I'd read all the reviews that say FF13 really is slow to develop.
But I can't really say that I was prepared for how slow it was to develop. I looked at the game clock when i started to get experience points....Experience points, not some complex concept--3:01 into play. Mostly due to me reading every single codex entry since the world of Cocoon-Pulse is pretty alien and new. More than 2 hours of literally pushing straight and mashing circle.
3 hours is half of a shooter, so that's a bit weird. One wonders why they take so long to introduce the games core mechanics to the player? I don't understand how they could weigh the risk of confusing the player with mechanics and put that on a scale with the risk of boring the player taking hours to find itself.
That said I knew what I was in for. I really like the story so far, the characters all seem pretty interesting and have okay motivations. And oh yeah it's incredibly gorgeous and looks so different from Western games. And I mean that in a good way.
I trust the battle system will come along, but I wonder if I'll have the patience to wait on it.
Final Fantasy XIII
Game » consists of 17 releases. Released Mar 09, 2010
This entry into the Final Fantasy universe is set in the worlds of Pulse and Cocoon. Players take control of multiple characters who are caught in a war between these worlds.
Wow this game really is THAT slow
I'd read all the reviews that say FF13 really is slow to develop.
But I can't really say that I was prepared for how slow it was to develop. I looked at the game clock when i started to get experience points....Experience points, not some complex concept--3:01 into play. Mostly due to me reading every single codex entry since the world of Cocoon-Pulse is pretty alien and new. More than 2 hours of literally pushing straight and mashing circle.
3 hours is half of a shooter, so that's a bit weird. One wonders why they take so long to introduce the games core mechanics to the player? I don't understand how they could weigh the risk of confusing the player with mechanics and put that on a scale with the risk of boring the player taking hours to find itself.
That said I knew what I was in for. I really like the story so far, the characters all seem pretty interesting and have okay motivations. And oh yeah it's incredibly gorgeous and looks so different from Western games. And I mean that in a good way.
I trust the battle system will come along, but I wonder if I'll have the patience to wait on it.
That is why I have yet to pick it up. Maybe Ill buy it this summer, but that's a huge investment of time.
" You'll have the patiences. Just need to chip away the hours a few times a day or so. If you're trying to play through it all on a few days you'll probably bore yourself to death. "You have obviously never power leveled an MMO character. Or as i like to call it listening to podcasts while i kind of play a game. Like compared to doing a 1-80 level grind in 3 weeks in WoW a few hours of downtime isn't so bad...it's just different in a single player game.
But i may mix in some other games as i have a few others waiting to go.
It gets better. You do not get your first summon or the ability to level up weapons before you hit the 7/8 hour mark.
10 hours in is where you first do anything other than run forward to the next enemy or cutscene. It is a very short (3min) scene where you get to run around a beach and talk to people. Then its back to running forward to the next enemy/cutscene.
Wait, your complaining it took 3 hours to get xp even though it was by your own choice? I mean seriously I made it to the "xp part" in half that time, around the 1:30 mark. Seems a bit silly to me to complain about how long it took you to reach there because you wanted to read all the datalogs.
" Wait, your complaining it took 3 hours to get xp even though it was by your own choice? I mean seriously I made it to the "xp part" in half that time, around the 1:30 mark. Seems a bit silly to me to complain about how long it took you to reach there because you wanted to read all the datalogs. "I wasn't even really complaining so much is it just felt remarkable to me how measured the pace of this game is. I knew what i was getting in for and it's still disjarring.
And to be honest I don't think reading the datalog is something that should be seen as optional, the game throws a lot of information at you right away and it would be a lot to take in without the datalog.
" @Zenaxzd said:Ah I see, just sounded like complaining is all. I know I didn't touch a single datalog outside of characters until chapter 11 and I had no problem following things going on (even helped explain it to someone else in another thread so yeah)." Wait, your complaining it took 3 hours to get xp even though it was by your own choice? I mean seriously I made it to the "xp part" in half that time, around the 1:30 mark. Seems a bit silly to me to complain about how long it took you to reach there because you wanted to read all the datalogs. "I wasn't even really complaining so much is it just felt remarkable to me how measured the pace of this game is. I knew what i was getting in for and it's still disjarring. And to be honest I don't think reading the datalog is something that should be seen as optional, the game throws a lot of information at you right away and it would be a lot to take in without the datalog. "
Something I try to suggest to everyone going into the game (and especially the first 2 hours of the game) is get out of the habit of using autobattle. The thing while may seem like it makes life easier and boring it only serves to slow battles down because it lacks the knowledge to AOE properly and strings together attacks as a ravager that are not so smart. Doing this also keeps you feeling more engaged in the combat (and one could argue "mashy" I guess but that isn't a bad thing).
Sure it is unusual but in context it all fits with the feeling and the story they are going for.
@Zenaxzd: I just wanted to comment on the auto-battle. I didn't find auto-battle to be that bad at all, in fact I used it for much of the game. There were a couple times when I had to take control and use the ability I wanted (mainly using Esuna while another medic healed) but overall I felt the game did a good job of choosing the attacks I wanted based on my job. This let me focus on macro-strategy of worrying about Paradigms, when to use a full ATB or cut it short, etc. Whenever I had to choose attacks manually I found it clunky and would always waste time because I had haste on almost always and the ATB would be full before I could manually choose the attacks I wanted.
" Much like the linearity the lack of experience for fights at the beginning is part of the story. You don't earn xp at the start because you are just people trying to survive, you aren't L'Cie and don't have any powers so there is nothing to power up by spending xp. The same goes for the lack of towns/linearity, you are on the run from a government that wants to kill you, it kind of kills the suspense and tension when you stop your escape to wander around a town, visit some shops, talk to people. Sure it is unusual but in context it all fits with the feeling and the story they are going for. "This
My little brother got a PS3 not long before FFXIII came out. Of course he picked it up for the nostalgia factor. I told him it would take a long time to get going and he said yeah that it was slow. I asked him why he kept playing and he just said the story was worth it. I'll have to take his word for it because I'm never going to play this game with all that I've heard. There are 10 year old games that handle it better.
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