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 COMING SOON TO STEAM! Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII If you pay attention to the internet even a little, you've probably heard about Final Fantasy XIII. The latest (non-MMO) entry in the franchise, it was released to... let's call it 'mixed reception' to put it softly. The combat system was generally praised but the plot, world design, and general linearity and hand-holding of the game upset a lot of long-time fans and reviewers alike. Despite this Square-Enix decided it needed not one but two sequels, each more insane than the last. Lightning Returns is the last of those sequels and the end of the mini-franchise. Why should I care about this? Final Fantasy XIII sucked! That's a good question. If you're going in to LR expecting to hate the game and everything in it, you're probably not going to have a fun time. It's a weird and rather janky game and the plot sure as hell isn't much better unless you like raw unfiltered incoherent JRPG injected directly into your veins. However, despite that, it has some things going for it. It has ditched the handholding of FFXIII almost entirely and instead gives you a relatively large world to explore, divided into four separate parts. (Two large cities, two wilderness areas.) The game is focused heavily around doing sidequests and exploring. There's no leveling system at all and instead you power up by finding equipment and doing sidequests, which alleviates any sort of JRPG 'grind.' Of course it sort of replaces it with an MMO-style quest grind but there you go. The combat system has also been revamped to be a pseudo-action combat system. It's somewhere in-between the original game, Valkyrie Profile, and Paper Mario. It's still, at heart, a menu-driven game but it has added in a number of action elements. It's pretty close to the best combat system the franchise has ever had and the general reception to it has been positive from even the harshest of reviewers. There's also now an in-depth customization system which allows you to alter everything about Lightning, from her attacks to her clothing. You can also make her wear a giant plastic beard or a pumpkin head because why not? Because this is Japan that means you can also make her run around in a catgirl outfit and the creators of the game were pretty vocal that was their intention. Fortunately they were kind enough to include a variety of non-lovely outfits, including cameos from previous Final Fantasy characters, for those of us who don't want to masturbate to a giant bobble headed anime girl. Because the game is so light on CGI cutscenes your costume and accessory choices will be reflected in pretty much every cutscene which does a lot for rendering the incoherent plot more tolerable.  What the hell is the plot of this game? Oh boy. Buckle down because you're in for a batshit insane ride. I'll link Square-Enix's own Retro-Spective but if you're actually expecting something a bit more coherent (but less funny) here is how it goes: In Final Fantasy XIII, a group of people were gifted with magical powers by a group of demigods known as Fal'cie as part of an elaborate and stupid plan to summon God. They rebelled against the demigods and won through a series of poorly-explained contrivances including a literal Deus Ex Machina from a different goddess known as Etro. Etro governs life and death and stepped in during the ending to help the heroes out. The good guys win, everyone is happy. Final Fantasy XIII-2 opens up with the idea that Etro kinda screwed things up. The protagonist of FFXIII, Lightning, vanished right after the end of the game due to Etro's bullshit. Her sister, Serah, sets off on a quest with a time-travelling hammerpants-wearing guy named Noel on a quest to fix time. The villain of this piece is named Caius and he wants to destroy time because his magical girlfriend is trapped in an infinite cycle of death and rebirth. (Again, because Etro screwed up.) Caius is in a position to do this because he was chosen by Etro to be her guardian. Basically Etro is remarkably bad at everything. Caius succeeds. He kills Etro. Serah dies. With the goddess of life and death no longer around, the world is also boned. See, turns out that humanity is made out of this stuff called Chaos, used more like the old "Primordial Chaos" meaning. Etro formed this stuff into new people and handled all the stuff involved reincarnation, including aging. So with her dead humanity has stopped aging and stopped having children. Instead they've just entered into a gradual decay where the human race slowly dies off to illness, accidents, and the occasional monster attack. This isn't helped by the fact that without Etro controlling it, Chaos has begun running wild and has devoured most of the world. It's been about 500 years since the end of XIII-2 when Lightning Returns starts. The game, as the title gives away, is about Lightning Returning. She sealed herself in crystal at the end of XIII-2 and fully intended to stay that way until the end of the world. Which, as it turns out, is in exactly 13 days. God Himself, as in the literal creator of the world, awakens her with a task: Start collecting souls for him because he intends to pull a reset-and-reformat on the planet in 13 days. Anyone left behind will be erased from existence forever. In exchange she gets to have her sister revived from the dead on the new planet. Lightning, of course, accepts and that is where the game begins. The Cast  Lightning: Protagonist of Final Fantasy XIII. Formerly an everyday soldier, she's somehow worked her way up to the position of Savior of the World. She's torn between stoic and quick to anger depending on the writing and the voice actress but is more likely than not to get pissy at someone if they don't do what she likes. She's remarkably good at killing drat near everything in existence. Her real name is Clare Farron (or Eclair if you're Japanese.) She chose to be called Lightning for reasons too goofy to state here.  Hope Esthiem Annoying little kid in FFXIII. Pope of Science in FFXIII-2. In LR, Hope has inexplicably reverted back to his childhood form although he still acts like the Pope of Science, if the Pope of Science had suddenly decided God is pretty kickass. Hope is your support character, also chosen by God, and spends all his time at Lightning's home base of The Ark. He is there to be the guy Lightning talks to about pretty much everything. Much less annoying than his XIII counterpart but still kind of annoying.  Snow Villers: One of the playable six in XIII. Snow was engaged to Serah but was out looking for Lightning when Serah set out on her quest. As a result was unable to protect her and she died without him being anywhere nearby. He's pretty regretful about that. As of LR he's become a willing servant to the last living demigod Fal'cie. As such he's got magical powers that nobody else does and is probably the strongest person left alive besides Lightning. Together Snow and the Fal'Cie Panadomnium run the town of Yusnaan, which is basically a nonstop party town as people get ready for the end of the world. He's voiced by Troy Baker so he's got that going for him.  Sazh Katzroy Another of the playable six in XIII. Sazh is most defined by having a son named Dazh who he'd do anything to protect and for having a giant afro in which his pet Chocobo chick lives. As of Lightning Returns his chocobo chick is missing and Dazh is in an eternal coma, unable to live or die. Sazh is trying to find a way to free his son and isn't having much luck.  Chocolina Chocolina functions as the game's NPC quest giver. There are a number of "collect these item" quests that you can turn into her for minor prizes and stat boosts. As for what she is? It was revealed in the previous game's DLC but Lightning Returns kind of treats it as a reveal so I'll put it under tags to be safe. She is Sazh's pet Chocobo chick. She fell into a time hole and Etro (again!) gave her the power to turn into a human being. She is irrepressibly chipper and optimistic.  Oreba Dia Vanille Mostly known as Vanille, she's got one hell of a backstory. 500 years before Final Fantasy XIII, she turned into a giant monster at the request of a Fal'cie and attempted to destroy the floating city-world of Cocoon where most of the rest of the cast lived. She failed because Etro (her again) stopped her and shoved her in a crystal. 500 years later she woke up and accidentally set off the entire event chain of FFXIII. She and her partner Fang ended up turning themselves into crystal to save a bunch of lives. Well, it's been about 500 years again and she woke up. Now she has the inexplicable magical power to hear the screaming of the millions who died in those 500 years and the local church thinks she is their personal prophet.  Oerba Yun Fang: Vanille's best friend and heavily-implied-but-never-stated love interest. Fang is basically the competent member of the duo. While Vanille is being fawned upon by the church, Fang has set out to find a magical artifact supposedly hidden the in depths of the desert.  Noel Kriess: Surviving protagonist of Final Fantasy XIII-2. Came from an alternate future timeline where he was the last surviving human being on the planet. Still loves his goofy outfits. Currently living in Luxerion and working as a monster exterminator and part-time superhero.  Caius Ballad: Surviving villain of Final Fantasy XIII-2. It turns out that committing ritual magic suicide by killing the Goddess of Death doesn't help much to actually letting you die. Caius is now spending his time sulking because his plan worked pretty badly despite working. Voiced by Liam O'Brian so he chews enough scenery to make his inane plot ramblings delightful.  Paddra Nsu-Yuel: Infinitely-reincarnated love interest of Caius and Noel. She is the "Seeress" and is gifted with the power to see the future. This comes at the cost of her dying young every single time she reincarnates. She's reincarnated a lot. If FFXIII as a franchise has a dumbest character, Yuel is it.  Lumina: A mysterious young girl who looks similar to but not exactly like Lightning's dead sister Serah. Spends her free time going around trolling people, although Lightning seems to be her new favorite target. The game repeatedly refers to her as devilish so you can kind of get what they're going for here. Right, I don't care about any of those assholes. Tell me about the gameplay. The Doomsday Clock. When I mentioned earlier that the world dies in 13 days, I wasn't exaggerating. Unlike most JRPGs, this is a strict time limit. You have 13 24-hour days to finish everything you want to finish before God shows up and the world ends. To be precise you begin with closer to 6 days and gain one day each time you finish a major storyline quest. Time passes in the game world at the rate of minute every few seconds. Each day begins at 6 AM and ends at 6 AM the next day. During that time you're free to do basically whatever you want although many of the game's quests and areas are time-sensitive. Time does not pass in fights but there are certain activities (like riding a train) that will unavoidably eat up time. Sounds overwhelming? It could be if not for one feature: Chronostasis. Early in the game you gain access this power. It stops time. Everyone in the world remains interactive but the clock stops. Stopping time costs 1 Eradia Point. You begin with a handful of Eradia Points but eventually can have around 8 total. You earn more EP from killing enemies or by chugging Ethers, although the latter is a fairly rare item. The thing about EP is that it is very plentiful. While regular enemies give about 10% of an EP per fight, there are several kinds of enemies who give 2 whole EP a fight, as well as "Chaos Zone" enemies who always give 1 EP in addition to their regular reward. Bosses will also drop 5 EP upon defeating them and your EP is refilled to full at the start of every day. In short, EP is plentiful and it is relatively trivial to keep time stopped effectively infinitely. As time progresses, new things are unlocked. Lightning gains a new power or a new Garb every day and the enemies get more powerful. Later-day enemies will also start showing up in new configurations with multiple kinds of enemies spawning together where previously they were alone. Certain boss characters will also gain special hard modes where they drop better items. Around Day 6 you gain the ability to synthesize your abilities together. Sidequests If you were upset about the lack of sidequests in the previous two games, LR has you covered. The game is based around sidequests. Pretty much every person in the game world needs help. Some of these are involved plotlines which can span the course of multiple days. Others amount to "Bring Me Three Rat Tails." Some involve fighting enemies while others just ask you to run from Point A to Point B and back again. They're fairly MMO-style sidequests but each other has its fair share of worldbuilding and goofy radio chatter which helps somewhat alleviate the tedium. It's up to you if the busywork adds to your immersion or gets in the way of your fun but either way it is something you've got to do. The reason being is that is how Lightning levels up. Every sidequest you do gets you a boost to your stats. Most are fairly small but they begin to add up very quickly. Several sidequests will give you new Garbs or useful items. Every single sidequest in the game has an associated Adornment. You can usually tell which one you'll get from a sidequest because the NPC who gave it to you is wearing it.  The Combat System Lightning Returns uses a modified version of the Paradigm Switch combat system found in the previous games. The biggest and most obvious change is that you only have one party member. Instead of switching Paradigms you're switching between three Schema. What the gently caress is a Schema, you ask? It's basically a complete equipment set, made up of the following: Garb, Weapon, Shield, Head Accessory, Arm Accessory, Adornment, and four ability slots.  Garb is your character's clothing. Most of the Garbs in the game have a special passive ability. These can range from a stat boost to special moves to altering the properties of certain attacks. Some garbs are flat-out better than others but the way the game is designed means that most garbs remain viable from beginning to end. Several that get outclassed get late-game upgrades. Most Garbs also come equipped with at least one "locked' ability that fills an ability slot. Garbs also determine how fast your ATB bar fills and how high it can go. Weapon is the thing you hit things with. Each weapon an attack and magic stat. Many also have special passive abilities such as boosting damage, making it easier to stagger, or causing debuffs to stick easier. Shield is what you use to block attacks. It determines your HP and how effectively you can block attacks. Head Accessory allows you to equip another passive ability specifically to that Schema. It does not apply to other Schema but tends to be powerful. It can be anything from starting with extra ATB to reducing all damage by 75%. It's probably the single most important inventory slot. Arm Accessory is a weaker version of Head Accessory. What makes it stand out is that Arm Accessories apply to all three Schema. Equip an anti-Deprotect and it works for anything you throw on. Abilities are your various attacks. One is bound to each of the four face buttons. These come in four types: Physical, Magical, Defensive and Debuff. Each has its own strengths and weaknsses and you'll quickly grasp the idea that it's better to specialize instead of trying to be a jack of all-trades. If you made a physical attack Schema you probably want to fill it with Attack and Heavy Slash. Adornments are silly accessories you can use to customize Lightning. There are hundreds of these suckers and not a single one has a mechanical effect. So wear whatever you want. I recommend beards. There are too many outfits! What do I wear? As I mentioned above you generally want to specialize your Schema. You can save multiple reserve Schema which allows you to easily swap between setups for various situations. However I'll give a quick overview of some useful 'all-rounder' types here: Defense-oriented Schema: A defense-oriented schema is the most important thing to have and most players should have this equipped at all times. Basically a defensive schema should be built around making your character as durable and tanky as possible. You should focus on giving it the best shield you can and Guard or Evade. I recommend Guard until you get comfortable with the combat system. It may be tempting to make every schema have a defensive option but it's far more effective to have one defend-oriented Schema you switch into whenever the enemy is attacking. It frees up other slots to use on your other schema and makes them more effective. In addition to Guard you should also use this schema as your debuffer. Since many of the defensive-oriented Garbs don't do much for damage, you can instead load up your defense schema with all kinds of debuffs with work the same regardless of your stats. There are low-damage weapons you can equip which boost debuff hit rate and duration such as the Femme Fatale Magic-oriented Schema: You have two significant choices for a magic schema. All-rounding or specialization. All-rounding generally involves equipping three or four elements so you can hit any possible enemy weakness. This is generally a good idea for areas with a variety of enemy types or where you're unsure of what enemies you're going to face. The reason I say "three or four" is that it actually is arguably more effective to have three element and the Imperil debuff that all four elements. Imperil reduces enemy elemental defense by one level. (Absorb -> Immune -> Resistance -> Normal -> Weakness) This can allow you to full damage with elements. I strongly recommend at least one of the spells be Aeroea because Aeroea is great at building up the stagger meter for an enemy who is vulnerable to repeated magic attacks. You generally will have to build this around a garb with a pre-equipped magic spell .(Midnight Mauve, for example, always has Fira.) Specialization is generally best used for bosses or strong enemies who have a specific weakness. In this case you want a strong spell of the element they are weak to, Deshell (if you don't have it on another Schema), and Imperil. Aeroea is, again, a good all-around spell if the enemy isn't vulnerable to any specific kind of magic. Physical-oriented Schema These are a bit more flexible and you have a lot of options there. The (element)Strike spells are great for exploiting enemy weaknesses and go well with Imperil on a magic-oriented schema. The Light Slash/Attack/Heavy Slash trinity is a bit flexible depending on what you're looking to do. The lighter an attack the worse it is at staggering but the less ATB it uses. If you use a 'spear'-type weapon (i.e: One that comes with Jump), the Beat Down ability can transform into the immensely damaging Jump attack which is great for dealing damage during an enemy's stagger or for staggering the enemy themselves. There are several unique physical attacks tied to special Schema which are worth using and in some cases incredibly OP. Find a setup you're comfortable with and it can carry you through most of the game. Right, but what about fighting? In combat you can swap between all three equipped Schema at any time with the shoulder buttons. Each Schema shares an HP pool, although they only share the percentage of your health bar that is full instead of the total HP, so you can have a schema with a ton of HP and a schema that is fragile as glass. HP does not recover after combat and there are no healing spells in the game. Instead you can only restore HP via limited healing items, the Curaga spell which costs 2 EP, or certain passive abilities like Mediguard. This means not taking a lot of damage is pretty essential unless you like wasting time going back to town for more potions.  Each attack you do takes up a section of the ATB bar. The ATB bar refills but very slowly. However each schema has its own independent ATB bar. If you swap to a different Schema the ATB bar of your standby schema begins to refill very quick. So combat involves swapping constantly to balance schema usage and ATB recovery. There is an action element to combat but it's fairly light. You can move Lightning around to avoid attacks, time your attacks to hit enemies during vulnerable times, and use various Guard or Evade moves to defend against attacks. Guard moves have a "just defend" mechanic where timing it perfectly will eliminate all damage from an attack and can knock an enemy down. Evasion moves negate damage entirely but certain attacks are unavoidable. There is also the Stagger system. This system appeared in previous FFXIII games but it is a little different here. Basically each enemy has a weakness that you can exploit. It depends on the enemy. A wolf creature that charges at you can be staggered by Just Defending just as they attack. A giant flan monster made of fire can be staggered by using repeated ice spells. Most enemies have multiple stagger conditions. Staggering an enemy will give them a unique debuff depending on the enemy and the stagger condition and leaves them more vulnerable to damage and debuffs. The aforementioned Flan, for example, will be frozen solid by your ice attacks. That leaves it more vulnerable to physical damage. A Goblin will be confused and attack his allies. A heavily armored robot may lose their armor. Some enemies are just knocked over. Repeatedly staggering enemies increases the debuffs and may allow the enemy to be Launched into the air which leaves them entirely helpless and extremely vulnerable to damage. Death is slightly harsher in Lightning Returns compared to previous games in the franchise. If you die in combat you'll respawn outside of the fight in the exact condition you were in before the fight but lose an hour of time. Escaping from a fight also has the exact same effect. As such it's a bad idea to get into a fight unless you're comfortable you can win it. Savescumming is a completely viable options however and you can just save before a tough enemy if you're not sure if you can beat it. There are a relatively limited number of enemy species in the game. (Around 30 distinctive ones.) Each species, however, is part of a measured whole. Killing a Flan permanently removes one Flan from the ecosystem. Kill all but one Flan and the final member of the species becomes a Last One. A Last One is a brightly glowing pink monster with massively boosted stats. Killing it earns you a special item and permanently removes that species from the game. That's right, forever. You just rendered a monster extinct. Most species in the game can be rendered extinct. There are several exceptions, usually human-type enemies or the chaos-born Anubys, both of which can't be rendered extinct for obvious reasons. It's entirely possible to end up with a game world with no enemies to fight at all although you have to do a lot of extincting to pull that off. There's a Beastery available here with more information. Alright. What about permanently missable poo poo? This is a JRPG, do I have to have a guide open 24/7 to play it? Every quest in the game is given to you by a clearly marked NPC. Some only appear at certain times of the day but it's pretty trivial to do a few loops of whatever area you're in to find them. There are, however, several permanently missable items. Blue Mage Garb: A pair of Diviners will ask you to return to their shop around noon on the day after you talk to them. Failure to do this fails the quest and renders the Blue Mage garb permanently unavailable. Dark Knight Garb: During one quest you're given the choice to read a journal or not. The game emphasizes this very heavily so you can't miss it. Choosing not to read the journal will lock you out of a sidequest permanently. If there's anything else easily missable that I, uh, missed, let me know and I'll add it. What about New Game +? Optional Dungeons and bosses? Anything else? Lightning Returns does feature a NG+. It allows you to start the game in Hard Mode and unlocks the weapon crafting system. All enemies get a massive boost to their stats in Hard Mode but you retain your equipment and items (aside from the Ultima Weapon) in the NG+. There are two optional bosses in the game. One begins appearing in the Desert around Day 7 and will show up as a giant glowing ball of death. The other is located at the bottom of the game's optional dungeon. The optional dungeon only unlocks on the last day of the game if you've done the majority of sidequests. When it unlocks you'll get a free bonus day to explore it. It's a fairly minor dungeon and mostly serves to give you a way to fight Last Ones without grinding enemies. The big gimmick is that time does not stop during fights so you have relatively less time to clear it. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 20:22 on Dec 5, 2014 |
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Feb 13, 2014 20:26
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Aphrodite posted:There's apparently 1 quest you can only get if you fail another. Not sure if that's the same as the journal one you mention. That's the one.
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Feb 13, 2014 20:48
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CowboyAndy posted:I'll stick with Final Fantasy 6, thanks. Just don't make it the iOS/Android version!
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Feb 13, 2014 20:56
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Sex_Ferguson posted:FFVI is a bad game, please play better ones like FFV, thanks. That is the Blue Mage Garb quest I mentioned in the OP. It's lost, I'm afraid. If it helps the Blue Mage Garb is kind of lovely. It doesn't actually have Blue Magic as an ability.
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Feb 13, 2014 20:59
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Phantasium posted:For the portion of the game that takes place in the demo, what Schema would you actually have for that moment? I assume just the three (if that) that you start equipped with? That is the tutorial. You only have the Savior and the Muse costumes and neither is as well equipped as they are in the demo.
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Feb 13, 2014 21:02
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Kalenn Istarion posted:In spite of your self-deprecation in the main FF thread, that's a great OP and covers pretty much everything that anyone wanting to pick up the game might be interested in. Nice job! There is a small typo in the thread title (Returns). Yeah, I'll try to get that fixed. Sorry! I'll add some stuff about Schema-optimizing to the OP, that's a good point.
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Feb 13, 2014 21:42
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Smornstein posted:So i've found two of the four cult numbers and i'm halfway through day 2 so far i really like this game but some of these sidequests make me kind of regret not grabbing the strategy guide since i don't know where to even begin looking for some of this stuff, like the girls doll for instance. Also is there any reason for me to not skip town and go check out some of the other areas of the game? Most items are found just lying around. Remember to smash crates and stuff. There's absolutely on harm in going to another town and poking around unless you're on a time-sensitive quest. It's recommended you visit each area at least once early on so you can unlock Teleporting to that place and start certain sidequests early. I've added some basic Schema-hints to the OP as well. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Feb 13, 2014 |
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Feb 13, 2014 21:57
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chumbler posted:Good OP, but you forgot to mention Chocolina (well, sort of). She's been added.
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Feb 13, 2014 22:06
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That loving Sned posted:I never really bothered to follow the first two games' plot outside of just watching the story cutscenes, but there's supposed to be this mythology shared between the XIII series, Type-0/Agito, and Final Fantasy XV. Does XIII-2 or Lightning Returns actually do anything with it, or do they go off on a tangent? There is supposed to be a shared mythology. The original plan was that they would all be the same world but that seems to have been changed at some point. Things like l'cie and the Goddess Etro however are referenced in all three games but it's pretty much impossible for them to be in the same world now. They basically appear to be treating the mythology like FF treats Cid and Chocobos and Moogles: They exist but their exact context depends on the game. I can go into more detail but it involves Type-0 spoilers. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 01:26 on Feb 14, 2014 |
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Feb 14, 2014 01:18
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DarkstarIV posted:gently caress some of the side-quests in this game. There is a bonus dungeon at the end of game which lets you instantly access every Last One. You can deliver the sidequest after finishing that.
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Feb 14, 2014 04:19
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Rascyc posted:So what happens if you do run out of time? I have not experienced it myself but what I'm told is that you restart the game with a 'soft' NG+. None of the bonus NG+ features but you carry things over.
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Feb 14, 2014 04:51
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Proto Cloud posted:The demo's combat system was incredibly janky, the moves are spammable and the game way too easy. (definitely doesn't feel anywhere near as tight as Valkyrie Profile like you suggest from my experience at least) In the demo you have gear that is high above the level you are at and it takes place in the first 15 minutes of the game. I compare it to the FF7/FF8 demos where you were in the opening area of the game equipped with Leviathan. The final battle system is a lot more tight although not flawless. It also is not based around long smooth combos in the same way VP is and if the OP implied that, I apologize. I would never say it is hard but it is a game that can punish you fairly hard if you give it a chance to. Enemies hit extremely hard and there are less pure defensive stats so you can get blindsided by enemies if you give them a chance. I'd compare it to something like SMTIV in that regards although it feels a bit less feast-or-famine than that game since it has a more twitch-interactive combat system. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Feb 14, 2014 |
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Feb 14, 2014 15:24
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Murodese posted:Did they fix (or break) the stacking of resist%? I just fought (late-game)Caius using Cyber Jumpsuit / Ghostly Hood / Guard Glove and Quiet Guardian / Preta Hood / Runic Ring and attacks did virtually full damage. I assume some of them were chaos damage, but it didn't even block the elemental ones much. That certainly works. You may have been misunderstanding which damage type was which but I can absolutely confirm that those two builds work. The thing with Caius is that he switches between attack types constantly so you can't just leave one on and be invincible. You have to swap, often mid-attack. When he's in Commando form he'll still toss magic attacks in. Ravager tends to be more purely magic but he'll go in for physical attacks sometimes. I think Megaflare is entirely unlockable but I may be mistaken. Also he can buff himself and deprotect/deshell you with Eye of Bahamut. If you are Deshelled or Deprotected you take damage from attacks even with those builds. That last thing is an easy thing to overlook. Remember that you can lessen/block status effects by guarding. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 16:48 on Feb 14, 2014 |
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Feb 14, 2014 16:43
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Proto Cloud posted:Ok, cool, that doesn't sound too bad. I might give it a shot. Is it short, though? Short RPGs are a plus in my book. I don't honestly care for sprawling 100 hour "epics". I'd say 30-35 hours is a safe bet for an 'average' time. It's fairly flexible because it depends on what you decide to do/how many sidequests you finish/ect. There's no way you can spend 100 hours on it though. There just isn't enough content to do it even if you go through on Hard Mode after Normal Mode.
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Feb 14, 2014 17:23
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Nyeehg posted:Okay I just got this game today after preordering It from amazon and forgetting about it. Can't play it till later tonight and i have a couple of questions. You need to enter the codes on PSN/XBL to redeem costumes. Once you do so they'll be available in the Barter Shop option on the menu.
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Feb 14, 2014 17:46
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Rascyc posted:I just watched a dumb review of this game that straight out proclaimed the final boss is unkillable on normal, hah. I'll assume this is lovely reviewer rhetoric as usual? Ahaha, no. Not even a little accurate. Especially since You get Ultima Weapon and Ultima Shield from a sidequest right before the final boss which is hilariously powerful. Like twice the stats of the second strongest weapon available.
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Feb 14, 2014 18:19
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Ethiser posted:I've beaten two of the main quests so far and my biggest complaint is that the speed at which you can pull up your guard feels weird sometimes. Some enemies can transition to attacking really fast and I feel like there is a small delay from me hitting the button and Lighting guarding. I guess I'm just wanting the game to be more action gamey then it really is. A good trick here is that you can hold the button down while transitioning and it automatically takes place. You can even hold it beforehand. It's even possible to do it like "hold square to fire -> transition to schema with square on block -> automatically be blocking." It's also possible to set up schema which have such high resistances that they auto-guard against physical or magical attacks. The other trick is to guard in advance. Enemies follow ATB rules as well and it can help to get a mental grasp over their 'time limits.' It slows down your attacking a little but if you can get the hang of schema-swapping in advance you actually can attack in an unbroken pattern. It looks pretty action-gamey but the game is still an RPG and enemies still have to wait their turn too. (And Slow still increases the time in which you have to act against them, making it a very useful debuff.) McDragon posted:Am I just poo poo at working out how to fight things or did I end up somewhere I wasn't supposed to? Ended up in the Warrens on the first day and the robots and robot bugs took ages to kill and took gently caress-all damage most of the time. Did manage to pick up a Thundara and Sparkstrike and they seem pretty good, but only really used them on regular crap enemies so I don't know how much better they are. Oh, ended up with Red Mage and a bunch of good things in the Ark too. There is no real 'overleveled' area in the game aside from maybe one. The Palace of Chaos in the Wildlands. For those guys, as people have recommended above, you really need to stagger them. The bug creatures take a lot of stagger when using Eerie Sound. Perhaps more important attacking them repeatedly during the first stagger gives them a ton of debuffs. The machine enemies are vulnerable to attacks when they are charging their laser and to having their Rush attacks perfect-guarded. Do that enough and their armor falls off and they become incredibly vulnerable to damage. Lightning, especially Sparkstrike, is very effective against them. chumbler posted:Just wait until you get to your first gaunt or zomok :unsmiggh:. I like this game's combat and how it doesn't pull its punches. For these guys, by the way, keep in mind that there's an anti-Wind item in the graveyard and both of them depend heavily on Wind attacks. Zomak's attacks all have fairly predictable Perfect Guard window which makes them a bit easier to tank through just on pure timing. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 01:06 on Feb 15, 2014 |
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Feb 15, 2014 00:59
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Smornstein posted:So i have to wonder where did everyone's Eidolon's from 13 go? Lightning not having Odin i can see but Snow doesn't have Shiva from what i've seen so far. Eidolons were gifted by Etro and since she's gone there is nobody to re-gift them to Snow and nobody else is L'Cie. Lightning got to hang out with Odin in Valhalla because that is where the guy normally lives. A datalog in XIII-2 mentions that part. They are addressed in the game but in a pretty weird way. Basically just "welp, Etro hosed up again" is the only sane way to summarize it. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 01:28 on Feb 15, 2014 |
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Feb 15, 2014 01:23
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Tempo 119 posted:When the game says I'm going to "offer Eradia" to Yggdrasil every morning, does that mean I'm supposed to save up some EP for it or does it just play out along with the story? It just plays out as part of the story as long as you're doing the main quests/sidequests.
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Feb 15, 2014 04:28
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Skeezy posted:Is this really in the game? Yes and no. LR has a Dark Souls Lite system where other people who are playing can post things. They'll appear as NPCs in the world who have floating messages and who you can talk to in order to see the screenshot that person posted and possibly to buy an item they put up. So that is in the game but it's something someone else playing it posted, not an actual bit of NPC dialogue.
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Feb 15, 2014 10:17
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The Grimace posted:Something that irks me is that it doesn't seem as though the various schemata Lightning can find don't seem to be able to level up? I mean, you can level up the separate abilities, but the ones specifically attached to the costumes themselves aren't able to be boosted, unless I'm missing something entirely. A real pain if you're like me. I'm actively trying to stick only with costumes I like, so I've stuck with the Equilibrium costume as my main for the whole game thus far, minus a few times where I've switched to the all-around upgrade "Nocturne" garb when I reach bosses. Certain Schema can upgrade but most are locked to what they are. Several kinds of upgrade things are locked until NG+. (For example you upgrade accessories to improved versions by finding them in a second playthrough.) The lowest-level Schema in the game (those you start with, for example) will get plot-related upgrades later in the game. Equilibrium is one of those Garbs. It gets Attack Level 4, ATB Recovery Plus and +30 Maximum ATB. Otherwise however you can use whatever Schema you like. A lot of the Schema are balanced around the idea that their passive or unique abilities balance out weaker basic abilities, or that they have a unique powerful ability to balance out weaker schema attributes. There are a few which just get outclassed, unfortunately, but I don't believe any gets outclassed to the point you can't use it because you like it. I was using early-game stuff at the final boss just because I liked how it looked more. Murodese posted:Hey ImpAtom, any idea if Artemis Arrow retains upgrades from the base heavy slash used? Or does it just replace it? Altered moves like that and Whirlwind Kick benefit from upgraded moves as far as I was able to tell. Level 3 Punt did more damage than Level 2 Punt at least. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 20:16 on Feb 15, 2014 |
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Feb 15, 2014 20:09
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ShadeofDante posted:Can anyone share some good physical combat schema set ups? I have a magic one down pretty well but I can't seem to find a good combo for physical based fighting. It depends on what you're looking for. If you want to deal a lot of damage, find a weapon with Jump equipped and put Beat Down on a character. Find a Garb with a good amount of AP and if possible physical bonuses. This gives you a really effective staggering tool and can deal a ridiculous amount of damage once an enemy is staggered. Attack or Heavy Slash both work for a regular attack/stagger builder. Heavy Slash in particular ends up being an incredibly reliable move for a variety of reasons. You'll get accessories that allow it to steal enemy buffs and the Warrior of Peace Garb can transform it into the strongest attack in the game as far as I'm aware. It depends on what feels comfortable for your build. Having Blitz is useful once you start dealing with multiple enemy spawns. You don't need it early on but it's really nice when dealing with Dryads or other enemies who cluster close together. There are other multi-hit attacks but they're a bit more situation and I wasn't as fond of them. Completing the Journal quest I mention in the OP gets you the Dark Knight Schema which is an incredibly effective physical attack Garb but it requires a few days to finish. Prior to that it depends. Warrior of Peace is great for the reasons I mentioned above but begins with 0 ATB in every fight so it can be a bit slow to build around. Velvet Bouncer is good for starting with Blitz. Shadow Trooper or Vengence both have Beat Down Level 3 as an innate ability which is great once you get Jump. My usual build was an elemental slash, a heavy attack and a lighter attack. If my equipped Garb had one of those by default then I would throw in either another elemental slash, a debuff, or Aeroa for improved staggering against magic-weak enemies. InfinityComplex posted:That gives you Blitz lv2 as standard and leaves it for stuff like Punt. Which I think Punt is the best attack ability. The Buster Sword gives increased stagger power while the Shard weapon from those orange behemoths give +500 attack power. Punt is a bit underpowered until you get the Martial Monk Garb at which point it becomes hilarious.
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Feb 15, 2014 23:34
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Aphrodite posted:Outerworld never seems to work for me. It sets on submitting forever. It seems to take obscenely long to go through. I've had it work but I have to leave it sitting there.
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Feb 16, 2014 04:35
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mikeraskol posted:Wildlands boss dominated me something fierce. He does loving tons of damage and I don't have enough AP to keep blocking all that poo poo. For him you really need to customize your schema a lot. It may even be worthwhile to make two defensive Schema, one geared towards physical and one geared towards magical. He's probably one of the overall toughest bosses in the game and really rewards specializing your setup. It also helps a lot if you can master perfect guarding which severely limits the damage he can do with some of his bigger attacks.
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Feb 17, 2014 00:43
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Sex_Ferguson posted:To be honest the ending's stupid, but it does make actual sense in the context of the dumb story. Like if it were just the reincarnations of the character or something like that instead of literally Lightning being on a train to loving France, there would probably be less outrage over it I guess. Basically what I'm saying is just DDS2 the ending. I'm pretty sure that is what it is supposed to be considering they're all magical ghost things by the end of the game.
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Feb 17, 2014 01:22
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mikeraskol posted:I understand that, that's kinda my point though. I use those big spells on the trash as I'm running around because you can clear them fast and easy. Then up pops a random enemy for which you have no effective skills at all and you lose an hour. Maybe they should have let you change abilities during a fight, or maybe an hour isn't that big of a deal, I don't know. An hour is not actually a big deal unless you're on a timed quest. However it generally helps to have at least one good staggering spell on your guys. That said, Earth Eaters are pretty big fuckers. They're probably the single most annoying regular mob in the game.
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Feb 17, 2014 02:05
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McDragon posted:Oh, and the Amazon Warrior garb or whatever turned up in the Ark. Ahahahaha. I was like "Huh, I wonder how bad...", saw it, and quickly clicked away before even checking the stats. It may be the strongest Garb in the game for all I know. It's still not getting equipped. The Demoness garb is worse.
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Feb 17, 2014 04:38
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ghostinmyshell posted:Except for the Wildlands and parts where they said gently caress this let's have fun with the script, I hate this game. Getting the bad ending is cannon enough for me. What's giving you trouble? I didn't have any DLC outfits and had no trouble with it so they're not necessary.
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Feb 17, 2014 09:03
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A lot of outfits get unique comments. Including, bizarrely, a few which are like "What a handsome man" and "Wow, he's cute... wait, that's a woman?!" which I don't even know where the hell that comes from.
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Feb 17, 2014 12:00
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Dr. Eldarion posted:Just finished this up today, and I had a blast. I really thought that time needed to be managed better than it actually did. By the end of the 6th day, I had completed all the main quests and something like 57 side quests (plus however many board quests), so I just said gently caress it and slept until the 13th day so I could do the bonus dungeon. Yeah, I really think the erred a bit too much on the side of caution. I can understand why considering how worried people got about the time limit but they went too far in the opposite direction and you just had too much time. If I ever replayed the game I might try to see how far I can get without Chronostasis.
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Feb 18, 2014 05:33
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The Grimace posted:End game poo poo: The trick to Heartless Angel is to defend as soon as the camera angle changes. As for the fourth form: You need to stagger it. He has a gigantic defense until he is staggered but once he is staggered he's basically dead.
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Feb 19, 2014 08:50
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Fedule posted:Funny story: There's a quest in Yusnaan where you have to defeat a bunch of Niblets, and they drop Niblet-Slayer Emblems on the field screen. There's also a quest in Yusnaan where you have to make Niblets extinct. I wondered how they handled that. Well, it's better than it being bugged.
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Feb 20, 2014 01:26
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ghostinmyshell posted:Is it worth it finish off Last Ones before the bonus dungeon? You get good items earlier. Ravager at bare minimum is worth finishing off.
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Feb 20, 2014 01:34
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NeilPerry posted:So did this game end up being FF: Majora's Mask? I love games with large towns and subquests like The Last Story, Deadly Premonition and MM. Is it ANYTHING like those games in terms of interesting microworld buiding? I wouldn't say it is as detailed as Majora's Mask but it's reasonable close to Last Story in that regards. There are two large towns and then a few wilderness areas with small villages in them.
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Feb 20, 2014 03:26
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Fhqwhgads posted:I...I just realized something. I'm on day 5, and completed missions 1, 2, and am stuck on the boss of 3, and have completed (almost) all of the sidequests in areas 1 and 2, and only NOW am I noticing the "Adornment" slot in my schemata. Yep. You have been severely underpowered for every cutscene. 
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Feb 20, 2014 04:54
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You can only have one of Preta or Ghostly equipped at a time. So you can be immune to physical or magical attacks but not both and it requires a specific schema. However that is still a fairly effective defensive schema. Otherwise, yes, those are all pretty good selections although they're not the only viable choice. Artemis Arrows is probably the easiest massive-damage-dealing setup to do but there are quite a few others you can fool with which have their own advantages and don't deal with Soldier of Peace's relatively slow ATB rate and crap starting ATB. Artemis Arrows is good because it is a huge amount of damage is one solid chunk but there are DPS options which are also very viable. Defensive-wise, there are some people who swear by Evade over the pure-tank build especially since it lets you avoid some attacks that a pure tank build can't avoid normally. It involves better timing but can be extremely powerful. You've also get Mediguard or whatever shenanigans if you so desire. Magic is, again, fairly flexible. You can go for mixed spells, non-element spells, imperil or just the -a tier spells and all are pretty viable depending on your preferences. The ideal method is to rearrange your abilities based on the enemy you are facing but that is obviously pretty time consuming. The build there is not necessarily the very best build (though it may be) but it's an overall powerful build for relatively little effort. ImpAtom fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Feb 21, 2014 |
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Feb 21, 2014 04:17
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mikeraskol posted:This is the weirdest loving post and I have no idea what to even say in response. Day 13. You'll get a very very obvious popup about it and you can't miss it. The explanation for it is so hilarious too. It turns out that those missing 2 hours from every other day have mysterious returned because you're so good at granting wishes!!
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Feb 21, 2014 07:56
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Chronostatis seems to last longer sometimes because fights stop the clock and so you can go like twenty minutes without it wearing off in certain areas. I sort of wish there were more options for Hard Mode. It'd be interesting to see one where the Bonus Dungeon mechanics were applied to the whole game as a challenge mode. Time passing during fights would probably make the clock feel a lot more meaningful. (I'd bet that was the original plan and playtesters or someone complained about it. A lot of the "there's too much time" stuff would vanish entirely if the clock wore down while you were fighting.)
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Feb 21, 2014 20:48
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Cake Attack posted:So once you've completed the Main Quests (there's five, right?) I take it you just get to screw around until the last day, or what? Yep. Sidequests, exterminate monsters, go to sleep, whatever.
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Feb 23, 2014 06:04
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Syrant posted:When do you unlock access to Last Ones? Just as soon as you drive your first enemy toward extinction? Pretty much. I haven't tested if they're available on Day 1 but there doesn't seem to be a specific unlock requirement.
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Feb 23, 2014 06:15
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