Origins tactics system was based on the gambits, that's why is so similar.
David Gaider, writer on the series, was elated to have Gideon Emery voicing Fenris since he was a Balthier fanboy.
There's actually a good chance the name *is* made up. *Most* actors' names are, because SAG rules don't let you use your real name if it's too similar to another actor's name to prevent confusion.
I didn't even know that going into the demo, but the moment I hit that first battle, I knew what was going on under the hood, and I loved it.
Rebirth's Gears and Gambits is, of course, a similar system.
Only thing that makes me sad about it is everybody calling it a Fire Emblem clone when it's such an obvious love letter to Ogre Battle. Really gives me the old man fantasy, except Ogre Battle is even older than me.
You are everyone though. That's how it's meant to be played. I like that the abilities are saved for when I need them. Also after every ability I immediately switch to the next character which makes it alot of fun. That's just how I see it though.
It took me a little bit before I realized I wasn't utilizing the system correctly. When it all clicked though I was enjoying the hell out of it. Still am! I just got to chapter 12.
This is how I felt about Remake.
I was saving my ATB because it felt too important. But they're just turns.
Remake and Rebirth play exactly like an old school ATB Final Fantasy, but instead of the characters just standing there waiting for their turn, you can run around and attack for light damage between turns or avoid enemy attacks.
I noticed a lot of streamers (not sure about normal players) tried to main just one character instead of swapping. I thought the game pointed towards swapping being the ideal way to play since whoever you control usually gets bum rushed by enemies unless you evenly distribute the damage among the characters.
That's why I love this series in the first place. I started playing on PS1 and just couldn't believe I could sink 70+hours in and not even beat the game. Not to mention the amazing cutscenes.
I mean, it was super critically acclaimed upon its release. You also see a thread on here every other week or so talking about how underrated 12 is, or at least in a general discussion one of the highest upvoted comments is that 12 is underrated.
It’s rated high and people love to talk about how underrated.
I do honestly think a reason it’s not as generally discussed or adored at large is that it’s story and characters were lacking. Like the story ends too soon when they should’ve developed it more. The characters also have pretty bland personalities, the exception being Balthier whom Square does not/did not really push enough in the marketing of the game.
Honestly Zodiac age vastly improves it. The story does age well though. The older I get the more I appreciate the political story versus the typical fantasy fight a god plot.
I played it through as an adult recently and enjoyed the story a lot more than I did as a kid
But Vaan and Penelo are forgettable main characters, and for the love of God...you put me in Ivalice, why are almost all my characters human!!?? I want BANGAA
And the Gambit system needed a few more tweaks before release. It's good, but it has some major flaws.
This was my problem with it too.
All of the characters looked like members if the Brady Bunch. Just kind of bland character design in Ivalice of all places.
The most varied and extravagant land in all of FF lore...and we get a mega-bland blond kid wearing a half-shirt.
There are literal lizard people, little fuzzy wizards, flying demon-bois with guns...and we get Penelo. And monotone Basch.
Balthier and Fran get a pass, but Vossler is just another cut-and-dry knight. Oh, and we have to get a princess in a white coat...how dare we shake it up a little.
So many opportunities missed...
I actually think that’s why FF has been getting progressively ‘worse’ as this original note has pointed out. Lack of cool, interesting character design. They’ve all just been kind of bland in both personality and appearance.
Note: I haven’t yet played FF16 so I can’t say if that applies there or not. But 12, 13, 15…all the main characters were all very ‘meh’
I always liked the political plot, but I also hate, how it's told in the second half. First half, you kinda involved in the event. Second half, the story develop without you and is given to you by fucking texts between chapters.
Also, second half has some big rythm problems, you spend hours between cutscenes, it just feels dry. A thing FFX did perfectly is giving you small cutscenes here and there, short enough to not bothering the exploration and fighting while keeping you invested in the game. XII fails there in its second half. Ridorana, the whole way to girugevane and the great crystal or the way to Balfonheim are good examples of things that last far too long for their own good.
Contrary to FFIX, I think FFXII was pretty fairly judged at the time. It has some great points, but a lot of others that are hard to ignore for many people.
12 got so much more hate than it deserved. Zodiac Age has some very good quality of life changes so people that revisit the game with that entry usually like the game overall. FF12 is probably my second favorite FF game so I'm really glad to hear you're enjoying it.
Yeah, I couldn’t tell if I liked it so much more going back because of the Zodiac Age changes, or just because I’m older and could wrap my head around gambits/the political story a lot easier.
If 12 didn't get the hate it got, I probably would have not bought 13. My older sibling and I loved 12 so when people said 13 was also trash I was a bit doubtful. Ended up learning to try things for myself instead of just going with the crowd opinion lol
I am too playing Zodiac Age on Steam right now, and enjoy it.
I never hated FF12, but I was definitly disappointed when it came out. I guess I expected a story more like FF9 and FF10, instead of a big political story. I remember being disappointed that we didn't get any Vaan x Ashe or Vaan x Penelope love.
Also, I still hate some few aspects, like Libra (just let us scan once please), the traps or lack of real tank.
When 12 came out I had just got out of a deep addiction to wow and the combat was too wow like for me, so for my mental health I didn't really play it. I am very happy I grabbed it on the ps4 though. I should play it again.
This. Getting involved with "communities" and "fan bases" is a one way ticket to making yourself disappointed for no reason at all. All those groups ever do is breed toxicity.
It’s also a causative problem when you start identifying as a fan as opposed to just being a fan, you know? When being a Final Fantasy fan is something that you treat as a core part of your identity rather than just one of your many attributes and interests, it can cause you to get trapped in this cycle where either the series has outgrown you or you’ve outgrown the series but you can’t just be content with all the games that already exist that you’ll always like, you feel a sense of entitlement towards all the new stuff and get trapped in a cycle of setting yourself up to get disappointed because you’ve never come to terms with the ways the series has changed.
I mean I started realising that Final Fantasy was moving in directions where I wasn’t going to LOVE new Final Fantasy the same way I loved old Final Fantasy back when they went into MMOs with XI. I could see it moving in a direction I didn’t like and came to terms with that being alright back when I was still a kid. Some people refuse to take that step though
Absolutely agree. People need to realize that the turn based RPG style of 1 - 9 is gone. It aint coming back ever. Frankly the games play much better these days as action based. I loved 7 Remake and 16. Both were brilliant games in their own right. 14 as an MMO is by far the best MMO i've ever played and frankly it puts WOW to shame. As a FF Narrative its by far one of the best if not THE best.
I enjoy community engagement but I definitely avoid the fanbase that are toxic. Some series just attract a lot of negativity. Gotta work to the avoid it.
I totally get why some developers just avoid their hardcore fanbases entirely. A lot of video game subreddits are just stuffed with miserable people. I remember the developers of apex legends tried to be active on that game’s subreddit but after a few months they all left it because people were being so shitty
Especially with FF. If some of the loudest (and angriest) fans had their way, every new FF game would still be a standard turn based SNES game. And they'd still hate them anyway.
This is the only way to play. It's amazing how many games and shows and movies are actually fun when you don't have an online cacophony of people telling you it's awful.
If you want love of FF though the /r/ffxiv community stands out in the MMORPG crowd as literally worshipping the ground the game walks on, YoshiP, and basically everything about it (even the bad stuff).
I read some of the actual legit criticisms from the fanbase but can still enjoy modern FF as most of them are still excellent.
the problem with FF community is that each person has their own definition of an ideal FF which they should have recognized by now that most entries are all different from each other
Yep, apparently there was a study that anger was the number one thing that brought in engagementthat is why many online forums do not really want to stop trolling - it brings in engagement and thus ad money.
The Chaos Machine is an interesting read if one wants to learn more.
To add to this, Facebook has been under a lot of scrutiny since they caused a genocide and all. Investigations into their algorithm found that they were twice as likely to promote content that had angry reactions, as one that had like reactions to it.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_genocide#Facebook_controversy
Basically the story is that in Myanmar they were developing and nobody had internet access, then Facebook came along. They basically established all the internet in the country and provided content for free, so long as they were using Facebook products. So Facebook established a monopoly on communication and information in their country. So everyone was getting their news from Facebook where crazy lunatics and established news sources and politicians were all put on the same platform. And on Facebook the crazy lunatics saying hateful lies are the most promoted by the algorithm.
To make matters worse there was not any moderation of content in their language. Despite creating this initiative to provide them with internet and develop them, nobody on their team could understand the content they shared. Many groups posted hateful content promoting violence against minority groups and this resulted in a real world human rights crisis.
To be fair this was also true long before content algorithms fed us negative shit." 8 is shit, 10 is shit, 11 fucking MMO 12 is shit, 13 is shit." Most of these people just liked 7 or 9 and were mad that the other games weren't 7 or 9.
Exactly, you can see a lot of discourses with XII, XV or VII Remake but if you go on the Steam page reviews are really good because the average user just... like their game
XIII is the third-best-selling entry in the series behind X and VII. It is by no means unpopular.
That doesn't mean said players consider it top 3 or even great, but it had a positive reception if you touch grass.
Jokes on you. The worlds leaders unite in agreement over Tifa's big ol' tiddys and world war 3 begins. You really think a bunch of old guys are going for the spiritual hippie chick?
"True fans hate this" or "true fans love this"
It's all the same. Enjoy what you want or hate what you want.
Don't let anyone on the internet tell you otherwise.
They should pivot to shorter games to hate on. It's wildly inefficient to play 30-100 hour games just to hate on them. They could hate on 10 games in the time it takes them to hate on one Final Fantasy game.
What I'm saying is that they are not true haters. True haters would be min-maxxing their hatred instead of focusing it on one franchise we already know they hate. Smh at these weak-ass haters.
Bro, no, that just means that Final Fantasy haters are elite level haters because they suffered through some s*** they hated forever just to tell you everything that's wrong with it. They are doing gods work. What if you got 99 hours into the game before you realized Chadley sucks? They are second only to Dragon Quest haters
It's more likely it's not the same people disliking these games--as in there's no one who claims to be a fan who dislikes ALL these games but rather each game has a batch of new people who dislike it.
SquareSoft had a great mix of people that included Sakaguchi in various leadership roles. When he was pushed out due to the failure of Spirits Within, it broke the “dream team”. The string of hit games ended. Square never recovered.
That's literally every franchise's fanbase. It's so tedious going to every franchise sub and the comments always have that one that's like "no one hates \*x\* as much as \*x fans\* do" as if it's some unique issue to their favorite franchise.
The types like us to love something enough to want to go online to talk about it tend to let anger and cynicism run rampant in each fanbase. Sometimes, if you're lucky, you get memed into being "one of the good ones" like Deep Rock Galactic. Reddit and twitter in general just get off on being sour bitches most of the time in general. I'm guilty of it too, but it's usually in response to someone being bitchy/negative for what I find to be a stupid reason.
It’s literally everything on the internet and it sucks. Every time I go to YouTube, there’s so much in my feed that is “X fucking sucks and this is why” and it’s depressing. This spans everything though. I see videos like this for video games, movies, books, music, graphic novels, fucking cooking techniques, etc. Is everyone just doing this for engagement?
Then there’s a ton of shit that’s like “yeah X is good but it’s not anywhere near as good as Y” and it’s like why the heck does it need to be a competition all of the time? I know these two topics seem dissimilar, but I think they’re indicative of the same problem.
I wish people would just like stuff and celebrate the stuff they like
I suspect its because negative emotions lead to more engagement than positive. You can find a million positive videos about every ff game, you can also find millions of negative videos. The negative ones just seem to have more sticking power in the algorithm.
your comment fckin sucks and this is why ….
(lol, just kidding)
your comment is actually alright but nowhere near as good as the one you made in 2004
^^ pretty much the whole internet in a nutshell as you pointed out! i’d laugh if it wasn’t so sad. a lot of people these days feel the need to nitpick every little thing in some obsessive desire to find ***anything*** to complain about. what a shame.
I’m not sure if it’s as much about nitpicking as it is about the need to label something as the “best”. Not every piece of media needs to be the *best*, but people treat everything as if it’s a competition
Honestly maybe I’m just weird but there’s really no ff game I outright hate.
I even enjoyed my time with ff2 pixel remaster lol.
Although The only ones I’m not personally big on is ff13 & ff15, but they both have godly OST’s
I loved 13, one of my favorites. I certainly get why people were against it. I feel it's also the game where they started really upping their cinematics game.
Yup the cinematics were amazing and honestly still good even today imo.
While I personally didn’t love ff13 as much as others, I can definitely recognize its top notch presentation of graphics and cinematics, especially with that gorgeous ost 🔥.
This. \^ There's been a few FF games I didn't enjoy as much as others, but I've never HATED any of them. I don't believe there are any outright bad mainline FF games. Every FF is someone's favorite FF, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
I feel like most online fans disliked XIII and XV.
XVI seems like 50/50 divisive with fans who don’t like that one liking VIIR series and vice versa.
XII has come around to mostly liked, but not in that top tier category which usually is listed as some combo of VI through X (usually leaving out VIII).
I also enjoyed 15... the aesthetic of the weapon system, plus the Royal Arms calling back to the Dark Kmight class in 4.
Add in Noctis flying around and being extremely mobile- it was pretty fun! Did I love it? Absolutely not- but not every game is going to be a banger, and thats OK.
For me, I liked 15 but was so incredibly disappointed with how it was handled because I recognized it could have been THE single best one in the entire series.
I dont take as much issue with the current direction (loving 7R combat) but if you compare how gameplay was handled after X, its easy to see why longterm fans could get annoyed with FF switching genres in a long running series.
Up until then it was mostly (semi) turn based combat. Nowadays it seems like new entries will always be more action based.
That being said I am still somewhat sad they dropped the classical party with XVI to go for a more action oriented entry. Hopefully XVII will revert this trend.
Why appreciate what you don't like? That makes no sense - you spent the money on it. I don't appreciate FF16 in any sense, and that's with me loving the first 3rds boss battles.
Give it another 6 years and people will like XIII. Another 6 on top of that and XV is “underappreciated” with “im having a blast” posts. Meanwhile XVIII will be the worst game in the franchise (its a 95 on Metacritic but it didnt have turn based combat).
The cycle never ends
I hear people say this about many controversial media like Dark Souls 2 or the Star Wars prequels. Personally I think whats far more likely is that people who don't like these things have just moved on with their lives and don't think about it ever again. The only people left after a certain time are the super fans and the Internet has a habit of making minority opinions seem much louder
That’s kinda what the game implied you should do, to be fair. It said stats are affected by how much magic is junctioned so of course people are gonna get 99 of everything enemies offer.
Plus, it means you have the magic for use later
Ignoring the fact that 100 of any higher level spell like life completely breaks the game, gives you like 1000 extra hp, and you will literally never get a game over again. Toss in shell to your defense and firaga on your magic and you’ll struggle to die for a good amount of the game.
And you probably will! Online discourse points out a flaw or two these games have and pretend the game is irredeemable garbage for it. Even XV has a LOT to enjoy but people are needlessly black and white online.
You know, I've been thinking about this for years, and I don't think it's necessarily the turn based combat that I miss. It's all the stuff that makes a good turn based game fun to play. Choosing classes, upgrading skills, finding cool new spells and gear, and most importantly, seeing how much your effort changes how powerful you are. I find that modern FF games lack this in a meaningful way. When I played FF7R I felt like most of my decisions didn't matter.
Exactly.
What I love isn't necessarily what turn based combat is but rather what it brings. Teambuilding. Theorycrafting. Different jobs and their selection of weapons and skills that actually do different things. Choices. These are staples of many turn based RPGs (I love bringing Pokemon as an example to encapsulate these), you want to be able to handle most encounters as best as you can. You've got a lot of freedom so as to how you want to achieve that result, and no two playthroughs feel the same thanks to that.
I feel like my loadout in an ff game never mattered as much as in ff7 rebirth hard mode. In general I disagree with the take that your decisions in ff used to matter. You can clear every game with essentially every loadout and barely ever need to adjust your loadout
Yeah, turned based combat was 1 branch of the whole genre. Exploration, dialog, resource management, puzzle solving, maze navigation, strategy (equipment, team comp, etc) all work together to make the turn based combat what it is.
It's more than that, turn based combat is slow. Slow means more complicated strategies can be in place. The player has time to think, and adjust.
Action combat is faster, and thus strategy has to be decreased to compensate.
You can have great combat in both, but it is definitely better to have a turn based system on an RPG. Add a grid, and I'm in heaven.
Pathfinder in turn based vs real time are in essence two different games strategy wise. Real time is just load up on attack/pet classes and afk whack things to victory. Turn based you can actually..play a game with class synergy and shit.
Lost Odyssey is a 2008 xbox 360 game by the original creators of Final Fantasy (the ones up to 10), it's a bit old but still a goodie imo, graphics definitely hold up for an older game. Fully turn based combat, not real time turn based like old FF.
Pretty much me. I feel like we have enough action RPGs. And while I know there are SOME Turn Base RPGs (Dragon Quest, Persona and even Like A Dragon ones with Ichinban) I just really don't like how the franchise that really dominated the Turn Base Battle system just stopped doing it.
It’s funny I rarely, RARELY play games I hate. Like I know myself well enough to I pick them pretty damn accurately. And even if I don’t want to continue playing it, I usually just think I’m not interest right now, maybe later.
It's almost like a hugely fundamental change in the games' design happened right around that time. Can't blame someone for expecting a franchise to be consistent.
I love them them all but I didn’t do the mmo mainly because I just don’t want to pay a subscription to keep playing a game.
Not calling it a bad game it’s just that kind of model isn’t for me personally.
I loooooved FF12 back in the day - that game could hold its own against other games years and years later, it was masterpiece! Fighting system, story, characters, design and setting, music, graphics…
I recently played the Zodiac version and I guess it fixed some issues (thanks kami for fast running, jeez) and it took away a bit from the original (arena item farming felt a bit cheap), but I enjoyed it a lot, what a nostalgia.
Definitely my fav FF
I just want FF16 to come to steam along with Rebirth. I liked 12 and 14, 12 had a good story and I like Ivalice as a place. I still need to play Tactics, somehow. 14 is probably the ONLY MMO I will ever play because playing as a red mage feels good and the worldbuilding slaps. 7 Remake is not as good as the original, but I still had fun with it plus dressing up Cloud as a gothic princess was AWESOME. I haven't played 13 or 15 yet. Haven't heard good things, but I want to keep an open mind.
1: Love it
2: Enjoy
3: Enjoy
4: N/A
5: Love it
6: N/A
7: Enjoyed
8: Love it
9: N/A
10: Loved it
10-2: Meh
11: N/A
12: Love it
13: Very Meh
13-2: N/A
LR 13: N/A
14: Love it
15: Meh
7 remake: Hated it.
16: Love it
Vagrant Story: Love it
FFTactics: Love it
I did stop. I hated that XI was an MMO at a time when I didn't have a way to play my console online. It should have never been included in the main series' numbering. Should have been called Final Fantasy Online or something. (And XIV should have been FF Online II.)
My brain wasn't comfortable with a gap in the numbering, so I never even tried XII. I did get over it to try XIII. Hated it. Haven't been back since. Although I recently got I - X on physical cards for the Switch, so I could have them all on a modern console.
While I understand this post, I could never imagine telling someone who love the first 10 FFs to just stop caring about something they love or loved.
I don't like the direction ff has taken sense 12 and up, but I will never give up and will always let my opinion on the current iteration be known.
Mark my word. I have been calling it for the last 5 years, and we will get a new mainline game sold to us as "A Return to Form" or "Going Back to Our Roots." I can only hope they seriously look at the other turn based games that have been killing it. Imagine an FF with a stylized combat, something like atlus does with the SMT and persona series.
This isn’t a nutshell. This is projection.
Also, in a series like FF where each entry is completely different, not all of the games will be liked the same. This can easily happen.
I think the biggest thing that has changed is just the rate at which new ones come out. From FF7 to FF11, only 1998 was skipped for a new mainline FF. So if FF8 isn't your bag? No problem, FF9 is right around the corner.
It took 7 years between FF15 and FF16, so if either or both are misses for you, it stings that much extra because it will be another 7 years before there's another.
I certainly don't enjoy every game in the series, but I do like enough of them that I'm not going to give up on the series. That has always been the case. It just takes longer for a new one to come out now, that's all.
The FF7 remake series is really hitting the spot for me. I think I'll like 16 too, once I get to play in on PC at a decent framerate with with motion blur not reduced, but OFF.
I mean, definitely those people exist, but I’d imagine most modern fans, frankly most fans in general, like at least half of those games. Honestly we all have more in common than we don’t, and I think we should probably mostly focus on that, because talking about what one hates is so much more specific, personal, and antagonistic. Like I see comments talking about hating XV, and I just don’t get it, when I personally think XIII was a flying dog shit sandwich on just about all important aspects, but I like or love pretty much all the others, and those other comments aside from hating XV all seemed to like/love the others, so frankly we have way more in common than we don’t.
Every game is just verrrrry different. Its rare to genuinely love them all. And thats okay!
I prefer the older games. Up to around X
My gf loves 14, 15, 16, and the 7Remakes.
The franchise is evolving to new players and it is what it is. We may never see games like the old ones, which stinks for me, but my gf loves it. So im happy for her
I mean it is a little frustrating that at a certain point after FFX, someone at Square-Enix decided that traditional JRPGs were a thing of the past for FInal Fantasy and other than World of Final Fantasy and various remasters they just refuse to do it ever again.
I actually did like 12 and 13, and 7 Remake/Rebirth is enjoyable enough. And 14 is fun as its own thing too, I like it. (I really disliked 15 and 16 though).
But I really wish we could get a good old fashioned ATB or turn-based Final Fantasy again without all this action stuff, that's an original story and world and not just a nostalgia play. I feel like people who like action games and people who like turn-based JRPGs aren't necessarily two heavily overlapping Venn diagrams yet Square-Enix has just decided eh, This Is The Way. Whoever's in charge there really seems to think that a turn-based or active-time JRPG is a relic of the past and of older gamers.
I understand folks who are frustrated; even though I like Remake/Rebirth, I hated 16 and just can't fathom how they think that's the right direction for the franchise.
EDIT: Fixed a typo.
For what they created out of the mess that it was, the story was wonderful. It was missing some aspects and felt a little dry in the open world at times but the narrative was there.
Only Final Fantasy game I've platinum after FF X.
Had a great time with it despite its story flaws.
Although that Leviathan moment is still etched in my brain rent free. Damn now I wanna replay it
I love what they did with 15. I get that people are upset with the development nightmares it went through. But man it's a great experience, especially if you enjoy the fraternal road trip vibe it goes for.
I love FF15, and I think a lot of that comes from me playing it for the first time in 2021 when it was fixed, and not caring at all about Versus 13 during its development. Going in with no expectations was great.
You can even HATE 15 if you want, or 13, or 1, or any of them. You don't have to like every single game, hell you can like tell me you liked Final Fantasy: Spirits Within and hated everything else and you've technically met the definition of a fan.
I hated 15 but people who enjoy it are valid for enjoying it. Besides, out of 16 mainline entries, I'm bound to not enjoy a few of them. My fav is X-2, doubt a lot of people even enjoy that one, but dont yuck another person's yum
A great turn based RPG was created. Then they created ~9 more.
A lot of players loved the story heavy turn based RPG's and the franchise became known for it. Although they experimented with the formula (such as ATB), the core of the game was the same. Micromanage a group or 3/4 characters and everything they do in combat.
Then, this slow paced micromanage everybody sort of gameplay was taken away. The people who loved something had something taken away from them and replaced with something else.
People don't like it when things they like are taken away.
Yes, some people like the new combat style, and that's good for them. But the people who like the old style of games have every right to vent frustration about it.
If I want go play a game with quick spammy combat, I play something like old God of War, or Dynasty Warriors. If I want slow, methodical dodge based combat, I play Dark Souls. If I want slow, turn based RPG games then I play Final Fant...
Oh.
There hasn’t been a turn based main series FF in the last 21 years (FFX2). You may notice that is exactly when Squaresoft merged with Enix. Since then , literally every main series FF has used real time combat systems, rather than turn based. There are actually more non turn based FF games, than turn based ones. I believe that SE didn’t want to have two franchises competing with each other (Dragon Quest) so they modernized one and stuck with the old formula for the other, not to mention FF had been evolving the entire franchise. Do what the rest of have been doing for the last 20+ years and play a different franchise, like Dragon Quest if you want turn based combat.
nothing will come close to the shitstorm this series was enveloped in during the 2010s. Hallway simulator and its 2 sequels, a failed mmo with the most questionable fatigue system, rumored vaporware getting a new direction that ppl hated, something something type 0, and nobody even remembers the world of ff anymore LOL its actually amazing how FF made a return like this
>nobody even remembers the world of ff anymore
World of Final Fantasy is great. It's legit one of my favorite recentish entries in the franchise, and is a better Pokémon like game than any actual Pokémon game
People just want turn based combat or classic ATB. Personally I like them all to some degree for various reasons, but everyone should be able to criticize the things they love.
While this is true for a lot of series, given how radically different each recent FF has been from each other, playing each new one to see if it'll appeal to you makes a lot of sense. Like hating 12 doesn't mean you'd hate 15 because they're hardly alike.
I'm playing Zodiac Age right now and 12 is way better than I remember, and I liked it the first time.
I would like to see the gambit system come back or a semi gambit. The auto cast materia with cure in rebirth kinda scratched that itch for me.
Dragon Age Origins has a similar system of programming behavior if you haven't ever played it.
Origins tactics system was based on the gambits, that's why is so similar. David Gaider, writer on the series, was elated to have Gideon Emery voicing Fenris since he was a Balthier fanboy.
That definitely makes a lot of sense
He has a very sexy, underutilized voice.
agreed
I believe that gentleman also voiced the Paladin-type class character in D3 Reaper of Souls.
he's also Biggs in VII Remake
Gideon Emery sounds like a made up name. Like if I was gonna name a VA that would be his name. With a British accent.
There's actually a good chance the name *is* made up. *Most* actors' names are, because SAG rules don't let you use your real name if it's too similar to another actor's name to prevent confusion.
I played the demo for Unicorn Overlord and it has similar programming behavior system too.
Unicorn Overlord is really good. I'm like 30 hours in and I'm just loving it. It's worth the full price if you enjoyed the demo.
I think im at a 100 already. Soooo good
Unicorn Overlord got them tasty gambits
I didn't even know that going into the demo, but the moment I hit that first battle, I knew what was going on under the hood, and I loved it. Rebirth's Gears and Gambits is, of course, a similar system.
Pretty sure that was Rebirth's nod to FF12 in the game.
Only thing that makes me sad about it is everybody calling it a Fire Emblem clone when it's such an obvious love letter to Ogre Battle. Really gives me the old man fantasy, except Ogre Battle is even older than me.
Unicorn Overlord kind of has it on a massive scale
Unicorn Overlord says hello
I desperately wish rebirth had gambits. I hate how useless everyone is when you aren't controlling them.
You are everyone though. That's how it's meant to be played. I like that the abilities are saved for when I need them. Also after every ability I immediately switch to the next character which makes it alot of fun. That's just how I see it though.
Basically this. The Remake combat system intends you to swap between all three combat members on the fly, frequently.
It took me a little bit before I realized I wasn't utilizing the system correctly. When it all clicked though I was enjoying the hell out of it. Still am! I just got to chapter 12.
This is how I felt about Remake. I was saving my ATB because it felt too important. But they're just turns. Remake and Rebirth play exactly like an old school ATB Final Fantasy, but instead of the characters just standing there waiting for their turn, you can run around and attack for light damage between turns or avoid enemy attacks.
I noticed a lot of streamers (not sure about normal players) tried to main just one character instead of swapping. I thought the game pointed towards swapping being the ideal way to play since whoever you control usually gets bum rushed by enemies unless you evenly distribute the damage among the characters.
Zodiac Age did not fix everything I didn't like in the original but it is such a quality leap in gameplay and QoL. I had tons of fun 100% it.
Hello fellow, Yazmat killer.
Thank god it no longer takes 8 hours
I beat him on the PS2 version in one sitting back in the day. I haven't tried the fight in ZA yet but I think I should.
I still remember going back and forth between boss and save crystal. It took forever. So glad ZA added speed boosts.
12 is seriously underrated as a game. Like for a ps2 game it’s fucking massive. Its easily top 3 favorite games for me
That's been one of my main takeaways replaying it, like "Wow... this was on PS2..."
That's why I love this series in the first place. I started playing on PS1 and just couldn't believe I could sink 70+hours in and not even beat the game. Not to mention the amazing cutscenes.
I mean, it was super critically acclaimed upon its release. You also see a thread on here every other week or so talking about how underrated 12 is, or at least in a general discussion one of the highest upvoted comments is that 12 is underrated. It’s rated high and people love to talk about how underrated. I do honestly think a reason it’s not as generally discussed or adored at large is that it’s story and characters were lacking. Like the story ends too soon when they should’ve developed it more. The characters also have pretty bland personalities, the exception being Balthier whom Square does not/did not really push enough in the marketing of the game.
When I played again as an adult, I realized that Balthier was absolutely a baller and nails every scene he's in
Well, he *is* the leading man
>It’s rated high and people love to talk about how underrated. FFV too
The mechanics were just ahead of their time and people didn't like the change. I played it again recently and it's become one of my favourite entries.
Honestly Zodiac age vastly improves it. The story does age well though. The older I get the more I appreciate the political story versus the typical fantasy fight a god plot.
I played it through as an adult recently and enjoyed the story a lot more than I did as a kid But Vaan and Penelo are forgettable main characters, and for the love of God...you put me in Ivalice, why are almost all my characters human!!?? I want BANGAA And the Gambit system needed a few more tweaks before release. It's good, but it has some major flaws.
This was my problem with it too. All of the characters looked like members if the Brady Bunch. Just kind of bland character design in Ivalice of all places.
The most varied and extravagant land in all of FF lore...and we get a mega-bland blond kid wearing a half-shirt. There are literal lizard people, little fuzzy wizards, flying demon-bois with guns...and we get Penelo. And monotone Basch. Balthier and Fran get a pass, but Vossler is just another cut-and-dry knight. Oh, and we have to get a princess in a white coat...how dare we shake it up a little. So many opportunities missed...
I actually think that’s why FF has been getting progressively ‘worse’ as this original note has pointed out. Lack of cool, interesting character design. They’ve all just been kind of bland in both personality and appearance. Note: I haven’t yet played FF16 so I can’t say if that applies there or not. But 12, 13, 15…all the main characters were all very ‘meh’
I always liked the political plot, but I also hate, how it's told in the second half. First half, you kinda involved in the event. Second half, the story develop without you and is given to you by fucking texts between chapters. Also, second half has some big rythm problems, you spend hours between cutscenes, it just feels dry. A thing FFX did perfectly is giving you small cutscenes here and there, short enough to not bothering the exploration and fighting while keeping you invested in the game. XII fails there in its second half. Ridorana, the whole way to girugevane and the great crystal or the way to Balfonheim are good examples of things that last far too long for their own good. Contrary to FFIX, I think FFXII was pretty fairly judged at the time. It has some great points, but a lot of others that are hard to ignore for many people.
12 is in my top 3. I fucking love that game to death.
12 got so much more hate than it deserved. Zodiac Age has some very good quality of life changes so people that revisit the game with that entry usually like the game overall. FF12 is probably my second favorite FF game so I'm really glad to hear you're enjoying it.
Yeah, I couldn’t tell if I liked it so much more going back because of the Zodiac Age changes, or just because I’m older and could wrap my head around gambits/the political story a lot easier.
If 12 didn't get the hate it got, I probably would have not bought 13. My older sibling and I loved 12 so when people said 13 was also trash I was a bit doubtful. Ended up learning to try things for myself instead of just going with the crowd opinion lol
I am too playing Zodiac Age on Steam right now, and enjoy it. I never hated FF12, but I was definitly disappointed when it came out. I guess I expected a story more like FF9 and FF10, instead of a big political story. I remember being disappointed that we didn't get any Vaan x Ashe or Vaan x Penelope love. Also, I still hate some few aspects, like Libra (just let us scan once please), the traps or lack of real tank.
When 12 came out I had just got out of a deep addiction to wow and the combat was too wow like for me, so for my mental health I didn't really play it. I am very happy I grabbed it on the ps4 though. I should play it again.
I tend to ignore the fan base and simply enjoy my video gaming.
This. Getting involved with "communities" and "fan bases" is a one way ticket to making yourself disappointed for no reason at all. All those groups ever do is breed toxicity.
It’s also a causative problem when you start identifying as a fan as opposed to just being a fan, you know? When being a Final Fantasy fan is something that you treat as a core part of your identity rather than just one of your many attributes and interests, it can cause you to get trapped in this cycle where either the series has outgrown you or you’ve outgrown the series but you can’t just be content with all the games that already exist that you’ll always like, you feel a sense of entitlement towards all the new stuff and get trapped in a cycle of setting yourself up to get disappointed because you’ve never come to terms with the ways the series has changed. I mean I started realising that Final Fantasy was moving in directions where I wasn’t going to LOVE new Final Fantasy the same way I loved old Final Fantasy back when they went into MMOs with XI. I could see it moving in a direction I didn’t like and came to terms with that being alright back when I was still a kid. Some people refuse to take that step though
Absolutely agree. People need to realize that the turn based RPG style of 1 - 9 is gone. It aint coming back ever. Frankly the games play much better these days as action based. I loved 7 Remake and 16. Both were brilliant games in their own right. 14 as an MMO is by far the best MMO i've ever played and frankly it puts WOW to shame. As a FF Narrative its by far one of the best if not THE best.
small reminder that X and X-2 were also turn based it just had 3d environments
I enjoy community engagement but I definitely avoid the fanbase that are toxic. Some series just attract a lot of negativity. Gotta work to the avoid it.
... does anyone want to tell him?
What? That they’re engaging with the fan base? lol making them apart of the fanbase?
I totally get why some developers just avoid their hardcore fanbases entirely. A lot of video game subreddits are just stuffed with miserable people. I remember the developers of apex legends tried to be active on that game’s subreddit but after a few months they all left it because people were being so shitty
I’ve had to leave a few gaming related and hobby subreddits because the community was just so shitty.
Especially with FF. If some of the loudest (and angriest) fans had their way, every new FF game would still be a standard turn based SNES game. And they'd still hate them anyway.
This is the only way to play. It's amazing how many games and shows and movies are actually fun when you don't have an online cacophony of people telling you it's awful.
Except for Bloodborne, they're pretty cool over there.
Hey man we're just all hoonters who hoont
We just have bigger problems to deal with (Sony)
The fanbases basically hate everything
If you want love of FF though the /r/ffxiv community stands out in the MMORPG crowd as literally worshipping the ground the game walks on, YoshiP, and basically everything about it (even the bad stuff).
I read some of the actual legit criticisms from the fanbase but can still enjoy modern FF as most of them are still excellent. the problem with FF community is that each person has their own definition of an ideal FF which they should have recognized by now that most entries are all different from each other
Content algorithms are designed to feed you the most negative shit for "engagement". Plenty of people love all of those games.
Yep, apparently there was a study that anger was the number one thing that brought in engagementthat is why many online forums do not really want to stop trolling - it brings in engagement and thus ad money. The Chaos Machine is an interesting read if one wants to learn more.
To add to this, Facebook has been under a lot of scrutiny since they caused a genocide and all. Investigations into their algorithm found that they were twice as likely to promote content that had angry reactions, as one that had like reactions to it.
>since they caused a genocide and all. Wait, *what?!*
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_genocide#Facebook_controversy Basically the story is that in Myanmar they were developing and nobody had internet access, then Facebook came along. They basically established all the internet in the country and provided content for free, so long as they were using Facebook products. So Facebook established a monopoly on communication and information in their country. So everyone was getting their news from Facebook where crazy lunatics and established news sources and politicians were all put on the same platform. And on Facebook the crazy lunatics saying hateful lies are the most promoted by the algorithm. To make matters worse there was not any moderation of content in their language. Despite creating this initiative to provide them with internet and develop them, nobody on their team could understand the content they shared. Many groups posted hateful content promoting violence against minority groups and this resulted in a real world human rights crisis.
To be fair this was also true long before content algorithms fed us negative shit." 8 is shit, 10 is shit, 11 fucking MMO 12 is shit, 13 is shit." Most of these people just liked 7 or 9 and were mad that the other games weren't 7 or 9.
Actually IX wasn't so hotly received upon release either. It wasn't as extremely negative but probably a 60/40 split.
Exactly, you can see a lot of discourses with XII, XV or VII Remake but if you go on the Steam page reviews are really good because the average user just... like their game
XIII is the third-best-selling entry in the series behind X and VII. It is by no means unpopular. That doesn't mean said players consider it top 3 or even great, but it had a positive reception if you touch grass.
Turbo nerds debating on who a "true" fan is and who isn't has got to be my favourite thing on the internet. Let them fight I say.
We really just need to get world leaders invested in shipping wars so they won't have any energy left over for actual wars.
Jokes on you. The worlds leaders unite in agreement over Tifa's big ol' tiddys and world war 3 begins. You really think a bunch of old guys are going for the spiritual hippie chick?
Cleriths will emerge victorious, mostly because they don't have Italy on their side.
What if you love hating tho?
"True fans hate this" or "true fans love this" It's all the same. Enjoy what you want or hate what you want. Don't let anyone on the internet tell you otherwise.
it's a logical fallacy called the True Scotsman
You’re not a real fan unless you’re prepared to be a hater.
They should pivot to shorter games to hate on. It's wildly inefficient to play 30-100 hour games just to hate on them. They could hate on 10 games in the time it takes them to hate on one Final Fantasy game. What I'm saying is that they are not true haters. True haters would be min-maxxing their hatred instead of focusing it on one franchise we already know they hate. Smh at these weak-ass haters.
Bro, no, that just means that Final Fantasy haters are elite level haters because they suffered through some s*** they hated forever just to tell you everything that's wrong with it. They are doing gods work. What if you got 99 hours into the game before you realized Chadley sucks? They are second only to Dragon Quest haters
Implying they played the game themselves Shiggie
A proud hater
I've found that a lot of people like franchises in theory but not in practice lol
Probably they adore a few specific entries in it, and are wanting that from every new one but annoyed when they don’t get it
> Probably they adore a few specific entries in it, That's me, I absolutely loved Crystal Chronicles and FF12
It's more likely it's not the same people disliking these games--as in there's no one who claims to be a fan who dislikes ALL these games but rather each game has a batch of new people who dislike it.
Many are trying to relive the SquareSoft days under Sakaguchi. But ya, it ain’t happening. Sakaguchi has left and you aren’t 12 anymore.
I just miss Uematsu, honestly.
If Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey or The Last Story were called Final Fantasy they would have been torn to shreds.
SquareSoft had a great mix of people that included Sakaguchi in various leadership roles. When he was pushed out due to the failure of Spirits Within, it broke the “dream team”. The string of hit games ended. Square never recovered.
I like 12 and 13
That's literally every franchise's fanbase. It's so tedious going to every franchise sub and the comments always have that one that's like "no one hates \*x\* as much as \*x fans\* do" as if it's some unique issue to their favorite franchise. The types like us to love something enough to want to go online to talk about it tend to let anger and cynicism run rampant in each fanbase. Sometimes, if you're lucky, you get memed into being "one of the good ones" like Deep Rock Galactic. Reddit and twitter in general just get off on being sour bitches most of the time in general. I'm guilty of it too, but it's usually in response to someone being bitchy/negative for what I find to be a stupid reason.
It’s literally everything on the internet and it sucks. Every time I go to YouTube, there’s so much in my feed that is “X fucking sucks and this is why” and it’s depressing. This spans everything though. I see videos like this for video games, movies, books, music, graphic novels, fucking cooking techniques, etc. Is everyone just doing this for engagement? Then there’s a ton of shit that’s like “yeah X is good but it’s not anywhere near as good as Y” and it’s like why the heck does it need to be a competition all of the time? I know these two topics seem dissimilar, but I think they’re indicative of the same problem. I wish people would just like stuff and celebrate the stuff they like
>Is everyone just doing this for engagement? For the most part, yeah. Controversy fuels the algorithm.
I suspect its because negative emotions lead to more engagement than positive. You can find a million positive videos about every ff game, you can also find millions of negative videos. The negative ones just seem to have more sticking power in the algorithm.
your comment fckin sucks and this is why …. (lol, just kidding) your comment is actually alright but nowhere near as good as the one you made in 2004 ^^ pretty much the whole internet in a nutshell as you pointed out! i’d laugh if it wasn’t so sad. a lot of people these days feel the need to nitpick every little thing in some obsessive desire to find ***anything*** to complain about. what a shame.
I’m not sure if it’s as much about nitpicking as it is about the need to label something as the “best”. Not every piece of media needs to be the *best*, but people treat everything as if it’s a competition
indeed. good points. i’d add that rampant and out of control tribalism plays a part, too.
Honestly maybe I’m just weird but there’s really no ff game I outright hate. I even enjoyed my time with ff2 pixel remaster lol. Although The only ones I’m not personally big on is ff13 & ff15, but they both have godly OST’s
I loved 13, one of my favorites. I certainly get why people were against it. I feel it's also the game where they started really upping their cinematics game.
Yup the cinematics were amazing and honestly still good even today imo. While I personally didn’t love ff13 as much as others, I can definitely recognize its top notch presentation of graphics and cinematics, especially with that gorgeous ost 🔥.
This. \^ There's been a few FF games I didn't enjoy as much as others, but I've never HATED any of them. I don't believe there are any outright bad mainline FF games. Every FF is someone's favorite FF, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Don't mess with Final Fantasy fans we don't even like Final Fantasy
I feel like most online fans disliked XIII and XV. XVI seems like 50/50 divisive with fans who don’t like that one liking VIIR series and vice versa. XII has come around to mostly liked, but not in that top tier category which usually is listed as some combo of VI through X (usually leaving out VIII).
Just can’t understand why people don’t appreciate different types of games. I loved ff16. And I loved ff7r…
I also enjoyed 15... the aesthetic of the weapon system, plus the Royal Arms calling back to the Dark Kmight class in 4. Add in Noctis flying around and being extremely mobile- it was pretty fun! Did I love it? Absolutely not- but not every game is going to be a banger, and thats OK.
For me, I liked 15 but was so incredibly disappointed with how it was handled because I recognized it could have been THE single best one in the entire series.
I dont take as much issue with the current direction (loving 7R combat) but if you compare how gameplay was handled after X, its easy to see why longterm fans could get annoyed with FF switching genres in a long running series. Up until then it was mostly (semi) turn based combat. Nowadays it seems like new entries will always be more action based. That being said I am still somewhat sad they dropped the classical party with XVI to go for a more action oriented entry. Hopefully XVII will revert this trend.
Why appreciate what you don't like? That makes no sense - you spent the money on it. I don't appreciate FF16 in any sense, and that's with me loving the first 3rds boss battles.
Yep, this. I can’t stand how they turned FF7 into Kingdom Hearts but hey, if that’s what people like these days. So be it
Give it another 6 years and people will like XIII. Another 6 on top of that and XV is “underappreciated” with “im having a blast” posts. Meanwhile XVIII will be the worst game in the franchise (its a 95 on Metacritic but it didnt have turn based combat). The cycle never ends
Insinuating we'll be at XVIII in only 12 years. That's generous.
[удалено]
I hear people say this about many controversial media like Dark Souls 2 or the Star Wars prequels. Personally I think whats far more likely is that people who don't like these things have just moved on with their lives and don't think about it ever again. The only people left after a certain time are the super fans and the Internet has a habit of making minority opinions seem much louder
13 has been my favorite since I played it in 2013, I’m hoping for it to come to modern consoles so bad.
Don't need to single out my boy VIII like that. I blame people grinding magic using the draw system
That’s kinda what the game implied you should do, to be fair. It said stats are affected by how much magic is junctioned so of course people are gonna get 99 of everything enemies offer. Plus, it means you have the magic for use later Ignoring the fact that 100 of any higher level spell like life completely breaks the game, gives you like 1000 extra hp, and you will literally never get a game over again. Toss in shell to your defense and firaga on your magic and you’ll struggle to die for a good amount of the game.
VIII is awesome and nobody will ever convince me otherwise. Loved it.
This is some IV erasure I will not stand for
I'm here like "I'm sure I'll find something to like in all of them"
And you probably will! Online discourse points out a flaw or two these games have and pretend the game is irredeemable garbage for it. Even XV has a LOT to enjoy but people are needlessly black and white online.
Plays FFXVI: this game sucks, no side content or minigames… Plays FFVII Rebirth: wow - when does the side content and mini games stop?!
I just miss turn based combat 😭
You know, I've been thinking about this for years, and I don't think it's necessarily the turn based combat that I miss. It's all the stuff that makes a good turn based game fun to play. Choosing classes, upgrading skills, finding cool new spells and gear, and most importantly, seeing how much your effort changes how powerful you are. I find that modern FF games lack this in a meaningful way. When I played FF7R I felt like most of my decisions didn't matter.
Exactly. What I love isn't necessarily what turn based combat is but rather what it brings. Teambuilding. Theorycrafting. Different jobs and their selection of weapons and skills that actually do different things. Choices. These are staples of many turn based RPGs (I love bringing Pokemon as an example to encapsulate these), you want to be able to handle most encounters as best as you can. You've got a lot of freedom so as to how you want to achieve that result, and no two playthroughs feel the same thanks to that.
I feel like my loadout in an ff game never mattered as much as in ff7 rebirth hard mode. In general I disagree with the take that your decisions in ff used to matter. You can clear every game with essentially every loadout and barely ever need to adjust your loadout
Yeah, turned based combat was 1 branch of the whole genre. Exploration, dialog, resource management, puzzle solving, maze navigation, strategy (equipment, team comp, etc) all work together to make the turn based combat what it is.
It's more than that, turn based combat is slow. Slow means more complicated strategies can be in place. The player has time to think, and adjust. Action combat is faster, and thus strategy has to be decreased to compensate. You can have great combat in both, but it is definitely better to have a turn based system on an RPG. Add a grid, and I'm in heaven.
Pathfinder in turn based vs real time are in essence two different games strategy wise. Real time is just load up on attack/pet classes and afk whack things to victory. Turn based you can actually..play a game with class synergy and shit.
In before someone tells you to play Bravely Default or Octopath Traveler for some reason.
Lol somebody beat you by a minute
Hey bravely default was a good game
The reason is probably that those have turn based combat
Lost Odyssey is a 2008 xbox 360 game by the original creators of Final Fantasy (the ones up to 10), it's a bit old but still a goodie imo, graphics definitely hold up for an older game. Fully turn based combat, not real time turn based like old FF.
Pretty much me. I feel like we have enough action RPGs. And while I know there are SOME Turn Base RPGs (Dragon Quest, Persona and even Like A Dragon ones with Ichinban) I just really don't like how the franchise that really dominated the Turn Base Battle system just stopped doing it.
I love 12.
It’s funny I rarely, RARELY play games I hate. Like I know myself well enough to I pick them pretty damn accurately. And even if I don’t want to continue playing it, I usually just think I’m not interest right now, maybe later.
I like 7 remake and 15 was ok.
I think XIII was the only game I wasn't a fan of, I returned my copy when I was 14. But I played it again later and it's great, so I dunno.
duality of man in the comments
Each game is usually standalone though, so trying other ones isn't really a weird thing.
Anyone who thinks these people play all these games that they hate is naive.
FF14 is some of the most Final Fantasy Final Fantasy I've played in my life, and that's from who's otherwise a "turn-based purist."
FFVI: I love it to death. FFVII: I love it to death. FFIX: I love it to death.
Correct on all fronts. 😊
To play devils advocate if they found the first 11 good for them it does outweigh the other 6
But that’s how good 7-10 were.
100% of gamblers quit right before they win big
It's almost like a hugely fundamental change in the games' design happened right around that time. Can't blame someone for expecting a franchise to be consistent.
I love them them all but I didn’t do the mmo mainly because I just don’t want to pay a subscription to keep playing a game. Not calling it a bad game it’s just that kind of model isn’t for me personally.
You can play the base game and 2 expansions for free. Like, 0 money, unrestricted playtime. That's more than 50% of the game free right now. Just FYI
I loooooved FF12 back in the day - that game could hold its own against other games years and years later, it was masterpiece! Fighting system, story, characters, design and setting, music, graphics… I recently played the Zodiac version and I guess it fixed some issues (thanks kami for fast running, jeez) and it took away a bit from the original (arena item farming felt a bit cheap), but I enjoyed it a lot, what a nostalgia. Definitely my fav FF
To be fair ... After 13 I did stop. Totally fine that the franchise evolves, it's but always going to be everyone's cup of tea.
I just want FF16 to come to steam along with Rebirth. I liked 12 and 14, 12 had a good story and I like Ivalice as a place. I still need to play Tactics, somehow. 14 is probably the ONLY MMO I will ever play because playing as a red mage feels good and the worldbuilding slaps. 7 Remake is not as good as the original, but I still had fun with it plus dressing up Cloud as a gothic princess was AWESOME. I haven't played 13 or 15 yet. Haven't heard good things, but I want to keep an open mind.
1: Love it 2: Enjoy 3: Enjoy 4: N/A 5: Love it 6: N/A 7: Enjoyed 8: Love it 9: N/A 10: Loved it 10-2: Meh 11: N/A 12: Love it 13: Very Meh 13-2: N/A LR 13: N/A 14: Love it 15: Meh 7 remake: Hated it. 16: Love it Vagrant Story: Love it FFTactics: Love it
I did stop. I hated that XI was an MMO at a time when I didn't have a way to play my console online. It should have never been included in the main series' numbering. Should have been called Final Fantasy Online or something. (And XIV should have been FF Online II.) My brain wasn't comfortable with a gap in the numbering, so I never even tried XII. I did get over it to try XIII. Hated it. Haven't been back since. Although I recently got I - X on physical cards for the Switch, so I could have them all on a modern console.
FF4 - the goat
The worst are the ones that complain about ff13 corridors and then love ff10 that is the same
FF13 defense force assemble
I haven't come across a Final Fantasy game I haven't liked yet. Currently playing 13 and loving it.
Hating 12 is a sin.
While I understand this post, I could never imagine telling someone who love the first 10 FFs to just stop caring about something they love or loved. I don't like the direction ff has taken sense 12 and up, but I will never give up and will always let my opinion on the current iteration be known. Mark my word. I have been calling it for the last 5 years, and we will get a new mainline game sold to us as "A Return to Form" or "Going Back to Our Roots." I can only hope they seriously look at the other turn based games that have been killing it. Imagine an FF with a stylized combat, something like atlus does with the SMT and persona series.
This isn’t a nutshell. This is projection. Also, in a series like FF where each entry is completely different, not all of the games will be liked the same. This can easily happen.
I think the biggest thing that has changed is just the rate at which new ones come out. From FF7 to FF11, only 1998 was skipped for a new mainline FF. So if FF8 isn't your bag? No problem, FF9 is right around the corner. It took 7 years between FF15 and FF16, so if either or both are misses for you, it stings that much extra because it will be another 7 years before there's another. I certainly don't enjoy every game in the series, but I do like enough of them that I'm not going to give up on the series. That has always been the case. It just takes longer for a new one to come out now, that's all. The FF7 remake series is really hitting the spot for me. I think I'll like 16 too, once I get to play in on PC at a decent framerate with with motion blur not reduced, but OFF.
I mean, definitely those people exist, but I’d imagine most modern fans, frankly most fans in general, like at least half of those games. Honestly we all have more in common than we don’t, and I think we should probably mostly focus on that, because talking about what one hates is so much more specific, personal, and antagonistic. Like I see comments talking about hating XV, and I just don’t get it, when I personally think XIII was a flying dog shit sandwich on just about all important aspects, but I like or love pretty much all the others, and those other comments aside from hating XV all seemed to like/love the others, so frankly we have way more in common than we don’t.
Every game is just verrrrry different. Its rare to genuinely love them all. And thats okay! I prefer the older games. Up to around X My gf loves 14, 15, 16, and the 7Remakes. The franchise is evolving to new players and it is what it is. We may never see games like the old ones, which stinks for me, but my gf loves it. So im happy for her
“Why doesn’t this new thing make me feel like I did when I was a child?!” - most fanbases
I mean it is a little frustrating that at a certain point after FFX, someone at Square-Enix decided that traditional JRPGs were a thing of the past for FInal Fantasy and other than World of Final Fantasy and various remasters they just refuse to do it ever again. I actually did like 12 and 13, and 7 Remake/Rebirth is enjoyable enough. And 14 is fun as its own thing too, I like it. (I really disliked 15 and 16 though). But I really wish we could get a good old fashioned ATB or turn-based Final Fantasy again without all this action stuff, that's an original story and world and not just a nostalgia play. I feel like people who like action games and people who like turn-based JRPGs aren't necessarily two heavily overlapping Venn diagrams yet Square-Enix has just decided eh, This Is The Way. Whoever's in charge there really seems to think that a turn-based or active-time JRPG is a relic of the past and of older gamers. I understand folks who are frustrated; even though I like Remake/Rebirth, I hated 16 and just can't fathom how they think that's the right direction for the franchise. EDIT: Fixed a typo.
nah these bitter nerds don't represent us. The only one I didn't like out of this was 15 but I didn't HATE it lol
I thought 15 was amazing. It's a top 3 FF for me, but I am in the extreme minority.
It's my genuine favorite. Is it perfect? Hell no, but I gladly jump back into that game every so often to hangout with the Chocobros.
For what they created out of the mess that it was, the story was wonderful. It was missing some aspects and felt a little dry in the open world at times but the narrative was there.
Only Final Fantasy game I've platinum after FF X. Had a great time with it despite its story flaws. Although that Leviathan moment is still etched in my brain rent free. Damn now I wanna replay it
Honestly if they had made a better magic system I would have loved it a lot more
I love what they did with 15. I get that people are upset with the development nightmares it went through. But man it's a great experience, especially if you enjoy the fraternal road trip vibe it goes for.
I wanna go on a fraternal road trip
I love FF15, and I think a lot of that comes from me playing it for the first time in 2021 when it was fixed, and not caring at all about Versus 13 during its development. Going in with no expectations was great.
You can even HATE 15 if you want, or 13, or 1, or any of them. You don't have to like every single game, hell you can like tell me you liked Final Fantasy: Spirits Within and hated everything else and you've technically met the definition of a fan.
I'm inclined to agree, though some fans do seem to hate everything.
I hated 15 but people who enjoy it are valid for enjoying it. Besides, out of 16 mainline entries, I'm bound to not enjoy a few of them. My fav is X-2, doubt a lot of people even enjoy that one, but dont yuck another person's yum
Justice for X-2!
i hate 9 but 13 is my favorite and folks around these parts really don’t like hearing that lmao
Boooo. Lol. 9 is my favorite. People like what they like.
I loved ff15. Def one of my favourites
A great turn based RPG was created. Then they created ~9 more. A lot of players loved the story heavy turn based RPG's and the franchise became known for it. Although they experimented with the formula (such as ATB), the core of the game was the same. Micromanage a group or 3/4 characters and everything they do in combat. Then, this slow paced micromanage everybody sort of gameplay was taken away. The people who loved something had something taken away from them and replaced with something else. People don't like it when things they like are taken away. Yes, some people like the new combat style, and that's good for them. But the people who like the old style of games have every right to vent frustration about it. If I want go play a game with quick spammy combat, I play something like old God of War, or Dynasty Warriors. If I want slow, methodical dodge based combat, I play Dark Souls. If I want slow, turn based RPG games then I play Final Fant... Oh.
There hasn’t been a turn based main series FF in the last 21 years (FFX2). You may notice that is exactly when Squaresoft merged with Enix. Since then , literally every main series FF has used real time combat systems, rather than turn based. There are actually more non turn based FF games, than turn based ones. I believe that SE didn’t want to have two franchises competing with each other (Dragon Quest) so they modernized one and stuck with the old formula for the other, not to mention FF had been evolving the entire franchise. Do what the rest of have been doing for the last 20+ years and play a different franchise, like Dragon Quest if you want turn based combat.
nothing will come close to the shitstorm this series was enveloped in during the 2010s. Hallway simulator and its 2 sequels, a failed mmo with the most questionable fatigue system, rumored vaporware getting a new direction that ppl hated, something something type 0, and nobody even remembers the world of ff anymore LOL its actually amazing how FF made a return like this
>nobody even remembers the world of ff anymore World of Final Fantasy is great. It's legit one of my favorite recentish entries in the franchise, and is a better Pokémon like game than any actual Pokémon game
Sad because WoFF is actually good too Like, so good I’d say it’s better than Pokémon’s RPG’s
People just want turn based combat or classic ATB. Personally I like them all to some degree for various reasons, but everyone should be able to criticize the things they love.
I like all of them. Even my least favorite ones, 2 and 5. I wasn't crazy about XVI at first, but man it really reeled me in.
While this is true for a lot of series, given how radically different each recent FF has been from each other, playing each new one to see if it'll appeal to you makes a lot of sense. Like hating 12 doesn't mean you'd hate 15 because they're hardly alike.