The entire game is like that, so don’t keep playing hoping it’ll change. It’s around 50 hours to the end.
There’s a big field & canyon area that’s a bit like Monster Hunter later on, with teleports between zones, but it’s still the same thing. Just an illusion of bigger corridors with optional boss type monster quests. Most of it probably can’t be beaten without finishing the game first. They locked the final tiers of character upgrades/customization until after the final boss.
It’s on sale during the Black Friday sale for $8 on Xbox Live. Tempting. However, I don’t have an Xbox One X, so I won’t get the enhancements.
I must admit I am tempted, even though I didn’t really like X or XII.
Well, it’s not that similar to X or XII, apart from a certain amount of general aesthetics. Then again I think most people would describe both of those games as better than XIII.
I will offer you no proof of this beyond my sacred word, which is my bond:
Do not purchase FFXIII, because it is not a good game.
If you must play a JRPG, reward Square for quality and buy Dragon Quest XI instead.
It’s not a good game. That being said, I may pick this up digitally and play it again. I quit 20 hours into it, after getting bored. But I did enjoy the combat system and it sure looked pretty. What I played of the sequel was better, that one i will definitely get back to.
A bunch of the Final Fantasy games are on sale right now. Is there any kind of consensus on which one is best?
Probably no consensus.
I’ve played:
FFIV - played this briefly. I didn’t have time to play more, but it seemed nice.
FFVI - played this for a couple of hours. If I hadn’t just finished Chronotrigger, I would have continued. JRPG overload at the time.
FFVII - played this for about 4 hours or so, or maybe 6. I was enjoying it so far, but then then announced the remake, so I’ll play that instead.
FFVIII - played the demo. You’re in a student academy, and you can go fight a dinosaur that’s impossible to kill. I didn’t get it.
FF X - THE BEST. PLAY THIS ONE. IT IS SO GOOD. Especially if you like Turn-based combat. The best story. The best combat. The best main character (Yuna).
FF XII - I hated this one. If you like MMO-style combat, this one is for you. Real time, but ability timers waiting to fire off. Healer in the back, healing and slinging. Tank in the front. Nuker trying not to get aggro. Story seemed nice in the beginning, but then you go through several dozen hours of combat, and I lost interest
I think Rock8man is right about X, but it is not a popular view.
Barring that, 6 and 7 are excellent, really wonderful.
I played FF II obsessively, that came out when I was in college and between that, Super Metroid and A Link to the Past those were all I really needed. I remember playing III when it came out too, but it was much larger and took much longer and I wasn’t as compelled to replay it as II.
I played VII all the way through, and I liked it well enough. I remember that and Resident Evil 2 were the reasons I bought a PlayStation. I even printed out some huge strategy guide off some site, so I could use it to get all the summons. I even got the Knights of the Round Table summon, which I recall took some doing.
I bought VIII and IX but I was pretty done with FF, and most JRPGs by that point. Then X came along and it was insane in a not very good way. I have no idea what happened in that game. I did play it to pretty near the end, but there was some boss I couldn’t beat and I just dropped it.
I barely even remember XII, besides thinking the creator seemed to have recreated Star Wars in the FF universe. I kind of liked the bunny girl but nothing else really made an impression.
Well geez, now I feel like I should at least give XIII a fair chance.
I have played FF1 to FF9. FF6 is my favorite, but many people don’t like the “remaster” done recently.
You should not expect the FFVII remake to resemble FFVII in any meaningful way. Just play the original if you’re interested.
FFIV - Love this one, DS version is my favorite.
FFV - People go on about how gameplay-wise it’s excellent but there is barely a story. But I like the characters/story - it doesn’t have to be this epic, convoluted mess to be enjoyable.
FFVI - Another excellent entry, large and varied group of characters, good battle system, great music, a villian you’ll love to hate (one dimensional? Cartoonish? Maybe, or just a sick, sadistic SOB).
FFVII - Skip it. You had to be there in 1997 to enjoy this one, I think. Then, it was an incredible display of tech (it came on 4 CDs!!!) with those amazing cut-scenes. Today, it’s very clunky and the core story is good but it’s just not told well at all. Could do with a major script re-write and higher res character models.
FFVIII - This one is neither here nor there for me. I’m replaying it now on my Vita and enjoying it so far but I remember pacing being off, story not being that exciting and the battle system being a step down from all the FFs before. It’s an average game but let’s see how I feel when i finish it, playing it again 19 years later.
FF IX My favorite FF. Love the characters, the artwork is beautiful, the music is another amazing score and it balances serious and dark with whimsical charm. It also goes back to a more medieval knights and castles setting than the futuristic settings of the three games before and all the games after. Battle system is back to good but more random battles this time which is annoying, but I believe the PC version allows you to speed up battles.
FF X This game has temples you have to complete puzzles in, the push-this-object-here-and-that-object-there kind. They get harder as the game progresses. I don’t have patience for these and if not for this, FF X would be in my top 3 fave FF games. That and something called “Blitzball” that you are forced to play once (thank goodness) and then it’s optional after. Those two annoyances for me aside, this one has the best FF combat system up to this point. Story is good, music is good. First FF with voice acting and it’s a mixed bag but not as bad as it’s been made to be (that “laughing” scene is taken out of context).
FF XII Probably my 2nd favorite FF. Maybe tied for first. I will need to replay it (so glad it’s coming to Xbox One!!!). Loved everything about this game except that toward the end the story just sort of lost momentum… I never made it to the end credits, spend a lot of time fighting the same type of enemy over and over in the last section. Even then, I loved the setting (set in Ivalice, same place as FF Tactics and Vagrant Story), the combat system (which was completely overhauled), and this one had a larger, more convincing overworld to traverse than previous games. This was peak FF in many ways, it’s a shame Square decided to go in a different direction with the next few games.
FF XV Put about 10 hours into this one. Only enjoyed it when I figured out you can set the combat to a sort of PAUSE-while-not-moving, otherwise it’s just too fast and confusing for me. Interesting take on the FF formula. Need to get back to it but definitely better than FF XIII and a step in the right direction. But I wish Square would pick a style and stick with it. Dragon Quest never disappoints and it’s been essentially unchanged for years, just refined and improved.
Play Final Fantasy Tactics.
Waaaaah?
(Checks Amazon, sees an entry for FF XII: The Zodiac Age, and also FF X & X-2 Remastered).
Holy moly! To be able to replay Final Fantasy X for the fifth time, but this time earn achievements? I wish it wasn’t the international version but the original U.S. release that they remastered. That one had a much better and complete ending (the International version added a cliffhanger to setup Final Fantasy X-2). Wow, thanks for the heads up Relayer! Was this news announced recently or has it been known for a while?
Was announced in September.
I’m pretty excited about playing XII, especially since it’s the revamped edition. Got FF X & X-2 for the Vita but haven’t had a chance to play, but now I will just play it on the big screen.
Nice to see more JRPGs for the Xbox One, even if they’re remasters/ports. Looking forward to the Tales of Vesperia remaster coming soon, as well.
Oh, interesting. Final Fantasy 7 and 9 as well. That will be tempting, if they still look playable these days. The Playstation 1 era games really have aged the worst. I think Final Fantasy 1 through 6 will probably look better than the PS1 era ones today.
Clearly something is very wrong with me. I had some time to game on Thanksgiving Day weekend and instead of finally putting some time into RDR2 or the other several dozen games on my backlog I started playing FF XIII.
I’m playing on the standard Xbox One and this 8 year old game still looks fantastic so it must look pretty amazing with the graphical upgrade on the XBx1X.
I think my perspective is different this time around. When I first played this, I had already read a lot of negative comments pointing out all the flaws so unfortunately, that’s what I focused on. I was also enamored with FF XII and was expecting something similar and FF XIII shares no similarities with that masterpiece whatsoever. So I played it, only enjoying the combat, and by hour 22 or 23 I put it aside, partly out of boredom and frustration (kept trying to do those hunts and getting my party’s ass kicked) and partly out of distraction from whatever else had come out at that time (that’s probably still in my backlog, heh). No loss, the game overall was a dud to me.
But this time around I am realizing this FF entry’s strengths. The pacing starts off much better than most other FF games. You are thrown in the action and story right off the bat and after about 3 or 4 hours or so there is a somewhat cringeworthy storytelling flashback, but then you’re right back in the action. And I still hate the loss of an actual overworld and towns, they went too far in a linear direction, but playing it again I see it kind of keeps the pace going with no downtime and fits with the story of being on the run.
This is the first FF I can think of that has inter-party banter as you wander around walk in a straight line to your next battle and it really adds to the immersion, depending on who is talking. And the voice acting is actually pretty good. Not all of it, of course, I could really do without Vanille’s (pink hair girl) voice. But some of the other actors do well - just that the writing ranges from passable to generally terrible.
And again, the game looks great. The futuristic art design is pretty cool. Too bad about the usually stupid apparel designs for the main cast that are standard in JRPGs. But otherwise, the game has a very interesting look. Music is much better than I remember (though Nobuo Uematsu’s scores for all the earlier FF games up to IX haven’t been bested). I liked the battle system originally and still do, and prefer it to XV’s. It’s pretty simple but is very fast paced and requires some strategy. Definitely keeps you engaged.
Will I finish it this time? Probably not. Eventually the overly linear gameplay coupled with the fact that the first 20 or so hours are a damn tutorial (I think you don’t get control over all characters until then, or more options open up for your skills in battle - memory is fuzzy on this) will get to me and I will stop playing.
But who knows, so far I’m actually really enjoying it. More so than the first few hours I put into XV (which I haven’t picked back up in a long while after about 10 hours of play time).
FF XIII has been on Game Pass for a while, but I finally felt the urge to try it. I like the idea of a linear corridor with (mostly) turn-based-ish combat.
30 minutes in, here’s my impressions:
Unfortunately, after 30 minutes, the game yanks you out and puts you in the shoes of a … I want to say Swedish emo dude? What the heck? Where’s Lightning? Time to take a break I guess.
Wow, has it been 4 years??? Crazy!
I was hooked on this game and got to what I think is one of the last areas of the game and the combat was just too much. When i wasn’t dying, I was getting into fights with really high HP enemies that would take forever to kill and I just gave up. Was really enjoying the game up until that point.
Enjoying it for the combat, that is. Still hated the somewhat confusing story and though I didn’t mind the linearity, the lack of towns and real shops was disappointing.
The characters grew on me, even those I really couldn’t initially stand, except for perky pigtail Aussie girl.
Still the worst FF game in my opinion (though I only put about 6 hours onto the last one).