Is Final Fantasy 12 worth playing?

Yes it is, imo one of the best FF games you wont be disapointed

Me and my friends hate the game and easily think it's the worst FF (discluding 11 and 14 since they're online only). But you should still give it a shot, who knows you might love it as everyone has different tastes in gaming...and it's cheap now anyway.

You should know that the story and characters in 12 though are terrible, and even then unlike other FF games the story doesn't play too big of a role in the game. Maybe if the story wasn't all about politics and if the characters weren't terrible then the game would've been better though.

But to answer your question about the battle system, if you've played 11 it's just like that - it's not turnbased unlike the other FF's. There are no random encounters or anything, which can be either good or bad depends on your preference. And the other members in your party are controlled by the AI.

If you're expecting a game with a similar feel to previous FF games then XII may disappoint you, but it's an excellent game otherwise. The story and characters are about average quality for an FF game. I find the gameplay to be some of the best in the series, with the good new design decisions significantly outweighing the bad. A few highlights:

Pros:

• The gambit system allows you to precisely customize ally AI, which reduces menu time in combat and improves the flow of battle.
• Random encounters don't exist.
• The game is huge, taking 80+ hours to complete if you're doing side quests.
• The game has plenty of gimmick bosses that will require you to think and adjust your tactics.

Cons:

• The license board system allows all of your characters to become near carbon copies of each other. Unless you set out to do otherwise, you'll finish the game with all characters knowing how to use every magic skill, weapon and armour in the game.
• Loot in chests is randomly generated.
• Money is scarce through most of the game.
• The battle system is unbalanced by end game, as casting animations for powerful magic are really long and physical attacks do almost equal damage.

Considering that your other option is SO4, FFXII is the better option. SO4 is an average-at-best game. I found it really disapointing after loving SO3.

While this is my most loathed FF game that I've played to date, I know many people who love it and thoroughly enjoyed many of the things that I completed hated. For me personally, it was the first "bad" FF game I've ever played, and I am hoping XIII which I own, but still haven't played will give me faith in this series again.

Opinions on Final Fantasy XII are polarizing, mainly because of large differences between it and previous FFs, mainly the battles taking place on a map, the story being less melodramatic etc...

I personally liked it very much, dumped some 180 hours on a single play. There are problems with it, my less liked aspect of it was the licence board, making all the characters feel less unique (they don't have "classes"). In the end the pluses outweighted the cons, as shown by the game clock.

Yes, it's very much worth playing.

(There is an "International" edition of the game which has some differences. The most glaring, is the zodiac job system which means characters actually do have classes. The game has 12 licence boards (the original only has one) and each one represents a specific class. You get to pick which ones you want for your characters. However, it was only released in Japan (English voice-over but Japanese text), and while there are ways to "patch" it to have english text, you need a moded PS2 to play the patched game, or an emulator (and a very powerful pc).

Opinions on Final Fantasy XII are polarizing, mainly because of large differences between it and previous FFs, mainly the battles taking place on a map, the story being less melodramatic etc...

I personally liked it very much, dumped some 180 hours on a single play. There are problems with it, my less liked aspect of it was the licence board, making all the characters feel less unique (they don't have "classes"). In the end the pluses outweighted the cons, as shown by the game clock.

Yes, it's very much worth playing.

(There is an "International" edition of the game which has some differences. The most glaring, is the zodiac job system which means characters actually do have classes. The game has 12 licence boards (the original only has one) and each one represents a specific class. You get to pick which ones you want for your characters. However, it was only released in Japan (English voice-over but Japanese text), and while there are ways to "patch" it to have english text, you need a moded PS2 to play the patched game, or an emulator (and a very powerful pc).

Cataclism

final fantasy characters were never to write home about anyway. ff12 you will either love or hate just like 13. I liked them a lot more than 8 and 9 for instance that imo are incredibly overrated, even for ff standards

Final Fantasy XII is definitely worth playing.

I thought it was pretty bad for a couple reasons -

1 - end game setup requires a couple items / spells that are entirely optional and never really pointed out "hey you need these if you want to even stand a chance"

2 - summons become useless shortly after you acquire them

3 - most large boss battles become a "i hope i can just chain enough mist attacks together" sequence

4 - plotline was really meh

5 - WoW esque treasure pickups.... no there will not always be the axe in that container, you might have to run in and out 30 times before the axe appears.

6 - License board - so 2 characters have figured out how to wear chainmail but the rest of them are absolute morons?

7 - At certain points gambit sequences can be hard to judge - "why aren't you curing him? oh his life is at 54% not 50.... oh wow now its 5% from that mega attackand he's poisoned... here comes the cure spell and oh, too slow,he died"

I did end up beating the game but i used a game shark to do it.

only 7

I thought it was pretty bad for a couple reasons -

1 - end game setup requires a couple items / spells that are entirely optional and never really pointed out "hey you need these if you want to even stand a chance"

2 - summons become useless shortly after you acquire them

3 - most large boss battles become a "i hope i can just chain enough mist attacks together" sequence

4 - plotline was really meh

5 - WoW esque treasure pickups.... no there will not always be the axe in that container, you might have to run in and out 30 times before the axe appears.

6 - License board - so 2 characters have figured out how to wear chainmail but the rest of them are absolute morons?

7 - At certain points gambit sequences can be hard to judge - "why aren't you curing him? oh his life is at 54% not 50.... oh wow now its 5% from that mega attackand he's poisoned... here comes the cure spell and oh, too slow,he died"

I did end up beating the game but i used a game shark to do it.

z4twenny

I thought it was pretty bad for a couple reasons -

1 - end game setup requires a couple items / spells that are entirely optional and never really pointed out "hey you need these if you want to even stand a chance"

2 - summons become useless shortly after you acquire them

3 - most large boss battles become a "i hope i can just chain enough mist attacks together" sequence

4 - plotline was really meh

5 - WoW esque treasure pickups.... no there will not always be the axe in that container, you might have to run in and out 30 times before the axe appears.

6 - License board - so 2 characters have figured out how to wear chainmail but the rest of them are absolute morons?

7 - At certain points gambit sequences can be hard to judge - "why aren't you curing him? oh his life is at 54% not 50.... oh wow now its 5% from that mega attackand he's poisoned... here comes the cure spell and oh, too slow,he died"

I did end up beating the game but i used a game shark to do it.

z4twenny

You actually had to use a gameshark to beat it? Seriosuly? The game was that hard for you?!?

I thought Final Fantasy XII was a good game but didn't like the gameplay as much, but the story was pretty good

I actually enjoyed XII even though it was different from previous FF games. I mainly loved the gameplay, sidequests and the setting. It odes have its flaws though and it mostly involves the characters.

Haven't yet played SO: International, but to answer your topic, yes FF XII is very worth it.

I personally liked it over the disappointment that was FF XIII. The main story is good, the battle system is really customizable, and you'll be putting hours into the main story and the plethora of side quests, optional bosses, and attainable equipment to be found. I still haven't completed everything there is to do and I got the game way back when it came out in '05.