Going into this game i wasn’t sure if i was gonna like it, since i never really played a SRPG (i played a bit of FE7 and some Advance Wars but that’s kinda it), and holy fuck was i wrong this game is awesome
I’ll start by saying i technically didn’t play this version of the game, but instead I played The Lion War of the Lions, which is a romhack of the original Final Fantasy Tactics that brings almost all the WOTL content to it (i think onion knight isn’t in it) and even made the multiplayer only rendez-vous playable in single player. I went for that romhack instead of the psp game because i know that while the slowdown can be patched, the audio quality can’t and i’d honestly recommend playing this hack instead of the psp port unless you really want to play it on a real PSP/Vita or plan to use one of the few elements they didn’t bring over
As i said above, i wasn’t sure if i was gonna like this game at first, and yet it ended up being one of my favorite game of the series, and unless we count spin-offs, it even is the one i’d say has the best gameplay. I’m obviously not an expert in the SRPG genre, but the way FFT approaches some of its mechanics in a different way than other series (at least Fire Emblem which is like the series i associate with the genre, even if i’m aware most other games probably differ from it a lot) really made me love it a lot. This game is extremely similar to Final Fantasy V (which might have one of the best gameplay of the turn based FF), but as a SRPG. Every character starts with a couple jobs unlocked, and performing actions as a job nets you EXP (which increase your overall level) and JP, for job points, which increases your job level. Each job comes with different abilities to unlock, divided in multiple categories depending on what they do : active abilities have their own category, and then you have one for movement, one for support abilities etc. Each unit, no matter its current job, can equip one of each kind of abilities from any job, just like in FF5, so for example you can have a thief that has black magic as a secondary ability and also has a passive ability that lets him equip swords. This system works extremely well, because it allows you to really build your team the way you want it. Each job has its strength and weaknesses, it’s far from being well balanced (monk is by far the most busted physical job, especially if you grind for dual wield) but it just works so well, coming up with ways to make your team really good is just so fun. Some story characters even come with their own special jobs, and those are really good, shoutouts to holy knight it’s just so good. The game has most of the classic FF jobs with a few exceptions like red mage, and even has some unique jobs, like mimic, orator or one of my favorite job, arithmetician
The game also approaches dying in a really unique and awesome way. When a unit dies (this applies to both allies and enemies), they don’t immediately disappear. Instead, for three turns, you won’t be stay on the tile they’re on, but you’ll have the ability to bring them back to life, using a raise spell or a phoenix down. If you don’t, the unit will disappear, leaving behind either a crystal (that heals you or sometimes lets you learn one ability if you stop on it) or a chest, and if it’s one of your unit, there’s permadeath so it’s goodbye forever. This approach to dying is so cool because it allows for a lot of strategy: if someone dies, it’s no big deal, you can bring them back! I know that depending on the game permadeath isn’t always that punitive because you’ll always get more units later on, but in FFT, since you build your units the way you want, losing them would be much of a pain considering there’s some grind involved (i ended up never losing a single unit permanently, and used the same 3 units + story related characters for the entire game and i think most people play that way too)
Spell casting is also awesome in this game. With a few exceptions, each spell will be cast in a cross shape around the tile/unit you’re targeting (for each spell you can decide to cast it on a tile or a unit, meaning if the unit moves your spell will still target them). Spells don’t cast as soon as they’re used tho, they all have a different cast speed which mean they’ll be cast after X units take a turn (you can even see who is gonna take a turn before you cast the spell, to know if it’s worth using it!) This can lead to really cool strategies too, like targeting one of your unit with a healing/buff spell and moving it next to another one of your unit to have the spell target them both, or even moving next to an enemy unit with one of yours that’s being targeted with an offensive spell to have the spell hurt both your unit and theirs. Some abilities other than spellcasting also have delay like jump for dragoons or aiming for archers, and i think this aspect of the game opens up for a lot of strategy, it’s really cool.
And on top of the combat system being amazing, the story is also really really good. It starts off a bit confusing since yknow, it’s a story involving a lot of factions in a war so there’s a lot of characters that are named and you have to remember them all, who they’re allied to and oh shit count bingus actually betrayed duke floppa so actually the relationship between their faction has changed, there’s a lot to take in but once you get past the first few hours and understand who’s who, it gets really good. Ramza is a really good protagonist, and Delita is one of the coolest mfer from the entire series. The game also has a lot of really awesome quotes, those dudes keep spitting fire at each other before, during and after battles.
The game starts off really challenging, and with a lot of difficulty spikes every now and then (you better make those backup save files), with the ending of chapter 3 being the big one a lot of people know about because if you don’t make a backup, chances are you’re gonna have to reset your game. Once you get past it tho, the final chapter is pretty easy, even the optional dungeon with the superboss in it isn’t that hard. The difficulty of the game is awesome tho, it’s challenging but not in a bullshit way and getting past those hard battles is so satisfying, and grinding isn’t even that bad since battles are more involved than in a turn based game.
Final Fantasy Tactics is a really awesome game, one that’s being slept on by way too many FF fans, either because it’s not a numbered game, or because it’s a strategy game. Almost everyone who played it will agree that it’s one of the best tho, and for a good reason: once you get into it, it’s one of the most fun and rewarding game of the entire series, backed up by some extremely extremely cool characters and settings.
I’ll start by saying i technically didn’t play this version of the game, but instead I played The Lion War of the Lions, which is a romhack of the original Final Fantasy Tactics that brings almost all the WOTL content to it (i think onion knight isn’t in it) and even made the multiplayer only rendez-vous playable in single player. I went for that romhack instead of the psp game because i know that while the slowdown can be patched, the audio quality can’t and i’d honestly recommend playing this hack instead of the psp port unless you really want to play it on a real PSP/Vita or plan to use one of the few elements they didn’t bring over
As i said above, i wasn’t sure if i was gonna like this game at first, and yet it ended up being one of my favorite game of the series, and unless we count spin-offs, it even is the one i’d say has the best gameplay. I’m obviously not an expert in the SRPG genre, but the way FFT approaches some of its mechanics in a different way than other series (at least Fire Emblem which is like the series i associate with the genre, even if i’m aware most other games probably differ from it a lot) really made me love it a lot. This game is extremely similar to Final Fantasy V (which might have one of the best gameplay of the turn based FF), but as a SRPG. Every character starts with a couple jobs unlocked, and performing actions as a job nets you EXP (which increase your overall level) and JP, for job points, which increases your job level. Each job comes with different abilities to unlock, divided in multiple categories depending on what they do : active abilities have their own category, and then you have one for movement, one for support abilities etc. Each unit, no matter its current job, can equip one of each kind of abilities from any job, just like in FF5, so for example you can have a thief that has black magic as a secondary ability and also has a passive ability that lets him equip swords. This system works extremely well, because it allows you to really build your team the way you want it. Each job has its strength and weaknesses, it’s far from being well balanced (monk is by far the most busted physical job, especially if you grind for dual wield) but it just works so well, coming up with ways to make your team really good is just so fun. Some story characters even come with their own special jobs, and those are really good, shoutouts to holy knight it’s just so good. The game has most of the classic FF jobs with a few exceptions like red mage, and even has some unique jobs, like mimic, orator or one of my favorite job, arithmetician
The game also approaches dying in a really unique and awesome way. When a unit dies (this applies to both allies and enemies), they don’t immediately disappear. Instead, for three turns, you won’t be stay on the tile they’re on, but you’ll have the ability to bring them back to life, using a raise spell or a phoenix down. If you don’t, the unit will disappear, leaving behind either a crystal (that heals you or sometimes lets you learn one ability if you stop on it) or a chest, and if it’s one of your unit, there’s permadeath so it’s goodbye forever. This approach to dying is so cool because it allows for a lot of strategy: if someone dies, it’s no big deal, you can bring them back! I know that depending on the game permadeath isn’t always that punitive because you’ll always get more units later on, but in FFT, since you build your units the way you want, losing them would be much of a pain considering there’s some grind involved (i ended up never losing a single unit permanently, and used the same 3 units + story related characters for the entire game and i think most people play that way too)
Spell casting is also awesome in this game. With a few exceptions, each spell will be cast in a cross shape around the tile/unit you’re targeting (for each spell you can decide to cast it on a tile or a unit, meaning if the unit moves your spell will still target them). Spells don’t cast as soon as they’re used tho, they all have a different cast speed which mean they’ll be cast after X units take a turn (you can even see who is gonna take a turn before you cast the spell, to know if it’s worth using it!) This can lead to really cool strategies too, like targeting one of your unit with a healing/buff spell and moving it next to another one of your unit to have the spell target them both, or even moving next to an enemy unit with one of yours that’s being targeted with an offensive spell to have the spell hurt both your unit and theirs. Some abilities other than spellcasting also have delay like jump for dragoons or aiming for archers, and i think this aspect of the game opens up for a lot of strategy, it’s really cool.
And on top of the combat system being amazing, the story is also really really good. It starts off a bit confusing since yknow, it’s a story involving a lot of factions in a war so there’s a lot of characters that are named and you have to remember them all, who they’re allied to and oh shit count bingus actually betrayed duke floppa so actually the relationship between their faction has changed, there’s a lot to take in but once you get past the first few hours and understand who’s who, it gets really good. Ramza is a really good protagonist, and Delita is one of the coolest mfer from the entire series. The game also has a lot of really awesome quotes, those dudes keep spitting fire at each other before, during and after battles.
The game starts off really challenging, and with a lot of difficulty spikes every now and then (you better make those backup save files), with the ending of chapter 3 being the big one a lot of people know about because if you don’t make a backup, chances are you’re gonna have to reset your game. Once you get past it tho, the final chapter is pretty easy, even the optional dungeon with the superboss in it isn’t that hard. The difficulty of the game is awesome tho, it’s challenging but not in a bullshit way and getting past those hard battles is so satisfying, and grinding isn’t even that bad since battles are more involved than in a turn based game.
Final Fantasy Tactics is a really awesome game, one that’s being slept on by way too many FF fans, either because it’s not a numbered game, or because it’s a strategy game. Almost everyone who played it will agree that it’s one of the best tho, and for a good reason: once you get into it, it’s one of the most fun and rewarding game of the entire series, backed up by some extremely extremely cool characters and settings.