Final Fantasy XII

There is something inherently conflicting about finishing Final Fantasy XII. I poured roughly 80 hours of my time over the past few months to complete the direct storyline. In my travels through Ivalice there were many occasions where I found some secret paths, a door that couldn’t be opened, a zone with monsters WAY above my ability to destroy, an incomplete ability list, and levels only halfway to the 99 maximum. All of these facts simply make me feel that I didn’t complete much of anything. I’m not truly upset about it, I’m just a completionist at heart and it pains me that I’ve not been able to put in serious time on a single game since Metal Gear Solid 2.

On with the mundane part of this review. Awesome graphics? Check. Beautiful music? Check. Voice Acting? Pretty darn good.

Battle system? Well, that’s more intricate and worthy of some discussion. The world of Ivalice is populated by many monsters all roaming freely and visibly, meaning an end to the random encounter formula. There are still some surprises where a giant toad will lunge at your party from a nearby river, dragons may swoop suddenly from the sky, or even a group of invisible enemies might suddenly surround you. It all makes for a much more pleasant exploring experience being able to see ahead. As for an actual encounter with foes, the game is more of the turn based fare where each participant in the battle can act at a given interval (every two seconds, for example). Anyone who’s played World of Warcraft would be used to this type of system.

Progressing through any particular zone will net many, many encounters. The monotony of scrolling through a well populated list of commands could bring pain to even the most serious enthusiast. Here is where the Gambit system comes in handy. Gambits are essentially simple commands given to any party member. For example, set up a Gambit to heal any party member who’s health goes below 50%, revive someone when they die, steal from enemies, cast offensive spells, etc. Despite what you might think there is no silver bullet combination of Gambits that will work for every situation. The monsters in each particular area have such varied strengths and weaknesses that you’ll find yourself tweaking Gambits constantly. Once I moved past the “this game plays by itself” frame of mind, it was easy to see the value in having the basic commands that “I” wanted to use accomplished for me. Also the pride of seeing my party react appropriately based off of what I asked them to do. Though there were many times where things didn’t work out as well as I thought they might.

Another interesting change from other RPGs is that enemies essentially never carry Gil (the currency of Ivalice). I learned quickly that in order to make any serious money I needed to steal loot from virtually every single enemy. Loot can then be sold at any merchant for cash, and another resulting benefit. There is a Bazaar unique items will appear when certain combinations of loot are sold. For example an unseen merchant will combine the earth stones, iron scraps, and flesh pieces you sold to a shop into an iron sword you can buy at the Bazaar. As you can imagine there are hundreds of item combinations to find and some very nice items you can acquire using this Bazaar method (heh).

As I alluded to earlier, the unfortunate thing about FFXII is that there is so much to explore and do in this game that a casual gamer could spend a year trying to get through everything. For those of you that can simply focus on the story at hand and stay away from the more obvious side quests the game may only take 50 to 60 hours. On the contrary, if you are a completionist or someone who loves side quests, FFXII has more than enough to keep you busy all the way to level 99. Either way you play Final Fantasy XII is decidedly worth the $50 price tag.

ESRB Rating information: T
Alcohol Reference, Fantasy Violence, Mild Language, Partial Nudity, Suggestive Themes

The M-Factor Rating Information

Blood and Gore: I honestly don’t recall any blood.

Violence (Fantasy Violence): During the common battles a colored flash of light (green, white, blue, etc.) indicates a hit. Upon death a fallen foe will drop or tumble to the ground and then disappear. Boss battles usually have a more in depth cinematic conclusion where they will either disappear, evaporate, or stagger in pain before falling over.

Mild Language: People in this game will yell and threaten one another.

Partial Nudity: If they are referring to the myriad of scantily clad females (and males) in this game then there is a lot of it. Certainly nothing glaringly “nude”.

Drug Reference (Alcohol Reference): I’m honestly having a difficult time thinking of a single occurrence as an example. There are drinking establishments you can visit, and people may or may not talk about drinking, but I don’t remember anyone agonizingly drunk.

-wileee