green background

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Final Fantasy XII: I finished it

Hello. I finished FFXII last night after 6 hours of consecutive playthrough. 4 hours in Pharos, 1 hour for cutscenes, and 1 hour for the cutscenes+final bos battles.

Here I shall discuss my verdict.

The Pharos: the final dungeon.
I hate (x5) HATE this place! Rawr! All the levels and all the puzzles! I'll let you know I'm not big on Final Fantasy puzzles. You really have to explore everything to figure out the puzzles. Me? I referred to online guides to pass this. And who cares if it 'takes the fun out' of the game! I'm already overkilling the bosses at this final dungeon.

I think like FFX-2 the storyline comprises of only 45% of the game. I clocked in over 130 hours because I completed the hunts after each storyline events. Before I went to Pharos I completed all hunts except for Behemoth King and Wild Marlboro. The reasons being 1) BK is an endurance fight even with my overlevel stats, 2) I hate marlboros. One spray of Putrid Breath gives you a cocktail of bad status effects. In addition, it is found in the Feywood, which I also hate. So, up until Pharos I have completed all hunts except these two.

After that is the Sky Fortress Bahamut. The bosses themselves are not hard, but if you screw up and loses any of the fights along the way, the last save point is the one before you even left for Bahamut! Which means a long ass cutscenes along the way! Thankfully, thanks to all the hunts I did I had a more-than-decent equipments and levels for the boss fight (and keeping in mind I was overkilling the bosses thus far). ...and what's with the final boss anyway? Seriously. I stored away one of the overlevel character and put in a normal level character, getting ready to swap them in case things turned ugly...which they didnt.

But, all went well and I finished FFXII. Not completed, of course, since there are a multitude of optional bosses I chose to overlook, like two more espers and Yiazmat *shudders*. I read online that beating the boss in 2 hours was fast! More hunts are available after Pharos, of course, and undoubtedly they all take place inside the tower which I happily ignored seeing as I HATE that place.

The ending...well, how platonic can you be? Still, FFXII was not a sappy love story like FFX and FFVIII so not an ounce of romance can be found, which is a good thing after the emotional rollercoaster known as FFX. But it's nice to see FFXII spurned into a sequel FFXII: Revenant Wings on the DS and a Balthier cameo in FFT: War of the Lions. Good enough for me xD. Though I only have PSP for FFT and I spoiled myself the story for DS.

FFXII had been fun, and gave a lot of insight into the old Ivalice oftmentioned in FF Tactics. All the difference races and class of characters and the glorious past overtaken by the grim future is such a common feature in Final Fantasy worlds that it makes you wonder if the creators have a complex by it?

Anyway, fun game. Maybe I'll return to it to fight the two espers or something. But for now. Hehehhehe. Ta'ra!