Yeah, I like this setup with the characters, as it lets you configure what you want each character to be, whether knight, mage, long range attacker and such. So far, I haven't changed the weapon types for any of the characters, but I'm interested in seeing what these "measures" look like and how they fucntion. They look somewhat like sextants to me, used in naval navigation.

Unfortunately, they do pretty much crap damage and the status effects barely make up for that.

@Spatula: I don't EXACTLY remember, but I think it had Salamand in the the name. The name was two words, and it was this gigantic fireball thing. It was in the Ogir-Yensa Sandsea, the northernmost section. I think in the JP version it was Spirit Salamander, if that helps any.

In any case, I know it had about 42,000 HP [used Libra], and using that 19-hit Quickening only took down about 12,000 or so. I don't know if I'm brave or stupid, but I've leveled up a bit since then [I'm now average 25-26], and I'm gonna try the thing again. Will post the results soon.

edit: Found a screenshot, looks like this:

Let's get some ratings here. What would you all give the gameplay & storyline out of 10, seperately?

That's the one I saw!! It was lurking in the corner of one of the ramps, waiting for stupid people to come along and attack it. EEK! I saw another species in the Esterland(sp?) and I almost didn't make it out alive >_>

Tomorrow I'll make sure to pass the temple.

Based on what I've played so far, the gameplay and story both get a 9 from me. I refuse to give 10's cause that'd make it perfect, and nothing is ever perfect. It has the best dialogue of any FF game, and the whole war thing is cool.

Of course, everyone says the story takes a total nosedive later, but until then, I'll have lots of fun with it. Love the battle system! The camera isn't that great though.

I love the poles for weapons. I always thought they were cool weapons, and heroes are always wielding stupid swords, so I gave a pole to Vaan and now he's kicking arse.

The best of luck to you man. I think the toughest enemy I've fought so far is probably one of the hostile sandpeople which is in Ogir-Yensa Sandsea. You'll find him in the middle of the three pronged fork, and he's by the refinery guarding passage to the next area. He has about 6000 HP, I think, and casts protect. He basically wasted Ashe, who had the highest at 1700 HP.

Here's just a very minor thing I noted, which really doesn't affect my view of the gameplay or anything. But like with most RPGs currently, I wish these RPGs would actually show your characters wearing the new gear and equipment you equip on them. I know this sounds silly, but when I put on some heavy armour and a helm for Vaan, he looks exactly the same as if he were to start out with the simpliest of armour (correct me if I'm wrong). I haven't noticed if the weapons look different. I'm sure in FFVIII, you could tell the different weapons, for example Squall's Lionheart looked MUCH different than the regular gunblade, or as with FFX, Tidus ultimate weapon looked massive, as compared to the default Brotherhood blade.

Of course it's with the limitations of the technology of the PS2, but I think it'd be sweet to have this. Metal Gear Solid 3 did this quite well with Snakes' constant change in camouflauge, but then I don't think the engine have to do so much processing power, as the NPCs and enemies were far fewer in any given screen/stage. Just my 2 cents.

Hopefully we might see this in FFXIII, but I have my reservations. Just a thing that I'd like future gen RPGs to adopt.

this is why i liked legend of lagaia for the psx. Every weapon and armor you put on them were visible when you were in battle and it actually looked really good on them.

and about the score thing, even though alot of people hold this game with high regards I say story 7, gameplay 6, and overall 6. I just play it cause its final fantasy =P

I just wrote a "little" First Play Review which you can read HERE.
So far I'm really happy with the game and love the MMORPG aspect (especially since I never played a real one yet) but whats really buggin' me is why the hell is there a fat black stripe on the bottom of the screen in every sequence (the one where you see the subtitles when they are turned on)??? I don't get it?

As long as FF games feature pre-rendered FMVs, which FFXIII still does have, I'm afraid it can't happen. However, in FFXI and a new FF MMORPG (FFXIV?), every gear and weapon is displayed on the screen, though I never recommend such time-wasting MMO games...


Oh, FFXII for US has sold 1,500,000 copies in a week.

1,500,000 copies? :megaman:

Greatest Hits coming like what. LOL, maybe Rockgammer might be a bit happier now. But of course I'm not surprised by those sales figures. Add maybe 200,000 copies in Canada or something. LOL.

Yeah, you can generally see the weapons you equip, especially when you equip stuff like the Zodiac Spear. :D

I tried to beat the Salamand Entite again, and I was... victorious! I used a party of three, Mist attacked, then as soon as it finished, switched ONE character out, and Misted again. Lather, rinse, repeat. I know it was cheap, but it worked. It gave me about 4000 exp, and a small fortune [read: less than 10] LP. Didn't drop any items though, which sucked. Seemed pretty useless except for the experience points...

But I'd rather just go chain some other stuff, it's a lot easier than trying to kill that flaming bastard. XD

Flaming bastard LOL.

Good job, although I'd rather fight 40 skeletons and get the same result in exp, plus 1 LP for each, plus they drop bone fragments for 190 gil each ^__^.

So at least I know I won't bother with it. I might do it once just for the hell of it. Also, I find my mist quickenings aren't very powerful. They may pull of maybe 500 HP dmg per each mist ( Each char only has 1 quickening so far), so maybe that's why the power isn't very good.

I kinda expected this one to sell well but not that well. Impressive.

I checked up with EB Games today, looks like they (at least in Canada) have bumped the price up by $10 to it's regular price of $59.99 CDN for the regular and $69.99 for the CE. I'm glad I got it when it was released. Looks like it was a 3 day special price. The same with Best Buy as well.

That's 1.5 million copies shipped, not sold.

My copy still doesn't work at that point so I called EBgames to ask about exchanging it since today is the last day it's within warrantee and I can't make it out there until tomorrow. Luckily today is voting day so that worked out to be a good enough excuse and the clerk said it was fine.

Hopefully it's the game and not my PS2 but if it was the latter then surely I'd of had problems from the start rather than 20 hours in.... :eyebrow:

This is exactly the reason why I love Radiata Stories. Not only do you get a change of weapons, your armor change is varied by a big difference too. I'm glad they at least have different models for shields and weapons for FFXII.

Also, yeah I'm playing FFXII now too lol. Just got to the place after Giza (Rain). Supposed to go east or something after that. I'm loving the hunt sidequests. Overpowered weapons as rewards FTW.

Quick question, but what was the official theme for this game? I don't mean musical themes, but the themes SE uses to describe the story (previous ones include "Love", "Past", and recently "Bonding" for FFXIII). I think it was "War", but I don't quite remember.

Yeah, I think it was officially "War," but after playing, it could be "Freedom" as well.


Plus, the characters are pretty much motivated by freedom.

Wants to be a sky pirate (Vaan), wants to free her country (Ashe and Basch), wants to be free of his family (Balthier and Basch), wants to be free to live outside of her homeland (Fran), etc...

Cool, thanks. Unless something goes horribly wrong (again), I should resume my playing tommorow once the floors are done and the new shelf is installed. Last place I saved was . Naturally, everyone is far and away ahead of me, but I feel no need to catch up and merely enjoy it at my own pace. I'll probably finish it by Feb 2007. :tpg:

I like how VG Cats is at its funniest when taking jabs at FF (everything else, not so much).

http://www.vgcats.com/comics/images/061105.jpg

That was the first thought I had when I heard about the license system. In context it is pretty stupid, but at the same time it's surprisingly fun to manage.

I understand that, however Taisai said sold, after posting I went and did a little research about this and yeah, it says shipped, not sold.

About the game:



That's all.

SOLDIER, you're not the only one going at their own pace. Several dungeons I'm redoing just to appreciate it more than have as a fleeting experience. This is partial to party grinding, but also to embrace each stage a little more, hopefully with nice scenery around to accompany that.

Hell, I've stopped playing altogether to make way for gears of War and Twilight Princess.

I have made it past the tomb and am on my way to Bur-Omisace now. Whooo! It feels weird to be attacking Chocobos though.

Vaan and Balthier are now at level 21, with the rest at level 20. Defeated the damn Nidhogg with Belias :D

I didn't really like Larser's acting before, but it looks like he improved since then.

Those judges have an interesting side to them.

I spent lots of LP on stuff like HP+ and Potion Lore+ and such. I'm nowhere near a Swiftness panel though. Darnit.

Those Wooly Gators are frickin' WEIRD.

Met more powerful werewolves. Luckily I was on a chocobo!

Balthier: "I'm only here to see the story unfold. That's what the leading men do."
I found that line funny as hell, but it could be just me.

Are these Werewolves that hard? The first time you meat them is at the Giza Plains and I was playing with the thought to attack one of them (with level 4 characters...) just for the sake of it. Still a good idea?

Yes, go ahead and attack one. In two seconds, you're dead!

NO, do NOT attack them whatsoever, or go anywhere near them! Remember Jinn's warning!

Just save before attacking if you're feeling sucidal.