Someone explain the appeal of Final Fantasy to me

[Sulaco]

i worked on NNK, doing loc + testing, so i had to play it waaay mroe than your average player.. think 8h a day for 7 weeks.

the combat is horrible, just like every FF out there (it's a clone).

the mobs are insufferable. i just hate having to fight a cute cactus plant with a bow on his head. or a butterfly with a kettle on its snout. or pig-like mobs called "piggers".

the story has a part wich is based in the real world, and it's a vomit-inducing sob story where you cause your mom's death.

the second aprt is based in the world of the witch, and it's slightly less insufferable, however it progresses with such molasses-like slowness that a lazy sloth would be proud.

once you complete nearly 99% of the game, and are on the last map, it actually becomes though (nowhere else can you actually "die" or lose the game, if you exclude a horrible miscalculation early on in the game where you can run into a boss w/o any mana), and once you finish this one though section, AND if you do a weird thing where you backtrack a shitton and have found a set of mobs + items that you had to grind, then you get to a secret section where you fight uber boss mobs that wipe your team in 10 seconds unless you spam (ridiculously rare and expensive) items you crafted after grinding even more.

ofc not only the combat is bad, but it's also broken, and you can do an exploit that makes the secret boss go down relatively easy.

overall, its a Fisher-Price version of a fantasy RPG, designed for kindergarten age children and non-gamer girls.

Eh.

I kind of agree. I own NNK and have maybe 12 hours in it. I might come back to it sometime, but I'm in no rush.
I can really appreciate the art style, attention to detail, and even the charm of games like NNK. I don't need "super serious post-apocalyptic downers" in RPGs all the time, but I DO think there is a middle ground. I just can't get into RPGs that are "too sweet" or "too cute" or don't really take themselves seriously.
Sure, there's a certain charm in it. And from an experienced gamers perspective, nostalgia, but when the monsters are frowny faced scoops of ice cream or the main characters don't ever seem to really be in danger or threatened, or the villain is eye-roll worthy, I have a hard time caring. That was my biggest issue with FF9: Dopey characters, dopey villain, and never any sense of urgency or danger or real threat of any kind. It tried SO hard to get away from the "mopey emo angsty teens" of FF7 and 8 that it just over-corrected into stupid storytelling land.
It's part of the reason why I could never really get into Dragon Quest VIII, despite the gushing reviews. It was just too cute, and I couldn't take the story and characters seriously.

I guess you could say that's the appeal for many gamers, and that's fine. I get it. But I just need characters and stories I can really dive into, and the feeling that the characters are taking this as seriously as I'm trying to.

 

[gorb]

FF8 is the best

 

[DigDog]

the last playable character you get in FF9 is a six year old girl. /facepalm

 

[Fingolfin269]

Yeah my main gripe with NNK was that the story was overly childlike. At the same time I did think it was delivered well and appreciated that. To be honest, the only reason I finished it was the connection to Studio Ghibli and wanted to see all of the story unfold for myself (as opposed to just watching on YT).

 

[shortylickens]

the last playable character you get in FF9 is a six year old girl. /facepalm

Relm was 8 years old.
Rydia was like, 4 or 5 when you first have her. And maybe only 16 when she's recovered.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Age means nothing, did you ever play the Shadow Hearts games? Anastasia was pretty young. Of course, 1 and 2 blow away every FF since 7.

 

[Sulaco]

Relm was 8 years old.
Rydia was like, 4 or 5 when you first have her. And maybe only 16 when she's recovered.

I couldn't care less about her age.

"Quina", on the other hand, was one of the stupidest, most worthless characters to ever be in an RPG, ever, and an example of IX's terrible characters.

 

[npaladin-2000]

FF8 was probably not the right one to start with. The combat system fell flat for a lot of people. FF7 had a lot more depth and strategy to the character and equipment selection. FF6 did as well, while FF4 swept you away with wonderfully developed characters that came and went and left you adapting to their different skillsets as they showed up. FF13 on the other hand redefined the strategy of combat by making you more of a general guiding subordinates but leaving them to make their own decisions.

On the other hand, FF5 felt like a rehash of FF3, which was a rehash of FF1, generic characters that developed generically. FF8 and 9 fell flat for me as well, they just didn't grab me. Haven't played 10-12. Ultimately SQUARE-Enix has tried to redefine/advance the combat system with each iteration. Some advances were more successful than others, obviously. But I'd suggest trying other members of the series. If you like the sci-fi aspects of FF8, then I'd try FF7 or FF13 first.

 

[DigDog]

there's an area in FF9 where every single step you get a random encounter

 

[exdeath]

Not too long ago, I actually dragged out my old PS1, with the intention of playing through some old favorites and actually tackling a couple games that I never got the chance to finish back in the day. Enter Final Fantasy VIII: a game that my teenaged self had no patience for back in the 90s, but I thought "maybe now!" But no...I still don't get the appeal.

There must be more to the game than I'm seeing, because so far, there's no challenge! Enter a battle every 2 seconds, easily win (just summon a GF, doesn't matter which one, or hit them with some magic; some are more effective than others but not by much), go to new location, fight battles along the way. Scroll through tons of predictable and cheesy dialog text. Watch a cutscene. Go to the next place. I'll admit that maybe I need to let it develop more...for those who know the game, I'm at the Tomb of the Unknown King, which according to a YouTube "Let's Play" video I found, that's about a 1/4 of the way through the game.

I played older RPGs back in the day and enjoyed the strategy involved in the battles, and puzzles along the way, along with an engaging story and set of characters. But this one? Man, I'm so bored! The only remotely fun part so far was the top-of-the-train thing.

This was my first, and still my only, FF game. I recognize that #8 isn't a lot of people's favorite, but it still has rave reviews and fans galore. I guess it's just not for me...

If you start with FF7+ you're not going to see any appeal. VIII, X-2, etc are among the worst of the entire franchise.

Try IV and VI.

Square has been a lost cause since (and including) FF VII.

FF XIV ARR, yes the MMO, is actually one of their best games since PS1. At least ARR with the 2.x Bahamut story arc which is now concluded. No idea what it's turned into now. 2.x was nearly perfect including the intro video and the Answers theme song setting the mood from the start.

FF IV is still my favorite. VI is a more refined game of course, but it can't beat IV for classic Shakespeare story telling packed full of drama and tragedy without being over burdened by grinding, mini games, achievements, complex battle systems, or any dumb time wasting filler you see in modern games that are necessary to distract you from the fact that the main story has no substance. FF IV is just straight tragic story telling from start to finish that never lets up and is never interrupted by dumb shit. FF IV is really the gold standard for what FF games should be.

The battles needed some work, and the story was a bit simple and weak, but I loved the warm hearted charm of Ni no Kuni. It's one of the first times I felt all warm and fuzzy in that way I haven't felt since playing a SNES RPG while huddled under a blanket on a frosty winter break.

You should be playing the Tales of games or the original Xenoblade Chronicles over FF VIII. This was the era of Square in their phase of CGI > * and catering to the mainstream with their Sephiroth/Akuma I'm too bad ass for my emo hair running up walls and jumping 100 times their height billy bad ass nonsense.

 

[Sulaco]

If you start with FF7+ you're not going to see any appeal. VIII, X-2, etc are among the worst of the entire franchise.

Try IV and VI.

Square has been a lost cause since (and including) FF VII.

FF XIV ARR, yes the MMO, is actually one of their best games since PS1. At least ARR with the 2.x Bahamut story arc which is now concluded. No idea what it's turned into now. 2.x was nearly perfect including the intro video and the Answers theme song setting the mood from the start.

FF IV is still my favorite. VI is a more refined game of course, but it can't beat IV for classic Shakespeare story telling packed full of drama and tragedy without being over burdened by grinding, mini games, achievements, complex battle systems, or any dumb time wasting filler you see in modern games that are necessary to distract you from the fact that the main story has no substance. FF IV is just straight tragic story telling from start to finish that never lets up and is never interrupted by dumb shit. FF IV is really the gold standard for what FF games should be.

The battles needed some work, and the story was a bit simple and weak, but I loved the warm hearted charm of Ni no Kuni. It's one of the first time's I felt all warm and fuzzy in that way I haven't felt since playing a SNES RPG while huddled under a blanket on a frosty winter break.

You should be playing the Tales of games or the original Xenoblade Chronicles over FF XIII. This was the era of Square in their CGI > * and catering to the mainstream with their Sephiroth/Akuma I'm too bad ass for my emo hair running up walls and jumping 100 times their height billy bad ass nonsense.

Which of the Tales Of games would you recommend for a complete n00b to the series? I've been looking to get into them.
Looking for the best story/characters...really don't care about battle systems or side quests as long as they are serviceable.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Which of the Tales Of games would you recommend for a complete n00b to the series? I've been looking to get into them.
Looking for the best story/characters...really don't care about battle systems or side quests as long as they are serviceable.

Most of the best ones are the old ones. The best 'newer' one is Vesperia, but it is 360 only (unless you know Japanese and want to use the PS3 version).

The latest ones (Tales of Xillia 1 and 2, and Tales of Zestiria) are meh compared to the older stuff, but still decent I am hearing. My favorites are the PS2 ones - Tales of the Abyss and Tales of Legendia. Of course most peoples favorites are Tales of Destiny series and Tales of Symphonia. If you really want to go oldschool there is Tales of Phantasia which is a great, large 16bit game. There are some GBA/DS games, but those mostly suck.

 

[Zodiark1593]

Which of the Tales Of games would you recommend for a complete n00b to the series? I've been looking to get into them.
Looking for the best story/characters...really don't care about battle systems or side quests as long as they are serviceable.

If you've a 3DS, Tales of The Abyss plays quite well on it (albeit, at a lower framerate on the overworld). Tales of Symphonia is supposedly launching on the PC at some point in a few months as well.

Another recommendation, Valkyria Chronicles.

 

[Ice_Dragon]

I loved FF1 and FFIII (the original one for Famicom) because of the class system. I never really played V but FF was great at one point and then I feel it started to focus too much on characters as with VII. I loved VII but I see where things went wrong. Compare that with Dragon Quest which for what will be 30 years in May has never diverted from it's formula except for 10 which was unfortunately an MMO and I believe tried only as an experiment.

 

[Spydermag68]

The thing about playing a FF game (7+) is that you need to explore how to play the game. Most of the time you can just press X and win, but if you dig deeper into the game play it can get complex. With 12, I thought the combat orders was interesting. In 7 the Materia in the weapons and armor was interesting since it limited in the spells you could cast, but late in the game tou could do a combo that lasted 20 minutes. FF 8 the spells that you junctioned with determined how strong you attack and defense was, as well the number of that spell stored.

The one thing that kept me playing was the mini games and the other stuff you could do. Ultimate weapons mini games was always fun until I had to jump away from lighting 200 times in a row or dodge butterflies. FF 13 killing turtles was fun for awhile but there was a better way to grind out money but you could only make it to the spot once in the game.

Long post short.

If you really want to enjoy a game then don't nitpick it to death. Play it and have fun.

 

[KentState]

This thread spurred my interest in my FF collection. I have pretty much everyone from III to XIII-2 and Type-O and have only finished VII on the PS1. For some reason I get excited about playing them, but they just don't hold my interest.

 

[pathos]

Which of the Tales Of games would you recommend for a complete n00b to the series? I've been looking to get into them.
Looking for the best story/characters...really don't care about battle systems or side quests as long as they are serviceable.

As mentioned above, if you wanted to try the tales games, I'd suggest Vesperia or Abyss as well, myself. The last few releases have been decent, but haven't been able to match those 2 games. They did release a hd port of Symphonia, which is considered to be one of the better Tales games, recently. I have yet to have the time to pick it up and play it yet, so I can't recommend it just yet.

I will mention that the first 20 hours or so of abyss can be a bit trying, depending on how much you can tolerate the main character. It does change at about the 20 hour mark tho.

The upcoming Tales of Besaria (sp?) looks intesting. Actually has a female mc. As far as I know, hasn't been announced for the west yet. I'm sure it will be at some point.

Also, if you were interested in playing jrpg's, and might be ok with stepping outside of the ff games, I'd also suggest 2 other series, if you haven't tried them yet.

First, Shin Megumi Tensei - Persona 3 and 4. Both can be a bit grindy at times, and 4's combat system is way more refined than 3's, but both have excellent stories, and the supporting cast for both are quite good. Persona 5 due out this year, I think. And, I'm looking forward to it.

Second - Legend of Heroes series. First are Legend of Heroes - Trails in the Sky, and Trails in the Sky SC, and then comes Legend of Heroes - Trails of Cold Steel (I think is the full name?). Part 2 of Cold Steel coming soon.

Trails in the Sky's battle system isn't particularly compelling...rather simplistic actually. The story and characters are great tho. Fairly long games.

Cold Steel's battle system isn't hugely differnt from the Sky game's battle system, but the story, and character interaction, actually remind's me of the Persona games.

In the final chapter of Cold Steel, and I think I might like it better than the Trails in the Sky games, honestly. And, although you'll get more out of Cold Steel if you played the Sky games, they aren't mandatory. You can play CS just fine as a stand alone.

Trails in the Sky - iirc, PSP game. Plays fine on my vita tv. Trails in the Sky SC - released for the vita, iirc. Plays fine on my vita tv. Cold Steel - released on both the Vita and ps3. I bought the ps3 version.

Last note - I'm currently in the final chapter of Cold Steel. I have probably 50 hours of gameplay on the save. For any genre outside of rpg, this would be considered an extremtely long game. But, for a jrpg, this would be considered quite short.

 

[ImpulsE69]

As mentioned above, if you wanted to try the tales games, I'd suggest Vesperia or Abyss as well, myself. The last few releases have been decent, but haven't been able to match those 2 games. They did release a hd port of Symphonia, which is considered to be one of the better Tales games, recently. I have yet to have the time to pick it up and play it yet, so I can't recommend it just yet.

I will mention that the first 20 hours or so of abyss can be a bit trying, depending on how much you can tolerate the main character. It does change at about the 20 hour mark tho.

The upcoming Tales of Besaria (sp?) looks intesting. Actually has a female mc. As far as I know, hasn't been announced for the west yet. I'm sure it will be at some point.

Also, if you were interested in playing jrpg's, and might be ok with stepping outside of the ff games, I'd also suggest 2 other series, if you haven't tried them yet.

First, Shin Megumi Tensei - Persona 3 and 4. Both can be a bit grindy at times, and 4's combat system is way more refined than 3's, but both have excellent stories, and the supporting cast for both are quite good. Persona 5 due out this year, I think. And, I'm looking forward to it.

Second - Legend of Heroes series. First are Legend of Heroes - Trails in the Sky, and Trails in the Sky SC, and then comes Legend of Heroes - Trails of Cold Steel (I think is the full name?). Part 2 of Cold Steel coming soon.

Trails in the Sky's battle system isn't particularly compelling...rather simplistic actually. The story and characters are great tho. Fairly long games.

Cold Steel's battle system isn't hugely differnt from the Sky game's battle system, but the story, and character interaction, actually remind's me of the Persona games.

In the final chapter of Cold Steel, and I think I might like it better than the Trails in the Sky games, honestly. And, although you'll get more out of Cold Steel if you played the Sky games, they aren't mandatory. You can play CS just fine as a stand alone.

Trails in the Sky - iirc, PSP game. Plays fine on my vita tv. Trails in the Sky SC - released for the vita, iirc. Plays fine on my vita tv. Cold Steel - released on both the Vita and ps3. I bought the ps3 version.

Last note - I'm currently in the final chapter of Cold Steel. I have probably 50 hours of gameplay on the save. For any genre outside of rpg, this would be considered an extremtely long game. But, for a jrpg, this would be considered quite short.

The first 2 Trails In the Sky games are on PC now - GOG and Steam. I've been playing part 1. Very old school RPG with tactics style fighting.

 

[sweenish]

FF7 had a lot more depth and strategy to the character and equipment selection.

This is just not true. As an example, Barrett was my healer. And he still did great damage. The impact materia had on a character's stats were so minimal as to be non-existent. There really wasn't much strategy in equipment in 7. 8's junction system, while killing magic use, was at least more impactful than materia. Junctioning is just the materia stat changes evolved. In 7 they were worthless, in 8 they were too powerful. So by 9 they said "screw it" and just went back to what worked before.

But I'm a weirdo who actually liked FF8. At least I finished it, where I can't get past disc 2 of 9.

Just for a little background:
Beat: 3, 4 (fave), 7, 8, 10, 13
Played: 6, 9, X-2, 12
Actually want to beat: 6, 12

X-2 I only played for a half hour, so I don't feel anything about it. I always lose momentum in 6 once I hit the world of ruin, and 12 does interest me, there's just always something else I'd rather play.

 

[Spydermag68]

I have played most of the major FF games 1,2,5,6,7,8,9,10,10-2,12,13,13-2,13-3.

The first play through I try to beat the game do side quest as they come up and have fun.

The second play through on 7+ I try for 100% completion. Since I know what is going to happen it is easier to pick up on plot elements that I missed the first time. X-2 was hard to get into and the do nothing chapter almost killed the game for me. The only one I have not finished is 13-3. I ran out of time and have not wanted to replay the game to get the good ending.

 

[shortylickens]

X-2 had a poor story but the combat and classes were fun. The 500 plus accessories got kind of annoying. The garment grids were more trouble than they were worth, but you had to use them.

12 was just irritating. I dont know why they thought Final Fantasy players wanted a hack n slash game.

 

[Sulaco]

As mentioned above, if you wanted to try the tales games, I'd suggest Vesperia or Abyss as well, myself. The last few releases have been decent, but haven't been able to match those 2 games. They did release a hd port of Symphonia, which is considered to be one of the better Tales games, recently. I have yet to have the time to pick it up and play it yet, so I can't recommend it just yet.

I will mention that the first 20 hours or so of abyss can be a bit trying, depending on how much you can tolerate the main character. It does change at about the 20 hour mark tho.

The upcoming Tales of Besaria (sp?) looks intesting. Actually has a female mc. As far as I know, hasn't been announced for the west yet. I'm sure it will be at some point.

Also, if you were interested in playing jrpg's, and might be ok with stepping outside of the ff games, I'd also suggest 2 other series, if you haven't tried them yet.

First, Shin Megumi Tensei - Persona 3 and 4. Both can be a bit grindy at times, and 4's combat system is way more refined than 3's, but both have excellent stories, and the supporting cast for both are quite good. Persona 5 due out this year, I think. And, I'm looking forward to it.

Second - Legend of Heroes series. First are Legend of Heroes - Trails in the Sky, and Trails in the Sky SC, and then comes Legend of Heroes - Trails of Cold Steel (I think is the full name?). Part 2 of Cold Steel coming soon.

Trails in the Sky's battle system isn't particularly compelling...rather simplistic actually. The story and characters are great tho. Fairly long games.

Cold Steel's battle system isn't hugely differnt from the Sky game's battle system, but the story, and character interaction, actually remind's me of the Persona games.

In the final chapter of Cold Steel, and I think I might like it better than the Trails in the Sky games, honestly. And, although you'll get more out of Cold Steel if you played the Sky games, they aren't mandatory. You can play CS just fine as a stand alone.

Trails in the Sky - iirc, PSP game. Plays fine on my vita tv. Trails in the Sky SC - released for the vita, iirc. Plays fine on my vita tv. Cold Steel - released on both the Vita and ps3. I bought the ps3 version.

Last note - I'm currently in the final chapter of Cold Steel. I have probably 50 hours of gameplay on the save. For any genre outside of rpg, this would be considered an extremtely long game. But, for a jrpg, this would be considered quite short.

Thanks guys.

I got "Xilia" for Christmas as a surprise, and have been debating giving it a go, or waiting to see if there are better entries in the series.
It sounds kinda silly considering I already own it, but JRPGs are the kind of games you can put in a dozen hours or more before you can even tell if the game is worth pursuing any further, and there's nothing worse than sinking 10 or more hours into a game and just realizing it's not very good. I just don't have the free time for that anymore.

 

[Aikouka]

As mentioned above, if you wanted to try the tales games, I'd suggest Vesperia or Abyss as well, myself. The last few releases have been decent, but haven't been able to match those 2 games. They did release a hd port of Symphonia, which is considered to be one of the better Tales games, recently. I have yet to have the time to pick it up and play it yet, so I can't recommend it just yet.

One nice thing about the Symphonia HD release is that it has Japanese voice acting in it. The lack of that and the weird Tekken-like combat system was a huge turn-off when I played Vesperia.

I hated the whole huge-hair-huge-sword-emo-teen crap FF went to.

I think that's largely related to them taking liberties with Amano's design to follow trends in manga/anime. If you do a Google Image search for "Amano Cloud", you'll see that his original designs depicted a similar character, but the sword was much more manageable, and while his hair was disheveled, it wasn't trying to rival Sonic The Hedgehog. Even Sephiroth's sword isn't that long in Amano's work.

 

[Fulle]

For some reason I'm surprised exdeath's favorite FF game is 4, and not 5. Not sure why, but just something about him makes me think he's a FF5 guy.... something about him... hmm.

Anyway, I like FF4 too. I think FF4-6 was a good run for FF games. FF4 introduced the time battle system, and is a solid traditional JRPG with a well delivered story that focuses on the characters more than FF6. FF6's story feels more grand in scope, and I think it's similar to FF7 in a lot of ways, but a better executed game overall... and it helps that sprite based graphics have aged a lot better than PS1 era 3D stuff. FF5 was cool, cuz it uses a job system, and it has an awesome lack of emo characters.

For newer "Final Fantasy" games, I think Bravely Default was a nice modern FF4 type game. Its combat system seems based on FF4's, but they've added some new ideas to it, and there's some conveniences added in since its a newer game. Bravely Default actually started development as a "Final Fantasy" IIRC, and drew inspiration from "Final Fantasy The 4 Heroes of Light", and FF4.... So, while not branded "Final Fantasy" I consider it as close to a Final Fantasy game as you're going to get from something not called Final Fantasy.

FF14 ARR is a well executed "themepark MMO". As far as it's game type goes, it's music and overall presentation are excellent. It plays better with a controller than most other games of it's type...

I also like FF Tactics. It's a pretty good SRPG, and good SRPGs are pretty rare.

For the others? Eh..... I hated FF7, FF8, FF10, and FF12. FF7's graphics have aged horribly, and the long cast animations by themselves would make playing the game feel like suffering for me. FF6 is what I'd play instead. FF10 has Tidus in it, so that by itself ruins the game. FF12? Eh, there's been better executed western RPG JRPG hybrids. The combat system is pretty clunky IMO... there are better games available to play these days.

I actually like 13... sort of. I think that once the "paradigm shift" system is fully realized about 1/3rd of the way through the game, it's combat is quite fun. There's really high production values in the cut scenes, and even though people complain about Vanille's voice acting, I like it because the voice actor is a pretty cool person IRL. Its still a pretty flawed game overall, though, I admit.

TLDR: I would recommend FF4 or FF6 to someone who wants to play their first Final Fantasy game. Or Bravely Default, to someone with a 3DS.

 

[cbrunny]

Dragon Warrior/Quest 1 through 4.

End thread.