Board 8 > Nook's FF Topic [FF16 hype] [Series Ranking]

(+) Yeah! (+)

Right. You wanna 8x shoot with Archer/Ninja? Go nuts, queen. Quick abuse as Time Mage Summoner? Sure! Completely trivialize a whole endgame area and super boss with Bard? Fuck yeah! Delete an eldritch abomination by throwing a buff at it with Chemist then abusing the power of math with Bluemage? Yep, we've got that too.

Even Berserker can have some fun if you know how the triggers function depending on what it wields, and its widely considered the "worst job."

KanzarisKelshen posted...

There was a lot of work done under the hood to ensure that just playing the game normally would actually leave you adequately powered up for everything.

Like what? You get more exp/ap? Enemies are weaker?

pjbasis posted...

Like what? You get more exp/ap? Enemies are weaker?

I have to look it up but I know they rebalanced the exp growth curve in particular. So enemies give the same amount of EXP but you level faster anyways. It's very noticeable in FF4 and FF5 where level is all and having a couple levels more really makes you much stronger due to the game math.

https://twitter.com/finalfantasyxvi/status/1653406841500745729?s=19

Dayum

Sorry guyz, I've been too busy to post lately because I'm going to Japan soon, and I've been spending all my time planning my trip. I'm going to be gone for two weeks, but I'll try my best to bump this topic. Please help me keep it bumped in case I forget.

#8. Final Fantasy VIII

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/3/9/AAK53VAAEcbv.png

It's weird because this game exists in two separate places in my mind - me playing it as a kid which is just pure nostalgic joy, and then me revisiting it as an adult and coming to recognize it's many flaws.

FF8 is unlike any other game in the series. This game was inevitably going to rake in huge amounts of cash after the success of FF7, and Square could've just played it safe and did something familiar. But instead they took a hard left, and I kinda respect that. It's kinda like Metal Gear Solid 2 in that way.

And I honestly think it paid off for the most part. The Junction system is either a convoluted clusterfuck, or possibly the most ingenious progression system in the entire series, depending on your perspective. I personally tend to lean towards the latter. Have you guys seen the videos of people breaking the game in the first couple hours? It's like you go get Quistis' Card, Refine it to some crazy item, go get Diablos' Time Magic Refine, get a gazillion Triples, and now all of a sudden your characters can do like 5000 damage per physical attack, or Renzokuken can do like 40,000.

And I'm just fucking aghast at the fact that the game let's you do that so early on. The game totally gives the player enough tools and freedom early on to go crazy, and it's up to them to put the pieces together. But then again, good luck navigating those obtuse tutorials and never-ending sea of acronyms. When I was a kid, I just ignored most of that stuff and played it like a regular RPG and did fine lol (which I actually find to be a testament to it's design - you can play as casually or hardcore as you want.)

Really the achilles heel in all this is how long it takes to Draw Magic. If they could just speed that up, it'd improve this entire package exponentially. Maybe they did in the Remaster? I haven't played it yet.

But yeah. The characters and story? Either you're here for it or you aren't. Me personally, I just embrace the madness. Hotdogs and trains, man. Quistis is probably my all time favorite FF waifu, and I always loved every scene Laguna was in. And Triple Triad? Still my all time favorite FF mini game.

The pre-rendered backgrounds were absolutely breathtaking, and the music equally so. This was definitely Square at their A-game - I don't think any of FF8's flaws can be attributed to cutting corners or lack of talent. They were at the height of their success, and they just wanted to go crazy and see if they could completely redefine what it meant to be an "RPG". Maybe it paid off, and maybe it didn't. It's definitely the black sheep of the series in that way.

Me personally? 8.7 seems about right. Not quite a 9, but I respect the hustle nonetheless.

The ranking so far
#8. FF8 - 8.7
#9. FF5 - 8.6
#10. FF14 ARR - 8.6
#11. FFX-2 - 8.5
#12. FF12 - 8.5
#13. FF11 - 8.4
#14. FF7R - 8.4
#15. FF1 - 8.3
#16. FF15 - 8.0
#17. DoC FF7 - 6.0
#18. FF2 - 3.5
#19. FF13 - 3.0

TomNook7 posted...

Sorry guyz, I've been too busy to post lately because I'm going to Japan soon

wanna hang out?

MZero posted...

wanna hang out?

lol what city are you in? Ill be in Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto

FF8 is the only FF I played through last century that I haven't played since. Anyway, it really feels like the battle system works better if you're playing it blind. Then you can get kind of a natural progression until you figure out how to break it yourself. You are indeed expected to break it to some extent, and if you don't get a good handle on it, you can get soft-locked around the Sorceress Adel fight towards the end. Also, at the same time there's so many hidden things most people would have a real hard time finding without a guide (e.g. Obel Lake sidequest stands out here, Card King quest, and a lot of the cards including that Quistis card). It came out at this weird time when the internet was just starting to get big but wasn't yet, which maybe influnced some of these design decisions.

FF8 is my most played FF.. Maaaaaaaybe Tactics meets it in total time, but full playthroughs is definitely 8.

It took a while for me, but FF8 is pretty good. The vibes are immaculate. I feel like the plot itself is overly confusing/unbelievable and any character not Squall or Laguna is badly written.

I will always triple down on arguing that Selphie is a fantastically written character whose psychotic nature terrifies the entire party.

Also, im bringing ff5, crisis core, and dissidia on the plane with me to japan

Is the original dissidia even worth playing, or should i go straight to 012? What even are these games lol. Apparently theres a 16 hour long campaign? I thought they were just fighting games

TomNook7 posted...

Really the achilles heel in all this is how long it takes to Draw Magic. If they could just speed that up, it'd improve this entire package exponentially. Maybe they did in the Remaster? I haven't played it yet.

There's an option for 3X battle speed which really helps, yeah. Could draw 99 of something on all 3 party members in a few minutes.

skullbone posted...

There's an option for 3X battle speed which really helps, yeah. Could draw 99 of something on all 3 party members in a few minutes.

Awesome. My wife wants to play through the remaster with me one day so maybe ill adjust my score then

FF8 is a profoundly weird game. Fun in the moment, but when you take a step back and stop to think about everything happening it's kind of a mess. Still finished and enjoyed it though, so it was doing something right.

Using Draw is a bad idea regardless imo. Refining spells is the way to go. Tent -> Curaga = easy mode.

Plus all the cards you can turn into spells. Playing Triple Triad to get more powerful is great.

With 3x speed drawing doesn't even seem that bad now! Might do a no-refinement run next time

#7. Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/7/9/1/AAK53VAAEcnf.jpg

It only took 100 hours of slogging through ARR, but finally - HW was what made me a believer in FF14.

It was an improvement on ARR in every way. The combat got more challenging and less mindless, the story got better, the music got better.

Like sure, ARR was pretty great for it's time, but it never felt truly "Final Fantasy." The characters were kind of just a bunch of weird strangers that I couldn't get attached to, and they just fell flat when compared to other characters in the series.

But then near the beginning of HW, when you're going on a journey with a ragtag group of friends - Alphinaud, Ysayle, and Estinien - and they have little moments where they bond over a campfire, or bicker over politics - it finally felt like Final Fantasy.

And it finally became a 9/10 for me when we were all defending Ishgard from Nidhogg, and the fight was just EPIC, and every character was bringing their A-game, and the music was just going full blast.

There's also some DONT HIGHLIGHT THIS IF YOU AINT PLAYED FF14: great character deaths, including the death of my fav FF14 character, Haurchefant ;-; and I never thought we'd get a Dragoon who could top Kane or Freya... but Estinien might be it. I just think it's so metal he dyes his armor in the blood of dragons. Also this is probably my favorite depiction of Shiva in the entire series. Like... she sleeps with dragons? It's all just so metal.

I also got heavily into Triple Triad around this time, which bleeds into a ton of side content, and somehow I ended up going on adventures with sky pirates and shit. That's the great thing about FF14 - there's so much player freedom, you never know where your adventures are gonna take you. In that regard, I truly believe Eorzea is the most fully realized FF world, topping even Spira from FFX.

So yeah, honestly, I haven't played many MMOs, but FF14 is definitely my favorite. And shout out to the community. Everybody I've met has been so incredibly helpful and pleasant to talk to. And that's just... generally unheard of when it comes to gamer communities.

So yeah, we're in 9/10 territory now baby.

The ranking so far
#7. FF14 HW - 9.0
#8. FF8 - 8.7
#9. FF5 - 8.6
#10. FF14 ARR - 8.6
#11. FFX-2 - 8.5
#12. FF12 - 8.5
#13. FF11 - 8.4
#14. FF7R - 8.4
#15. FF1 - 8.3
#16. FF15 - 8.0
#17. DoC FF7 - 6.0
#18. FF2 - 3.5
#19. FF13 - 3.0

TomNook7 posted...

There's also some DONT HIGHLIGHT THIS IF YOU AINT PLAYED FF14:

https://youtu.be/L4jUqpMmR_g

TomNook7 posted...

#7. Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/7/9/1/AAK53VAAEcnf.jpg

It only took 100 hours of slogging through ARR, but finally - HW was what made me a believer in FF14.

It was an improvement on ARR in every way. The combat got more challenging and less mindless, the story got better, the music got better.

Like sure, ARR was pretty great for it's time, but it never felt truly "Final Fantasy." The characters were kind of just a bunch of weird strangers that I couldn't get attached to, and they just fell flat when compared to other characters in the series.

Its pretty wild what a difference 0.4/10 can make.

redrocket posted...

Its pretty wild what a difference 0.4/10 can make.

Yeah dude! I consider 5/10 as average, so thats a huge statistical jump
on this scale. But I probably might drop ARR to 8.5 the more i think about it

Your stats don't drop that much if you go from 100 to 90. And it's not all that useful to use most magic anyway if you're min/maxing. Plus the most useful ones to use like curaga are easily replenished.

Heavensward is like 9.8/10 for me. I've never fallen in love with a fictional city as much as I have with Ishgard. The companions were wonderful - Aymerick, Estinien, Ysayle, and Haurchefant all remain some of my favorite characters in all of RPG history - the enemies were intimidating, and everything just made sense as to how it plays out. The Fortemps are, as far as I'm concerned, my WoL's family, and Ishgard is "home."

Thordan is super underrated as a villain imo.

That final showdown with Nidhogg gave me chills.

Ishgard is amazing, yes. Absolutely love the music.

Estinien is the best FFXIV character.

Wouldn't say the human villains are anything special though.

I think the patch content for Heavensward is better than the 3.0 content. I love the 3.0 villain aesthetically but not so much in prescence. Obviously a part of this is that we're spoiled for memorable villains after this by banger after banger.

UltimaterializerX posted...

Is there an in game menu to see the bestiary in FF1 pixel remaster or do I have to check from the main screen?

Its in the Configuration menu.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/2/2/AADcu0AAEcrG.jpg

(Screenshot from FF3 but they all have had it in that spot so far.)

UltimaterializerX posted...

More importantly, please tell me they arent all like this.

Like what?

UshiromiyaEva posted...

I think the patch content for Heavensward is better than the 2.0 content. I love the 2.0 villain aesthetically but not so much in prescence. Obviously a part of this is that we're spoiled for memorable villains after this by banger after banger.

Gaius is a lot better in 1.0 content, fwiw. He gets a few truly remarkable moments there which I'm still shocked were never rescued in any way.

https://youtu.be/CqV84_rKfxU?t=313

Talk about making a remarkable entrance!

That was a typo and I meant 3.0, lol. Brain forgot FFXIV starts at 2 for a second.

But yeah I do like Gaius a lot, certainly more than the 3.0 villain. Sure a lot of that is memes, but still. Elevator speech still good the 125th time you hear it.

Heavensward is so good. The final confrontation will forever live rent-free in my head.

Yeah, it's crazy seeing some people rank Stormblood and Endwalker higher.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

That was a typo and I meant 3.0, lol. Brain forgot FFXIV starts at 2 for a second.

But yeah I do like Gaius a lot, certainly more than the 3.0 villain. Sure a lot of that is memes, but still. Elevator speech still good the 125th time you hear it.

Gaius is really cool.

3.0 villain got rescued by Ishikawa using him brilliantly in Endwalker

Bump from tokyo

Bump. Id do another write-up but i just hate doing it from my phone ya know?

So Gogo from ff6, the Brothers from ff8, and Krile from ff14 all first appeared in ff5

amazing

also i love chemist

So let me get this straight:

spellblade flare + dual wield + rapid fire + mimic x3 = 32 flares?

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/4/7/AAK53VAAEdur.jpg

Oh but of course some random enemy used berserk on my entire party, but theyre all mimes, and mimic replaced attack for all of them, so now all i can do is watch helplessly as my party just endlessly mimics each other mimicing

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/4/8/AAK53VAAEdus.jpg

this is just the best gameplay in the entire series

Help I have no clue where to go

I got the four tablets and the twelve weapons, and now what?

Guides online show a cut scene thats supposed to happen with exdeaths minions - didnt happen

And they show the airship can now enter the black holes on the world map - doesnt happen

they say you can advance somewhere through the desert? Which desert?

i got bahamut and phoenix

what do

You should have been able to enter the holes as soon as you recovered the airship so uhhhhhhh..

It's specifically the black hole that swallowed Tycoon Castle that you enter with the airship - the other black holes don't do anything.

Your options for 5 now, since you're in endgame mode (spoilers)
- Obtain Mime (you did this)
- Obtain the rest of the summons
- Fill out your spellbooks to completion, including Blue Magic.
- ...I forget what else, actually. 5 didn't have much in outside-Ethereal-Void content except for the GBA, did it?

Aight i beat ff5

Dual cast Bahamut, 4 mimes, and a chemist mixing items that raised all my characters levels to 99

I just shit all over exdeath lmao

Or at least i wouldve, but mimes cant equip ribbons (awesome game balance honestly), so those status effects were really getting me. Instant KO + stone = brutal. I had to sacrifice bartz and faris spellblades for item just to keep everyone going.

Honestly it was a pretty lit final battle, and ff5 has like some of the best combat and progression systems in the entire series. Pretty damn impressive for a game from 1992. Its just a shame about the story and world building

Playing ff5 and x-2 has really given me a new perspective on the core gameplay of this series. 8.6 is definitely too low for ff5 now that i think about it, and honestly i have a bit more respect for ff5, ff8, ffx-2, and ff12, and maybe a little less respect for ff14, ff15, and ff7r. I just have this newfound craving for player freedom, customization, and strategy that i just dont get from the more recent entries

And now im kinda wary of ff16 with its action based combat. Its like yeah i trust yoshi p, but not so much modern day square lol. But well see

anyway yeah ff5 is at least 9/10. So good.

Hell yeah for a long time I considered FFV my favorite of the 2D games. I think FFVI might be inching closer though.

I'm working on the FFV plat right now and almost at the end. First playthrough in over 10 years and I forgot how fun the gameplay is.

Hell yeah

I wanna do FF3 next, but with TOTK waiting for me back home im probably gonna be taking a hiatus from ff for a while lol

im gonna at least start dissidia 012 on the plane ride home tho

FF3 was the biggest surprise for me while playing through the pixel remasters. Much better than I remembered!