Final Fantasy XII

I'm going to hide my shame of being 3 days late for a review and jump right into the next game I was supposed to review, Final Fantasy XII. This game could easily be the most time I spent on in my entire life after Star Ocean 3: Till the end of time. I have accumulated 425 hours of gameplay on it and I am quite proud of that achievement only because I have experimented with every possible outcome in the world of Ivalice aside from a fishing mini-game.

Final Fantasy XII has one of the most beautiful worlds and environments out there. It was supposed to be more grand than what it actually is, until a certain someone took a vacation and his ideas were rehashed from having Basch as the main character accompanied by Balthier and Fran to having two useless characters added simply to sell the game well from a marketing standpoint (Vaan and Penelo).

Regardless, Final Fantasy XII is still a hit or a miss to most fans of the series and is not favored by a lot. In fact, it had quite the backlash of a reaction because of its gameplay being similar to an offline MMO, where your characters perform their actions automatically and rarely resembles the old Final Fantasy model we have grown up with.

As I have previously mentioned, Final Fantasy XII takes place in the world of Ivalice, where other games have also taken residence in it and none of them have disappointed such as Final Fantasy Tactics, Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. Your characters are caught up in Dalmasca, a kingdom situated between Rozaria and Archadia that are waging a war. Ashe, the princess of Archadia creates a resistance group and travels the world in search of the meaning behind her name, a dream of Vaan to become a sky pirate and a lot of  resistance against the empire. Wait, I said the empire. Yes, sadly there are no storm troopers here but it's pretty much the same thing and we cannot hide the fact that this game is heavily influenced by Star Wars.

The environments can be interacted with more easily in FFXII where objects and enemies are found on the overworld map instead of random battles. The whole game's combat system and mechanics are changed in the same way an MMO is played. Items found on the field are random and you don't obtain gil by slaying enemies in battle but you have to exchange the loot you gain from said enemies. When you finally sell the loot, you get gil for it and also unlock more items to craft in the bazaar, pretty close to the synthesis option in Final Fantasy IX.

The system that was newly introduced to the entire series and one that took me at least 100 hours to understand due to my slow mind, was the gambit system. Your characters can follow a set of macros based on the orders you give them. Certain actions can be customized such as (Take potion when HP is below 30%) or (Focus enemy with highest HP) or (Attack the leader's target) and last but certainly not the least (Use phoenix down when someone is dead) all these automatic functions when piled up upon each other can actually create an unstoppable party for you. I once hilariously followed a set of gambit functions that was shamelessly taken from someone genius online, and I left my characters in a dungeon for a few days. The gambits they followed allowed them to endlessly grind and the respawning time for the monsters was carefully planned enough for them to go from one area to another by slaying monsters and using potions at the right time or casting cure when necessary until when I came back, I found the 3 characters as level 99. I know, I know very shameless and cheap of me but rest assured despite my shameful act, the game is much more difficult than having a few characters reach up to max level without having a few difficulties.

There is also an upgrade system that I am very fond of that is quite different than the rest of the upgrade systems in any previous entry, named as the license board where the character is easily customizable based on what you want them to be. Right off the bat from the beginning of the game, the choice is entirely up to you on what class you want your character to be based on what they are "licensed" to wear or cast whether you want them to be black mages or knights. The remastered version that we are waiting for has an entirely different License board that I am also looking forward to that changes the order of the grid into actual classes instead of you chasing certain weapon/armor grids all over.

The new limit break system, although deemed itself to be very interesting is not one of the most favorable ones out there for me and is easily forgettable. There are certain movesets that the characters combine if their limit break bars are all complete and they all simultaneously attack based on a few quick time event prompts and the other option for your limit break is to summon an esper after defeating it. The Esper has its own gambits and automatically attacks alongside your party.

After the departure of Nobuo Uematsu, it was strangely relieving to hear a new composer come into the series and I was glad to follow Hitoshi Sakimoto's other work. Not only is the soundtrack vibrant with strong tracks that fill you with adrenaline during boss or esper fights, but it also has these ambient tracts that really draw you in the vast environments that you travel through endlessly such as the dalmascan estersand. Final Fantasy XII is huge and it would be unfair of me to just simply state the combat system and consider myself done with explaining how great of a game it is because it is definitely much more than that if you are a big fan of exploration. The story itself wont take more than 40 hours but it is such a great feeling when you advance the plot bit by bit and find intertwining dungeons connected to where you are headed that are completely optional not to mention finding hidden espers, bosses and treasure which make it all the more worthwhile. Out of all the entries, FFXII is the only entry that I have beaten once and I am glad to undertake this journey again when the remastered version comes out soon on the PS4. I've been Ahmed Jadaa and I'll see you on my next Final Fantasy review.