Summary: Some brief final thoughts on Final Fantasy Tactics A2.
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Protagonists
Luso: Not my favorite protag. Heedless, not terribly thoughtful or empathetic. He clearly cared for his friends even if he wasn’t great at doing so.
I wanted to like him more, but I couldn’t get past that
Adelle: The game’s all-star. I love her personality, that decision of whether to embrace solitude or friendship given her “gifts.” Seeing her get involved with Clan Gully and resist returning
”My Adelle,” by ShlineX/D. Can we talk about how awesome the arms are in this drawing?
Oh and this gem:
“You’re an intriguing woman,”
“Thank you. I am.”
Cid: I really, really like this incarnation of Cid. Cid usually is the flawed scientist who fucks something up and spends the rest of the game trying to correct it. (XII villainy aside.) Here, he’s a mentor who got out of a shitty work environment while staying on the good side of amoral.
Hurdy: Cute moogle bard! A simple role he played well.
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Side Characters
Frimelda: What a pure badass. I wish the storyline had completed much earlier so I could’ve incorporated her into my team.
”Fallen Angel,” by LohiAxel.
Lezaford: A neat side character/mentor. I don’t know why we didn’t get him as a party member. Would’ve much preferred him to my generic nu mou.
Vaan & Penelo: Awesome seeing their long-term development. From basically kids in XII to mentors in Revenant Wings, and now to full-blown sky pirates. Unlike Frimelda, I’m glad they didn’t join until later. I saw their story and didn’t need more than a glorified series of cameos.
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Antagonists
Illua: She seemed neat? Idk. We saw so little of her. I liked the plot we got in the last couple of quests and her relationship with Cid.
”Ilua’s Black Journal,” by Toyoll.
Khamja: This was almost a more interesting villain then Illua. We saw a lot more of them, interacted with their hierarchy.
Duelhorn: They were awesome! The four leaders were some of my favorites.
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Story
The pacing in this game was weird. I won’t say bad, because it’s an intentional choice and parts of it I liked. But it was weird.
Stories: I loved the core imagery around books and stories! It was so cool that Luso’s main adventure was to live as adventurous a life as possible in Ivalice. There’s something inspiring there.
Luso art by Gefloung.
Scale: The small scale was great. Even smaller than Revenant Wings. This was basically a collection of short stories. Silly stories, dramatic stories, tragic stories, humorous stories.
And yet.
Main: The main story was almost non-existent. Illua and Khamja felt more like a big series of side quests. It got much stronger in the last 2-3 quests, largely due to its reliance on Adelle’s development.
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Setting/Tone
Similar to FFTA. Light, relaxed. This is a world at (relative) peace. Khamja’s a threat, but it’s a normal threat. Not an apocalyptic threat. Even that bit at the end where Illua tried to open a rift felt shoe-horned in, out of step with the rest of the game.
”Chibi Hurdy,” by Kittyjoy.
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Gameplay
Jobs: Adding in job unlock quests was a GREAT idea. Would’ve liked them to make even more like them. The variety felt less redundant than in FFTA too. Something about the way the kits were set up. Not sure why.
My favorite job system in the Tactics series.
Laws: Did NOT like this. Pretty much at all. The stakes were lower than in FFTA without jail (thank goodness), but it also meant that I ignored it.
I get what they were going for. Force you to build a wide repertoire of strategies and tools, adapt to new scenarios. But it just didn’t work for me. They should’ve made better rewards.
No Random Battles: (Or rather, no required random battles.) YES YES THIS WAS GREAT, MORE OF THIS PLEASE! Every battle I fought was for a quest, a story. The lack of random encounters was glorious.
I remember the first game I came across this in, FFVII: Crisis Core. Only one of the early missions was like this, with enemies in pre-set places. FFTA dabbled in it, and FFXII to some extent with enemies that you could avoid.
I hope FFXIII builds on this.
Timed Mission: Ugh. Bad. No. This added a mini-game of trying to knock out multiple missions before they left the pub table, and I hated it. It gave me no joy or value. The fewer timed things, the better.
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Music
Much like Revenant Wings, I liked how… well, how pretty so much of this music was! Very solid background music. (I’m bad with music so some of these may have been from prior games without my remembering.) Some favorites:
-“Putting Words Together”
-“Adelle”
-“Unhideable Anxiety”
-“Finale”
-“A Poem for the Journey”
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Art/Visuals
Fantastic portrait art! Similar to FFTA, with stepped-up spell graphics and effects. Most portraits were on the silly side. It made the creepier or sadder ones stand out.
Still not over the crying Adelle. Never, especially since she never got to really process that feeling with Luso.
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Length
Too long. As I wrote, like 80% of the game felt like side quests which made the pace feel sluggish. I’m sure I could’ve skipped some of those to make the percentage of main quests higher, but that doesn’t feel like playing the game as it was meant.
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Replayability
Pretty good. There’s a hard difficulty to try, new job combos, new race combos. I’d love to try a main party with a seeq and a gria.
(Still disappointed that the game gave me so many frigging humans main characters.)
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A Brief Ranking of the Side FF Games I’ve Played It’s Just One Small Opinion Please Don’t Kill Me
1.Tactics Advance
2.X-2
3.IV: The After Years
4.Tactics
5. Tactics A2
6.VII: Crisis Core
7.II: Soul of Rebirth
8.X-2: Last Mission
9 .XII: Revenant Wings
10.VII: Dirge of Cerberus
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Final Thoughts
A quiet, solid wrap-up to the Ivalice games. One of the weaker stories but strong mechanics and some fantastic characters.
I started in Ivalice on July 11, 2017.
http://coldrungaming.blogspot.com/2017/07/ffxii-p...
It’s been a long and awesome journey, getting to explore this world. I’ve enjoyed Eorzea (XIV) over that time.
And after that, I’m excited to see the new world of XIII.
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Next time: the rest of the Stormblood main quests.
