FFXII progress report
Jan. 8th, 2007 08:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
petroniaSororial unit wailed when I explained the Ivalice timeline. "I don't want there to be a Fall of Rome! I didn't do all that so there would be a Fall of Rome!" The funny part being she's actually watching Rome - the TV series (and previous to starting FFXII was playing Rome: Total War on the PC). I guess I should compile her some fic recs that prominently feature the Archadian senate etc.
Personally I dig the parallels. Most fantasy settings are preceded only by myth - that is, FFXII is preceded by myth too, if you asked the characters they would probably say the gods and heroes had gone before them and they were living in the Iron Age, but then history just goes on. Like maybe Ashley out of Vagrant Story is to Ashelia as a modern-day (well, 16th-century) person named Julian would be to the Julii / Julius Caesar. (Cid -> Sydney? Don't answer that.) Scholasticism and legend, scrolls preserved in Rozarrian libraries, cities upon ruins upon forgotten ruins... standard mythological references in literature (mais ou sont les neiges d'antan?). You sort of see what kind of fic I'm doomed to write for this game, if I were going to write. orz
However I kind of see the big-ass lettering on the wall, insofar as there may be politics, war, etc. in the plot but what I'm going to be doing all this time is fetchquesting magic crystals from sunless dungeons. >_>
Graphics/environment/gameplay: every time I enter a new area my PS2 makes a sound like it's hacking up a hairball. Hell, it makes discomfited loading noises when I change the members of my party. It's a long way from FFX's no-pain character toggle. XD; (Although you can and do change party members in-battle, not to mention re-equip them from scratch à la Vagrant Story. Except instead of the "hang on lemme change the jewels on my sword hilt" dance, it's the "hang on lemme find the license for this accessory" dance. Equipment menu-ing during boss fights FTW!
Seriously, guys, I am SO GLAD I played Vagrant Story before playing this. I'd be completely baffled otherwise.)
I was going to say the desert is to FFXII what the ocean is to FFX, and then I got to the Sandsea ahaha. Like the music the environments are much more umm environmental, like if you're in the desert it's just these vast expanses of sand and rocky outcroppings and blue sky, and if you're in the dungeons it's a maze of twisty little passages, all alike (and then the lights go out and you're eaten by a zombie mage). In other FFs when you arrived somewhere new you'd sort of coo a bit at the pretty landscape and the pretty theme music before walking into the monsters' maw. I can't recall a single note of FFXII's music but it's sterling at ambience, I literally can't stay down in the Lhusu mineshaft for longer than twenty minutes because I get twitchy and claustrophobic. XD;
When we were playing FFX exactly six years ago (...) I was speed-gaming to beat the thing before my winter break from school ran out, and my sister could afford to run around levelling and playing blitzball. Now the situation is reversed, she's about five boss fights from the end without so much as a Haste spell and I'm hunting marks. Dunno, I like it better than all that card game nonsense, I don't even play card games in RL so why would I, etc. XD; Whereas hunting marks is straight profit, and profit pays for weapons upgrades, and I am unable to resist the siren call of weapons upgrades. I don't know where the money for grimoires is going to come from.
FTR my sister plays straight 2 x melee + 1 x white mage, I rotate my characters in and out of the party indifferently but it's always something like:
A: time mage/thief/fighter (Vaan, Balthier, Ashe - manually controlled, high evade)
B: heavy duty fighter (Basch, Balthier, Ashe)
C: white mage/archer (Fran, Penelo, Ashe)
Generally A steals and takes the damage, B deals the damage, C heals and nukes from afar. Everyone is in charge of buffing themselves. A also acts as a secondary white mage/chemist but that's because I like to keep HP above 70% which sororial unit scoffs at. Fran was nominally my black mage but black magic is sort of useless. It's the princess I don't quite know how to use, actually, but I think part of that is because she's underequipped. ^^;
I was going to write more character blurbs but it'll have to wait - bookblogging too.
Personally I dig the parallels. Most fantasy settings are preceded only by myth - that is, FFXII is preceded by myth too, if you asked the characters they would probably say the gods and heroes had gone before them and they were living in the Iron Age, but then history just goes on. Like maybe Ashley out of Vagrant Story is to Ashelia as a modern-day (well, 16th-century) person named Julian would be to the Julii / Julius Caesar. (Cid -> Sydney? Don't answer that.) Scholasticism and legend, scrolls preserved in Rozarrian libraries, cities upon ruins upon forgotten ruins... standard mythological references in literature (mais ou sont les neiges d'antan?). You sort of see what kind of fic I'm doomed to write for this game, if I were going to write. orz
However I kind of see the big-ass lettering on the wall, insofar as there may be politics, war, etc. in the plot but what I'm going to be doing all this time is fetchquesting magic crystals from sunless dungeons. >_>
Graphics/environment/gameplay: every time I enter a new area my PS2 makes a sound like it's hacking up a hairball. Hell, it makes discomfited loading noises when I change the members of my party. It's a long way from FFX's no-pain character toggle. XD; (Although you can and do change party members in-battle, not to mention re-equip them from scratch à la Vagrant Story. Except instead of the "hang on lemme change the jewels on my sword hilt" dance, it's the "hang on lemme find the license for this accessory" dance. Equipment menu-ing during boss fights FTW!
Seriously, guys, I am SO GLAD I played Vagrant Story before playing this. I'd be completely baffled otherwise.)
I was going to say the desert is to FFXII what the ocean is to FFX, and then I got to the Sandsea ahaha. Like the music the environments are much more umm environmental, like if you're in the desert it's just these vast expanses of sand and rocky outcroppings and blue sky, and if you're in the dungeons it's a maze of twisty little passages, all alike (and then the lights go out and you're eaten by a zombie mage). In other FFs when you arrived somewhere new you'd sort of coo a bit at the pretty landscape and the pretty theme music before walking into the monsters' maw. I can't recall a single note of FFXII's music but it's sterling at ambience, I literally can't stay down in the Lhusu mineshaft for longer than twenty minutes because I get twitchy and claustrophobic. XD;
When we were playing FFX exactly six years ago (...) I was speed-gaming to beat the thing before my winter break from school ran out, and my sister could afford to run around levelling and playing blitzball. Now the situation is reversed, she's about five boss fights from the end without so much as a Haste spell and I'm hunting marks. Dunno, I like it better than all that card game nonsense, I don't even play card games in RL so why would I, etc. XD; Whereas hunting marks is straight profit, and profit pays for weapons upgrades, and I am unable to resist the siren call of weapons upgrades. I don't know where the money for grimoires is going to come from.
FTR my sister plays straight 2 x melee + 1 x white mage, I rotate my characters in and out of the party indifferently but it's always something like:
A: time mage/thief/fighter (Vaan, Balthier, Ashe - manually controlled, high evade)
B: heavy duty fighter (Basch, Balthier, Ashe)
C: white mage/archer (Fran, Penelo, Ashe)
Generally A steals and takes the damage, B deals the damage, C heals and nukes from afar. Everyone is in charge of buffing themselves. A also acts as a secondary white mage/chemist but that's because I like to keep HP above 70% which sororial unit scoffs at. Fran was nominally my black mage but black magic is sort of useless. It's the princess I don't quite know how to use, actually, but I think part of that is because she's underequipped. ^^;
I was going to write more character blurbs but it'll have to wait - bookblogging too.
