Final Fantasy Challenge: Final Fantasy Tactics Part II. “My lord, you appear to me as a warrior in his prime.”

Copyright Square Enix

He really wasn’t kidding. Orlandeau shows up with all of Agrias’s skills, all of Gaffgarion’s skills and all of Meliadoul’s abilities and she doesn’t even join your team until well after Orlandeau joins. The game really does lose a lot of its challenge once Orlandeau starts smiting fools left and right. Hell, part of the issue I had with Zalera was because I had him as a dragoon to unlock samurai so he could get Shirhadori, just to make him even more invincible. Then he killed Ultima.

Setting all of that aside, Final Fantasy Tactics really was a beautiful game. I’ve mentioned before that I bounced off of it twice, and part of me kind of regrets not really finishing it until now. However, a lot of the quality of life improvements brought in from the Ivalice Chronicles are kind of why I got through it. Being able to see where I can put my soldiers on the field, being able to fast forward through the long spell animations and long conversations on a redo and being able to check where things are at each town really help get through some of the rougher patches of the game. That said, unlike, say Final Fantasy II, where the remaster basically makes it playable in general, the remaster here just kind of caters to my weaknesses. This game is phenomenal even without the quality of life improvements.

One thing that struck me every time I played was the sprite work and polygon work. The Ivalice Chronicles has a smoother look, designed for my 1080p flatscreen monitor, than it did for my best friend’s 13 inch 480p scanline TV that he played the original on in his bedroom. Most of the time, when these sprites get smoothed out, they look a lot worse (see also the terrible character sprites for the mobile versions of Final Fantasy V and VI), but the artists here really understood why the sprites were made in the first place. They understood how the sprites were originally made with scanlines in mind, used that to smooth them out and they look accurate. Nearly every screen, every diorama-inspired scene, had me just staring in awe at something. Either animation work, character designs or just something cool in the background that had tons of detail. Not just in cutscenes, either, but in battles. There’s this fight at the bottom of Orbonne, before you go into the Ruins of Mullonde at the end of the game, and you fight on these stacks of giant books against a bunch of wizards in a magic circle, rent apart by their spell. It looks so cool, really evoking the feel of fighting in a magic library. It also reminded me a bit of the fight in the Library of the Ancients in Final Fantasy V, with the enormous books. A little bit of the Great Gubal Library from Heavensward as well, but I do think that the Library dungeon was a shout out to both of these in the first place.

What really puts this game into S-tier along with XII, XIV and VI (and maybe XVI) is the same reason all of those wound up in S-tier. This story is so good. I always knew the story was well done, I mostly bounced off due to mechanical issues, but I never got past the gallows and I missed so much good stuff. The complicated politics is just a part, but the themes of power is what really kept me in. Ramza’s journey from naive squire to a true Gallant Knight, who is willing to save the country and the commonfolk regardless of what it costs him is wonderful. As he grows to understand what power is, and how it can be used, he uses it not for himself, but for the other people. Delita, of course, is also doing this, but he’s so far gone after Tietra’s death, he’s someone who winds up sacrificing his own happiness, even his actual love for Ovelia, for power. He spends his life miserable and lonely, and something of a hypocrite. He would die for Ovelia, but when she stabs him, he stabs her on reflex (yes, and Matsuno said they lived unhappy, but successful lives as monarchs after) proving he still sees himself first. Meanwhile, Ramza does get power, but he only uses it for other people. As such, he never sacrifices his happiness for power, instead going the other way around. He and Alma, and probably Orlandeau, Mustadio, Agrias, Beowulf, Reis, Worker 8, Meliadoul, Rapha, Marach and all of my dudes and their chocobos, got to live their lives free and happy. Away from the petty struggles of nobles, away from the machinations of demons and militant zealots. It’s a bittersweet tale, and I loved every second of it.

I will say, mechanically, it does only fall into A-Tier. I love that you can customize each guy in your warband. I’ve recently gotten into Warhammer and painting minis. While I don’t see myself building an army, I might do Kill Team. One thing I like about that is customizing my dudes, and that was something I loved here. I spent most of my 47 hour playtime (where I did Midlight’s Deep, the sidequest and all of the Errands in addition to beating the game) grinding side battles to make my party into cracked-out badasses. Ramza ended the game dual wielding an Excalibur from Midlight’s Deep and Save the Queen, with a Brave of 97 and a Shiriahdori, making him damn near invincible. That was cool. What wasn’t was that a lot of the fights are just kind of cheap.

I love the idea that the game is about outsmarting the enemy. You’re outmanned and outgunned in most story fights because you’re not a powerful badass, you’re an outlaw on the run. Even when you personally are an unkillable badass, you’re still out gunned. There’s also the idea that power isn’t good, and that smarts, caring for your people and selfsacrifice are important themes in the story, and having Ramza’s company constantly on the backfoot supports these themes, tying them directly into the gameplay. I love that shit. Unfortunately, it also means that sometimes you start a fight poisoned, or you have to fight Wiegraf in a duel, then he turns into a demon who can just spam cast Lich. Then you have to prevent Rapha from committing suicide by assassin when she’s really determined to do that. Riovannes was a nightmare. That second fight with Count Elmodre was a pain in the ass, with the assassins having auto-kill abilities with a 100% success chance, Elmdore’s parry being almost as high as Ramza’s and also they kept fucking casting Charm on Cid. That’s the worst guy to have charmed. I also gave him Shirihadori, so I couldn’t hit him. I didn’t even steal the Masamune from him.

Anyway, I get that it’s the point, but some of the fights really are just kind of bullshit. Plus, some of the mechanics, like spells charging up and stuff do knock the game a bit. I think I got Cherry Blossom on Cloud to work once, ever. Eventually, you adapt and start working within the confines of the game, understanding what it wants, focusing on positioning, equipping the right accessories for the story missions and so on. However, those are things that are hard to know going in. This is really a Guide Dang It sort of game with some of these fights. I love them, I loved the challenge, and I made it through, but it doesn’t mean they weren’t kind of bullshit.

However ultimately, this is one of the best game I’ve ever played. It used to be #1 on my list of Top Ten games I thought were brilliant masterpieces but didn’t like and now it’s going on my Top 20. At least. The Ivalice Chronicles completely changed my mind, and I should have been able to do this sooner.

Final Fantasy Challenge: Final Fantasy Tactics Part 1. “Tolerate No Injustice. Stray Not From the True Path”

You know, I actually bounced off of Final Fantasy Tactics twice in my life. First, back on the original Playstation (although I played it on the PS2) I got to about the fourth map and couldn’t do it. I died face down in the dirt over and over again because of those goddamn archers. The second time, I tried it again on the PSP, the War of the Lions edition, and I got farther, but I can’t remember how far I got. Part of me thinks I got to chapter 2, because I remember the conversation with Mustadio about the ancient world, but I don’t remember the end of chapter 1 at all, so I don’t know. Either way, no matter how far I got on the PSP, I’m officially further than I’ve ever been now that I’ve completed the second chapter and got Agrias on my team. I don’t think I’m going to bounce off of it, even though I do feel like a lot of the issues I have with the game are still here.

Now, the game is definitely top-notch, I’m not coming into this as a negative. I’ve just played a lot of Strategy RPGs, especially Strategy JRPGs, and it’s rare that I bounce off. Especially one with as compelling a narrative as Final Fantasy Tactics, but I’ve done it twice, and I can see why, as even with the slightly eased accessibility options of the Ivalice Chronicles, it’s still got some issues. I do feel like I spend three-quarters of the game in the character menu. I demoed it to some friends, one of which had never seen it but I think it’s up his alley, and my best friend who has beaten this game more than once said that Final Fantasy Tactics is like American football. You spend a lot of time going over your strategies and tactics, getting ready for the fight, then there’s the fight. I am spending less time in the actual battles, which is something I don’t like as much. I don’t mind the customization, I do like it, but because you’re almost always outnumbered, outflanked or in a bad situation (or all of the above, really), it does mean that I’m spending more time double checking my optimization than anything else.

Honestly, some of that wouldn’t be too bad if the game wasn’t so slow. It’s not just the speed of the game, going from unit to unit, but the fact that they talk. A lot. I mean, Ramza will often have big, long speeches with his enemies, allies and many others as the level progresses. I did the fight at the gallows just about an hour before I wrote this, it took me a few tries, and the conversation between Ramza and Gaffgarion, and Agrias when she decides to chime in, is a lot. I’m glad, at least, I get to fast forward through it now. Also, I don’t have to wait until I’m dead to restart the fight. So, you know, it’s a bit slow, it’s a bit clunky, I think mechanically, the Tactics Advance games are better (although part of that is because they’re faster and don’t have the camera issues), but in the end, none of that matters, because none of them are as good or as compelling as this game.

I don’t know if I’m going to rank Final Fantasy Tactics on the list, but if I do, it will be S-tier with XII, XIV and VI. This game is amazing. Like, there’s a lot of shit here I find to be incredibly frustrating, but I’ve learned some patience from Dark Souls (and now I can fast forward through the dialogue, so I don’t have to sit through it a half dozen times) and I’ve found that even when I find a map to be frustrating, I know I just need to figure out the trick. The game is about optimization and problem solving, not about fighting a battle (which is cool, we’ll talk about those themes in a bit), and so the idea is to figure out the solution rather than execute combat. That’s pretty cool. Once I nail a battle I’ve been struggling with all day, there is a sweet sense of satisfaction that I don’t get in other Strategy RPGs, except maybe the first time I beat the Kraken fight in Shining Force II.

Each battle is interesting, and that’s important. Now, do I wish it was easier to grind out my characters, sure. Do I wish the battles went faster, of course. However, again, that doesn’t matter because each (canon) battle is an interesting puzzle that is important to the character’s journey. There’s nothing wasted here. Even bullshit fights where they’re just dropping summoners out of the blue on your is about teaching you the importance of Faith and Bravery. The fights where you’re out gunned and split up is about understanding how to maneuver yourself and to check that you’ve built your characters properly.

Beyond that, however, it’s not just about combat, this story is amazing. The writing in this game is so good, and it’s interesting to compare it to Tactics Ogre, and how much better it is there. How similar, too, and while it’s cool you can get a different game if you massacre the village or not, I’m actually kind of glad that there aren’t choices, because it allows for a tight, singular story with lots of character development, and I prefer that to a bunch of smaller, less developed stories. Not that Tactics Ogre’s stories are bad in any way, but they don’t match up to what’s here. This game focuses on Ramza and Delita’s journeys, and even halfway through, Ramza changing from a wide-eyed idealist to a reluctant revolutionary is great, and it parallels Delita’s journey to becoming a real piece of shit. I mean, they were drawing parallels between Delita and Argath immediately (and it was great to see him die face down in the snow). Ramza having to understand the nature of the world, and still deciding to stand against it is a great story, and great character development.

The politics, too, are very well done. They’re a bit complicated, what with the queen’s children getting assassinated and the princess being adopted by her brother (which is not ahistorical, but it’s a bit weird for a European-inspired fantasy game, but it did happen), but the conflict between Larg and Goltanna is simple enough to understand. The War of the Lions being a game to control the regency over an impressionable young king is very good, and I do think that it’s an interesting backdrop for Ramza’s story, which is about saving the world from Ultima (yeah, I know a bit of story, which is why I can’t actually remember how far I got before). I do kind of understand how it got a weird translation back in 1997, though, because this shit is complicated.

Thematically, the game is very well done. It’s a story about how nobles abuse their position, and how those with power need to swim against the current to make a better world, even if it brands you heretic or outlaw. It’s a very anti-authoritarian kind of game, and very Final Fantasy. I think that’s why it does a better job at the similar things Tactics Ogre does, because it has a stronger, direct thematic tie. It knows what it wants to say. Ramza isn’t going to massacre any villagers, after all. Hell, Denim really shouldn’t, either, but whatever, that’s the choice in Tactics Ogre. Either way, this game is very strong about it’s themes, as it comes to even the canon fights. The reason you’re always outgunned and on the run, the reason why each fight is more about solving the puzzle than fighting, is because first, Ramza is against the world. That’s not easy, and it shouldn’t be. Second, though, it’s because war isn’t good. Sure, Ramza’s company is mostly a commando unit who avoids real battles (although I did besiege a castle today, but it was more D&D than anything else, since I broke in during the dead of night, then killed a demon), but it’s still a game of death. Ramza is a good person, and while being a knight is about protecting people, it’s also about killing people. These fights aren’t about executing combat, but a plan, because the game is about how people who use violence to overcome everything begin to use it for everything. Violence corrupts them and it becomes their only answer. The opening to Chapter 3 spells this out, with Orlandeau straight up saying “everything is shit, we have refugees all over the kingdom and we have no money and hundreds of thousands have died, we need to negotiate for peace” and Goltanna is like “mother fucker, we ain’t stopping, there is no peace.” Ramza wins because he’s smart.

After all, Gaffgarion was right, I couldn’t beat him in a fight. So I had a black mage fry him.