Please do!

The Diablo II review was another good read, though again I don't feel like you've hit on every detail. This time it's a game I haven't played, so I say that because I can't get a good picture of what you're talking about. For example, there's a sort of vague description of the battle system all throughout: it's point and click; loot is dropped randomly; dungeons are generated randomly; but by that alone I can't tell what you mean by the game being ageless or that it loses momentum in single-player. It would help if you elaborated on some of those points.

iloveflash

Hrmm. Someone who hasn't played Diablo? I didn't know they existed. I'm pretty sure my mother has played it at some point, and that's really about it. Go play the demo before you disappear in a cloud of smoke due to how you can't actually exist!

You just described Diablo in your post. You click on enemies until they die. There are lots of enemies, and they drop loot. I mean, I'll revise the review if I can, but I don't think that I can add any more information than that. Diablo is not a complex series, and as such doesn't really require a complex review.

I found the thread.

EDIT: I added a few sentences to help explain the series.

[quote="xVxOblivionxVx"]

Ah, well my counter-argument to the Agro vs. Epona case is that, though the Epona control sheme is more fluid, it feels like you are riding a mechanical machine as oppose to actually living breathing creatures. Agro on the other hand feels real, because like any real creature, it has its own mind and thus it may not listen properly to your commands or it may even make a mistake here or there. One good example, is when agro makes a makes a mistake, you are inclined to show emotions such as anger or frustration at the horse which makes it feel real. While with Epona, the horse is incapable of making mistakes, and anything that goes wrong you got no one to blame but yourself since you are in FULL control.

iloveflash

Cheer up, okay!

I remember reading a fifty page thread on Agro and Epona's handling after one of the writers on Rock Paper Shotgun called Agro "wonky." I should go find that thread; it was hilarious.

Now that everyone gained +5 EXP from the above pointless conversation:

Diablo II

It's fair if you don't think of some of the game's flaws as flaws, but I do. Not saying this was a bad review because of it, I just can't recommend it.iloveflash

That's not the same as actively reccommending people stay away from it, as you did. There's a difference between indifference and active down thumbing due to a difference in opinion.

The thumbs are labeled as "helpful." Not "do you recommend this review" or "do you agree with this review." Furthermore, when I post my reviews to the Writer's Lounge, I would hope for WRITING TIPS and comments on the choices I made in expressing my views, not just being attacked senselessly for my opinion.

It all makes me feel like this is a massive waste of my time, if the comments I receive on this board are going to revolve around whether or not you agree with my views. Of course they won't.

A guy wrote a review about Alter AILA Genesis (quite frankly the greatest RPG Maker 2k3 game EVER CREATED) saying it was mediocre, and everyone bashed him for it in their comments. However, no one said his review wasn't fleshed out; it was probably bashed more than any other review BECAUSE he pointed out more about the game than anyone else. They just disagreed that those points made the game mediocre.iloveflash

It's sad that an opinion that disagrees with the collective gets shunned so quickly. Shows just how foolish and childish most people are when they're given the internet.

I have to say, I can't recommend a review based simply on its depth and the amount of work you poured into it any more than I can recommend a garbage video game because a team of people poured blood and sweat over it for a year and a half. If the review has points I disagree with or at least doesn't bother to mention certain things I think are VITAL about the subject matter, more often than not I'll lean towards not recommending it, save maybe if the plus points outweigh the negative points, and as I said before, I disagree with some of the plus points here. I suppose it would've been better for me to not rate this review at all since it was good anyway, but come on, when have you ever been a softy pants?iloveflash

I'm not petty enough to downvote a review because I disagreed with it. Call me what you will, but I've only downvoted reviews that weren't helpful, as they should be.

I'm not even sure what the heck you're talking about in the last sentence. Do I have a history of downvoting reviews I don't agree with?

And for the record, I'd give XII an 8.5, the same score I gave IX. Didn't I mention I played both to completion more times than you? GS must've deleted that part. Hm. Well. Who's the fan now.iloveflash

For the record: I don't care. Playing a game more than me doesn't prove anything, other than you have about ten times more free time to play games than I do.

For the record: It's amazing how quickly you dodged all of that text I typed in defence of my views. It's like you're...trying to deflect the blame! Oh, I see! I come up with well founded opinions based on a substantial portion of gameplay, you attack me, I defend them well, and then you say, "well I've played more than you, so nuah" and of course that is supposed to be that.

Way to bring up something completely irrelevant to the discussion. Thanks for completely derailing my reviews thread, wasting my time over a 0.5 score difference, and downvoting my review for no reason other than "I disagree with your thesis." I'm SO glad I came back to the writer's lounge for this.

You list many positive things about the game that are spot on, but there are glaring flaws which you ignore or don't explore that deeply,iloveflash

 BECAUSE I DON'T THINK THEY ARE FLAWS. I THINK THE GAME IS AWESOME AND THAT THE FLAWS YOU MENTION ARE NOT FLAWS, AND THAT YOU ARE WRONG. WHAT THE HECK IS SO HARD TO UNDERSTAND ABOUT THIS? I DIDN'T TALK ABOUT THE FLAWS THAT I DIDN'T THINK ARE FLAWS.

I mentioned everything I thought was important.Just because YOU think something is important that I didn't mention doesn't mean I'm wrong!

Notes:

-Final Fantasy minigames are all terrible and the removal of them is a godsend. If you liked any FF minigames, you're the reason why we can't have nice things.

-"I list Tidus as a standard because yeah, he was a more engaging protagonist than Vaan. Not moreso than Larsa, but definitely Vaan. This is not all subjective"

"Interesting" is a subjective term. Honestly, are you drunk? You're usually smarter than this.

I thought Tidus was the worst protagonist in a game I've ever played because:

1) He was annoying.

2) He was annoying.

3) He was bloody annoying.

4) Every once in a while his entire personality would change out of the blue to suit the mood.

5) His daddy issues were boring and uninteresting, which made up 60% of FFX's plot

6) Every time he did something I was screaming at the TV. "NO DON'T DO THAT GOD YOU'RE SUCH AN IDIOT"

7) He was annoying.

8 ) He was unrelatable.

9) He was so annoying I just wanted to stop playing the game because of him, despite the fact that the gameplay was a lot of fun.

Meanwhile Vaan is:

1) Mildly annoying, but at least consistant.

2) I wasn't screaming at him, except for the beginning when he wanted to break into the castle (though I thought that was pretty badass)

3) He may always be there, but the plot doesn't revolve around him. He gives us someone to relate to in the political heat.

-I don't understand the critisism that only some of the characters directly relate to the plot, considering that they came along for the ride. I mean, did you like KOTOR's cast? Not all of them directly related with the plot, but they were interesting; I'd say more interesting that FFXII's cast, but that's because KOTOR had about twenty times the diologue.

And FFXII's cast was far better than FFX's strong but silent type, strong but silent type, strong but silent type, strong but silent type, comic relief racist, and strong but silent type (whom were all so badly translated that none of them had personalities, just spoken words that sort of made sense if you bashed your head against the wall), or even FFVIII's cast of headstrong emo, headstrong emo, headstrong emo, headstrong preppy, and headstrong emo. And lets not forget FFVII's cast of dejected emo, dejected emo, racial stereotype, pretty face with no personality under the hood, pretty face with no personality under the hood, and so on.

As far as Final Fantasy parties go, XII doesn't have the best (that's IX's domain) but it's still better than most of the games in the series, as far as I'm concerned. It reminds me (again) more of a western RPG, like Baldur's Gate or KOTOR, and I like that.

-I liked the battle system, though I agree that sometimes a command can take too long to get around to being cast. But itt was just too slow. It was even too slow for MMO games. Compare XII to WoW or Everquest and you'll see that it's slow even compared to that. So I don't agree with your MMO assertion.

I said in the review that I think the game was trying to be more like KOTOR than an MMO, and I stand by that.  I think they would have done better by ripping off KOTOR more than they did, though they took most of what was there. In fact, the main niggles of the battle system would have been fixed had they removed the legacy Final Fantasy cruft like the active time battle loading bar nonsense.

However, I'm not arrogant enough to think I know why a developer did what they did. I can make guesses, but I do not know. I honestly think they slowed it down because they were afraid if it was too fast the FF feel would go away, but so much for that. 

-Foolz: I loved the story! I don't know why you're panning me for it. I honestly have no clue.

---

I'm genuinely surprised at the negative reaction my positive review of this game is getting. Seriously. I effing love this game. Why is my love for a game so troubling to everyone?

I liked a game you didn't. Get over it. Seriously.

Oh my **** GOD. GS just deleted my whole post. Frick, man.

Your review listed too many things as being good about the game, and too few things that were glaringly awful, so I thumbed it down. Among them: the story is not so great, the character development is, frankly, half-assed (let's try to keep at least Tidus as a standard here please), and the battle system features lag just for the sake of making it feel like an MMO--and that's what's making your fighting so slow. But the audiovisuals are indeed teh shiet, the game does set a mood worthy of honoring our previous trips to Ivalice, and overall, it is pretty addictive, this adventuring and hunting and stuff.

iloveflash

So, basically, you didn't agree with me, so you decided to be petty and thumb the review down instead of discussing the issues in the game with me? Son, I am disssssapoint.

The story is excellent. I was constantly impressed with the writing and the plot.

The character development is far better than in any Final Fantasy game before it, save IX. Are you really offering Tidus as an example of good character development?  His constantly changing personalities was awful development, if you could even call it that. Not to mention that the translation of X made it so hard to understand what the heck anyone was saying.And how about VIII? You know, where mister tough and gruff suddenly turned into Rinoa's knight in shining armor in the process of about two seconds. I hear 6 had good development, as well as 9, but all the rest are bad at it. Final Fantasy stinks at character development; 12 is the only one that got it somewhat right.

I talked about how the fighting is slow. That's the game's one and only flaw for me; everything else was 10/10. I didn't know why they did it. I'm not a bloody developer. They fixed it in the International version, which would probably be a 10 out of 10 for me.

You're a mad man. The game's lovely and I love it. Just because I didn't mention the stuff you didn't like didn't make is a bad review.

Final Fantasy XII review

More to come, including an editorial with me and Foolz.

the game was stuttering, sputtering, hacking and wretching at every frame rateiloveflash

You're doing it wrong. Deep down inside yourself I think you already knew this. We both know you can do better. Next time, try this:

i ran teh gamez at 500 fps and it was garbage imo liek their was no point and it was so pretenious and it didnt work in wine loliloveflash

I just played that game till it crashed. I got 400 million points and third place on the leaderboard. Talk about an eye orgy.iloveflash

Now you go and tell me that wasn't a 9.5 worthy level of pretty lights. I mean, come on.