I was feeling pretty frustrated with this game around the endgame and final dungeon, unfortunately, and I don’t think it would have been quite as tough to get through in the original PS2 release. I’ll get to those problems later, but I gotta say, the banger final boss sequence through the last cutscene really carried it through to me. Final Fantasy X is just a good ass story! Who knew a story about a pro sportsball player getting isekaied into some kinda death cult continent would be so solid?? I am not afraid to admit that I cried several times. Some aspects weren’t total bangers in that regard—I feel like Seymour was handled a little weirdly and Kimhari could’ve used more focus. Also letting the player name Tidus was a deeply weird and awkward decision, and while the actors were doing the best they could with the bizarre voice direction they received, some of the delivery is a little weird. Fortunately, it all comes together pretty nicely and I feel like it’s definitely worth experiencing!
The battle system is pretty neat, though there are definitely flaws in my opinion. I like that it’s actually pretty worthwhile to use status effects on your enemies and Christ Haste is so useful! However I wasn’t too hot on the weapon/armor customization system, personally. It felt like it induced some real choice paralysis and equipment hoarding, which is really bad when you have a limited equipment inventory… I think I would’ve preferred the old system of accessories and normal armor/equipment upgrades more. Still, it was an interesting experiment, and I understand why people would like it a lot. I prefer the sphere grid in terms of weird customization shit, even if the exp system made random encounters pretty tedious by the end. I feel like it was intended to balance the fact that you can switch out your party members at any time, along with the fact that you game over if your front line dies… but it’s really weird from a ludonarrative perspective that the rest of the party just goes “guess I’ll die” if three people bite it. Come on guys Dragon Quest had this figured out on the NES. Then again it sounds like this game is held together with spaghetti code based on the unskippable cutscenes, so maybe I shouldn’t hold it against the devs.
Speaking of things I actually hold against the devs, wow, the weapon sidequests are uhhhhhhhh. Well I did Rikku and Auron’s, with Auron’s being way more useful and turning him into a murder machine, but man, I do not want to play Blitzball. You show me a fast-paced game in three dimensions in the cutscenes and you just make it a slow soccer sim in practice? C’maaaan. I did really enjoy the quest about tracking down Jecht’s road trip spheres because it’s some incredible dudes rock content. More of that, less chocobo racing, please.
Also the fact that this is based on the International Version made the endgame even worse due to the presence of the Dark Aeons. As a narrative element, I like them, and I have to kind of admit that the way they were implemented makes sense on a narrative level… but who decided to put two unavoidable superbosses in front of two places the game strongly encourages you to backtrack to? If you don’t 100% Besaid and Macalania’s shitty sphere puzzles your first go and you want to see Seymour’s backstory and get Anima then lmao, git gud idiot. I guess it’s cool that people outside of Japan get access to the International Version after all these years though.
God do you remember that shit? When Square Enix would release a game in Japan, then add additional content for the international release, and then re-release the international release in Japan with even more added content that no one else in the world would get access to unless they knew Japanese and had a region-unlocked system? That was a bullshit, anti-consumer business model, right? Speaking of bullshit, anti-consumer business models, don’t buy a physical version of this game used! Don’t be like me. I mean, unless you don’t want to play FFX-2, which I did! And I straight up cannot get FFX-2 because of some anti-consumer, anti-resale bullshit that requires a unique code. I guess that’s on me for not doing research but that sucks ass!! I think there’s even an Asian markets only Switch version where all the content is on the cart so it’s not like they couldn’t do it, they just did it the other way to be greedy assholes!
Also the HD models are weirdly stiff and not as expressive as the PS2 models which is bizarre. It also makes the disparity between party members and NPCs considerably more stark because you have these HD looking motherfuckers talking to guys whose faces are flat textures. Then again that’s hilarious.
Anyway even if the last three points really soured my experience and lowered my rating, game still good. I think unless you are a true hardcore gamer you should try and play the PS2 version honestly… that’d be a good 4.5/5-5/5 experience.
The battle system is pretty neat, though there are definitely flaws in my opinion. I like that it’s actually pretty worthwhile to use status effects on your enemies and Christ Haste is so useful! However I wasn’t too hot on the weapon/armor customization system, personally. It felt like it induced some real choice paralysis and equipment hoarding, which is really bad when you have a limited equipment inventory… I think I would’ve preferred the old system of accessories and normal armor/equipment upgrades more. Still, it was an interesting experiment, and I understand why people would like it a lot. I prefer the sphere grid in terms of weird customization shit, even if the exp system made random encounters pretty tedious by the end. I feel like it was intended to balance the fact that you can switch out your party members at any time, along with the fact that you game over if your front line dies… but it’s really weird from a ludonarrative perspective that the rest of the party just goes “guess I’ll die” if three people bite it. Come on guys Dragon Quest had this figured out on the NES. Then again it sounds like this game is held together with spaghetti code based on the unskippable cutscenes, so maybe I shouldn’t hold it against the devs.
Speaking of things I actually hold against the devs, wow, the weapon sidequests are uhhhhhhhh. Well I did Rikku and Auron’s, with Auron’s being way more useful and turning him into a murder machine, but man, I do not want to play Blitzball. You show me a fast-paced game in three dimensions in the cutscenes and you just make it a slow soccer sim in practice? C’maaaan. I did really enjoy the quest about tracking down Jecht’s road trip spheres because it’s some incredible dudes rock content. More of that, less chocobo racing, please.
Also the fact that this is based on the International Version made the endgame even worse due to the presence of the Dark Aeons. As a narrative element, I like them, and I have to kind of admit that the way they were implemented makes sense on a narrative level… but who decided to put two unavoidable superbosses in front of two places the game strongly encourages you to backtrack to? If you don’t 100% Besaid and Macalania’s shitty sphere puzzles your first go and you want to see Seymour’s backstory and get Anima then lmao, git gud idiot. I guess it’s cool that people outside of Japan get access to the International Version after all these years though.
God do you remember that shit? When Square Enix would release a game in Japan, then add additional content for the international release, and then re-release the international release in Japan with even more added content that no one else in the world would get access to unless they knew Japanese and had a region-unlocked system? That was a bullshit, anti-consumer business model, right? Speaking of bullshit, anti-consumer business models, don’t buy a physical version of this game used! Don’t be like me. I mean, unless you don’t want to play FFX-2, which I did! And I straight up cannot get FFX-2 because of some anti-consumer, anti-resale bullshit that requires a unique code. I guess that’s on me for not doing research but that sucks ass!! I think there’s even an Asian markets only Switch version where all the content is on the cart so it’s not like they couldn’t do it, they just did it the other way to be greedy assholes!
Also the HD models are weirdly stiff and not as expressive as the PS2 models which is bizarre. It also makes the disparity between party members and NPCs considerably more stark because you have these HD looking motherfuckers talking to guys whose faces are flat textures. Then again that’s hilarious.
Anyway even if the last three points really soured my experience and lowered my rating, game still good. I think unless you are a true hardcore gamer you should try and play the PS2 version honestly… that’d be a good 4.5/5-5/5 experience.
2 Comments
Yeah it’s such a bummer. I like supporting my local indie-ish used game store so I bought it there and I don’t consider this their fault… it’s all square Enix!!
roxanneB
1 year ago