I’ve always been interested in FF12 aesthetically and it has been on my list for quite some time - now that it’s leaving PS Plus I had enough motivation to prioritize it and see it through fully to completion. I enjoyed my time with it greatly for the most part and am glad I finally played it.
Many people will talk about 12’s gameplay as if it’s a black sheep in the series, but having played other entries before and after, and both MMOs, I actually think it’s the gameplay is extremely fitting for where Final Fantasy was at when it released. It truly feels like a single-player evolved version of Final Fantasy 11 but with a stronger cast, less required busywork, and a solid trust system. If you approach this game with that understanding, I think it’s quite enjoyable and has considerable depth. A lot of what became Final Fantasy 14 (particularly ARR and later) also shows through in this game, which makes sense considering the large overlap in the development teams.
The gambit system is daunting at first, but quickly makes sense when you consider it as an assisted gameplay function. The easiest one to understand is attacking: this game would be quite tedious if you had to hit attack constantly, so you can set a gambit to hit attack every time your cooldown ends. You might want to automatically resurrect a character when they die. Automatically heal when you are below 30% of your HP. From this perspective, thinking of it less like “programming a character entirely” and more like “what do I want it to do by default with me still interjecting regularly” makes it easier to build a gambit system for yourself. The system is limited, but can be used effectively to avoid overly needing to micromanage your team while letting them do a considerable range of actions. Coming from more recent Final Fantasy entries, I actually appreciated the very wide range of status effects and vulnerabilities, which felt much more like earlier entries in the series in a good way. The gambit system can also be used to deal with many of these status effects automatically, and ultimately, these statuses can be used to break the game which is always a fun learning moment in any FF.
The plot is mostly fine: you’re a team of sky pirates and orphans helping a princess in exile get her kingdom back with her retainer. That focus is pretty clear from near the start of the game. The playable and non-playable characters have interesting connections and, other than Penelo who makes hanging around Vaan her entire personality (but makes a great healer!), everyone else seems to have an interesting backgrounds and driving factors. I found Vaan a little grating at times, and Ashe a little more passive and opinionless than I’d have liked, but overall was interested in the overarching narrative. Without spoiling much, the villains are layered and often sympathetic in some ways, which I think some people found dampening but after reflecting I found it kind of interesting. It sort of feels like not a ton gets resolved at the end but I think enough does that the basic plot feels complete and the main objectives feel satisfied, which honestly doesn’t even happen in most modern games now.
I previously attempted finishing this game on the Switch version, and remember struggling due to a lack of money and gear. Part of that is due to the importance of stealing in this game - if you’re not getting loot constantly and completing hunts, you aren’t making the most of your time in Ivalice. Loot is the primary way to make money early in the game, and selling loot earns you gil for buying new gear. Having a character set to Steal automatically for any full health enemy meant I had a very regular stream of loot incoming, so I never was stressed for money. Hunts also give good rewards, and eventually offer you the opportunity to get a specific set of accessories that ROCKET how much money you earn. At that point you can basically buy anything you want at any time.
While I never played the original, the Zodiac Age changes make this game much better than I would have imagined the original being. There is a 4X speed mode, which I used more than I expected to get through some of the grinding in the game. Without it I easily would have spent well over 100 hours playing, and probably wouldn’t have looked for some of the rarer gear as much. The licence board is very well done, and lets you try a lot of combinations of jobs and espers to build a set of 6 characters that work the way you like. These licences also lock different armor and weapons behind jobs, and because characters can have two jobs, you can make combinations of gears and abilities as well. The loot system in the newer version uses a lot of chests with random chances at providing different gear, which is fine for the most part, but also means some fairly critical skills are behind random chest spawns. This isn’t common enough to truly bug me, but felt a little odd.
I think this would only impact you if you went for a full 100% playthrough, as do most of the more tedious parts of the game. Someone who is mostly just hitting plot beats with light side content I think can have a satisfying journey - because of all the side content I did I felt exceptionally overleveled for the final boss, so it’s not necessary to overly grind to finish the game.
I had one main gripe with the game - the licence board is buggy and sometimes crashes when you open it. A few times I opened it directly after beating an Esper with the goal of getting the licence on my board, and the game crashed before I could auto save. This has apparently been an issue for years in the final update of the game and it should have been fixed by now. Smaller gripes are the plot being kind of whatever at times, and a little bit of tedium in some of the side content.
Generally, I think the game is fun and would recommend it. A solid JRPG with complex gameplay and layered decision making, wrapped in an MMO-like casing.
Many people will talk about 12’s gameplay as if it’s a black sheep in the series, but having played other entries before and after, and both MMOs, I actually think it’s the gameplay is extremely fitting for where Final Fantasy was at when it released. It truly feels like a single-player evolved version of Final Fantasy 11 but with a stronger cast, less required busywork, and a solid trust system. If you approach this game with that understanding, I think it’s quite enjoyable and has considerable depth. A lot of what became Final Fantasy 14 (particularly ARR and later) also shows through in this game, which makes sense considering the large overlap in the development teams.
The gambit system is daunting at first, but quickly makes sense when you consider it as an assisted gameplay function. The easiest one to understand is attacking: this game would be quite tedious if you had to hit attack constantly, so you can set a gambit to hit attack every time your cooldown ends. You might want to automatically resurrect a character when they die. Automatically heal when you are below 30% of your HP. From this perspective, thinking of it less like “programming a character entirely” and more like “what do I want it to do by default with me still interjecting regularly” makes it easier to build a gambit system for yourself. The system is limited, but can be used effectively to avoid overly needing to micromanage your team while letting them do a considerable range of actions. Coming from more recent Final Fantasy entries, I actually appreciated the very wide range of status effects and vulnerabilities, which felt much more like earlier entries in the series in a good way. The gambit system can also be used to deal with many of these status effects automatically, and ultimately, these statuses can be used to break the game which is always a fun learning moment in any FF.
The plot is mostly fine: you’re a team of sky pirates and orphans helping a princess in exile get her kingdom back with her retainer. That focus is pretty clear from near the start of the game. The playable and non-playable characters have interesting connections and, other than Penelo who makes hanging around Vaan her entire personality (but makes a great healer!), everyone else seems to have an interesting backgrounds and driving factors. I found Vaan a little grating at times, and Ashe a little more passive and opinionless than I’d have liked, but overall was interested in the overarching narrative. Without spoiling much, the villains are layered and often sympathetic in some ways, which I think some people found dampening but after reflecting I found it kind of interesting. It sort of feels like not a ton gets resolved at the end but I think enough does that the basic plot feels complete and the main objectives feel satisfied, which honestly doesn’t even happen in most modern games now.
I previously attempted finishing this game on the Switch version, and remember struggling due to a lack of money and gear. Part of that is due to the importance of stealing in this game - if you’re not getting loot constantly and completing hunts, you aren’t making the most of your time in Ivalice. Loot is the primary way to make money early in the game, and selling loot earns you gil for buying new gear. Having a character set to Steal automatically for any full health enemy meant I had a very regular stream of loot incoming, so I never was stressed for money. Hunts also give good rewards, and eventually offer you the opportunity to get a specific set of accessories that ROCKET how much money you earn. At that point you can basically buy anything you want at any time.
While I never played the original, the Zodiac Age changes make this game much better than I would have imagined the original being. There is a 4X speed mode, which I used more than I expected to get through some of the grinding in the game. Without it I easily would have spent well over 100 hours playing, and probably wouldn’t have looked for some of the rarer gear as much. The licence board is very well done, and lets you try a lot of combinations of jobs and espers to build a set of 6 characters that work the way you like. These licences also lock different armor and weapons behind jobs, and because characters can have two jobs, you can make combinations of gears and abilities as well. The loot system in the newer version uses a lot of chests with random chances at providing different gear, which is fine for the most part, but also means some fairly critical skills are behind random chest spawns. This isn’t common enough to truly bug me, but felt a little odd.
I think this would only impact you if you went for a full 100% playthrough, as do most of the more tedious parts of the game. Someone who is mostly just hitting plot beats with light side content I think can have a satisfying journey - because of all the side content I did I felt exceptionally overleveled for the final boss, so it’s not necessary to overly grind to finish the game.
I had one main gripe with the game - the licence board is buggy and sometimes crashes when you open it. A few times I opened it directly after beating an Esper with the goal of getting the licence on my board, and the game crashed before I could auto save. This has apparently been an issue for years in the final update of the game and it should have been fixed by now. Smaller gripes are the plot being kind of whatever at times, and a little bit of tedium in some of the side content.
Generally, I think the game is fun and would recommend it. A solid JRPG with complex gameplay and layered decision making, wrapped in an MMO-like casing.