Vincent Grayson
Member
I swear people used to always say "The story falls apart after Leviathan".
Yes, there's a big break for travel in the
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Final Fantasy XII The Zodiac Age |OT| You Had One Job!
- Thread starter FlutterPuffs
- Start date
I swear people used to always say "The story falls apart after Leviathan".
Yes, there's a big break for travel in the
I love that option, because otherwise I would waste so much time doing the same again and again which I already did when I had the time and I was younger. Improves the game x10.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Wolf Akela
Member
I'm pretty sure it only improves the game 2x and 4x
Sure, but it feels 10x better.
I have less time to play these days. If I can get through the bad parts much faster, then it automatically makes the game better for me. I only liked XII back then, because I absolutely hated the slog of farming and traversing huge landscapes. The only open world landscape I genuinely enjoyed exploring was in The Witcher 3.
TurnipFritters
Member
I'm grateful for the fast forward, it's something I'd want in basically any game I play. I also wouldn't have been opposed to a more robust fast travel system in 12 though. Gold Crystals are great and all, but it doesn't really hold a candle to, say, Xenoblade/X's stuff.
You know what game really would have benefited from a fast forward? FF15.
You know what game really would have benefited from a fast forward? FF15.
Mr.Deadshot
Member
The story was always "good" and the characters are great. I actually like Vaan and Penelope. Bash and Balthier are among my favorite Final Fantasy characters. Fran is cool. I only dislike Ashe. She is easily my most disliked Final Fantasy main girl.
My problem with the story is, that it's not what I expected from a Final Fantasy. There is too little anime-drama and over-the-top stuff in FF12. The pacing, especially in the middle part is rather poor. Too much political talk and the villain isn't that great. It feels more like Final Fantasy Tactics than Final Fantasy 7. This might be a good thing for some people, but I prefer the more extravagant stories.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Wow. I love her. I mean I'm falling in love with her all over again with fresh eyes.
She is probably one of the better heroines in a videogame. She's strong, intelligent, resolute and stands up to others, but not in a cartoonishly "badass" / "superhero" way like Lightning is.
I agree with what you say. But I think it's a good thing for me.
The thing is, not every FF should be like XII. But I think it's good that the FF series can accommodate a story like XII. In my ideal rotation you'd get a mature/subdued story like this every 3-4 FF games, and still allow for the more melodramatic high concept anime FFs in between.
And having said that, I'm surprised by how much "anime drama" XII does have. There are a lot of emotional scenes between characters under the stars, etc. There was a scene between Vaan and Ashe in Garif village, talking about the motivations for Vaan journeying with the team, and I really bought it. It's closer to FF ideal than I remembered. Meanwhile in XV we get one scene of Prompto and Noctis on the roof of a hotel and little else.
Oh dear, so very wrong
My favourite female character in the series and a contender for overall favourite
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Love this character. Her design, voice acting, relationship to her tribe..... she's perfect.
I wonder if she qualifies as a POC? Her skin is quite dark. I guess she's not afro with that straight hair, but you could imagine she's middle eastern or south asian by Earth standards.
FlutterPuffs
Member
Haha, this is probably why I loved FF12 so much.
BlazingDarkness
Member
I stil can't get the damn chest to spawn
This is actually the thing I'm enjoying the most in this game, even if the characters sticking together doesn't seem to make much sense, but I like how everyone is "normal" without falling into anime cliches (only Penelo seems to be following anime archetypes, that's why she's the worst of the cast right now lol) and the story seems pretty grounded (of course with fantasy tech and stuff).
I'm at that oilplant and fuck this why is this place this big and repetitive?lol
D
Deleted member 57681
Unconfirmed Member
Any impressions of the Prima guide?
decoyplatypus
Member
Real talk: the first half of the story ain't so hot either.
Some better pacing and fleshed out scenes and the story would've been legendary. It's so refreshing playing a game where the world isn't about to end. No cheesy lines, NO CHILDREN or a sloppy love story. It's an extremely grown up story compared to your regular JRPGs. I just think a lot of FF fans are into shounen stuff.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
I think you might have just nailed the very simple fact of why XII has been so difficult to talk about with many FF fans.
Pantz
Member
It blows. The only CE things about it is the hard cover and a forward from Hiroaki Kato. The main walkthrough hardly mentions side events/rare encounters and when it does, it doesn't reference what page to find more info on it. The maps and treasure lists for them are good, but if it's a map outside of the main story, you have to go searching for it in some random part of the extras section. The info's all there but it's not presented very well.
Edit: There was an index, it was just really small. And It's word for word the same as the old BradyGames guide aside from the updated info, but squished down into 7 less pages not counting the trial mode section.
encephalon
Member
The scenes are well directed and the localization was great, but there are no interesting characters and nothing of consequence happens. Had they done anything with the rich world they created, it could have easily been one of the best JRPGs. It just doesn't go anywhere.
The "it's not a save the world story" comments are especially strange in light of FFX,that came before it, which wasn't a save the world story. Sin would have just continued to protect "Zanarkand" for eternity. But FFXII is a "save Dalmasca" story from start to finish and it never really deviates from that path.
It is a fun and expansive game with great music, however.
The "it's not a save the world story" comments are especially strange in light of FFX,that came before it, which wasn't a save the world story. Sin would have just continued to protect "Zanarkand" for eternity. But FFXII is a "save Dalmasca" story from start to finish and it never really deviates from that path.
It is a fun and expansive game with great music, however.
Yep. I mean shounen stuff can be great but must every JRPg have to be that way? It really is a genre who historically don't like to change very much in that regard. FF is breath of fresh air.
It has some great characters though? What kind of consequence would you like that isn't about impending doom? This game does not want that nor require it.
Horology is worthless iirc. Don't worry about it.
D
Deleted member 57681
Unconfirmed Member
Business as usual then
- it was infuriating how confusing and unclear the FFXV guide was.BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
An elder statesman, by jRPG terms.
Take solace in the fact that Japanese media's relationship to age is unrealistic and fucked. Of course a character like that in real life would be late 20s or more. IRL people aren't that eloquent and witty without some history behind them.
jRPGs want to make it out like 30 is an old man. Meanwhile in the West, MCU "youthful rogue" characters like Starlord are 35+.
encephalon
Member
FFXII needs something, anything, desperately. FFXII is a story about a princess who loses her kingdom, collects magic stones, and does so. I know, "but you can can be reductive with any story!" However with FFXII, I struggle to think of anything else that happens in the story of consequence.
Vayne is a poorly written gray villain. Half way into the story we learn he wants to "put history back into the hands of man." The story never evolves from this. By the time you get to the Stilshrine of Miriam and Mt. Bur-Omisace, you have seen everything the game has to offer. The Occuria are introduced, but never really take the story anywhere. Venat appears to be manipulating Vayne for his own purposes, but is as shallow as this sentence. The political "intrigue" within the empire is irrelevant to the progression of the story. It's all decoration. None of it leads anywhere.
VI, VII, VIII, IX, and X all change tracks at some point in the story and are better for it. FFXII feels like it ends just about the story is about to become about Venat and then ends. It feels like a part 1 to something more grand that never happens.
Spehornoob
Member
This game really has some of the best voice acting. The amazing translation doesn't hurt.
Drillary Clinton
Banned
Yeah the voice acting is among some of the best in a JRPG. Problem with the remaster is the audio files are super compressed or something. Some voice quality sounds a bit... off
My first time through the game, I was turned off by the surprising lack of story...
My 2nd time through the game, I had a much stronger appreciation for the large world to explore. It really felt like an MMO space that i had all to myself.
Not yet, but I will totally play it a 3rd time with the International job system...
My 2nd time through the game, I had a much stronger appreciation for the large world to explore. It really felt like an MMO space that i had all to myself.
Not yet, but I will totally play it a 3rd time with the International job system...
TurnipFritters
Member
Does X really change tracks though? It's "Stop Sin" all the way through, all that changes is how they choose to go about it. Like, I wouldn't say there's a particularly huge difference between
Venat and Yu Yevon
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
I used to think putting XII in my top 3 FFs was a provocative statement.
Now I believe it to be true in my bones.
Ivalice's history, at least from Raithwall onward, has been manipulated Illuminati-style by the Occuria. Vayne and Cid succeed in severing - at least for a time - that control when Ashe and Reddas destroy the sun-cryst. Venat was just an Occuria who disliked his fellow god's hubris, (of course, he may have had other more sinister ambitions) and chose Vayne to help carry out this wish. Vayne, like any good villain, was seduced by power.
The implications of the Occuria's removal from the scene aren't discussed explicitly, but it's easy to infer that as revenge they may have had a hand in the cataclysm that later leads to the events of Final Fantasy Tactics.
The implications of the Occuria's removal from the scene aren't discussed explicitly, but it's easy to infer that as revenge they may have had a hand in the cataclysm that later leads to the events of Final Fantasy Tactics.
Overall, I think one of Ivalice's best qualities is that we very much DON'T get the be-all and end-all of the history of the world.
In most FFs, every event that's ever worth noting just happens to take place in the span of the game's story.
In Ivalice, we get periodic glimpses of a world that has existed long before the story we're experiencing, and will go on long into the future. History keeps on happening.
The objective from the start is to defeat Sin before it destroy everything. The only thing that changes is that we discover how the Final Aeon stuff works, but the only goal we have there is to defeat Sin.
Absoludacrous
Member
You can zone in and out some to see if you can get the the chest to spawn on the 6th zone in. If it spawns there the chest will have the bow when the kid is in the same spot (after 4 sets of pacing).
Otherwise, yea, close it down completely to reset the rng
encephalon
Member
I think you have a point - the story is pretty much about putting a stop to sin from beginning to end. But unlike FFXII, the new elements introduced surrounding that narrative matter a lot more to FFX. FFX's formulaic "pilgrimage" means that when Yevon is revealed to be a farce, it's more dramatic and changes the way the characters interact with their world. The fact that sin isn't just a big scary monster, but "armor" for a summoner to perpetually summon Zanarkand matter a lot more to the story than anything that happens in FFXII.
In FFXII we learn that the
Occuria are manipulating the kingdoms of man and that Vayne is being manipulated by a rogue one. Okay, so what?
Sin was never going to destroy everything. It's easily to mistakenly believe that in the beginning of the game, but it's not the case.
I don't think "there are implications for the rest of Ivalice's history" really helps the game much. I understand appreciating the sense of history in Ivalice games, but I don't think it saves FFXII.
Yes, but the characters don't know that until late game. And even after understanding everything that's happening, the objective stays the same: defeat Sin.
Lights and Waves
Member
Vaan's voice actor sounds like such an amateur. Even I can do a better job at acting than this. It's distracting. He's leagues behind the rest of the cast.
Drillary Clinton
Banned
Him and Penelo tbh
encephalon
Member
Which doesn't change the fact that it's not a save the world story.
Absoludacrous
Member
Yea, you can also get a Mythril Blade as well, so the Karkata is like third in his list.
He was in one of the Spy Kids movies, what higher seal of quality do you need?