A couple of weeks ago, I bought a PSP off of a co-worker when he told me he was going to purchase a newer one but in silver. Once I had bought it from him, I promptly purchased Dissidia and Duodecim as soon as I had the chance to. After I had finished some grueling schoolwork, I delved into the first Dissidia before I leaping into the second one. (Which I'm currently playing.)

When I first heard about Dissidia, I wasn't too sure how Square was going to translate Final Fantasy into a fighting game. They have put FF characters in a fighting game (Ergehiz) but that was more of the typical fighting mechanics seen in most anime fighting games (Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, etc.) you see today. Much to my surprise, I'm very impressed with what they created.

Dissidia's game mechanics are deep and it's what you would expect in a typical Final Fantasy game. You equip weapons, armor, accessories, and summons; gain experience, and learn new abilities as you level up. The way this translates in a battle effects how quickly and effectively you can defeat your opponents, even if they are a higher level than you. One of the fighting mechanics that intrigues me the most is the bravery meter. This meter increases the more you land bravery attacks so when you use an hp attack (to actually lower the opponents' hp) it does damage according to the amount of bravery that was accumulated. This offers variety than your typical fighting game where all you do is mash buttons to lower an opponent's health bar. Square Enix, I tip my hat to you.

The story, on the other hand, isn't really all that special. It's interesting seeing familiar characters interacting with each other but that's about it. Dissidia's story is bland as bland can get. Within each character's story, some sort of personal conflict is verbalized as they are trying to find their crystal. They resolve what's eating them, fight the main villain of the game they came from, and group up when said crystal is found. Rinse and repeat to the next character until everyone finds his or her crystal before going on to fight Chaos, the main villain in this game. There is a plot twist; however, it's a copy and paste from one of the Final Fantasy games. Again, nothing special. To quote from another review of this game, it's pretty much pure fan fiction.

Each story section is divided up in a world map that, to me, resembles the over-world map in Super Mario Bros 3. You move on squares, defeat a level/enemy in order to move on, collect items along the way and defeat a boss at the end; though in some world maps of Dissidia a boss may not be at the end, then possibly view a cut scene. This pretty much makes up the entire story mode.

Next up are the voice actors. I have to admit, some grade "A" acting was produced here, especially Dave Wittenburg's Kefka. After witnessing his performance, I really want a remake of FF6 and not in the FF4 bigheaded, little body type, a full PS3 game with 13's graphics. The others take some getting used to but mold in their roles quite exceptionally, except with Clouds' and Sephiroths'. I still can't get over the fact that the same guy who does Superman is also voicing Sephiroth, that and the fact that Cloud has to pause in between almost every sentence. It completely dumbfounds me they had the voice actor do that.

I found the game to be incredibly difficult at times, especially when you get to the boss of each map. They usually are a couple of levels higher than you and make you work for that victory. In some maps in each characters story, there is an optional enemy to encounter that is usually well equipped and 10+ levels higher than you. It is possible to defeat them but not really necessary unless you really want to grab every treasure chest that is on the map. The most difficult part, in my opinion, was the final boss encounter with Chaos. Why the heck did Square have to make him so damn hard!? Ungaahh! What I didn't understand is why I had to fight him 3x in succession, especially if you beat him twice and then get defeated, you would have to refight him again those 3 times. Square, was that really necessary to do?

Getting equipment/accessories for your characters is quite easy to do as you pretty much receive stuff just by defeating enemies in the game. Honesty, I'm not sure how exactly it works but whenever a chocobo "sings" after each battle there is a good chance that you gained some item. Usually it's something that can be used in order to exchange for something for a better equipment or accessory. I find that chocobo to be annoying at times. I end up talking to the screen saying, "Go away. You're bothering me." Oh well, at least it's useful for getting you items that boost the experience gained after each battle so it's not as bothersome as I think.

Another feature added was accomplishments. This is pretty much the flea market version of achievements on Xbox and trophies on PS3. Though you they work the same gaining them, the accomplishments are useful as they reward you with items/accessories when you gain them instead of a adding to a non-important score. The only crappy part of them is that most are hidden so you have no idea how to earn them until a message pops up when you go to the menu screen.

Well, that's Dissidia in a nut shell. The only people I can see playing this is anyone that has played more than one Final Fantasy game before. I highly doubt someone who either plays Street Fighter or Call of Duty will shine to this game. Despite it being a fighting game, it is a quite lengthy game, as a matter of fact; I wouldn't be surprised that this has the longest play time completing the story mode alone. Though I would say Super Smash Bros Brawl story/adventure mode was a bit long, along with any number in the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja series, Dissidia launches it clear out of the water.