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Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]

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Zap Rowsdower said:
Well, "works" is a generous term, when you're talking about SNES/SFC III/VI. Looking at you, Relm.
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I didn't have any trouble with the Pixel Remaster version of it

Flare said:
In that game's case is more like "It's 30 years and we still have to fix shit".
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Nah, there was an actual no-shit balance patch that among other things added a level up speed boost to Quetzalli so that Odin isn't literally the only source of speed in the game and it also changed the main cast sprites to be closer to the SNES shading. Someone made a slider to show the differences.
 
Zap Rowsdower said:
Indeed - as was stated, they fixed the bugs rather than keeping VI wholly faithful, because a wholly faithful VI is basically a quality control failure.

There are still loads of bugs, of course, but some just couldn't be let stand.
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They should have made it so that you could encounter each of those bugs exactly once, but then they're fixed for the rest of your time playing. Y'know, for authenticity.

illhousen said:
Her art is simply transcendent and cannot be contained within the game's confines. Plebeians wouldn't understand.
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I was gonna link this later, but I can't not pull up the relevant Captain SNES page.

(The comic page is only game spoilers in so much as you'll see some of the cast there talking, but I'm assuming Omi has seen the sprite sheet or something by this point so the mere existence shouldn't amount to much.)
 
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Omicron said:
Yeah, so, the bird-shaped peninsula - which is incidentally where our airship was stranded just sank into the sea, unleashing the Dragon King Bahamut. Thankfully he does not immediately swoop down from the sky to smite us; instead, the skies darken as he looms over the pyramid and he sends us a message:
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Oh, so that's where it came from.

I was wondering in my FFXI playthrough if the concept of "Bahamut emerging from the seas" was in a prior Final Fantasy game, and this seems like the closest reference.
 
crankers said:
So, good news. You don't need to get all 12 legendary weapons at once. Each tablet will give you 3 of them in the temple.
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Best part is, you can totally pick and choose so you can just... take the best ones first. You know, like getting Excalibur instead of say "the ultimate bell, Gaia's Bell! (Wielded by literally only one class that you probably aren't using)". Granted not all of them are that clearly skippable, but there's totally some not worth worrying about until last.
 
McFluffles said:
Yeah, as time goes on a lot of RPGs have moved on somewhat from ye ol random encounters into things you can avoid somehow. Heck, it was a thought even back in the SNES days with a few games like Earthbound which was iirc entirely overworld encounters, and if you were strong enough compared to them you would instakill the enemy on contact to not have to deal with trash mobs.
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I'm fairly sure, though I can't remember examples off the top of my head, that mixed avoidable/non-avoidable and entirely-visible, no random encounter design was around pre-SNES, too. Memory's swearing there was at least one or two on the NES, at minimum.

It was significantly more common by the time the SNES finished its run, though, and even found in odd places like Ogre Battle, which had random encounters in various sorts of terrain you used to recruit specific units (mostly monsters) on top of most of the enemies being entirely visible.
 
I'm not quite sure I'd really say Ogre Battle counts or not as an example for this matter, as both types of approaches to encounters answer to different needs. Random encounters in a normal RPG are there to fill out a gameplay void and to give a way to grind for xp. Meanwhile in Ogre Battle, while you do want to make your units stronger, fighting too much might hurt other things you might want to care about like populace approval and morality.

Or looking at it from a different angle, you mostly skip random encounters in a RPG because you can't be arsed or are too low level. In OB you tend to avoid random encounters because the PR machine demands so, you only want the two dragons and no more (this isn't pokemon, even captured beast have upkeep costs IIRC), and because you got the enemy knocking on your gates with a half ton stick WE NEED REINFORCEMENTS NOW DAMMIT PEOPLE ARE DYING.

I do want to say Super Mario RPG has both random and overworld encounters, but I can't remember if that was the case with absolute confidence.
 
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Connelly said:
I do want to say Super Mario RPG has both random and overworld encounters, but I can't remember if that was the case with absolute confidence.
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To my memory, Super Mario RPG (and later the Mario and Luigi series) are entirely overworld encounters. Of course, this can include things like "enemies hiding behind level geometry that rush you too fast to dodge" or "opening the wrong door with an enemy behind it for an encounter", but they don't really have traditional RPG "take three steps in the forest and suddenly time to fight half a dozen tree monsters" random battles.
 
The M&L series are entirely overworld encounters, which trigger a fight vs a bunch of mobs in the battle screen, at least. I quite enjoyed playing 'em growing up, at least the first few titles.
 
The Paper Mario series is the same way, and, like M&L and SMRPG, have the whole "start combat with an advantage by hitting a map sprite with an appropriate attack' gimmick.

Well, except for Super. But there's, uh, a lot of things that're different between Super Paper Mario and the games that came both before and after it.

Side note: TTYD remake when
 
Poor Omi, the pyramid is super rough going in blind. OTOH if you know what you're up against, it's significantly easier. My party for this was two bards and a Red Mage, with Vigilance, !Control, and !White6 as secondaries. Undead die in 1~2 casts of Requiem and are not a concern and a lot of stuff is vulnerable to the AOE Stop song so the bards really pull their weight. For actually killing the non undead stuff, you know that pain in the ass summoner? Berserk, and then you just sit in the back row smacking her in the face with a judgement staff (stolen in the previous dungeon) and a dancing dagger + Lamia Crown combo. Stone tablets are weak to lighting so a couple casts of thundara are sufficient. Giant mecha is vulnerable to !Control. The kung fu dudes (a random chest monster, one of three possible encounters IIR) are also vulnerable to !Control, confuse, and mini. One of a kind minotaur dude...I don't remember, but I think !Control worked just fine there too.

This dungeon taught me to appreciate White Mages as being more than heal/protect/shell bots. Berserk on caster enemies is so good.
 
Oh, right, the Thornlet. The Thornlet's main thing isn't that it blocks sleep, it's that it's the strongest headgear in the game in exchange for that sap effect and a minus 5 to your magic stat. Oh, and there's a much bigger price to pay as well; as long as that thing is in your inventory, thanks to having the highest defense stat any headgear can have, it's permanently going to be the headgear that the Optimize option will pick, even if you don't want it, just like the Bone Mail. I have a feeling you also have that Cursed Ring from the Pyramid as well. It's the same kind of equipment as the other two, only this one gives you Doom. Having all 3 makes the Optimize option borderline useless. Also, there is code for a shield version of this kind of armor in the game as well, but there is no way to get it.
 
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Omicron said:
The Pyramid of Moore is the bane of my existence, and I'm going to make it your problem. It's time for a dungeon deep dive.
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Yeah, I am an unabashed FFV fan and even I find the pyramid a bit of a slog. It's probably the lowest point of the game for me. Getting the Brave Blade or Chicken Knife first helps a lot.

Omicron said:
…huh. I know that visual design. It's very reminiscent of Omega from FFXIV. But why are mecha heads roaming what's effectively a giant tomb? I don't know, but they're weak to Thundaga, so they're not too much of a problem…
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Fun fact about these guys, they have an attack that to my knowledge is both completely unique to them and rather pointless. Interceptor (or Interceptor Rocket) is a counter-attack that is used specifically against the Dragon's Jump. It is the only attack in the game that can hit a jumping dragoon, and simply cancels the jump state to pull them to the ground.

Why though? Jump isn't exactly something that needs countering. Another strange oddity this game has.

crankers said:
having all 3 makes the Optimize option borderline useless.
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See, you would think the cursed equipment curses the wearer, but in reality curses the player to spend more time in menus. Truly diabolical.
 
Nah. This place is a chore, but it's not the kind of place where petty concepts like mercy and hope go to die.
 
McFluffles said:
Really what got me through the pyramid was Faris having Rapid Fire + Spellblade. Every encounter was just "Faris buffs, Faris instakills most of the enemies because she's doing buttloads of damage and also -Ga level spellblades instakill if they hit weaknesses." Throw in a little Bartz for summons and Time Mage nonsense, and it wasn't that bad.

The random encounters, anyways. The Pyramid itself is a fairly obnoxious dungeon.
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One thing I've found about Spellblade is that, playing mostly blind as I am, it's effective but it's slow - aside from some monters that have obvious weaknesses, I need to use Libra first to find out their weakness before I can use Spellblade to buff, which means it's like two full turns before it's online.

On the other hand, I am finding that Dualcast makes Libra tremendously more convenient, because I'm no longer spending a full turn scanning an enemy, I can actually cast a damage spell as part of the same action! (this sometimes backfire when I accidentally hit an Absorb but mostly Bio and Firaga are almost always good bets).

Warclam said:
Symbol encounters are just the best. They are objectively superior; If you think you like random encounters better, I'm sorry, but you're incorrect.
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I agree. Although I'm surprised how tolerable I'm finding them across these LPs so far; my childhood memories of games with random encounters (not just Final Fantasy) is one of just. Endlessly tripping on goblins and it making everything take hours and hours. So far it's only really been an issue in endgame dungeons, though.

GilliamYaeger said:
Yeah it's basically a choice between power and convenience here. The chicken knife is stronger, but the brave blade doesn't require you to jump through a bunch of annoying hoops to use it. If you want to spend a couple hours running from every fight you get in order to power up the knife that's good, but there isn't anything wrong with skipping that shit and just using the brave blade.
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Okay, considering the patched mechanics for the Brave Blade, I am definitely fine with a merely obscenely powerful weapon for free as opposed to a slightly more obscenely powerful weapon that I have to run through hoops for. I mean, I'm already going for Rapidfire Dualwield Spellblade, do I really need to break the game more?
Flare said:
In that game's case is more like "It's 30 years and we still have to fix shit".
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Given that FF6 is always talked about in such praise as the most popular and well-remembered FF of the 2D generation, there is something comforting to learning that it was also a janky pile of bugs.
 
Omicron said:
Given that FF6 is always talked about in such praise as the most popular and well-remembered FF of the 2D generation, there is something comforting to learning that it was also a janky pile of bugs.
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My personal take on why FFVI is remembered so fondly is that for a decade and a half people didn't really have FFV to compare it with; in Japan, who had both, FFV was often considered better.

Even with that though, there's plenty of good reasons FFVI is iconic, and the many bugs are also a (small, overall) part of its charms. It is certainly an ambitious game - just perhaps one a bit too ambitious, in that they included so many things they didn't have the time to quality check all of them. And, of course, the cartridge was packed well beyond the point of sanity with stuff, which was one of the reasons for the bugs.

But that's better discussed after you actually have the chance to experience the game for yourself - the pixel remaster likely has corrected most of the biggest issues, I imagine, but I'm sure that won't stop anybody from pointing them out as the situation where they'd normally apply come up.
 
Omicron said:
Given that FF6 is always talked about in such praise as the most popular and well-remembered FF of the 2D generation, there is something comforting to learning that it was also a janky pile of bugs.
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Now TBF the game was developed in about a year with a 60 people team, so QC and bugfixing probably weren't the main priority during development.
I rib on its bugs with affection more than anything else, and the Advance and later Pixel Remaster versions do fix the vast majority of bugs, so it's not like you're going to play a pile of janky code that barely works.
 
Yeah even the original version is plenty stable, it's hardly modern AAA gaming where you pay full price for a janky mess where people's faces fly off then they fly after it before the game crashes to desktop a dozen times an hour. Like most games of the era, it's more... there's a ton of silly stuff hiding under the code (barring of course Relm, but... we'll get there), but the game itself is still perfectly functional.
 
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