What I Know About FFX Going In
Practically nothing. The only thing I know is that some people are looking forward to it so it probably doesn’t have an FFII-esque reputation.
-I also know that this is the first in the PS2 generation, although I’m playing it on Steam.
-That’s it. Let’s go!
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New Game
-The FFX/X-2 launcher has a bunch of people on it, but not gonna look too closely at them. They look like people. That’s all I really picked up from the glance.
-The new game screen is pretty! Blue and red theme. The logo looks to be a blue woman with a massive cloak or possibly a tail that swoops into purple and then orange colors.
-There is also a watery theme at the top going on.
-Character Advancement System: standard or expert sphere grid? I go with standard, cause I have no idea wtf this is talking about.
-Soundtrack type: original or arranged? I’ll go with original. Cause why not.
-Intro cinematic starts up. A scene of ruins. Ruined buildings, and a blue watery sword stuck in the ground.
-A large party of people hanging around a campfire.
-Close-up on a woman with two different colored eyes.
-A dude with sandy yellow hair puts his hand on her shoulder and starts to walk toward the ruins.
-The piano music playing here is quite beautiful. It keeps going even when I pause the game, which is a nice change.
-Close-up now on the yellow haired dude who walked to look at the ruins.
He seems amazed at something. Not necessarily unpleasantly. Not horrified.
-Different colored comets are flying about behind him. Perhaps eidolons/espers.
-HOLY SHIT IT’S VOICE ACTING!! “Listen to my story.” SO we’re starting in media res – or perhaps even near the end. “This may be our last chance.”
Title screen.
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The Story
-Techy music. What sounds a bit like club music – hee! It’s club music with that rising/falling FF scale built into it. Immediately getting an FFVIII vibe from the architecture.
-A crowd milling about, being called into something. Back to the club or whatever.
-A stealthy figure, almost transparent, follows behind them.
-The yellow-haired dude emerges, and the crowd cheers. This is the guy from the beginning. A celebrity of some kind?
-Got control of the character. The city behind him is BEAUTIFUL. My favorite part is what looks to be a magically-suspended water bridge and water floor holding up a higher section of the city.
-We appear to be on a boat of some kind. Guessing this guy is a famous actor and this is a theater ship.
-Can’t pull up a status screen. In an interesting change from prior FFs, the default is to run. I have to press a button to walk instead.
-Let’s talk to the crowd.
-Aha! An athlete instead. A kid wants the dude to sign a ball. We got a name: Tidus.
-Someone else wishes him “good luck tonight.” So this is pre-game. Neat! Tidus seems like a positive, upbeat guy.
-And a bit of a player/flirt. Promises to score a goal for these two women – east block in the front row, fifth from the right. (Writing that down just in case it becomes important.)
-Some kids yell out, “Teach us how to blitz!” Football maybe, since blitzing is a thing there? No, those balls are not (American) footballs.
-CREEPY. He tells the kids he’ll teach them how to “blitz” tonight after the game, and then that little stealth dude says “You can’t tonight.” Tidus listens to him, corrects himself immediately. What is Tidus’s relationship with Sneaky McStealtherson?
-The kids all do some kind of hand motion that could be his team’s symbol or something like that.
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-Really modern looking city. Get a great view of it. Not even present day, but futuristic even.
-A few skyscraper walls have a mural of a dude with black hair and a red bandana. A leader? Emperor? Competing athlete? Leaning towards the latter.
-Tidus stares at the mural, and kind of harumphs it. A rival perhaps.
-A voiceover – not Tidus. Someone running away when he heard the news that “our hero, Jecht,” had vanished.
-The speaker is Zanar. Jecht was indeed an athlete.
-This is strange. Zanar is speaking as if he knows he’s narrating the game.
-That was ten years ago. Today is the Jecht Memorial Cup tournament.
-lololol – the names of the two teams are the Abes from A-East and the Duggles from C-South. Now I’m thinking the guy is a sports announcer/commentator.
-A name for the sport: blitzball.
-Tidus is the hot young star. “Jecht’s blood,” though hard to say if this means Tidus is literally Jecht’s relative or just similarly good to Jecht.
-Yup, Tidus is Jecht’s son. The dude in the mural must be Jecht. The harrumph from Tidus indicates some strains/bad blood there.
-It’s so exciting to be playing a new game! A woman I pass on the street says she’s got the shivers. Could just mean it’s a cold night, but maybe it’s foreshadowing of A PLAGUE OF DEATH!! SHE’S PATIENT ZERO WITH CAPTAIN TRIPS AND IT’S UP TO ME TO STOP THE PLAGUE AND REMEMBER THIS PERSON!!
(Probably not.)
-The opponent tonight is the Zanarkand Duggles.
-There’s some kind of super shot called a Jecht Shot.
-Oh. Maybe I wasn’t so wrong about the plague thing. Another person on the street feels sick, like he’s “on a rollercoaster.”
-The Abes are the Zanarkand Abes. This must be some kind of megalopolis with different districts.
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Blitzball Stadium
-Two giant stone statues are outside the arena.
-This stadium is metal AF. So is the music.
-It’s the dude from the intro with the glasses lowered on his nose!!
-WHOA GIANT WAVE – something to do with the game?
-BLITZBALL SO AWESOME!! FUTURISTIC AF. No clue what’s going on, but it looks a bit like water quidditch combined with the sport from Korra.
-The game is intercut with Glasses Guy walking forward, and the water in his wake is acting unusually. It’s rising from the sidewalks.
-…pretty sure that’s not part of the game
-Yup. The city is about to get destroyed by a giant ball of water.
-ALSO BY THE LASERS SHOOTING OUT OF THE GIANT BALL OF WATER WTF
-gravity is fucked up. The stadium collapses, Tidus fall down.
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Escape
-Intense, fast-paced music.
-Tidus (heh, just noticed even his name is watery) running from the ruined stadium.
-Minimap! That’s new. Telling me where to go.
-Glasses Guy is waiting. His name is Auron, and Tidus knows him.
-Auron walks away. Tidus goes to follow, and… time stops. He can move, but time is otherwise stopped. Stealthy Short Guy is here – someone who moves outside of time, or maybe a time mage?
STEALTHY: “It begins. Don’t cry.” Zidane is confused. Hasn’t met this guy yet. [later edit: still not sure then how it seemed like Tidus heard him when talking to fans. Perhaps Stealthy spoke in a way that Tidus's subconscious could hear.]
-Time resumes, and Stealthy is no longer there. Just Tidus and Auron.
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Next time: across the bridge towards the watery death sphere.
