Have you heard the good news about SaGa, now widely available via many classic remasters and also the newest and maybe most accessible entry, SaGa Scarlet Grace, all at very reasonable prices on a console or PC near you?
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Ahead On Our Way - The Top 21 Numbered Final Fantasies Countdown
- Thread starter Positronic Brain
- Start date
Have you heard the good news about SaGa, now widely available via many classic remasters and also the newest and maybe most accessible entry, SaGa Scarlet Grace, all at very reasonable prices on a console or PC near you?
I had 2/II at #8 on my list (which only went up to 8). I played it via the PS1 and GBA re-releases which helped alleviate some of the possible issues with the game systems. I enjoyed those versions of the systems but since it is my least most favorite it is at the bottom of my wanted list for the pixel remaster versions.
*In prototype/beta form.
I think it also introduces not only some other staple enemies but also the beginnings of the iconic looks* of other staple enemies like the Slime/Jelly/Mousse/Flan.
*In prototype/beta form.
I have! I just haven't gotten around to playing it yet.
Purple
(She/Her)
I only very very recently got around to giving 2 a real proper shot, and it's actually quite good so far. My one complaint is there's a very early boss which seems to pretty explicitly request you give every character at least 1 damage spell.
I feel like damn near everyone heard the same advice from Timmy on the playground about having all your characters drop everything and punch themselves in the face 200 times right at the start of the game, but, Timmy's a dumb weird jerk who messed up his ability to properly enjoy the game AND continue to get proper regular stat growth. If you just... don't look for weird exploits and play the game like a normal person it all works quite well.
Also credit where it's due for hitting the ground running, the little flourishes to NPC interactions, the airships randomly zipping by on the overworld, and that key word system I don't think I've ever seen anyone else use besides the SNES Shadowrun. It's a good system and more games should use it.
I feel like damn near everyone heard the same advice from Timmy on the playground about having all your characters drop everything and punch themselves in the face 200 times right at the start of the game, but, Timmy's a dumb weird jerk who messed up his ability to properly enjoy the game AND continue to get proper regular stat growth. If you just... don't look for weird exploits and play the game like a normal person it all works quite well.
Also credit where it's due for hitting the ground running, the little flourishes to NPC interactions, the airships randomly zipping by on the overworld, and that key word system I don't think I've ever seen anyone else use besides the SNES Shadowrun. It's a good system and more games should use it.
4-So
Spicy
Gotta admit I raised an eyebrow when I saw this one place so highly in the list. Above FF3 is a helluva thing.
I never got far in the Origins or Dawn of Souls versions but I enjoyed Pixel Remaster well enough to get all the achievements, so it must have done something right. And if for nothing else, FF2 gave us this banger. The overworld music is quite lovely too.
I never got far in the Origins or Dawn of Souls versions but I enjoyed Pixel Remaster well enough to get all the achievements, so it must have done something right. And if for nothing else, FF2 gave us this banger. The overworld music is quite lovely too.
I had it at #8. The two series fulfill very different interests for me so it's to be read to its credit that I place it that high within its own context, though I don't dwell too much on rankings for these things.
My initial journey with FFII is more or less catalogued in the mini-LP of sorts I did years ago when I first played the Famicom game, in parts one, two, three. It's a highly enjoyable game to me in basically any form it's taken since, and I pop real hard whenever a series celebration crossover like Dissidia or Theatrhythm incorporates material from it. My level 999999999 Emperor from the former speaks to the affinity I feel for the visual and conceptual basis for that antagonist, for one. A ridiculous man whose killing only increased his ambition to take over hell itself.
conchobhar
What's Shenmue?
Final Fantasy II was #7 for me. Similar to III, this is a game I was hesitant about due to its reputation, only to play and discover those complaints are not just overblown but misleading. I'm just repeating everyone, now, but the levelling system isn't nearly as punitive as people say, and that memetic strategy of "unequip everyone and have them punch each other to grind levels" is… I mean, I guess that'd work, but people will cite it as if players need to grind to make headway, which is simply not true. You don't really need to pay attention to unique levelling system… just playing the game the way you would any other JRPG will raise the characters adequately.
There's a lot to like about Final Fantasy II, but if I had to pick my favourite thing about it, it's the Emperor. The Emperor remains one of the best villains the series has ever done. I love the way he's kept out of the player's sight for the first half of the game, with his presence known instead by his plots and the the destruction he causes. You can see echoes of this in Sephiroth and Ultimecia, but what sets the Emperor apart is his role in the world — where those two are elusive because they're busy putting their plans into action, the Emperor, as a leader, is simply above all that busywork. So when the Emperor does appear in the flesh, and it turns out he was toying with you, it's like he was deigning himself to even reveal himself to you. That his design is Evil David Bowie helps, too.
Also, last entry it came up how much III influenced IV, but II is another big influence on that game. Characters like Josef, Gordon and Leon pave the way for Yang, Edward and Kain, and — skipping ahead a game — I think you can even take Leila as a proto-Faris.
There's a lot to like about Final Fantasy II, but if I had to pick my favourite thing about it, it's the Emperor. The Emperor remains one of the best villains the series has ever done. I love the way he's kept out of the player's sight for the first half of the game, with his presence known instead by his plots and the the destruction he causes. You can see echoes of this in Sephiroth and Ultimecia, but what sets the Emperor apart is his role in the world — where those two are elusive because they're busy putting their plans into action, the Emperor, as a leader, is simply above all that busywork. So when the Emperor does appear in the flesh, and it turns out he was toying with you, it's like he was deigning himself to even reveal himself to you. That his design is Evil David Bowie helps, too.
Also, last entry it came up how much III influenced IV, but II is another big influence on that game. Characters like Josef, Gordon and Leon pave the way for Yang, Edward and Kain, and — skipping ahead a game — I think you can even take Leila as a proto-Faris.
jpfriction
(He, Him)
Original sauce FFII is pretty rough since 90% of the doors in dungeons lead to monster closets. When you can pull up a map and see which rooms to avoid in PR, it’s quite a bit less obnoxious.
Purple
(She/Her)
The real kicker is I'm not even sure it would. People are down on the whole bit where stats sometimes drop after a battle, but that's in there A- to nudge people towards a particular specialization in the long run, and B- as a way to kinda gently encourage you to keep progressing. The growth isn't enemy-agnostic. Win tough fights, get big rewards. HP and MP you get more of when they dip below half. If you just try to grind your way to being a powerhouse before you even really start for some weird reason, you're going to spend most of the game just having all your stats rot because you're breezing through every fight, and if stupidly high defense enemies show up again, refocusing to deal is going to be so much more of a pain than if you weren't all weirdly min-maxed to hell like that. Just... play the game.
This is basically my response any time that anyone suggests grinding in any JRPG ever, and this one is no different.
Moms are though
#1311
Final Fantasy XIII
a.k.a. The one with the futuristic dial turned up to 13.
438 points • 17 mentions • Highest rank: #1 (Lokii, Peklo)
#
Final Fantasy XIII
a.k.a. The one with the futuristic dial turned up to 13.
438 points • 17 mentions • Highest rank: #1 (Lokii, Peklo)
Released on December 17, 2009 (Japan)
Producer: Yoshinori Kitase
Director: Motomu Toriyamai
Composers: Masashi Hamauzu
XIII represents the series jump into HD. And it looks and feels different to what came before.
Its development was troubled - it didn’t help that they switched consoles from the PS2 to PS3 during the early stages, and then Square decided to create a whole new engine to go with it, which was a monumental task. Also word is that Square underestimated how difficult creating assets for HD resolution was, and in the end different teams ended up creating areas of the game in isolation from other teams, with their own assets and art styles.
That said, it really tried hard to set its own identity within the series. The art style and the UI was intentionally made to look much more futuristic than the series baseline, and the battle system was redesigned to make it more dynamic and fast.
The highlight of XIII’s mechanics is the Paradigm system. While inputting individual commands for the team leader is still possible, most of the time combat is too fast-paced for it to be comfortable in every battle. Instead it’s more effective to let your party autobattle and just orchestrate the flow of the battle by switching jobs (or “roles”) as the battle demands. It has been remarked how the battle system and the fact that status and health resets after every battle, successful or not, makes every fight feel like a puzzle to solve. The system itself also has a rhythm by itself, refreshing the ATB bar if you change paradigms at the right moment, so once you get the flow and figure out how to beat each enemy, battles go really fast.
And then there’s the cast. XIII has a casting charm of characters, starting with female protagonist Lightning, who becomes the leader of a small band of rebels branded by divine beings and cursed to become monsters unless they fulfill a mission they have not even the slightest clue about.
For all its strengths, what really hurts the game is its patchwork nature - sets are really different from one moment to the next, more like setpieces than like part of a world; the story has really whiplash moments, with characters attempting to commit suicide to twirl around happily in a motorcycle the next moment; lots of secondary characters, but none of them make an impact in the story. XIII is a very odd beast, but it looks beautiful and plays even better.
I also have to clap for the bold move of hiding the game ending in the title logo, something so effective they did it again later in the series.
Something Old
XIII upgraded the bestiary and summons for the HD age. Behemoth had never looked this good, nor worn more stylish zippers. Most of the influence is thematic at this point, though - the de-emphasis in items and individual commands make this game play very differently from where the series started.
Something New
The Paradigm system was completely new for the series - yet another step into trying to move away from menus and keep the battles fast-paced, but Square hadn’t committed to go full action yet. And it would get used by one more game! That doesn’t sound like much, bust ask CTB how things went for it.
Ah! This game also introduced the “Ruin” spell. The series had always lacked an every day non-elemental spell (Flare always arriving in the late game) and XIII fixed that by introducing this spell which would resurface in XIV and several spin-offs.
Something Blew
The Shiva twins mic drop
Score
70 / 77 paradigms
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BTW, to this day I still can't stand this game's story, and will die on the "second half makes no sense" hill, but I platinumed this game, which is a huge thing for me. I usually don't stay past when stories stop making sense for me, yet here I did.
The game's linearity is also a major strike against it - not that it was linear, but that it didn't make any effort to disguise that linearity, with not even backtracking being possible.Paired with the linear Crystarium level-up system, it makes the game feel too much like it's on rails. I didn't want to open that can of worms in the entry, but I consider it a valid critique, one that would influence XIII-2's design.
But again, platinum. Hard for me to really hold all that against the game when I just couldn't put it down.
The game's linearity is also a major strike against it - not that it was linear, but that it didn't make any effort to disguise that linearity, with not even backtracking being possible.Paired with the linear Crystarium level-up system, it makes the game feel too much like it's on rails. I didn't want to open that can of worms in the entry, but I consider it a valid critique, one that would influence XIII-2's design.
But again, platinum. Hard for me to really hold all that against the game when I just couldn't put it down.
Johnny Unusual
(He/Him)
I... is this a joke or not?
13’s not actually my favorite—I think every game in the series is a special perfect baby—but as time goes on I find myself endeared to 13 more and more. It’s a wild swing for the fences, and certainly it didn’t work for many people, but I’m intrigued by its vision, its thematic complexity, its reworking of expectations, its ambition, and its courage. What other game would dare hold off its overworld for 40 hours? A messy game for sure, but not one without value. And remember the secret ingredient for a good time: turn off that dang mini-map!
I think the referential quote at the start is incorrect? Unless it's meant to be following another statement.
Dads aren't tough.
Moms are though
Dads aren't tough.
Moms are though
4-So
Spicy
Like a dutiful FF fan, I bought FF13 when it was released, and I while I never regretted the purchase, I stopped playing a few hours in. For whatever reason, the Paradigm system didn't click, I thought the game was overly difficult in places, and I hated having to dip into the Datalog every time a blinking ! lit up the menu. A few years ago I found the game on sale on Steam and decided to give it another go and everything just clicked. The Paradigm system is now one of my favorite FF battle systems. The less said about the Datalog the better but I've learned to largely ignore in-game compendiums, so it was no big shakes to just never dip into it and keep the action moving forward briskly.
I still dislike the Gran Pulse section of the game. I still think Lightning is unlikable and one of the worst FF protags. (Maybe I'd like her better in the sequels; I have not played those.) Snow and Hope I could easily do without. Thankfully, there's Vanille, Sazh, and Fang to make this cast not a complete loss.
I'm a big audio guy and FF13 has one of my favorite FF soundtracks. I mean, come on, you know? So good.
I still dislike the Gran Pulse section of the game. I still think Lightning is unlikable and one of the worst FF protags. (Maybe I'd like her better in the sequels; I have not played those.) Snow and Hope I could easily do without. Thankfully, there's Vanille, Sazh, and Fang to make this cast not a complete loss.
I'm a big audio guy and FF13 has one of my favorite FF soundtracks. I mean, come on, you know? So good.
I desperately, desperately wish more of XIII's story/lore that's tucked away in the data logs was just in the narrative directly, or that the game didn't keep you isolated from other human life to get some of it a little more organically. Otherwise XIII is a really damn good game. I can take or leave the general story because I don't particularly enjoy a lot of it between the very start and the very end, (and I enjoy it a lot more in the total context of the trilogy) but the battle system tho, it's so so good. My only gripe with it is that some tougher battles can be TOO strict about which roles you need to be using and when, I vastly preferred the freedom X-2 affords you in that regard even for its superbosses. Like the way I prefer X-2 over XIII, I prefer this system over XIII-2 (although I don't really know why, something just feels a little off to me in the latter).
Lightning, Fang, and Vanille are also absolutely incredible characters in their own right. Sazh was pretty great to my memory but they really did not do him justice in the sequels. While I'm sympathetic to Hope in this game, that evaporates for the sequels and the best thing I can say about Snow is that I love the opportunity Lightning Returns gave me.
Lightning, Fang, and Vanille are also absolutely incredible characters in their own right. Sazh was pretty great to my memory but they really did not do him justice in the sequels. While I'm sympathetic to Hope in this game, that evaporates for the sequels and the best thing I can say about Snow is that I love the opportunity Lightning Returns gave me.
I basically had the opposite reaction to FF13 compared to everyone else I knew. I absolutely loved the first half of this game. One of my favourite things about old JRPGs is when they forcefully remix your party and challenge you to optimize your new crew (newer games seem afraid to do this, instead erring on the side of giving players more freedom/options), and the first half of this game does that over and over and I loved it. I love it when games constrain me, and pretty much all of 13's systems do so in interesting ways. Then I got to Gran Pulse and suddenly everything opened up and I immediately felt overwhelmed, wandered around for an hour or so then lost interest and never played it again.
FFXIII was the last FF game I played at release, and I loved it. I've always been meaning to come back to it and play the sequels.
It came out around the time that I was finding that the rote approach to talking to NPCs in towns in many JRPGs was becoming tedious, so I didn't really mind taking them out at all. More JRPGs need to rethink whether or not the traditional town NPC approach is really the best option for what they're doing, or if some alternative might work better. This doesn't necessarily mean exactly FFXIII's approach, but it's one idea. You've also got good examples in Persona 3 Portable, Saga: Scarlet Grace, and Final Fantasy: Tactics that execute town functions through text based menus rather than explorable spaces, and there are alternatives like Romancing SaGa 2 or Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song where there are only a limited number of meaningfully interactable NPCs and most character models are just there for flavor. For me, a FF12 or DQ11 style town where there might be a couple dozen NPCs who all say a slight variation on the same line and then a handful with something important or interesting flavor text is not fun or interesting, and it makes me want to use a guide to find relevant sidequests instead of just playing the game. For a series that's increasingly focused on bombastic or cinematic narratives, exploring new approaches to towns, up to and including removing them altogether outside of a few setpieces, absolutely makes sense to me.
Also, as someone who enjoyed FFXII's automatation of the mindless parts of JRPG encounters with the Gambit system, I also liked FFXIII's alternate approach where the rote stuff is automated and your role is to conduct the flow flow of battle, and the stagger system helped to create meaningful rhythms for you to conduct.
Digital Foundry recently started an I'm assuming two part retrospective on the FFXIII games (maybe they specified this, I forget). I enjoyed the first part. For people who are only familiar with their work from hearing it cited when someone is complaining that a game sometimes drops to a Literally Unplayable 119fps or whatever, they also do some interesting technical analysis of older games, and I find that they do a pretty good job of not just falling into repeating received wisdom and approaching games on their own merits and the historical context of their release.
Also, I love Hamauzu's soundtrack here. This is probably my favorite battle theme in the series, and one that fits perfectly with the feeling of conducting the rhythms of battle that the game creates:
It came out around the time that I was finding that the rote approach to talking to NPCs in towns in many JRPGs was becoming tedious, so I didn't really mind taking them out at all. More JRPGs need to rethink whether or not the traditional town NPC approach is really the best option for what they're doing, or if some alternative might work better. This doesn't necessarily mean exactly FFXIII's approach, but it's one idea. You've also got good examples in Persona 3 Portable, Saga: Scarlet Grace, and Final Fantasy: Tactics that execute town functions through text based menus rather than explorable spaces, and there are alternatives like Romancing SaGa 2 or Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song where there are only a limited number of meaningfully interactable NPCs and most character models are just there for flavor. For me, a FF12 or DQ11 style town where there might be a couple dozen NPCs who all say a slight variation on the same line and then a handful with something important or interesting flavor text is not fun or interesting, and it makes me want to use a guide to find relevant sidequests instead of just playing the game. For a series that's increasingly focused on bombastic or cinematic narratives, exploring new approaches to towns, up to and including removing them altogether outside of a few setpieces, absolutely makes sense to me.
Also, as someone who enjoyed FFXII's automatation of the mindless parts of JRPG encounters with the Gambit system, I also liked FFXIII's alternate approach where the rote stuff is automated and your role is to conduct the flow flow of battle, and the stagger system helped to create meaningful rhythms for you to conduct.
Digital Foundry recently started an I'm assuming two part retrospective on the FFXIII games (maybe they specified this, I forget). I enjoyed the first part. For people who are only familiar with their work from hearing it cited when someone is complaining that a game sometimes drops to a Literally Unplayable 119fps or whatever, they also do some interesting technical analysis of older games, and I find that they do a pretty good job of not just falling into repeating received wisdom and approaching games on their own merits and the historical context of their release.
Also, I love Hamauzu's soundtrack here. This is probably my favorite battle theme in the series, and one that fits perfectly with the feeling of conducting the rhythms of battle that the game creates:
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Final Fantasy XIII was an easy first place for me. I played it on release and liked it well enough, but it did not latch on as a exceptional favourite at the time. Some of that was due to my own maturation and in which kind of stage I experienced the game in: for this forum's age demographics, I'm generally on the younger side, still in my upper teens when XIII happened. To put it in perspective, the comparable generational matchup for some others present may have been the context in which they experienced FFVI in, or likelier something from the yearly string between VIII and X at the turn of the century. I had developed the basics of my own media tastes and preferences by that time, but I was more susceptible to be influenced by whatever external opinions that I encountered, especially if they came from sources perceived to be authoritative. The great swell of skepticism and rejection that XIII inspired in its wake was not echoed by me as I did enjoy it, but in retrospect it seems likely many of those suspicisions and dressing-downs that were and still largely remain ubiquitous affected my willingness to commit to liking something so many seemed to detest, at that particular stage of life when many other things seemed as unsure.
XIII's time as a game and a series flagship came and went, to be replaced by other endlessly litigated controversies and unfulfillable audience expectations. I kept thinking back on it every so often, and upon reflecting on it more in the abstract, found myself liking it more and more compared to the first-hand experienced I had had with it. It was a process facilitated by greater media exposure, better understanding of the game's context within its own series, within its genre, and in the industry it was part of, cultivated by shifting personal priorities and firmer ability to read and interpret media to the ends that interested me, and not ones dictated by others. After enjoying the game as a theoretical and a series of recollections, I replayed it about a decade after I'd first done so.
Final Fantasy XIII is my favourite Final Fantasy because it has a concept that it establishes and sticks to to the bitter end, at a cost to itself and all that crash against its shores. Was it at least partially the result of troubled production pipelines, of a scattershot development purview that had the team shuffle and reorient what they had however many times we'll never be privy to on the audience end? Sure, because creation is never without compromise, and none more than something of the preposterous commercial and human scale that a project like this in its day represented. What matters is what's left for others to interact with, and XIII's conceptual basis is clear as crystal, but as unbreakable--as unaccommodating--as diamond. It is an uniquely exhausting game to play for long periods because it's so single-mindedly focused on its prime qualities which it devotes all its existence and resources toward, and the root of its divisive nature. If you don't click with what it's doing, nothing else about the experience can sustain interest for long because nothing else exists beyond its core components of character melodrama, battling and forward propulsion. Everything else--especially in context of the generalist-ringmaster-of-many-showpieces genre precedent the series had itself built up and previously relied on--is gone from its structure, discarded as elements that would only muddle the whole.
That that element of exhaustion exists on the player end is part of what makes me so enamored with the game's storytelling since it's directly reflective, even transitive, of the headspace that defines the narrative for the characters. XIII is a breathless runaway yarn that it comes to not only through the specific actions and motivations that guide its cast, but the play structure of the game itself and how it makes a player feel in the process of embodying their invisible tagalong and shepherd. You cannot diverge from the path set in front of each grouping of the six, as on a base level it doesn't matter where each of them is going--their priority is simply to keep moving, to be anywhere but here, and never stop. It's about losing yourself, and losing your inevitable need to think and reflect, in the backroads and simply putting one foot ahead of the other, in an effort to bury oneself before what eventually must be confronted arrives. Lose yourself in an endless sequence of battles, flaunting your newfound divine powers even as they drag you toward their root cause and journey's end.
Lose yourself in petty squabbles motivated by interpersonal resentment, misdirections and misunderstandings, assumptions of others' motives, the worst-faith reading of them and their actions, and explosions of repressed anger at the futility of it all. XIII's cast are my favourite collection of misfits the series has provided because they are colourful and distinct as individuals, but their story is one of a forced group consensus, unity and identity that's imposed upon them and which none of them want even beyond the rawest of bargains offered to them by the gods. It's not just about the boiling point being teased but about witnessing the kettle explode in one's hands, through several confrontations where the makeshift group's infighting truly becomes untenable (often with Lightning as the aggressor) and they can do nothing but go their separate ways with nary a plan except to reduce the toxicity in the air.
The time they spend paired up in the game's middle chapters provides a lens on each individual but also allows them the space needed to reassess what they actually think of the others, of themselves and their commiserative predicaments. Lightning being defined by anger from the start isn't a point of celebration as she channels that into violence upon her brother-in-law to-be, but her lowest point as a person that she needs to eventually recognize and take responsibility for, much in the same way as he needs to for the actions that provoked such a reaction in the first place. All that this group of characters come to represent to one another--that they ever reach the conventional definition of a "party" in genre context to begin with--is rooted in the extended character studies the game devotes so much of itself to, in fashioning its world through the shifting perspectives of what in practice reads as a rotating cast of ensemble leads rather than a protagonist and her also-rans. It has a "character arc" that applies to the group as a whole and which eventually allows them to be read as such, taking them from a barely holding together assortment of iconoclasts to ones that cohere and choose their unity through will and affection instead of simply rejecting the whims of circumstance.
To draw a cliché'd comparison for myself, Final Fantasy XIII is valued by me because in some ways it's Like Other Media I Like, in this instance possessing an almost Claremont-Simonsonian ethos as expressed through their X-Men works. Superpowered youths and strangers are pulled together against impossible odds, struggling against power structures and legislated discrimination far larger than they even in their supernatural power, throwing their all against a fight they suspect they cannot win but do it anyway, all expressed through a melodramatic interpersonal storytelling focus that prizes character rather than the moves and motions of a plot, but which is nonetheless buoyed by the medium it inhabits and its structural nature. Found family takes precedence over traditional structures, whether the story casts its light on the uncommonly feminine perspective in its most prominent lead, or the subtextual queers that preside over just as much of the narrative lens. It's easy to draw these parallels if you set your mind to it, but if I do try to isolate elements that make me invest in and care about media, the patterns that emerge will in certain instances of course reoccur. If Final Fantasy XIII just superficially echoed other narratives that I valued, for name recognition or as enthusiast signifiers, I would have no reason to feel positively about such connections. The game's lasting credit is that it's about as committed to the dismantling and upheaval of established idols as it possibly could be, while at the same time managing to evoke concepts and qualities through its nascent voice that resonate as strongly as what had come before.
XIII's time as a game and a series flagship came and went, to be replaced by other endlessly litigated controversies and unfulfillable audience expectations. I kept thinking back on it every so often, and upon reflecting on it more in the abstract, found myself liking it more and more compared to the first-hand experienced I had had with it. It was a process facilitated by greater media exposure, better understanding of the game's context within its own series, within its genre, and in the industry it was part of, cultivated by shifting personal priorities and firmer ability to read and interpret media to the ends that interested me, and not ones dictated by others. After enjoying the game as a theoretical and a series of recollections, I replayed it about a decade after I'd first done so.
Final Fantasy XIII is my favourite Final Fantasy because it has a concept that it establishes and sticks to to the bitter end, at a cost to itself and all that crash against its shores. Was it at least partially the result of troubled production pipelines, of a scattershot development purview that had the team shuffle and reorient what they had however many times we'll never be privy to on the audience end? Sure, because creation is never without compromise, and none more than something of the preposterous commercial and human scale that a project like this in its day represented. What matters is what's left for others to interact with, and XIII's conceptual basis is clear as crystal, but as unbreakable--as unaccommodating--as diamond. It is an uniquely exhausting game to play for long periods because it's so single-mindedly focused on its prime qualities which it devotes all its existence and resources toward, and the root of its divisive nature. If you don't click with what it's doing, nothing else about the experience can sustain interest for long because nothing else exists beyond its core components of character melodrama, battling and forward propulsion. Everything else--especially in context of the generalist-ringmaster-of-many-showpieces genre precedent the series had itself built up and previously relied on--is gone from its structure, discarded as elements that would only muddle the whole.
That that element of exhaustion exists on the player end is part of what makes me so enamored with the game's storytelling since it's directly reflective, even transitive, of the headspace that defines the narrative for the characters. XIII is a breathless runaway yarn that it comes to not only through the specific actions and motivations that guide its cast, but the play structure of the game itself and how it makes a player feel in the process of embodying their invisible tagalong and shepherd. You cannot diverge from the path set in front of each grouping of the six, as on a base level it doesn't matter where each of them is going--their priority is simply to keep moving, to be anywhere but here, and never stop. It's about losing yourself, and losing your inevitable need to think and reflect, in the backroads and simply putting one foot ahead of the other, in an effort to bury oneself before what eventually must be confronted arrives. Lose yourself in an endless sequence of battles, flaunting your newfound divine powers even as they drag you toward their root cause and journey's end.
Lose yourself in petty squabbles motivated by interpersonal resentment, misdirections and misunderstandings, assumptions of others' motives, the worst-faith reading of them and their actions, and explosions of repressed anger at the futility of it all. XIII's cast are my favourite collection of misfits the series has provided because they are colourful and distinct as individuals, but their story is one of a forced group consensus, unity and identity that's imposed upon them and which none of them want even beyond the rawest of bargains offered to them by the gods. It's not just about the boiling point being teased but about witnessing the kettle explode in one's hands, through several confrontations where the makeshift group's infighting truly becomes untenable (often with Lightning as the aggressor) and they can do nothing but go their separate ways with nary a plan except to reduce the toxicity in the air.
The time they spend paired up in the game's middle chapters provides a lens on each individual but also allows them the space needed to reassess what they actually think of the others, of themselves and their commiserative predicaments. Lightning being defined by anger from the start isn't a point of celebration as she channels that into violence upon her brother-in-law to-be, but her lowest point as a person that she needs to eventually recognize and take responsibility for, much in the same way as he needs to for the actions that provoked such a reaction in the first place. All that this group of characters come to represent to one another--that they ever reach the conventional definition of a "party" in genre context to begin with--is rooted in the extended character studies the game devotes so much of itself to, in fashioning its world through the shifting perspectives of what in practice reads as a rotating cast of ensemble leads rather than a protagonist and her also-rans. It has a "character arc" that applies to the group as a whole and which eventually allows them to be read as such, taking them from a barely holding together assortment of iconoclasts to ones that cohere and choose their unity through will and affection instead of simply rejecting the whims of circumstance.
To draw a cliché'd comparison for myself, Final Fantasy XIII is valued by me because in some ways it's Like Other Media I Like, in this instance possessing an almost Claremont-Simonsonian ethos as expressed through their X-Men works. Superpowered youths and strangers are pulled together against impossible odds, struggling against power structures and legislated discrimination far larger than they even in their supernatural power, throwing their all against a fight they suspect they cannot win but do it anyway, all expressed through a melodramatic interpersonal storytelling focus that prizes character rather than the moves and motions of a plot, but which is nonetheless buoyed by the medium it inhabits and its structural nature. Found family takes precedence over traditional structures, whether the story casts its light on the uncommonly feminine perspective in its most prominent lead, or the subtextual queers that preside over just as much of the narrative lens. It's easy to draw these parallels if you set your mind to it, but if I do try to isolate elements that make me invest in and care about media, the patterns that emerge will in certain instances of course reoccur. If Final Fantasy XIII just superficially echoed other narratives that I valued, for name recognition or as enthusiast signifiers, I would have no reason to feel positively about such connections. The game's lasting credit is that it's about as committed to the dismantling and upheaval of established idols as it possibly could be, while at the same time managing to evoke concepts and qualities through its nascent voice that resonate as strongly as what had come before.
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Okay. I've been putting up and shutting up as to not "rock the boat" but this is too fucking much. What is it with this forum and its insistence to relitigate topics that have been discussed into perpetuity for its entire existence, under the context of a thread that's about celebrating its subject matter as they've been voted in by the community? This constant need to deliver criticism disguised as compliments or posts like these that are nothing but extended grievances do nothing to forward the purpose of discussing whatever people like about each entry. I can only speak for myself but they make me not want to or even regret participating at all.
You're right Peklo, I'll delete my post
FelixSH
(He/Him)
Ok, new monitor, so I can actually write stuff again. Let's see.
FF X-2
When replaying it recently, I got addicted to it. The mission-based structure did REALLY work for me. I was done with the game in two weeks, maybe less. That said, I only got through one playthrough.
I love the development of Yuna, and how she just keeps growing and growing, in this new environment of freedom. We learn, that she is a leader, even without the restrictions of Yevon. We learn, that she is totally able to be goofy and silly, and have fun with all kinds of nonsense. It's beautiful, seeing her develop, and already not being that girl that would apologize for everything. It's great. I wished the NG+ would have worked for me, as I feel like I'm missing a crucial part of the game, but oh well.
I generally love, how the first direct sequel goes into the opposite direction from the one before as hard as it could. Even if I didn't like the game, I would appreciate it just for that.
The mood is great, everyone trying to move ahead, finding their new place in the world, and things simply opening up. It's just pure, distilled fun, especially when the Gullwings are goofy. Oh, and LeBlanc, of course, is a joy. I love this trope of a character, the lighter antagonists, who become allies as the real villain appars.
FF II
Thanks again, everyone who here played the game and made clear that everything the Internet says about it is wrong. I remember Peklo, but there were others too. I'm glad that I got to experience this fun game.
That info, that you have to hit yourself, is not only wrong, but also detrimental, probably the worst advice I've ever heard about a game. It's still a dungeon crawler, and, after you waste time doing the most boring grind imaginable, the dungeons have no teeth and are therefore just boring.
Sorry, had to get that out again. For active positivity, a small thing that I love is the inclusion of the first Chocobo, who plays a cute game of hide and seek with you, without much of a point - it's just a cute thing, to let you ride around on a cute bird.
Aside from that, the mood is great, if you let yourself get into it, you get a very grim world, that is fighting the last fight against being taken over be Hell. And even after taking the Emperor down, there is still more to come.
Just take a look at this guy.
Great design. The colors make him look sick, the face is nearly completely black, aside from the sickly-shining eyes. He looks more like a skeleton than a person. And then, you get his final form:
Look at this sprite, it's amazing. Not quite on the level of the Cloud of Darkness, but that game came later, so fair enough. These big NES FF sprites are great, aren't they?
The Emperor is, indeed, a great villain. So much more on top of things than anyone after him. Which is part of the story still being minimalistic, but I feel like he is a great, terrifying presence during the whole game, until he is finally taken down. A second time, after he took over Hell. Which, as others mentioned, what a move.
Even if one doesn't like the game, I think there is a lot to appreciate. And I think people have started to realize that, with the argument changing from "this sucks" to "I don't like it, but I appreciate what it did, as a whole and for the series".
Oh, and this feels like the first real FF game to me. And it laid the groundwork for how the story in these games would work, at least from IV onwards. There is always, I think, an evil Empire, with a resistance that fights against it, and basic Star Wars references. VI is not too different there from IV. It's an absolutely essential game in this series.
FF XIII
I have put this at the bottom of my list, together with XII, but only because they are the only ones I haven't replayed for my project yet, and my opinion feels uneducated.
I did enjoy my one playthrough very much, and remember really feeling the horror of being chosen by the gods, when the group gets to Palomporom, being hated by everyone. It was a great moment.
The other moment I remember is, when I realized how intense the contrast was between Cocoon and Pulse, and what it meant for the world. I don't remember details, but it stuck.
I enjoyed the battle system a lot. Especially the first half, where you get assigned groups and have to work with that. I could really take more of this, it is one of the things I DO like a lot about IV.
Certainly looking forward to replaying it. I did enjoy all the characters, I think it's a great set.
FF X-2
When replaying it recently, I got addicted to it. The mission-based structure did REALLY work for me. I was done with the game in two weeks, maybe less. That said, I only got through one playthrough.
I love the development of Yuna, and how she just keeps growing and growing, in this new environment of freedom. We learn, that she is a leader, even without the restrictions of Yevon. We learn, that she is totally able to be goofy and silly, and have fun with all kinds of nonsense. It's beautiful, seeing her develop, and already not being that girl that would apologize for everything. It's great. I wished the NG+ would have worked for me, as I feel like I'm missing a crucial part of the game, but oh well.
I generally love, how the first direct sequel goes into the opposite direction from the one before as hard as it could. Even if I didn't like the game, I would appreciate it just for that.
The mood is great, everyone trying to move ahead, finding their new place in the world, and things simply opening up. It's just pure, distilled fun, especially when the Gullwings are goofy. Oh, and LeBlanc, of course, is a joy. I love this trope of a character, the lighter antagonists, who become allies as the real villain appars.
FF II
Thanks again, everyone who here played the game and made clear that everything the Internet says about it is wrong. I remember Peklo, but there were others too. I'm glad that I got to experience this fun game.
That info, that you have to hit yourself, is not only wrong, but also detrimental, probably the worst advice I've ever heard about a game. It's still a dungeon crawler, and, after you waste time doing the most boring grind imaginable, the dungeons have no teeth and are therefore just boring.
Sorry, had to get that out again. For active positivity, a small thing that I love is the inclusion of the first Chocobo, who plays a cute game of hide and seek with you, without much of a point - it's just a cute thing, to let you ride around on a cute bird.
Aside from that, the mood is great, if you let yourself get into it, you get a very grim world, that is fighting the last fight against being taken over be Hell. And even after taking the Emperor down, there is still more to come.
Just take a look at this guy.
Great design. The colors make him look sick, the face is nearly completely black, aside from the sickly-shining eyes. He looks more like a skeleton than a person. And then, you get his final form:
Look at this sprite, it's amazing. Not quite on the level of the Cloud of Darkness, but that game came later, so fair enough. These big NES FF sprites are great, aren't they?
The Emperor is, indeed, a great villain. So much more on top of things than anyone after him. Which is part of the story still being minimalistic, but I feel like he is a great, terrifying presence during the whole game, until he is finally taken down. A second time, after he took over Hell. Which, as others mentioned, what a move.
Even if one doesn't like the game, I think there is a lot to appreciate. And I think people have started to realize that, with the argument changing from "this sucks" to "I don't like it, but I appreciate what it did, as a whole and for the series".
Oh, and this feels like the first real FF game to me. And it laid the groundwork for how the story in these games would work, at least from IV onwards. There is always, I think, an evil Empire, with a resistance that fights against it, and basic Star Wars references. VI is not too different there from IV. It's an absolutely essential game in this series.
FF XIII
I have put this at the bottom of my list, together with XII, but only because they are the only ones I haven't replayed for my project yet, and my opinion feels uneducated.
I did enjoy my one playthrough very much, and remember really feeling the horror of being chosen by the gods, when the group gets to Palomporom, being hated by everyone. It was a great moment.
The other moment I remember is, when I realized how intense the contrast was between Cocoon and Pulse, and what it meant for the world. I don't remember details, but it stuck.
I enjoyed the battle system a lot. Especially the first half, where you get assigned groups and have to work with that. I could really take more of this, it is one of the things I DO like a lot about IV.
Certainly looking forward to replaying it. I did enjoy all the characters, I think it's a great set.
A little behind:
FF III: I remember when I first played this on emulator back in 2003 and was blown away that this was an NES game and it looked, sounded and played this good. There's so many neat bits in it. After you get the Invincible, some of the shine does wear off, but that is mainly the sections where every tile has a random encounter and that did detract from the experience a bit. The splitting enemies, too, but they're only a problem in the one dungeon before you can have a powerful M. Knight. I actually love the mini dungeons and thought they were a nice conceit.
FF II: I'm not as sold on the mechanics as some others, but I don't think they're the worst thing. There's a lot to like about this game, though, not least of which is that, in its 8-bit form, it exudes atmosphere. That overworld theme in its original incarnation is one of my favorite NES tracks ever.
FF XIII: I got pretty far into it but stalled out around when you get back from Pulse. I remember enjoying it. The combat was fantastic, the setpieces are some of the best in the series, and the music was great (I agree with 4-so that Gapra Whitewood is a killer track). I thought Lightning was a pretty great character, TBH.
FF III: I remember when I first played this on emulator back in 2003 and was blown away that this was an NES game and it looked, sounded and played this good. There's so many neat bits in it. After you get the Invincible, some of the shine does wear off, but that is mainly the sections where every tile has a random encounter and that did detract from the experience a bit. The splitting enemies, too, but they're only a problem in the one dungeon before you can have a powerful M. Knight. I actually love the mini dungeons and thought they were a nice conceit.
FF II: I'm not as sold on the mechanics as some others, but I don't think they're the worst thing. There's a lot to like about this game, though, not least of which is that, in its 8-bit form, it exudes atmosphere. That overworld theme in its original incarnation is one of my favorite NES tracks ever.
FF XIII: I got pretty far into it but stalled out around when you get back from Pulse. I remember enjoying it. The combat was fantastic, the setpieces are some of the best in the series, and the music was great (I agree with 4-so that Gapra Whitewood is a killer track). I thought Lightning was a pretty great character, TBH.
I had been meaning to post a little something about all of these as they were posted. I'm still going to do that, but in a spoilerpop.
Over the past few console generations, the Final Fantasy series' commitment to radical departure has contributed to frankly impossible expectations for each new game. Even within the series, though FFVIIR (#6) had an exceptionally difficult time of it. How do you make a fully-realized 3d iteration of one of the most iconic settings in gaming history? How do you design a world that can compete with what your audience imagined 25 years prior? Incredibly, VIIR not only meets but exceeds those expectations - in some cases, by sidestepping them (the character-action-style battle system is a departure even from XV's open-world adventure); in some cases, by embracing them (I don't know how else to put this: They made everybody really sexy.) VIIR is, more than any Final Fantasy since the one it remade, a AAA game - it follows the design allowances and scope of your God of Wars etc., and is less stereotypically "an RPG" in its gameplay than any mainline game in its series, but holds a not-quite-slavish continuity with the way the Midgar piece of VII unfolded. It's also a lot shorter than most other series (I think 30 hrs or less to first completion?) - worth making time for if you care enough about Final Fantasy to participate in this thread.
FFXV (#10) - Maligned for the abysmal pacing of its final third and a plot that almost demands you watch a supplemental movie & anime, XV still deserves more love than it gets. No game has ever captured the enormity & mundanity of the American road trip like this one, and I can’t imagine any other game franchise even attempting it. There's so much love in the banter between the boys, the rendering of food, and the act of browsing Prompto's photos. I guess any game would struggle with shifting its stakes from so quiet to so cataclysmic. The ending's "You guys ... are the best" might be my favorite line reading in any video game. Lunafreya deserved better, though.
FFXIV (#15) is the only MMO I have played for any appreciable amount of time (maybe 50 hours - basically to the end of ARR), and I can see why it's so beloved. The designers of the game love the series as much as we do, and every expansion adds depth to the world and the cast of characters. I do feel a little forbidden from coming back to it, though - much of the progression feels Skinner-box-y to me, like the crafting & gathering job development, and the HUD/battle system does give me sensory overload to an extent that makes it hard for me to feel like a good partner to the randos of the Internet. I like it, but I'm not convinced it's for me - someday, though, I'm certain I'll install it on my Steam deck, and then it's curtains for me.
FFIII (#13) was an intensely ambitious game, and I have to wonder how much more impressive it would have been to see FFIV. The two games share a lot of DNA, down to graphic assets, but have very different approaches to how their stories are told. On paper, III is more open than most other games in the series - 20+ jobs! Multiple times when you can pick where to visit in a shiny new vehicle! - but it might also be the hardest mainline Final Fantasy game, which robs you of a lot of choice. Leaving aside the last dungeon, the game also sends you through multiple dungeons where physical attacks won't help you, and maybe a half-dozen other dungeons and bosses that necessitate a single job. Your blank-slate orphans also didn't have a lot of room to participate in the plot, something which I appreciated the remake's attempts at. III's shortcomings, though, are also reflections of two conflicting directions for the series to go - with IV and V, we would see each of those directions in glorious 16-bit color.
FFX-2 (#17) is, in some ways, exactly what I would want from a direct sequel. YRP are a great team and the plot is a clever exploration of what happens after the apocalypse is canceled. Unfortunately X-2 does some things that don't click as well with me - it seems to have more missables than anything else in the series, and the various optional content hidden behind completion %ages and mission success have made actually playing the game more stressful for me than I'd like. One day I'll come back to it.
FFII (#16) is a surprise to see ranked so high, but a pleasant one. The darker tone, real characters, and genuinely excellent antagonist all elevate the game substantially, and it introduced a ton of series staples. If I'm being honest, though, FFII is especially important because it's the first Kawazu game, and though I don't have quite as much love for the SaGa series as FF, I feel like I love them more every year. For all FF owes to this game, the principles of game design here would be most clearly seen in Romancing SaGa 3, SaGa Frontier, and Scarlet Grace.
FFXIII (#8) deserves every bit of the critical re-evaluation it's gotten in the past couple years, especially because of how thoroughly it diverged from the prevailing design trends of the past 15 years. While procedurally-created content and open worlds reign, FFXIII is a meticulously designed & choreographed series of setpieces. While RPGs like the Xenoblade series put systems on systems, XIII has the most streamlined character/weapon development since FFIX. They don't make 'em like this anymore, mostly because they can't afford to, and in revisiting this game what shines through is how modern it still feels. Battles have some teeth, but more importantly, have respect for your time. The story is, on a first playthrough, nonsense without intensive Datalog study, but while you're not having to remind yourself what Cid Raines is actually there for, FFXIII has some of the best character work in the series. Fang/Vanille may be the best couple in the series, and for all the "25-hour tutorial" cracks, the first 8 chapters of the game are pretty masterful in the way they play the characters' differing motivations and mechanical abilities off each other. It's flawed, like every Final Fantasy, but looking at it in the 2020s I feel like it's one of the best examples of what separates FF from basically every other game series.
FFXV (#10) - Maligned for the abysmal pacing of its final third and a plot that almost demands you watch a supplemental movie & anime, XV still deserves more love than it gets. No game has ever captured the enormity & mundanity of the American road trip like this one, and I can’t imagine any other game franchise even attempting it. There's so much love in the banter between the boys, the rendering of food, and the act of browsing Prompto's photos. I guess any game would struggle with shifting its stakes from so quiet to so cataclysmic. The ending's "You guys ... are the best" might be my favorite line reading in any video game. Lunafreya deserved better, though.
FFXIV (#15) is the only MMO I have played for any appreciable amount of time (maybe 50 hours - basically to the end of ARR), and I can see why it's so beloved. The designers of the game love the series as much as we do, and every expansion adds depth to the world and the cast of characters. I do feel a little forbidden from coming back to it, though - much of the progression feels Skinner-box-y to me, like the crafting & gathering job development, and the HUD/battle system does give me sensory overload to an extent that makes it hard for me to feel like a good partner to the randos of the Internet. I like it, but I'm not convinced it's for me - someday, though, I'm certain I'll install it on my Steam deck, and then it's curtains for me.
FFIII (#13) was an intensely ambitious game, and I have to wonder how much more impressive it would have been to see FFIV. The two games share a lot of DNA, down to graphic assets, but have very different approaches to how their stories are told. On paper, III is more open than most other games in the series - 20+ jobs! Multiple times when you can pick where to visit in a shiny new vehicle! - but it might also be the hardest mainline Final Fantasy game, which robs you of a lot of choice. Leaving aside the last dungeon, the game also sends you through multiple dungeons where physical attacks won't help you, and maybe a half-dozen other dungeons and bosses that necessitate a single job. Your blank-slate orphans also didn't have a lot of room to participate in the plot, something which I appreciated the remake's attempts at. III's shortcomings, though, are also reflections of two conflicting directions for the series to go - with IV and V, we would see each of those directions in glorious 16-bit color.
FFX-2 (#17) is, in some ways, exactly what I would want from a direct sequel. YRP are a great team and the plot is a clever exploration of what happens after the apocalypse is canceled. Unfortunately X-2 does some things that don't click as well with me - it seems to have more missables than anything else in the series, and the various optional content hidden behind completion %ages and mission success have made actually playing the game more stressful for me than I'd like. One day I'll come back to it.
FFII (#16) is a surprise to see ranked so high, but a pleasant one. The darker tone, real characters, and genuinely excellent antagonist all elevate the game substantially, and it introduced a ton of series staples. If I'm being honest, though, FFII is especially important because it's the first Kawazu game, and though I don't have quite as much love for the SaGa series as FF, I feel like I love them more every year. For all FF owes to this game, the principles of game design here would be most clearly seen in Romancing SaGa 3, SaGa Frontier, and Scarlet Grace.
FFXIII (#8) deserves every bit of the critical re-evaluation it's gotten in the past couple years, especially because of how thoroughly it diverged from the prevailing design trends of the past 15 years. While procedurally-created content and open worlds reign, FFXIII is a meticulously designed & choreographed series of setpieces. While RPGs like the Xenoblade series put systems on systems, XIII has the most streamlined character/weapon development since FFIX. They don't make 'em like this anymore, mostly because they can't afford to, and in revisiting this game what shines through is how modern it still feels. Battles have some teeth, but more importantly, have respect for your time. The story is, on a first playthrough, nonsense without intensive Datalog study, but while you're not having to remind yourself what Cid Raines is actually there for, FFXIII has some of the best character work in the series. Fang/Vanille may be the best couple in the series, and for all the "25-hour tutorial" cracks, the first 8 chapters of the game are pretty masterful in the way they play the characters' differing motivations and mechanical abilities off each other. It's flawed, like every Final Fantasy, but looking at it in the 2020s I feel like it's one of the best examples of what separates FF from basically every other game series.
This thread got me to re-buy 13 and newly buy 13-3. (13-2 gets left in the lurch because it sounds like it's a pain to get running on Deck.) I refunded 13 on my PC a year ago because it kept crashing, so I'm happy to have a way to play it again (originally 360, but that's had the red rings for years now).