Erosion Blues (Day 198)

I've logged around 12 hours in Final Fantasy XIII-2 so far, and it's already put me in a Final Fantasy mood. I'm currently looking into making yet another attempt at playing through the first two games in the series. After a little research, I decided the Final Fantasy Origins versions would be best since they're very true to the originals while having superior graphics. It also helps that I've owned the disc for many years. In fact, I tracked down my PSOne (the tiny one) and the disc was still in the tray after all this time.

I've discussed this before, but out of all the contiguous Final Fantasy games, I've finished everything but the first two, Final Fantasy X, XI, and XIV. Regretfully I don't think I'll be jumping on FFXI and grinding out 99 levels any time soon, but the others are all definite possibilities. If I can work up enough motivation, I think I can play through the Origins versions of the first two titles and alternate working on those while playing through FFXIII-2. After I've done all that, I could move on to FFX--although I did run into some emulation issues the last time I tried.

Before I jump into that ill-fated plan, I should probably talk about my initial impression if FFXIII-2 since it seems I've been putting that off for some time now. I was a fan of the original FFXIII despite its convoluted and confusing plot and mostly asinine characters. I thought the gameplay, though controversial to some, was fantastic. It introduced a sort of job class system that was unlike any of the previous games in the series (barring perhaps a superficial resemblance to FFX-2). Each character had access to the same pool of six classes and could switch between their available classes at will during combat. Each of these characters would learn skills from these classes in different orders and have differing aptitudes for each class. It was necessary to mix and match which classes your three combat characters were using in order to succeed in combat.

Not everyone was happy with the style of combat when the game originally released, though. Many dismissed it because it felt like the game was playing itself--and indeed you could get through many battles by selecting Auto-Battle whenever prompted for input. However, not every encounter was like this and boss battles absolutely required strategy to prevail. Unless one were to power level beyond what was reasonable, many boss battles required careful thought. The lionshare of the strategy in FFXIII was in paradigm shifting. A paradigm is a combination of classes. For example, you could have Lightning as a Commando, Sazh as a Ravager, and Vanille as a Medic. This is a balanced strategy that is fairly safe--but your damage output and potential to stagger is limited.

Each class--or role as I think they were called--performs a specific function. You could almost treat them as roles in an MMORPG. In an MMO, you generally have a healer, DPS, a tank, and sometimes a support. FFXIII (and its sequel) basically have these roles with DPS and support split into two roles apiece. Ravager and Commando are there primarily to deal damage, but their secondary purpose is to cause opponents to stagger. Ravagers build up the bar required to stagger an opponent very quickly, but without the assistance of a Commando, the bar will also drain quickly. Staggering an opponent is often very important, because it greatly increases the damage they suffer. For some enemies, staggering them is the only way to do any significant damage at all.

Saboteurs and Synergists are essentially two sides of a coin in that they both support the team--by debuffing enemies and buffing allies respectively. Many boss battles are almost impossible without the spells these roles provide. Saboteurs can poison, reduce defenses, and a host of other things. Synergists are capable of massively increasing the defensive and offensive capabilities of his allies.

Sentinels do little to no damage, but are greatly invaluable in that they absorb and redirect massive amounts of damage directed at allies. They are the tanks of both FFXIII games. I use these the least, but they are often necessary to get through difficult phases of boss fights. They are most effective when combined with a Medic to keep them alive nigh-indefinitely. Medics, like healers in MMOs, are also capable of curing many status ailments.

Not much has changed as far as the battle system goes for Final Fantasy XIII-2, aside from a few notable changes. This entry is getting pretty long, though, so I might save that for next time. Once again, I haven't really talked about the game in question all that much--most of this applies to the original game. Oh well.