Im a huge fan of the FF series. Played the earlier games on snes emulator after playing VII on PSone & this series got me hooked on RPG's.
The game itself, apart from looking a little dated on the old PS2 (abit of anti aliasing & it would be perfect) , is not the best FF of the series but far from the worse (yes X-2 & even X for me).
The style looks alot like FFIX but mixed with another Square title you may have played called "Vagrant Story". Area's I have visited so far in 30 hours of playtime are all well designed. Ive gone through deserts, mountains,caves & dungeons each with there own monsters of various levels.
As you would expect from an RPG theres plenty of sidequests & FFXII has one of the best Ive seen. Its called Hunts.
You get jobs off a notice board (abit like kingdom Hearts another Square title) to hunt dangerous creatures. Once you have the job you need to speak with the person who posted the job in order to get more details & to accept the hunt.
They basically give you a general whereabouts & sometimes clues on how to lure your prey into the open if it needs it. You then either make your way especially to an area for the hunt or just get it while passing through the area as you are progressing in the story. Once the prey has been "Vanquished" you return to the "Petitioner" (person who posted the job) & they will give you a reward for your troubles. You also join a hunters clan & depending on how many hunts completed, your rank within the clan progresses, unlocking more Elite hunts with chance of special rewards.
The storyline itself has lost me to be honest. Its basically the same as any other FF game, Large Evil Empire, Small Rebellion which turns into a large rebellion blah blah game over. Im sure theres going to be some great twists like Ive come to expect but the voice acting is abit poor & dosnt seem to suck me into the story.
The sphere grid from FFX has been changed for a type of gameboard with chess coloured tiles. After each mob is killed you will recieve XP & LP. Now LP is License Points. Basically if you want to wear a particular piece of armour or wield a certain sword, you would have to of used your LP on the skillboard to own the license for it.
So as you earn LP you will keep going back to this skillboard & seeing what license you can afford to learn. Like the Sphere grid as you learn one square, the immediate (touching) surrounding squares will reveal what licenses they are for you to decide what to learn next time.
Theres basically half the skillboard with armours/weapons & the other half Magic/Gambits/Techniks.
It sounds weird but works really well after I actually started to spend my points. The only problem now, is that I have so many cool things to learn, its a abit hard to decide what to go for first
Ah it wouldnt be FF without summons & limit breaks. Well technically its not a limit break as you dont have to wait til you have been pummelled to be able to use your specials.
They are called "Quickenings" which each character can learn 3 lvls of from the skillboard. When one character learns a quickening that square is removed from the others skillboards. They are always on the egdes of the board to not effect it too much but you have to work out each characters routes so they all can get 3 quickenings each. It dosnt matter which ones they get, as its already been decided what special moves they do, they just need 3 of the quickening squares.
Once in battle with a couple of characters who have learnt a single or all of there quickenings its selected under the battle option "Mist" (this is the same with summons) & unfortunatly it does cost your casting character all his/her MP.
Once its been cast it goes into a summon style cutscene & if you do have others in your party who also have quickenings you can chain them together (this costs them there Mp too). A time bar will appear in the bottom right of the screen, along with names, of those with quickenings & they have been assigned a button each.
So lets say the caster is X, the other 2 are Square & Circle. While X is casting you may see a square Icon next to another characters name. Whack Square & thats your 2hit combo. Ive managed to get 8 hits on a chain & its awesome against bosses. Dont worry about the 0 MP as you can swap your characters during battles. Heres the good thing. If you swap just one of the 0 MP characters for someone who has a quickening & full MP they can cast & the other 2 with 0 MP can still add to the chain
Summons: Ive only got one so far but its basically fight it first then get to wield it. It becomes a square instantly learnable but only on one characters skillboard which you decide who. Obviously the next summon I aquire can go on someone elses skillboard or onto the previous characters its entirely upto you.
Once summoned under Mist the caster & the summoner will be the only ones in the fight for a short while. This is determined by the casters KO, the Summons KO or the summons time runs out but when this happens its a good thing as the summon does a final super move. The casters job is to stay alive (run out of range of aggro & let your summon build aggro up) & throw potions or heal the Summon to hopefully allow the time to run out.
Overall: A decent installment to the series with a great new style of battles, these being real time so no more randoms, you can actually see your targets & decide whether to attack or not. Just like an MMO with this freedom.
Story is complex & apart from the poor voice acting, would be more enjoyable.
SkillBoard system a game in itself working out who is going to learn what but a joy when you can see it start to fill up.
Quickenings are a nice touch for those limit break fans like myself with some stunning visual cutscenes to pull it off.
Summons it just wouldnt be FF without them.
If youve played the rest this wont disappoint & may well be your favourite one over time, it may actually be mine
)
