it starts off really slow and i made sure to give it time to hook me -- introduce a character that i'll go crazy about, show me a mechanics complication that i'll be excited to exploit, set up a plot thread that looks promising -- but it just refused to do any of that. i gave it enough time, even, to do what fft does in its first act -- throw us into the confusing tutorial mission in medias res to create the impression of a whirlwind of political violence and uncertain allegiances, and then flash back to introduce the historical background, ramza's relationship with his brothers, delita's difficult place in the family, all the stuff about the corpse brigade or whatever those guys were called. triangle strategy used that time to drag its feet and belabour the most obvious "everything changed when the fire nation attacked" setup in history.

i really tried to like it. i wanted to see what it was going to do with its branching narrative stuff and all the scheming nobles it was so slowly introducing. but i just don't have enough fft nostalgia in my body to carry me through what's otherwise an alright but thoroughly unexciting game.