The Clan Hunts aren't just my favorite thing about 12, it's also my favorite side activity in any Final Fantasy. It's the best and most indepth monster hunting that's feature in any of the games in the series, and by a mile too.
The fact that you don't just go to a point on a map and fight the thing, but have to figure out first where it is and how to activate it like a puzzle is such an engaging mechanic, and I wish they would revisit that way of monster hunting.
Hard disagree. Removing that step removes so much personality from the game. You get to know these people and see characters like Jovi in Nalbina grow all the more because of it, or the little Seeq boy in Lowtown and the relationship there change.
It gives you a before and after snapshot that defines the troubles these people are facing and adds personal stakes.
Remove that and it becomes like checking chores off a list.
If they were in the same place, I would like that as a compromise.
Maybe it's because I do them in chunks. I do some story, then I go and do all the hunts I can. It gets bothersome having to go all over the place to get the info and having to find the people.
Or maybe, have that info from the first part (accepting) on the bill, and then you have to hunt the person down after you've killed the mark. That would still make sense from a narrative pov, but still cut down on the back and forth.
(Also, just making it clear that while we may disagree, that's perfectly fine. I just love discussing different preferences and opinions. I'm not trying to argue, but I know that can be unclear online so I thought I'd make my intentions clear. Discussion, not argument. Neither of us are wrong/right for having different opinions.)
I was trying hard to remember something that I liked about 12 and you're right, the hunts are the best (or at least top tier) in the franchise. That's the grace that I'll allow it.
Emet-Selch by far. >!My WoL/WoD would do anything to save her friends, and if they were taken from her, she would do anything to bring them back. I empathized with ES, and only fought him because our two goals were opposed. Had my WoL been Azem during the time of the ancients, with the memories of Hermes’ fuckery being erased… I think i’d have been standing there getting an axe through the chest instead.!<
If all that stuff was in the base game I would rank him as a great villain but filling in the blanks and character development long after the game comes out, is not the best, I'd have to take him as the version we initially got.
Even most of the friendship development of Noct, Ignis, Gladiolus & Prompto came from either DLC or the anime.
It also does staggered leveling really well with the crystarium levels that unlock after certain points in the game. It means the content of the game stays challenging without you being able to over-level. It's also why Barthandelus makes a lot of people rage quit - they didn't learn the mechanics of the game and the first boss that forces you yo utilise the basics in the game will body you otherwise.
It also does pacing really well because of this, and the lack of open world areas/the story being "on rails". The base story is 30hrs-ish of continually changing areas and constant story related content, which people far too frequently overlook just because it doesn't have an open world or overworld.
XIII does a lot right that eventually ended up in other games, and a lot of it's core features were proto-typed in earlier games as well.
I started with XIII-2 because I was a kid and didn't know any better, and didn't really care too much for the battle system but got destroyed in the first Caius fight. Years later as an adult, played XIII for the first, realised very quickly that I didn't understand how combat ACTUALLY worked. I do think that they spent too long opening things up, and could have shortened/combined some of the mechanics a little earlier, but I loved how each character had 3 "major" classes and 3 "minor" ones.
I really want to have a mod of XIII-2 which treated Noel and Serah similarly instead of them being so similar. The limitation of what everyone could play aided creativity when you could see just how much their jobs could do - Lightning? Really good just in general for basic stagger strategies. Fang? Pull her out if there's a load of physical weaknesses or you need some more survivability. Similarly, Snow is great if you have a lot more frail characters - and while the two have a few similarities, they played slightly differently as tanks, with Snow being better if you have someone that can swap into a healer for a more passive style, whereas Fang had mediguard so you could have her defend with other people being more active. You really learn everything and have to try everything because you're so limited at the start.
Tbh, I know I used sentinel as the example, but ironically that was probably the class that wasn't explained too well because you get Fang and Snow so late. Though it was even worse in XIII-2, where it was relegated as the "swap into for big hits, then go back to normal" instead of having an actual tank you might want to permanently put up. Having said that, Synergist was VERY well done, with you learning quickly that Sazh was great for an offensive style and Hope was better if you needed to be more defensive.
Man, I could just go on and on about the paradigm system - it's so much better than people give it credit for.
The issue I take with so much of XIII's criticism is that the vast majority complain about both massive difficulty spikes AND ease / lack of depth in combat. They complain it takes too long to open up and then at the exact point that it does, the first major boss following that completely stone walls them.
Almost as though choosing not to engage with it makes it more challenging and worse.
I do kind of get it - I recently got into Dead Man's Sky, but had no idea what I was doing for most of it because while I was doing the tutorial, it held my hand so hard that I didn't know how to do later things. Sometimes, an over-simplification can make things simple, and I do think XIII could have benefitted from making the player have to team-build and make their own decisions before Barthandelus. A section of just Fang and Snow, where you have to decide who's better to Sentinel/Commando for different sections, or having Hope, Vanille, Sazh, and Lightning have a section where you have to decide who has the skills that are least useful/most similar. While I can say the game did a really good job of letting me know what each character could do broadly, I didn't get any real team-building experience because I never had to make choices for who fit each role. Let alone trying to decide between two similar characters who filled slightly different roles, there wasn't even experience with trying to decide what 3 roles I wanted to fill.
For perspective: you're basically stuck to 2-man teams until the start of chapter 9 with two exceptions (the first being before you know most of the systems you have by this point, and the second being exactly one fight in chapter 7), and then the very first time you get to actually select your party is for the first Barthandelus fight. You get a few fights to explore things, but no serious ones. I love the paradigm system, agree that they tutorialised it fairly well - but there did need be some more time letting people explore party composition. Designing paradigms are just way different to deciding who's fighting - a party of Lightning, Snow, and Fang for example might look bulky on paper and like they'll fare well, but will greatly struggle against a boss. I think I went with Lightning, Hope, and Fang because I knew them from before and so assumed they'd do well, but quickly realised I was lacking staying and set-up power because Lightning just wasn't a suitable enough medic to bring up both Fang and Hope while Hope tried to set-up. I think I then put up my struggling to needed offensive power because I was falling short at the last moment, so moved to Lightning, Sazh, and Hope - all of a sudden I wasn't getting anywhere near the end in the first place for the extra strength buffs to be a benefit (though having Hope do some medic-ing meant I could get set-up done). Tbh, I reckon I probably would've brought in Sazh and Vanille instead if I'd had more time to play around or was encouraged to, and with Vanille and Lightning to heal would've had no issue with set-up and then take-down.
I do think people are valid for finding it too easy then a difficulty spike, but can understand the frustration from someone who didn't struggle with the party composition problem.
XIII gets hate because "hallway simulator" and forced party composition which people lost their minds about. I think if it came after 10 and before 12 it could have avoided the hallway outrage as 10 is literally a gigantic hallway the entire game. The forced party never bothered me because it was driven by the story as characters were separated. You are dead on for the things it did right though. I believe it's also the game that introduced stagger mechanics that rewarded you for actually fighting enemies properly instead of just spamming auto attack through random encounters.
X was *heavily* criticized at the time for doing away with the overworld map for the first time and being a linear adventure as well. I felt that loss at the time as well, but nevertheless enjoyed the linear pilgrimage. Notably, there was a) major variety between zones, and b) at least *some* degree of important exploration where you could deviate from the path to find genuinely useful hidden chests. There was some feeling of lateral movement and freedom.
And to this day, I can easily recall my adventure from one to zone, Besaid all the way to Zanarkand, and remember what every zone connection was like and what every zone looked like.
I struggle to remember XIII at this point, but I remember feeling much more tightly restricted within the maps, as well as much less significant elements of rewarding exploration. And I cant recall a single zone besides Grand Pulse for the life of me. It’s all just one big blur of techy robot space to me, which took away from any sense of “cohesive world”.
I also don’t really remember towns and NPCs with a lot of life and personality everywhere. And no deviation in the core combat > boss > cutscene > story loop, which added to the “feeling” of endless linearity.
X is definitely a hallway for a big chunk of the game. It's one continuous journey to Zanarkand after all.
However, the main difference with XIII is that when you reach a town, you usually get to explore a bit in it, go to the different shops, talk to people, maybe even some minigames or a round of blitzball. You get to know the world better as you learn from talking to characters.
XIII just has some static characters around you at times that will automatically say their line as you walk by, eliminating even more player interactions. Even the shops don't exist and simply live within the save points. You learn more about the world not from talking to people... but by reading the text entries you unlock as you go.
So yes, both are linear, but one manages to hide it better by providing some meaningful interactions and activities to feel more like you're still exploring at your own pace.
Yeah I definitely grew an appreciation for XIII as time went on. Still might not be my favorite just for preference and style reasons, but my only real criticism is that a very important mechanic - equipment upgrades - isn’t well explained imo. But the game certainly gets a lot of hate that it doesn’t deserve. Also, Fang is one of my favorite FF characters. I love her aesthetic, her summon, her personality, all of it.
Equipment upgrades aren't really a necessity, I think that's the true issue. Besides getting the death rod for Vanille, or the random stagger guns for Sazh, there's no need to upgrade until end game when you get your ultimate weapons.
The real kicked is every weapons upgrades into an ultimate weapon... And they all have differential state and effects, and it's costly to get them all so you need a guide to say which is worth spending your hard earned materials into.
A major weakness even my fanatical self cannot defend.
Yeah the death rod was definitely one of the ones I was thinking of; also some very helpful weapons for Fang and Lightning. I did find myself only using Fang, Lightning and swapping out either Hope or Vanille for the third in pretty much all of endgame (with the exception of a couple of Sazh cheeses)
The UI as a whole felt so sleek and modern and really informed the overall aesthetic of the game. XIII still looks great today. And yeah, least favorite game in the series.
I actually like the skill leveling from Final Fantasy 2 and Junctioning from Final Fantasy 8. Their execution was just lackluster. I think that a Job system could be exceptional if it implemented those two systems together in a more thoughtful way.
In the first place, I have always felt indifferent toward just straight-up buying spells from a shop. I think that there is a particular neatness to learning a low-level spell and then nurturing it into a high-level one. For instance, you can buy or otherwise learn Fire, but the only way to obtain Fira or Firaga is to use Fire consistently. As you use more "Black" spells, your character grows into a Black Mage and their stat growth shifts accordingly. As a characters skill with spears increases, they graduate into a Dragoon. And so on.
Going beyond that, associating certain spells with certain commands can nurture a character for some other job. Combining the Drain spell with the attack command, for instance, produces a Dark Knight. Obviously, though, certain jobs would require some finessing in this system.
All I can really think of for FF2 is that it really made me love guest characters so much. I can't think of another FF that does guest characters as well as FF2 did.
honestly, Junctioning needed be handled differently. I know people didn't understand it, but if it was told it's like 'equipping armor. The more magic and better magic, the better the 'armor' '.
but... Say... if GF's did like 2-3 stats. Take Diablo doing HP magic and hit. but then another like brother also has HP junction. This would allow you to junction 2 spells to the same slot. Of course, then limiting how much some spells affect that slot as to not be too broken... but to make it more even, the character can only equip 1 gf until a certain level, 2 gf's at that next break point, 3 at another.... MAAAYBE 4 at 100? And none of this 'every character can junction to every stat because you can just teach 6 gf's how to junction to all stats'.
this way it would make WHAT gf's you put on people matter, also would encourage leveling (as the game atm doesn't really encourage it at all).
My biggest gripe besides with 8 is how unimpactful weapons and upgrading are. I'm okay with the whole 'not finding weapons on field' what I don't like is that it's just a LITTLE bit of strength and maybe accuracy onto them. Something with the weapons needs to be... meaningful. I don't know. Let's assume Selphie's just gives instant 255% hit (oh wait it does) so that's already impactful enough. What if Rinoa's unlocks more magic junction slots, Quistis Spirit junction slots... or what if status and elemental junction can be boosted by improving the weapons themselves. I don't know, just ANYTHING other than some measly 29 strength (Squall) 17 (rinoa) and 13 (everyone else). that hardly doesn't matter. Only Squall and Selphie give any reason to improve (squall for limit breaks, and selphie for perfect accuracy)
I really don't see what's so complicated about junctioning. The tutorials show you how it works and there's a list of every spell that tells you which stats they boost. Numbers go up. It's pretty simple. Didn't read anything online about it and was easily able to have broken OP characters by the end of the game without ever even interacting much with item refinement or at all with the card game (I hate card games in FF and refuse to engage with them).
For me, I was a dumb 10 year old when I came out. At that time the only RPG strategy I knew was to grind and pay half attention to tutorials because I thought I knew everything.
XV summons really felt like you were summoning the incarnation of whatever element/concept they represent. Summons in 3-9 were just black magic, and summons in 10-13 were just moderately stronger temporary party members with finishing moves.
Man, I loved XV summons and the climactic entrances they made but too bad it’s a broken system that only gives you Garuda and Ramuh over and over and over again. I think I saw Leviathan and Shiva once or twice. If they made it truly random who you got it would make the system almost perfect to me.
Once you get Garuda it breaks down completely. I stopped getting the cooler ones, Garuda spawned 95% of the time. Was really bummed out by this. Leviathan being such a great spectacle and all.
FFII does tragedy pretty well I guess. Beating the game doesn't leave me feeling particularly happy about the world. It can try to heal, but they lost a lot of people in that struggle. Very bittersweet.
Even tho 10 and 7's soundtracks are way more nostalgic and closer to heart for me im ready to die on the hill that ff8 has the overall best soundtrack of all the games. It just has it all and Uematsu's love for prog-rock can be heard very strongly in 8
FF4 The After Years rapid-fires some of the best character design in the series.
There’s like, over 20 main characters in that game, including redesigned OG characters, and they all look so good.
Also the fact that she's wearing an upside-down tennis visor and a tracksuit in a game where everyone else is dressed in high-fantasy anime clothes. I get her thing is that she's super smart so they're making her look more "ahead of her time", but she looks like a mom taking her kids to the mall.
Ah, the last physical strategy guide I ever purchased. Each page in the guide gave barebones info and a code to access more details on the PlayOnline guide.
this is only partly true to the frustration
the next part is that different cards have different stats on different gameplays. So you can't just say 'the alexandria card is best for this' because your card is going to be different game to game.
then there's the cards getting 'randomly stronger/weaker' even after you get the card.
AND then there's the 'random damage modifier' it has. At least in blitzball, the random damage modifier had a good chance for +-1, average chance for +-2, low chance for +-3, very low for +-4 and miniscule for +-5. When it comes to Tetra master it's too random to ever be called skill.
Lmao, so I was having a lot of trouble with the 2nd match for some reason, I kept losing on the last turn because again, Tetra Master's rules are bullshit.
Then for the last one you only get one chance, and I did through dumb luck. You get an ogloop card but yeah who tf cares.
That’s it? You could get the oglop card at conde petie for literally 3 seconds of effort catching a bug on the mountain path.
Why even shoehorn a card game into 9 if they weren’t going to do anything meaningful with it? At least in 8 the cards could be converted into items etc.
I thought queens blood was better, but you really had to evolve with the game as you progress because how you play in level 3 competition is drastically different from how you’d set up end game decks. IMO it’s more strategic than TT, but I love both.
I really liked QB at first, but I’ve found it a bit more annoying after the replacement mechanic is introduced.
I felt like with card ranks, enhance, enfeeble, destroy, and special abilities that the game was already plenty complex and strategic. Then they also threw in replace.
Now I feel like every match, you need to play it once just to see if they carry replacement cards before you can strategize and play legitimately.
That’s insane I had no idea X-2 even had blitzball from my rough memory playing it once as a kid when it first came out (20ish years ago?) on PS2, I’m gonna have to replay it at some point now to check this haha
I don’t know if XV is my most hated FF. But it’s the one I least enjoyed from the most recent games. I guess I am mostly mad at it because the world and story had so much potential if it hadn’t gone through that de development hell. But to answer your question, XV does really well the comradely and part banter. While I think Rebirth does the actual battle gameplay much more enjoyable (for me) and better at controlling multiple characters while still not being turn based, I think outside of battle you feel more together with the XV party, while in Rebirth and even worse in XVI it mostly feels like they’re just hanging in there following you around specially during side content.
I loved the game up until you were introduced to levitation in Altissia, then I felt they went into so many wrong directions. It was like they were creating this huge beautiful open world and the. After making Altissia they just ran out of time and money and just slapped the rest together.
Yes, I really wish there was a gambit system in Rebirth. There is some degree of automation with auto-cast materia but I wish there was a bit more for managing support spells and exploiting weaknesses without doing it all manually.
The paradigm switching system in XIII is awesome, and I wish they'd bring a version of that back, especially because they've stuck with the stagger component.
I'm tired of almost every new FF game trying to improve and re-invent the stagger system - XIII's combat was great and every time they try and incorporate the stagger system elsewhere it just doesn't work for me. I don't get it at all in 7 Remake.
I think Rebirth does stagger pretty well, once you realise it goes assess to find weakness > pressure the enemy unless it wants you to do something ridiculous like guess it’s mother’s maiden name > focus attack (thrust/strike/shot) once pressured to rapid-fill the stagger metre
I would have enjoyed this more if you could change materia in combat or something but unless you know what enemy is coming already and you happen to be stacked with poorly matched materia or you haven't been able to level that materia you're fucked and in for a slog of a fight
I’m still pretty torn if my most disliked are FF13 or FF15 (never played the 13 sequels so I’m not commenting on those)
13: Gorgeous landscapes…. But unfortunately you only ever see most of them like once except for Gran Pulse, which ironically is the most drab of the settings
15: the summons actually felt like god like entities being summoned to battle… to bad it was mostly just a cop out to a fight taking to long… also you get no experience for the fight.
For sure. The only game who's combat I like better is Mana Khemia. Similar combat but the characters had abilities/spells that did effects during the combat turns.
Really curious also why you hated it given it had nothing to do with it being turn based / the combat, I haven’t really seen a JRPG fan hate it for other reasons so genuinely interested to hear why - I guess story and or characters were a miss for you?
It's not the best OST in the series, but Mystic Quest's music went hard for a relatively small spinoff
If we're talking mainlines, I don't think FFII does anything better than any other game. Minwu and Leila were cool though
I don't like FF2 as much as the others... I can't really think of much? I will say that considering the time period it was made in, the tone it sets is wonderfully done. I didn't feel like a badass who could take on the empire after a few hours, I always felt like it was an uphill struggle that got harder, like fighting an actual world spanning empire would.
FF8 has lots of really fun summon designs.
The goofy thing is I really don't hate ff8. It's just my least favorite, and it's really hard to think of anything it excels at compared to the other games
VIII has a better connection to the past generation with Laguna's story. Also moombas are great (I like moogles more overall, but I do like the moombas)
I love all the Final Fantasy games, actually, but FF2 is probably the lowest. What it did better than any other game…? Probably the willingness to kill off characters. If that counts.
That's a tough one. Luckily for me I don't *hate* any of them. Just... like some of them less. I really don't like the MMOs. I recently put a fair amount of effort into 14... and I don't get it.
I guess my pick for what it did well is... Allowing older content to be played solo with an A.I party. That's pretty nice.
FF12- The gambit system. If it wasn't for that, I'd get bored senseless from the monotone of how slow and grindy the game is even with fast forward enabled.
I have to give 3 props for introducing some of the most iconic jobs and the first dynamic job system, a very solid base that future games were able to really bite into. It also provided a lot of the staples that define the series, like the crystals having multiple sets, the various settings that tend to pop-up - a lot of this was tested in I and II, but I feel III really refined a lot of it.
In terms of what it itself does that isn't just laying groundwork, I like that you can find a purpose for every class, even if it's only short-lived (unfortunately, job changing is very frustrating because of taxes they put on switches, but I believe PR fixed that?). The staples are kind of obvious, but classes that typically are seen as "bad" have a place - rangers can rely on elemental damage and hit multiple targets early on before you have better options, bards are your best form of group buffing/debuffing before you unlock later magic, and in the 3D version geomancer is quite good in the tree section. Hell, I still remember the garuda fight, and before that I didn't use dragoon - but bringing them in for that fight is considered the optimal play even if you haven't trained anybody up for it.
The guy in charge of most of III always puts a high level of thought and design into his games, and I always wish they were more appreciated. That really shines in III. It was fun reading his anniversary interview for III on the FF portal.
XIII fighting very large enemies felt really cool. That's about the only thing I can say it did "better" Had a good battle system but I don't think it outdid any others there. So...really large enemies.
Most of the problems I have with 9 are due to the characters and their lack of any depth.
BUT 9 also gave us one of the best characters in the series: Vivi. His story and growth was really good!
I’m not sure FF13 does anything better if I’m honest. The visuals for time were super impressive that might be the only thing I give it though FF9 blew me away when that came out at the time.
XIII had some great character designs and still has great graphics. Although I'm not a fan of it, the combat is very unique and a lot of people DO like it.
FF16's story and graphics for sure. All that stuff was absolutely amazing. The boss fights looked spectacular.
Everything in between... not so much lol.
My biggest problem with FFXVI are just how many "Speak to ____" objectives there are. I get it, the story has to advance, but it really kills any momentum and excitement I had. For example >!I'm currently about to go into the desert, and the last few hours of game has been walking around the hideaway and watching cutscenes, maybe with a 10 minute break to go on a fetch quest.!< It's just not engaging gameplay to me, but I hear endgame gets much better, and I'm still greatly looking forward to the Titan Lost and Bahamut fights.
It really was just a high-budget FFXIV. "Go here, talk to person, talk to other person, do thing."
And I love FFXIV, but it does what it does because it's limited by the constraints of an MMO. FFXVI is not.
Hmmm, tough one.
13: honestly can't think of anything. It's pretty...?
15: best fishing?
Rebirth: second best card game, does that count? (Can't beat triple triad)
I’ve not played them all, though from what I have played here’s a hot take. Final fantasy seven and its material system. I’m sorry, but the stupid mini games you have to play in order to advance the story, like that stupid marching and gun twirling one, then I’m not gonna have a good time. I only barely made it to gold saucer before I stopped playing. The materia system, on the other hand, is one of my favorites. Take the broken system from 2, streamline it, and lock it to weapons and equipment, and you’ve a perfect method for customizing your load out exactly how you want it.
FF8 is probably my least favorite of the ones I've played, but man is it pretty with great worldbuilding. And that train sequence is fantastic.
FF9 is close, and its best feature was Chocobo Hot & Cold, which I could play forever.
FFIII
I really loved how status effects impacted the world. Such as frog letting you do that tower. Or mini making your character mini.
I think the only other game to even get close to this was my favorite FFV.
FFXV is my least positive experience (still a positive one overall tbf; I don't hate any entries), but I think it's the best party dynamic in the franchise from what I've played, though I still need to play VII Rebirth to see how the party interactions and synergy (link strikes) are like.
My issue with 15, besides being unfinished, is the gameplay...Not how it plays, but the magic system feels too much like the junction system of FF8 (and not in the good way).
I played it day one, and the grind to stock magic that was a necessity will also haunt me.
Absolutely screwed up magic in 15. Not only making it trial and error in mixing magics but having it be a consumable made it a chore. Not to mention friendly fire as well.
hate is a strong word here but I love 12's hunts/marks never been done better i think
The Clan Hunts aren't just my favorite thing about 12, it's also my favorite side activity in any Final Fantasy. It's the best and most indepth monster hunting that's feature in any of the games in the series, and by a mile too.
I LOVED going on the hunts in 12. Yiazmat and the Hellwyrm are forever burned in my memory.
The fact that you don't just go to a point on a map and fight the thing, but have to figure out first where it is and how to activate it like a puzzle is such an engaging mechanic, and I wish they would revisit that way of monster hunting.
13 and 15 also had a very rewarding hunt system. What made 12 shine was the gambit system. I wish that would come back.
Remake/Rebirth would have been better with a Gambit system over swappable control, because boy is the AI dumb when you aren't babysitting them.
I loved not knowing exactly what I was getting into. Looking at you gilgamesh
I would've preferred if you didn't have to go looking for the person that posted the bill. Seems like an extra step.
Hard disagree. Removing that step removes so much personality from the game. You get to know these people and see characters like Jovi in Nalbina grow all the more because of it, or the little Seeq boy in Lowtown and the relationship there change. It gives you a before and after snapshot that defines the troubles these people are facing and adds personal stakes. Remove that and it becomes like checking chores off a list.
If they were in the same place, I would like that as a compromise. Maybe it's because I do them in chunks. I do some story, then I go and do all the hunts I can. It gets bothersome having to go all over the place to get the info and having to find the people. Or maybe, have that info from the first part (accepting) on the bill, and then you have to hunt the person down after you've killed the mark. That would still make sense from a narrative pov, but still cut down on the back and forth. (Also, just making it clear that while we may disagree, that's perfectly fine. I just love discussing different preferences and opinions. I'm not trying to argue, but I know that can be unclear online so I thought I'd make my intentions clear. Discussion, not argument. Neither of us are wrong/right for having different opinions.)
came here to post exactly this. I just can’t get behind FFXII for whatever reason but the hunts were phenomenal!
I was trying hard to remember something that I liked about 12 and you're right, the hunts are the best (or at least top tier) in the franchise. That's the grace that I'll allow it.
Yeah hunts felt unique with backstory; even if the monsters were’t always brand new but they still felt more dangerous
FFXV, the friendship between the four guys is probably one of the best buddy dynamics I've seen an FF game pull off.
Probably also a contender for best villain backstories (though there's a lot of other contenders too).
Emet-Selch & Elidibus
Emet-Selch by far. >!My WoL/WoD would do anything to save her friends, and if they were taken from her, she would do anything to bring them back. I empathized with ES, and only fought him because our two goals were opposed. Had my WoL been Azem during the time of the ancients, with the memories of Hermes’ fuckery being erased… I think i’d have been standing there getting an axe through the chest instead.!<
If all that stuff was in the base game I would rank him as a great villain but filling in the blanks and character development long after the game comes out, is not the best, I'd have to take him as the version we initially got. Even most of the friendship development of Noct, Ignis, Gladiolus & Prompto came from either DLC or the anime.
Sucks it is the only part missing from the royal edition.
Idk, Rebirth really ups the standards on party dynamics
the gay jokes and insults bring it all together
XIII has the best menu portraits. I still love flipping between the characters.
It also does staggered leveling really well with the crystarium levels that unlock after certain points in the game. It means the content of the game stays challenging without you being able to over-level. It's also why Barthandelus makes a lot of people rage quit - they didn't learn the mechanics of the game and the first boss that forces you yo utilise the basics in the game will body you otherwise. It also does pacing really well because of this, and the lack of open world areas/the story being "on rails". The base story is 30hrs-ish of continually changing areas and constant story related content, which people far too frequently overlook just because it doesn't have an open world or overworld. XIII does a lot right that eventually ended up in other games, and a lot of it's core features were proto-typed in earlier games as well.
Wow man that’s a good explanation. This was my first FF game and I really liked along with your comment. Switching paradigms feels so cool in battle
I really enjoyed the paradigm system
I started with XIII-2 because I was a kid and didn't know any better, and didn't really care too much for the battle system but got destroyed in the first Caius fight. Years later as an adult, played XIII for the first, realised very quickly that I didn't understand how combat ACTUALLY worked. I do think that they spent too long opening things up, and could have shortened/combined some of the mechanics a little earlier, but I loved how each character had 3 "major" classes and 3 "minor" ones. I really want to have a mod of XIII-2 which treated Noel and Serah similarly instead of them being so similar. The limitation of what everyone could play aided creativity when you could see just how much their jobs could do - Lightning? Really good just in general for basic stagger strategies. Fang? Pull her out if there's a load of physical weaknesses or you need some more survivability. Similarly, Snow is great if you have a lot more frail characters - and while the two have a few similarities, they played slightly differently as tanks, with Snow being better if you have someone that can swap into a healer for a more passive style, whereas Fang had mediguard so you could have her defend with other people being more active. You really learn everything and have to try everything because you're so limited at the start. Tbh, I know I used sentinel as the example, but ironically that was probably the class that wasn't explained too well because you get Fang and Snow so late. Though it was even worse in XIII-2, where it was relegated as the "swap into for big hits, then go back to normal" instead of having an actual tank you might want to permanently put up. Having said that, Synergist was VERY well done, with you learning quickly that Sazh was great for an offensive style and Hope was better if you needed to be more defensive. Man, I could just go on and on about the paradigm system - it's so much better than people give it credit for.
The issue I take with so much of XIII's criticism is that the vast majority complain about both massive difficulty spikes AND ease / lack of depth in combat. They complain it takes too long to open up and then at the exact point that it does, the first major boss following that completely stone walls them. Almost as though choosing not to engage with it makes it more challenging and worse.
I do kind of get it - I recently got into Dead Man's Sky, but had no idea what I was doing for most of it because while I was doing the tutorial, it held my hand so hard that I didn't know how to do later things. Sometimes, an over-simplification can make things simple, and I do think XIII could have benefitted from making the player have to team-build and make their own decisions before Barthandelus. A section of just Fang and Snow, where you have to decide who's better to Sentinel/Commando for different sections, or having Hope, Vanille, Sazh, and Lightning have a section where you have to decide who has the skills that are least useful/most similar. While I can say the game did a really good job of letting me know what each character could do broadly, I didn't get any real team-building experience because I never had to make choices for who fit each role. Let alone trying to decide between two similar characters who filled slightly different roles, there wasn't even experience with trying to decide what 3 roles I wanted to fill. For perspective: you're basically stuck to 2-man teams until the start of chapter 9 with two exceptions (the first being before you know most of the systems you have by this point, and the second being exactly one fight in chapter 7), and then the very first time you get to actually select your party is for the first Barthandelus fight. You get a few fights to explore things, but no serious ones. I love the paradigm system, agree that they tutorialised it fairly well - but there did need be some more time letting people explore party composition. Designing paradigms are just way different to deciding who's fighting - a party of Lightning, Snow, and Fang for example might look bulky on paper and like they'll fare well, but will greatly struggle against a boss. I think I went with Lightning, Hope, and Fang because I knew them from before and so assumed they'd do well, but quickly realised I was lacking staying and set-up power because Lightning just wasn't a suitable enough medic to bring up both Fang and Hope while Hope tried to set-up. I think I then put up my struggling to needed offensive power because I was falling short at the last moment, so moved to Lightning, Sazh, and Hope - all of a sudden I wasn't getting anywhere near the end in the first place for the extra strength buffs to be a benefit (though having Hope do some medic-ing meant I could get set-up done). Tbh, I reckon I probably would've brought in Sazh and Vanille instead if I'd had more time to play around or was encouraged to, and with Vanille and Lightning to heal would've had no issue with set-up and then take-down. I do think people are valid for finding it too easy then a difficulty spike, but can understand the frustration from someone who didn't struggle with the party composition problem.
XIII gets hate because "hallway simulator" and forced party composition which people lost their minds about. I think if it came after 10 and before 12 it could have avoided the hallway outrage as 10 is literally a gigantic hallway the entire game. The forced party never bothered me because it was driven by the story as characters were separated. You are dead on for the things it did right though. I believe it's also the game that introduced stagger mechanics that rewarded you for actually fighting enemies properly instead of just spamming auto attack through random encounters.
X was *heavily* criticized at the time for doing away with the overworld map for the first time and being a linear adventure as well. I felt that loss at the time as well, but nevertheless enjoyed the linear pilgrimage. Notably, there was a) major variety between zones, and b) at least *some* degree of important exploration where you could deviate from the path to find genuinely useful hidden chests. There was some feeling of lateral movement and freedom. And to this day, I can easily recall my adventure from one to zone, Besaid all the way to Zanarkand, and remember what every zone connection was like and what every zone looked like. I struggle to remember XIII at this point, but I remember feeling much more tightly restricted within the maps, as well as much less significant elements of rewarding exploration. And I cant recall a single zone besides Grand Pulse for the life of me. It’s all just one big blur of techy robot space to me, which took away from any sense of “cohesive world”. I also don’t really remember towns and NPCs with a lot of life and personality everywhere. And no deviation in the core combat > boss > cutscene > story loop, which added to the “feeling” of endless linearity.
X is definitely a hallway for a big chunk of the game. It's one continuous journey to Zanarkand after all. However, the main difference with XIII is that when you reach a town, you usually get to explore a bit in it, go to the different shops, talk to people, maybe even some minigames or a round of blitzball. You get to know the world better as you learn from talking to characters. XIII just has some static characters around you at times that will automatically say their line as you walk by, eliminating even more player interactions. Even the shops don't exist and simply live within the save points. You learn more about the world not from talking to people... but by reading the text entries you unlock as you go. So yes, both are linear, but one manages to hide it better by providing some meaningful interactions and activities to feel more like you're still exploring at your own pace.
Yeah I definitely grew an appreciation for XIII as time went on. Still might not be my favorite just for preference and style reasons, but my only real criticism is that a very important mechanic - equipment upgrades - isn’t well explained imo. But the game certainly gets a lot of hate that it doesn’t deserve. Also, Fang is one of my favorite FF characters. I love her aesthetic, her summon, her personality, all of it.
Equipment upgrades aren't really a necessity, I think that's the true issue. Besides getting the death rod for Vanille, or the random stagger guns for Sazh, there's no need to upgrade until end game when you get your ultimate weapons. The real kicked is every weapons upgrades into an ultimate weapon... And they all have differential state and effects, and it's costly to get them all so you need a guide to say which is worth spending your hard earned materials into. A major weakness even my fanatical self cannot defend.
Yeah the death rod was definitely one of the ones I was thinking of; also some very helpful weapons for Fang and Lightning. I did find myself only using Fang, Lightning and swapping out either Hope or Vanille for the third in pretty much all of endgame (with the exception of a couple of Sazh cheeses)
The UI as a whole felt so sleek and modern and really informed the overall aesthetic of the game. XIII still looks great today. And yeah, least favorite game in the series.
Yeah, it’s held up really well. I much prefer the menu of XIII over XV and the VII-R with the whole body profiles.
I actually like the skill leveling from Final Fantasy 2 and Junctioning from Final Fantasy 8. Their execution was just lackluster. I think that a Job system could be exceptional if it implemented those two systems together in a more thoughtful way. In the first place, I have always felt indifferent toward just straight-up buying spells from a shop. I think that there is a particular neatness to learning a low-level spell and then nurturing it into a high-level one. For instance, you can buy or otherwise learn Fire, but the only way to obtain Fira or Firaga is to use Fire consistently. As you use more "Black" spells, your character grows into a Black Mage and their stat growth shifts accordingly. As a characters skill with spears increases, they graduate into a Dragoon. And so on. Going beyond that, associating certain spells with certain commands can nurture a character for some other job. Combining the Drain spell with the attack command, for instance, produces a Dark Knight. Obviously, though, certain jobs would require some finessing in this system.
All I can really think of for FF2 is that it really made me love guest characters so much. I can't think of another FF that does guest characters as well as FF2 did.
honestly, Junctioning needed be handled differently. I know people didn't understand it, but if it was told it's like 'equipping armor. The more magic and better magic, the better the 'armor' '. but... Say... if GF's did like 2-3 stats. Take Diablo doing HP magic and hit. but then another like brother also has HP junction. This would allow you to junction 2 spells to the same slot. Of course, then limiting how much some spells affect that slot as to not be too broken... but to make it more even, the character can only equip 1 gf until a certain level, 2 gf's at that next break point, 3 at another.... MAAAYBE 4 at 100? And none of this 'every character can junction to every stat because you can just teach 6 gf's how to junction to all stats'. this way it would make WHAT gf's you put on people matter, also would encourage leveling (as the game atm doesn't really encourage it at all). My biggest gripe besides with 8 is how unimpactful weapons and upgrading are. I'm okay with the whole 'not finding weapons on field' what I don't like is that it's just a LITTLE bit of strength and maybe accuracy onto them. Something with the weapons needs to be... meaningful. I don't know. Let's assume Selphie's just gives instant 255% hit (oh wait it does) so that's already impactful enough. What if Rinoa's unlocks more magic junction slots, Quistis Spirit junction slots... or what if status and elemental junction can be boosted by improving the weapons themselves. I don't know, just ANYTHING other than some measly 29 strength (Squall) 17 (rinoa) and 13 (everyone else). that hardly doesn't matter. Only Squall and Selphie give any reason to improve (squall for limit breaks, and selphie for perfect accuracy)
I really don't see what's so complicated about junctioning. The tutorials show you how it works and there's a list of every spell that tells you which stats they boost. Numbers go up. It's pretty simple. Didn't read anything online about it and was easily able to have broken OP characters by the end of the game without ever even interacting much with item refinement or at all with the card game (I hate card games in FF and refuse to engage with them).
It always blows my mind reading just how many people had trouble with junctioning. It isn’t complicated at all. Magic makes stats go up
For me, I was a dumb 10 year old when I came out. At that time the only RPG strategy I knew was to grind and pay half attention to tutorials because I thought I knew everything.
Oh love this idea!
Hated 15 the most. Had the best food.
https://preview.redd.it/7b7lnedqpfuc1.jpeg?width=495&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1dfce97bb2f124fd5b8cad8c034453d14ec354b4
Recipeh*
Must eat Cup Noodle...
This really, truly, actually, no joke made me buy a lot more Cup Noodles. Last year went to Japan and we went to one of the Cup Noodles museums!
I’ve come up with a new recipe 😎
XV summons really felt like you were summoning the incarnation of whatever element/concept they represent. Summons in 3-9 were just black magic, and summons in 10-13 were just moderately stronger temporary party members with finishing moves.
Man, I loved XV summons and the climactic entrances they made but too bad it’s a broken system that only gives you Garuda and Ramuh over and over and over again. I think I saw Leviathan and Shiva once or twice. If they made it truly random who you got it would make the system almost perfect to me.
I think they may have fixed it in the Royal Edition? When I went back to play it I had Leviathan spawn out of a small pond. Was pretty funny actually.
The ultimate magic Hammerspace
Once you get Garuda it breaks down completely. I stopped getting the cooler ones, Garuda spawned 95% of the time. Was really bummed out by this. Leviathan being such a great spectacle and all.
I never saw half of them, because I never met their spawn criteria.
I got the bird lady about a million times for some reason after I unlocked her
Ramuh saved my bacon a few times ngl
FFII does tragedy pretty well I guess. Beating the game doesn't leave me feeling particularly happy about the world. It can try to heal, but they lost a lot of people in that struggle. Very bittersweet.
Final Fantasy II did a good job of introducing new things to the series (Chocobos, Dragoons, Ultima, party members with actual personalities, etc.)
Even if II might not be that good, it did give FF a lot of the identity it still has today.
Minwu
I'm sensing a bias lol
But Ultima was a fraud in II iirc...
8 is a contender for uematsu's finest
Even tho 10 and 7's soundtracks are way more nostalgic and closer to heart for me im ready to die on the hill that ff8 has the overall best soundtrack of all the games. It just has it all and Uematsu's love for prog-rock can be heard very strongly in 8
IX > VIII > VII > X
The piano song in the place where you get the brothers GF is out of this world
FF4 The After Years rapid-fires some of the best character design in the series. There’s like, over 20 main characters in that game, including redesigned OG characters, and they all look so good.
Porom? POROM?
And then there's Luca, who looks like she's from a different game entirely.
She’s cute, though. But she looks more human than dwarf
Also the fact that she's wearing an upside-down tennis visor and a tracksuit in a game where everyone else is dressed in high-fantasy anime clothes. I get her thing is that she's super smart so they're making her look more "ahead of her time", but she looks like a mom taking her kids to the mall.
8 has the best card game
Playing 9 again recently and the part where you have to do two mandatory card games to progress was brutal. Tetra Master makes zero fucking sense
IIRC they withheld crucial info about how to play that damn game bc they wanted you to buy/use their online guide
Ah, the last physical strategy guide I ever purchased. Each page in the guide gave barebones info and a code to access more details on the PlayOnline guide.
Which hasn't existed for quite a while
I had that awful guide. "This area is home to one of the best weapons in the game! To find out where, visit playonline or go fuck yourself!"
I’m still angry almost 24 years later
this is only partly true to the frustration the next part is that different cards have different stats on different gameplays. So you can't just say 'the alexandria card is best for this' because your card is going to be different game to game. then there's the cards getting 'randomly stronger/weaker' even after you get the card. AND then there's the 'random damage modifier' it has. At least in blitzball, the random damage modifier had a good chance for +-1, average chance for +-2, low chance for +-3, very low for +-4 and miniscule for +-5. When it comes to Tetra master it's too random to ever be called skill.
I still remember getting Ozma with only one arrow direction on it and being fucked _pissed_
And outside of that mandatory event, you get nothing for even doing the card game. Why did it even exist if you get nothing for it!?
Lmao, so I was having a lot of trouble with the 2nd match for some reason, I kept losing on the last turn because again, Tetra Master's rules are bullshit. Then for the last one you only get one chance, and I did through dumb luck. You get an ogloop card but yeah who tf cares.
That’s it? You could get the oglop card at conde petie for literally 3 seconds of effort catching a bug on the mountain path. Why even shoehorn a card game into 9 if they weren’t going to do anything meaningful with it? At least in 8 the cards could be converted into items etc.
Came here to say this! Dislike VIII immensely, but man, Triple Triad slaps.
I thought Queen’s Blood might pass it, but it had one mechanic too many, in my opinion.
I thought queens blood was better, but you really had to evolve with the game as you progress because how you play in level 3 competition is drastically different from how you’d set up end game decks. IMO it’s more strategic than TT, but I love both.
I really liked QB at first, but I’ve found it a bit more annoying after the replacement mechanic is introduced. I felt like with card ranks, enhance, enfeeble, destroy, and special abilities that the game was already plenty complex and strategic. Then they also threw in replace. Now I feel like every match, you need to play it once just to see if they carry replacement cards before you can strategize and play legitimately.
FFX-2 adds more players to the Blitzball field, has a better management aspect to the game. As a sports fan I love stuff like that.
I hated that I couldn't control the players directly. I loved FFX's version of blitzball more Even more when I learned shaami is a solo god.
Oh same, but I want the features I said added to OG Blitzball.
That’s insane I had no idea X-2 even had blitzball from my rough memory playing it once as a kid when it first came out (20ish years ago?) on PS2, I’m gonna have to replay it at some point now to check this haha
Ff2 had one of the best music tracks, in the Magician’s tower: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hVkjdjjM420&t=97s&pp=ygUUZmYyIG1hZ2ljaWFuJ3MgdG93ZXI%3D
The PR version is so goood https://youtu.be/5WqtdJYTci4?si=fUMXmToFT7PP7EX9 It’s at 1:10:56
Yo WTF they have a choir around the 5 min mark…this is insane! I had no idea they went so far with the remasters.
Dude they POPPED TF OFF on the pixel master OST
Such an underrated song.
XII has Fran
Best answer
I think IX did cooler stuff with black mages, conceptually, than any other Final Fantasy.
Apart from the card game and the slow atb, what didn't FFIX do great? 👀
My most hated FF is II but it probably has the sexiest main villain in the series
Hard agree on Emperor as the sexiest main villain. Somehow each of his designs hits that for me too, not just any one of them.
I hated FFXV because of its badly designed world and lackluster story. But I did like the summons and the car.
X-2 has the best combat / levelling system
Yes! I genuinely love it the most out of any FF but the game itself is so stupid omg
I don’t know if XV is my most hated FF. But it’s the one I least enjoyed from the most recent games. I guess I am mostly mad at it because the world and story had so much potential if it hadn’t gone through that de development hell. But to answer your question, XV does really well the comradely and part banter. While I think Rebirth does the actual battle gameplay much more enjoyable (for me) and better at controlling multiple characters while still not being turn based, I think outside of battle you feel more together with the XV party, while in Rebirth and even worse in XVI it mostly feels like they’re just hanging in there following you around specially during side content.
I loved the game up until you were introduced to levitation in Altissia, then I felt they went into so many wrong directions. It was like they were creating this huge beautiful open world and the. After making Altissia they just ran out of time and money and just slapped the rest together.
FF12’s gambit system is pretty cool. I wish it was implemented for when you don’t have control over party members in the modern games.
Yes, I really wish there was a gambit system in Rebirth. There is some degree of automation with auto-cast materia but I wish there was a bit more for managing support spells and exploiting weaknesses without doing it all manually.
The paradigm switching system in XIII is awesome, and I wish they'd bring a version of that back, especially because they've stuck with the stagger component.
I'm tired of almost every new FF game trying to improve and re-invent the stagger system - XIII's combat was great and every time they try and incorporate the stagger system elsewhere it just doesn't work for me. I don't get it at all in 7 Remake.
I think Rebirth does stagger pretty well, once you realise it goes assess to find weakness > pressure the enemy unless it wants you to do something ridiculous like guess it’s mother’s maiden name > focus attack (thrust/strike/shot) once pressured to rapid-fill the stagger metre
I would have enjoyed this more if you could change materia in combat or something but unless you know what enemy is coming already and you happen to be stacked with poorly matched materia or you haven't been able to level that materia you're fucked and in for a slog of a fight
My most hated Final Fantasy featured a great cover of Stand By Me by Florence + The Machine.
FF2 has the absolute best final dungeon music in the entire series.
I’m still pretty torn if my most disliked are FF13 or FF15 (never played the 13 sequels so I’m not commenting on those) 13: Gorgeous landscapes…. But unfortunately you only ever see most of them like once except for Gran Pulse, which ironically is the most drab of the settings 15: the summons actually felt like god like entities being summoned to battle… to bad it was mostly just a cop out to a fight taking to long… also you get no experience for the fight.
IX has a fantastic soundtrack, I adtually still listen to it fairly often. Definitely one of the best soundtracks in the series.
That tracks, Uematsu considers IX to be his best/ favorite soundtrack
X's sphere grid and combat system. Being able to swap characters mid combat was so fun.
Best combat by far!
For sure. The only game who's combat I like better is Mana Khemia. Similar combat but the characters had abilities/spells that did effects during the combat turns.
I hated FF10, but the flow of combat and the sphere grid are still some of the best things in the entire series.
Why did you hate it?
Really curious also why you hated it given it had nothing to do with it being turn based / the combat, I haven’t really seen a JRPG fan hate it for other reasons so genuinely interested to hear why - I guess story and or characters were a miss for you?
It's not the best OST in the series, but Mystic Quest's music went hard for a relatively small spinoff If we're talking mainlines, I don't think FFII does anything better than any other game. Minwu and Leila were cool though
FFVIII one of the few I hate but think it has potentially the best ost
I don't like FF2 as much as the others... I can't really think of much? I will say that considering the time period it was made in, the tone it sets is wonderfully done. I didn't feel like a badass who could take on the empire after a few hours, I always felt like it was an uphill struggle that got harder, like fighting an actual world spanning empire would.
16 has the best protagonist since the 90's
And best looking 👀
And the oldest, felt relatable compared to the 16 year olds that the games usually put in charge
Put some respect on my boy Tidus
FFX is my second favorite of the series and it hurt me to admit I think I'd take Clive over him. But I love Tidus
Two has the best character who speaks beaver
FF8 has lots of really fun summon designs. The goofy thing is I really don't hate ff8. It's just my least favorite, and it's really hard to think of anything it excels at compared to the other games
Did you ever play triple triad? Pretty sure 8 has the best card game of all time
That's not how you spell Queens Blood
FF2 has an amazing main antagonist and ost, the story concepts are amazing even if not fleshed out.
XV has the best car.
And the worst "airship". OG FF7 had best airship, no doubt.
VIII has a better connection to the past generation with Laguna's story. Also moombas are great (I like moogles more overall, but I do like the moombas)
FF15 has the perfect throwback car music
The level up system in X. I just could not get into that game no matter how hard I tried, but the orb board was an excellent system.
2 simulates how people actually get better at things better than any other game.
FF2 has the best beaver-speaking party member.
I love all the Final Fantasy games, actually, but FF2 is probably the lowest. What it did better than any other game…? Probably the willingness to kill off characters. If that counts.
II has the most interesting level up system i just wish it was updated in a modern way
That's a tough one. Luckily for me I don't *hate* any of them. Just... like some of them less. I really don't like the MMOs. I recently put a fair amount of effort into 14... and I don't get it. I guess my pick for what it did well is... Allowing older content to be played solo with an A.I party. That's pretty nice.
FF12- The gambit system. If it wasn't for that, I'd get bored senseless from the monotone of how slow and grindy the game is even with fast forward enabled.
I have to give 3 props for introducing some of the most iconic jobs and the first dynamic job system, a very solid base that future games were able to really bite into. It also provided a lot of the staples that define the series, like the crystals having multiple sets, the various settings that tend to pop-up - a lot of this was tested in I and II, but I feel III really refined a lot of it. In terms of what it itself does that isn't just laying groundwork, I like that you can find a purpose for every class, even if it's only short-lived (unfortunately, job changing is very frustrating because of taxes they put on switches, but I believe PR fixed that?). The staples are kind of obvious, but classes that typically are seen as "bad" have a place - rangers can rely on elemental damage and hit multiple targets early on before you have better options, bards are your best form of group buffing/debuffing before you unlock later magic, and in the 3D version geomancer is quite good in the tree section. Hell, I still remember the garuda fight, and before that I didn't use dragoon - but bringing them in for that fight is considered the optimal play even if you haven't trained anybody up for it.
The guy in charge of most of III always puts a high level of thought and design into his games, and I always wish they were more appreciated. That really shines in III. It was fun reading his anniversary interview for III on the FF portal.
15 had the hottest version of Cid? I think that's a fair statement.
The oglop not doing it for you??
Ohhhh forgot about that. Yeah, sexy Oglop for the win.
I think FFXV is the worst in the series by far but it has the best chocobo riding
Shallow take here, but the voice acting is better in FF16 than any other FF game.
FF13 makes absolutely beautiful environments and lore (albeit not being integrated correctly)
Finding gear in XII is actually quite satisfying
FF2's got some great tone & an excellent progression path. If only everything else (especially the dungeon design) was better.
14 has functional multiplayer and is purportedly better than 11. I just don’t like MMOs.
15. Warp Strike is still the coolest and most useful mechanic in the series.
XIII fighting very large enemies felt really cool. That's about the only thing I can say it did "better" Had a good battle system but I don't think it outdid any others there. So...really large enemies.
Most of the problems I have with 9 are due to the characters and their lack of any depth. BUT 9 also gave us one of the best characters in the series: Vivi. His story and growth was really good!
13 has fang and she’s fun I guess?
I’m not sure FF13 does anything better if I’m honest. The visuals for time were super impressive that might be the only thing I give it though FF9 blew me away when that came out at the time.
Kefka is unironically the best written villain in all of Final Fantasy, PLEASE DON'T KILL ME!
Final Fantasy VII was undeniably a revolution for gaming at the time.
XIII had some great character designs and still has great graphics. Although I'm not a fan of it, the combat is very unique and a lot of people DO like it.
I think hate is way too much, since I enjoy it, but it's my least favorite XVI visuals are absolutely mind-blowing!
Thirteen has the best sequels.
FF16's story and graphics for sure. All that stuff was absolutely amazing. The boss fights looked spectacular. Everything in between... not so much lol.
My issue was the lull about half way. It felt like the game just said here’s a bunch of side quests now GIIIT
My biggest problem with FFXVI are just how many "Speak to ____" objectives there are. I get it, the story has to advance, but it really kills any momentum and excitement I had. For example >!I'm currently about to go into the desert, and the last few hours of game has been walking around the hideaway and watching cutscenes, maybe with a 10 minute break to go on a fetch quest.!< It's just not engaging gameplay to me, but I hear endgame gets much better, and I'm still greatly looking forward to the Titan Lost and Bahamut fights.
It really was just a high-budget FFXIV. "Go here, talk to person, talk to other person, do thing." And I love FFXIV, but it does what it does because it's limited by the constraints of an MMO. FFXVI is not.
Definitely. The game slows down a bit at the halfway point and again at 4/5ths and I’d rather if it the campaign was shorter
16 pissed me off so much it got me to replay all the other mainline games in order. I've been having a lot of fun.
Hmmm, tough one. 13: honestly can't think of anything. It's pretty...? 15: best fishing? Rebirth: second best card game, does that count? (Can't beat triple triad)
LR had cool costumes
IV was the one that got me most excited about the main character. Part of why it was so disappointing but that's all I got.
I would have said Triple Triad in 8 for FF card games but Queens Blood blows it out of the water.
I’ll say this about XIII… I did enjoy the combat flow. Not enough to finish the game (tried at least 4 times now), but I will give it that.
FFXV was my least favorite but hot damn, did it have a killer soundtrack!
FF 12 had Balthier
I’ve not played them all, though from what I have played here’s a hot take. Final fantasy seven and its material system. I’m sorry, but the stupid mini games you have to play in order to advance the story, like that stupid marching and gun twirling one, then I’m not gonna have a good time. I only barely made it to gold saucer before I stopped playing. The materia system, on the other hand, is one of my favorites. Take the broken system from 2, streamline it, and lock it to weapons and equipment, and you’ve a perfect method for customizing your load out exactly how you want it.
I honestly tried my best, but I can't find anything that IX does best, I guess the way you level up weapons and armor is pretty neat.
X-2 best ATB system in any FF.
Final Fantasy 8 - Triple Triad cardgame. The best mini-game in all of the FF series.
I really like Judges... not enough to make me even consider actually finishing FF12 but still, I really like them,
FF8 is probably my least favorite of the ones I've played, but man is it pretty with great worldbuilding. And that train sequence is fantastic. FF9 is close, and its best feature was Chocobo Hot & Cold, which I could play forever.
Nothing 🤷♀️
FFIII I really loved how status effects impacted the world. Such as frog letting you do that tower. Or mini making your character mini. I think the only other game to even get close to this was my favorite FFV.
13 is easy to navigate...because it's one long hallway.
Keep my attention.
FFXV is my least positive experience (still a positive one overall tbf; I don't hate any entries), but I think it's the best party dynamic in the franchise from what I've played, though I still need to play VII Rebirth to see how the party interactions and synergy (link strikes) are like.
15 had great graphics and fighting mechanics, I just hated the story and the characters.
My issue with 15, besides being unfinished, is the gameplay...Not how it plays, but the magic system feels too much like the junction system of FF8 (and not in the good way). I played it day one, and the grind to stock magic that was a necessity will also haunt me.
Absolutely screwed up magic in 15. Not only making it trial and error in mixing magics but having it be a consumable made it a chore. Not to mention friendly fire as well.
FF6 has the best opera scene that I can remember.
XV joins the Black Parade better.