Final Fantasy XIII

Part 2:

The place made entirely of crystal, which is apparently a lake, is the first time the game has actually felt like Final Fantasy for me. I like it. After a brief argument between the characters, something attacks. Snow is first to react; the brand on his arm glowing and causing him to tear the monster a new one with one blow. He doesn't know what happened, but Hope thinks it was magic, he says they're all l'Cie now. Some more monsters show up, and it's battle time!

Time to learn about Paradigm Shifting! It seems a paradigm is a general role for the party that determine how each character will fight. Finally the battle system is developing a little more substance! I like it! I'm not sure I care for the names though. Commando? Sentinel? Medic? Whatever happened to the classics like Fighter or White Mage? I'm not sure I like where this is headed, but I shall persevere.

Oh my, I like the placement of Vanille's brand, I hope it plays a bigger role in future. Hope is still feeling sorry for himself and throws another tantrum, and Vanille is once again there to comfort him. The girl is still far too calm for her situation and her accent is still bizarre and bad.

Apparently none of them know their focus, but they all had the same, ambiguous dream. Snow decides that, although the fal'Cie is apparently an enemy of Cocoon, their focus is to protect it, and nobody seems inclined to disagree. We've also unlocked Crystarium! At first glance, this looks a lot like the Sphere Grid system in FFX, only with a more confusing layout. Still, character growth, yay!

It looks like I have no way of changing who is in my party. I don't particularly mind, as I have the 3 best characters already, but since everyone is here it seems strange that it isn't an option. After a brief stroll, our friends have another chat. Snow is sure that their focus is to protect Cocoon, offering Serah as proof, while Sazh thinks otherwise. He reminds me of a fundamental religious person, convinced everything about Pulse and the fal'Cie is evil, even though I'm pretty sure there's been no proof of this other than what the Sanctum says. But on the other hand, Snow is overly optimistic and will believe anything that makes Serah look good. We shall see I suppose.

Some PSICOM soldiers have found there way down, and have us a gunpoint. Just like last time, Lightning pulls off a bunch of awesome ninja moves and disarms a few of them. Looks like we're going to have to fight the rest. The new tutorial explains that now Lightning is l'Cie, she has 3 segments on her ATB gauge. I recall that Vanille already had 3, does that mean she's been an l'Cie this whole time? It would explain her lack of caring about being inside the Vestige and the ever-present threat of becoming one. Interesting thought!

The soldiers were incredibly weak, and Sazh takes note of this. Lightning, however, insists that while the grunts are pathetic, the higher ups would make short work of the party. Vanille decides they should run away, and takes off, giggling all the while. The datalog is again updated. I find I spend as much time reading updates to this thing than actually playing (and more time writing this). I'd be fine with this, but the bulk of each new entry is simply reiterating old information and if I'm lucky, contains a line of something new. I would simply stop reading them, but the idea of missing something eats away at me. Damn my OCD tendencies, and damn this datalog!

I've now had my first battle with Paradigm Shifts, skills other than Attack, and knowing how to execute commands without waiting for the full ATB bar, and I must say, it was quite fun! Even if I don't like the classes, I'm confident I'll enjoy the battle system. Character behaviour outside of battle is quite interesting. Rather than breathing down my neck constantly like in FFVIII, they seem to just run wherever the hell they want, and I'll make my way along a path and find a couple of them just staring at some monsters. It's certainly different!

A correction on the previous entry: What I interpreted as the fal'Cie going into hypermode after the fight with it was apparently not right, and it in fact did die. All the action was due to PSICOM successfully destroying the Vestige, and everything inside falling down to Pulse. How wrong I was!

After walking and jumping along the path, we find Serah. Snow grabs the nearest sharp object to try and dig her out of the crystal or something, perhaps to lug her around for the remainder of the adventure, I'm not sure, and is assisted by Sazh and Vanille. Lightning is prepared to say goodbye and escape before PSICOM show up, and when Snow's optimism becomes too much, she gives him a couple of right hooks to the face. Predictably, in the time they spend arguing, PSICOM show up, and it's on.

After the fight, they finally convince Snow they have to keep moving, with the help of Sazh, who's quickly gone from comical idiot to the most level headed of the bunch. So 4 of them move on, but Snow apparently wants to stay and continue his futile dig. Hope tries to speak his mind on the way out, but still doesn't have the stones. Sadly this means Snow has left my party for now. Shame, he may be all talk, but he was a good tank, and I can't see Sazh being half as good.

"Don't shake the slippery tube!" says Sazh, as we continue along the path. Quite a good line if I don't say so myself. I have to wonder about the 'treasure chests' in this game. Actual treasure chests being placed all around the world in past games was enough of a stretch, but who's been leaving these high tech orbs everywhere? Perhaps they're PSICOM supplies and we're basically raiding them?

After quite a while with no save points, I finally come across one, which can only mean there's a boss fight in the in air, and it's another Behemoth!. This battle again offers me a tutorial, this time for battle techniques. These are apparently special techniques that make use of the yellow bar below Lightning's HP that I've been curious about for a while now. Seems the only technique I have at the moment is Libra, which not only shows me enemy weaknesses, but makes auto-battle abuse these weaknesses…automatically. Sadly the TP bar is not replenished between every fight, but I suppose they needed to bring some difficulty into it at some point.

That fight gave me less CP than half the regular encounters did. *thumbs down*. We approach some kind of military base and have a nice cutscene. Sazh is reflecting on the inhumanity of the whole process, and Hope is still being all self-loathing. Some aircraft zoom in, and we have to get moving again.

I just had to fight a flying motorcycle. That was quite strange. After another stroll we reach another cutscene, and apparently Vanille has just caught on to the fact that whole place is made of crystal. Lightning believes Serah didn't think she could trust her enough to tell her what her focus was. Her negativity is a bit of a downer.

I just realised that whenever I'm walking around, Sazh and Vanille are usually running off ahead or standing around, but I don't remember the last time I even saw Hope. Maybe I lost him. Hey, I can dream. In other news, I just reached some stairs that aren't made of of crystal. Chances are something interesting is about to happen.

I eventually had to fight a Garuda. It was a 2 part fight, with the second being more difficult, but it was still little trouble. Unfortunately, Hope is still around, so that's a bummer. The party have found an aircraft, which Vanille believes will work.

After the screen fades and it asks me to save, we're back with snow. He appears to have made no progress digging, and the authorities have spotted him. After taking out half a dozen troops with little effort, he has to fight an Eidolon, the Shiva Sisters. There are some weirdos on a hill nearby that appear to be responsible for their presence. It's an interesting fight. Rather than trying to kill them, which is apparently impossible, he has to fill gauge by performing actions, somewhat like impressing them I suppose. The catch? He has Doom cast on him. I got the gauge to about halfway before the counter ran out. I guess I'll try again tomorrow.

IMPRESSION: I'd comment on the linearity that people were so concerned about prior to release, but I don't think I'm far enough into the game yet, it's still practically in tutorial mode. However, the controversial lack of towns idea may have been a lazy development move, but conveniently enough I think it will fit with the story; if Pulse is supposed to be basically an uncivilised, wild area, having no towns seem fine. Gameplay wise, It does seem quite slow to open up; I only just gained access to character growth and abilities beyond attack, but the system does seem interesting; I like Paradigm Shifts a lot better than Dress Spheres in FFX-2. The Crystarium system also seems a little restrictive; my characters are a measly few CP away from maxing out the jobs that are currently available to them. At this stage, I definitely liked the Sphere Grid system better. The story still has me interested and wanting to play on.

Lightning: Lightning is coming across very cold and negative, and without the amusing streak Cloud or Squall had. I have no doubt she'll have a revelation and come good down the track, but for now she's not my favourite.

Sazh: He started out as the goofy black guy from every second movie ever made that I always hate, but he's come good since. While the others all have a real personality flaw in terms of being heroes and saving Cocoon; Lightning is too negative, Snow is too optimistic, Vanille is too carefree, and Hope is useless, Sazh is very level headed, if a little too brainwashed by Sanctum bullshit.

Snow: This guy, as stated by several characters in game, is all talk. He rambles on about saving Serah and Cocoon and the world, but does nothing to suggest he's capable of any of it. I certainly can't doubt his passion, but his optimism and lack of competence is getting slightly tedious.

Vanille: She's still happy, and still adorable, but so much so that she's basically in another world. It wouldn't kill her to pay a little more mind to her situation. Though I still think she was already a l'Cie, so isn't as shellshocked as the rest. And once again, the location of her brand is awesome.

Hope: I hate this kid.