Five Things I Like from Final Fantasy VIII

I guess I'll write this since I'm feeling a little nostalgic, Final Fantasy VIII hits PC for the second time, and after so much confusing moves from Steam and Green Man Gaming by moving this game in and out of my region it's finally available now.

Final Fantasy VIII was first released on 1998 on PC and PS1 and was my second Final Fantasy after FFVI (back when it was released as FFIII in US version), the animation was so awesome at that time and as a highschooler it quickly grabbed my attention, however at that time I'm still a hot headed gamer and burned my way through the content before completely stuck on the last boss, I re-played it several years later with a pace of a snail, reading all dialogues, question all NPCs and stuffs, and I experience the full gist of it. Speaking of 'it' here's five things I like about Final Fantasy VIII

5. Selphie

I must admit that I used to be madly in love with this character, Selphie Tilmitt has a cheery optimistic aura, she truly cared about all of her peers and the total opposite of Squall, she thinks Squall's too aloof while Squall thinks Selphie is an annoyance, she do have some emotional meltdown moments in the game but always bounces back at her feet after some well designed conversation or scenes.  You encounter her early at the game before you recruited her to be a permanent squad member. Her Limit Break is called Slot, it's a roulette where you can cast some super-powered spell with no cost... well, almost... since the mobs will continue to attack as you tried to find THE END, the spell that will end battle, even the LAST BOSS BATTLE!! (upgrading her weapon helps you gain much more higher level spells)  Lovable character, truly, joking all the time and put a joke in the last battle itself =))

4. Limit Breaks

Limit Breaks are high damaging super powered flashy moves of playable characters (also some NPCs too), They sometimes go beyond all reason to emphasize how devastating those attacks are, when I first watched limit breaks scene I was stunned and realize it will be the major legacy of Final Fantasy series, I was right (especially when Limit Breaks on Final Fantasy VII is not that flashy)

3. The Setting

Gaia is a world where Magic and Technologies go side by side, although techs are seriously hindered, it will be explained during the storyline so I can't spoil it. The setting is a total revamp of other Fantasy series where it's usually set on Medieval-like era with some touch of tech, in final Fantasy VIII everything is the future: trains, tanks, APCs, gunblades, big cities with neon lights, while maintain the fantasy side with well designed monsters and GF (summoned creatures). Gardens as the  mercenary breeding grounds fit perfectly in this warmongering era although the war itself isn't really showing, instead FFVIII push the stories of trained hired hands teenagers to the audience and portrayed their emotional conflicts, not perfectly, but still great

2. Deep Sea Research Center

The Deep Sea Research Center is an optional dungeon and it's the House of Horror of FFVIII, it's not even in the map and house the baddest mobs ever, worse it you can't skip them with no-encounter junction, you can't run away and you must fight them with a chance they will one shot you even if you're maxed your HP because of sloppy junctions, at the end of the dungeon you'll face Ultima Weapon: The strongest monster in the game (well... no, it's not) :D
The reason why I like this dungeon because it's scenery was traversing from beautiful seaside platform into a dark, depressing hell hole accompanied with mobs and hellish random encounters.

1. Triple Triad

Triple Triad is the FFVIII card mini game, the rules are simple but sometimes hard to execute winnings, you can play triple Triad with most of the NPCs scattered around the world of Gaia by pressing 'O' button (if i'm still remember), there are numbers of picture card, ranged from the monster card, GF cards, and character cards (which usually the strongest ones), there's even a society of it where you challenged the lowest member and climb your rank up until the unknown king of cards (which makes a satisfying reveal of mysteries). And what do you do with cards? You can keep it or refine it into some useful items, you can also create cards with GF abilities (usable on mobs) and if you're a completionist you won't waste a chance travelling the world between stories just to reach an NPC rumored to have some cards (there's a guide of course, scattered on the web). I can't put my finger to the real reason why triple triad is my favorite aspect of the game, perhaps it's a welcomed break during random encounter battles, or perhaps it's the thrill of obtaining new rare cards (and the frustration when you lost it), nevertheless this mini game is the reason why my play hour is longer than my sleep hours =))

Spoiler: The strongest monster is Omega Weapon :)

Final Fantasy XIV Open Beta Test: A Hype Reborn

Final Fantasy is the most popular game franchise in the world, it's the only thing that have double digit number in the sequels (as I recall Ultima only got to 9) not to mention every other spinoffs, movies, crossovers, and so on. The latest installment is the MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV, they actually release it on 2010 after being in development for 5 years, and it flunked, they only live for several months before Square fired the director, revamped the development team and everything in the game and will relaunched it on 27th of August 2013 (If Square was an American company, they will shut it down after 2 months and never looks back), I guess they really don't want it to tarnish the 'Final Fantasy' name, Japanese can be scary determined demons sometimes =))

They also invented this thing

So let's talk about it, Square officially renamed it, Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, FFXIV takes place on a crystal covered/attuned/based/everything- revolved-around-it-world called Hydaelyn, the continet is called Eorzea, the original installment takes place in a peaceful era called Astral, the server pre-shutdown event which happens in November 2012 marked the 'transition' into the Realm reborn timeline, which can be called Umbral, marked with the unleashing of Bahamut (the dragon which exist all accross final fantasy series) and the destruction of Eorzea itself (after thet it's server shutdown to give time for development). The existing players are 'teleported' to the future, to the Realm Reborn chaotic Umbral era, while new player will also started here

The Beginning:

I participated on their latest CBT and OBT, due to hype on those MMORPG webs...   Anyway: There are three starting town which house the eight initial classses of FFXIV, first is Ul'dah: the desert area and home to pugilist (roguelike hand to hand specialist), Thaumaturgist (offensive spellweaver), and Gladiator (sword-shield tanker). Next is lush jungle of Gridania for Conjurer (healer), Lancer (spear/polearm DPS), and Archer (umm... archer) :D. The last is Linsa Lominsa the port piratey island of Marauder (melee DPS and off tank axe wielder), and Arcanist (summoner type). Continuing the footstep of Final Fantasy XI every class can be everything else, just equip their weapon and you become that class (axe for marauder, sword for gladiator, etc etc) of course you'll still need EXP to level up those class, not to mention specialized armor and weapons

On my first CBT test I first step up in Ul'dah as a pugilist and for a moment I return to Rabanastre (a place in Final Fantasy XII), as expected from Final Fantasy series the cities are breathtakingly beautiful (Linsa Lominsa could use a polish though), the early quests revolved around classical fetch and go and kill ten rats things, so there's not much to say about it.

The combat is another return to classical MMORPG, with hotbars and trinity system, rotation and don't stand in the fire things, pugilist delivers quick blows and stance change depends on it's condition and playstyle, Marauder just hack things but a good interrupter, magic class is the most boring IMO since they shoot bolts while standing still... (It made me miss my mesmer)

The combat system also doesn't require you to get party, although there's a vague chain kills system that multiplied your EXP every time you killed something, not sure how it works then. The basic is when you see someone punching a mob, join him/her, every hit you land is counted towards the "kill xxx mob" quest, you're also have personal loot which automatically gained after you kill something, so no kill steal and no loot drama (damn, no more popcorn...)   

The End:

What? It ended already? Well, Open beta lasted only three days and I have like 52 hrs downtime because of error 3102 and social time, but here's some highlights and perk of Final Fantasy XIV that started to grow on me at the end:

The Story so Far....
It's good, not really magnificent but I can tell they did it with passion, personal story quests takes place in a solo instance and introduces you to important NPCs, some are memorable than other, story dialogue are short and since our character didn't talk it feels like playing Half Life 2 combined with a little bit of The Sims, cutscenes are many although I prefer them voiced


Non Combat Class (Gathering and Crafting)

There's no gathering and crafting as a side job on Final Fantasy XIV, they have their own class!!! Non combat classes on Final Fantasy XIV are unlockable on level 15, there's gathering professions (Fisher, Botanist and Miner) called Disciples of Land, theres also crafting profession (Alchemist, Armorer, Blacksmith, Carpenter, Culinarian, Goldsmith, Leatherworker, and Weaver), you can switch back and forth of it anytime, just like switching combat classes, they have their own weapon (tool) and armor though.

Switching to gathering profession will enable you to see resource nodes on world map, although you might want to be careful since you don't have  combat abilities and battle armor and monsters can attack you, gathering from a resource node will display what item can you obtain from the node, along with their percentage, switching to crafting profession enable you to craft weapon/tools/armors/accessory, the crafting process is ... intriguing, it desn't involved RNG but it involved percentage like LOTRO style, you can add some additional materia to add effect on things, I don't manage to fully grasped the concept due to my low playtime on it but I believe Eorzea Reborn has good guide on it

Guildleves

How am I gonna level up my character? I ran out of quest for my level 14 character, fret not, you can grind repeatable quests called levequest or guildleves, unlocked at level 10 through story quests, levequest are bounty-like quests, they rated you based how you finish the quest, whether you're fast enough, have additional monster spawn, enemies have ++ level from you (just like City Of Heroes instance scaling) and many more. It's still a grind though but the reward is plausible enough to go on (it's the only thing there is now, btw) there are limited numbers you can do from it though, like 6 per day or something. Guildleves also have levequest for crafting and gathering professions so instead of grinding on making and gathering items, you can do this kind of grind instead :D

Guildhests and Dungeons

The Guildhests is basically a short (some of them long) instanced scenario created for group party, fortunately Final Fantasy XIV is generous enough to give us.. LFG Tool!!... errr they called it Duty Finder, usually they required one tank, one healer and two DPS, dungeon needs more and has longer time. Unfortunately: I only have time to tested out Guildhest, and it's pretty cool, not too special, not too hard (I guess those time on Ascalonian Catacombs taught me something)

You know the tune that plays everytime combat won, yep, they play when leveled up too

FATE system

It's Dynamic Event on FFXIV!!! a scalable open world event, and I LOVE IT!! YAY!! KILL ALL DODOS!!

Poor Dodos...

Armory

The armory system is revolutionary, it's a separate inventory for putting your armor and weapons, you can also create equipment set for all of your class of your character and shortcut it so they will automatically wear their intended armor and weapon when they switch class

Things To Smooth Over:

• The combat is still feel clunky but the animation has softened during Beta Phase 3 to Phase 4, I think they need to address this just for the sake of aesthetics, Final Fantasy style.
• The Aether Crystal is a waypoint system similar to Guild Wars 2 but you must remember the name of the waypoints because instead of displaying their location on the map they only listing names of the crystal which I found... hassling.
• Teleport Spell and Return Spell should be combined into one single spell, only with different costs, zero cost for home
• PUT...VOICE...ON...MY...CHARACTER...ON CUTSCENES!!!
• PUT...VOICE....ON EVERY OTHER CHARACTERS... ON...CUTSCENES!! (there's some that's been voiced though, they promised it on release it'll be fully voiced)
• Why is my starter armor looks awesome but the rest after it... looks sucks, unmemorable, bland, and bad?
• I really want to see an item icon (hovered for info) and animation of it being put in my bag whenever I received a loot, right now there's only text that tell me that I got something after a battle, it's not a link text too.

Last Words:

It's Final Fantasy after all, expect the lavish buildings, radiant colored worlds, Chocobos, Ifrit, Bahamut, and great soundtracks (it's the greatest thing in this game so far) but anyway let's do something about the hype: I can't really put my finger on Final Fantasy XIV, I don't know, it looks like there's not a thing that can keep me here, I guess it's wait and see since I don't mind buying another subscription MMORPG. It's a good game but there's nothing clicked with me... for now.

Although I'm sure the chocobos will bring me to it