RPG Diary

Lightning Returns

Lightning Returns is the third and final game in the Final Fantasy XIII series. While I did not enjoy Final Fantasy XIII, I was pleasantly surprised by Final Fantasy XIII-2, so I was cautiously looking forward to this game. I bought it on release, but I abandoned my initial playthrough about halfway. I don't remember much about the game, but it's time to finally play it start to finish.

Title	Lightning Returns
Year	2013 (US 2014 )
System	PS3 360
Developer	Square Enix
Publisher	Square Enix

Lightning Returns is very different from the previous games. After a brief prologue, the game becomes non-linear: there are five quests in four areas which can be completed in any order. There is not much information or guidance given upfront, so you must explore the world to figure out what to do. Additionally, the majority of the game occurs under a doomsday clock — the main quests must be completed before the clock runs out. The clock gave me a lot of anxiety as I was constantly afraid of running out of time. Ironically, the clock is actually quite generous (on easy mode at least). I had so much time to spare that I literally slept through the last few days at the inn to get to the ending.

The plot is a mess, although it is not surprising given how the previous game ended. Still, the God and his savior story felt like it came from out of nowhere with little explanation and I did not care for it. After the prologue, the game felt very dull and boring to me. Most of the game is focused around "saving souls" which is just a polite way to say "banal fetch quests for generic NPCs". While many RPGs could be described this way, the difference is that instead of cutscenes advancing a main story, there is just a bunch of filler dialogue with NPCs about their personal lives. To be fair, there are a few scenes fleshing out the main story, but they seemed to be gated by the doomsday clock instead of quest progress, so I didn't see some of them until I was almost finished with the game. The ending chapter has the most developed and interesting story, but it takes 30+ hours of gameplay to get there.

Every major character from the previous games makes an appearance in this game. While I thought Snow and Noel were written well, the rest were a mixed bag. Hope is inexplicably a child again. Sazh has become somewhat of a joke now as he is yet again separated from Dajh. Caius is somehow still alive. Strangest of all, the legion of Yuels is revealed to be the Great Chaos that destroyed the world. The ending also made little sense to me as it felt like a lot of handwaving to resolve everyone's issues.

I generally enjoyed the battles in this game as they felt fast-paced. Lightning has three schemata slots (equipment and abilities) and you can switch freely between these during battle. Each schemata has its own ATB bar, but the active schemata's ATB bar does not charge. This means many battles require frequent switches. There are bonuses for timing attacks and guards well which makes battles more engaging. I tended to overcommit to attacking though, so I was terrible at guarding.

I was disappointed with the soundtrack this time. I thought many of the new songs are bland and forgettable, especially compared to the soundtracks of the previous games. Several memorable songs from those games are reused again here, which I think exacerbates the issue.

After completing a game, I add it to my overall enjoyment ranking which orders the games I've completed from those I most enjoyed to those I least enjoyed. I did not enjoy this game, but I did not hate it as much as Final Fantasy X-2.

Final Fantasy XIII-2

Although I am a big fan of Final Fantasy, I was very skeptical of Final Fantasy XIII-2 — I didn't like Final Fantasy XIII and I really did not like the only other direct sequel in the series. Did this game exceed my expectations?

Title	Final Fantasy XIII-2
Year	2011 (US 2012 )
System	PS3 360
Developer	Square Enix
Publisher	Square Enix

Despite the abrupt and confusing introduction, I enjoyed the plot in this game. Caius is a solid antagonist which is something that I thought the previous game was missing. The main story is a little short, but I really enjoyed the ending. There is also a fair amount of side content that helps round out the world. My biggest complaint is that some previous characters, Sazh and Snow, are largely written out of the game without a satisfying explanantion. Also some of the finer lore details are again hidden in the datalog, which I think is a poor design choice.

Overall, the game changes most of the things I disliked about the previous game. As explained above, the plot, side quests and game world are much improved. Game overs were much less frequent in this game since both Serah and Noel need to be KO-ed this time (you can switch between them). Party members are still controlled by AI, but the faster-paced battles made poor AI choices less impactful.

Most monsters have a chance to join the party after they are defeated. There are only two characters this time, so the third party slot is reserved for monsters. Monster catching adds a collectible aspect to the game which makes it more fun to slow down and explore areas. Unfortunately, raising monsters seemed to be very expensive (in either gil or time) since it depends on consumable items instead of experience points. By the end of the game my monster was essentially deadweight as Serah and Noel had significantly higher stats.

I was frustrated by some of the mini-games. There are recurring "anomaly" puzzles that need to be solved to advance the game. The "connect the dots" type becomes unnecessarily difficult as the camera moves back and forth, making it harder to see where to go. The "clock" type can be randomized and can also have a time limit. As the puzzles got larger and larger, it became too difficult for me to solve without just brute-forcing it until I stumbled into a solution. Finally, there's a side quest to just grind out 7,777 coins from a slot machine — I gave up after an hour.

Final Fantasy XIII-2 was the first game in the series with DLC. Unfortunately, I think most of the DLC is pretty low quality: useless cosmetics, some equipment (thankfully not gamebreaking), and some bonus fan-service boss battles. Lightning's DLC does round out the story a bit, but I found the actual gameplay boring — I ended up watching the cutscenes online instead.

After completing a game, I add it to my overall enjoyment ranking which orders the games I've completed from those I most enjoyed to those I least enjoyed. I was pleasantly surprised by this one, and I was a little sad that the game ended so quickly. It's not a top tier Final Fantasy, but I think I enjoyed it more than Final Fantasy IV.

Final Fantasy XIII

I distinctly remember not enjoying Final Fantasy XIII when it was released. Lately, I've seen more positive opinions about the game, and even comparisons to one of my favorite games, Final Fantasy X. Did I have different opinions replaying this game 10 years later?

Title	Final Fantasy XIII
Year	2009 (US 2010 )
System	PS3 360
Developer	Square Enix
Publisher	Square Enix

Final Fantasy XIII is an extremely plot-focused game. As a whole, the party is probably the most developed of the entire series — all of the characters feel relevant and fleshed out. It is well-known as the most "linear" game in the series as there is very little optional content to do outside of advancing the main story. Unfortunately, I thought the main story was not very interesting.

The game starts immediately without backstory or introduction, and the party is essentially on the run for the first half of the game. During this time, there are very few interesting events — there are no towns to explore and there are no NPCs to interact with. The game compensates for this with flashback scenes explaining what led up to the start of the game. However, this makes the gameplay parts feel disconnected from the story parts. This part of the game drags on far too long in my opinion and it really began to feel like filler. Did Sazh and Vanille even have a plan or were they just wandering?

Things don't get much better in the second half either. While there are finally clear goals for the party, there are still barely any NPCs. The boss battle with Cid Raines comes out of nowhere, but this "betrayal" had no impact on me because he was only just introduced in the previous chapter. I also didn't understand the ending. Didn't the party do exactly what the villains wanted by killing Orphan? And why/how did the party transform into Cie'th and back? I get the feeling the game has deep lore, but it did not explain things very well.

Battles are once again fairly different from previous games. I was a bit disappointed that a dedicated battle screen returned after enjoying the seamless battles directly on the map in Final Fantasy XII. I was even more disappointed that only the party leader is directly controllable in battle — the extra party members are controlled by AI. While you can influence the AI's actions by setting the current "paradigm", I was frequently frustrated by the AI preferring different actions than what I wanted to do. Worst of all, the party leader getting KO-ed causes a game over. Thankfully, game overs are almost meaningless (you just respawn before the failed battle).

10 years later, I still do not enjoy this game. The story and the pacing is a mess. The battle system has some action elements that may appeal to others, but I did not care for it. In the end, I had this weird feeling that I might have enjoyed the story more as a movie or show because I liked the characters but hated the actual gameplay.

After completing a game, I add it to my overall enjoyment ranking which orders the games I've completed from those I most enjoyed to those I least enjoyed. It's tough for me to choose between this and Final Fantasy VIII since I had issues with the plot and gameplay in both games. I'll pick XIII over VIII, but it's really a toss-up.

Final Fantasy XII

Final Fantasy XII marks a major turning point in the series for several reasons. The game had a very long development period during which Square merged into Square Enix, and several influential people left the company. Final Fantasy XI was an MMORPG and there was some uncertainty about the future of the Final Fantasy series. I was in college when XII came out and I barely remember playing it. Given that context, I was looking forward to play this game again.

Title	Final Fantasy XII
Year	2006
System	PS2
Developer	Square Enix
Publisher	Square Enix

The battles in this game are probably the biggest change from previous games. First, battles occur directly on the map without a separate battle screen. Second, your party members can be programmed to act automatically with the "gambit" system. You can still override this with manual input at any time, so there is little downside to it. I generally enjoyed the battles as I found it to be smoother and less tedious than previous games. My biggest complaint is that many useful gambits are locked by story progression, which means that the AI is unnecessarily dumb for much of the game.

Characters unlock abilities (including abilities to wear equipment) on the "license board". In theory, this flexibility allows for a lot of customization. However, I found just the opposite — once license points were no longer scarce, my main characters all had basically the same build. Since my characters were functionally identical and the plot never forces specific characters into the party, I just stopped using half of them completely. In my opinion, this is a very big design flaw.

It can be frustrating to acquire good equipment in this game. Almost every treasure chest has randomized content, but some will never respawn. This means it's possible to miss (powerful) unique items from chests in the endgame. In my opinion, that is also very bad design. Some equipment is only obtainable from the "bazaar" — a special store that sells items based off the "loot" you have previously sold. Unfortunately the bazaar recipes, are not listed in-game and some of them require grinding chains of loot to fulfill. I typically do all sidequests and optional dungeons for "ultimate equipment", but this time I only bothered to get the two easiest ones (i.e. no bazaar, no random chests): the Zodiac Spear and Masamune.

I did like the story in Final Fantasy XII, but it will not be for everyone. While Final Fantasy is typically known for character-driven adventures, this game is a political war drama. Instead of character growth and romance, there is intrigue and political scheming. While the story started off strong, I felt that things kind of fell apart towards the end. After Vayne seizes power, it felt like the world came to standstill and the party was just marching back-and-forth across the map. The other odd thing is how the characters Vaan and Penelo seem irrelevant to the plot and bolted-on. Ashe and Basch are much more important to the story, yet they were the last two characters to join the party.

This game has a ton of optional content, mostly in the form of hunts and espers. I normally don't comment on this, but given the sheer volume and how they are generally more difficult than the main quest, completing these will make the main quest trivial. Unfortunately, I also found many of their rewards to be unsatisfying, so I stopped doing them. It would have helped if espers weren't so useless gameplay-wise.

Ultimately, I have mixed feelings about the game. There are some things I think it does very well, but there are other things that felt either incomplete or just not very fun. I did really enjoy the game in the beginning, but by the end I was glad to be done with it — I skipped a fair amount of the optional content at the end. The Zodiac Age re-release makes some significant changes to the game and I am interested in playing that eventually to see whether those changes improve the game.

After completing a game, I add it to my overall enjoyment ranking which orders the games I've completed from those I most enjoyed to those I least enjoyed. This is a tough one for me to rank because of how my feelings changed during my playthrough. It's definitely below Final Fantasy IV, which was a quick and solid adventure. Overall, I think I enjoyed Final Fantasy III just a bit more, so I'll slide this under it.

Final Fantasy X-2

After completing Final Fantasy X, I had to decide whether to play its sequel or skip ahead to the next main game. Ultimately, I chose to play this because it was released chronologically between X and Final Fantasy XII, so it felt historically relevant. Oddly, I cannot remember if I have actually played this game before or if I've only read about it. It's a very controversial game among fans of the series, so I was curious how I'd feel about it.

Title	Final Fantasy X-2
Year	2003
System	PS2
Developer	Square
Publisher	Square

In many ways, Final Fantasy X-2 is a polar opposite of Final Fantasy X. Unfortunately, since I enjoy almost everything about X, that means I really did not enjoy this one at all. Honestly, I wanted to quit pretty much immediately, and that feeling lingered the whole playthrough.

The most obvious and glaring thing that hits you as soon as you start the game is the massive change in tone. Final Fantasy X is a very serious game, but Final Fantasy X-2 is lighthearted and campy. I found this a little frustrating as some returning characters felt reduced to gags and some of the changes seemed nonsensical. Yuna cannot be a summoner anymore, so now she's a dual pistol wielding pop singer in hot pants? Cid turned Zanarkand into a tourist trap? And what is the deal with Brother? I was fine with the new characters being campy however.

I really do not like the plot in this game at all. The doppelganger / mistaken identity plot device feels lazy and uninteresting. The concept of Vegnagun is somewhat interesting, but I don't really understand how it and everyone else travels to the Farplane. Worst of all, I actually hate the "good" ending more than the "bad" ending! The "good" ending somehow handwaves Tidus back into existence and that really undermines Yuna's character develpoment. On the contrary, the "bad" ending has Yuna finally move on and accept Tidus's disappearance, which seems much more fitting.

Final Fantasy X-2 brings back the job system which is a favorite mechanic of mine. However, this particular iteration felt very flat to me. You generally cannot mix jobs together this time — instead, you can change between jobs mid-battle to access the abilities you need. This game also brings back ATB battles. Unfortunately, it also brings back charge times which I think is an absolutely awful mechanic. The basic Attack is instantaneous, but powerful abilities and spells have a delay before executing. All these factors led me to spend most of the game parked in high strength jobs repeatedly selecting Attack which was quite dull. I couldn't even be bothered to use Armor Break most of the time due to its lengthy delay!

Finally, this game is absolute hell if you are a completionist! There's a progress meter on your save, so naturally I wanted to get 100%. However, this is truly tedious as it requires very careful planning to avoid missing some very minor scenes. In addition to that, there are a lot of mini-games and tasks to do, most of which I found either boring or just not fun. The main in-game reward for doing all of this is the previously mentioned "good" ending, which I actually hate anyway! (Apparently, you only needed 75% for that, while the full 100% just adds an extra bonus scene.) I regret the time spent grinding that junk, and I almost feel punished for it. (I actually gave up at 99% — the last few things were just too tedious.)

In the end, I think I set myself up to really hate this game. I can't help but compare it to Final Fantasy X, and it really fails to deliver anything like that game. I also tried to 100% it, which forced me to meticulously follow a checklist, sucking most of the fun out of the game. If I ever play this again (New Game+?), I would definitely ignore most of the side quests. I'm not sure I could ever truly separate the game from its predecessor though.

After completing a game, I add it to my overall enjoyment ranking which orders the games I've completed from those I most enjoyed to those I least enjoyed. There's no doubt that this was the least fun that I've had playing anything in a long time. (Sorry.)