(no subject)

[prositen]

I may have pulled an all-nighter to finish FF13. I may also have spent two hours after that reading through the second half of Howl's Moving Castle (again).

Well, I have vacation, dammit.

So, as promised, here are some thoughts.

• Linear game is extremely fucking linear. The FF games have never been much about freedom of choice or intricate multiple-path storylines, but when the entire game feels like a series of cut-scenes with a couple of minutes of playing in between I'm getting a bit of a nerd-rage. What is this, Metal Gear Solid?
• And not only that, but for the majority of the game you aren't even allowed to pick your own battle team. I can see why, sort of - having to learn all the different battle roles blah blah whatever - but for so long?
• There are no side quests at all (unless I missed them, which I doubt) until you come to chapter "here's a whole new world for you", in which most people probably spend an insane amount of time running the missions because finally you can do something else rather than wait for the next cut scene
• I do like how they've completely changed the focus of the battle system. Instead of micromanaging what attack to use on which enemy and which healing spell to apply to whatever ailment you have, the battles are now more tactical. Pick a battle role, and let the AI deal with the details. I almost exclusively let the AI decide on what to do for the party leader - it was doing such a good job for the remaining party - and was quite satisfied to just switch roles when needed. (There's plenty of stress involved in that part, too)
• The characters are for the most part really stupid. But hey, this is Square we're talking about. I just wish that Vanille's voice actress didn't sound like she was in a porn movie instead of in a monster fight.
• The world feels.. really empty. I know that the cities of Cocoon are filled with people, but you can't really talk to them. You walk past them and they automatically say something inane, visible in the lower left corner of the screen. I know, it's not like NPCs in the earlier games are extremely interesting, but at least you can interact with them. These guys just sit and whine out loud about the state of the world while I happen to walk past. They feel like dolls with one prerecorded voice loop. The number of NPCs you really can talk to, as in "push X to have a discussion where someone actually responds to something my team is saying" is less than 10, and most of these only have one or two lines to say anyway. Even the (more or less) optional missions are given out, not by actual people, but by the crystallized remains of people who died hundreds of years ago. I have seldom felt so alone in a game.
• The final dungeon looks like it was picked from a Star Ocean game. Or Megaten.
  
• Just one summon per character? ;_; Though I liked the summon battles, and how they felt completely impossible until you've figured out the trick to them
• I like that the debuffs and debilitations actually mattered in this game. The various creatures are weak to different debuffs, and it really made a difference if you used them. Some mobs were shitty-hard to fell until you gave up and actually "fogged" them (so they couldn't use that pesky magic) or increased your own agility and those hits never connected. This made the Synergist (buff) and Saboteur (debuff) roles quite more useful than I'd thought at first.
  
• Ending spoilers: Of course those two had to survive. :| I know, I know, this is an FF game and they get happy endings but gnnh. The game was so much about loss and moving on through that sort of pain, and then they go and throw it away like that.


• Very few unique monster designs. Most enemies are recolours of previous, lower-level counterparts. Booooring. X-^

Now that I've beaten the game and because of this the crystarium is finally completely unlocked, I guess I have to grind some more. Gotta unlock at least a few more trophies. Maybe I'll even be able to beat the shit out of those most annoying mission bosses in a couple of hours or so.

There's probably more to say, but this wall of text will have to be enough for now.