Final Fantasy Megathread - People here, it sounds like sickness

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Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Welcome to the New and Improved Final Fantasy Megathread!! (Previous thread can be found at Link)

Consider this thread a safe-haven for talking about anything and everything Final Fantasy!

Kupo.

So just what exactly is Final Fantasy and why is there so much of it?
If by chance you are completely unaware on just what exactly this series is, Final Fantasy (ファイナルファンタジー Fainaru Fantajī) is an Japanese RPG owned by Square-Enix (formerly Squaresoft) which first made it's debut in the year 1987, and has been going (relatively) strongly since. There has been a game donning the "Final Fantasy" brand released almost every year since it's inception. As of 2010, fourteen games have been released as part of the main (numbered) series, which I will try to cover briefly below. In addition a huge slew of sequels, prequels, spin-offs, and related video games have been published, as well as numerous titles in other media forms, which I will also try to go into detail. The series has been a resounding critical and commercial success for Square-Enix, and due to its immense popularity, there has been a whole slew of Remakes, Enhanced Ports, and Fan-Translations for a variety of different games in the series.

I've never played a Final Fantasy, what should I know and where should I start?
One of the unique elements found in the main numbered series of Final Fantasy, is that each game takes place in its own independent fictional universe. While there may be some recurring names, creatures, plot themes, or tropes, you can pretty much pick up any numbered game, and play it from start to finish without worrying about missing anything.

When it comes to choosing which Final Fantasy to play first that's when you'll get into conflicting opinions... Like the thread title states, for every positive suggestion you'll get from someone, you'll most likely find someone else who thinks that's the worst game in the series, and that you should play another one instead.

Either way, you can't go wrong, they're ALL great.

So... what you're saying is...
What I'm saying is if there is one thing Final Fantasy fans share in common, it's that people LOVE their favorite Final Fantasy. This series is home to probably the most fanatical passionate lovers of any game on the planet. There are people who are fans of this series that could spend hours upon hours just talking about their interpretation of certain plot points from games released decades ago; Cosplayers who spend days meticulously sculpting their costumes to identically match these characters they love; People who listen to the orchestrated music from their favorite scenes to reminisce, and Musicians who try to emulate their favorite songs; Artists who will draw portraits of their favorite characters; Writers who will draw inspiration from their game play experience; and even just Gamers, who will pour hours and hours into these games trying a variety of different playstyles and strategies...

... and it is all just fantastic.

Release years by system:

_{Also included in the Final Fantasy I-II (Nintendo Entertainment System, 1994), Final Fantasy Origins (PlayStation, 2002), and Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls (Game Boy Advance, 2004) compilations and the Final Fantasy Mobile (Mobile phones, 2004) collection}

Ahhh! The start of it all.

This Fantasy is relatively simple, four youths called the "Warriors of Light", each carry one of their world's four elemental orbs which have been darkened by the four Elemental Fiends. Together, they quest to defeat these evil forces, restore light to the orbs, and save their world. While it might sound corny reading it now, back in 1987, it blew people away. FF1 is regarded as one of the most influential and successful role-playing games on the Nintendo Entertainment System, playing a major role in popularizing the (nearly non-existant) genre.

Before it's release, Square really wasn't doing so well in the gaming industry, and was literally on the edge of bankruptcy. That's when the creator, Hironobu Sakaguchi, realized that his next game was most probably going to be the companies last, so he wanted to go out with a bang. The irony in this games creation comes in the form of its title, Final Fantasy, is exactly what it was meant to be, a last attempt at something great. Little did he know that he had just planted the seed that lead the Final Fantasy series to become one of the most recognized names in the entire gaming industry.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy centers on four youths whose parents were killed during an army invasion by the empire of Palamecia. Three of the four main characters join a rebellion against the empire, embarking on missions to gain new magic and weapons, destroy enemy superweapons, and rescue leading members of the resistance. After defeating the empire and the Emperor, the trio discovers that the fourth youth, now a dark knight, has taken the place of the previous emperor and is preparing to attack the rebellion. Upon confronting him, the Emperor reappears as a demon and prepares to attempt to destroy the world; the four characters agree to join forces to defeat him.

Final Fantasy II is when Square really tried to push the envelop when it came to story-telling in the video game medium. Contrary to how FF1 was created, the team on FF2 focused first on creating a compelling narrative, and then designed the core game play mechanics around it. One of the biggest changes to this game was completely abandoning the traditional EXP system that was found in other popular RPG's such as Dragon Quest, and instead going with a "Activity-Based Progression" system. Which essentially boiled down to, The more I hit with my Axe, the better I am with Axes! This lead to some hilarious masochistic grinding in the first area of the game to completely break the game flow.

Also worth noting that, due to the untimely release of the SNES in conjunction with the localization time needed for FF2, this game never saw North American shores until much, much later.

One of the key things to note is that FF2 is the spawning point of a large variety of recurring elements found throughout the series, such as Crystals, Cid, and most importantly :frogsiren:

Chocobos!! :frogsiren:

Release years by system:

This Fantasy revolves around four orphaned youths drawn to a crystal of light. The crystal grants them some of its power, and instructs them to go forth and restore balance to the world. Not knowing what to make of the crystal's pronouncements, but nonetheless recognizing the importance of its words, the four inform their adoptive families of their mission and set out to explore and bring back balance to the world.

Coming somewhat back to their original roots from FF1, they returned to the standard Experience System for FF3. Only this time, they introduced the phenomenal "Job System" which introduced a variety of classes which are easily recognizable to this day. Each of the four characters could change their "Jobs" at will, to a variety of staple classes such as Black Mage, White Mage, Thief, Monk, Warrior, and much more. This allowed for an enormous amount of customization and let the players craft their team however they desired.

Once again though, due to the untimely release of the SNES, North Americans didnt get a chance to get their hands on this game until 16 years later when it was Remade for the Nintendo DS.

Release years by system:

_{Included in the Final Fantasy Collection (1999, PlayStation) and Final Fantasy Chronicles (2001, PlayStation) compilations, and the European release of the Final Fantasy Anthology (2002, PlayStation) compilation, as well as the Finest Fantasy For Advance collection (2005, Game Boy Advance)

The PSP version of the game is a compilation of the original game, its sequel Final Fantasy IV: The After Years, and an all-new story which is a tie-in between the other two games.}

This game was one of Squares major landmarks on the industry and the genre. FF4 is often heralded as one of the top in the series, and the entire genre as well. This is mostly due in part for it's very strong characterization and story-driven events, as well as the ground-breaking new role-playing designs such as the ATB-Battle system (which has been used for years afterwards)

This Fantasy follows Cecil, a dark knight, as he tries to prevent the sorcerer Golbez from seizing powerful crystals and destroying the world. You can pretty much tell by this point, that "Crystals" usually appear in some way in the plot of any FF whether its major or minor.

This games release in North America also was the reason for MUCH confusion. Due to FF2/FF3 not ever making it to NA shores, FF4 was released in NA under the name "Final Fantasy II" on the SNES. So for those of you who started their first Final Fantasy with FF7 on PS1, and wondered where FF4/5/6 were, this is the reason. Thankfully developers have since rectified this mix-up, and all re-releases have been accurately named FF4.

Nearly all the re-releases of this game are great. The DS version is probably the most newbie friendly of the bunch though, in addition to the cutscenes and graphical overhaul, it has some significant design changes to make some of the more "useless" abilities become useful in their own right.

Release years by system:

_{Included in the Final Fantasy Collection (1999, PlayStation) and the Final Fantasy Anthology (2002, PlayStation) compilations, as well as the Finest Fantasy For Advance collection (2006, Game Boy Advance)}

This Fantasy begins as a wanderer named Bartz investigates a fallen meteor. There, he encounters several characters, one of whom reveals the danger facing the four Crystals that control the world's elements. These Crystals act as a seal on Exdeath, an evil sorcerer. Bartz and his party must keep the Crystals from being exploited by Exdeath's influence and prevent his resurgence.

This is the Final Fantasy that took the Job System which was first introduced in FF3, and kicked it into overdrive. This is mostly due to the addition of a new form of experience, noted as "Ability-Points" (AP). AP was used in order to individually level up and master the various jobs used by the character. Once an ability was learned, it could be equipped as a sub-skill on another class, allowing for tons of "player created" combinations. The freedom and customization allowed by the player on their party was greatly praised.

Once again, due to a variety of translation issues and time constraints, this game never saw a proper North American release on the SNES. We had to wait for it to be released later on the Playstation/GBA much later. Incidentally though, FF5 was one of the first games to be fan-translated completely.

If you want to play this game, be warned: the release available on the PSN is typically considered to be something of a subpar product. It suffers from significant load times that don't exist in other versions and a script that wasn't localized all that well. It's worth your while to seek out the GBA version, which works off of a much better-written translation, or the Original SNES version with Fan-Translation Patch.

Release years by system:

_{Included in the Final Fantasy Collection (1999, PlayStation) and the North American release of the Final Fantasy Anthology (2002, PlayStation) compilations, as well as the Finest Fantasy for Advance collection (2006, Game Boy Advance)}

This Fantasy is set in a fantasy world with a technology level equivalent to that of the Second Industrial Revolution, the game's story focuses on a group of rebels as they seek to overthrow an imperial dictatorship. The game features fourteen permanent playable characters, the most of any game in the main series.

It was in this game where Square slowly stepped away from the "high-fantasy" setting, and instead focused on a more "steampunk" aesthetic. The narrative structure was also very different from previous final fantasy's at the time. Instead of focusing on a very linear experience, through the use of flash backs and many optional sub-plots which could be completed in any order, the players were able to create their own non-linear design and really felt as though the story was crafted just for them.

Despite having worked on the previous 5 Final Fantasy games, Hironobu Sakaguchi had to step down from directing FF6 due to having a very large workload. The director role was passed on to Yoshinori Kitasep and Hiroyuki Ito, 2 names you might have undoubtedly heard in the Final Fantasy circa. This game is also another victim of incorrect title labeling, FF6 was originally released in North American on the SNES under the title of "Final Fantasy III"... I promise though this is the last time they mess up a Final Fantasy title when bringing it overseas.

It should be noted that the PSN version of 6 has load time problems. Go for the original SNES version (also on the Wii Virtual Console) if you don't mind a few minor bugs or the GBA version if you don't mind decreased sound quality.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy follows protagonist Cloud Strife, who, at the beginning of the game, joins the rebel organization AVALANCHE in their quest to stop the world-controlling megacorporation Shinra, which is draining the life of the planet for use as an energy source. As the story progresses, Cloud and his allies become involved in a larger world-threatening conflict and face Sephiroth, the game's main antagonist.

While Final Fantasy had been primarily found on Nintendo consoles up until this point, Square decided to make a bold move when seeing the power of the Playstation and moved this title there. It was a smart decision indeed, as FF7 was one of the biggest launches in the series selling over 10 million copies worldwide, the most any FF has ever sold. It could even be argued that the success of FF7 is why the Nintendo 64 saw next to no RPG's.

The addition of CGI Backgrounds and Cinematics helped enhance this story-driven narrative ten-fold. This games release literally laid a landmark on history of video games, as it set a standard for RPG's and other games in the genre from then on.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy focuses on a group of young mercenaries who are drawn into an international conflict, and seek to protect the world from a sorceress manipulating the war for her own purposes. The primary protagonist is Squall Leonhart, a 17-year-old reclusive loner and student at the military academy Balamb Garden, who is training to become a "SeeD", a mercenary paid by the academy.

With the success of FF7 under their belt, Square felt pretty comfortable in their position and could really think about pushing their limits further. One of the most notable graphical changes was in FF8; In all previous FF's, there were two seperate character sprites/models, one for in the field, and one high-definition for in battle. They decided to abolish this idea, and instead create a single high-definition model which can be used in every situation, whether it be on the field, in a cut-scene, or in battle. This enhanced immersion greatly in the title.

While remaining somewhat in the "steampunk fantasy" genre, FF8 also focused on the concept of being a student in the military academy. This gave the game a sort of "school days" vibe to it and felt really unique when compared to the rest of the series. It showed in the sales, as this title snagged a healthy 8 million units sold.

FF8 also made a nod towards FF2 with its unique leveling system. Rather than having players focus on Experience Points and Magic Points, they used the "Junction" and "Draw" system in tandem with character growth. Players could "Draw" (up to 99) of a Magic Spell, and then Junction that onto a Characters Stat in order to raise it. This allowed players a great deal of customization, and not to mention crazy tactics to break the game.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy centers on a war between many nations. Players follow a young thief named Zidane Tribal, who joins with others to defeat Queen Brahne of Alexandria, the one responsible for beginning the war. The plot shifts, however, when the characters realize that Brahne is working with an even more threatening person called Kuja.

This title took a different approach when compared to the last 3 titles in the series. Rather than going with the realistic steam-punk aesthetic, they instead followed the roots of the series and went with more of a cartoony and distorted high-fantasy tale. Sakaguchi himself called this his favorite Final Fantasy game as "it's closest to [his] ideal view of what Final Fantasy should be," the Final Fantasy that he envisioned all those years ago.

Despite a few complaints that "old fashioned" can sometimes border on clich�, it was the best reviewed game in the series, at least in the West. Despite this, it "only" managed to sell 5 million copies, a fact that could partly be attributed to the declining 32-bit generation and the release of Dragon Quest VII in Japan a few months earlier.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy is set in the world of Spira, and is centered around a group of adventurers and their quest to defeat a rampaging monster known as Sin. The player character is Tidus, a blitzball star who finds himself in Spira after his home city of Zanarkand is destroyed by Sin. During the game, Tidus, along with several others, aids the summoner Yuna on her pilgrimage to destroy Sin.

This was Squares largest undertaking in the series. Due to the newly launched Playstation 2, Square was given the ability to do things they could not on previous consoles. The first of those things was completely abolishing 2D CGI backgrounds, and instead creating fully navigable 3D Environments. The second of these things, was making the entirety of the game... voiced. While most games at the time had small snippets of voice acting, FF10 managed to cram 30-hours worth of voice-acting and pretty much set a standard for games of the genre. They also went crazy when it came to In-Game Cut-scenes, as this title had the most the series had seen to date.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy follows the character Yuna from Final Fantasy X as she seeks to resolve political conflicts in the fictional world of Spira before it leads to war.

One of the first things worth mentioning about this title, is that it is the first ever "Direct Sequel" in the main series. By this I mean, the story from 10-2 directly follows after the story from 10, so chances are if you play this without knowing what happened, you might be a little lost. It was also the first game in the series to feature only three playable characters, an all-female main cast, and early access to most of the game's locations. It's also one of the few games in the series to feature multiple endings. Finally, it was the first Final Fantasy game in the series that didn't have any musical contributions in it from longtime composer Nobuo Uematsu.

The developers sought to make this a very "light-hearted" title from the start. At the time, Final Fantasy was mostly recognized for its heavy melodramatic plots, and 10-2 took a step in the opposite direction and made the narrative very fluffy and fun.

Release years by system:

Also known as Final Fantasy XI: Online, This Fantasy is set in the world of Vana'diel, where player-created avatars can both compete and cooperate in a variety of objectives to develop an assortment of jobs, skills, and in-game item rewards. Players can also undertake an array of quests and progress through the in-game hierarchy and thus though the major plot of the game. Since its debut in 2002, four expansion packs have also been released, adding numerous areas, quests, and item rewards to the Final Fantasy XI world.

This was the series first undertaking in the Online MMORPG market. Despite being in the Online world, Square took great efforts in keeping their mantra of Innovation. FF11 was the first ever "Cross-Platform" MMORPG, meaning players on the PS2 could play alongside players on PC. They also took this a step further and merged North American and Japanese Servers together, and through the use of a simple Auto-Translator, ultimately forced players across the globe to communicate and play together.

To this day, the game is still going strong and there is a core dedicated development team who plan on releasing new content. Feel free to check out the FF11 Goon Thread for more information.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy takes place in the fictional land of Ivalice, where the empires of Archadia and Rozarria are waging an endless war. Dalmasca, a small kingdom, is caught between the warring nations. When Dalmasca is annexed by Archadia, its princess, Ashe, creates a resistance movement. During the struggle, she meets Vaan, a young adventurer who dreams of commanding an airship. They are quickly joined by a band of allies; together, they rally against the tyranny of the Archadian Empire.

Final Fantasy XII had an uphill battle to climb. The Xbox 360 had already launched, and sales of PlayStation 2 games were falling. In America, Western games like Knights of the Old Republic and Oblivion were eroding the stranglehold Japanese games once held on the console RPG market. When all was said and done, Final Fantasy XII sold 5 million copies.

One of the biggest changes to this game in the series was the complete removal of the turn-based "random battle" screen. Instead the entire world map was transformed into a living battle screen, and monster encounters could be avoided by simply circling around them. Another Love/Hate design addition, was in the form of a mechanic named "Gambits." This allowed players to "pre-program" their party to perform actions when certain conditions were met (example: When Ally HP is Below 50%, Cast Cure.) Some players loved this function, since it eliminated the monotony of repeatedly performing the same actions in battles, whereas other players hated it, since it made it feel like the game was essentially playing itself.

The International Zodiac Job System version of the game made tremendous improvements to the game and is by far the recommended version of the title. The problem is it's been released in Japan Only. A Complete English Fan-Translation Patch exists but that falls under :filez:

, if you can get your hand on that, it's well worth it.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy takes place in the fictional floating world of Cocoon, whose government, the Sanctum, is ordering a purge of civilians who have supposedly come into contact with Pulse, the much-feared world below. The former soldier Lightning begins her fight against the government in order to save her sister who has been branded as an unwilling servant to a god-like being from Pulse, making her an enemy of Cocoon. Lightning is soon joined by a band of allies, and together the group also become marked by the same Pulse creature. They rally against the Sanctum while trying to discover their assigned task and whether they can avoid being turned into monsters or crystals at the completion.

Final Fantasy XIII is the flagship title of the Fabula Nova Crystallis collection of Final Fantasy games and is the first game to use Square Enix's Crystal Tools engine. Final Fantasy XIII received mostly positive reviews from video game publications, which praised the game's graphics, presentation, and battle system. Reviewers were more mixed in their opinion about the game's story and linearity compared to previous games in the series.

The games prominent feature is the "Paradigm Shift" battle system, which allows players to rapidly shift between set roles for their 3-man team setup in order to exploit enemy weaknesses. This allowed for the most active and intense battles the series has seen to date.

Release years by system:

This Fantasy takes place three years after the events of FF13. Lightning, the protagonist of the original game, has disappeared into an unknown world. Her younger sister Serah Farron, a returning character, and a young man named Noel Kreiss attempt to find Lightning.

This is the second direct sequel in the main numbered series. Most of the changes found in this title were directly aimed at criticisms found in FF13, particularly the linearity. Because of these changes, the title received mostly positive reviews from video game journalists, which praised the game's graphics, lack of linearity and gameplay but criticized the story.

Release years by system:

Also known as Final Fantasy XIV:Online, and similarly to FF11, this title is also an MMORPG. This Fantasy takes place in a land called Hydaelyn, mainly in a region named Eorzea, which has a contemporaneously aesthetic blend of science fiction and classic fantasy elements, Players can choose from a variety of races to set as their Avatar as they cooperate to unfold the story.

This game was released to generally negative reception. Due to criticisms of the game's quality, Square Enix has reshuffled the development team and completely overhauled the gameplay since launch. On October 14th, 2011, Square Enix announced their intention to relaunch the game as "Final Fantasy XIV 2.0". The relaunch, currently slated for late 2012-early 2013, will incorporate a new graphics engine, new server and data structures, revamped interface, redesigned maps, more gameplay variations and content, and new playable sexes of certain races (male Miqo'te and female Roegadyn). Final Fantasy XIV 2.0 will coincide with the PlayStation 3 release of the game.

Despite the rocky start, the developers have showed that they are pouring a ton of passion into this title, and it's quickly shaping up to be a very memorable experience. Feel free to check the FFXIV Goon Thread for more information or to ask any questions

If there is anything you see that is incorrect...
OR
if you wish to submit your own screenshots/paragraphs of informatory text of either spin-offs I haven't covered, or updates to things I already have covered...
OR
any sort of feedback at all really...
feel free to just PM me or Let me know in the thread, I'll do my best to keep it up to date.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 01:15 on Sep 25, 2012

# ¿ May 13, 2012 17:33

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 00:05

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

_{Written by: TurnipFritter}

Release years by system:

2009 - Nintendo DS

This Fantasy combines the great tastes of hat fetishism and storybooks. Following in the footsteps of the Final Fantasy III and Final Fantasy IV remakes, it was an attempt to create an all-new 8-bit Final Fantasy title for the NDS. 4HoL follows a group of teenagers trying to save the local princess from an evil witch. Much like in the original Final Fantasy, rescuing the princess is just the beginning: A curse befalls their hometown, turning everyone stone, and the four set out across the world to find a cure.

The Job system makes a return, this time in the form of Crowns: By changing a character's adorable hat, they change their job as well. Many traditional FF Jobs do put in an appearance (Red Mages, Dragoons and Summoners are notably absent), but with just enough design changes to make them feel fresh after FFIIIDS.

Stripped of the ATB, extraneous stats, and even the ability to manually select your targets, 4HoL is meant to be as efficient as possible. Even MP and spell charges were dropped so the player doesn't have to worry about rationing their magic through lengthy dungeon treks.

The game was met with mixed reviews. The graphics were praised as charming, while players were less than thrilled with the old school gameplay staples like "walk around and talk to everybody" and limited inventories.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2008 � PSP

This Fantasy is the equivalent of Super Smash Brothers, this brawler pits ten heroes from the main games selected by the Goddess of Order, Cosmos, to fight for the crystals against ten villains chosen by the God of Discord, Chaos.

There are twenty-two playable characters, each with their own unique playstyle, with some more difficult to master than others, but the gameplay mechanics themselves are simple to grasp, and most importantly, fun.

As a massive love letter to the series, it's chock full of references, allusions, imagery and locations spanning the entire series, be they obvious or subtle.

Fairly well recieved, and praised for its fluid combat controls (though not for the camera), it did well enough to gain a sequel Dissidia Duodecim: Final Fantasy.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2002 - Playstation 2 (Kingdom Hearts 1)
2002 - Playstation 2 (Kingdom Hearts Final Mix) (Japan Only)
2004 - Game Boy Advance (Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories)
2006 - Playstation 2 (Kingdom Hearts 2)
2007 - Playstation 2 (Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix+)
2008 - Mobile (Kingdom Hearts: Coded) (Japan Only)
2008 - Playstation 2 (Kingdom Hearts: Re: Chain of Memories)
2009 - Nintendo DS (Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days)
2010 - Playstation Portable (Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep)
2010 - Nintendo DS (Kingdom Hearts: RE:Coded)
2012 - Nintendo 3DS (Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance)
TBD - Next-Gen Consoles (Kingdom Hearts 3)

First conceived by a chance meeting between a Square executive and a Disney executive in an elevator, the Kingdom Hearts series was an unlikely fusion of Disney and Final Fantasy characters in a third person, action-adventure JRPG.

Following the story of Sora - a young boy who has been gifted the Keyblade, a key-shaped weapon of mysterious power - as he, along with Donald Duck and Goofy, attempts to stop the threat of creatures known as "the Heartless" from devouring the hearts of entire worlds, destroying them in the process. While also on the look out for his lost friends, and the missing king, Mickey Mouse.

Despite the insane premise of the union, the games have proved successful enough to become a strong series in its own right, though still replete with the usual cameos of Moogles and Final Fantasy characters.

It has its own megathread.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2006 - PS2

One of the many spawn from Square Enix's Compilation of FFVII series, the story follows the ex-Turk Vincent Valentine, three years after the end of Final Fantasy VII, as he uncovers both the reasons behind his mysterious transformation abilities and the attacks by an enigmmatic army - Deepground and the Tsviets - one of the Shinra company's lingering, hidden experiments, who are involved in the inexplicable kidnapping of thousands of people.

As a third-person shooter, something of a radical departure from the series more traditional menu-based combat, Vincent makes his way through the levels with his trusty three-barrelled pistol, Cerberus, though he can later find both a sniper rifle and machine-gun, and use magical projectiles. And occasionally can transform into a murderous rampagin hellbeast to deal with larger threats.

The game has had mostly mixed to negative reception, with common complaints being about the slippery shooting mechanics, the melodramatic story and characters, and the overabundance of cutscenes.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2007 - PSP

Taking place seven years before the start of Final Fantasy VII, the game follows the previously untold story of Zack Fair, following the trail of the missing first class SOLDIER, Genesis Rhapsodos, aided by his friend and mentor, another first class SOLDIER, Angeal Hewley, and occasionally by Sephiroth - the pride of Shinra's SOLDIER.

The game is an action RPG, similar to that of Kingdom Hearts, with battles taking place in real time and allowing Zack to move around the battlefield, attack or dodge. By equipping various materia, the player can customise his actions and moves in battle, as well as using them to give stat boosts.

The big feature of Crisis Core though is the "Digital Mind Wave" (DMW), a type of slot machine device, which will grant random bonuses, attacks or summons during the battle to aid them.

Reception to the game was mostly positive, praising the graphics, music and combat system, but with some negative issues involving the random nature of the DMW, and the character of Genesis Rhapsodos - musician, Gackt Camui's literal Mary Sue self-insert.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2004 to 2006 - Various Mobile Phones (Japan only)

The first game to be released for the Compilation, the plot is set six years before the events of Final Fantasy VII, and follows the Turks as they follow the bidding of the Shinra electric company, and try to foil the plans of AVALANCHE, an eco-terrorist organization dedicated to stopping Shinra.

Spread over twenty-five chapters and released over a period of two years, it allowed play as one of many Turk characters, each with their own speciality.

Despite hints that there would be an English release, the game still remains firmly in Japan's clutches with little chance of localisation.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

2011 - PSP (Japan Only)

This fantasy, formally known as "Agito" follows the story of Class Zero of the "Rubrum Peristylium Suzaku" magic acadamy (think FFVIII's Gardens), as they protect their country's crystal from the might of Cid Aulstyne, High Commander of the neighbouring Milites Empire, as he attempts to steal it from them.

Apparently playing similarly to Crisis Core, the player can play as 14 different characters, each specialising as a certain job. It also brings back the world map and travel by Chocobo.

Initially announced for mobile release, it was later changed to the PSP early in development. Much like Before Crisis, it remains firmly in Japan's vice-grip, though with this one, there may yet be a chance of seeing it on Western shores.

_{Written by: Pesky Splinter}

Release years by system:

TBA - PS3

This fantasy follows Prince Noctis "Noct" Lucis Caselum as he tries to protect his country's crystal from falling into enemy hands, and deal with the mysterious forces that work against him.

Initially announced in 2006, the game has fast become Final Fantasy's very own, Duke Nukem Forever, with scant information having been released over the last six years, outside of one song, three trailers and a half dozen screenshots.

The trailers seem to indicate a third-person, real time action type game, as seen in the Kingdom Hearts series, though with a chance to change to a shooting mode, and ride vehicles. Of course, whether any of that remains in the final game, remains to be seen.

Square Enix, are still apparently working on it. So watch this space!

********

Post Reserved for Tactics, bad movies, a bunch of Chocobo/Crystal Chronicle spin-offs, and ~~that Versus thing that maybe will come out sometime in our lifetime~~.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 23:07 on May 25, 2012

# ¿ May 13, 2012 17:34

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

TurnipFritter posted:

I'm poor and don't have PM so:

Nice! I'll add it to the post right away. I'll whip up a matching banner for it as well tomorrow.

Also for anyone else reading, feel free to whip up your own write-ups/screenshots for any spin-off games in the Final Fantasy series. I'll gladly add it to the OP. The same goes if you'd like some extra history about anything I've already written added as well.

vvvvvvv :glomp:

Thanks!

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 18:52 on May 13, 2012

# ¿ May 13, 2012 18:49

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

I just thought about it... I think my very first Final Fantasy was... Mystic Quest. :staredog:

# ¿ May 14, 2012 03:30

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Soylent Heliotrope posted:

"Which version should I play" info that I would like to submit into consideration for the OP:

Yea great idea, I'll add little addendums on each

Also thanks to everyone for submitting any mistakes I've made

# ¿ May 15, 2012 03:21

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

So this week the supposed :airquote:

final

FF13-2 DLC "Lightning's Story: Requiem for the Goddess" comes out.

If anyone could spoil (and don't forget to spoiler tag it) the summary of the whole DLC, it would be much appreciated.

# ¿ May 15, 2012 18:45

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Speaking of Yuffie, there was an article today on Kotaku;

quote:

Now, 15 years after its initial release, director Yoshinori Kitase has released some of the few remaining development notes [of FF7] to the Weekly Famitsu. Among the development notes, mostly consisting of rough sketches and storyboards, are some preliminary plot notes with some ideas that were never used in the game. One such plot note covers details about meeting the character Yuffie Kisaragi. The following is a translation of the plot notes:

*Initial Plot*
About Yuffie
(Prep) From the opening and forward, wanted posters for Yuffie can be seen in town here and there.
Yuffie is a fugitive. Her age and what she looks like is different for each poster.

(How to make her join)
Random encounter.
Or, she will attack Cloud when he is sleeping in an inn.
Either event can happen anywhere.

(Any time)
From this point, Yuffie can be recruited at any time.
The Wutai event requires Yuffie and therefore, she must be recruited in order to complete the Wutai event.
What Yuffie looks like (and her level) is determined when she first joins.
(This is based on the last wanted poster that was viewed)
Therefore, by selectively choosing which wanted poster you look at last, you can recruit the Yuffie that suits your liking.
*end*

Sadly, there were no rough sketches for the different Yuffie styles (Or anything on the potential resurrection of Aerith for that matter). Still, it's an interesting look at some of the ideas that went into the game and what might have been.

Could have been pretty interesting had they done this, let the player essentially choose the Yuffie look they want. Although knowing them, probably all versions would have been variations of Ninja Teenage Brats... :geno:

# ¿ May 17, 2012 19:08

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

http://squallsdead.com/ :tinfoil:

# ¿ May 23, 2012 00:10

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Just taking a short moment to let you guys know I've updated the OP with some new descriptions for other FF titles (Type-0, Versus13, Kingdom Hearts, 4HoL, and even the entire FF7 Compilation). Special thanks shout-out goes to Pesky Splinter and Turnip Fritter for actually writing these out!

:glomp:

Also a bonus reminder that anyone can write up their own description or added information, please feel free to do so! As most of you are already aware there is a veritable poo poo-load of games/spin-offs/etc.. in FF series, so any help I can get writing some of these descriptions is much appreciated.

Back on topic though;

I disagree in that, FF13's difficulty curve wasn't exactly that super-smooth. It had a overly long "tutorial" segment, where it was basically impossible for the player to fail, or for the player to deviate off track. This eventually led to the segments where you finally had access to all the Paradigm roles, but even then SAB/SYN/SEN roles were really never needed for any of the content/bosses until many hours later when you reach Gran Pulse. The critical story encounters for the game were really "under-tuned" compared to the abilities an average player had access to when he encounters them. Like ImpAtom says as well, once you reach the end-game, it simply becomes a grind fest for trophies, since the actual content had been easily beaten.

FF13-2 had a much more smooth difficulty curve in comparison, especially with the introduction of monster types containing paradigm roles you may have not unlocked yet on Noel and Serah. Not to mention the 6 paradigm roles were given to the player MUCH earlier as well. It was just a tighter paced, and IMHO, more enjoyable game play experience compared to FF13.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 23:32 on May 25, 2012

# ¿ May 25, 2012 23:26

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Fungah! posted:

Unrelated to anything anyone's talking about, but does anyone know when the FFV Four Job Challenge starts up again? I've been thinking about loading up V again and that'd be about as good an excuse as any.

Supposed to be sometime in June! I've been keeping an eye on it and will probably do a big post in this thread about it once it gets started.

vvvv
I suppose not. The patch is fine, its just the actual game ISO which falls under files. I'll update accordingly!

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 23:52 on May 25, 2012

# ¿ May 25, 2012 23:46

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Before you start reading... Click me and listen while browsing the instructions below to get you in the mood

Alright goons, it's time for this years Final Fantasy Five: Four Job Fiesta 2012!

Hosted directly by the folks at neoGAF, I've taken the liberty to bring this directly to us goons. As such, I'm posting the rules which were written by Aeana in the neoGAF thread, so props for that. A big special thanks to RevenantKioku from neoGAF for hosting this event as well!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Like last year the fiesta has its own homepage at http://www.letsplaying.com/FF5FF and its own Twitter account @FF5ForFutures

What is the Four Job Fiesta?
You play Final Fantasy 5, the best Final Fantasy game. The only difference is, you are allowed only four jobs, one from each crystal. And they are randomly assigned to you by the Gilgabot on Twitter. To claim your victory over the challenge, When you beat Exdeath, you must post a final screenshot. Your picture must show all four of those jobs being used to qualify you as a winner.

Or, this year, there is hard mode. (Use #reghard instead of #reg.)

What's hard mode?
Every time you unlock a new crystal you will get a new job from any of your currently available jobs! That includes duplicates! It's possible you may never proceed beyond Wind Crystal jobs! You could even get multiple Berserkers! Newcomers to the Fiesta are welcome to sign up for hard mode, but remember, you can end up with anything!

Could you give a detailed version of that?
As you play Final Fantasy Five, jobs are unlocked at certain parts of the game. The wind crystal, water crystal, fire crystal and earth crystal. When you unlock the wind, water, fire and earth crystal jobs, send a tweet to @FF5ForFutures with #wind, #water, #fire or #earth respectively. You will then be informed of your new job!

Here is an example;

EXTRA RULE: If your Wind Crystal Job is White Mage and you are having troubles, you may use ONE FREELANCER until the water jobs. If you are playing Hard Mode, however, this is discouraged.

What versions of FF5 are acceptable?
Any.

What if I have never played FF5 before?
It�s cool, you can still sign up.
This isn't the recommend way to play the first time. But, no one is stopping you from trying.

How do I sign up?
Make a tweet to FF5ForFutures containing #reg or #reghard. And then wait. The fiesta starts June 17th.

What if I don�t get any tweets back?
Gilgabot works on a schedule and will respond to tweets when it is able. Should ten or fifteen minutes go by, don�t resend the tweet, but let RevenantKioku know. He�ll look into it and if something is really gunked, manually set you up. It just may take a while if that is the case, but it shouldn�t be.

I don�t want to play, but I want to watch!
Feel free to check out the site and look at the logs of everyone, or the players individually. There will surely be livestreams, YouTube videos and even a few people making their own unique works here in this very thread.

What�s with that donation box?
Once again this year, the FF5FJF is being played for Child�s Play! You don�t need to donate to play, of course, but your contribution, players or no, is appreciated!
The donation period will be from June 1 to August 31. Ideally, you will want to beat the game within that time. But if you don�t, don�t worry! The site will remain operational until for a good while after that, although most of the fanfare will likely have cooled down.

Still using Twitter? Isn't that so 2008?
Gilgabot loves you. And remember, using Twitter does not give any of your personal information to anyone. If you insist on having your account set to private, let Gilgabot know so he can follow you back. You must also follow Gilgabot for it to work. There are some cool things in store this year that Twitter support is helping to allow.

I have a question!
Send a tweet to @FF5ForFutures and you will be answered as soon as possible!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What's new in 2012?
A whole lot!

1) Pledges
Tweet #pledge and what you pledge to Gilgabot and it will be logged on the site for everyone to see!
Examples

And so on. Of course we cannot make you honor your pledge and we understand things happen. But remember that it is great motivation and for a great cause!

2) Hard Mode
Detailed above. Essentially, you could end up with White Mage, White Mage, White Mage, White Mage. Or Thief, Berserker, Berserker, Bersker. Or even get something like a normal run.

3) #myparty
I FORGOT MY JOBS! OKAY I'LL JUST TWEET #myparty to Gilgabot and he'll tell me what I unlocked so far!
If, for some reason, you really don't want to visit the beautiful site that there is.

4) rk's Run
Starting June 15, RevenantKioku (the events host) is going to live stream his run. But Gilgabot is not in charge of his fate this year. You are!
Go to http://www.letsplaying.com/FF5FF/rkrun.php and select the jobs you want rk to use. Then select a donation (if any) and press submit. You must have a twitter account to make the tweet. Just tweet what comes up after submitting.
If you don't donate your vote counts once. If you do donate you add 1 vote for each donated dollar.
Donating is separate from voting. Once finished tweeting your vote, go to ChipIn, make your donation and when you donate add your twitter handle in the comment box. You can also add what you voted for to be doubly sure. Once it is confirmed that your donation went through your extra votes will be tallied.
Why not just give him the hardest jobs?
Here's the rub! rk will start live streaming his marathon on June 15. When he finishes the Fiesta starts! Of course, if he doesn't finish by June 17 it'll start anyway. But if his jobs are easier, the fiesta begins sooner! Plus, some job combinations will be funnier than others. And the hardest combo isn't really decided upon.

Why isn't he doing hard mode?
Because he doesn't want to be play Thief, Berserker, Berserker, Berserker.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 16:34 on Jun 1, 2012

# ¿ Jun 1, 2012 13:50

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Those of you who are curious, here are some statistics from last years Fiesta

# ¿ Jun 1, 2012 13:51

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Pyroxene Stigma posted:

I want to do this, but I hate twitter and don't have an account. Will someone just roll a d20 instead?

You and me both :o:

In all seriousness, you aren't alone in disdain for twitter and/or even having an account. My last tweets on my twitter account were from LAST YEARS fiesta... that's how little I use/care for it.

But like RevenantKioku says, Twitter allows for privacy (if you make a new account). Not to mention at this point the Twitter Gilgabot is pretty deeply embedded in automatically tracking a lot of things, such as the statistics of progress, donations, pledges, and job allocation of hundreds of different players all simultaneously, and automatically updates these events on website. It takes a huge load of work off the event organizer, and makes things really clean and efficient, by having Twitter support.

So making a twitter account in less than 2 minutes to sign up really saves a lot of time in the long run, and is well worth it since this event rocks!

:getin:

EDIT: I also signed up for Hard mode!

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 16:11 on Jun 1, 2012

# ¿ Jun 1, 2012 16:07

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Momomo posted:

Sounds like an interesting challenge, but I've never played V. How hard of a game is it, because I might use this as an excuse to get it.

I suggest having the best of both worlds;

You've got over 2 weeks until the Fiesta officially starts. Boot up the game and play through it like a legit first-time player would. Switch jobs around, get a feel of each job and their roles in battle, find your favorites, all that jazz.

Then when the Fiesta rolls around, you can start up a new game and dive into the challenge! :woop:

By that point you'll atleast have a base knowledge of the way the game works.

Fungah! posted:

Regged for hard mode. LET'S DO IIIIIIIIT

GBA one, hands down. Although I'm damned if I know how I'm going to get a screenshot off of it.

Last year, a lot people on were taking their victory screenshots the old fashioned way; :v:

# ¿ Jun 1, 2012 19:21

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Hedera Helix posted:

I actually just finished a White Mage/Summoner/Bard/Chemist Fiesta, so if you end up getting one of these jobs, here are some things I found out that might be helpful:

cool info, I guess I can share mine. Last year's fiesta I got Blue Mage/Time Mage/Ranger/Dancer.

* Blue Mage was an absolute cake-walk until the 2nd crystal. They are pretty resilient, can actually hit pretty hard with plain old Attack, and if you take the time to learn, have access to some really handy spells. I was worried when I got Blue Mage as my first job since I almost never play Blue Mages in prior FF's, but it proved to be surprisingly easy in the end. I really like the job now, since it's so versatile.

* Time Mage was better than I thought. Having access to Regen made things really smooth until I got White Wind on my Blue Mage. It goes without saying that Haste/Slow made things even easier. But the best thing about Time Mage by far was BREAKING RODS. For those who don't know, during a battle, if you go to the item list, go to the top row, then press up, it will show you the weapon and shield you have equipped. If you're equipped with an elemental rod (ie: Ice Rod), select it and it will cast a very powerful AoE spell of that element, but will break the rod, destroying it permanently. Destroyed many of the bosses inside and out just by buying a bunch of rods, and breaking them.

* Ranger... just put him in the back-row, Use Aim instead of Fight, and then when you get it, use X-Fight pretty much always. It's really simple, but really boring at the same time. Can't really complain though, cause it can dish out some really nice Physical damage.

* Dancer I found to be really fun. Although the Dance command is really unreliable for the most part of the game, your main goal is to eventually get the Dancing Dagger and the Rainbow Dress. The Dress makes you have a 1/2 chance (instead of 1/4 chance) of bringing out Swords Dance, which is a 9999 damage attack. The Dancing Dagger on the other hand, makes it so that there is a chance that whenever you Attack normally, it'll do a Random Dance.

Combine those two items on Dancer with X-Fight (4x Attack) and its :unsmigghh:

Harlock posted:

Is there a long delay in signing up and being recognized? I signed up sometime early yesterday and never got a confirmation.

If you're still having problems and haven't been registered (the bot should take like 10-15 mins max), you should be able to send message to @revenantkioku and he should be able to sort things out.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 02:00 on Jun 4, 2012

# ¿ Jun 4, 2012 01:45

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

quote:

Hell, there was a good MMO in there too. It's just a shame that the bullshit made it so hard to find.

FF11 contained a lot of really obtuse, distinctly Japanese, game design philosophies which made the barrier of entry really difficult to break into. Then even if you managed to break through the initial barrier, it became even more obscure, vague, and masochistic. There was no real rewarding questing mechanic like those found in modern day MMO's. With the exception of one job (Beastmaster), it was made virtually impossible to solo any of the content or levels. Traveling to new locations was a really long, and arduous process the first time around. Not to mention it was one of the few games at the time that promoted the "everyone together" philosophy, so you had North American's playing alongside Japanese players, with a very hit-or-miss auto-translate function to communicate.

With that said... FF11 was also the type of game that, if all the stars somehow magically aligned, was absolutely phenomenal. The best way I can possibly describe it is it's a diamond in the rough.

I haven't played an MMO before or after it that has come close to giving the same experience. There was nothing quite like defeating the Shadow Lord for the very first time with a group of guildmates I've met in leveling parties along the way to lv.60, who had all gone through similar experiences and hardships.

# ¿ Jun 11, 2012 19:33

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Since it's so close, I figure it's worth a reminder for all newcomers to the thread; CLICK HERE to head on over to the informatory post about the FF5 Four Job Fiesta everyone is talking about. No pressure on registering right away either, you can register whenever you feel like it, even after the event starts.

Also the Event Website actually has a LOG section for if you feel like recording a journal (of sorts) of your journey. You can actually tweet the GILGABOT �@FF5ForFutures #up My FF5 Story Part #1 <LINK TO SA POST>� or something like that and people viewing the event website will be able to click and be brought to your thread-post here.

I can't wait to see everyone's stories of success and despair this fiesta too. :allears:

EDIT: speaking of despair from RevenantKioku's stream (Blue Mage/Berserker/Bard/Dancer)...

quote:

Trying to learn White Wind [Blue Magic] so they used Pond Chorus [Frog Song] on the berserker to stop him from killing the enemy. Death Sickle Axe's instant death proc activates when the frog'd Berserker attacks. Thats got to be a run highlight.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 00:53 on Jun 16, 2012

# ¿ Jun 16, 2012 00:44

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Knight!

Double-grip Axe-wielding Berserkers here I come :black101:

Rooreelooo posted:

Motherf... wasn't there a rule that says you're allowed to use a freelancer as well? Because i can already tell that this is gonna be a looong road to victory...

quote:

EXTRA RULE: If your Wind Crystal Job is White Mage and you are having troubles, you may use ONE FREELANCER until the water jobs. If you are playing Hard Mode, however, this is discouraged.

# ¿ Jun 16, 2012 12:55

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

I just found a pretty informative Class Analysis post by Man God over at NeoGAF from last years Fiesta. I figured I would share it with you all!

quote:

FF V JOB FIESTA CLASS ANALYSIS:

Guaranteed Game Winners (By Crystal)

Knight

Default Ability: !Guard
Innate Abilities: Cover
Can use: Daggers, Light Swords, Heavy Swords, Shields
Affects:
Strength: +23
Agility: +1
Stamina: +20
Magic: -14
Total ABP to master: 690

Abilities: Cover, !Guard, 2 Handed, Eq Shields, Eq Armor, Eq Swords

Upsides: Knights are the best pure physical attackers in the game. Two handed makes world one a joke up until the earth crystal. They can heal with flametongues, use flame shields to open up their equipment slot. Excalibur and Brave Blade are insane, and Ragnarok is even better, though you're unlikely to get it. The only better equip ability in the game over what the Knight has is Equip Ribbons. Shields are awesome on mages, Knight swords are awesome on Berserkers, Ninjas, Dancers, and any other physical class. Heavy Armor can also be really decent. Knights take almost as good as they give. Rapid Fire, Dual Wield, Spellblade are all amazing on a knight. They can be decent users of White Wind because of the HP.

Downsides: Kinda slow. Might want to take Brave Blade (and never run ever) over Chicken Knife. Yeah, not much here, knights rule.

Fun Idea: Dueling Knights in the fork tower have the rare steal of Flame Shield! Get four, equip shields and you have late game healing sown up while freeing up your accessory slot!

Blue Mage

Default Ability: !Blue (all spells)
Innate Abilities: Learning
Can use: Knives, Light Swords, Rods, Shields
Affects:
Strength: -8
Agility: +1
Stamina: +3
Magic: +23
Total ABP to master: 350

Abilities: !Check, Learning, !Blue !Scan

Upsides: Decent equipment for mages, blue magic is insanely useful in this game. Magic power ignoring healing through reflect, mighty guard for buffing, level 5 death for money/abp grinding on objects d'art, other level x spells giving you untold options. Dancing Dirk is all you need to get all the spells in the game, but Beast Master can make your challenge even less difficult. All that and you can equip shields.

Downsides: Berserkers can kill your learning buzz...and that's about it.

Fun Idea: You can teach the Rift boss Azulmagia the few Blue Magic spells he doesn't know! Self Destruct in front of him for any easy victory, but remember to learn any spells you can from him first!

Mystic Knight

Default Ability: !Spellblade
Innate Abilities: Magic Shell
Can use: Daggers, Light Swords, Shields
Affects:
Strength: +14
Agility: +14
Stamina: +14
Magic: +1
Total ABP to master: 680

Abilities:Magic Shell, !Spell blade lv1- !Spell blade lv6

Upsides: Easy single target healing via flame spell blade, easily self healing with drain sword, break sword kills everything not immune to it, elemental weakness enemies are also one shot. Good stamina, great speed, spellblade works on all knight swords, most light swords, all regular knives and some ninja knives. Give this guy two handed, dual wield or rapid fire and its really game over. Oh, add shields and heavy armor to that. Incredible class. Can easily solo Exdeath.

Downsides: Lowest Strength of any Heavy Armor job. Poor knowledge of enemies can lead to embarassing multi thousand hp heals. Yeah, I'm stretching here.

Fun Ideas: Well, you need flare and holy swords for their incredible strength, but what if you don't have a caster with you? Silence Sword to the rescue.

Summoner

Default Ability: !Summon (all spells)
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Rods
Affects:
Strength: -10
Agility: -1
Stamina: -1
Magic: +33
Total ABP to master: 750

Abilties: !Summon 1- !Summon6, !Call

Upsides: Ultimate utility caster. Insanely high base magic. Spells of every element, instagib abilities, Full revival, Perfect physical and magic protection. Rods. You give them !gaia, !barehanded, !animals, !throw (yes throw, scrolls+appropriate rod+high magic power=dead enemies at a low low cost) or any of the wind crystal magical jobs and they will just be better. Remember kids, Air Knifes will boost Slydra!

Downsides: Not good with physical hits. Boo hoo. Not that fast either.

Fun Idea: Call is actually pretty awesome...if you skip every early summon except Ifrit and Titan (you can't miss them) you can turn call into a powerhouse summon most of the time!

Chemist

Default Ability: !Drink
Innate Abilities: Pharmacology
Can use: Knives, Staves
Affects:
Strength: +2
Agility: +3
Stamina: +6
Magic: -4
Total ABP to master: 630

Abilities Pharmacology, !Mix, !Recover ,!Revive

Upsides: The truely broken !mix ability can beat any boss at pretty much any level. Speaking of levels, they don't matter. You can buff your entire party to level 255 if you want, with 9999 hp. Bosses will do almost nothing to you. You can also add almost every buff in the game to your physical attackers. !Drink would be an amazing ability if not for mix only being able to do most of that stuff. You even have options for debuffing (crippling really) most bosses or just killing them with your underrated targeted attacks. Anything to improve the Chemists horrible defense and regular offensive abilities is appreciated.

Downsides: Some of the worst stats in the game. But who cares?

Fun Ideas: Most people know all about raising your own level and such, but if you have a Blue Mage, raising your opponents level can be just what you need for added violent death.

Samurai

Default Ability: !Zeninage
Innate Abilties: Shirahadori
Can use: Daggers, Katanas, Shields
Affects:
Strength: +19
Agility: +2
Stamina: +19
Magic: -12
Total ABP to master: 820

Abilities: !Mineuchi, !Zeninage, Shirahadori, Eq Katana, !Ianuki

Upsides: GP Rain, Critical hit happy katanas, arguably the best 12 legendary weapon that gives you a free turn before anyone else, heavy armor, shields. !GP Rain is wanted by everyone except Berserkers and can easily kill old Exdeath. You also have some interesting utility with your slow as hell Odin impersonation. Shirahadori is amazing when passed as an innate to freelancers but isn't great in a fiesta challenge. Equip Katana could probably be used on a Berserker. Samurai's love the stuff other physical classes do; Equip Swords, Two Handed, Dual Wield, that sort.

Downsides: Katanas are rare early on. GP Rain can be expensive and won't be great damage if you are low level. Yeah, not much here to complain about.

Fun Ideas: Thieves can steal a ton of good Katanas early on. !Ianuki works on some bosses, give it a go!

Great Party Member (By Crystal)

Black Mage

Default Ability: !Black (all spells)
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Rods
Affects:
Strength: -9
Agility: No Change
Stamina: -2
Magic: +31
Total ABP to master: 680

Abilties: !Black 1 - !Black 6, MP+ 30%

Upsides: Black Magic, high magic attack power. This class was the hardest to place as it really is almost good enough to hang with the big boys. Firaga+Flame Rings is basically just as good of a method of healing as Curaga. Break (so long as it beats the opponents M. Def) is really useful. You can break rods...or equip them to make your spells even better. !Black is appreciated as a back up (or primary) casting method on the water crystal caster jobs and on a team with flame rings can go on ANYONE for some in battle quick healing. You go great with any passed caster abilities, or !Gaia or Barehanded for some early destruction. A good defensive equip also never goes wrong.

Downsides: Terrible non casting stats. Not the best equipment choices. Only one Magus Rod that you might need to share with another class. Have a hard time against Garula.

Fun Ideas: Black Mages, like Knights, are terribly straight forward. Give them fun attacks that use Magic Power and stuff will fall over.

White Mage

Default Ability: !White (all spells)
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Staves
Affects:
Strength: -7
Agility: +1
Stamina: No change
Magic: +25
Total ABP to master: 580

Abilties: !White 1 - !White 6, MP +10%

Upsides: Straight forward healing magic and decent defensive buffs. After doing a bunch of Fiesta challenges without white magic you really start to appreciate it. It goes well with all other caster jobs and is a great all around job to toss on someone for a quick heal and then put on a different ability. Late game Holy does destroy all. As with all casting jobs does well with any Magic Power based abilities.

Downsides: Weak. Hard to beat Garula with just them (Cure and be lucky) Yeah, that's about it, White Mages rule.

Fun Stuff: White Mage your only caster and you need to beat Omni? Berserk him after buffing your party up! You can do it! Also you can beat the crap out of Metamorph's in the sages cave for their awesome staff of light!

Time Mage

Default Ability: !Time (all spells)
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Rods, Staves
Affects:
Strength: -5
Agility: +2
Stamina: -3
Magic: +24
Total ABP to master: 530

Abilities: !Time 1 - !Time 6, Equip Rods

Upsides: Buff Magic is extremely strong in this game. They have most of it; Regen, Haste, Quick, Float. Not to mention their impressive as hell debuffs; Slow, Silence, Old, Stop. Don't forget gravity based attacks (pretty decent on non heavy enemies) and Meteor and Comet. These guys can do it all. !Time is a great second spell school for other casters, all other classes appreciate haste without an accessory and equip rods, while expensive, can still be useful if you master it early enough. Also Thieves LOVE RETURN. Time mages themselves love other spell schools and defensive equips, and stuff like !gaia, !animals, !call, that sort of thing.

Downsides: Direct damage is random. Same boring and bad cloth equips.

Fun Ideas: More of a glitch but Return does not reset Odin's timer in the NA and JPN versions of FFVa! Return is awesome for stealing so go crazy after you get that thief's knife.

Beastmaster

Default Ability: !Catch/!Free
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Whips
Affects:
Strength: +13
Agility: +1
Stamina: +8
Magic: -3
Total ABP to master: 460

Abilities: !Calm, !Control, Equip Whips, !Catch

Upsides: Beastmasters are hard to place. On one hand, they have bad equipment and mediocre stats and seem to lack for ways of dealing direct damage. On the other hand, !Control is probably the second best ability in the game behind !Mix. !Control allows you to completely control one monsters actions and it works on just about every single non boss creature in the game. If you have a blue mage you have just made the game extremely easy, but don't overlook its other uses. You can keep a monster from attacking you for at least one turn, and possibly many more if it has a magical attack that it can damage itself or its allies with. You can also use some monsters for healing or buffing. !Catch is also extremely powerful in the right hands. This often mysterious ability can produce some amazing effects like 25% health drain on any monster, Mega Flare, Curaga, Reflect, or other spells. They appreciate any more reliable method of damage dealing or defense, and minus three magic isn't that bad if you have a spell school to give them.

Downsides: They never really impress with the damage. Sure you can get a 9999 hit out of them, but only one. Controlling your way through fights can take a long, long time.

Fun Stuff: Fire Lash, their legendary weapon, blows. Stingrays however can sometimes drop the Dragon's Whisker, a really decent whip that does double damage on dragons. Get one if you can!

Ninja

Default Ability: !Throw
Innate Abilities: First Strike, Dual-Wield
Can use: Knives, Ninja Weapons
Affects:
Strength: +15
Agility: +14
Stamina: +3
Magic: -10
Total ABP to master: 690

Abilities: !Smoke, !Image, First Strike, !Throw, Dual Wield

Upsides: Dual Wield is a fantastic ability that every physical class wouldn't mind having.
!Throw is a great source of damage and is an underrated ability when used with the scrolls on Mage classes. One of the best possible partners and almost good enough for the top tier.

Downsides: Knifes aren't the best weapon and there aren't many good ones in world two without having a thief around. Tend to get blown up from time to time in the front row.

Fun Ideas: You can duplicate items in the original SFC version of FF V! Don't do it!

Bard

Default Ability: !Sing
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Harps
Affects:
Strength: -8
Agility: +8
Stamina: -9
Magic: +11
Total ABP to master: 175

Abilities: !Hide, Eq Harps, !Sing

Upsides: Bards are normally considered one of the worst classes in the game, so why are they so high in a Fiesta challenge? Buffs. If Chemists are the Batman of FFV, Bards are the Robin. If you can survive Exdeath long enough to get going you can destroy Neo Exdeath. Bards need help from any good ability, and can only really pass on !Sing and !Hide in return. Bards also dominate the first half of world three with the Apollo's Harp and Requiem song. CAN KILL OMEGA.

Downsides: Maybe the worst stat block in the game. Equip Harps is fairly bad. Terrible equipment. Can't even use equip shields.

Fun Ideas: !Hide can actually be a great ability. Make a Zombie with a weapon that casts an offensive spell on hit (Thor's Hammer is ideal) and give the Zombie a reflect ring. !Hide the rest of the party.

Ranger

Default Ability: !Aim
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Bows
Affects:
Strength: +16
Agility: +12
Stamina: +1
Magic: -5
Total ABP to master: 600

Abilities: !Aim, !Animals, Equip Bows, !Rapid Fire

Upsides: !Rapid Fire, is an insanely potent ability. Four Attacks with one weapon at half power. This is normally paired with Spell Blade in a regular playthrough for your standard kill em all Freelancer, but on any offensive character this is a real treat. Rangers love a better weapon than bows so Equip Swords, Katanas, Hell maybe Lance is a good idea.
!Animals is also a great early ability for casters.

Downsides: Bows are inaccurate in this game. Animals fall off in usefulness pretty quickly.

Fun Idea: They might fall off quickly, but if you level enough and have a good Magic Power then animals can be pretty disgusting.

The game picks a random number between the character's level and 0, and
produces an attack according to a chart. At level 60 and beyond you can summon a unicorn who heals your party to full, no questions asked!

Dancer

Default Ability: !Dance
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives
Affects:
Strength: +5
Agility: +5
Stamina: +10
Magic: -5
Total ABP to master: 400

Abilities: !Flirt, !Dance, Equip Ribbons

Upsides: Dancers are a lot like Bards, bad stats, look useless, not used much in standard playthroughs. However underneath the soft exterior lies the heart of a true glass cannon. Sword Dance can be absolutely brutal with a high powered weapon like the Chicken Knife, or even worse on a dual wielding character or someone with the right sword. Equip Ribbons is normally outshined by the freelancer, but in this challenge it is a great asset for Exdeath. Dancers can use some defensive help, and another more reliable outlet of offense like !Throw is a good idea. Magic can work with only a minus five, but isn't ideal.

Downsides: Terrible Stats, Dies all the time without defensive help.

Fun Ideas: Flirt isn't that bad really. Works on most non heavy enemies as a sort of stun lock. Rainbow Dress and the other dancer equipment doubles the chance of it working.

Adequate (By Crystal)

Monk

Default Ability: !Kick
Innate Abilities: Barehanded, Counter
Can use: None
Affects:
Strength: +26
Agility: +1
Stamina: +26
Magic: -23
Total ABP to master: 700

Abilities: !Focus, Barehanded, !Chakra, Counter, HP + 10%, HP + 20%, HP + 30%

Upsides: Low cost high hit point front line glass cannons of doom. Barehanded is almost enough to get one through the first world by itself and is an amazing early ability for mages, giving them the unequipped proportional strength of a spider. !Focus ignores the running away effect of the chicken knife but is otherwise too time consuming to consider using much. Monks are basically the only offensive class that doesn't want two handed or dual wield, but I think rapid fire will work out well for them. Monks are the worst casters in the game. Chemists and Dancers and Bards might want the HP +30% though for surviving Ex Death. Their damage is affected greatly by their level, so if you're having trouble just level up!

Downsides: While being amazing in the first world, Monks fall off a cliff in the second part of the game. Kaiser Knuckles can bring them back to a degree of awesomeness at the high price of a better accessory.

Fun Stuff: While you can't do it in the fiesta challenge, Guard+Counter can lockdown a bunch of enemies in the regular game, including any boss that relies on physicals. !Kick is the only command that you can't pass to any other class!

Thief

Default Ability: !Steal
Innate Abilities: Find Passages, Sprint, Vigilance
Can use: Knives, Special
Affects:
Strength: +1
Agility: +16
Stamina: +2
Magic: -6
Total ABP to master: 635

Abilities: Find Passages, !Flee, Sprint, !Steal, Vigilance, !Mug, Artful Dodger.

Upsides: Who cares if they aren't the best offensive class, Thieves can steal the entire game. This is extremely powerful, allowing for equipment not normally seen until much later, if at all, to be had, sometimes in unlimited quantities. Almost certainly the best class for gil production in this game. Thieves do well in almost every party. Some classes really appreciate the early equipment, Samurais have a great source of Katanas, you can get awesome Ninja knives very early, free flame rings for all, much easier reflect rings, all the Elixers you can drink. As mentioned earlier a Thief loves Time mages for the return spell. Real men also appreciate Dash, especially when combined with the Dash button found in the ports for light speed warping. Thieves are probably the second best Chicken Knife user and appreciate anything that can add to their offense or defense.

Downside: No good attacking stat. Hard early going with the Thief, and not terribly useful in the third world without some serious help from other jobs. Still, who cares, Stealing stuff is awesome!

Fun Ideas: Instead of throwing gold needles at Objects D'art on your Thief's turn, try stealing. Double Lances are uncommonly good at that early part of the game, especially if you have a Ninja around. You can also get unlimited Flame Rings from the Monster chests in the Barrier Tower if you have return.

Red Mage

Default Ability: !Red (all spells)
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Knives, Light Swords, Rods, Staves
Affects:
Strength: +8
Agility: +5
Stamina: -6
Magic: +8
Total ABP to master: 1159

Abilities: !Red 1 - !Red 3, Dualcast

Upsides: If you have !Black, !White, then congratulations, you just won the game. Without it, you have one of the best first world classes who really can't do anything great except break rods in world two and three. Offensive Equips can help a lot.

Downsides: Can't do enough damage, isn't good enough for the front row without serious help. Takes forever to master!

Fun Ideas: Nothing really.

Geomancer

Default Ability: !Gaia
Innate Abilities: Find Pits, Light Step
Can use: Knives, Bells
Affects:
Strength: +4
Agility: +2
Stamina: +4
Magic: +24
Total ABP to master: 460

Abilities: !Gaia, Find Pits, Light Step

Upsides: Geomancers are hard to wrap your head around. Decent if unimpressive physical stats, great magical stat, weird, seemingly random ability, terrible (for the most part) weapon, very little practical use. Believe it or not though, this was the second hardest class to place as it is actually really great if you know what to do with it! Depending on what terrain you are in you can do serious elemental damage or even 100% reliable instant death on all non heavy monsters. Geomancers also love getting spell casting schools and are ideally placed being a fire crystal job. They can also use a shield or heavier armor to great effect if you have a knight, and have just barely enough stamina to do ok in the front row for most of the game if you have a decent weapon equip to give them. Gaia Gear can boost Earth Damage (found in about a third of all terrains) and Air Knife can boost Wind Damage (found in almost every terrain) and as mentioned before, spell casting classes LOVE geomancy for random battles.

Downside: The reason they are here is that without the right party Geomancers can seem like a drag. They offer very little to the physical classes besides an inconsistent source of multitarget damage. But with the right make up these guys can really shine. Bells (save for one shining example) are probably the second worst weapon in the game.

Fun Ideas: Geomancers rule against Neo Exdeath as the only spell you get in space is Wind Slash, a high damage MT Wind spell. You can win Rune Chimes off of Baldanders in the Ronka Ruins section of the Rift that is basically a better version of Magus Rod for Geomancers, boosting every type in the game save for Water. Geomancy is a lot like Animals in that access to better spells is random and governed by your level, so you can just keep leveling and get some truely impressive results in certain terrains.

Dragoon

Default Ability: !Jump
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Daggers, Spears, Shields
Affects:
Strength: +18
Agility: +5
Stamina: +15
Magic: -12
Total ABP to master: 600

Abilities: !Jump, !Lance, Equip Lances

Upsides: Heavy Armor and the ability to kill Dragons. That's it.

Downsides: Takes forever to master, lances suck, offers pretty much nothing other classes would want.

Fun Ideas: The upper back part of Neo Exdeath is considered a Dragon. Bahamut, despite being god king of dragons, isn't.

Berserker

Default Ability: None
Innate Abilities: None
Can use: Daggers, Axes, Hammers, Shields
Affects:
Strength: +21
Agility: -9
Stamina: +25
Magic: -23
Total ABP to master: 500

Abilities: Berserk, Equip Axes

Upside: Insane Damage potential and high survivability. Axes ignore the effects of Old. Don't have to mash A. Loves Equip Swords, Katanas, Dual Wield, Two Handed, HP +30%, Barehanded, Counter and nothing else.

Downside: Cannot control. Ruins Beastmasters lunch. Can't equip any action ability, must rely on other things. Can be a liability in certain counter happy boss fights.

Fun Ideas: There is a ridculous number of awesome Axes and Hammers that appear in the late game like the Gaia and Thor's Hammer (Thor's are infinite!) Titan Axe, Earthshaker though you need to go into the Advance dungeon to get this one.

# ¿ Jun 16, 2012 14:36

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

So I finally got some free time to spend on the Fiesta, and I've ended up with...

Does anyone want to give some advice as to how to assign sub commands for this team?

Is DblGrip better than Dual-Wield on these physical attackers? Should I go for DblGrip Axe Berserkers or Dual-Wield Axe Berserkers? Should I be giving EquipAxe/Sword to my Ninja? or EquipSword to my Berserkers instead of using Axes/Hammers? Or something else all together?

I'm really unsure on these types of fine details on which weapon is more ideal. I've never really had to deal with so many physical attackers all at once.

# ¿ Jun 24, 2012 20:58

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Thanks everyone for the advice on DblGrip vs. Dual Wield and others, it was very enlightening, and it helped me tonight in accomplishing this...!

_{(Knight/Berserker/Ninja/Berserker)}

God drat that was tough...

The team was in the range of Level 42-44, and my strategy involved putting my Knight and Ninja in permanent Defensive Item-popping mode. Tossing Phoenix Downs, Elixirs, and Hi-Potions pretty much non-stop while praying that my two Berserkers hit the proper targets instead of swinging at nothing. I ended up giving one Berserker DblGrip with Rune Axe, and the other Dual-Wield with Thor's Hammer and Earth Hammer. I also wound up giving my Ninja Equip Shields of all things, because Blocking is way too clutch in this game. Not the most graceful of strategies.. but hey, it worked!

All in all, a very enjoyable challenge compared to last year. I'm glad I managed to complete it.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 04:15 on Jun 25, 2012

# ¿ Jun 25, 2012 04:10

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

W.T. Fits posted:

For a list of good rare steals, consult this Google document a bunch of the guys in the IRC channel threw together: FF5FJF Tips

Woa very nice! This document is great. Major kudos to the people who contributed.

# ¿ Jun 25, 2012 21:14

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Berk Berkly posted:

I also keep finding it an amusing bit of video-gamism that you can steal the pelt right off of a living animal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBrHWgg522U

:v:

# ¿ Jun 28, 2012 15:18

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

and... DONE! Finished my 2nd Fiesta run.

_{(White Mage/Thief/Monk/Dancer)}

This team was surprisingly bad compared to my previous team of Knight/Ninja/Berserker/Berserker. It took a really long time for this team to finally come into it's own.

Getting White Mage first was very slow progress until the Water crystal.
Getting Thief second was even slower, and the damage they dish out is marginal.
Getting Monk third, helped a little, but not as much as I would have liked.
Then Dancer coming in fourth, actually lowered my killing speed for a long while because I had to sacrifice a Monk for it.

Atleast my previous team had tons of killing power. The bright side was that thanks to !White, I was able to endure my way through most encounters, not matter how subpar my damage output was.

Only after I got a fully charged Chicken Knife and a Rainbow Dress did my Dancer suddenly become a powerhouse of 9999 Sword dances every odd turn or so. Because of this, beating Neo Exdeath basically involved liberal use of Blink/Shell/Protect/Curaga on everyone, and the power of DANCE!!! :woop:

# ¿ Jun 29, 2012 05:19

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Kyrosiris posted:

And liquifying people with Holy, I imagine.

I didn't have Holy since I couldn't figure out a way to beat Omniscient with this team :blush:

I tried casting Berserk on him so that I could hit him with Melee, but he ended up physically hitting both my characters for more than their max HP, even with protect on. Silence didn't last long at all, and relying on damaging him through Reflect wasn't working and/or was too time consuming.

Any ideas?

EDIT:
vvvvv... Ohhhh, I didn't even think about draining his MP. Nice idea. It's amazing that this game from 1992 actually allows these kinds of strategies.

EDIT EDIT:
vvvvv... GOD! I didn't even think of using Blink to deal with Berserked Omniscient :cripes:

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 05:42 on Jun 29, 2012

# ¿ Jun 29, 2012 05:29

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Mega64 posted:

...Welp.

Godspeed on your challenge, great goon :patriot:

This Solo-Edge challenge sounds rough.

# ¿ Jun 30, 2012 02:46

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Somewhat under the radar, but Theatrhythm Final Fantasy is coming out this tuesday (and this friday for EU) for 3DS for those who are interested in playing Elite Beat Agents to Final Fantasy music. I'll do a write-up for the OP sometime next week as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypYapTG7jIQ

And in the spirit of the FF5 Fiesta, the above video is Clash on the Big Bridge on Expert/Hard mode. Looks pretty difficult to say the least.

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 06:00 on Jul 1, 2012

# ¿ Jul 1, 2012 05:57

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

THE AWESOME GHOST posted:

Yeah I realized this later. Seems kinda flawed as a lot of the wind jobs are simple but useful, like I'm pretty sure a Knight is better than a Dragoon at any point of the game and "Hard" mode can give you an easier party a lot of the time.

Yea I agree, Hard mode isn't necessarily difficult when you have a chance of getting some really stellar teams that aren't possible in Normal mode. Usually if you luck into even 1 of the really powerful jobs (Mystic Knight, Chemist, Black Mage, etc...) the game becomes a cakewalk regardless.

Next year I'd love to see a "Weak" mode, where Gilgabot basically only assigns you jobs from a pool of the community-decided weak or flawed jobs. A good example can be found if you look at the Job Fair prices set for each job, and basically take all the cheapest costing jobs. So for example;

Weak Wind Jobs

Weak Water Jobs

Weak Fire Jobs

Weak Earth Jobs

Then you could combine Weak-mode with Hard-mode to almost guarantee yourself some really awful, and consequently challenging, team setups.

Even then, Time Mage and Freelancer might be too good for this type of challenge lol.

# ¿ Jul 3, 2012 20:33

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Fister Roboto posted:

Not sure why you consider Time Mages weak, considering all the awesome spells in time magic. !Time is good to slap on literally every other class due to Quick. Also including freelancer defeats the purpose of the challenge.

Yea... That's why I mentioned in the same post that Freelancer and Time Mage probably aren't suitable, since they're both good classes. :shobon:

I added them partially because I thought having more than 2 jobs (8 total) per crystal would have been nice for diversities sake, and also because both of those classes take a good while to actually become very powerful. But they totally don't need to be there, it's just a suggestion after all.

# ¿ Jul 4, 2012 00:07

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Mill Village posted:

I'm playing FF XII IZJS again, and I'm really unsure about my jobs now. There's so many different teams that work that I just can't decide on one. This is what I have right now:

Vaan- Hunter
Balthier- Knight
Fran- Red Mage
Basch- White Mage
Penelo- Black Mage
Ashe- Samurai

I keep thinking I'm going to regret making Basch a White Mage and Vaan a Hunter. I also feel like I need a Time Mage, but their lack of offensive options makes me unsure.

Well pretty much any job setup can succeed (to varying degrees), so that's not much of a problem in the end. You really can go with what you find most enjoyable.

With that said though, I would say on first glance the biggest (and probably only) flaw with your team is that you literally have no way to physically hit flying enemies. You can of course always cast offensive black magic or use Shades of Black on your Samurai to circumvent the issue. In my opinion, this can get sort of tedious, but considering most of the enemies in the game are grounded, it's really not that big of a deal.

Another work around you've got is that Telekinesis (Allows you to strike with physical damage at range) eventually will become available for your Hunter and Knight. The downside is that Telekinesis is found in a chest somewhat late in the game, and your Knight can only learn it if you get purchase the Ultima Esper on your Knight's Licenseboard, which is also late in the game. Another possibility is from one of the notable changes to IZJS; Monk's Pole weapon and Uhlan's Spears can now strike flying enemies, so maybe even consider adding one of those to your team (or the obvious Archer & Machinist jobs).

# ¿ Jul 4, 2012 00:54

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

I did too... :smith:

(This and more FF/Classic Gaming related artwork can be found here)

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 15:44 on Jul 4, 2012

# ¿ Jul 4, 2012 15:19

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Cross-posting Mo0's awesome Theatrythm Final Fantasy thread :siren:

Seriously this game is a lot of fun despite having a terrible title. You should check out the thread if you are a at all fan of either Rhythm Games or Sweet Final Fantasy Music.

# ¿ Jul 4, 2012 21:02

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

In a very not at all surprising fashion, Motomu Toriyama hints at a new Final Fantasy XIII in Ultimania Omega

quote:

http://www.novacrystallis.com/?p=3027

The Final Fantasy XIII-2 Ultimania Omega has made it out into the wild, and with that comes the usual bits of information contained within.

In addition to a collection of artworks from the game, including rough character sketches of Lightning, Hope, Serah and Caius by Tetsuya Nomura, the guide also features a brief interview with staff members Yoshinori Kitase and Motomu Toriyama.

The most interesting bits come from questions regarding the recent Lightning episode DLC, which includes perhaps a bit of insight into Toriyama�s next project. �Like Lightning advancing one step forward in the secret event, I think we want to take a step forward to advance our own project. From now on, I�d be happy if you could anticipate it.�

Does this mean Final Fantasy XIII-3 is truly in the works? Toriyama did recently mention he would be working on a new project soon after XIII-2′s completion� and with XIII-2 not exactly �concluded� I suppose we�ll find out in due time.

Another bit from the guide translated by Gematsu reads:

Kitase: (The last part about Lightning�s DLC Episode) Explaining �XXX Years Later� would be pointless. It might seem that the line �To Be Continued�� means that Lightning�s chapter will continue in more download content, but we are doing it in a different interpretation.

Toriyama: With Lightning remaining in the 〇〇〇〇ル (crystal?) but still keeping her heart, you could say that the world of Final Fantasy XIII will be permanently 〇〇ed. I�m praying for the day to come that Lightning will surely 〇〇めて (wake up?) and Serah will be rewarded.

quote:

http://squareportal.net/2012/07/05/the-announcement-of-final-fantasy-xiii-3-is-happening-soon

The Announcement of Final Fantasy XIII-3 Is Happening Soon?

According to the Famitsu interview when they asked �Is there something Final Fantasy XIII related in the works at the moment?� Motomu Toriyama has commented that we may soon discover the meaning behind the secret ending of Lightning DLC which was released in last May.

In few interviews Kitase has commented that they want development cycles like Call of Duty series. Also a lot of original Final Fantasy XIII staff wasn�t credited for Final Fantasy XIII-2. This makes us wonder: Has another team been working on XIII-3 when other has been doing XIII-2?

Maybe we'll hear something more at TGS?

# ¿ Jul 5, 2012 15:15

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Fister Roboto posted:

I rereg'd for the Fiesta, and my first three jobs are Knight, Berserker, Ninja. Unless I get Chemist for the fourth one, this is going to be rough.

This is very close to my first run of Knight, Berserker, Ninja, Berserker :pwn:

It was pretty rough, and I had to level a little bit in certain areas but it was still very much doable.
Here are some tips though for this kind of team;

Berserker LOVES DblGrip OR Dual-Wield. Dual-wielding Death Scythes is double the death chance!
EquipAxe on Ninja + Dual-Wield on Berserker + 4 Death Scythes =
EquipSwords is great on Ninja, and Dual-Wield is great on Knight
Contrarily when you need to be defensive, EquipShield is nice for Ninja, and !Image is nice for Knight!
Due to the lack of conventional healing Stock up on Hi-Potions, and focus on Healing your party only outside of battles. (Unconventionally, Flametongue and Fire Absorb equipment also works very well)
Sometimes Offense is the best Defense. Many times when I first fought I boss, I would literally just try to see if I could kill the boss before it killed me, by ignoring all healing (except for tossing Phoenix Downs) and just making everyone attack every turn. This strategy succeeded an alarming amount of times.

# ¿ Jul 6, 2012 23:31

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

If someone knows, I'd appreciate an explanation behind the final events with Cid Raines in FF13.

He's leading the cavalry in the hunt against Lightning and her crew for most of the game, eventually you encounter him and he reveals that he's also an L'Cie and that he was planning to overthrow the Fal'cie, but cannot due to his focus binding him. Then he goes all Super-Saiyan Ci'Eth on you, and you have a Boss Fight where you beat him and he Dies/Turns into Crystal.

The spoilered part above is fine. The problem comes afterwards, where there is a long period of time that goes by where you literally never hear about this guy ever again. Then eventually your party gets in a space-shuttle and flies through a portal and winds up back at Eden in the middle of an F-Zero race, and you witness a cinematic directors wet dream of a cutscene, which starts with... Cid Raines addressing the people on a Jumbotron? The same Cid Raines who was killed/crystallized by you earlier, seems to be alive and totally okay. Then after that, he's once again never heard of or mentioned again.

:psyduck:

Was this ever explained or did I just totally miss something? If so when/where/by whom? I always thought that the explanation was the cinematic team completed that jumbotron cinematic before the story was solidified by the writing staff... But that can't be right :ohdear:

Happy Blue Cow fucked around with this message at 06:08 on Jul 12, 2012

# ¿ Jul 12, 2012 06:01

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Winks posted:

Got crystalled, taken back, uncrystalled, forced to be leader (Primarch, instead of Barty), then boom, headshot

I seriously had no idea when "taken back, uncrystalled, forced to be leader (Primarch, instead of Barty)" was ever explained or showcased :negative:

But that does answer my question, thanks.

# ¿ Jul 12, 2012 06:13

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Modoh posted:

So, more FF5 stuff.

Is there any good way around Almagest? I know about the Aegis Shield working on it, but allowing a Berserker to survive alone isn't all that helpful since he can't bring back the other guys. It's currently one-shotting my whole party, and I don't really have much to work with on my team of 2 Dancers/2 Berserkers. The only solution I can come up with right now is just grinding to nearly level 50 so my Dancers can survive the hit, but I'd like to avoid that if possible.

Use a Magic Lamp to summon Catoblepas to cast Break, instantly killing the bottom-right part of NeoExDeath, which is the part that casts Almagest.

# ¿ Jul 13, 2012 21:56

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Gammatron 64 posted:

Yeah, FF12 is like the first Final Fantasy game ever that has lovely music. Up until that point, one of the primary selling points to those games was really really great music.

It's not the first game that wasn't primarily composed by Nobuo Uematsu (Naoshi Mizuta did most of XI) but XII was done almost entire by Hitoshi Sakimoto, who did Tactics Advance, and it shows.

You guys are seriously way too harsh on FF12's Soundtrack.

To say that its music is "different", sure. "unmemorable", possibly. "not your favorite", subjective... But to define it as lovely and really crappy? What the?!

Giza Plains and Dalmascan Desert, The Empires Theme, Rabanastre, Esper and Boss Fight Themes, just to name a few. Not to mention probably the best renditions of The Clash on the Big Bridge and the Crystal Theme (from the opening) that the series has ever done. There is seriously a ton of really stellar orchestral tracks in FF12.

# ¿ Jul 16, 2012 20:47

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Himuro posted:

Final Fantasy XII does indeed have the best rendition of The Prologue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HM7MGqzekFU

:swoon:

# ¿ Jul 16, 2012 20:52

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 00:05

Happy Blue Cow: Oct 23, 2008; I have moooore respect for
Mr. Carpainter then others. Even if I become someone's steak dinner, I'll still respect him.

Azure_Horizon posted:

These are cool, custom dialog boxes you can stick on your fridge. The examples are classic quotes from FFVI, but you could make them say anything.

Thanks for bringing these to my attention, it's awesome and I bought one.

# ¿ Jul 25, 2012 03:12

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Final Fantasy Megathread - People here, it sounds like sickness

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