Current Events > Final Fantasy VIII Remaster playthrough. *progressive spoilers*

(+) Yeah! (+)

No spoilers for ahead of where I am, please.

Started it the other day, and I just left Timber.

Squall's cool. Only knew of him from Kingdom Hearts, so it's nice to see him in his own game (and in general, since he wasn't in KH3...).

Everyone's pretty one-note, though. And character moments feel pretty contrived. Like, Seifer just went with "the sorceress" for pretty much no reason at all. "You're a boy." / "Don't call me a boy!" / "Come with me then." / "Okay, I guess."

That said, it all feels more natural than most of FFXV's story and character beats. A lot of it is probably just because the cutscenes weren't as cinematic 20 years ago.

As for your partners... Zell's just, like, Prompto mixed with Ryuji Sakamoto. Selphie is typical bubbly anime girl. Quistis is somehow a teacher but also like 16? And everyone at school loves hotdogs (what's the JP version have? I know it can't be fuckin' hotdogs).

The story's alright so far. Nothing crazy. Balamb Garden raises mercenaries, who become SeeD members when they pass the graduation test. Squall, Zell, and Selphie pass and their very first mission is to work for Rinoa until "Timber is liberated," which could honestly last for-fuckin-ever, so nice job on that one, Mr. Principal.

Gameplay is...weird. Don't really see any real reason to prioritize any one character since they all do the same thing, and you can Junction any GF to anyone. And apparently enemy levels scale to yours, so is there any reason to level up?

Card game thing has badass music, though, but I have no idea what I'm doing when I play it.

Overall, nothing awful. Will play some more tomorrow.
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Ive been playing through the ps1 classics release on ps3. Ive played to the part youre at sooooo many times..
There was always a point around where youre at where i would lose interest, then once i made it to the end of disc 3 (was playing a physical version) and the disc was scratched or something and i couldnt progress...

Im at around the 20hr mark on my current playthrough, so a ways further than you. Its a great game, i hope this is the time i finally finish it.

Hot tip! People have told me they get stuck at the end of the game because they have no phoenix downs or potions and no means to get any - make sure to have a lot of phoenix downs and potions.

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Regarding the gameplay - you're right, the only thing that really differentiates characters are their limit breaks (in which case Zell is probably the best, unless you wanna abuse Selphie's slots to get The End).
FFVII was similar, in the sense that pretty much any character can kinda be interchanged aside from their limit breaks. (I know there were some stat differences with VII without materia, but they were pretty minor).

And yes, you don't really need to level up. Get used to the junction system, junction good magic to your stats, and you can steamroll most things. You really don't need to level up at all.

And the card game is fantastic, plus you can get some great rewards from it if you learn the Card Mod ability (can't remember which GF teaches it - Quezacotl I THINK?)
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Limit Breaks only appear when you're low on HP, right? I'm never really sure about when they're supposed to appear, or how to pull them off.

Zell's is pretty cool, though, yeah.

I think Quistis said to hold down R1 when attacking at the right time to pull off a better attack or smthng, but I kinda missed her explanation. So I'm not entirely sure what that was about.
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slmcknett posted...

Limit Breaks only appear when you're low on HP, right? I'm never really sure about when they're supposed to appear, or how to pull them off.

Zell's is pretty cool, though, yeah.

I think Quistis said to hold down R1 when attacking at the right time to pull off a better attack or smthng, but I kinda missed her explanation. So I'm not entirely sure what that was about.

Yeah. Unlike in VII though, limits can be repeated as long as you stay at low HP. It's a perfectly viable strategy to get a character to critical HP, then just keep pressing Circle (I think it's circle) to skip their turn (keeping the ATB charged so their turn comes straight up again) and just keep skipping until a limit is available. They have a much higher chance of appearing when you're on low HP, so you can potentially get one every turn and just spam them.

The R1 thing only applies to Squall. Basically, as his regular attack is about to hit an enemy, press R1. If it works you should see a small explosion effect as he hits the enemy. That'll give him a slight damage boost compared to if you didn't press R1. It's not major though, so don't worry too much about it.
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Fantastein posted...

slmcknett posted...

Limit Breaks only appear when you're low on HP, right? I'm never really sure about when they're supposed to appear, or how to pull them off.

Zell's is pretty cool, though, yeah.

I think Quistis said to hold down R1 when attacking at the right time to pull off a better attack or smthng, but I kinda missed her explanation. So I'm not entirely sure what that was about.

Yeah. Unlike in VII though, limits can be repeated as long as you stay at low HP. It's a perfectly viable strategy to get a character to critical HP, then just keep pressing Circle (I think it's circle) to skip their turn (keeping the ATB charged so their turn comes straight up again) and just keep skipping until a limit is available. They have a much higher chance of appearing when you're on low HP, so you can potentially get one every turn and just spam them.

menu button, which was Triangle in JP, Circle in NA, and whatever they assign it on PC and Switch version.

The R1 thing only applies to Squall. Basically, as his regular attack is about to hit an enemy, press R1. If it works you should see a small explosion effect as he hits the enemy. That'll give him a slight damage boost compared to if you didn't press R1. It's not major though, so don't worry too much about it.

Seifer has it too, but he's just a guest character.
you can also set it to auto.

btw, i seen people complaining that the remaster is actually an enhanced PC version, which was suck because of things like no 360 movement with analog, only 8 directions.
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Yeah the 8 direction thing is kinda wonky since the angle of the camera in some rooms makes it difficult to navigate and face NPCs at times.

Also since the environments aren't touched up, it's easy to get lost in some rooms since everything is blurry.
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Seifer wanted to be a Sorceress' Knight
ever since he was a child--he saw Laguna's movie and emulated Laguna's gun blade stance.

So following Edea was fulfilling his childhood dream.

Game doesn't make that 100% clear.

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I felt like they explained Seifer quite well.
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Am I the only one who couldn't follow the plot at all?

darkmaian23 posted...

Am I the only one...

99% of the questions that started with this has "no" as an answer.
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Having played it more times than any other game over the last 20 years.
FFVIII is ALL about limit breaks and abusing the cheat-y brokenness of the combat. Throw 100 Deaths on your status attack junction and very little will stand in your way. Play just a little of the card game and mod them for magics you shouldn't have for a dozen hours more.
Degenerator for the win.
Rinoa sucks in combat. Most useless character. Let me amend that. Rinoa sucks overall.

I love the game. I think because a lot like MW2's mp it's completely broken and I love that. Weird I know.
But oh lord is the story pretty bad.
The Squall/Rinoa love story especially. The whole love story, his character and the other characters flip attitudes out of nowhere in an instant.
Rinoa is an annoying pest and he doesn't like her. Now he's losing his mind and being reckless head over heels in love with her. Because ????????? That change is in an instant. No setup. No buildup. No real chemistry. Just Bam! Contrary to his whole character he can't think about anyone else in the world but her.
The cast insists he forget everyone in the garden mid battle and think about nothing but Rinoa while he insists the garden and students come first.
Then later.
Squall is freaking out and not caring about major story moments while the cast insists he calm down and NOT think about nothing but Rinoa for a minute.
Which is it then?

Idk why but for the first time ever I'm realizing just how anemic the story is and how fast everything moves.
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EternalDivide posted...

The Squall/Rinoa love story especially. The whole love story, his character and the other characters flip attitudes out of nowhere in an instant.
Rinoa is an annoying pest and he doesn't like her. Now he's losing his mind and being reckless head over heels in love with her. Because ????????? That change is in an instant. No setup. No buildup. No real chemistry. Just Bam! Contrary to his whole character he can't think about anyone else in the world but her.
The cast insists he forget everyone in the garden mid battle and think about nothing but Rinoa while he insists the garden and students come first.
Then later.
Squall is freaking out and not caring about major story moments while the cast insists he calm down and NOT think about nothing but Rinoa for a minute.
Which is it then?

it will make more sense if you realized that Squall is actually an introvert and the crew treat him like a "special" kid.
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Ricemills posted...

darkmaian23 posted...

Am I the only one...

99% of the questions that started with this has "no" as an answer.

In this case, I meant "the only one in this topic".

Quistis best girl

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Just met Irvine and got to Galbadia.

I turned on that "no random encounters" feature since leveling doesn't really matter. Not entirely sure if "no fighting required" is a really good feature for a JRPG, though... Cuz all that's left is talking and running around, with some scripted encounters along the way. Pretty weird game design.

I like how their first mission to "liberate Timber" has been replaced with the much more reasonable second mission to "defeat the Sorceress to bring about world peace."

Apparently Rinoa loves Seifer, which is...something, I guess. Did she know him before the party at Balamb? I'm not sure how their off-screen relationship fits into the timeline of what's going on.

And let me get this straight... Galbadia is the country where the bad guys live, but the Galabadian Garden is not bad? The Gardens are an independant organization, or something, and one's just set up in Galbadia?

darkmaian23 posted...

Am I the only one who couldn't follow the plot at all?

It is kinda all over the place, with stuff just seeming to happen for the sake of it.

Like all the "Laguna in our dreams" stuff. And everyone just assuming Seifer is now dead, even though...I don't know why anyone would come to that conclusion since he was last seen willingly going with the Sorceress. And all they know is that he was put on trial and a sentence was carried out - no one even mentioned an execution, but that's what they're going with.

The plot seems to kinda hinge on -- dunno how to explain this properly, but -- characters doing stuff to make the plot progress, regardless of if there's actual logic in their actions or trains of thought.
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Gonna play more later. Bump till then.
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Plot twist, guys. The evil sorceress was actually evil. Surprise, surprise.

So she kills Rinoa's dad, while Quistis decides it's a great idea to leave her post after 5 seconds. This is why you were fired as a teacher, or whatever. You're dumb. Meanwhile, Rinoa has the genius idea of walking up to Edea and...giving her a wristband, or something? Everyone's smart as fuck in FF8, guys.

Edea commits murder in front of everyone and summons some demon dogs to attack the city, but every time it shows the citizens they're still cheering and dancing for the ceremony? ...Okay.

Seifer is alive, to the surprise of no one. Apparently he's always wanted to be the sorceress' knight, but I don't remember that being mentioned before? Maybe it was, and I just missed it?

Anyway, Leon get's impaled and now it's a year later. Laguna quit the army because jumping off a cliff into the ocean apparently wasn't the best idea and he was bedridden for 6 months.

On that note, I'm not sure what Laguna's squad was even trying to do in that last "dream" sequence? They were fighting enemies (Esthar soldiers?) for some reason, and then they get cornered, or something. Not really sure about that whole segment.

Anyway, the story's picking up a bit now. Still has characters doing dumb things for the sake of the plot, but it's not too awful.
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Trying to escape the prison. Irvine just came to the rescue.

I don't get it, Laguna said it's been a year since his last appearance, but there's no way the guys have been locked up for more than a couple days. What's that about.
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they're flashbacks.
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After how many days do topics gets purged? Need to know how long I can go without updates.
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slmcknett posted...

Limit Breaks only appear when you're low on HP, right? I'm never really sure about when they're supposed to appear, or how to pull them off.

Zell's is pretty cool, though, yeah.

I think Quistis said to hold down R1 when attacking at the right time to pull off a better attack or smthng, but I kinda missed her explanation. So I'm not entirely sure what that was about.

You ever play Paper Mario or Super Mario RPG? It's like that except press R1 right when the sword hits
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slmcknett posted...

After how many days do topics gets purged? Need to know how long I can go without updates.

They don't last long on CE. Should've posted on a more dormant board if you wanted it to stay alive :)

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I have not played those Mario games, no. :(

gloBal enemy posted...

They don't last long on CE.

D'oh.
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I wish the nature of the sorceresses and their mind control was better explained. Seifer, Galbadia, and the general distrust in sorceresses makes a lot more sense when you see how insidious their influence can be.
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Sent Selphie, Zell, and Quistis into the enemy army base to stop the missiles. They all fail. That last boss - the tank - was pretty OP. Took like 3 tries.

Now Squall, Cowboy, and Rinoa are trying to evacuate Balamb Garden. There's apparently a coup d'etat or some such going on, and some guy named NORG (a name I don't recall having heard before now) is causing everyone to betray Cid.

Climbing down into the bowels of the garden now.
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Oh man, lots of plot-twists going on.
Cid is married to Edea, Laguna's from the past, and Ellone's been the one putting Squall's squad into the dream world?

I just got past the NORG fight and sent Ellone back with some Galbadian soldiers, and the story's kinda getting good now.

Not entirely sure I followed the whole backstory of Garden that Cid was explaining, but it sounded like Edea wasn't always evil? But after she turned evil, the purpose of the Gardens turned to training SeeDs to be strong enough to defeat her? Or maybe that's what NORG wanted all along?

Anyway, I like how Squall's being written. He's very introspective and anxious about stuff. And he doesn't seem to like to be placed in situations where a lot is expected of him. Overall, he's pretty relatable. I wasn't expecting that.
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Selphie just put on the concert.

That was a fun event, getting everyone to try out different instruments. The way the game is using the characters is so much better than how FFXV did it, it's not even funny.

The talk that Squall and Rinoa had is probably one of my favorite scenes so far.
"I'm sorry." / "No, you're not! You just want to get the hell out of here!"
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How are you this far in the game? Shouldn't you still be drawing magic in the fire cave?
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i dont get it
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Oh shit, I can use the school as an airship and travel around the world!

I'm only now noticing there's a world map, and...jesus, there's so much of this world hasn't been explored yet (I also only now noticed I'm on Disc 2, of what appears to be four total. Jesus...)

My brother told me that the more magic I have drawn to a character, the stronger that spell is when it's Junctioned? Or something similar to that. So turning back on random encounters to draw as much magic as possible is a good idea.
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DeadBankerDream posted...

How are you this far in the game?

That was also my thought, but realized that you can turn random encounters off and other speed-bonuses in the remaster.
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Oh, I thought he was making a "this game is so bad, I can't believe you got past the first dungeon" kind of remark.

But yeah, you can turn off non-scripted encounters and run the game at x3 speed.

(Though, the fire cave was the first part of the game, pretty much. No way I'd still be back there after a week and a half.)
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slmcknett posted...

So she kills Rinoa's dad, while Quistis decides it's a great idea to leave her post after 5 seconds. This is why you were fired as a teacher, or whatever. You're dumb. Meanwhile, Rinoa has the genius idea of walking up to Edea and...giving her a wristband, or something? Everyone's smart as fuck in FF8, guys.

Rinoa's dad is General Caraway, so unless they did a major rewrite from the original, he's still alive and well; Edea killed the president. You'll want to revisit him at his house later in the game and challenge him at cards.

Incidentally, it bears mentioning how comically inept Caraway is. Think back on him explaining the assassination plan to the party in the empty intersection in front of the palace, running back and forth as he does so; this isn't made obvious since there's no voice acting, but unless they've all been issued Avengers-style earbuds, he's actually shouting his assassination plans across the street right in front of the target's house.
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Yeah, I went back to Rinoa's house today (where he challenged me to a children's card game) and Caraway was still alive. I guess I thought Caraway was the president?

But yeah, the scene where he was explaining the plan was hilarious.
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Love 8, but story wise is definitely style over substance.
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slmcknett posted...

Oh, I thought he was making a "this game is so bad, I can't believe you got past the first dungeon" kind of remark.

But yeah, you can turn off non-scripted encounters and run the game at x3 speed.

(Though, the fire cave was the first part of the game, pretty much. No way I'd still be back there after a week and a half.)

I was making a joke about the system encouraging you to spend forever drawing magic from early game enemies.
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Ah.
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Only played a little today. Went back to Balamb, and Raijin and Fujin were part of the Galbadian army.

"Seifer's got a lot of fans, but we're his only friends. We gotta support him." / "Then tell your friend he's being stupid."

It was a good scene. Rai and Fu are cool.
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8 sucked balls
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i kinda dislike on how the translation uses ALL CAPS for Fuujin's text.

in JP, she only used one single kanji letter every time she spoke. english translation made her like a dumb girl who always scream when talks.
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Ricemills posted...

i kinda dislike on how the translation uses ALL CAPS for Fuujin's text.

in JP, she only used one single kanji letter every time she spoke. english translation made her like a dumb girl who always scream when talks.

I always felt that she was a reticent girl, who had a powerful voice.

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Alucard188 posted...

Ricemills posted...

i kinda dislike on how the translation uses ALL CAPS for Fuujin's text.

in JP, she only used one single kanji letter every time she spoke. english translation made her like a dumb girl who always scream when talks.

I always felt that she was a reticent girl, who had a powerful voice.

which doesn't makes sense in some scenes where she looks like she's speaking softly.
her character was defined as a no-nonsense girl who speak straight to the point, but not always loud. the use of ALL CAPS made her looks like speaking loudly.
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TC, you need to fight random battles.
Just find a spot/enemy that gives you plenty of AP like the Cactuars. GF Abilities make the game much more enjoyable and you need AP for those.
Also forget about drawing magic from battles. Triple Triad and Quetzacotl's Card Mod along with the different refinement abilities is where the true power lies.
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Fujin speaks in kanji, which was probably a translation headscratcher. What we ended up with was probably the best fit, though we could have done without the caps. Her switching speaking styles late in the game also happens in Japanese too.

Since I only know Fujin from KH2, I never hear her all-caps talk as yelling, since she wasn't yelling in KH2 when she spoke.

But I guess without hearing her talk there, you would imagine her as always yelling.

fusespliff posted...

Triple Triad and Quetzacotl's Card Mod along with the different refinement abilities is where the true power lies.

I have no idea what any of this is.

The trading cards affect battle?
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slmcknett posted...

I have no idea what any of this is.

The trading cards affect battle?

Card Mod allows you to transform cards into items, which then can be turned into magic. So by playing a shit ton of TT you can get magic way earlier than you would otherwise and junction them for insane stats.

slmcknett posted...

Since I only know Fujin from KH2, I never hear her all-caps talk as yelling, since she wasn't yelling in KH2 when she spoke.

But I guess without hearing her talk there, you would imagine her as always yelling.

fusespliff posted...

Triple Triad and Quetzacotl's Card Mod along with the different refinement abilities is where the true power lies.

I have no idea what any of this is.

The trading cards affect battle?

They don't affect battles in the way you're thinking. You can just get more powerful magic in a much more enjoyable and speedy manner than drawing 100 of each in random battles.
You can refine the cards to items by having Quetzacotl learn Card Mod. Select GF and then have him learn the ability by gaining AP in battles. Then go to Ability and use Card Mod.
Different GFs have different refinement abilities (like Ifrit can refine Fire magic). You can refine items gained from battles and refined cards into magic with those abilities.
Several NPCs hold special cards like Bosses, party members and GFs. Those cards refine into some insane items that give you great abilities like Auto-Haste and insanely powerful magic. Also look up the CC group in Balamb. Beating all of them gives you the ability to refine special cards and regain them by playing the CC group over and over again on Disc 3&4
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Oh, I gotcha.
Auto Haste sounds amazing.

I suck at the card game tho, I've only won once out of like 15 tries.
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It's easy once you learn the basics and how to manipulate the rules. Basically you only want the Open rule to spread and all others abolished in all regions. That makes it a pure numbers game where the higher number beats the lower.
I'm doing my first playthrough of Remastered myself and am at about the same point as you are. Ou t of the several hundred games I've played, I lost 1 and had a Draw 4 times. Granted, I do have 20 years worth of experience playing this game.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps4/266152-final-fantasy-viii-remastered/faqs/10404

This guide focuses solely on Triple Triad, its rules and how to manipulate them and where to get the special cards.
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