RE: Ranking Final Fantasy Games Part 2
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I can bring in another perspective on this as I'm also a fan of FFX-2.
As a game it is severely lacking. The dialogue is very genki girl. The tone is far too cartoonish especially compared to the previous game. Some of the costumes feel like unnecessary fan service. It can also feel disjointed since most Final Fantasy games are linear while this one was mission-based.
However I think they did that on purpose. The point of the game was for Yuna to live the life of a young woman that she was never supposed to live because of being a summoner living during the Age of Sin. Everything we're seeing in FFX-2 is a brand new era for the world so they're all trying to find their way. The music is a dramatic departure from traditional entries too. And so the story itself is about trying to tie up the loose ends of the past so that they can truly live in the new era. The final boss is from the ruined nation of Zanarkand and even physically looks like the man Yuna had to give up last game.
Anyway the reason I liked it was that it developed the history of the game more than FFX ever did. We learned more about what happened to Zanarkand, the true costs of the war and even how it might tie into FFVII which is what Kitase had revealed in an interview. Basically the Dressphere job class system is a precursor to FFVII's Materia and of course Shinra is an ancestor to the Shinra family that would eventually found the ShinRa Company.
Oh god I totally forgot about the whole dressphere thing - which I also disliked lol.
But man you have a profound memory or played comparatively recently. It's all a vague memory for me after only giving it a go through once. The way you put it does tend to make it feel more justifiable as a project - although it's often dismissed as more of a side-game or something, not often included in main-game lists.
I suppose I oughtta give it another shot one day, after the one day when I re-play X heh
O definitely. It was pretty much Square's experiment into doing sequels for their games which up until that point was an established one totally new world per entry. FFX-2 paved the way for the Compilation of FFVII and then the Fabula Nova Crystalis project. It might even be why FFXII turned out to be a game set in Ivalice from the Tactics series rather than its own separate world. And then of course getting its own sequel too.
When it comes to the dressphere job system I do agree. It's pretty hit or miss. I had a friend who gamed that system so hard though so using some of his strategies probably gave me better memories of it. Trigger Happy + Cat Nip + setting up for low health is incredible lol. Sadly doesn't work on International or the remake. I did appreciate how it sped things up dramatically. FFX was Square's attempt at a slower and more strategic combat system compared to the old ATB system and then FFX-2 was pretty much ATB on full throttle until we got the newer games like Lightning Returns and XV.
It's been a while since I played. I get really invested in a game's story and after that happens I tend to really remember them. Like I said, I'm a fan of FFX-2. I vaguely remember the systems in stuff like FFXII or the older games like FFIII. It's kinda like Genshin right now I can mostly remember when and how I got each of the characters.