I picked up a PS4 with Final Fantasy 15 and got Rainbow Six Siege for free.
I managed to plat Final Fantasy 15, took around 80 hours not counting times when I was charging the controller. I wrote a series of blogs on my thoughts about FF15, here they are:-
And so , it begins...
Finally I begin my Final Fantasy 15 journey.
I'm up to chapter 3. Without giving much away, the story has been interesting so far, it goes for a Final Fantasy 12 style of presentation, where it keeps the cutscenes short and lets you figure out much of the story for youself. It's world setting is interesting, with a wilderness influence by the Southern United States, but the world also has monarchies, and nice seaside resorts.
The battle system, it reminds me of the Ys style battle system, where it's fast and real time, and it's fluid. The party members do stupid things though, such as engaging enemies when I want to activate a quest that's nearby. The open world is to my liking, driving makes it quick to get around, but you can and will need to go onfoot when you travel off the roads.
As for the characters, Ignis has a likable personality, where as Noctis' personality doesn't really appeal to me, but he has an interesting past. And something going on with a girl he's meant to marry, and whom he knew when he was a kid and still has vivid memories about it.
It's been fun so far.,but I don't like the way the levelling system is done( so far) and silly little things like bad camera angles and stupid party members.
Up to chapter 5 in FF15.
I don't know how I feel about the combat, at times it feels fast and fun, but at other times, it feels a bit messy and battles drag on a bit too long. I've played lots of action RPGs before and loved the combat in them, such as Ys, The Last Story, Tales of etc. , but the action combat in those games felt cleaner and the battles didn't drag on too long. It feels as if FF15 tries to force you to use teammate abilities, warp strikes and QTE in just about every battle to make the battle system feel like it has depth, but it doesn't equate to fun.
The world looks amazing, and has much detail, but most NPCs cannot talk to you, and it's disappointing since I enjoyed hearing the things NPCs said in the older FF games, and even though the game's world has many people, Shenmue has countless NPCs walking around everywhere whom have something unique or interesting to tell you, plus SE worked on FF15 for 10 years, and said they wanted to create a realistic world, but didn't add simple little things that make RPGs more fun to play.
Also, it's hard to take some things about the world and story seriously, such as the characters are afraid to drive around at night because demons (powerful enemies) come out at night, yet the diners and restaurants are full of people at night? And there's a mission where you need to rescue your car that's been impounded in a military base, yet there's many cars driving past on roads, so they couldn't steal a car? Morality shouldn't be an issue since the world is at war, and the party members kill lots of enemies, yet they won't steal a car in order to save the world?
The story does have some emotional moments and it seems a heart warming romance could be building, but I must say even though I like this game, it doesn't feel like Final Fantasy, it feels like an action game. Especially since you don't encounter enemies very often , much of the gameplay appeal comes from doing sidequests such as taking photos or fetch quests.
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Up to chapter 8 now (roughly half way through), after 22 hours of playing time, and my characters are arond level 36. Sometimes it feels like a Metal Gear Solid game, because it wants you to use stealth, and turrets found around bases are more effective against mechs than melee weapons.
I agree with people who say they can see influences from The Last Story's battle system in FF15,because The Last story applied stealth mechanics years ago, as well as having fluid battle mechanics, allowing you to give commands to your party members mid-battle in real time, and allowing you to roll away from enemy attakcs.
I spend much of my play time driving around and taking pictures for side quests. There is nice scenery to see, and I like exploring the open world, such as being able to trek to places which are away off the main path, and walk along side a river or through the desert or forests or up mountains. The environments have much detail, i like how when I walked along side a river, I saw lots of fine little details such as pebbles and intricate rock layouts.
I must say, even though I like the story because it's emotional and interesting at times, the story does feel rushed in some parts, because certain characters go from being an enemy to a friend very quickly without much explantion why, and some chapters are very short, and I still remember a nonsensical main story quest where your goal is to retrieve your car from a heavily guarded military base even though there's many other cars being driven around that you could use.
Now up to chapter 12 in F15. I can see why people say some of the chapters feel very rushed, because you can plow through them very quickly, plus some of them just involve walking through linear passageways.
During chapter 8, I was level 36, hence I thought I would easily be over level 70 by the end, because the game has 14 chapters , so I made the assumption I was half way through, but I didn't know the chapters near the end of the game would be so short, and they take your characters far away from the city to linear environments, so you can't pace your journey by doing some exploration or sidequests.
The story has had some very emotional moments, but it has pacing issues, and I've already mentioned how the characters behave in nonsensical ways and get themselves in trouble, such as when they entered a heavily guarded military base just to retrieve their car, well another such incident occured when Noctis demanded the leader of some nation allow him to speak to Luna(the woman he wanted to marry).and I won't go into detail because it would be a spoiler, but the way Noctis, a future king, does negotiation very poorly, especially when he's trying to secure the safety of the woman he loves just gives me a headache.
In essence, even though Noctis is supposed to be a future King, he is very quiet and passive , to the point I think it goes overboard. Many people said they don't like Tidus from FFX, but Tidus showed determination to rescue Yuna on a few occasions, even if it meant doing dangerous and daring things, and Tidus tried hard to find a way to get Yuna out of having to sacrifice herself.
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I beat Final Fantasy 15. People weren't kidding when they said the 2nd half of the game is very short. The 2nd half of the game goes from being an open world RPG to an linear action game.
The story went in all sorts of weird directions near the end, I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but I'll say it goes from being about a world at war to a story that feels a little bit like Dragon Age (no, really), and with a bit of the Korean movie Snowpiercer (literally). Then, it took another twist , and I can't say what happens, but it kinda makes for a happy and emotional ending.
It's kinda like I have a love/hate relationship with this game, it's great and annoying in many different ways, I don't even know what score I can give it.
Next, I'll try to platinum it, but the lack of quest variety will make it feel like a grind. I think Square Enix should take a lesson from CD Projeckt Red and Bethesda when it comes to open world, by either making the sidequests have some sort of impact on the world, or make them have an interesting story behind them.
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I'm closing in on the plat for FF15. The only trophies left that involve actually fighting enemies are defeating adamantoise, costlemark tower and unlocking 50 ability nodes. I managed to do 80 side quests, and it was so tedious, such boring side quests, like I said before, Square Enix needs to take a look at how Witcher 3 and Skyrim do side quests and give them some interesting story .
I beat Ifirit on normal difficulty, and I was worried at first because I kept dying so many times, even after I beat the game, but after getting the royal shield and grinding up some upgrades to greatly increase HP, armor and spirit, he was quite easy to beat.
An obstacle that could get in my way are FF15's trophy glitches, such as one that doesn't give you the trophy for unlocking 50 ability nodes (hence people are recommended to save when you unlock 49 nodes, and redo the 50th one if you experience the glitch). There is a glitch where sometime after doing 80 side quests you don't get a trophy, and it would be really frustrating since it took me so long to do those very boring side quests. Luckily I dodged that glitch, but some people didn.t
And there's even a glitch in costlemark tower, that prevents you progressing further in it.
I've read the ruby light doesn't revivie Noctis in the battle with adamantose, but I've read it's not a hard battle, but it's just a long battle, unless you do certain side quests which I don't wanna do since I'm sick of side quests.
The non-battle related trophies I still need are for fishing, cooking and walking. Yes. I need to do a LOT of fishing still... I've nearly got the trophies for cooking and walking, but it's kinda annoying that after I've cooked many different meals hundreds of times and have been exploring the world (often on foot) for over 50 hours, yet I still need make gladiolus walk even more.
I managed to get the royal weapon from costlemark tower, even on easy the battles lasted a long time because it makes you fight numerous heavily armored enemies at once,and since you have little control over your party, they do stupid things and get themselves killed.
I managed to defeat Adamatoise, it took over 3 hours, because I didn't know the ring I had could do so much damage, the guides mentioned a ring that could kill him quickly, but I was sure the ring in the guide had a different name to the ring in my inventory. I spent the first 2 hours and 40 minutes bringing the health of adamantoise down below 50% , but his attacks became faster and more powerful to the extent he kept instant KOing me when I got near him, thus I used up nearly all of my revival items. Then I decided to stand a far distance from him and shot him with the ring I had and it depleted the other 50% of his health in less than 20 minutes, and luckily I had lots of items that could restore my MP.
All that is left is trophies for unlocking 50 nodes and some silly fishing,cooking and walking trophies. If the 50 nodes trophy doesn't glitch, then I'm guaranteed the platinum. I think I will load a much earlier save when I didn't spend my AP on expensive upgrades and will just unlock lots of cheap upgrades to unlock the 50 required.
Even though I've beaten the story, done all the optional dungeons and bosses, the game says I haven't made Gladiolus walk enough... Same goes for me cooking hundreds of meals but I still haven't cooked enough. I'm nearly done with those trophies though, it's just their requirements are silly. The fishing trophy will be a bore, because I have much fishing to do before I earn that trophy.
P.S Damn FF15 is glitchy as hell. When I fought adamantoise, Noctis got stuck against adamantoise, and it caused me to get KOed twice because I couldn't run away from him. Also, sometimes I couldn't see where adamantoise was because it made him invisible, but it wasn't some sort of invisibility ability from adamantoise, it was just another glitch, this happened when I got close to him. I couldn't see him and had to guess where to strike my weapon. And the camera is terrible often Noctis would face the wrong way, not just in the battle against adamantoise, but against many enemies. It was just more annoying against adamantoise because the battle lasted so long, and I didn't want to have to redo hours worth of work because of glitches.
I finally platinumed FF15. After 86 hours of game time, minus 6 hours or so when I was charging my controller , and one dungeon I spent hours in for a sidequest before I gave up on it.
It's my first PS4 plat, for the first PS4 game I've played Also, it's the 4th Final Fantasy game I've platinumed, along with Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy 13 and 13-2.
There's still lots more side quests in FF15 that I haven't done (although I've done over 100 of them already if I count the hunts). I'm hoping to play some of the DLCs to learn more about the story, and to get more trophies, since even though I've platinumed the game, I have only 50% trophy completion for it.
I must say, Final Fantasy X was so much more fun to plat, not just because it's my favorite game, but because Blitzball is so much fun, and it even has league and knockout tournaments.
http://harambeshidaway.freeforums.net/ We've created this forum to be like the old Gamespot. I hope Travisstags,Danwarecritic and other people still remember me and MeganDia.
Before the mass exodus on Gamespot,I used to do an annual game of the year award blog,where I'd mention my overall favorite game,plus my favorite game from each genre.Anyways,I thought I'd catch up a bit,and I'm only going to count games that I've played.
2016
The Eden of Grisaia
I'm going to cheat with this award,because the localized version of this game came out early in 2017,but it won't stand a chance against Persona 5,and since I didn't play many other titles in 2016,I thought I'd count this as being close enough to a 2016 game.
The grisaia series is about troubled people,who are sent to an academy,that's really a prison,so they can get educated,and put on the right path.Skip forward to the 4th game in the series,the main character(Yuuji) is suspected of terrorism,but at the same time,you see how him and Yumiko have created a romance,and want to live a relaxing life together. It's hard to talk about the plot without giving away spoilers,but I love this game because of the artwork and peaceful feeling it gives.Here is an example
Honorable mentions No Man's Sky and World of Final Fantasy.Incase you're wondering,I don't own a PS4,hence I haven't played Uncharted 4.
2015
Witcher 3
Memorable quests/characters,romance,and a huge world to explore make this game my favorite game from 2015.I like how you see the world affected by the decisions you make.It's combat is fluid and requires various strategies with various weapons on the harder difficulties.You can spend 100 hours exploring it's world and discovering many interesting stories within it's world.
Honorable mentions Metal Gear Solid 5 and Life is Strange,
2014
Ar Nosurge
A creative and unique story,in which 2 pairs of characters begin on separate adventures,so you will see 2 separate stories viewpoints for a while,and 1 of the character pairs have a friend who is in possession of an ancient song magic that could be used to defeat aliens who have oppressed the human race,but she has gone missing.
The story has some interesting plot twists,and is quite funny,and has an adult feel,despite being anime style.The game has romance choices as well.It's combat system isn't great,but at least it's different.
Honorable mentions Akibastrip and Wolfenstein NWO.
2013
Fire Emblem Awakening
A lot of likable characters,lets you create romance and make children with your partner,and the permadeath will make the story emotional when a character dies,and can be tactically crippling for your party.The battle system has a lot of tactical depth,with many different unit types with various strengths and weaknesses,and it takes place on a grid style system.I like how the story has numerous things the characters need to deal with at once.
Honorable mentions Beyond Two Souls and Ni No Kuni.
It's been years since I've heard from quite a number of good friends I had on here. Travisstags,Danwarecritic,ShinobiNeo,GarrisonFord.Anyone else alive on here?
It's been years since me and many others left this site.
I met many great people on here during that time,but during the fast exodus,I lost touch with many of those people.
If anyone who talked to me all those years ago on here is reading this,I'm still active on these sites http://warriorclan.shivtr.com/ and http://fuser.ninja/
Just incase any of my old Gamespot friends still lurk around here and haven't added me to PSN or gone to gameinformer,I'll just give an update.Last year Ar Nosurge was my game of the year,it's story was quite captivating and creative.I'm excited about Final Fantasy Type 0 and FFXV but I still don't have a PS4.Another Tales JRPG named Tales of Zestiria is due out soon for PS3 so that's something I can play.Persona 5 isn't too far away either.Anyways bye.
I want to say Ar Nosurge was a wonderful story experience,with heartfelt romances and emotional plot twists and with sex haha.As an actual JRPG it's gameplay it's battle system is kinda similar to Ar Tonelico 2's and can be quite intense if you don't over-power your characters because you need to press the circle button at the right time during defensive phases in the battle system to protect your song magic user.It's story does a good job of explaining how the world in the Ar Tonelico series named Ar Ciel came into existence.
I also platinumed Ar Nosurge.I've also platinumed Final Fantasy X HD.
Bayonetta 2 is spectacular and one of the best action games ever and Valiant Hearts is a hidden gem and has quite a heartfelt story and lovely artstyle.
I want to review these games but I don't spend much time on Gamespot anymore.Most of my former Gamespot friends now hang out at Gameinformer.Some of my former Gamespot friends are still here but not very active.I miss the old Gamespot.Anyways that;s all for now.
It's been nearly a year since I last blogged.In the past year I've visited Gamespot occasionally,maybe once or twice a month just to check if I got messages from old friends.I loved the old Gamespot so much but this new version of Gamespot is so cold and lifeless,many people who used to get lots of blog comments on Gamespot in the past don't get blog comments anymore because nobody see's their blogs.
A lot has happened in the last year.I was living in the Philippines for a while and a lot of things happened when I was there(I won't say what).
The only reason I'm back here is because I miss the old Gamespot and I wanted to see if Gamespot had changed back but it's still the horrible new site and still very glitchy.
I did miss the fun things Gamespot offered for all those years such as the leveling up system and emblems and the way it put our latest reviews on your profile page and same goes for the ratings we give to games.
Now I hang around Gameinformer a lot,lately I got a mention on it's news about a review I did for 'To The Moon' so it didn't take long for me to get noticed there.I even copied and pasted an image of my emblems onto my gameinformer profile.But still gameinformer still isn't quite what old gamespot used to be,especially since gameinformer doesn't put our game ratings or latest reviews on our front page.
Lately as far as gaming goes I've platinumed Final Fantasy X HD and I've beaten Tales of Xillia with both Jude and Xillia.To go further back,I gave Beyond Two Souls my game of the year for 2013.
I had so many fun years on this site and with this profile since 2007,it makes me sad to post here but I thought maybe old friends will read this and who knows,maybe gamespot can go back to how it once was,many people have said if gamespot changed back to the good old gamespot they will come back,because while gameinformer is great for chatting and interacting with other people,I think the old gamespot was the best ever gamesite for allowing us to display our personal gaming scores and reviews and for allowing us to earn emblems for good game reviews as well as other things.
Anyways,that's all for now I guess,maybe I will post here again one day.Bye!
A few months ago I said I wasn't going to blog again until if and after certain problems in my personal life were fixed.Well those problems have gotten better(too complicated to explain what they are)but Gamespot deteriorated and is nothing like the site it once was.
1.I can't see which of my friends are online
2.It's hard to find my friends profiles or see their new blogs
3.I don't see the point in blogging anymore since most of my friends probably won't see my blogs and have left Gamespot.
To all the idiots who said people were ''complaining about nothing'' or ''people who were threatening to leave Gamespot were never really going to leave'' they are just as foolish as the staff who made all these changes.
It's like the changes to Gamespot discourage blogging and try to encourage people to post in forums but that takes away much of the fun of Gamespot.
I have found a new and better game site now,it's called Gameinformer and here is my profile
and many people who were very active on Gamespot for years have left Gamespot and post on there now,it's a better site because it makes it easy to find our friends profiles,see their updates,see which friends are online and we can delete comments that get posted by other users on our profiles which discourages the bad trolls from trolling our profiles and friends profiles.
I really didn't want to leave Gamespot,I was a very active user since 2007,I made lots of friends,posted over 300 reviews,rated thousands of games,became a well known user and earned emblems for good game reviews and blogs but now it's time to leave and it makes me sad by saying that.Anyone who wants to stay in touch with me,you can email me thelastangel1997@hotmail.com or add me to PSN TidusandYuna1983 but my PS3 is in another country and I won't be able to use it for a long time.
Anyways,goodbye.Well done all the Genius Gamespot staff who brought these changes and members who encouraged these changes,this site is shit now but you guys should stay here and eat your words because you guys wanted these changes.
Also, it's the 4th Final Fantasy game I've platinumed, along with Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy 13 and 13-2.
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