Topic: Final fantasy discussion thread

@Voltan @belmont they indeed abused on the number of minigames and difficulty of some of them.. and also specially the brutal and legendary challenges.. got the plat last week after 200+ hours
I got though the last brutal and legendaries with some help of guides online.. they should have added one checkpoint at least, specially on the ones with 10 rounds.. it's a joke, way too much
that chocobo glide rank 3 minigame in cosmo canyon is also another joke..
Good luck!

I have beat the Brutal Challenges!
Now Legendary Bouts await lol

@Fatewalker I thought the glide wasn't too hard but there's a trick to getting the last one (you have to turn back to gain more altitude at one point)

@Voltan Yes, l've came across with that work around after wasting so much time trying to do it normally. It seems devs didn't test it out or simply a bad design, it doesn't make any sense having to go back, ppl like had to really find some ninja stuff to be able to complete it..
Good luck on the legendary bouts

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is actually a pretty short game if you skip all the optional stuff

Playing all the chapters in hard mode now, for the last couple trophies.
I've done all quests and challenges beforehand so now especially the open world chapters are quite funny, since you can basically go straight to the boss fight and that's it
Played for a few hours and I'm at the end of chapter 7.

After suffering severe body and mental torture where I was Zantetsuken-ed or Omnislash-ed to oblivion countless times and after about 300 hours I have the platinum trophy in Rebirth. I can finally rest and return to my normal day to day activities.

Still, I miss some trophies in the main entries of FF. Back in PS3 I don't have everything in FF13 and 13-3. In PS4/5 I miss some from the FF15 DLC, the Yuffie DLC and the whole 10 HD collection.

I really loved the line "I can finally rest and return to my normal day to day activities."

I’ll be starting Final Fantasy XIII tomorrow and am pretty excited to play it having enjoyed XV, VII Remake and XVI these last few years. I do have a slight concern though… obviously the FF’s I’ve played have real-time action combat, while XIII (& pretty much all the others afaik) are turn-based, something that I’ve historically struggled to connect with.

If anyone has any advice/tips… or any information at all really, it would be appreciated.

Prepare for a lot of jargon to be thrown at you @colonelkilgore. I think it even has a glossary if I remember correctly... Which often tells you of events the game doesn't outright tell you about? I dunno it's been a while.

It may be turn based but XIII's battle system is incredibly quick. Maybe a bit too much given the auto battle option is the first thing you cursor hovers over once you start a fight.

This is also where stagger system originally comes from I believe and... You'll be making a lot of use out of that.

Not much I can really think of... Just good luck I guess!

@HallowMoonshadow okay cool, well I’m familiar with the stagger system at least 😅.

So mucho exposition-reading… not my favourite thing to do while gaming but from my brief dalliance in the FF universe (or multiverse?) I do like to fully immerse myself in the world and lore, so I think I’ll be getting my reading specs out for this one 🤓.

Really hoping this is the first turn-based rpg I see through to the end… let alone the platinum!

@CthulhuFhtagn I have no doubt that I’ll like the characters snd story well enough but… as a general rule (but not exclusively) the actual moment-to-moment gameplay (competing against an adversary… vis-a-vis - succeeding in a combative scenario) is something I weigh heavily in the overall tomatometer.

It’s why I’ve been at pains to abandon Divinity: Original Sin 2 and Persona 5 even though I’m well aware I’m missing out on something special by doing so. I just… for what ever reason find turn based combat an enigma (in both terms of enjoyment and a lesser extent understanding). Without wanting to offend aficianados… it’s always just seemed some unnecessary game of chance when action-combat feels like taking the bull by the horns and every decision being rewarded/punished in real-time and without any element of doubt (dependent on hit-boxes etc 😉).

Look, the last thing I wanna be is a turn-based combat antagonist… I actually want to get into the genre/sub-genre. There are a multitude of turn-based games in my backlog that I’m eager to enjoy… I’m just hoping that I will find that one game that will click with me. Then I can embrace a whole sub-genre I’ve been waiting to gorge myself on.

Yeah I didn't wanna colour your expectations @colonelkilgore any more then you've probably already heard about XIII hence why I just stuck to a few key points.

I will say this though... I think the overall plot of XIII is interesting, and it has a neat premise on paper.

To be honest I haven't actually played many FF's, only a few more then you and I actually never really liked J/RPG's myself beyond getting addicted to Pokémon as a teen when it first released.

It was actually Final Fantasy X-2 that made me like the genre (which at the time was the most reviled FF) and Japanese media as a whole really (Well that and Persona 3 but that's a different story).

I only bought it at the time because it was dirt cheap from Argos and thought I might as well try one.

I was not prepared for how corny and cheesey it was and how it didn't take itself too seriously (which I always assumed they were, especially seeing all those FF VII adverts with Cloud on the motorbike back in the day).

So... Yeah. I do genuinely hope you end up liking the genre even through XIII. I'll be able to relate in some way even if both X-2 and XIII have had more balanced views nowadays.

@HallowMoonshadow I’m gonna try and play a Final Fantasy game each year moving forward and X (part 1 anyway) might well be the one I play after XIII.

Thoughts on XIII so far… that opening CGI movie was frikkin’ beautiful 🤩!

@CthulhuFhtagn not yet mate, it is something I’ll get to before the end of the year but I’ve just made a start on FFXIII this morning, so that will take up my gaming time for a while.

In regards to playing what you enjoy, of course that’s what gamings about… but I just feel that I’m missing something with turn-based JRPG’s… something that if I persist with, that I’ll eventually click with and really enjoy. ATM I feel like I’m missing a portion of gaming that I like in all aspects apart from the combat. I love the visuals and OST’s… from what I know of the narratives they are also up my street. It’s just the combat that I’m missing something with. I mean take my morning with XIII… now given it is still extremely early so things will undoubtedly change and evolve but so far, every time I get into a combat scenario I just hit X until the enemy (or enemies) die. It just feels very uninvolved.

So probably got around 6/7 hours done on FFXIII today and overall quite enjoyed my first session. While the turn-based combat still feels a little uninvolved, the introduction of paradigm shifts, techniques and the like has given it a bit more oomph. I’m really liking what I’ve heard of the OST so far and the game still looks pretty good considering its age.

I’m interested in the narrative if a little unclear on what exactly is going on… but the vague understanding of rebellious group going all David on the Empires’ Goliath ass is enough to hold my attention rn. Overall, I’m finding it a real chilled out experience, which is a nice change of pace following Dead Space impossible run and Alpha Protocol’s overly complex trophy list.

@colonelkilgore I’m glad to see FF13 is keeping you engaged so far.

I liked the game back in the day. I do remember the battle system being a bit simplistic and ‘mash X to win’ type of situation. The big complaint at the time was the excessive linearity of the game, and I think that time has been kind to the game in that regard since a lot of people have open-world fatigue nowadays with all these huge long games (as was manifest by the latest FF game, Rebirth). But back then openness of game flow was all the rage and so the sequel XIII-2 changed the format to be more open and it was okay, but just never really won me over and I never finished it. It’s one of my gaming regrets, because I hear XIII-3 was quite good, but of course I never got to it because I never finished #2. I’ve been holding out for the eventual remastered trilogy with all three games.

@Th3solution yeah I think the furore over its linearity has actually helped set my expectations with FFXIII. I’ve gone in knowing that I’ll be running corridors for the first 2/3’s of the game so haven’t felt aggrieved by that. I do however think I would’ve felt disappointed by it if I didn’t already know tbh.

I do have FFXIII-2 and Lightning Returns but am not planning on playing those. I say not-planning, there is always the possibility that FFXIII hits so hard for me that I simply have to play them… but I doubt it.

Still, I’ve woke up this morning, keen to start my next session which is always a good sign. As I said in an earlier post, there’s something very chilled about the game… which is not always something that I’m looking for. That chilled-out experience is working for me rn though, so I guess I got lucky with when I’ve started it.

@colonelkilgore yeah agree with everything said here. In a lot of games, it’s the preconceived notions that ironically help you form a nicer perspective. I was actually able to focus more on the combat system and treasure exploration which I both liked. I also happen to just enjoy the story in general, in spite of its occasional silliness be that as may be.

@Yousef- yeah I actually feel like I’m starting to click with the combat now. I think it helps that although it isn’t action combat, it isn’t really turn-based either as it’s real time. It’s like a fusion of the two I suppose.

Had my first difficulty spike this morning where I had to fight the Odin Eidolon. I honestly had no idea quite what I was supposed to do for the first few attempts but finally beat him on the sixth or seventh attempt.

@colonelkilgore it’s also got a baby easy plat! Only missable trophy is the treasures.

@Yousef- Well… I would never call a 6.6/10 difficulty and 75-100 hours plat (according to PlayStation trophies… PSN Profiles say it’s 5/10 and 80 hours), a baby easy plat but I get where you’re coming from in regards to missables etc. 😉

@colonelkilgore ah crap then, I may have mixed it up with the Xbox one! I recall that one was a 3/10. Apologies friend!
Edit: double error! The Xbox one is rated 7/10! I’m really losing it today…