Final Fantasy X is a decent enough game, no reason not to play it. Story and characters are fine enough and it has one of the best turn based battle systems ever I think personally.
It is a downgrade from Final Fantasy IX, but then again so are all other Final Fantasy games.
Eh, it's not a terrible game. The story is absolute nonsense, the voice acting will make your ears bleed, and the protagonist is a completely unlikeable wanker, but the actual gameplay is fun enough with a very neat take on the combat system.
FFX is, by far, the single best combat system in any main-line Final Fantasy game to date. Its a subtle variation on the ATB system which is referred to something like "conditional turn based"; in essence this means the combat is a lot more ordered and tactical because there's a bar at the side which lists precisely in what order turns will be taken by the characters in a battle, which changes depending on spells and things like that. It also has a wonderful swap in/swap out system allowing you to freely change your party in battle. And it has controllable summons which are just glorious.
The story isn't as strong as IX, but since IX is probably the finest game in the entire series that's a hard mark to beat. I'd probably put X as second or third on my list (either just ahead of or just behind IV). With VI as fourth and V as fifth.
If you're looking to avoid the really weird ones then start avoiding as of XI. XI and XIV are MMOs, XII is an MMO in single player form, XIII is a weird hybrid of going back to the old system and doing something new which basically falls apart.
This fellow has pretty much exactly my opinion of FFX and the series as a whole, though personally I happen to prefer VI to IV and VII to V. But other than that, he's spot on. If you liked the previous games, chances are you'll like FFX as well. Give it a shot.
It does have a few quirks that get annoying, like constantly switching up the party both in and after battles (you're rewarded for putting your fastest characters at the top of the lineup before each battle, then switching to the heavy hitters once battle has joined, which means that you're bringing up the character selection menu after every single random battle, which gets quite old. It's still more efficient than leaving your slow characters at the top, though.) Random nitpicks aside, though, it's a pretty good game, and you should definitely try it.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: A story is only as good as its characters, and the Final Fantasy series since IX are shining examples of original and interesting stories being sunk by terrible characters. I could count the number of characters that I like in those games on one hand and still have fingers left over. All the rest are met with indifference at best and hatred at worst.
But...yeah. X-2 is nothing more than concentrated fanservice bored directly into your brain. Avoid it, that game is the bottom of the Final Fantasy barrel.
I though that 9 had mostly good characters for the story. Zidane, Garnet, Steiner, Vivi, Cid, and many other support characters fit really well into the plot. Freya was great until she found Sir Fratley and lost much of the character motivation behind her reason's for being there. (Fighting Kuja for helping destroy her kingdom was still there, but she felt out focus and unimportant after for 2/3 of the game.) Eiko's place is mixed for me. She was plot important as Ms. Exposition in disc two, but nixing her and some rewrites still could make the overall story work. Quina was just there for gags, to the point that most of his/her scenes after you absolutely have to recruit him/her seem like they were designed in case s/he wasn't in the party. Amarant was the only one that really didn't feel like he belong and slowed down some scenes.
I'd say it really started with VIII (or maybe even VI) having characters shoved in to pad out the party, but making the story suffer somewhat for it. IX was the one that problem mostly skipped over to start hitting hard in X and especially XII (as good of a game as 12 is).
While I agree that X-2 is Final Fantasy: the Fanservice Pack (I think Spoony was even repulsed by the hot springs scene.), it is still worth checking out for anyone who bought the FFX HD Remaster and can stand the blatant fanservice and cheesy 70's Charlie's Angles vibe the game gives off. The job system and more open ended options are fun to experiment with. Beside what has been said, the only other flaw is there are only a few new areas in the game, so you are stuck exploring FFX's linear paths for much of the game. Though, I will say that it isn't worth spending money on to get that game alone. I gave my original copy away after getting over halfway through.
The_Great_Galendo said:
It does have a few quirks that get annoying, like constantly switching up the party both in and after battles (you're rewarded for putting your fastest characters at the top of the lineup before each battle, then switching to the heavy hitters once battle has joined, which means that you're bringing up the character selection menu after every single random battle, which gets quite old. It's still more efficient than leaving your slow characters at the top, though.) Random nitpicks aside, though, it's a pretty good game, and you should definitely try it.
Except for when you encounter the same enemy formations over and over, I never really saw a benefit to doing maintaining a consistent opening party(being slightly over leveled helps). Otherwise, no encounters until very late in the game open with attacks that threaten someone with decent current HP or use abilities that put them at an advantage. All I can think of are some encounters in the bonus dungeon where having a character with a "First Strike" weapon in the top three is almost mandatory, like the Great Malboros who will open every battle with bad breath.
There is a quirk I do fall prey to very often, though. Since experience/AP isn't divided up between the participants of a battle, the number awarded to each party member is the same for a given battle whether there was just one person taking action, or all seven. That means that you get the most AP possible by having every character do something in a fight, even if its just blocking and switching them out for more useful party members afterwards. It's faster and easier than concentrating on one group for several fights and switching members out as they hit the progression you want them to be at.
Final Fantasy 10 is pretty great, if you can aquire a taste for that thick, heavy Square cheese. It did set the template for the overly convoluted techno-magic plotline that has been applied to nearly every Final Fantasy since,
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