Final Fantasy: one of the biggest gaming franchises?

I don’t like my piece. It was the first piece I wrote after my Dad died and I felt very out of the game. Plus looking at it now, as is usual with group pieces, I look at everyone else’s and they seem so much more appropriately written!
Of course there is the chance that this may all be down to me being a perfectionist.

Besides that Fable 2, Gears 2, Viva Pinata: Trouble In Paradise, Infinite Undiscovery, The Last Remnant, Star Ocean 4 and Tales of Vesperia; and I’m very pleased to know that my 360 will be used a lot in the coming months.
I’m especially pleased that so many RPGs are coming to the system. With 6 on the way, all fairly different; I’m pretty much guaranteed some decent quality RPG gaming. And while I wait for that? I’ve still got Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon to complete; and Eternal Sonata and Mass Effect to finish off achievements.

Anyways I spent my weekend as a semi crippled person (taking the tape off my back was murder, left my skin very sore, tender and red; and BOTH shoulder blades hurting lots!) gaining lots of achievement points like the sad sod I am on the quiet
I’d received Spiderman: Friend or Foe from Lovefilm and I actually quite enjoyed it.
Sure it was stupidly easy and obviously aimed at children (you couldn’t even really die in the game), but it had a certain charm and it reminded me a little of Streets of Rage for some reason. It was a nice mindless distraction for a while really. I’d never buy it and I’d have been gutted if I’d paid money for it but as a free rental it was fine.
The only really crappy thing was the stupid last 75 point achievement. It involved upgrading your 14 (yes 14) sidekicks fully. This took over 2hrs and numerous replays of the final level just to gain the coins needed to upgrade. And it was bloody annoying! And pointless. Yet I was so near to 1king the game that I felt compelled through my bloody stubbornness to do it. So I did……I’m a fool

The other game I played as much as possible at the weekend was Lost Odyssey. A game that should be everything I could ever dream of….yet it’s missing something. Made by all the geniuses of Final Fantasy, it has an incredibly good story that keeps me playing. The dream segments are truly touching and emotional; yet I still can’t help but feel it’s just not quite there.
There’s no innovation, it’s the same kind of RPG as you’d see 10 years ago. No bad thing…but I kind of want something new and exciting now. You still wander around people’s houses nicking their stuff without any questions asked, the battle system is near identical to Final Fantasy VIII yet lacks a comprehensive magic system like materia or junctioning brought; and it has some daft minigames in it that break up the story too much.
I just want more, I’m not quite sure what right this second but I know this is missing something. I’ll still enjoy working my way through it, I just wish it could truly amaze me. The first 10 minutes amazed me, but that was that

For now I bid adieu as I have updates to restart for and I want to see how WoW plays on this lappy

The essay on Communities will be uploaded soon, promise!

And re the comments. Yeah I got lazy and didn’t finish up NHL2k6 or Bioncle Heroes. I wasn’t overly keen on either so I just wanted to get rid! Of course NHL2k6 then had to get lost, but I got TMNT a few days ago so that was good Completed it extremely quickly but it was good fun. Only really worth it if you’re a die hard TMNT fan though I think, otherwise it’s just a very basic Prince of Persia for kids.
I’ll re-rent Bioncle Heroes sometime to finish it up, and maybe NHL2k6. Not sure how flexible my feet are
I’ve got Cars on the way next at least, actually really want to play it Sure it’s a kids game but hoping it’s fun too. My little cousin would love it as he’s a huge Cars fan but doubt I’ll get a chance to show him it.

Anyway.
I’m finally back to two console ownerdomthingy (I’m not counting the mega drive and the DS Lite). A good friend’s given me his PS2 in exchange for whisky once I’m working again, along with it, he gave me Resident Evil Outbreak (Not tried it yet), Sonic Heroes (Not tried that either) and Sega Mega Drive Collection.
Sega Mega Drive Collection is like my childhood on a DVD so it rocks! Spent ages yesterday playing Sonic 2 and Comix Zone.
I also went out and traded some stuff in for Final Fantasy 12, the main reason why I wanted a PS2 again (This is my 3rd PS2, and my first slimline one, bloody hell it’s tiny!).

Final Fantasy 12 is interesting so far. It’s not grabbed me yet but I’ve only had a chance to play it for about an hour yet. So far I’ve determined that the cut scenes are a little long for my liking, I have a crap attention span at the best of times and I think it’s particularly bad at the moment due to my limited free time. However, the cut scenes does make it more cinematic. A friend of mine said that the game felt more like a film than any other Final Fantasy game he’d played so I was half expecting that.

I’m also a bit unsure about the combat. I’m old-fashioned, I expect turn based Final Fantasy style combat. This is quite a revelation. Hopefully it’ll turn out good though. The real test is larger boss battles which I have yet to encounter. The last turn based RPG I played was Enchanted Arms so that doesn’t help because I loved that combat system!

But Final Fantasy 12 has a lot of promise, if nothing else the graphics are amazing for the PS2 and the soundtrack is great too. So hopefully after a few more hours I’ll be hooked, nearly all RPGs take a while to get you hooked anyhow.
It doesn’t help that I am the biggest Final Fantasy VII fanboy/girl I know, so in my head I’m comparing it to 7 no matter how hard I try not to!

Finally, some photos of my set up as I took them for another forum a few days ago:

Bit messy, it’s my set up having returned from Uni and midway through completely trashing my room and starting over again. The 19″ widescreen TFT is currently nearly purely for the 360 and the 17″ TFT for the PC. I tend to switch to dual monitors for the PC when I’m writing essays or doing websites. I’m hoping in the summer to buy a new HDTV so the monitors can be just for the PC and the 360 will get moved around along with mostly everything in this place. Just noticed the poor little external HD is getting treated like dirt as per usual!

is a close up of the games for the 360.

Hoping that by the next time I update i’ll have played a bit more of CoD2, FF12 and maybe even a spot of Dead Rising as it’s so cruelly neglected.

Plus my essay on war comes up on the second page of MSN Live search if you type some fairly common words for an essay title.

Perhaps most intriguingly someone found me by typing on Google ‘Propp Final Fantasy’ and finding my Essay on Propp Theory connected with Final Fantasy VII. Didn’t realise others might be writing something similar! It probably helps that mine doesn’t require logging into view, unlike many that come up on the same search. Although I’m not sure if I’d quite be worth quoting anywhere just yet.

Seem to show up on a fair few RSS readers so I’m happy! It’s nice to have such good traffic when I’ve barely even started yet.