LogFAQs > #979343588

adjl posted...

I can see it go either way. The biggest criticism I see about that sort of levelling system in general (whether it's FF8, Oblivion, or any other example) is that it's just not intuitive: Instead of levelling up and becoming more powerful being something that happens naturally as you play normally, you have to go out of your way to metagame if you don't want to lag behind. I personally like metagaming and min/maxing and turning games into spreadsheet simulators, but even I don't like *having* to do that.

Basically, there's a difference between "this game will be hard if you don't make sensible levelling choices" and "this game will be hard if you don't look up a levelling guide ahead of time or otherwise collect information on how the levelling system works because that's the only way you're going to be able to figure out what levelling choices are sensible." Everyone expects to have a hard time if they pump Int on their Fighter. Fewer people expect to have a hard time if they focus on levelling the skills they picked as the character's "main" ones (to use Oblivion as an example because it's one of the worst offenders). From what I understand about FF8 (I haven't actually played it), it's kind of borderline in that you don't *have* to metagame much just to get by, but if you don't you aren't going to get much of the sense of power growth that people typically like to get from RPGs and will therefore have a lesser experience than you would with a more intuitive levelling system. For people that like metagaming enough to do a bit of it all the time, it's not a problem, but for people who just want to play normally and not try to game the system to get an edge, it'll be bothersome and mess with their ability to immerse themselves in playing the game. I get why it's divisive.

Every time I play FF8 I quickly went to that island with high level monster and maxed my level. It made the game more fun, had more magic to draw, and didn't make anything more difficult.
Shit you mostly just spam limit breaks by raising your max HP to 9999 and leaving yourself at 2500. You get a limit break every turn. Junction enough defense and attack and the game is a cakewalk even at max level. This isn't even meta gaming. If you unlock the GFs item to magic skill, you will very quickly learn on the very first beach there is fish that drop fins 100% of the time, each fin refines to water. Then go get Ifrit and you get junction strength, put water on that and BAM you are a god already, with no guide, because this is super obvious. I had this on my first play through as a small child with no help or internet. Also figured out spamming the character swap button causes limit breaks to refresh, the game even ignores your input during the noise and animation for a limit break, stopping you from skipping past it.
In short the level scaling in FF8 works just fine and is hardly noticeable.