From everything I've read so far, this is the Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest of the next-gen series.
Then you've been reading the accounts of liars.
The game is gorgeous and challenging, but never too much so. It sure as shit is no Mystic Quest. There are many elements which are different and in a world of morons, might be "dumbing down". In reality, there's so much going on in combat that I can't see how anyone would call the game easy or suggest that it holds your hand.
If anything, the elements which have been reduced to being more "pure", like stats (which are straight up HP, Attack Power, Magic Power) do the game, and players a great favor. All those other random stats in a game (as most JRPGs are) with no roleplaying that uses any information aside from "How hard can you hit" and "How hard can they hit you" are just filler.
I haven't been able to use the weapon upgrade system yet, but it sounds pretty cool. There's some awesome little things the game doesn't tell you about, which I think someone else mentioned, where equipping certain combinations of items reveals added abilities.
How's the bestiary in this guy? Did they put as much love into it as they did into 12's? I loved the bonus lore you got after you smacked a certain number of mobs.
Between here and the GAF thread, I'm starting to get the impression that summons are by no means required for any fight, if you're playing correctly. Yay!
I can't help but laugh seeing that map posted, because I just finished the very end of that map, and it really doesn't feel like I'm just walking in a straight line at all. You're running through new areas, jumping around, climbing up and down stuff, finding small side-paths with treasure.
It's fun. Don't let some dumb map make you think the game isn't totally fucking awesome, because it is.
It's too bad this game doesn't have an Asian-English version like Demon's Souls and Hakuna Matata did. I'd import this game so damn fast. Three months is much too long a wait!
Dashui on
Xbox Live, PSN & Origin: Vacorsis 3DS: 2638-0037-166
From the article not-linked earlier, the first six hours of the game in map form:
:?
I had such high hopes, too. I mean, I knew this wasn't going to be another FFXII, much to my chagrin, but...
So...it looks like every other Final Fantasy game? They have all been very linear.
I haven't played very many Final Fantasy games, but I remember 7 and 8 being a little bit less linear than 10. Still, I would kind of like to see an FF game made in the style of Fallout 3 or Oblivion, with a more open ended environment.
If you want a non-linear SE series there's SaGa. The FF series has always been tightly focused around a strict narrative. SaGa is its opposite in the corporation. Or The Last Remnant, which is a spiritual successor to the SaGa series - but only if you play the PC remake and not the horrible 360 beta version. They rebalanced the game entirely from the ground up and made several underlying mechanics/system/character changes.
Of course, Crystal Bearers is the awesome exception.
From the article not-linked earlier, the first six hours of the game in map form:
:?
I had such high hopes, too. I mean, I knew this wasn't going to be another FFXII, much to my chagrin, but...
So...it looks like every other Final Fantasy game? They have all been very linear.
Nuh-uh. Not to this degree. Except maybe X. I acknowledge XII was an anomaly in how open the areas were, but even so. FF games are made up of periods of linear corridors interspersed with run-around-town or explore-the-area-and-proceed-when-you're-ready sections. This looks to be all the former, if we're going purely on that map and what's been said, and very very little of the latter.
I'm not necessarily saying XIII doesn't have other charms, either; it may well be great fun. But this still looks even more linear than we're used to.
Zetetic Elench on
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RentI'm always rightFuckin' deal with itRegistered Userregular
edited December 2009
Man I don't get why people bitch about the FF games being linear
Especially FF X. Okay, so you were only going on one path the entire time, yeah, okay
Except for the fact that every place you went to was fucking amazing as hell to go to and totally goddamn unique
I mean seriously, FF XII was like "ooh, go exploring! Too bad there's like, five environments, and you'll see them all repeated over and over and over again throughout the entire fucking game! Awesome!
The game is as linear as it looks. I'm not sure exactly what they were thinking by literally making the dungeons into straight lines. I hope that Square-Enix takes a page out of the Valve playbook for their next game and hires some architects to design the game world.
The other thing that really gets to me is how lifeless the world feels. Yes, setting is important, but it's also the people that inhabit a world that it come to life. FFXIII feels like a dungeon crawler. I also thought that FFXII was weak in this area as well, but FFXIII is much worse.
Games that are too obviously linear mess with immersion IMO
FFs are typically more linear than most western RPGs but not to this degree.
I'll probably wait for reviews of the full game to come out, but I'm not encouraged right now.
On the plus side, I am encouraged by what I've seen from FFXIV. Who knows when it'll be out though.
Yougottawanna on
0
PunkBoyThank you! And thank you again!Registered Userregular
edited December 2009
I for one don't mind the linearity. I find it annoying to run around without a clue where to go.
PunkBoy on
Steam ID:
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0
RentI'm always rightFuckin' deal with itRegistered Userregular
edited December 2009
Honestly I'm the other way; games that are like "WE GOTTA SAVE THE WORLD GO GO GO GO GO...but, er, let's tool around in these cities and towns for like a good 3 weeks first" are really immersion-breaking
Also, people are gloom-and-dooming this game already? Really? What was the last objectively bad main-series FF released? V? III? II? Probably not V, so either II or III
So, we've had a run of at least nine fucking games that were at least "pretty good" in quality, from a total average of public opinion perspective
Rent on
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited December 2009
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
And...goodness do I hate the word immersion and its overuse this generation.
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
Zetetic Elench on
0
RentI'm always rightFuckin' deal with itRegistered Userregular
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
And...goodness do I hate the word immersion and its overuse this generation.
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
Not really, I'm just going off how you guys use it. If you're going by plot progression, all FFs are pretty linear. Just because you can go to a side town that has no bearing on anything whatsoever before you get back to business doesn't really change that(and I doubt you guys weren't talking about areas because you're complaining about a map...which is a area).
Also about the immersion thing. I just think people use it whenever they're talking about a game mechanic they don't like. Suddenly, it's breaking immersion or what the hell ever, to the point that it doesn't really mean anything. Kind of like the internet use of emo.
So for the people playing, I have a question. What the hell does leveling up individual roles do?
As far as I can tell, it didn't unlock new abilities, and I don't *think* it made me any stronger.
Almost 10 hours in now, and yeah, it's linear as fuck...but I don't care as it's fun to play and it fits the story. The story really would not at all lend itself to stopping anywhere to dick around. It's kinda refreshing to just be going from combat to running through dungeon to upgrading to more fighting to cutscene.
I'll be interested to see if it does actually open up later on.
Vincent Grayson on
0
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
Not really, I'm just going off how you guys use it. If you're going by plot progression, all FFs are pretty linear. Just because you can go to a side town that has no bearing on anything whatsoever before you get back to business doesn't really change that(and I doubt you guys weren't talking about areas because you're complaining about a map...which is a area).
Also about the immersion thing. I just think people use it whenever they're talking about a game mechanic they don't like. Suddenly, it's breaking immersion or what the hell ever, to the point that it doesn't really mean anything. Kind of like the internet use of emo.
Honestly, if you were fine with the dungeon design in FFX, I don't see FFXIII being that much of a problem. The game being linear isn't the problem with me, the problem is that I'm literally running in a straight line from one end of the game to the other (once again, not unlike FFX). Well, the other big thing is that the world is devoid of life except for my party. That's really the much bigger let-down for me.
There's still plenty good about the game. Maybe some people like running in a straight line for 50 hours.
CygnusZ on
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited December 2009
Well. I can understand the thing about it probably being lifeless(that whole not being many towns thing does sound kind of weird...I'm hoping it is just because you guys aren't that far into the game). Even FFX which was very straightforward in its task had to stop through a number of populated places.
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
Not really, I'm just going off how you guys use it. If you're going by plot progression, all FFs are pretty linear. Just because you can go to a side town that has no bearing on anything whatsoever before you get back to business doesn't really change that(and I doubt you guys weren't talking about areas because you're complaining about a map...which is a area).
I don't care about how linear the plot is; a completely linear but spectacularly told main story is part and parcel of a modern FF, part of what makes it special, even. It's really just that running in a straight line, as Cygnus put it, is boring. Combat and levelling aside, you may as well be playing a rail shooter. Spicing the area design up with a variety of both constrained and open areas with several things to do is part of what has made FF games not-boring to play despite the railroady nature of the experience.
Zetetic Elench on
0
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
Meh. I think that whole linearity argument is stupid anyway. So, that isn't really a certain with me. I'd rather have smaller spaces with more in them, than larger spaces of nothing.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
Not really, I'm just going off how you guys use it. If you're going by plot progression, all FFs are pretty linear. Just because you can go to a side town that has no bearing on anything whatsoever before you get back to business doesn't really change that(and I doubt you guys weren't talking about areas because you're complaining about a map...which is a area).
I don't care about how linear the plot is; a completely linear but spectacularly told main story is part and parcel of a modern FF, part of what makes it special, even. It's really just that running in a straight line, as Cygnus put it, is boring. Combat and levelling aside, you may as well be playing a rail shooter. Spicing the area design up with a variety of both constrained and open areas with several things to do is part of what has made FF games not-boring to play despite the railroady nature of the experience.
Well, I fail to see how the shape of an area determines its content, is what I'm saying.
Also, people are gloom-and-dooming this game already? Really? What was the last objectively bad main-series FF released? V? III? II? Probably not V, so either II or III
IMO, XII horrid combat is a total deal breaker for rpgs for me.
TheUnsane1 on
0
DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited December 2009
Yeah. XII was pretty...not good. it still has its fans though.
XIII sounds like it stream-lined the gameplay quite a bit. It's an RPG, so it's only fair that we judge it not only for it's game portion but also for the storyline. And since I know almost nothing about it and can't see it for myself...Just going to have to wait, I guess.
I think FFXII is well above-and-beyond any other installment in the series, 6 included. I can absolutely see how it's a dealbreaker for some, but the way I see it, Gambits were such a success that Bioware took notice.
For me, that's a huge pat on the back for the series.
XIII sounds like it stream-lined the gameplay quite a bit. It's an RPG, so it's only fair that we judge it not only for it's game portion but also for the storyline. And since I know almost nothing about it and can't see it for myself...Just going to have to wait, I guess.
Both of the main writers for XIII worked on X, that's all I needed to know.
I think FFXII is well above-and-beyond any other installment in the series, 6 included. I can absolutely see how it's a dealbreaker for some, but the way I see it, Gambits were such a success that Bioware took notice.
Yeah, I loved XII, despite all its flaws. I'm a gigantic, massive fan of Matsuno & co., though.
Not very. Aside from the big events in the beginning, the last several hours have been dungeons and flashback sequences filling in details of what happened in the lead up to the game's introduction. I can tell there's a ton of stuff in the encyclopedia, but I just don't know enough Japanese to make much sense of it.
I guess a good way to put it is that the bulk of the cutscenes so far have been conversations, rather than events.
So for the people playing, I have a question. What the hell does leveling up individual roles do?
As far as I can tell, it didn't unlock new abilities, and I don't *think* it made me any stronger.
Almost 10 hours in now, and yeah, it's linear as fuck...but I don't care as it's fun to play and it fits the story. The story really would not at all lend itself to stopping anywhere to dick around. It's kinda refreshing to just be going from combat to running through dungeon to upgrading to more fighting to cutscene.
I'll be interested to see if it does actually open up later on.
As far as I can tell, leveling them up does nothing,. When the Crystarium levels up again, you'll need to go through the level up nodes to reach the next "platform" of nodes.
I'm still waiting for impressions of the over world in this game first, cuz you're essentially starting off in "Midgar" in the beginning of the game, so I can forgive the linearity there. But I agree with the complaints of linearity in Final Fantasy games. When I think Final Fantasy, I think of giant world maps where I can take my characters to explore every nooks and crannies of the game world. When I first played FFX, and finally got to look at the world map, I was quite disappointed.
Posts
I did a real basic search on 2ch to see if this was really true or not. There is at least one town, but you can't do any shopping there.
I'll play a bit more tonight, but once again, I doubt I'll have much new to report.
Then you've been reading the accounts of liars.
The game is gorgeous and challenging, but never too much so. It sure as shit is no Mystic Quest. There are many elements which are different and in a world of morons, might be "dumbing down". In reality, there's so much going on in combat that I can't see how anyone would call the game easy or suggest that it holds your hand.
If anything, the elements which have been reduced to being more "pure", like stats (which are straight up HP, Attack Power, Magic Power) do the game, and players a great favor. All those other random stats in a game (as most JRPGs are) with no roleplaying that uses any information aside from "How hard can you hit" and "How hard can they hit you" are just filler.
I haven't been able to use the weapon upgrade system yet, but it sounds pretty cool. There's some awesome little things the game doesn't tell you about, which I think someone else mentioned, where equipping certain combinations of items reveals added abilities.
Between here and the GAF thread, I'm starting to get the impression that summons are by no means required for any fight, if you're playing correctly. Yay!
I had such high hopes, too. I mean, I knew this wasn't going to be another FFXII, much to my chagrin, but...
Fuuuck... if thats the case these places better be riddled with puzzles.
I mean, to be honest the plot might dictate linearity to some degree. That is still a little disappointing.
Granted, this is still looking like a purchase to me, unless we learn anything else horrible.
It's fun. Don't let some dumb map make you think the game isn't totally fucking awesome, because it is.
So...it looks like every other Final Fantasy game? They have all been very linear.
I haven't played very many Final Fantasy games, but I remember 7 and 8 being a little bit less linear than 10. Still, I would kind of like to see an FF game made in the style of Fallout 3 or Oblivion, with a more open ended environment.
Of course, Crystal Bearers is the awesome exception.
// Switch: SW-5306-0651-6424 //
Nuh-uh. Not to this degree. Except maybe X. I acknowledge XII was an anomaly in how open the areas were, but even so. FF games are made up of periods of linear corridors interspersed with run-around-town or explore-the-area-and-proceed-when-you're-ready sections. This looks to be all the former, if we're going purely on that map and what's been said, and very very little of the latter.
I'm not necessarily saying XIII doesn't have other charms, either; it may well be great fun. But this still looks even more linear than we're used to.
Especially FF X. Okay, so you were only going on one path the entire time, yeah, okay
Except for the fact that every place you went to was fucking amazing as hell to go to and totally goddamn unique
I mean seriously, FF XII was like "ooh, go exploring! Too bad there's like, five environments, and you'll see them all repeated over and over and over again throughout the entire fucking game! Awesome!
Edit: FUCK YES I AM UNJAILED
The game is as linear as it looks. I'm not sure exactly what they were thinking by literally making the dungeons into straight lines. I hope that Square-Enix takes a page out of the Valve playbook for their next game and hires some architects to design the game world.
The other thing that really gets to me is how lifeless the world feels. Yes, setting is important, but it's also the people that inhabit a world that it come to life. FFXIII feels like a dungeon crawler. I also thought that FFXII was weak in this area as well, but FFXIII is much worse.
FFs are typically more linear than most western RPGs but not to this degree.
I'll probably wait for reviews of the full game to come out, but I'm not encouraged right now.
On the plus side, I am encouraged by what I've seen from FFXIV. Who knows when it'll be out though.
Also, people are gloom-and-dooming this game already? Really? What was the last objectively bad main-series FF released? V? III? II? Probably not V, so either II or III
So, we've had a run of at least nine fucking games that were at least "pretty good" in quality, from a total average of public opinion perspective
And...goodness do I hate the word immersion and its overuse this generation.
That's a pretty false dichotomy you got there.
Even besides which, size of area =/= linearity.
I immersed your Mom
With my dick
You know, you just got out of jail. Like an hour ago.
Not really, I'm just going off how you guys use it. If you're going by plot progression, all FFs are pretty linear. Just because you can go to a side town that has no bearing on anything whatsoever before you get back to business doesn't really change that(and I doubt you guys weren't talking about areas because you're complaining about a map...which is a area).
Also about the immersion thing. I just think people use it whenever they're talking about a game mechanic they don't like. Suddenly, it's breaking immersion or what the hell ever, to the point that it doesn't really mean anything. Kind of like the internet use of emo.
As far as I can tell, it didn't unlock new abilities, and I don't *think* it made me any stronger.
Almost 10 hours in now, and yeah, it's linear as fuck...but I don't care as it's fun to play and it fits the story. The story really would not at all lend itself to stopping anywhere to dick around. It's kinda refreshing to just be going from combat to running through dungeon to upgrading to more fighting to cutscene.
I'll be interested to see if it does actually open up later on.
Honestly, if you were fine with the dungeon design in FFX, I don't see FFXIII being that much of a problem. The game being linear isn't the problem with me, the problem is that I'm literally running in a straight line from one end of the game to the other (once again, not unlike FFX). Well, the other big thing is that the world is devoid of life except for my party. That's really the much bigger let-down for me.
There's still plenty good about the game. Maybe some people like running in a straight line for 50 hours.
I don't care about how linear the plot is; a completely linear but spectacularly told main story is part and parcel of a modern FF, part of what makes it special, even. It's really just that running in a straight line, as Cygnus put it, is boring. Combat and levelling aside, you may as well be playing a rail shooter. Spicing the area design up with a variety of both constrained and open areas with several things to do is part of what has made FF games not-boring to play despite the railroady nature of the experience.
Well, I fail to see how the shape of an area determines its content, is what I'm saying.
IMO, XII horrid combat is a total deal breaker for rpgs for me.
For me, that's a huge pat on the back for the series.
Both of the main writers for XIII worked on X, that's all I needed to know.
Yeah, I loved XII, despite all its flaws. I'm a gigantic, massive fan of Matsuno & co., though.
Not very. Aside from the big events in the beginning, the last several hours have been dungeons and flashback sequences filling in details of what happened in the lead up to the game's introduction. I can tell there's a ton of stuff in the encyclopedia, but I just don't know enough Japanese to make much sense of it.
I guess a good way to put it is that the bulk of the cutscenes so far have been conversations, rather than events.
As far as I can tell, leveling them up does nothing,. When the Crystarium levels up again, you'll need to go through the level up nodes to reach the next "platform" of nodes.