I initially had some hesitation on whether or not I was going to get this but after playing the demo, which was included in the latest issue of OPM, I'm going down to EB today and pre-ordering this one.

I love the FF series but I wasn't to keen on them doing a sequel and when the first media was released on FFX-2 I thought Square was out of it's mind. The pic of Yuna holding two guns...I thought "OMG they've made Yuna into Lara Croft" and the sequel looking like a Tomb Raider 'wannabe'. I enjoyed FFX and thought the ending finished the story nicely, so I couldn't really see the need to do a sequel and if that's the case why not do a sequel to another FF game that was more beloved by the fans, like FFIV, FFVI or FFVII?

Anyways reading OPM's review and playing the demo has changed my mind about this title. The battle system is super action oriented. Gone is the 'turn based' aspect of it, everything is in real-time except when you change jobs in the middle of the battle it goes into this 'Wait' mode as you watch your character transform to the chosen job. Hopefully in the final release there will be a way to skip through this sequence..it's kinda like watching the Aeons make their intro, from FFX, but only shorter. So combat requires quick thinking and I think definitely lessens the 'boredom' of fighting random battles.

The ability to change jobs on the fly, in battle, is killer and adds a unique strategy to the game. Certain bosses or monsters may have an immunity to physical or magical attacks and in this case just change out to the appropriate job. Need to heal? Change to a White Mage, heal, then switch back and deal damage. I like the flexibility.

The game is mission based which is cool cause you're not set on one path the whole game, like FFX. You decide how you want to play the game and how you play the game may result in a different ending which provides alot of customization to the player on which path he/she takes. After you complete the game there's a Game+ feature which will give gamers a reason to replay the game if you choose to do so.

I mentioned resemblence to Tomb Raider earlier and while thats not the case totally there is one aspect of the game they have in common. When moving your character around you now have the ability to jump and climb which you couldn't do before in an FF game...well climbing ladders yeah but I'm talking about making your character leap to grab a ledge and pulling yourself up sorta climbing hehe. You pretty much walked in a straight path, from place to place in FFX, now you have to work your way through obstacles and deal with the random battles. Plus some of the missions are timed based which makes this more of a challenge too. My only gripe about this was that in the demo you couldn't move the camera which made certain areas difficult to manuever thru.

Playing the demo has changed my attitude towards this game and I'm looking forward to picking it up next week. Any of you FF fans that had doubts like I did, do yourself a favor and pick up the newest issue of OPM and give it a try. A nice little bonus on the demo was a 15minute video which kinda ties FFX & FFX-2 together. It was included with FFX International which was a Japan only release.

I'll definitely pick this game up sometime down the road. I've just got to finish FFX first and spend some time with some of my other games before I even attempt to start FFX2.

I'm a FF junky and I'll pretty much play any FF game they put out there without a hesitation.

After the monumental disaster that was Final Fantasy X, i have no faith in the franchise any longer.

FFX was a disaster? Could someone elaborate?

FFX wasn't a disaster. In fact it was probably one of the best in the series. For me, nothing will ever top FFVI & FFIV those were the 2 best titles in the series imho. FFIX and FFX are right behind those two. If you want to call any title in the series a 'monumental' disaster it probably would have to be FFVII or FFVIII but personally I've loved the entire series, some titles more than others. I can't wait to play thru FFX-2 and I'm looking forward to FFXII. Some people think this series is going down hill I believe it's continuing to get better.

Lol did you just say FFVII was a disaster? That was the one which turned most people onto the series and stands out as a classic right next to FFIII. I personally think that FFIX I don't even know what they were thinking trying to take it backwards like that.

I'm watching this with cautious anticipation. I saw a little glimpse of it in a commercial that showed a bunch of PS2 games on TV. IGN has a review of it up already that is very positive. But I'm gonna wait until it has more reviews until I get really excited. I liked FFX, so I'm still looking forward to this game regardless .

No, I didn't say it was a disaster. Read the post. I said if you were going to call any games in the series a 'monumental disaster' then you could say FFVII or FFVIII only because the direction the series took with both of those games. I liked the settings of FFI thru FFVI and FFVII took a totally different direction which I wasn't fond of. Doesn't mean I hated the game...I still enjoyed it. Tell me, how can you call FFX a monumental disaster?

Personally I loved FFIX because it reminded me more of the days of FF1-FFVI. FFVI(or FFIII U.S.) is a classic and one of my favorites in the series but FFVII doesn't pale in comparrison to FFVI but thats my opinion. The reason why FFVII turned alot of people on to the FF series was because of Sony's marketing campaign for FFVII. It was one of the biggest for any game ever made and there was alot of 'hype' built up because of it.

FFVII's post-industrial steam-punk setting is what turned off a lot of long-time FF fans, but i enjoyed it.

How was FFX a monumental disaster? because it only focused on having awesome movie-like cutscenes. I didn't mind any of the changes made to the battle system or the gameplay, but they were horrendously executed. The sphere level system sounds interesting in theory, but it took waaaaaaaay too many sphere levels - and by implication AP, and even further, endless battles - to gain a significant boost in stats. The turn-based system was pathetic and required no strategy. ATB was what made FF battles so entertaining - why remove it? Blitzball was by far the most overcomplicated and unfair minigame ever conceived. The sidequests to achieve the ultimate weapons were rediculously difficult - who wants to fight bosses with MILLIONS OF HIT POINTS? the main quest was boring, nonsensical, and overly linear. The characters were some of the largest stereotypes ever seen in a videogame - hey Square, next time don't have a Jock as the main hero, because your fans used to get beat up by them. The dialog was starchy and poorly written, and the lipsynching was the worst i've seen this side of anime. The music was pretty bad too, Nobuo Uematsu's done better.

Well, i guess that's what i would call a monomental disaster.

About the only thing you said, in regards to FFX, that I agree with would be the Blitzball game. I too thought it was a joke for a mini game and simply chose not to play it. Other than that I loved everything else about FFX. The story, music, which I thought Uematsu did a fantastic job, and battle system were all extremely well done.

I said that I was dissapointed with FFVII only because I really didn't like the change that was made to the series. I thought it completely went away from what they had established with FF1-6. But hey, I excepted it and I enjoyed playing FFVII. It was definitely not the best game in the series but it was a solid game none the less. After FFVII and then playing FFVIII I learned to except the direction Square was going with their franchise. I wasn't too fond of the character designs or the setting in which the games took place in but the stories, gameplay, and music all remained top notch.

As far as cut scenes go...I don't mind them. They definitely add to the story and it does give you a feel that you're actually playing through a movie. Probably the only two things I've really hated about the Final Fantasy games since FFVII have been the long drawn out summons in FFVII and FFVIII and the 'Draw' system from FFVIII. Not being able to skip through the summons sequence in those games made battles longer than they needed to be and for the most part I would purposely not use them. The Draw system was probably the biggest joke ever intoduced into a FF game...Blitzball is a close second. Drawing magic from your enemies became so tedious and boring that I had to buy one of those turbo controllers, set my cursor to memory, and leave my game on while each of my characters drew magic from the enemy until the accumulated 100.

FFX was much better in comparrison to FFVII or FFVIII. If you're going to call FFX a 'monumental' disaster then FFVII and FFVIII were even bigger disasters cause FFX was much better than those two titles, imo.

I played the demo and the battle system was not fun to me the shit moved to fast for my slow ass. By the time I picked what I wanted to do I'd get hit like 5 times. I will put a little more time into the demo and see if I get better at it. Also WTF where is the big titty girl in the party!? I mean we had lulu in FFX no idea why she is not in FFX2 as one of the mean stars.

I mean I need my boobs in games I like me some big breast on me womens.

I am sure they'll miss your business

As someone who has purchased every FF game upon release since FFII, I'll be passing on FFX-2 . VII is my favorite (followed closely by III (VI, for you purists)), IX made up for the bad taste VIII left in me, and I didn't even bother finishing X. The linear changes, completely non-engrossing story, blitzball, and sphere system really just made me dislike the game. I'll probably get it when it's $15, though.

you left out, "for superboy"...

although, i didn't like the game that much, i thought FFX was one of the most lucrative ff games. so, in terms of success, it is hardly a disaster of any sort.

i'll wait for ffx-2 to become a greatest hit before i pick it up.

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btw, there is a presumption that all the FF games will be similar. i disagree. if ffx takes the route of more "cinema" vs gaming, so what? if you don't like it, don't buy it and let the others enjoy it.

I am posting an opinion, not stating facts. As my english teacher once said, never say "I think" or "I believe", because it weakens your argument.

Any-ways...like i said, i didn't mind the changes, but they were horribly executed. FF games have ALWAYS been cinematic, but FFX apparantly had all it's energy poured into it's graphics and cinemas. The cinemas themselves are rather boring to watch because while visually engrossing, they aren't at all exciting and the dialogue sucks. I think you spent more time reading in FFVI than you do watching cinemas in FFX.

Did we play the same game or was yours some boring, mediocre, pirated special edition?

If you had read my post you would have found out that Square has gone away from a linear storyline for FFX-2. The game is mission based and totally non-linear. The battle system has been given an overhaul, the ATB combat system, which was used in all FF games up through FFIX, is back but now the action is real-time. Gone is the sphere grid, which I thought was a unique approach to advancing your characters, and back is the leveling system of old, which I'm happy about. Oh, and no blitzball mini game. So, from it sounds like, everything you disliked about FFX will not be in FFX-2.

Yes, who could forget such Oscar-worthy dialogue such as "Need...FIRE!" and "Need...FOOD!" and nearly everything said by Rikku and Wakka.

Nobody said it was "Oscar worthy" dialogue. It wasn't as bad as you say it was, though.

FFX is by no means terrible. It's actually a good game. Just not up to the standards of previous FF games. The only FF game I'd classify as mediocre is FFVIII. The junction system was an interesting approach but overused. (You had to junction a particular Aeon so one character could do a simple thing like block?!) Also, though paramagic was all fine and dandy for the "regular" characters and okay for all during the first half of the game, given the storyline and the fact that certain characters are supposed to be sorcerers, learned magic and MP should have popped up during the latter half of the game. Of course, exclusive to the so-called sorcerers in the game. The other bad part was that Squall was a boring cliche and just really made me not want to play the game. In fact, I hated all the characters except for Seifer (who was also another cliche but not so bad) and calling the story weak is an understatement. The only reason I played it for so long is because I hoped something great would happen eventually to make me happy with my purchase. No such luck. The game is wonderfully packaged (the graphics at the time were top notch and the cinemas are the best the PS era FF games have ever had and the opening score/sequence was fantastic) but under that is nothing but a pile of good and mediocre ideas mashed together into a pile of crap.

i think you need to think for yourself. i believe you need a new english teacher.

by stating your opinion as fact, it is less credible and easily refuted... ie you're wrong.

gamerankings - 91%

that's a fact.

I'll probably never get around to it, but I need to check out the earlier FF games. FFX is the only one I've played. I really liked it though. The combat in FFX-2's demo was freaking me out. Slow down! I wanna think about it!

You hit the nail on the head. That english teacher is full of crap. State facts as facts, and opinions as opinions.

Stating opinions as fact doesn't make an argument stronger, it just makes you look pompous and will cause people to quit reading your work.

well, I for one can't wait until I play FFX-2. Continuing the FFX story, hot chicks in multiple outfits. It's always nice to see hot chicks in skimpy outfits in video games. no complaints here.

Now the only problem is finding the time to play another RPG...

That's not a fact - that's STILL an OPINION - or rather the average of many opinions, which does not make it a FACT, my friend.

Fine, fine, fine...

I think Final Fantasy X was a monumental disaster.