Some minor changes but definitly Final Fantasy as we are used to it!!
As one of the few true action RPG haters you can asume that I hate the new battlesystem since it is a lot more fast pased and has a lot more action in it. Trust me if you give it the time and learn to use the AI a bit you will learn to see it trough it. The learning curve of the new system is taught by the game itself trough a series of phases. At first I started weaping for what they did to FF battle system as well, the gameplay now seemed very dull because at first sight you seem to be only able to control one character. Ofcourse another addition to it is that it is realtime at first sight, wich ofcourse is another issue. You do not even want to think about having to control 3 characters at the same time. So here is what the developers did to counter these so certain problems. You will be able to prorgram your characters AI! Yup that's right you can tell your characters what to do in certain situations. You will be able to buy gambit skills from vendors all arround the globe. Conditions for example is when character xxx is < 30% mp use charge. Or attack same foe as party leader. The party leader is the one character that is most likely controlled by you not saying that you cannot controll the other characters but the leader is the most easy one to aprouch you can make any party member leader as long as they are not guest party members. You can do the same with HP for example when character xxx is < 30% HP use cure. To give these commands you need gambit slots for example a character with 3 gambitsslots can be given AI commands. So it's starts of really easy by using commands for example attack same foe as party leader. Later on a pretty plain combination will be
1. if partymember < 60% cast cure on that member 2. attack same target as party leader
3. attack closest target
The higher you put a gambit command the more priority it has. For example in a fight it is most likely that there is always a target to get attacked if I put that on top he will not perform any other commands until all targets are dead. As the game progresses or you require different tactics for example fighting undead you dont want to have cast spell dark on undeads cause it is only healing them so you want to change it in fire or something. Pretty straight forward you need to plan a battle in advance with gambits, the only way to do that is actualy do that is if you do a battle a second time. So one of the biggest problem with this battle system is that thanks to this system you do not have the advantage of changing strategy very fast it takes time. A advantage ofcourse of this is that when fighting none bosses you can take them down and the game becomes less repetative, you do not have to do the same thing over and over gain. Hell if you know a boss well you can program the AI of the party run to the boss go drink tea come back before the cutscene of the bosses defeat starts. But a more likely situation is that you need to press pause get the menu and change the tactics against bosses then put them all back for trashmobs. Summary: Yes the battlesystem is indeed changed and yes I do ask myself why they changed it bacause it does make things a bit more difficult especialy because you cannot save customized AI settings. It is a very big change and it has a very big learning curve to it. In addition I can understand some people will have difficulties programming their characters because plainly put it's not for everyone. So YES the old system is considered to be better, yet it's not game breaking. Next big difference on this game is the leveling considering it has nearly always been different every FF game it is not very suprising. A nice feature of the system they have picked is that you actualy get to specialize a charcter completly how you want. it is totaly up to me if I decide if a character becomes a rogue, mage, warrior, healer or a hybrid of any of those. Altough I must say hybrids are a bit difficult to realize because you need a lot of gambit slots to get the sofisticated AI you want for that. For each kill you will get a LP (liscense point) for those you can buy the skill. In addition you just get expierience wich increases your stats, nothing special there ofcourse. But anyways I like this system because it gives you a lot of freedom on how or what you want to play FF. In addition there is a clan system where you can do some sidequests wich consist of killing rare monsters, you will get rewards for this in addtion to the extra xp and you will gain a title, nothing really special you don't have to necesarily do them in order to complete the game. I consider them quite boring but ofcourse some rewards could be worthwhile and in addtion it makes the game a bit easier because your characters will be slightly more powerful. Apart from these changes you can consider this game what you expect from final fantasy time consuming and above all worth while playing, definitly worth every penny you pay for it !