FF7 vs. FF10

[Manhattan Sports Club]

I know there are a lot of people who argue that FF7 is overrated, but what about FF10? I finally got the opportunity to start playing this game earlier this year and enjoy the mechanics, but I can't say I'm too fond of the story and characters. Since I don't take most RPGs too seriously to begin with, this game is no worse than most other melodramatic RPGs, FF entries included. But I am wondering if some would go as far as saying this game is better than FF7. I read that FF10 was voted #1 (above FF7) in Famitsu's top 100 games of all time list, which was dedicated almost entirely to RPGs. So, I'm looking for opinions from RPG buffs on this.

[Zthun]

I know there are a lot of people who argue that FF7 is overrated, but what about FF10? I finally got the opportunity to start playing this game earlier this year and enjoy the mechanics, but I can't say I'm too fond of the story and characters. Since I don't take most RPGs too seriously to begin with, this game is no worse than most other melodramatic RPGs, FF entries included. But I am wondering if some would go as far as saying this game is better than FF7. I read that FF10 was voted #1 (above FF7) in Famitsu's top 100 games of all time list, which was dedicated almost entirely to RPGs. So, I'm looking for opinions from RPG buffs on this.

That's funny, I'm the opposite. I liked the story of FFX, but I cannot stand the mechanics of the game. Having to micro manage everything and not being able to easily return to previous areas until the end of the game killed it for me.

The balance on that game is majorly f***ed up as well. In the earlier portion of the game it has monsters way beyond the power level that you can really handle, but by the end of the game, you can have spell casters almost one shot the last boss with 2x 100K hit Ultimas. Break damage limit was...well...broken, and should have never been put into the game.

I personally loved FF7's materia system for battles. I wasn't as fond of the story or characters (minus a few), but I do consider FF7 to be a lot more fun than FFX.

[kupomogli]

I'll reply later in detail, but I thought Final Fantasy 10 was garbage.

[Tanooki]

If that's not a rumor from Famitsu having played both deeply but finishing neither to be up front about it I'd put 10 well over 7 too. FF7 is grossly overrated but I understand why too. So many cut their teeth on it as their first console and their first RPG and Sony really lured Square away from Nintendo in full force not just internally with licensing deals and so on and being with a disc, but they ran a full blown long run ad campaign for it touting it up as the game you must own if you consider yourself a game player at all. They ran it up the flag pole so far they basically talked shit about the previous 6 titles as relics and of the past in their tone of things. Far more people were lured into 7 than 10.

By the time 10 finally popped up on the PS2 years later it was just fan service, it wasn't some huge ad blitz all over and something that had to be sold by Sony to feed Square's wallet and Square has always been one then to run some ads but not ever go nuts over it. FF7 got a free pass on so much from the blocky graphics, poor story, and other weirdness involved but it did have some good redeeming qualities that made it middle out as a nice average RPG. FF10 was divisive but the story (despite some boyband looking dork in Tidus) was solid and the set pieces were great, yet as noted you did have the more linear approach. The game also was a tipping point where they took the strategy out of the boss fights of the franchise, just late in the game like the big golem where you needed to use specific sphere system learned skills or it would just fubar the crap out of you (and if you used a faq or bought their guide, it was a cakewalk as was the final boss.)

I think FF10 was the better game as it just had for me a better system (I liked the sphere system), better characters, better story (barely), and just felt more engaging. Personally I put 13 above both and I know that's even more divisive, and over anything the PS family has had I like 9 best.

[LaughingMAN.S9]

The mechanics in final fantasy 7 are the only things that don't hold up as well today, but apart from that I still maintain it is the best final fantasy in terms of story, setting, music and characters.

No game in the final fantasy series is perfect (except for tactics, fuck you! Lol) but 10 is simultaneously both the last true final fantasy and also vanguard and harbinger of its inevitable downfall as a series. It's the first to start the no backtracking, linear story progression all the way until just before the last battle bullshit. Generally I didn't like the characters at all minus auron but after playing ffx hd remake waka is starting to warm up on me. Same with yuna.

It also was the first to introduce full voice work so now im forced to listen to the whiny prattling of the effeminate protagonist and their bubbly voiced 16-19 year old blue eyed, blonde haired japanese companions all game. Towns are too small to really explore but at least they have towns unlike ff13.

I could be wrong on this 1 but I think sidequests were either non existent in ff10 or severely limited. Admittedly o don't remember since I haven't played ffx since 2006 and I'm still early in ffx remake on PS3 so I haven't come across any yet.


On the other hand ff7 had none of these problems really and the only knock I have against it is the 4 hour long, unskippable summon animations and a snowboarding minigame that doesn't hold up to how I remembered it

[Manhattan Sports Club]

Now you've got me doubting whether I should keep playing. I had no idea FF10 would remain that linear. I was hoping for more. :\ I'm only about 13 hours in so far and have gotten up to that stupid field you explore shortly after that shenanigan with the Aurochs vs. Goers scene. Spent a lot of time grinding there.

[Gameguy]

Watch Spoony's review for Final Fantasy X. I have a couple copies of the game but I won't bother playing them.

[ZeroCool]

7 is much better than 10. I couldnt stand the characters in 10. The story and setting in 7 were much more interesting. XIII is honestly more interesting than 10 and it was pretty much hated.

[o.pwuaioc]

I'd take 6 or below over 7 and up. 9 is the one beacon of light in a pile of shit.

[kupomogli]

Alright, so I mentioned above Final Fantasy 10 is garbage, and it's not just in one or two aspects, it's pretty much everything. Although comparatively, Final Fantasy 10-2, other than having an awful storyline, is a much better game, and I'll explain why I think that as well.

I'll start with the storyline. It doesn't really seem awful at first, but it's never really that great and then about four hours in it really kicks you in the teeth. So it starts off where Zanarkand is attacked by Sin, Tidus is all alone, gets captured, gets attacked by Sin again, washes on the beach and meets Wakka and the gang. Now up to this point the storyline isn't so bad and all of the characters except Kimahri are likeable. Yes, I actually liked Wakka unlike everyone else on the planet it seems, and Lulu as well, if for nothing else but that eye candy. Once you reach Luca and you have the blitzball tournament the storyline just goes downhill, and it's not like you couldn't see it coming, it's just that's where it stopped being good and went to crap.

When you first met Yuna they already explained that she was on the pilgrimage to go pray at each of the temples, and they had to stop by Luca. Up to that point, the characters had some life to them. Sure Tidus was using the excuse about getting too close to Sin so he lost his memory 947 times and it seemed like a very poorly done running gag all the way to midway into the game, but the characters were more lively and you got to know about them As soon as it hit the point where they finished the tournament, Wakka was no long the upbeat character praising blitzball and his team and the story moved from being about the characters to being about the pilgrimage.

The pilgrimage, basically a way to say you're going from point a to b to c to do to e. Not only was the storyline a one way street until a ridiculously stupid plot twist late game but Final Fantasy 10 is one long hallway with small branching points every so often. The gameplay on Final Fantasy 13 sucked ass, but the majority of people bashing the game always used the excuse of it being one long hallway. What about Final Fantasy 10 you hypocrites? The only difference in Final Fantasy 10 and Final Fantasy 13 is there were towns, but in Final Fantasy 10, the towns were worthless ventures outside of hiring people to join your blitzball team.

Now for the not so amazing gameplay. The short version is the gameplay is monotonous and boring as every battle you do nothing but change characters, attack, change characters, attack, change characters, attack, repeat. So you have Tidus, Wakka, Auron, Rikku, Kimahri, Yuna, and Lulu. When combat starts there are three enemy types that will appear on screen and to efficiently kill them, you'll use the correct character. Tidus is average in all stats, so he's fast enough to hit any medium sized enemy and powerful enough to one shot them. Wakka is slightly weaker but has high accuracy and is able to hit anything, taking out the faster but weaker flying enemies in one hit while even Tidus has trouble hitting them. Auron is a heavy damage dealer. Don't bother attacking medium or fast characters with him as he'll probably miss both. He's pretty much there to take 10-20 times the damage off high HP monsters than any other character. Lulu casts elemental spells, usually killing them in two hits at first, but after about five hours you'll start killing them in a single hit. Rikku can steal from machines, dismantling them Kimahri is pretty much Tidus with slightly higher attack and slightly lower hit percentage but since he can't swim, he's pretty much a pointless character outside of following either Tidus/Auron's or Wakka/Auron's grid to help with either good or bad status effects because his larger pool of MP. Not worth sending him Yuna and Lulu's route since his magic sucks.

Now if you play through the games gameplay efficiently, fast, medium, and elemental enemies will be killed in a single hit by the character they're weak against. Early in the game, weapons with the petrify skill are given away like candy whether it's from chests, enemy drops, etc, and the large enemies have no resistances, so even those enemies can be killed in a couple of attacks. Why am I explaining this? Well, up above I failed to mention Yuna, the character who's completely worthless outside of support. She's good for boss battles mostly, but in regular combat there's really no use. The thing is, Final Fantasy 10 doesn't divvy the experience unless the party has participated in combat. No, not just switching the character out then switching them back. They have to atleast take an action. With only three enemies to take action against you have four characters that get no exp. Yuna especially will get no exp because if you play efficiently, the only time you'll heal is outside of combat. So in order to keep everyone similarly leveled without having to grind, you need to take out the first two enemies, defend with every character while attacking with the last character to kill the last enemy. There's no reason this game should have forced you to go through some bs work around when every character could have and should have received exp from the get go.

The sphere grid. Yet another feature brought over from Final Fantasy 10 to Final Fantasy 13, praised on one game, panned on the other. The sphere grid allowing any sort of meaningful customization is some bogus crap that fanboys of the game like to throw around. In all reality, the sphere grid sets each character on a single path and only when you reach the end of that path can you really branch off and create a group of overpowered characters. You can branch off earlier than that, but you'll destroy the character build and make the game harder, not easier. Once Tidus changes paths and loses his medium attack bonus and medium accuracy bonus, he may either no longer hit or one shot medium speed enemies. If Wakka changes paths and loses the accuracy boost that he receives on his path he'll start missing flying enemies. You can add this concept to every other character. By going off the set path a few levels to get some useless skill another character probably already has access to, you're already screwing up your characters build.

The other problem with the sphere grid is having to even go to the sphere grid at all. Even if you wait a few levels before going to the sphere grid, you have to move your characters current location one or two spots, then make sure to use the stat spheres or ability spheres to level up that stat or gain a new ability. Then you have to do this for each and every character, that's even if you have the spheres to actually level up, and if not you have to grind for those as well. In order to keep it from being a waste of time, they should have made everything preset from the start then unlocked the ability to change paths once you reached the end of the characters specific path.

At the end you get the airship, now you can do crap like dodge 200 lightning bolts, win a chocobo race with a time of 0.00 seconds, find a literally invisible treasure chest, etc, all to get the most powerful equipment in the game.

Final Fantasy 10 is garbage.

---

Final Fantasy 10-2 on the other hand is a great game. The only real fault that this game has is the terrible storyline. Some of the quests are crappy as well, the developers trying to push different styles of gameplay into the game.

With Final Fantasy 10-2, you start with the airship and like Final Fantasy 10, you can go to any save point to go back to it. No longer are you restricted from point A to B until the very end of the game, you can pick any destination you want from the start. The game features a quest system so you can go to any of the available locations that have a quest notification and it'll let you know which quest is the main quest.

Equipment on Final Fantasy 10-2 is no longer weapons with a small stat or ability modifier and the obligation to upgrade on your own, which is one aspect of Final Fantasy 10 that wasn't so bad in terms of gameplay balance, more so an issue because equipment had little value. In Final Fantasy 10-2 you gain a long list of accessories. Think Final Fantasy 6 and how many different combinations of accessories there were and it's pretty much the same.

You only have three characters this time around; Yuna, Paine, and Rikku. The characters don't have any preset classes though, but rather a gameplay system that's similar to, but a lot deeper than Final Fantasy 5. You have a job system called the dress sphere system and outside of combat the skill list for that job system is sort of an inverse Final Fantasy Tactics skill system. Where in Final Fantasy Tactics, you gained points through combat and then put those points into learning skills, on Final Fantasy 10-2 you choose a skill and as you battle you'll gain points and will eventually learn that skill mid combat. The game will automatically change to a different skill once the one you chose has been learned so you continue to gain points towards that class.

You'll acquire a set of sphere grids in the game that are small grids that allow you to preset with dress spheres that you plan to use for that character. When you get into combat, say you're a gunner, thief, and a warrior, you can bring up each sphere grid in combat and change the characters dress sphere mid combat. In a way the changing dress spheres is similar to changing characters, but combat this time around isn't switch to the correct character and attack. Like most RPGs, the game goes back to the basics where the only weaknesses enemies may have are elemental skills, blue mage skills, and status effects, not a specific class attack. You just now have many different ways to combat the enemies.

By making the airship a central hub for different side quests, having amazing gameplay, and then just filling it with a ton of content, they turned a game world that was originally absolute garbage into a great game.

[kupomogli]

As for FF7, it's a great game. A lot of the earlier games and FF9 are better, but Final Fantasy 7 is good in its own right. Even though you're severely limited at the time, the storyline during your time spent in Midgar is the best imo. After you leave Midgar the storyline does get worse as it's more of a chase Sephiroth to the end of the game, but the storyline is atleast decent from there to the end and the gameplay is entertaining if a bit easy.

I really want to like Final Fantasy 12, as the storyline is great, the world is amazing, etc, but the battle system is what's holding me back from enjoying it. I'll eventually give it another chance. It's the only game in my collection that I have both a love/hate relationship for.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

Would you say that Dragon Quest VIII is a better Square-Enix offering than most of the Final Fantasies on the system? From what I've played of it, that seems to be my impression so far.

[Rickstilwell1]

I'm actually playing Final Fantasy 7 right now, for the first time without cheats. It is pretty addictive and easier to level up than I remember. Probably now that I understand the spell functions from previous games in the series better, I can't see why I even felt the need to cheat last time.

My only big gripe about Final Fantasy 7 now is the control within dungeons. You are on land that allows 3D movement but you are stuck to the D-Pad because the game was released before the analog controller existed. Sometimes there are areas that appear slanted where pressing up will make you walk diagonally up-left or up-right or some variation of the example. It can get disorienting at times having to switch between going for diagonals or straight directions. I know on a PS3, a USB Logitech controller can bypass the problem by allowing you to press the analog button which assigns the d-pad functions to the left stick and that was useful on Diablo which had similar problems of almost always needing to use diagonals with no analog support. Playing on a PSP probably also solves the issue. I just haven't tried either of these two methods as I normally like to stick with the original console my first time through a game.

Other than that the music, some of the artwork and some of the characters are very likeable.

10 I can't speak on because I haven't played it much, but once they started adding voice acting to a lot of the JRPGs it started taking away an aspect of the imagination you could have with the various tones of speech. I Imagine Barrett yelling at everything would get kind of annoying after a while, especially if he had a crappy voice actor. And what if they gave Aeris, Tifa or Yuffie a squeaky high pitched voice that pinched your hearing nerves every time you heard it. That's another place they have gone wrong in some newer games. Just look at Sonic games... There are some aspects that classics like these will never have to suffer unless a remake is done poorly. In most cases the remakes are still good.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

I second that the voices of FF10 detract greatly from the experience. Terrible. But they had to compete with modern games and just wanted to impress people with a multimedia experience.

I liked FF7 but it didn't strike me as being the be-all-end-all PlayStation RPG that most (casual) gamers tout it as. I just took it with a grain of salt and enjoyed it.

I would say I have to agree with fans who say that FF6 succeeded at delivering the most masterful execution of a more 'serious' storyline. All without voice actors, to boot. I can't take it as seriously today as I did when I was young and thought it was high-literature, but it's the only 'serious' FF that didn't strike me as being 'whiney'. I believe if they had added the cheesy voice actors to it, that it would have certainly killed the experience for sure.

I have no interest in playing any of the post-FF10 entries unless it's a remake or re-release of the older ones.

[Rickstilwell1]

I won't go as far as not playing them. The post 10 games are just so much different than 1-10 are because of the changes in the way battles are fought. You have to look at them as individual games rather than entries in the popular franchise. Final Fantasy XIII-2 I've beaten and as an adventure it was pretty interesting to me. It has some recurring enemy types and Chocobos, but other than that I didn't really look at it as a typical Final Fantasy game.

[kupomogli]

I have no interest in playing any of the post-FF10 entries unless it's a remake or re-release of the older ones.

Most video games are going to have a crappy story, so if you're interested in great gameplay I'd recommend 10-2.

If you want a great story, great voice acting, beautifully well crafted world, and maybe you might be able to get past the gameplay. So far I haven't so I've never completed the game, then play FF12. The voice acting is extremely well done and for what I've played the storyline was great. I just wasn't able to get past the flaws that I found in the gameplay. I'm going to give it another chance eventually.

[LaughingMAN.S9]

Most video games are going to have a crappy story, so if you're interested in great gameplay I'd recommend 10-2.

If you want a great story, great voice acting, beautifully well crafted world, and maybe you might be able to get past the gameplay. So far I haven't so I've never completed the game, then play FF12. The voice acting is extremely well done and for what I've played the storyline was great. I just wasn't able to get past the flaws that I found in the gameplay. I'm going to give it another chance eventually.

Lol you and me are total opposites on this one, I actually feel the gameplay and combat were great in ff12 and I loved the setting but thought the story was meh at best. I also didn't finish it, but I did sink 40 hours into it before I lost the motivation to continue because it suddenly dawned on me that I didn't really know wtf was going on and I had stopped caring 10 hours before. Also wanted to add that every single fucking character in that game that wasn't balthier and Fran, maybe even that little prince were terrible, the absolute worse. Vaan is easily the most forgettable main character in the series, from what I remember it never even felt like he was in any way important to the story, he was just there taking up space

[ZeroCool]

I also didnt bother with a Strategy guide or walkthrough with FF7. I missed out on so many things and side quests. It literally took me almost an hour to beat Sephiroth. How that battle lasted that long is beyond me. I guess I didn't grind enough. FF9 on the other hand I remember grinding the hell out of the game that the last boss was a cake walk.