I posted this in my other blog, but...

I posted this in my other blog a while back, but feel it has a place here. Go ahead and read that blog too, at fultonrants@blogspot.com.

When I was but a young boy, I began playing those most epic of games, Final Fantasy. They have always been my very favorite RPGs, as I am sure is true of many of us, but the feelings of joy and unadulterated happiness I used to feel every time a release date drew near have become dread and horror. Some recent news about Final Fantasy XIII, which I until now hailed as a savior for the series, has turned my very blood cold. This is the last straw. You, Squeenix, have betrayed my trust for the last time.This is a chronicle of how I, a once die-hard Square fanboy, became a bitter, angry Squeenix-hater.

Long ago, when I was around nine or ten, I was a firly lonesome boy. I didn't really have a lot of friends my own age, so I knd of hung around with the younger kids who lived in my neighborhood. We had little in common, but at that age, you were where you were, so I made the best of it. Until I met Dan. Dan was a kid a little bit older than me who lived up the street from me, and had that most sacred of instruments; The Super Nintendo. We hit it off fast, and soon, I was spending hours in his basement, playing Mario and Zelda, talking about Star Trek, and that was that. Until, that is... that golden day, when Dan recieved something new, something I had never thought of before... Final Fantasy III. To this day I remember the first question I ever asked about it: "If it's a FINAL Fantasy, how can there be three of them?" Dan nodded sagely, scratched his chin, and imparted to me the sacred wisdom, that he had, in fact, NO idea. Grinning, we set about playing the game. Here was something i had never seen the likes of before... an overworld. Once you got an airship, you could fly it whereever you wanted. Zelda had had something similar, of course, but not on this kind of SCALE! The turn-based battles that allowed you to think things through, the magic spells, the use of multiple characters at once... it was incredible. I remember sprawling, monstrous summons, and a deep story that I felt like my parents would be mad if they knew I had read. In time, I didn't see so much of Dan anymore, but I will always remember those days, when I first began to become the gamer I would always be. From that day, I regarded Square on the level of godhood, like the great Nintendo or Sega themselves.

The next I knew of Final Fantasy was when Final Fantasy VII came out. I was young, and confuced as hell about the numbering system. Wasn't the last one Final Fantasy III? It would be years before I heard about the now famous numbering SNAFU that led to this, but I simply shrugged and went with it. Unfortunately, when faced with the choice between a Playstation or a Nintendo 64, I had decided to not repeat the mistake of the Sega CD, and went with the 64. This gave me little to no access to the game, but I do remember playing it in pieces at a friend's house. The new 3D graphics amazed me, and I remember being utterly amazed at the speed of the Highwind, and the size of the monstrous Weapons. The story was even better than III (now known to in fact be VI), with a villain driven insane by the awful things that had been done to turn him into a hero. Gone were the short, squat people I remembered; they had been replaced with graphics that looked like humans and were, dare I say it? ATTRACTIVE.

I heard nothing of this wonderful world of games for many years, until I was going to High School. There, I was good friends with a guy named Rick, who had played but not enjoyed his copy of Final Fantasy VII, and so, gave it to me. What ensued was a wave of years passing, during which I became obsessed. I played every Square game I could get my hands on. By this point, I had my own PSX, and a world of possibilities was open to me. I played the Anthologies, thus visiting the original games I remembered, as well as being introduced to many that were new to me. I played the untouchable Chrono Trigger, and it's amazing sequel Chrono Cross. I played Vagrant Story and Star Ocean 2. I played the incredible Final Fantasy VIII, of course, with mounting joy.

Then, it happened. Final Fantasy IX. The game that was then, and in many ways will always be, my favorite RPG of all time. It was not without it's flaws, but Zidane's bright attitude and Vivi's tragic story held me in sway. Backed up by classic gameplay with a few twists, it easily ate hours of my life. With a smile on my face, I couldn't wait to pilot my strangely literal airship on a sea of mist. Thus ended what I now call the golden age of Square, and began what is now tainted forever in my mind as the Age of Squeenix.

The Playstation 2. Arguably the most popular videogame console of all time, this system is still in production today, despite the PS3 having been released years ago. With it came a whiole new wavelength of games and graphics. One day, I flipped open my Playstation Magazine, and there, printed before me, were the three letters I felt I had been waiting my whole life for: FFX. With baited breath, i read the article, frantic for any word whatsoever on this wonderful game. I soon discovered that the battle system I had grown to love would receieve a few tweaks. I had no worries, though. How could SQUARESOFT make a bad game, after all? In the months to come, when the game was finally released, I found myself to be a strange mix of satisfied and dissapointed. The game had indeed been excellent, with voice acting, action scenes, music I adored, and fun, though simple, gameplay. However, a small but inescapable cloud fell over the game. There was no overworld. I had been looking forward to flying a beautiful airship around a lovely, ocean blue planet, eagerly landing in unexplored places to seek all the strange and new secrets the world was sure to hold. Instead, i got to pick locations from a menu, and play a built in sports game.

This sadness was cut short as Square again shot me full of joy, with one of the greatest games they ever made, Kingdom Hearts. This odd mix of Final Fantasy storytelling and art direction with beloved Disney characters and locations was a surprise hit, to say the least. The very idea sounds absurd! However, I loved the game, and my doubts about Square were set safely aside for the time being. Little did I know what awaited on the horizon. Final Fantasy X-2 (Yes, that's said Ten two) was coming. At first, it made sense. "AH," I thought. "THAT'S why they didn't let you fly an airship! They knew they were going to make a sequel, and they didn't want to leave a question as to why you couldn't find the locations you visit in X-2 in the first one!" Nodding to myself, I waited happily for the game... only to be tragically dissapointed. It wasn't a BAD game... it was simply silly and thoughtless, which felt harsh and strange after the fun, deep world of X. Still in denial, I chalked it up to the natural order of things. After all, not everything is perfect every time. Even Square could make mistakes, right?

Shortly after, the Squeenix incident occurred. Square was hemmorhaging money fast after they had spent so much money on their relative failure of a movie, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Personally, I found the film to be excellent, but fans in general were crestfallen. They didn't want this new story. Most of them wanted Final Fantasy VII, but on the big screen. (Ironically, they would later get just that, and proceed to complain about it, too. You simply can't please a fan.) This combined with a bunch of other things caused Square to be bought out by Enix, a rival developer, and one who's games I had NEVER enjoyed. With a heavy heart, I purchased the first game to be released under the SquareEnix label, and was pleasantly surprised. Kingdom Hearts II was fun and intriguing, a somewhat darker counterpoint to the original. Maybe, I said to myself, things weren't so bad after all.

Then came the dark ages, from which we have never risen. The days of Final Fantasy XI. The game was designed to be a completely online experience, much like WOW, and frankly, was doomed from the start. Not only did you have to buy the PS2's optional hard drive to play it, but you had to shell out a monthly fee to be connected. I know very few people who even bothered. Those who did paint a bleak picture. Gone were the wonderful characters and events of games past, gone were controlling your parties in a turn based battle, gone were the days where puzzles took time and thought. All of this was replaced with grinding. Grinding, for those not in the know, is when you fight monsters for hours to level up your character to a point where the game becomes easier. They took a beautiful, tried and true system, and abandoned it comepltely.

Heartbroken, I waited for the day when Final Fantasy XII would be released, hoping for something, ANYTHING to dull the pain. Finally, that day came. The classic system had not been restored, so it played exactly like an MMORPG. That was bad enough, but I musceled past it. Suddenly, it happened. I realized what had been removed this time; the story. Where before there had been lovingly crafted tales of fantasy and worlds we could never even imagine, now there was a 70 hour treasure hunt. The absolute low point came for me when, in the course of the "story", a term I use loosely, it became necessary that a world famous Captain, who was in your party, reveal that he was alive and well. Instead of having him do that, they have you, a 17 year old street kid, PRETEND TO BE HIM. The utter lack of logic so defeated me that I broke inside. Not only was Squeenix crushing my childhood, but they were assuming I was an idiot, too.

With that, I put up my Final Fantasy belt. Many games have come and gone since, mostly in the Final Fantasy Tactics and Crystal Chronicles franchises, but I don't have the heart to even rent them. My very soul cries out in torment at the thought of not being first in line for a Final Fantasy purchase, but there is nothing to be done. The only rays of light come from a strange place: the PSP. Oddly, the few Final Fantasy games released on that system, specifically Dissidia and Crisis Core, were actually pretty good. For a while, I thought that this was indicative of things to come.

Suddenly, there seemed to be a silver lining. Final Fantasy XIII was on its way, and it was supposedly turn based again. It seemed to me that they were finally listening to the outcry of the fans, but recent revelations indicate that it was, in fact, not to be. Though the gameplay is of a more classic nature, they have gone one step too far. There are no longer towns in Final Fantasy, because SquareEnix has decided that they are simply "too hard" to program. They also throw around words like "archaic". The joys of shopping, visiting the Inn, of seeing what life is like in a strange new world, are gone. The world map is insanely linear, with no exploration to be had. It has been said to me that the first six hours of the game are literally in a straight line. These accusations, should they prove true, are the death of this series for me.

Final Fantasy was, to me, about exploring a fantasy. I loved the exotic locations, I loved that there were complete worlds to explore, and above all, I loved the quality. I played these games as a child not because of the popularity, but because of what the name Square meant. It guaranteed quality, it guaranteed that even if I didn't enjoy the game, I would be able to see the love and effort put into it by those who made it. No longer. The games have become lazy, and too absorbed with trying to make money off of pretty graphics and shallow gameplay.

Every Final Fantasy since IX has lost some major portion of what once was the very core of the series. X abandoned the beautiful overworld. XI abandoned the classic party system and turn based gameplay. XII ditched the once lovely story in favor of mindless droning. And XIII... XIII has abandoned what was most important of all... the atmosphere. The towns and shops and random exploration that made the worlds fell ALIVE. I once believed that the new generation of systems would bring an end to shallow games.

I hope to the god of games that these thoughts are unfounded, and that, in a little less than a month's time, I can post a retraction with a song in my heart and a smile on my face. However, I can't help but think back to the day I was a small, lonely boy in his neighbor's basement. I can't help but feel that now I know the answer to the question I asked that day. In a world where swords and spells are fast being replaced by grinding and guns, maybe the day has finally come where it makes sense. Those worlds that meant so much to me are gone. Maybe they really were my Final Fantasy.

Final Fantasy 13 - Battle System

While my opinion of Final Fantasy 13 overall is not entirely a favorable one, I also do not think it to be a bad game or bad by Final Fantasy standards in general. With that said, I do think it has the worst battle system of any Final Fantasy game in the main series (yes worse than 12).

For the uninitiated, Final Fantasy 13 utilizes what is called the Paradigm system. This means nothing without explanation of course. What it means though, is that each character has set actions under a specific title given to it, or easier explained they are temporary job classes that can be changed on the fly. Those jobs are, Commando, Medic, Ravenger, Sabatour, Synergist and Sentinel. The goal of the system is to continually keep your party in check using the appropriate skill-set needed at a specific time to either keep your party alive, or ensure the enemies stagger meter keeps going. The main goal of every fight is to raise the enemy's stagger meter to the max, break it, and then kill the enemy quickly.

While on the surface this system seems interesting, it falls apart in various ways. The first major issue I have with the system is what it actually stands for. In this game you can only control one character, that being your leader. The remainder of your team is controlled by the AI and does actions assigned to the paradigm they have set currently. So the paradigm system in the end has one and only one major function, and that is to give the AI only a very specific set of options to use and hope it does what you want. While the AI is limited, you are also unfortunately very limited to your own role and what you decide to do as the leader. To make this easier to understand why this system is not only horrible and tediously restrictive, but also to show how poorly it was implemented I will break up the issues I have found by class.

Commando: I'll start out with the game's least offender of problems. The commando class is essentially the Warrior class allowing the computer to use basically attack and blitz, blitz being an attack that affects many enemies. It is entirely straightforward and keeps the enemies stagger meter up, but does not increase it. How does the AI screw this up you ask? That answer is simple. If I want a team with two warriors, com/com/doesn't matter, the AI will attack whatever enemy I am not attacking, which is fine in some cases I may indeed want that. But I have NO choice in the matter. I can't further edit the Commando class to have the AI combo attack the same thing I am for some swift justice. Only if it is the ONLY enemy left on the field will the AI agree that it should also attack the same enemy I am.

This is just the first phase of the battle system telling me I am not allowed to decide how I want to play the game.

Ravenger: My issues with the Ravenger class stem less from the class itself and more from how the battle system is designed overall. But don't get me wrong the AI still manages to screw this up anyway. This class is the Mage essentially, and only casts offensive magic. Every enemy in the game has some weakness or immunity to one magic or another, however, the AI in all it's wisdom has no fucking clue what that weakness is unless you cast Libra. The game forces you to cast Libra JUST so the AI knows how not to be a retarded mess. Once Libra is cast the AI now knows the weakness, but it's a waste of a turn if you ask me. I KNOW the enemy's weakness 90% of the time without Libra, I've played RPG's since I was a wee lad so these games tend to make it obvious. The mere fact that because I cannot control my party means I have to play teacher for every new enemy just so the AI does what I want it to do pisses me off to no end.

So after Libra, how does the AI still manage to be a dumbass? Well it does manage this, oh yes it does. After an enemy becomes staggered you are given the ability to launch the enemy in the air preventing it from doing any damage at all. Now, I don't know about you but I want this to happen ALL the time. Here's the rub, Ravenger's only ability to launch an enemy is Aeroga (or however it's spelled) point is the AI will tend to not use this spell when I want him to, you know all the damn time after stagger. If I COULD control him that's what I would have him do. Even if the enemy is not weak to Wind, I don't care, I want that beast floating around till it's dead.

But I don't get what I want do I, no I'm playing Final Fantasy 13, the game on rails.

Sentinel: The Sentinel class is a defensive class that allows the user to literally just not die. It provokes surrounding enemies to attack only the sentinel in which next to no damage occurs. Oddly, this is the only class the AI does not manage to screw up, but I still hate it. I hate the idea that I need it (and yes you actually have to use this class). I've played countless RPG's and never was it my strategic prerogative to defend, ever. There was no need for it, even if my mage ran out of magic I'd still prefer it to attack for the measly 15 damage it could do or throw out some items. But again, I'm playing FF13 so I don't get to play the way I want to play.

The enemies in this game after a while literally force you to put up a Sentinel and either heal, or buff with the other two classes just to survive long enough to cast offensive spells. Now this is great for bosses, it actually makes you think you're outsmarting them, but when you have long 7 hour stretches of fighting enemies and waiting for the retarded AI to cast the CORRECT defensive buff (read Synergist section) on every fucking encounter, you start to want to kill yourself. Seriously, it annoyed me that much.

Sabatour: Sabatour is the class that casts debuff effects on enemies, ie slow, pain, etc. This one is funny to me. My annoyance with this class comes from my very own need to develop my own strategy in a game I've come to realize simply won't let me. The Sabatour class is the only class other than Commando that also keeps the stagger meter going without dropping briskly while having the added benefit of causing debuffs on the enemy. I love this, and hate this, here's why....the STUPID FUCKING AI.

So often I'll find myself in a tight bind in this game, nearly dead after some super attack the AI did. I want to heal, but I don't want to lose my stagger meter, and I wouldn't mind debuffing the enemy in the process. Simple solution, medic/medic/sabatour. This works great, fabulous even...until...until the enemy IS actually debuffed. I'm not fully healed yet, and the AI decides to stop doing ANYTHING because it figures the enemy is debuffed enough.

Actual conversation with the TV

"NO NO NO AI, I want you to keep casting slow before I lose my stagger meter! What are you fucking doing???"

So once an enemy is debuffed the sabatour class is actually completely useless and you may as well forget you have one paradigm setting. Oh yes, did I mention you only have 6 different settings to choose from? *sigh*

Synergist: I've saved my most hated two classes for last. Synergist is the opposite of Sabatour, it buffs your party. There are many problems with this class, I'm not sure where to begin. I'll discuss how the AI is programmed I guess. I've played this game for 40 hours now, and routinely see how the AI operates, and I just don't fucking understand its reasoning. My party is Lighting (leader), Hope, and Fang. Hope is the Synergist if you didn't know, and the rules of this game state that if your leader dies, you lose, got it? Good.

So the AI when it first casts buffs casts them on who first? Take a wild guess. NOPE not the Leader! Well what about the Synergist himself? Fuck NO! The order of buff, and this never changes, is to cast it on the third useless character FIRST for no god damn reason. I don't CARE if the third character dies, the game ends if I fucking die! I wouldn't even mind if the Synergist buffed himself so he survives and buffs my leader. But NO he buffs himself last, which makes even LESS sense considering he has the lowest HP and can die very quickly. Again, if I were in control this would never happen. You want to know the shittiest part? Say I have Com/Syn/Sent up, guess who he casts protect on first? The FUCKING SENTINEL!! What sense does this make?

There is more...

You literally get no control in this game, have I mentioned this before? The only control you get is to tell the AI what set of spells or attacks he is allowed to use at a given time. Keyword, SET of spells or attacks. Here we have the Synergist, whom has...how do I put this...an ASSFUCK set of spells that you do NOT get to decide the order in which they are cast.

Actual conversation to the TV

"Hope...Hope! Cast protect on Lighting Hope...Anytime would be great...No I didn't want shell on Fang...I don't want shell at all. Nope didn't want Veil either. What the fuck does that even do (I found out later, and really don't give a shit about Veil). Waste more time please..."

That was a normal encounter folks, one of many...This happened through all of Chapter 10 I'd say.

So here's the deal, instead of allowing the user to further customize the Synergist (or any) class telling it specifically what order you want what, or to exclude this or that, you get NO choices at all and are simply subject to the AI's whims at all times. They will literally go through the order of buffing you with every god damn spell they have. It is a waste of time!

Medic: This is my most hated class for the AI to control. It encompasses everything about how the AI and battle system functions that makes it completely atrocious and every time I see the AI use it I ask myself this, "Why can't I control what my party does?"

Oh boy here we go.

So the healing class, probably the most important class in any RPG in the hands of an AI I can't tell what to do. In Final Fantasy 12 you could tell it what to do. You could specifically set its program to revive, to heal at a certain % of health or whatever, it was your call. The Medic however, is designed thus, to heal whatever character has the lowest hit points at the time. This is a detrimental design flaw, and really the only one that actually breaks the game sometimes. Bosses and some powerful enemies have devastating attacks that will send the whole team to red. You have to HOPE and PRAY that the character in your party with the LEAST HP is your Leader. Yeah that's right, you want your leader to be on the verge of death so the AI will heal it and you'll survive. That's a perfect world though, as I've had countless battles where the AI will decide to heal another character with lower hit points all for the sake of who the fuck cares. So my leader sits there dying, and often does with the next blow while the AI thought it to be a wonderful idea to heal the THIRD character whom means NOTHING at this juncture.

Why is it programmed this way? Wouldn't you ALWAYS want the leader to be alive? Wouldn't you always want it to have top priority? Hell at LEAST heal the leader if it is blinking RED, but fuck that, the third character has less HP, heal that instead. Stupid....stupid....stupid!

Here's another fun flaw in the Medic. The raise spell. What does it do? Brings back a ko'ed character. Fucking useless in a game where if your leader dies you lose the game. So the raise spell doesn't work on one of three characters. OH WAIT! It doesn't work on TWO of three characters either. That's right, the Medic himself also has no fucking use for the raise spell....cause he'd be dead.

It gets better. The raise spell is further useless to the AI because it will never fucking cast it unless BOTH remaining characters have near full HP. I have seen it go through 4 turns making sure both he and I were literally at MAX HP until it used raise to bring the third character back. WHAT....THE.....FUCK?

Conclusion: The sad thing is all of this could have been easily avoided if you were allowed to further customize how the AI operated in their respective class. While my personal preference would be to never ever let the AI control my party anyway, I would have liked more options, more choices. The way FF13 plays now I feel like I have no control, and I'm just paradigm shifting simply to stay alive and allow the battle to play out all by itself. There is no sense of accomplishment, no sense of actual strategy either. The AI just comes out and spams all its debuffs and all its buffs because it was programmed that way. Instead of having strategic uses for any of these classes you are locked in to simply just watching shit happen, oh and casting Libra to make sure the AI doesn't fuck up more.

The intentions of this battle system are clear, it was built for noobs, 5 year olds, people who like games on auto-pilot. This was not built for gamers, not built for RPG players used to setting up sound strategic options against tough foes. There is no sense of accomplishment with this system. There is never a critical moment where you saved yourself or your party because of a decision you made. There are no decisions to make in this game, there's only what the AI chooses to do. Oh, and did I mention you also have an option called "auto battle." Prove to me this game wasn't made for noobs and I'll mail you a cookie.

*lamest battle system ever*