In my youth I loved a series of Japanese role-playing games Final Fantasy. Then the game seemed to me something incredible, so I willingly spent their evenings, with the head going in a fantastic story, a unique combat system and enjoying the indescribable romance of fabulous adventures. Over time a series began to happen something strange: guide Square Enix obsessed with the idea of creating a MMORPG based on the popular franchise, what is at the root of ruined the magic for which many loved Final Fantasy. One of the last “proper” games in the series was FF XII, which was released for PlayStation 2 in 2006. Today I’d like to tell you about a remaster of this great game for the PlayStation 4 with subtitle The Zodiac Age.
Game: Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age
Platform: PlayStation 4
Genre: JRPG
Developer: Square Enix
Publisher: Square Enix
Release date: 11 Jul 2017
For developing the game Final Fantasy XII answered the legendary Japanese game designer Yasumi, Matsuno. He is at once came up with the fantastic world of Ivalice, where the unfolding events of almost all of its future games, including hits such as Final Fantasy Tactics (1997), Vagrant Story (2000) and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (2003). The world of Ivalice is also populated by many wonderful species, but in its atmosphere and especially the architecture throughout, the influence of the European middle ages. The magic here is adjacent to the complex mechanisms like flying ships, as the traditional elements of the Final Fantasy series can be found on almost every step. Mizuno have done a truly tremendous job, creating Ivalice. The quality and depth of this world can be easily compared with middle-Earth John Ronald Tolkien or Westeros from the works of George Martin.
Unfortunately, Yasumi, Matsuno was unable to complete work on Final Fantasy XII because of sudden health problems, so the post of Director, screenwriter and producer, he was replaced by good friend and colleague Hiroshi Minagawa, who previously worked together with Matsuno on many games. Critics at the time noted that because such an unexpected change of project Manager in the introduction of Final Fantasy XII has a large number of exciting mini-games, and the gaming scene is the most full, whereas closer to the finale all of this is gradually eroding. The father of the series Hironobu Sakaguchi was upset because of the departure of Yasumi, Matsuno from the post of Director and did not even bother to pass the game to the end, though acknowledged that “it’s a real Final Fantasy”. But the health thing is so that no arguing against it.
Powerful Empire Arcadia and Rozarria fighting for power over the land of Ivalice, and the tiny neutral Kingdom Dalmasca is on the map in the center of the unfolding military conflict. Arcadia occupies Dalmasca, so the king Raminas agrees to surrender to avoid further bloodshed. On hearing this, the Royal knight Basch von Rosenburg kill the king for treason. The young Prince of Dalmasca Lord Rasler dies heroically, defending the Royal Palace during the siege, and his wife Asheliya B’nargin Dalmasca in despair commits suicide. Pretty dark beginning for the Final Fantasy game series, agree? Game Yasumi, Matsuno always been the same: the most serious, adult, and riddled with political intrigue.
Further, the events take us to the next two years. The main character becomes an orphan and street thief named Vaan who lives in the capital of Dalmasca – the city Rabanastre. Lad wants to grow up and become noble by the pirate, plunder the ship of the Empire and return to his people illegally seized his wealth. For a teenager watches his childhood friend Penelo different from Vahan with prudence and discretion. But even she can not prevent him secretly get into the treasure house of the Royal castle in the midst of the solemn reception of the new Consul. During a RAID on the Treasury, Vahan meets a couple desperate air pirates – Baltera and Fran, and stumbles upon the leader of the resistance Amalia (actually it’s Princess Asheliya, who staged his own suicide). Caught custody at the scene, they are in the Royal dungeon, where free from the chains of the knight of the traitor bash.
In this team, the player will have to complete the game from start to finish and try to stop the long war, tearing Ivalice apart. However, the main characters will join guest characters, fighting with them shoulder to shoulder. Surprisingly, this Final Fantasy has no clearly defined protagonist. The main character is the entire team, each character of which is accurately spelled out in the overall story and gives the story something of their own. Princess Asheliya strives to bring peace back to her rightful Kingdom, knight Bash tries to clean his name from the stigma of being a traitor and pirate Balthier haunts known only to him one goal. But one of the main characters are similar: they are struggling to thwart the militaristic Empire Arcadia. And for this they first need to be deprived of its main military advantages.
In the world of Final Fantasy XII, as in many other games in this series, the emphasis is on the use of magic crystals “magicite”. In some regions of the state of Ivalice distributed energy, referred to as “haze”, which literally hangs in the air in a dense fog. If the crystal magicite absorbs darkness, he turns into “the nethicite,” and its holder gets access to additional magic abilities and special techniques. Empire Arcadia uses the nethicite for military purposes, trying to strengthen their air fortress and army soldiers. In a secret laboratory Dr. Sid (well, what “finalka” can do without Sid?) conducts experiments on natural nethicite, trying to create its artificial counterpart. It is the nethicite is the cornerstone in the struggle for power, and that he is being chased as antagonists, and the team of the main characters.
When I first encountered Final Fantasy XII in 2006, I tried hard to leap from a fabulous, largely romantic stories, FF IX and FF X to so serious, impregnated with political strife plot. Also, FF XII has largely become like a MMORPG with open world, huge maps and battle system, much like the battle of the online role-playing games. At the time it is because of these innovations I abandoned the passing game after about the first third, and then it never came back. Therefore, the release of the remaster of The Zodiac Age was a great opportunity to catch up and learn, finally, what ended the story of six friends and the Kingdom Dalmasca.
The combat system of FF XII do not like the accustomed to what fans of the series. The player chooses three characters of the six, and the leader of the Trinity, which will be able to control himself. The remaining two characters act on their own and are subject to so called “gambits”. Gambits is a kind of programming language, when a player using special commands and conditions configures the AI fighters. For example, attack the nearest enemy caught in their sight, to bring down fiery magic on monsters vulnerable to fire, use the healing item on a wounded comrade, and so on. A few gambits available to the player initially, but most have to be purchased in special shops scattered across Ivalice. The leader of the team the player can control in manual mode, and maybe just automate it using gambits.
When confronted with enemies (which, by the way, no longer occur in a random way) the main characters are no longer transferred to a separate arena to fight. The battle takes place directly at the location where the collision occurred. This combat system is called Active Dimension Battle (ADB), and she changed the usual Active Time Battle (ATB). However, in the game options you can configure the stop time in those moments when the player is sneaking around in the menu. In addition to traditional physical attacks, magic, all sorts of colors and use of objects, characters also available special military equipment. For example, inflict a powerful attack that consumes your own health or the accumulated money, the attack dealing damage proportional to the number of character steps, stealing items from monsters and so on.
To replace powerful “limits” and “overdrives” came the so-called Quickening. These attacks consume magical energy and the darkness were divided into three categories of power. Each character can be no more than three such attacks, but they can be linked in a chain during the fight, inflicting massive damage. Also in the game there are the traditional Final Fantasy series appeal to demons. In FF XII they are called “Esper”. Part of the Esper becomes available to the player as you progress through the story campaign, and the remainder will be able to get only during special quests. Each Esper, the player must choose his master of the six characters. Called to the battlefield Esper fights before until the owner dies or until the Esper is not over health.
In Final Fantasy XII is a very advanced system of leveling. It is based on three components: the traditional experience received in battles, boards license, reminiscent of “Grid fields” from Final Fantasy X, and the system of professions, which came in a remastered was released exclusively in the Japanese version of FF XII, subtitled International Zodiac Job System. Each character can only learn two professions of the 12 available — just two on each of the six characters. Here you have the knight and the samurai, the machinist, owning firearms, and Archer, and monk, and all kinds of magicians. Complete with profession, the character receives the appropriate Board license. For killing monsters the main characters get “license points”, which allow you to unlock cells on the Board and to access the use of new combat techniques, magic, perks, weapons, armor and accessories.
Tellingly, in FF XII you can’t just take and wear any armor or pick up any weapon. On your Board license must be activated and the corresponding cell. Of course, armor, headgear and weapons are divided into classes. Specializiruetsya samurai sword, the monk prefers staves and the Archer bows and crossbows. In addition, unlocking on the Board, say, a healing spell, you will not be able to use it immediately. You need to purchase this spell in the magic shop (fortunately it must be done only once). The same applies to all martial techniques. Is such a pleasure not cheap, so be ready for a serious spending. And with the money in the game too, all is very interesting. You don’t get money for killing monsters. Of them only drops loot. But this is the loot you can sell to merchants and earn decent money. Also the money you can find in numerous pots and chests that will often stumble during the passage.
As for gaming locations, in FF XII presents a huge open world, the locations of which are connected by transitions. The usual interactive world map in the game. Only the screen used for navigation, which is marked settlements. So the player suffered in those places where he is to appear before the developers settled their powerful monsters to defeat them without the proper pumping almost impossible. Absolutely self-regulating system. The player happen to be in the vast deserts and icy wastelands, dense jungles, lost cities, ancient civilizations and other not less picturesque places. Explore the world of Ivalice is possible for tens and hundreds of hours. The only thing I didn’t like the monotony and poor design of dungeons. Yes, some of them will offer the player the solution of different puzzles, sometimes very exciting. But in General, most of the dungeons can be described as incredibly long dark corridors with branching and repeating textures of the walls.
If you want to distract from the plot of the passage, you can always go to any tavern and on the Bulletin Board to take in order to kill a dangerous monster. Just like in “the Witcher 3” only FF XII came out long before the game universe based on the works of Andrzej Sapkowski. For defeating the monster, the customers will reward you generously. The game also is a lot of fun side-quests that can captivate you for hours. Very pleased with the presence of fan service. You will definitely be glad having met tiny creatures Mugla or again perched on the back of Chocobo racing birds. The latter, incidentally, are rented only for a while. But they are the secret paths that it is impossible to walk. Near passages you will see on the ground traces of the bird’s paws. This means that close to hid something interesting.
It’s time to talk about the innovations that offers us a remastered 2017. In addition to the aforementioned job system in The Zodiac Job System, which was reconstructed and largely improved, the game contains many surprises. First, significantly prettier picture. Now we see a legendary game in HD, and the models of the main characters, as I understand it, was partially redrawn and brought to mind in terms of detail. The character design of this game, I always truly admired. Artists have tried to fame and created an incredibly memorable characters, which is nice to look. CG-rollers have also been remastered and look as they did a couple of years ago, not in 2006. FF XII had inherited from the Japanese version of the game “challenge Mode”, previously unavailable to Western players. It contains 100 levels of saturated ongoing battles with powerful opponents. The catch is that saved the player every 10 levels. But for winning you will receive especially valuable treasure and money.
A pleasant innovation was the mode of increasing the speed of the gameplay. By pressing just one button on your controller you can speed up the game in two or even four times. This greatly simplifies the grind and knocking out valuable points of licenses. But to use such “cheats” you, of course, no one makes. The game has got the support of trophies that will certainly please fans of “beat platinum”. In the options you can choose Japanese or English dubbing the characters. Surprisingly, I liked the English sound track. The voices of the characters are just gorgeous. Especially remember the charming voice of Fran, which belongs to the race of the Weir. The music in the game has also been remastered and updated soundtrack includes several new songs. At any time in the options the player can switch between the original and contemporary sound track. All this magnificence for the first time can be heard in 7.1. Has significantly accelerated load (in the days of the PlayStation 2 sometimes had to wait forever), and also appeared automatically save when you move from one location to another.
However, there is in the game and a serious enough problem that transcends it from the original. One of them is absolutely unbearable game camera. She behaves completely unpredictable, which can sometimes fall into a wall or hitting a character’s head, leaving the player the ability to see the battlefield in the heat of battle. Difficult the camera has to the narrow dungeons, from which the game is 60%. The second problem is the inability to adjust the brightness of the image. Yes, I understand that you can adjust the picture directly on the TV, but I don’t want each time to adjust equipment individually for this game. The third problem is a serious desync facial expressions of the characters with their speech. It concerns only the English audio track and it happens not so often, but unpleasant osadochek remains. The fourth problem is an extremely small draw distance. It seems that the game engine is no desire to rewrite is not burned, leaving everything as it was in 2006. Therefore, some objects appear out of nowhere only a few metres away from the characters.
Pros:
- In HD the game and cutscenes look just fine.
- Great character design is my sincere respect.
- Incredibly complex combat system that uses gambits.
- The system of professions makes the game more varied.
- Test mode will please the most battle-hardened players.
- Due to the acceleration of grind have ceased to be tedious.
- Classic and updated music included.
- Just a magnificent work of actors English dubbing.
- A huge number of various minor improvements.
Cons:
- The story of the lacks inherent in previous games romance.
- After 10 years in the game and did not deliver the translation on Russian language.
- Game camera often behaves just disgusting.
- From the original migrated some remnants of the past.
- Very dark and monotonous dungeons.
Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age is a monumental work of gaming art authored by the legendary Yasumi, Matsuno. One of the most complex combat systems in the history of Japanese role-playing games, memorable characters, huge game world filled with adventure, danger and secrets, all of which can pull you out of reality for a couple of weeks. The game is quite long, and if you do not resort to accelerating the flow of time, then the passage will take at least 60 hours. If you suddenly want to beat the game 100%, get ready to spend more than 150 hours of his life. And it will be time well spent, because FF XII: Zodiac, The Age of such a fascinating book that is extremely difficult to put down. I put the game score of 8 out of 10.
Game overview Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age
Sergey Grey