Final Fantasy general

@Kuja debate: I think how much one likes/hates him depends on what you are looking for in a villain. As a character, Kuja is one of (if not the) my favourites, but as a bad guy Kefka is unrivalled. Then there are fangirl baits, who don't need anything beside good looks to be popular. I hate this type, so I'm one of those weird girls who can't stand Sephiroth. There are also different types of villains. Kuja is a Tragic Villain, Vayne is a Sympathetic villain, Golbez is an Anti-Villain and so on.

@anime (sorta): I am going to watch OV As soon, already saved them on my laptop. I also recently finished Unlimited (man, I was watching this one for a very long time). The series would benefit from cutting Stock Footage. Or just removing Kaze altogether.

Finished FFI. It's So Okay, It's Average so much, the only thing I can praise is music (played PSP version). Also started FFII. Now this one I enjoy very much! I have a headcanon that monsters in this world die from laughter while watching the good guys beat each other.

edited 20th Aug '14 6:34:03 AM by Kara

FFExplorers is out on 18/12 in Japan.

I find Xande to be underwhelming, but in general the only Final Fantasy villains I found to be outright bad were Genesis Rhapsodos and Caius Ballad. All the others I just plain liked, or thought were badass, or I thought had great determination, or were incredibly ominous, or were funny,

I've literally seen none of that here.

edited 20th Aug '14 7:38:55 AM by VeryMelon

Sometimes, it's fun to just sit back and have a villain who's straight-up evil, and enjoy watching him get his face pounded in.

Like Dio Brando/DIO.

x?

NES version is the only way I can enjoy FF 1.

I enjoy sympathetic villains, but I like outright evil villains when they have qualities I like such as competence, humor, presentation or intelligence. I don't root for them, but I find them enjoyable and take them for their own merits.

You're right. Caius and Genesis were awful.

edited 20th Aug '14 8:19:34 AM by Aquaconda

It depends on the work. Volgin is one of my favorite MGS villains. Why? Because he's just an evil crazy Russian bastard. That's it, that's all there is to him. He is so patently absurdly Stupid Evil that it's awesome. He perfectly fits how MGS 3 was a nod to the old Bond films.

On the other hand, I can appreciate Solidus or The Patriots A.I.s or other baddies with more substantive reasons for being villains.

In terms of FF, I've grown rather apathetic to the Big Bads of the franchise and mainly enjoy secondary antagonists. People like Seifer or Gabranth.

And sometimes I think people put the Pants on Vayne too much. Okay, maybe it's not DILP but his character sheet and certain other things on the FFXII page made him out to be too sympathetic, at least the last time i looked at them. Far as I'm concerned, he overthrew the Occuria just so he could place himself in a position of power. And the Occuria were hardly some nightmarish evil deities that enslaved everyone. They pretty much left everyone up to their own devices. Except for that one time they brought peace to the planet. My god, how evil they are!

edited 20th Aug '14 8:40:19 AM by Nikkolas

Yeah, I haven't played the remakes of Final Fantasy 1, but I really like the NES version still. First final fantasy game I played 2 years ago.

edited 20th Aug '14 8:41:59 AM by VeryMelon

Apparently all the remakes make it too easy. Well, the Origins version for the PS 1 apparently keeps the difficulty intact.

Looking up some info, I see the Dawns of Souls remake described as a toned-down, fast-leveling remake of a mostly plotless NES game.

When I played the GBA game, II was much more fun than the first game. I liked how it did something different, something I never saw before.

I'm still annoyed that people treat "you can beat up your party members to level up easily" as a huge flaw, but if they ever notice that Final Fantasy Tactics lets you do the exact same thing, they treat it as a joke instead of a complaint.

With the PSP version of FFI, by the time you get to the Elf kingdom (maybe a trip to the cave right afterward), you'll have all the gil necessary to keep your entire party outfitted with the latest stuff for the rest of the game, with more than enough to max out on items, as well. Which leads to easy leveling by simply taking a stroll.

At that point, the only challenge left would be the bonus dungeon with Omega and Shinryu.

?

I recall grinding for hours outside Elfheim to get enough Gil for new magic. To say nothing of armor and swords.

If so, it's a good thing that I love the Monk, then. I once came upon a site that gave an all-Monk team a -43/10. For comparison sake, he gave an all-White Mage and all-Black Mage team a 1/10, respectively. That was kind of weird.

Odd. That was always the point where the game just threw truckloads of money at me out of nowhere.

x5 FF 2 is great and the hate it gets is undeserved. I went into the game being told it was WORST FF GAME EVER and I just don't see it. The battle system is interesting, the Keyword system is something diffeent and the game is a true FF in that Uematsu produced a fantastic score for it.

Several sequels later and this is still the best normal battle theme in an FF game.

edited 20th Aug '14 3:46:09 PM by Nikkolas

Personally, I regard FFX HD as the best normal battle theme ever, followed by Don't Be Afraid and FFIX's normal battle theme, but FFII's battle theme is still pretty neat.

I really like Final Fantasy II and III's themes the most, thou V's theme is almost up there for me as well. Blinded by Light is also really good.

edited 21st Aug '14 8:47:04 AM by VeryMelon

Favorite normal battle music for me... probably FFVI's or Blinded by Light. There's a reason why the latter is my most-played song in Theatrhythm (well, other than how I really like the way the note pattern goes on Ultimate difficulty).

i played through 98% of FF 2 on the GBA. I stopped right after Leonrejoins your party and before the Jade Passage. Why, I have no idea.

But I'm doing a new playthrough of the Origins version on the PS 1. Got it off PSN with my nice new PS 3 and I intend to finish it this time. I know there are all sorts of ways to break 2 wide open - something to do with just equipping people with two shields to max Evasion? - but I liked the game and found it decently challenging last time. And that was on the GBA. All the GBA versions of FF games appear to be dumbed down or easier. I know i played an emulated version of FFIV JP with an English patch and it was way harder to me than FFIV Advance. And everyone says FF 1 is way easier on GBA too.

Anyway, point is, I want the game to be a bit of a challenge so I'm kinda going with a pseudo-Job setup. Last time I just decked out everyone in best weapons and equipment and all the best spells. This time Firion will be a Paladin, Maria will be a Black Mage, Guy will be a Monk and Character 4 will be...I have no idea. I haven't figured that out yet.

Also I've been informed that DS Paladin Cecil can use Shell and Protect so I am glad I can give those to Firion because I was worried about not having anyone to supply buffs.

Does anyone know if FFIV GBA/PSP is actually easier that the Japanese SNES and PSX version? I know remakes of I and II are easier, and the DS remakes of III and IV are generally harder, but I've heard IV GBA and PSP being easier and I've never found anything concrete on things being changed.

The only fourth character worth building up is Leon, since you'll be doing the final dungeon with him.

As I recall, to start with, Firion's built like a Warrior, Maria starts out with Black Mage-y stats, and Guy is an unusually tough White Mage, though of course, you (and the Random Number God) can build them in any direction from there.

GBA and PSP versions are roughly the same as the original FFIV, with the international FFII being easier than the Japanese version but harder than FFIV EasyType. The DS version is probably the hardest, at least on the first run.

edited 20th Aug '14 11:49:38 PM by Pulse

Well I have to build up the fourth character somewhat. On my DOS run I remember after Leila (the pirate chick) joins your party you go into this cave and run into your first Gigas as a regular enemy. It wrecked me easily so I spent a good while leveling up Leila's and everyone else's attack magic.

Don't intend to do that this time but I remember Gordon at least starts off as completely useless and while he gains stats fast you have to dedicate a good while to training him up so he doesn't die in one hit.

What I like about this game is that their stat growth will perfectly fit whatever job I give them. Monk Guy will never get strong magic, Mage Maria will never have very good HP or Defense, etc.. It's why I love FF 2's battle system to begin with - it is all about use it or lose it. You can only improve what you spend time training instead of everything inexplicably going up together.

edited 20th Aug '14 11:59:35 PM by Nikkolas

On the other hand, it means the best way to strengthen your skills with weapons, the strength of your muscles and the durability of your body is to repeatedly engage in self-harm in front of terrified on-looking goblins.

Well they should know not to mess with us. Goblin #30 might not think twice about atacking us after we killed #1-29 but if he sees us beating OURSELVES up, maybe he'll realize we're fucking crazy and just run away. "Don't want to mess with these guys. They're insane!"

Explorers sounds like Crystal Chronicles and Dragon Quest IX rolled into one. I like the sounds of this.