for a game that was essentially the drawn out equivalent of the "Spirits Within" interactive DVD menu.
What I wasn't prepared for is how, after almost totally eliminating player cognition in favor of "storytelling", the story is still boring and stupid.
I'm about six hours in right now. I've literally fallen asleep while playing. I don't mean I fell asleep and stopped playing, I mean I fell asleep while actually in a fight and finished the fight.
Pulse must be a completely different game. Not a variation on the hallways, but a totally different game altogether that shares only a few similar aspects to what I'm playing right now. That's how everybody talks, and it's the only way I can imagine this game getting anything but the worst reviews from everyone.
"Spirits Within" had better graphics and a more streamlined and innovative combat system. The story was still stupid, but the characters weren't as irritating.
Most of the plot details are in the encyclopedia? That's cute, kinda like directing a movie and having a voice over explain literally everything while the actors dance around and do completely meaningless, nonsensical things all of the time.
"Time to jump."
Jump where? Why? Where's the encyclopedia entry explaining why you have electricity and what your motivation is?
"Deal with it later! Ciao!"
Are you just a dopey whore or is it poor writing that made you say that to a kid who just watched his mom die? Why did you hand him a gun that he dropped almost immediately? Why are you talking to him at all? Why am I still playing this game? Maradon! fucked around with this message on 01-31-2011 at 05:51 PM.
I wish that was a joke, because it's not. Yes Pulse is better in that you're given the option to run around a complete a few side quests (that if you're capable of doing at this stage make the end boss considerably easier), or just simply max out all the characters as best you can (because after the final boss, you get the FINAL rank in their various trees).
Lightning: Cunt. Never thought anything different through the game.
Snow: Mouthy jerkbag I was glad to sideline until the end of the game when I "needed" him.
Hope: In dire need of a slap in the face and a pair of balls. Jesus you little whiny fuck.
Vanille: Can someone get me a ball gag for this bitch? If it wasn't for the fact that she gets Death and can possibly earn you some easy T4 "upgrade tokens" I'd have let her rot.
Sazh: Second least annoying of the bunch. Like the mini chocobo, but dont' wanna know what's actually in his fro after that bird's been there a few days. Also cheapass moves with the guns that lets him back away from a combatant and 'cheat' a few of the hunts. 
Fang: Ok, I kinda like her. Yes there are some cliche bits from her, but those bits aside she's the least offensive. That and I kept making "has a dick" references about her every time she popped up before joining the party completely. Doesn't hurt that she's also the biggest badass in the game (She dealt the 2 attacks to kill the final boss, final form. That's all, 2 shots) when you finally get everything setup (and if you can get her a Genji glove before the final boss fight).
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Maradon! had this to say about dark elf butts:
I'm about six hours in right now. I've literally fallen asleep while playing. I don't mean I fell asleep and stopped playing, I mean I fell asleep while actually in a fight and finished the fight.
Me too!
It doesn't get much better, really.
Pulse only makes it better if you are into doing a million monster hunting sidequests.
The rest of the game just really irritated me. I hated being led around by the nose and not having ANYWHERE to explore until you got to Pulse. The story was annoying in many ways. The bosses were pretty lame and annoying.
I love Final Fantasy, but this game sucked as a member of the franchise. As a standalone game it *might* have been passable.
It's definitely my least favorite and I've played Mystic Quest.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
I'm somewhat amused that they think the game was good enough (or maybe bad enough) to need a second part. 10 got a second part and while the second one wasn't really all that great, 10 itself was pretty badass overall. 7 got multiple "sequel" installments and was worth it. Still not sure how Versus and Type-0 (formerly Agito) are going to fit into this crap either.
Also kinda irritating that they wanted to make this an "interactive story" type game, but went with a combat system that required as much manual intervention as it did. After a while in 12 you could just watch the fight as the gambit system took care of 90% of "common" fights. Would have been nice to have that kind of control setup for 13, IMO...
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Lyinar Ka`Bael's fortune cookie read:
It's definitely my least favorite and I've played Mystic Quest.
MQ isn't all that bad if you scratch out the words "Final Fantasy" on the cart. No worse than any other "small time" RPG...
It's time for that tech demo to become a real game, Squeenix.
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Densetsuing:
Square should just start remaking the classic FF games PS3-style. They'd make a shit ton of money, and we'd actually be happy as fans of the franchise.It's time for that tech demo to become a real game, Squeenix.
They made a shit ton of money on FF13, so they really have no reason to make anything different.
What kind of target demo is out there that's bothered by decision making and has been waiting desperately for video games that they don't have to play? Why is it now a big trend to eliminate player cognition? Why does "Streamlining" earn so much praise from reviewers and fanboys alike?
I really doubt it's being driven by FPS players. Just look at FPS's: they're going the opposite direction, adding in complex character building systems and the players love it. Maradon! fucked around with this message on 02-01-2011 at 06:33 AM.
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And I was all like 'Oh yeah?' and Maradon! was all like:
I really doubt it's being driven by FPS players. Just look at FPS's: they're going the opposite direction, adding in complex character building systems and the players love it.
No, the "hardcore FPS" players (and honestly, I say "Hardcore Console FPS") are the ones that are liking it.
RPGs used to be for "serious" players... then they realized that if they "simplified" and "streamlined" the playing they could sell more to other classifications of people. The fanboys will still buy it if we slap name X on it, and if we make it shiny enough then other people will buy it! Win/Win for us! Who cares that people started returning it to Gamestop 3 days later? We don't care about those wankers because people will buy it new online!
And the last FPS that had "character customization" that I thought was really worth a shit was DeusEx... Can't think of one since that's really been a "character" instead of a "exploit selection"
FPS's continue to get deeper, while CRPG's only seem to be getting radically shallower. Maradon! fucked around with this message on 02-01-2011 at 10:26 AM.
It has weird experimental moments where they try to mix genres that just don't feel right, but the story is a hundred times more interesting than FFXIII's 50 hour long "Run away!", and the characters are a actually a bit deeper than their respective stereotypes.
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Maradon!'s account was hax0red to write:
TF2 has player classes and unlockables
TF2 now has unlockables. The original game didn't, and the original concept of unlockables was to balance classes/get more people playing classes rarely played. Such is the reasoning behind putting stuff out for Medic first.
The problem is that they gave stuff to classes that didn't really need stuff(Scout, Demoman, Soldier,) so that stuff just isn't used unless someones gimmicking, having a chill time, or is just an idiot. But a lot of people just don't, because it almost always hurts their team more than it helps. Skaw fucked around with this message on 02-01-2011 at 12:58 PM.
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When the babel fish was in place, it was apparent Random Insanity Generator said:
Still not sure how Versus and Type-0 (formerly Agito) are going to fit into this crap either.
Neither of those are sequels. Versus and Agito are stories that are supposed to be connected by the same mythos, but not setting, story, characters or anything else.
Did they really rename it to Type-0? I hadn't heard that. Agito was actually a more interesting title.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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Maradon! had this to say about pies:
Most of the top selling FPS titles of the past two or three years have had some kind of character advancement or customization system. TF2 has player classes and unlockables, the latest CoD iterations have actual rank leveling, even Reach has suit powers tailored to specific combat roles and unlockable appearance customization.FPS's continue to get deeper, while CRPG's only seem to be getting radically shallower.
TF2's unlockabl^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H buyables aren't "character advancement", they're just player mods. Same thing as what created Team Fortress to begin with.
CoD, Reach, MW2, etc are all "Console Tard FPS Games" in general. Everyone I know who has the available PC versions for those types of games generally play the story mode through, maybe spend a week in online play and then forget the game until they wanna play story mode again.
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Lyinar Ka`Bael had this to say about Robocop:
Neither of those are sequels. Versus and Agito are stories that are supposed to be connected by the same mythos, but not setting, story, characters or anything else.Did they really rename it to Type-0? I hadn't heard that. Agito was actually a more interesting title.
Neither are sequels, yes (13-2 is a sequel, announced earlier this year) but they're supposed to be in the same "story" arch. Kinda like how Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are not sequel connected, but (and totally BS, IMO) are linked as being in the same overall story-world.
And yeah, they're supposadly renaming the PSP based "Agito" to "Type-0" for some reason. I was under the impression that the "Fabula Nova Crystallis Final Fantasy" cluster were all supposed to be PS3 titles.... Oh, and further suck-fest? Rumor is this will be the first Multi-UMD PSP Game. o_O
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Random Insanity Generator had this to say about Robocop:
Neither are sequels, yes (13-2 is a sequel, announced earlier this year) but they're supposed to be in the same "story" arch. Kinda like how Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are not sequel connected, but (and totally BS, IMO) are linked as being in the same overall story-world.And yeah, they're supposadly renaming the PSP based "Agito" to "Type-0" for some reason. I was under the impression that the "Fabula Nova Crystallis Final Fantasy" cluster were all supposed to be PS3 titles.... Oh, and further suck-fest? Rumor is this will be the first Multi-UMD PSP Game. o_O
Actually, especially with some scenes that were added to the PS release of Chrono Trigger, it was established CC IS the sequel to CT.
Fabula Nova Crystalis were never all PS3 titles. XIII was PS3/360, Versus I've only heard being on PS3 and Agito (ugh, Type-0...) was always PSP.
And goddamnit. I don't want to play XIII-2. But I will. I am Square's bitch. I will play it just because it's a goddamned console Final Fantasy game. And to see what they changed and what happened after the last one.
X-2 was okay with that. It was always going to be two stories. They had that whole theme in X of "this is Tidus's story" and then in X-2 of "This is Yuna's story" and the whole "x person's story" was a running theme. And it worked.
But I thought I was done with this damned game until Versus. Fuck.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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Random Insanity Generatoring:
TF2's unlockabl^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H buyables aren't "character advancement"
Splitting hairs over something that isn't even related to what I had to say.
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Random Insanity Generator had this to say about Jimmy Carter:
TF2's unlockabl^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H buyables aren't "character advancement", they're just player mods.
Actually since you unlocked them by completing various sets of achievements, they kind of were.
This is of course before they added randomly being awarded items, as well as a real money for virtual items shop.
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Everyone wondered WTF when Lyinar Ka`Bael wrote:
Actually, especially with some scenes that were added to the PS release of Chrono Trigger, it was established CC IS the sequel to CT.Fabula Nova Crystalis were never all PS3 titles. XIII was PS3/360, Versus I've only heard being on PS3 and Agito (ugh, Type-0...) was always PSP.
And goddamnit. I don't want to play XIII-2. But I will. I am Square's bitch. I will play it just because it's a goddamned console Final Fantasy game. And to see what they changed and what happened after the last one.
X-2 was okay with that. It was always going to be two stories. They had that whole theme in X of "this is Tidus's story" and then in X-2 of "This is Yuna's story" and the whole "x person's story" was a running theme. And it worked.
But I thought I was done with this damned game until Versus. Fuck.
From what I've found, Agito was originally slated as a phone title, not PSP. They wanted to build on the success of one of the FF7 spinoffs. 13 was originally a PS3 only and I'm pretty sure Versus will get the same dual console treatment.
They Retcon'ed CT to make CC connect. That's pretty much cheating to make it work..
The only thing I had against X-2 was the 'lack' of cast after X. It wasn't a bad story or a bad game, it just felt a little light in comparison.
Edit: I did play some of FF14 a while back, and it had everything I disliked about 11 plus plenty of glitches and lag with some pretty graphics (As long as you didn't, say, swing your weapon) Vallo, the Second Coming fucked around with this message on 02-02-2011 at 08:46 AM.
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Your words are as empty as your soul! Mankind ill needs a savior such as Random Insanity Generator!
They Retcon'ed CT to make CC connect. That's pretty much cheating to make it work..
CC was a sequel to Radical Dreamers, which was a sequel* to CT.
All Square did was make the transitive property complete.
* - It wasn't so much as a sequel as it was a side story in the same universe with a character who was also in CT. Close enough.
Yeah, that was like if you wanted to play an MMO without socializing or having anything fun to do.
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Mr. Parcelan had this to say about John Romero:
12 was...what, the one with the weird little kid?Yeah, that was like if you wanted to play an MMO without socializing or having anything fun to do.
12 was the one they claimed "makes FF a masturbatory experience". Had Vaan as the main char, had the bunnies from FF Tactics (supposed to be set in the same game universe).
And yeah, once you got the right gambit setups it was mostly walk around, get into fight, watch fight, move on. Only bosses after a certain point needed input..
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Random Insanity Generator painfully thought these words up:
You liked 12 more than 10? 12 was ok, but at least 10 still felt like playing a game most of the time.
12 was fun, not amazing. 10 was a pile of shit. Literally the only part of 10 that doesn't piss me off is Blitzball. If 10 were nothing but Blitzball with no explanation or reason, it would have been a better game. If 10 had no characters, voicing, or lines it would have been a better game.
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This insanity brought to you by Vallo, the Second Coming:
12 was fun, not amazing. 10 was a pile of shit. Literally the only part of 10 that doesn't piss me off is Blitzball. If 10 were nothing but Blitzball with no explanation or reason, it would have been a better game. If 10 had no characters, voicing, or lines it would have been a better game.
Wow. Then again you didn't claim 8 was a steaming pile of crap so I shouldn't be shocked that some of the others are steaming piles of crap... I've found no one that has ever been able to say "I liked them all"..
Give me XII's system with X's character-centric story and it'll be the perfect FF for me. 
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Check out the big brain on Nina!
12 didn't have a main character. Character development all-around was fairly weak. It's a shame they didn't have more of it in such a large world, that would've given more reason to explore than doing the hunts. I loved the free-roam and combat system, however. It was like FFXI, without having to spend 2 hours looking for a party that turns out to be full of morons.Give me XII's system with X's character-centric story and it'll be the perfect FF for me.
I accept, as long as none of X's actual characters get anywhere near it. Well, okay, Lulu and her plushies and bewbies can come.
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Check out the big brain on Densetsu!
CC was a sequel to Radical Dreamers, which was a sequel* to CT.All Square did was make the transitive property complete.
* - It wasn't so much as a sequel as it was a side story in the same universe with a character who was also in CT. Close enough.
CC was a remake/re-envisioning of Radical Dreamers, with quite a few changes and a much more involved plot
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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Skaw probably says this to all the girls:
12 would've been world better had Basch remained the main character instead of Square-Enix scrapping that during development because a grizzled adult soldier doesn't mesh well with their native demographic.
Hell yes. Basch was a great character. I loved Balthier as well, but Basch was the kind of character that heroes are made out of.
I really enjoyed XII. I was dubious of the Gambit system at first, because I was afraid it would make combat too easy or hold my hand too much. But all it really did was take the tedium out of random battles, which was just excellent.
The story was lame in some places and some of the characters were just boring or idiotic. But I did enjoy playing it.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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Die, Lyinar Ka`Bael! You don't belong in this world!
CC was a remake/re-envisioning of Radical Dreamers, with quite a few changes and a much more involved plot
Which really isn't difficult since RD was a text-based game.
Though from what I understand, "re-envisioning" would be a much better term than remake for it since CC was fairly different from RD.
Only real bad part of the engine was it seemed they used the gambit system to run the bosses. Witch face it, most of the boss fights, if not all were pretty lack luster with the exception of the Gilgamesh encounter.
Also 13 didn't grab at me..kinda looked to go the way of Metal Gear Solid were become more of a movie with annoying bits that you have to do stuff to see more of it.
Peter fucked around with this message on 02-05-2011 at 12:50 PM.
And really it is kind a growing trend out of any bigger developer. How much of your budget can you devote to game play and storyline? Doubly so when you have a CEO and investors wanting you to pop that game out to improve their bottom line.
*self righteous smugness*
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The propaganda machine of Mortious's junta released this statement:
I didn't play any of them after FF7.*self righteous smugness*
I didn't play any after 7 but it was because I didn't have a PSX.
Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite. - John Kenneth Galbraith
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Densetsu enlisted the help of an infinite number of monkeys to write:
Which really isn't difficult since RD was a text-based game.Though from what I understand, "re-envisioning" would be a much better term than remake for it since CC was fairly different from RD.
Yeah I've read a run-down of RD and it was quite different from CC, with really just some of the characters and a few events the same.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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This insanity brought to you by Peter:
I liked 12's game system, you know it's not really fun trying to get from town A to town B and spending like a half hour in random battles. Then in said battles you are just zipping through the same damn menu choices over and over and over again.
I liked the gambit system so I could have a party member always see to it that haste and shell and crap like that was up on my guys rather than constantly doing it till I got fed up and went to do something fun...like bathing in lye.Only real bad part of the engine was it seemed they used the gambit system to run the bosses. Witch face it, most of the boss fights, if not all were pretty lack luster with the exception of the Gilgamesh encounter.
Also 13 didn't grab at me..kinda looked to go the way of Metal Gear Solid were become more of a movie with annoying bits that you have to do stuff to see more of it.
And really it is kind a growing trend out of any bigger developer. How much of your budget can you devote to game play and storyline? Doubly so when you have a CEO and investors wanting you to pop that game out to improve their bottom line.
The Gilgamesh encounters were so much fun! Those were probably my favorite boss battles in the entire game. But you're right about the rest of the boss fights.
And I liked that I could have someone Shell party members when it went down, too, because it wasn't always something you noticed in the heat of battle. I didn't think it made things too easy because there were still plenty of things I had to take care of during the battles myself. So it really was just eliminating so much of the tedium, without killing the challenge.
XIII is worth playing. I enjoyed the Paradigm system. It definitely is a large step up from having to flip through numerous menus and it has a mix of that AI sort of behavior that made XII's Gambit system so nice.
Lyinar Ka`Bael, Piney Fresh Druidess - Luclin
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Lyinar Ka`Baeling:
XIII is worth playing.
I could not more emphatically disagree.
