This game far surpased my expectations! Addicting!
This paragraph is about the ups.The first thing i'll mention is the graphics.The graphics for the ps2 are very good and not pixelated at ALL.The surroundings are great even in the places you can't go, like foliage.it's not ps3 level obviously, but extremely good for ps2.Next is customization.There is a new abbilities area called the license board which is very cool and VERY customizable.This alone is a good reason to buy this game.There are hundreds of tiles and each one is called a license.Every time you kill a monster you get 1 license point.once you get enough, you can unlock a license which unlocks certain abilities, items, magick, weapons, and armour, but you still have to buy the unlocked item.Its complicated at first, but not for long.The story is great too.I won't tell you to much but it's not your ordinary "overthrough the empire" deal, its very interesting, and will make you wish it was longer, but its definitely long.( 40-50 hours depending, and around 300 if you get 100% status )The cool thing is is that when you play this game for an hour, you feel like it was 20 min.The gameplay is epic 'cause its free scape, which means no random battles or turn base gameplay.You walk around ( so do the monsters )in a HUGE world that would take hours to cross by foot.Thankfully you can borrow chocobos to ride that quicken travel a lot.Plus, you don't travel for more than 7 minutes at a time, usually less.
Customization is pretty good in this game.You can't change the characters looks, but you can customize abbilities, equipment, weapons, items and more.Another plus is the hundreds of weapons available.There are many different types of weapons like bows, swords, greatswords, handbombs, maces, staves, rods, daggers, ninja swords, katanas, measures, and many more.
Now there are more good stuff in game but aren't very influencing in buying the game, like awesome ckaracters.The downs are few but must be mentioned.Grinding is somewhat nescesary if you run from monsters a lot.But you can beat the game at level 50.Grinding can be actually fun for quite a while.I grinded for 5 hours and its still exillarating to level or get gil by the 5 digits.Another thing to know is that you can switch characters, and you will probably have to considering the main character is kind of lame while fighting, which is fine, just use balsch.But during story the main character is fine.
And thats about it.I give it a ten because the downfalls are minimal, and are as insignificant as downfalls can get.