The HotSpot - Final Fantasy, NeverDead - 2/1/12

FF 13-2 Monster Mechanic = Tales of Symphonia 2: Dawn of a New World Monster Mechanic =P Look it up.

Great games are games we didn't know we want until we've played them, totally agree with Kevin.

@Aim4theheads97 Alas, opportunities missed.

Should have named the podcast, "Final Fantasy is Neverdead podcast".

Damit give me Final Fantasy 8 HD

I disagree with the argument about final fantasy 2 being the worst in the series, hands down final fantasy 8 was the worst game. You can literally max your character out before you leave the first area of the game. i killed the final boos in 1 hit. the story was not interesting, bland characters, easy combat system, not so original art style.

final fantasy 4,5,7 and 9 all have the same "atb" battle system's, and the same exploration. ff 11 is where they first started to try to make their games unique. and personally, the series has not been any good since 10. my opinion tho.

tom, your comment about diablo 3 and its auction house was so inaccurate it's sickening.

I tried Never dead, it was trash. I can see that you kinda liked it because it was trying something different, but c'mon, that game is awful and you know it.

We need more dramatic Readings!!!

Yay, shout out to FFXII! Like Kevin said, I feel like it's an unsung gem and it's a shame that many people just brush it off as a failed MMO-wannabe.

I really must say that Squire changed alot after fusing with enix, that said I loved x-2 battle system, XII world and battle system, 13 story and battle system. Their is something about FF that comes again and again: you got magic, summons, items. You got stuff like ulitma weapon, open world, airship. Things like this can be called identifiers of an FF game. excluding extra games like tactics, dissedia etc. I think the characters in an FF game used to be brilliant, like deep. 13 lacked alot of the feats above but its a beautiful game. its not deep, the characters is so stereo-typish. That Lighting is even getting compared with Cloud is stupid. Cloud was a loser, a nothing, a simple military man looking in from the sidelines, he forgot his identity, He both dark and light in him. The long thrilling journey gathering clues to find out who he really was a great part of the game. Lighting is all on the surface, Snow is all on the surface. They are alright but their story is nothing I need to know. I don't even remember the big boss in FF 13, where Sephiroth is name people who hasn't even played FF 7 knows. How you hate him, but still their is still some empathy their. How Prof. Gast was really the bad guy. It is not that I dont like FF 13 but it lacks depth

@Vince21C Yeah, the "choices" in FFXIII-2 were asinine, made all the more so by SE giving you the chance to relive those experiences by closing and opening the gates.

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I am so wif u about FF-13 Kevin Personally I thought it was fine, sure it linear but the battle mechanics were the real star of FF-13. It was VERY slick, flashy, and challenging (minus the mini cutscene for paradigm shifts...) Stories are linear anyways and FF-13, in terms of production value, focused more on combat, story, and of course, making everything look pretty. FF13-2 is just such nonsense I mean QTE and meek decision choices made it seem like such a joke. imo FF14 hit the franchise VERY HARD. The funny thing is most mmos are moving away from auto-attack when FF14 is trying implement one into the game. FF14 was unfinished but it didn't lack vision, SE took a heavy hit for pressuring the release of an incomplete game and it resulted in FF13-2 and fyi games don't "need" choices or QTEs, if u are going to implement those systems it is b/c it fits into the core vision of the game, NOT as something to tick off on a checklist i.e. Mass Effect Renegade vs Paragon and GoW cutscene murder moments, Dark Souls Insane difficulty matched with their note writing, death system Bad examples, FF13-2 SE don't make junk that like again...

Indie games = where innovation thrives due to non-existent production cost

Did McShea really just say that Bethesda just polishes games at 31:50? Bethesda does a lot of amazing things in games...but polish is not one of them. Every game they put out is full of bugs...some of them are redeeming but they are bugs none the less.

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SKYRIM is not the best elder scrolls either lol. Morrowind is still the best one. So i dont agree the newest games are the better ones. Also a million sales is a TON of sales and if a company cant make money off a million sales , theres something seriously wrong.

A lot of people hated the MMO style of FFXII but for me it's definitely one of my favorite RPGs of all time :)

Man, this one hour show sucks, because the best thing about the hotspot was the fact that thing were really discussed, and now with this time limited show we have a lot of interesting stuff cut suddenly in orther to atend the time limit. We didn't even get questions read on thi show...come on guys...bring back the longer shows. Now, about the show...I hate when people try to resume the japanese gaming problem to a western/eastern...we used to love Final Fantasy...and the reason we don't get excited about it anymore is because of the lack of innovation...I mean, the thing is, while we didn't knew how was to play a RPG with freedom, FF was the best thing ever...once we tasted and saw that there as more on a RPG that FF was giving us, we simply moved on...and the problem with the japanese publishers is that they didn't get that...they keep releasing the same kind of games and expecting us to buy it just for it's name. Even each FF having a different story, the core mechanics are the same. When the japanese innovates and gives us new experiences, everyone get crazy about it, like when Shadow of The Colossus was released...so, the problem isn't about different cultures, is about really new experiences on games.

good episode

@TomMcShea I read my comment again and actually I sounded a bit like a jerk. It was not my intention. Sorry.

@chicknfeet He's actually that pale, on account of having died in 1997.

@Batmantheorphan @benito is a video producer who used to run CNET's podcasts. He works for us now, and is frequently behind the scenes on a lot of our video content.

lies. ffii is one of my favorites in the single player series (along with xii). the leveling is actually based on the player's changing gameplay decisions rather than rigid paragons or randomness. there was even player input on conversations rather than scrolling through the usual dialogue boxes. also, it had a guy named guy. its hard to understate the importance of that.

I have to say, that was a solidly hosted show.

i agree with lazarius12. it is really annoying when you guys are fleshing out a topic with some depth and it just gets cut off. the best part about really good podcasts are when things get dissected by people in the know(you guys) and sometimes even go off the rails. P.S. the book thing was pure comedy last week.

hey! where did that gonzales guy suddenly pop out from?!?!?!?

Good stuff!

@TomM_GScom - You should do books on tape. :D

I understand that you guys do the hotspot during your work day, but I really miss the longer versions. Or at least I'm finding myself constantly annoyed when a good topic is reaching its peak, only to have Tom say "OK, we have to move on...". I listen to three different video game podcasts during the week and what I love about them the most is the improv conversations and opinions that develop from the weeks topic. If you could stretch the length to 1.5 hours or perhaps just use one topic per week to discuss, rather that trying to fit new release talk, news talk and extra talk in, in under an hour, then that would be much better.

Best podcast since it went to video, these need to be longer for the discussions and segments though.

In reference to McShea's post about "defending the 6.0" yesterday, how many times was the word "polish" used in this hotspot? :P

dot...dot...dot... I don't have a twitter account! Well i'm not in the States either so... :)

Maybe we need a Jank score to go along with the overall game score.

The first Assassins Creed sold 10 million units and is still the best selling of the series. So Tom, this time you are wrong.

Tom Magrino is on his [first punctuation mark]

Bioshock Even though it was an fps Story Atmosphere Tone New outlook and polished mechanics

@klasco Me too, lol. What a story teller! Great show as always guys

Hotspot was excellent. And yes I already sent my admission on Twitter for the book.

Love the laid back session of professionals talking together. :)

Is safe to say that Bethesda borrowed a few things from Risen for Skyrim?

great show:)

I hope nobody responds to that question relating to that book prize just so another page has to be read next week :D

HotSpot get.