[DS] Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift

Final Fantasy Tactics was a game that when people asked you about it, you could sit down and explain it to them and sell them on it. Its not a perfect game but I'll say its one of the very few PSX games that you can detail as the best of the system (and for those of us intellectuals - as one of the greatest games ever made.)

FFTA is the kind of game you played while no one was looking.

Now, if you enjoyed FFTA - more power to you. Liking fun things is what life is about, but the fact that you went from a deep, interesting story with phenominal battle system to a "kids game" (Im using that loosely) with an awful Judge system to hamper the gameplay was like walking out of a fine dinner and stepping in dog shit.

FFTA2? I hope a lot of people enjoy it - but truth be told, I'm considering getting a damn PSP off of Ebay just to play FFT; I won't buy a DS for this - even though its easily the better handheld.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Mo0

Downside is, I've seen one review mention one of the rules they go to be "Don't let enemies steal gil from you." What the hell? I hope there's not one that says "Don't get hit."

Yeah, I'm not really sure if you can say the game is less draconian if its going to have the AI set the rules in its favor.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Zephyrin

Is it more difficult?

I think the jury is out on if FFT was really hard or I'm just a crappy gamer. However, I think everyone can agree that both fights with Wiegraf were stupid, stupid, stupid fucking hard for no real reason. The first one at the windmill was just hard because of the way the level is set-up but the second one is just raining piss and bullshit. (You have to fight him one on one, which always results in Ramza getting his ass-kicked no matter how good you are - and then it goes straight into a second boss match with Wiegraf / Zodiac Monster and two demons.)

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by xiaowei

Weapon Break and Armor Break pretty much stops anyone who wields a sword or has any type of Sword Skill in the game.

That option is only really viable toward the second half of the game, since Weapon / Armor / Speed / Whatever Break has such a low hit percentile, its usually not worth trying most of the time.

Originally Posted by xiaowei

For the second battle, Razma can just run around using Yell so his speed is crazy.

What are you, some kind of sissy queer?

Seriously though - all those "building up" skills are super-duper cheap. By the end of FFT, you can have Ramza as a Knight, equipt heavy-ass armor, then equipt Squre skills with Throw Stone and Yell and Foot Up Ass skills and the double-sword skill, so you can carry two giant-ass swords, doing 300+ HP a shot.

I purposely try not to "skill stack" my characters into a battle; the lower the challenge the less interesting the game is. The only exception in FFT is really the matches where the entire fucking map is Chocobos. Get out of here with that shit. Yellow ones cast cure on the red ones (who cast flare and fire and dick-fuckery) you're trying to kill to make a hole in their offense.

Originally Posted by Zephyrin

That was amusing, Lehah, but I was looking for a comparison to FFTA.

I didn't finish FFTA so keep that in mind as I write this.

The difference between FFT and FFTA is easily described as the same difference between the movies Flesh + Blood and The Neverending Story Part 2. Anyone whos seen both these movies can see what I'm talking about.

One is a hardcore, epic slaughter involving a death of empire and kings, as women manipulate fiefdoms and knights fight for the dying and dead impulses of chivalry. It involves nostalgia and ethics and fighting for the love of the wrong woman. Slaves turn to masters as religion turns to conspiracy.

The other one involves some dork getting caught in a crappy fantasy cliche. I'm biased against FFTA and thats because it doesn't attempt to be like FFT. I suppose thats a good thing - it would be a more spectacular failure if they tried to make it too close to the original.

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