Streets of SimCity main theme. Awesome music from a not-so-awesome game.

Also the entire World of Goo soundtrack.

IIRC Elnoyle doesn't drop Energy Crystals until it's around level 30 (maybe higher). And it's not immune to instant death so the easiest way to kill it is to junction 100 Death to your ST-Atk.

Final Fantasy IV is an awful game. It chooses your party members for you. You can't change their abilities. You can't decide which magic spells you want them to learn. You can't affect the way their stats increase when they level up. About the only thing you can do is control them in battles, which happen way too often and typically require little skill or strategy beyond "push X until all the monsters are dead".

And yet everyone seems to think it's the best game of all time. I just don't get it.

The Mega Man box is a work of art and should be hanging on the wall in a museum somewhere.

Well, not really. But it is so hilariously awful that I can't help but love it.

Lol, yeah, I got a bit carried away when I was writing it xP. I Didn't realize how long it was until after I'd posted it and read it again. Anyway, I didn't quote your whole post either, but I'd still like to address other things that were mentioned. You had a compelling arguement for the gambit system (and yes, that was my biggest complaint, you're correct). I'll probably try the game again and have a better opinion of it, but like I said earlier, Normally when I get a bad first impression. I normally buy my games in spurts, so when a certain game doesn't drag me in within about ten hours than I usually toss it to the side until I've completed all of my other ones. I'm actually going through one of those spurts right now and it is making it very difficult to stick to my runthrough of FF games xP lol. Anyway, iy was a compelling arguement that actually makes me more willing to try the game again.

As far as FFIV goes, yes your characters are generally chosen for you, but there is a deeeper amount of strategy (in this game at least) when it comes to facing the challenges WITH what they give you. I found it challenging and fun, but everyone has their own opinion.

Xx_Kares_xX

Yeah, take some more time off of FFXII to let the bad impression fade a bit, work through some other games, but come back and give it another shot someday. And after that, if you still don't like it, you can go ahead and give up and I won't blame you. Can't expect everyone to like the same types of games as me. :P

To me, video games are like books. Due to the recent influx of garbage, I usually turn to video games for a good story. I really don't like playing games regardless of how fun they are if they don't have a decent story. (Though exceptions are there like Worms) And FF 12 had this entire political story that I really didn't care about. Most of the time I had no idea as to what my party members were upto. Shame, because Ivalice is a really interesting and beautiful world.

fend_oblivion

Well, I'm the type who thinks of games as games first and foremost. So if a game is fun enough, I can overlook a bad story. And along the same line of thinking, if a game is not fun, it doesn't matter how good the story is, I'm not going to like it. Not to say that I don't appreciate a good story when I find one (because I do) but it's just not an important part of the gaming experience for me. Even with games like Final Fantasy.

So apparently we have very different views when it comes to games and story. Of course, my opinion is definitely the right one. :P

I thought the gambit system was pretty awesome. And some of the boss battles, I really had to use my brains instead of using the Attack/Quick Hit/Ultima/Flare etc in the other games. I loved the gameplay of FF 12.

But the one thing that sucked - was the story. I really don't like politics, so I stopped playing once I reached level 51. And I'm pretty early in the game too. (I power levelled because doing Marks is fun!) And another thing that sucked - Ashe. "Wooo look at me, I'm a widow so I'll walk about in a mini-skirt with a personality that is as dense as a rock!"

fend_oblivion

So you gave up on a game that you admit you had fun playing because you didn't like the story? When did video games become books? :?

FFXII I didn't finish because the game played itself for you. The whole point of Final Fantasy is too Control your party, using all your characters different strengths and strategies in different situations. Even FFVII and FFVIII would have bugged the hell out of me if it weren't for the character Development and amazing stories. All the cahracters in those three games are card board cut outs of each other, the only abilities that are any different are their 'limit breaks/ quickenings'. Since FFXII has a plot that seems more like Lord of the Rings, and (from the 30 hours I played) the characters have NO personality, I was bored out of my skull. It's been a few years since I've played it, and I will go back and try it again eventually, since I find that I often over criticize things when I have a ba first impression. But even so, I'll go into it EXPECTING a crap game, so it will probably be a lot better than I remember.

Xx_Kares_xX

Don't want to quote your entire post because it's loooooooooong but I'm going to single out this one piece to pick on. :P

When you say FFXII plays itself I assume you're complaining about gambits. I think you're looking at it the wrong way. Gambits are there for your convenience. You get to set them up however you want and will end up constantly tweaking them to adapt to different situations or to try out different strategies. And if you get into trouble, you can always override any character's gambits by issuing manual commands. Or if you wish, you can turn gambits off entirely. My point is that gambits don't play for you; you can't just set them up at the beginning and then march through the game without ever touching another button. They just eliminate the tediousness of having to press X everytime you want someone to do anything at all, without taking complete control away from you.

If you want to talk about a game that plays itself and doesn't let you control your party, just look at Final Fantasy IV. It tells you who's going to be in your party, what jobs they'll have, which spells they'll learn, how their stats will grow, etc. The only thing you're allowed to do is run around fighting monsters. And since you didn't get to set up your characters, you don't really get to try out your own strategies, since so much of the strategy in these types of games depends on how your party is set up. So you end up using whatever strategy works best for the group of characters the game forces upon you. About the only thing it doesn't do is press X for you.

By comparison, games with "card board cut out" characters let you build each individual character from the ground up any way you want. You decide what spells and abilities they have and how their stats are distributed, and are then free in battle to just play around with all kinds of different strategies until you find something you like. If your characters all end up the same, or are ridiculously overpowered to the point of being broken, you only have yourself to blame. Because you made them that way.

And if you didn't like the plot and characters of FFXII, well, that's your opinion and I don't expect to change your mind. All I can say is I disagree with you and felt FFXII had one of the more interesting stories of the series, with a vibrant and detailed world to explore and characters who, despite all claims to the contrary, do indeed have personalities (whether or not you like said personalities is an entirely different story).

[QUOTE="TleilaxuMaster"]

FFVI is mediocre at best and FFIV is just awful. I don't understand for the life of me what people see in these games that would make them worth considering as candidates for best Final Fantasy.

SupernaturalX55

FFVI & IV were classics on the SNES, During that era they were amazing. If you don't like them because of the outdated graphics, well hopefully 'if' Square remakes FFVI they'll go all out on it. If you didn't like the story.. well.. im not sure why you wouldn't. Kinda hard to figure out why you don't like them in the first place.

I don't recall mentioning anything about graphics or story. So you really shouldn't assume that's what I don't like about these games. But that's partly my fault for not explaining properly. So here it is.

Final Fantasy IV is awful because it basically plays itself. It doesn't let you pick your characters or change your party or decide which jobs/skills/magic you want to have or tweak stats or otherwise customize your characters in any meaningful way. FFI, II, and III all give you more than this. About the only thing you can decide is how to equip your party, but since there's really no good reason to go with anything besides the strongest stuff available, it's a meaningless decision. You're basically given a pre-made group of characters (whether you like 'em or not) and sent off into the world to battle monsters every five steps, which is essentially pressing A until they all die and healing when necessary; no real thought or strategy required.

Final Fantasy VI is a bit better, allowing you to actually build your own party by choosing from a large cast of characters. Again, though, these characters are not nearly customizable enough. They all have their unique skills that can't be changed, and you can't really do anything with them aside from teach them all the same magic spells and give them a couple of relics. Plus, they feel really unbalanced; some are so useful you'll be using their ability in every single round of combat, while others are basically useless and do nothing more than take up space. All the Final Fantasy games that came after (and some that came before) do a much better job of letting you really make the characters your own. Thus, mediocre.

I can handle "outdated" graphics. I did grow up with the NES, after all. And considering these are both SNES titles, that's actually an improvement. And story? Irrelevant. If a game is bad, then Shakespeare himself couldn't write a story good enough to make me like it.

Final Fantasy XII. No random encounters, a great story (which many people seem to dislike for some reason), a more detailed and interesting world than any other in the series (with the possible exception of X), the gambit system which eliminates the "press X until everyone's dead" tediousness of combat without removing the fun or challenge, plenty of monsters to hunt on the side, and no random encounters. I know I said that last one twice but it's that important to me.

And because I can, here's my ranking of the series from best to worst:

FFXII > FFX > VIII > VII > V > IX > VI > III > II > I > IV

If I left anything out, that's because I haven't played it yet. Except for X-2, which isn't technically part of the main series (but if you really must know, I'd put it between X and VIII).

FFVI is mediocre at best and FFIV is just awful. I don't understand for the life of me what people see in these games that would make them worth considering as candidates for best Final Fantasy.