How I want Elemental Spells To Work In RPGs

Simply put, the current way damn near every fucking game does elements (fire, water and such, not Oxygen, Iron and Uranium) is leaving me feeling a bit high and dry.  I thought about why it was unsatisfying to me.  My conclusion was that the various elements have nothing unique to them.  In Final Fantasy 13, there are 6 different elemental types.  But for gameplay purposes, all it does is affect how much damage each spell does to a monster, no side effects other than straight up damage, and on a monster with no weakness, fire is the same as water is the same as lightning.  It’s not interesting to me in the least, as there is nothing distinct.  The quickest way I thought of to improve them was to go the Champions Online route, which is that each elemental type carries a small debuff on it, it would give me a reason to consider which spell would be most useful if given that all of them do the same base damage.  For example, fire could have lingering flames, lightning could give a quick stun, water or ice could temporarily slow a guy down.  Then I also thought of doing it different.  What if there was a sort of chain order to the spells?  Water makes Lightning do more damage, but lowers fire damage taken in the future, while other spells could have their own synergy.

Just a thought, to add more excitement to a game.

Final Fantasy XIII’s cast is a knock off of XII’s cast

I did some more thinking about Final Fantasy XII today, and I liked the cast more when it was Final Fantasy XII.

• Hope is a lamer version of Vahn (who would have picked up the gun at the start of the game!)
• Sazh is a whinier version of Basch who is a poor fighter, and almost as bad of a pilot as Launchpad McDuck.
• Lightning is Ashe with a bigger chip on her shoulder.
• Vanielle is Penelo… with an Australian accent.
• Snow WISHES he was Balthier, as did I, as Balthier was the shit.
• Fang is Fran with more clothes and less bunny ears.

You know I am right.

This comes from me having beaten the game and being left extremely unsatisfied with where the story went and how everything concluded.  It felt kind of weak-sauce happy ending, like the game was aiming for a darker place, and then at the end decided to make it all better, aside from poor Vanille and Fang who were put back into crystal for another… god knows how long.  Everyone else had their c’ieth marks removed, everyone lived and all was happy.  No satisfying conclusion to the characters.  The whole game was kind of fluffy that way, things happened.. but I never got the sense of things really happening.

Final Fantasy XIII Review

I gave the game 40 hours, I feel that is enough time to review a game.

It’s a great 30 hour game, but it feels like there is another 20 hours to the game.  At first, the pace was 2-3 fights then a cutscene then a scene change.  Now it’s more like 20 fights, maybe a short cinematic, then another 20 fights in an area that looks exactly the same.  It’s getting annoying that the game is just so damn long, and character progression is so pointless feeling.  I gave a character nearly double the stats, but they don’t seem to be any stronger, so what is the point?

It’s a good looking game, with nice animations, good voicing, a bit of a shit story that stars a cast of characters I want to punch in the face, and who I hate seeing get hit in combat, as they have the most annoying whines and grunts.  My inspiration to not suck at the game is to stop hearing Hope grunt “ugh!” as it’s the kind of sound that makes you want to punch him in his stupid neck handkerchief thing, like he is a fucking cowboy, or a hipster douche.  Which he would be, but he has no taste and wears capris.  I enjoy the game, I just think it would be more enjoyable if there was less of it.

Sorry

It seems that for the past week, my entire soul has been consumed by Final Fantasy XIII.

I have mixed feelings on the game, as I managed to dump 40 hours into it, but yet I don’t love it.  I don’t get why I am slogging forward in the game, as I have other games to play, and other things to do.

FUCK YOU VANILLE

Vanille is a character in Final Fantasy XIII.  She pisses me off.

She just kind of wanders around and gets caught up in the drama of stupid people, and manages to make said stupid people look SMART.  She also has lame pink hair too.  Her voice angers me, it has a stupid tone to it and her dialog is.. horrible.  She also has this stupid run animation, with her arms flapping off to the sides like she is on a stupid airplane, she also skips while she runs.. in a dungeon.  Her weapon looks like a lacrosse stick that shoots death yoyos, it’s a pretty good weapon, but I hate her so much.