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NikkolasKing posted:XIII was a glorified hallway in stunning HD graphics. FFX was still a bunch of hallways. If anything they were even more straight than FFXIII's. It just also had a few towns (although they were largely frontloaded) which helped disguise it.
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Dec 1, 2013 02:04
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Reminds me of that one bit of FFXIII apologism that said it was just as linear as any other JRPG, only without the adornments. Turns out those adornments can be pretty darned important!
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Dec 1, 2013 02:06
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ImpAtom posted:Luigi's Mansion ruled though. And the level design was aces!
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Dec 1, 2013 02:06
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How can you call XIII-2 nonlinear when you just pick levels from a menu? It is functionally the same as Super Mario 3 but there is someone saying in a cutscene that it's traveling through time.
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Dec 1, 2013 02:07
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Great Lakes Log posted:How can you call XIII-2 nonlinear when you just pick levels from a menu? It is functionally the same as Super Mario 3 but there is someone saying in a cutscene that it's traveling through time. Because, as Oxxidation mentions above, people are not arguing about this from a logical game design perspective. Illusion of choice matters a lot to people. There is a lot of stuff FF does which seems really stupid on paper but which people get really upset about being removed or altered, and no amount of "but it actually..." changes that fact.
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Dec 1, 2013 02:08
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ImpAtom posted:
I don't think much people would have problem with it, but FFXIII took things to the loving extreme where for a good part of the game where you literally have no loving choice on things, that you're not allowed to make a lot of a decisions until the game tells you it's okay. I liked FFXIII when I played it. I got the plat trophy for the game and I will never, ever loving play that game again because I remember the first 30-40 hours of the game going "Okay, now this is your party, now this is your party, now this is your party. You are not allowed to do anything else with it and please walk down these halls, or have your choice of halls here" and there was 0 distractions from it. It was that until near the end. FFXIII had a great battle system, but it sacrificed it pretty much for everything else that makes a game fun. It's personally why I like FFXIII-2 better, it may have become a broken mess in combat, but the combat system was still fun enough, and I had the freedom to gently caress things up for myself if I wanted to, and I did. I would play XIII-2 again before I would play XIII because I know going into it I can create a different experience for myself with XIII-2, which I don't know how I could do with XIII until late game and gently caress slogging through that again. ImpAtom posted:FFX was still a bunch of hallways. If anything they were even more straight than FFXIII's. It just also had a few towns (although they were largely frontloaded) which helped disguise it. Yes. FFX had the common sense to break up the experience. It might have been linear, but people had a break, were able to kick back their feet for a bit and gently caress around if they wanted too. Don't wanna do story or battle? Okay, play Blitzball! Wanna do something else in FFXIII? Okay...do...hunts? FFXIII NEEDED distraction, if people could have hosed off from the story for a couple hours doing whatever, and had a tiny more choice in the game I think it would have gone a long way. They just made a game that's good to play once and that's it. The Black Stones fucked around with this message at 02:14 on Dec 1, 2013 |
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Dec 1, 2013 02:09
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Great Lakes Log posted:How can you call XIII-2 nonlinear when you just pick levels from a menu? It is functionally the same as Super Mario 3 but there is someone saying in a cutscene that it's traveling through time. Instead of making a fun world to explore, you pick each world like a Mega Man game, except each stage is filled with tedium and bullshit.
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Dec 1, 2013 02:12
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The Black Stones posted:Yes. FFX had the common sense to break up the experience. It might have been linear, but people had a break, were able to kick back their feet for a bit and gently caress around if they wanted too. Don't wanna do story or battle? Okay, play Blitzball! Yeah, but if you ask anyone about any of those distractions, the vast majority of the response will be talking about how lovely and awful they were. Half the posts about FFX HD are discussing how they dread doing Chocobo Racing or Blitzball or Butterfly Catching or Lightning Dodging or whatever again. Which is what I mean about the "on paper" thing. FFXIII, even with its many production problems aside, is very much an 'on paper' game. FFXIII-2 kind of is in that regard too, but much lazier. They focus on what people want 'on paper' instead of what they actually want which can often be illogical, contradictory, or difficult to understand. It's not exclusive to FF either. You can see it in a lot of long-running franchises. For all people complain about or ignore certain things, they're actually part of why they like something. They just also like to complain about it. There's also the fact that people are more likely to complain than praise which leads to developers doing stupid things because they didn't realize people liked stuff. Good developers can get around this. Bad developers can't, even if they can otherwise make good things. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 02:24 on Dec 1, 2013 |
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Dec 1, 2013 02:17
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Blitzball was great  and also it wasn't just playing Blitzball, it was going around and recruiting players, that was part of the fun too. I really do miss good minigames in RPGs, FF7 was fantastic for this and I think it's pretty much unrivaled actually. There was so much stuff to play and do outside of the main game
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Dec 1, 2013 02:58
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ImpAtom posted:It's not exclusive to FF either. You can see it in a lot of long-running franchises. For all people complain about or ignore certain things, they're actually part of why they like something. They just also like to complain about it. There's also the fact that people are more likely to complain than praise which leads to developers doing stupid things because they didn't realize people liked stuff. Good developers can get around this. Bad developers can't, even if they can otherwise make good things. That last point has been a real problem with SE lately. Whenever they get wind of a component in one of their titles that many people disliked, they change course so hard that they flip the entire boat upside-down. The FFXIII games have been showcasing that habit in painful detail.
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Dec 1, 2013 03:02
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The only hallway areas of X were the Moonflowm, Macalania Forest and Mt. Gagazet. Even then, the Moonflow was broken up by cutscenes or the battle with the Unsent summoner and Mt. Gagazet had the dead summoner memorials or that sphere of Braska he left for Yuna. Killika Wood, Mi'Hen Highroad, Thunder Plains, you could easily just jog right on through but there were little nooks and areas you could go to get treasure, or there were NPcs to talk with. Fact is, the FFX areas felt alive and not like a long, boring corridor. You cannot say the same for XIII. It's all in the presentation. I just realized the presence of people strolling about in most of the X areas was a really smart move. Oxxidation posted:That last point has been a real problem with SE lately. Whenever they get wind of a component in one of their titles that many people disliked, they change course so hard that they flip the entire boat upside-down. The FFXIII games have been showcasing that habit in painful detail. That is why XIII is the anti-XII. People bitched about XII being too open, now you can't go anywhere. The antagonists felt like they had more presence in the story than the heroes, now you have villains who barely exist in the game and it focuses almost exclusively on the party and no on else. NikkolasKing fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Dec 1, 2013 |
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Dec 1, 2013 03:04
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NikkolasKing posted:The only hallway areas of X were the Moonflowm, Macalania Forest and Mt. Gagazet. Even then, the Moonflow was broken up by cutscenes or the battle with the Unsent summoner and Mt. Gagazet had the dead summoner memorials or that sphere of Braska he left for Yuna. Man, if you're going to argue that this:  isn't a corridor, I don't know what to say.
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Dec 1, 2013 03:05
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FFX also had a goal. Once you get past the tutorial and introduction, the player is given the goal of getting Yuna to the end of her pilgrimage and defeating Sin. Each area you go through is progress towards that goal. FFXIII, on the other hand, just has the protagonists wander around aimlessly, but not letting the player explore.
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Dec 1, 2013 03:08
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ImpAtom posted:Man, if you're going to argue that this: It's a straight line but it's at least a big open area with lots of little things about the scenery that are at least interesting. The difference between the areas of FFX and FFXIII are more about feel than actual physical design. They're both straight lines but one of them is an old Dirt Highway connecting the city to an old temple, filled with NPC's with interesting things to say, Crusaders pushing carts down the road, etc. and the other one is, for the most part, Literally A hallway. Like half the places you seem to go in FFXIII are tight indoor locations and all you're doing is moving from one walkway to the next with no real interaction or world building in location design or NPCs. Hell, they managed to make half the outdoor locations feel like cramped corridors by making half of them valleys and cracks in the earth you could barely turn around in. Those bells and whistles are what make it enjoyable in 10 or at the very least you don't notice it like you do in 13.
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Dec 1, 2013 03:11
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I always thought that was kinda funny. Like the only reason the story really progresses is because you are playing a video game and there is a corridor so you walk down the corridor and story happens. It's complete nonsense and a total distillation of how Final Fantasy games work without even trying to mask it. It's so bizarre.
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Dec 1, 2013 03:12
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Has anyone lined up the minimaps from 13-1 so that it makes one long hallway?
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Dec 1, 2013 04:31
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The Machine posted:Has anyone lined up the minimaps from 13-1 so that it makes one long hallway? It's not all of the map, just one from a single chapter, I think: 
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Dec 1, 2013 06:20
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Pesky Splinter posted:It's not all of the map, just one from a single chapter, I think: Chapters 1 & 2, if that caption is any indication. Also I immediately recognized the second half of the map as the layout of that frozen lake, which raises some disturbing questions about my memory's priorities.
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Dec 1, 2013 06:23
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Oxxidation posted:Reminds me of that one bit of FFXIII apologism that said it was just as linear as any other JRPG, only without the adornments. "nonlinear" just means wander around aimlessly or look up where to go on gamefaqs, i prefer linear games.
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Dec 1, 2013 07:30
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I've been playing FFII (Dawn of Souls version), and I'm a bit of the way in and I noticed Maria has 4-0% evasion, and Guy has 2-0% evasion. Maria also has 7-11% accuracy. Everyone else has normal Evasion/Accuracy, how do I fix this?
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Dec 1, 2013 07:34
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GodFish posted:I've been playing FFII (Dawn of Souls version), and I'm a bit of the way in and I noticed Maria has 4-0% evasion, and Guy has 2-0% evasion. Maria also has 7-11% accuracy. Everyone else has normal Evasion/Accuracy, how do I fix this? I'm at the final dungeon this moment, and looked at my stats - Each have 99% accuracy, and Firion has 32% evade, Maria 12%, and Gus 0%. I have no idea how to raise evade, but for accurace you just need to grind the poo poo out of hitting attack. I guess if you have everyone attack eachother, that could theoretically raise evade, as I believe evade raises when you are targeted from an attack. I don't know for sure though. Looking it up, yeah taking damage will increase your evasion and agility, so have your dudes smack eachother around a bit.
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Dec 1, 2013 08:00
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Okay, so Evasion/Agility is the basically one of the most important and most obtuse mechanics in FF2. Basically, agility determines base evasion percentage (not the other number), and your equipment adds or subtracts to evasion. Shields, especially if you have a high shield level, add a lot to evasion. However, heavy armor tanks it really bad. Also, you again agility by having high evasion. That is it. It does not matter how often you're hit. It's very easy to gently caress yourself over when it comes to agility and evasion. Conversely, it's absurdly easy to raise your evasion so high that nothing can hit you. You just have to know about it. (There's like a million more things I could mention about agility and evasion in FF2, but let's just say that the guaranteed road to success is: one person in the front row, everyone in light armor and shields.) Oh, and as for your poo poo accuracy: are you equipping the Blood Sword? It's really good, but it does tank accuracy (but do use it because it is a great boss killer)
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Dec 1, 2013 08:27
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GodFish posted:I've been playing FFII (Dawn of Souls version), and I'm a bit of the way in and I noticed Maria has 4-0% evasion, and Guy has 2-0% evasion. Maria also has 7-11% accuracy. Everyone else has normal Evasion/Accuracy, how do I fix this? Heavy armor is a trap. Light armor usually has the same defense, is much cheaper, and doesn't tank evasion or magic potential. Yeah, it makes no sense that light armor completely outclasses heavy armor, but a lot about this game makes no sense. This armor guide is of the NES version, but other than names I believe the stats are the same for armor. As you'll see, pretty much everything tanks evasion, though hopefully you'll eventually get enough evasion to counter some of the steeper penalties. Here's the weapon guide as well, as a lot of stuff like the Sleep Sword or whatever have crap accuracy. Note that the magical penalties for weapons and shields were removed in DoS, but not from armor. Also, make sure the character has their weapon in the correct hand. Maria's right-handed, for instance, while some people are left-handed. Should say in the status menu.
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Dec 1, 2013 10:46
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Fight Club Sandwich posted:"nonlinear" just means wander around aimlessly or look up where to go on gamefaqs, i prefer linear games. Why don't you tell us next how giving players agency makes it hard for them to experience a "compelling narrative" like FF13 has, Toriyama?
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Dec 1, 2013 10:54
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Mega64 posted:Heavy armor is a trap. Light armor usually has the same defense, is much cheaper, and doesn't tank evasion or magic potential. Yeah, it makes no sense that light armor completely outclasses heavy armor, but a lot about this game makes no sense. Thanks for the all the responses, I'll have to work on grinding the evasion a bit, I've been abusing everything else in the game, why not that, and the accuracy problem was due to Maria using the Dark Bow (same accuracy problems as the Sleep sword and the like)
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Dec 1, 2013 11:10
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I received FFXII from Gamefly today. So far I am liking it. I know someone from Vagrant Story was involved with the production of this and I can definitely see it in some of the dungeons and visual design. I'm looking forward to playing more.
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Dec 1, 2013 11:42
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Defiance Industries posted:Why don't you tell us next how giving players agency makes it hard for them to experience a "compelling narrative" like FF13 has, Toriyama? I was talking about gameplay not narrative, but sorry if ff13 hasn't lived up to your lofty expectations of gay anime rape or anime time compression. You might want to check out the story for 13-2 though since there's more agency there
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Dec 1, 2013 18:01
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Fight Club Sandwich posted:You might want to check out the story for 13-2 though since there's more agency there And also proving that it doesn't matter if it's linear or not, if your story sucks, it sucks no matter what.
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Dec 1, 2013 18:31
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James Woods Fan posted:I received FFXII from Gamefly today. So far I am liking it. I know someone from Vagrant Story was involved with the production of this and I can definitely see it in some of the dungeons and visual design. I'm looking forward to playing more. Same director (Yasumi Matsuno), also same composer (Hitoshi Sakimoto) Might be more team members that worked on both but Matsuno is gonna be the one you're thinking of.
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Dec 1, 2013 20:34
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James Woods Fan posted:I received FFXII from Gamefly today. So far I am liking it. I know someone from Vagrant Story was involved with the production of this and I can definitely see it in some of the dungeons and visual design. I'm looking forward to playing more. Where are you in the game? I consider FFXII one of the best in the series but man, did it start off slow. I hate sand. /Anakin
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Dec 1, 2013 20:41
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Dr Pepper posted:FFX also had a goal. Yeah that was a big part of it. It was a mostly linear path, but done well and the story justified it. FFXII, on the other hand, randomly dropped you from area to area without much rhyme or reason with each section having some sort of miniboss who wasn't relevant to the overall plot much if at all. XIII was obviously an attempt to recreate X's style but it utterly failed to do so.
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Dec 1, 2013 21:03
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I played the FFXIII-3 demo and it was pretty fun, even if I must have missed something about the fighting because I kept getting hit by magic attacks even if I dodged out of the way. I had to use all my healing items. The music in the demo was nothing special. Best part was putting the same over-sized hat on Lightning no matter the outfit. Whoever decided to create a character who is basically 12-year-old Sarah, put her in a gothic lolita outfit, and make her act like a Japanese idol on crack needs a good slap in the face. Worst part of the demo by far.
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Dec 1, 2013 21:12
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Fight Club Sandwich posted:I was talking about gameplay not narrative, but sorry if ff13 hasn't lived up to your lofty expectations of gay anime rape or anime time compression. You might want to check out the story for 13-2 though since there's more agency there The narrative was the stated reason FF13 was so linear. You can't separate the two from each other, because gameplay is apparently secondary to their terrible stories. Also, why would you think I'd be holding up JRPG anythings as examples of player agency?
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Dec 1, 2013 22:09
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James Woods Fan posted:I received FFXII from Gamefly today. So far I am liking it. I know someone from Vagrant Story was involved with the production of this and I can definitely see it in some of the dungeons and visual design. I'm looking forward to playing more. ninjewtsu posted:Same director (Yasumi Matsuno), also same composer (Hitoshi Sakimoto) Akihiko Yoshida was in charge of character designs and Hiroshi Minagawa handled art direction between Vagrant Story and FF12.
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Dec 1, 2013 22:52
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Defiance Industries posted:The narrative was the stated reason FF13 was so linear. You can't separate the two from each other, because gameplay is apparently secondary to their terrible stories. Not even that. They made all the cutscenes for promo material and then had to figure out a story to connect them, iirc. So all those characters who get one or two scenes? They never had anything further planned for them in the first place. FFXIII was comically mismanaged.
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Dec 1, 2013 23:35
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Mokinokaro posted:FFXIII was comically mismanaged. It still surprises me that the direction and lack of focus was so poor. I mean, it's SE flagship title for most of the world - and this is how they were planning it!? For anyone not in the know, it was basically; a bunch of people spending their time making random assets for the game, with zero idea how or if they were going to be used, the writers coming up with plot points, having CGI cutscenes made of them, and then moving on to the next revison of the story, and then frantically having to tie all this poo poo together with glue, and a combat team that couldn't quite decide how the game was going to play. From its public announcement in 2006 to the release of a playable demo in 2009, it was only at the demo stage that they came up with a unified game idea, and started to clumsily seam the various threads together. Only eight months before its Japanese release. So for four years, they had essentially, been faffing about, aimless as poo poo. I think at least five people left during that time, because of how it was managed. Pesky Splinter fucked around with this message at 00:12 on Dec 2, 2013 |
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Dec 1, 2013 23:59
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Doesn't fill me with a lot of optimism regarding future Final Fantasy games.
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Dec 2, 2013 00:22
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Pesky Splinter posted:For anyone not in the know, it was basically; a bunch of people spending their time making random assets for the game, with zero idea how or if they were going to be used, the writers coming up with plot points, having CGI cutscenes made of them, and then moving on to the next revison of the story, and then frantically having to tie all this poo poo together with glue, and a combat team that couldn't quite decide how the game was going to play. For reference: this is exactly how Duke Nukem Forever was "developed" under 3D Realms.
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Dec 2, 2013 00:24
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Mokinokaro posted:For reference: this is exactly how Duke Nukem Forever was "developed" under 3D Realms. It was tragic with Duke. I remember playing DNF and seeing some set pieces that, with a bit more polish and work done, would be really neat. FF13 had no neat set pieces.
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Dec 2, 2013 00:29
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Overbite posted:Doesn't fill me with a lot of optimism regarding future Final Fantasy games. Pretty sure that Square is painfully aware of the problem and the sales to cost is going to spur them to get something different going quickly.
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Dec 2, 2013 00:43
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