Final Fantasy XIII-2‽ Catch-All

And that was a doozy to click! Sorry. Edited.

I just finished the main story, and I heartily endorse everything that Minarchist said. I would say that just about every FF game has a free roam before the final act that steals the momentum, though. Stupidly, I never finished FFVII because I got bored trying to master materia.

NOTE YE WELL: Do NOT click the spoiler tag if you haven't finished the main story and intend to do so.

Spoiler:

you cannot kill off the main character, start the end of the world and throw in "To Be Continued" after a game this long. You just can't. It's a frigging insult to everyone who played that far.

Like Minarchist, I rather enjoy the game, despite all that. I'm carrying on with the post game, despite an ever-growing pile of other titles.

spider_j wrote:

And that was a doozy to click! Sorry. Edited.

Not your fault at all, no need to edit it really. It's on me.

As an RPG completionist, this game doesn't make it easy. After finishing the game, I am going back to get the rest of the fragments. I am not thrilled with the stupid Captain Cryptic and the dozen paradoxes in Oebra. Ugh. Just make it stop! Damn you Cryptic!!

Agreed on the former, but I loved the stuff in Oerba. I thought the puzzles were one of the best parts of the game. Of course, I didn't solve all 18 or so of them in one sitting, either...

Minarchist wrote:

Agreed on the former, but I loved the stuff in Oerba. I thought the puzzles were one of the best parts of the game. Of course, I didn't solve all 18 or so of them in one sitting, either...

I just wish they were spread out a little more. I know that I could have left and done something else for awhile but they built the game with all of these puzzles lumped together. Frustrating. I also still have the Serendipity stuff left--did anyone else do the rubber band trick with the slot machines that I have heard about?

See, I did them over a few periods of time. I unlocked Oerba well before I reached Academia 4XX, and every few hours would come back and knock a few puzzles out. It was a nice palate cleanser.

As to the slot machines, I definitely rubber-banded. First, though, I got my 10,000 coin fragment from the chocobo races, since that actually requires a net gain of 10k chips, not just winning overall. Then, I bought enough chips to have like 40,000, and let the thing run. Took 3 hours or so, but you might get luckier than me.

Wise man on the Oerba puzzles. I'll be off to Serendipity soon--time to find a good rubber band.

IMAGE(http://www.rpgreporter.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Final-Fantasy-13-2-N7-armor.jpg)

You know, that would be more entertaining if it were the other way around and you could dress your Mass Effect characters in Final Fantasy outfits.

Just read through the last few pages of this, that's to a link from Minarchist on his thoughts on the game. Interesting impressions everyone, and thanks MASSIVELY for the spoiler tags. I'd been on unintentional blackout due mainly to disinterest, but I've found the game at a pretty decent price, so it's back on my radar.

Going into any of these 'new' FFX's with the right mindset I think is half the battle these days. I enjoyed FFXIII because I'd heard so much about the structure/pacing/linearity, and how it was part of the narrative pacing. Knowing 'roughly' what to expect from this title will help in the same way.

Thanks all

I have the guide if anyone wants it, just pay shipping.

I'm like... 15 hours into this, and I'm starting to get pretty irritated by the game design. I keep missing where I'm supposed to go next, or the game's not telling me. I get artefacts with no clue where to use them, and an irritating world to traverse just trying all the different gates.

I'm not usually bothered by the use of GameFAQs for a JRPG with this sort of design, but the open-ended nature of the world makes it hard to pin things down.

The last major story beat (I think) was me meeting Caius in Oerba, then going to the non-eclipsed verstion of Yaschas Massif to tell Hope about it. Then I went to Augusta Tower, because it was the new thing that opened up, but I hit a wall there and now have no idea where to go. The FAQ I looked at said to do some stuff in the Sunleth Waterscape 300AF, but I've already done that part. In fact, I did it like 6 hours ago. So the next place on the list is Archlyte Steppe, and the monsters in that place still kick the sh*t outta me (just one type of enemy there, but still).

Is this a fair complaint, or am I just doing it wrong?

I would say that it is a fair complaint. I ended up needing a couple trips to GameFAQs for that game on when/where to use the artefacts. My first trip was about the point you are at right now. The open world is a nice change but having no clue where to go next was not fun.

Spoiler:

By the way, I believe you are at a point where you need to use an artefact if you haven't done so yet.

The thing of it is, and I'll always be mad at FAQ writers for this, everyone writes their guide as though you've been following it word for word the entire time.

I got that situation figured out, but I've stumbled again. The two new areas I have access to are the Void Beyond and what looks like the casino I've heard about, but I can't get more than 10 feet into either. I'm sure I need some item or another, but have no clue which. Normally my solution in this situation is to just wander around til I figure it out, but I don't like the game world enough to enjoy doing it, which is an even more fundamental issue.

If I finish this game, it'll be toward the bottom of my FF rankings. I guess I should have seen this coming. I actually enjoyed the linearity of FFXIII. Not the simplistic level design, but the focus of the plotting.

Edit: All right, I think I quit. The game's made me angry enough to develop a headache. Too many systems, too much bloat, too much bullsh*t. They could really learn something from the elegance of design on display in The Last Story. This tangled mess makes me seriously question whether the current Square-Enix team can handle something as complex as Lightning Returns.

Blind_Evil wrote:

They could really learn something from the elegance of design on display in The Last Story.

Or, y'know, the last game they made in the series.

Angry Minarchist is angry.

As much as I adore the Final Fantasy series, I really just can't get any traction on this game. I grinded out XIII, but I can't do it for this one. Well, law of large numbers says Square was bound to make a stinker eventually. I just hope they learn from it for XV.

Blind_Evil wrote:

If I finish this game, it'll be toward the bottom of my FF rankings. I guess I should have seen this coming. I actually enjoyed the linearity of FFXIII. Not the simplistic level design, but the focus of the plotting.

Go play Grandia 2

I personally enjoyed 13-2 more than 13, which just has so much trudging. If nothing else, while Square-Enix still made mistakes with it, I feel that they did a pretty good job of fixing the common complaints and generally took enough steps in the right direction so as to make me cautiously optimistic for part 3. But then, I thought that 12 was legitimately excellent.

Eh, I couldn't stand Grandia 1 by the end of it, and that was when I was too young to know what a bad game was half the time. I'll pass. Also I don't have a PS2 anymore.

I'll agree that XIII-2 addresses popular complaints with XIII, though I didn't share all of them. This game has its own batch of problems that I think are even more damning.

Stele wrote:

Not sure I would want to jump in having not played XIII. But then again I had already decided there was no way I was playing XIII. So maybe this might be worth picking up sometime, even if you didn't play XIII?

Still feeling the same way as this post from last year several pages back, although now this game is under $20. Currently $16 something at Amazon. Anybody else try this without playing XIII?