LogFAQs > #932243474

33.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB7p8O2_mz8

1995, 2011
SNES/PSP

Ive been a big fan of Let Us Cling Together since the 90s. (Its one of only 12 games that have made every top xx games list of mine since I started tracking them in, lets see, early 2004.) At this point I only play the remake, but I do have a ton of affection for the original.

Tactics Ogre is FFTs daddy, and there are some things that it does straight up better than FFT. Its branching story is super fun and really forward thinking given when it came out. Its really fascinating to watch the whole story play out differently when you change up a few choices.

The characters arent as good here as they are in FFT, but its mostly because everyone in this game is a gigantic dick. LUCTs world is super harsh and that carries over to a really brutal atmosphere. The PSP version of LUCT also has a fantastic translation, much better than any of the versions that FFT got. That translation really lets the dicks shine.

Battles are also on FFTs level, if not above them. You get a bigger army in LUCT and the quality of life tweaks in the PSP version make battling a lot more fun. There are a ton of named characters that join your party and theyre a lot of fun to use. Youre looking for every advantage you can get in this game because some of the content can be pretty rough to deal with, especially the optional content.

Unfortunately, they somehow screwed up the progression in LUCT. Without going too into the weeds, classes level up, not characters, which means that any new class that you unlock is largely useless unless you spend hours and hours dragging those classes along until theyre finally on a competent level to be able to help your party. The end result is that you basically never change class, so while there is a job system at play here and you use all sorts of different classes, youre never going to be bouncing your characters from class to class to mix and match skills. That just doesnt exist, and its really too bad because its all there to be leveraged. The game just doesnt allow it with how its designed.

The gameplay is awesome, and theres tons of optional/postgame content, but oh my god does it grindy in the postgame. You can beat this game in 50 hours and feel satisfied, but youll be putting in like 500 hours if you actually want to get 100%. It sucks because the gameplay here is so good, but they basically force you to run maps over and over in the hopes of getting random drops so you can continue on. LUCT is awesome but theres just enough questionable stuff in the remake to keep it a clear tier below FFT.

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xyzzy