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Review By: Christopher
Coey |
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| Developer: |
Square |
| Publisher: |
Square
EA |
| # of
Players: |
1 |
| Genre: |
RPG |
| ESRB: |
Teen |
| Online: |
No |
| Accessories: |
Memory
Card |
| Date
Posted: |
4-8-02 |
The first thing you'll realize when you begin
playing the latest entry into the fantastic, best-selling Final Fantasy
franchise is how immersive the game is. It really draws you in. The story, which itself
is both complex and
beautiful, unfolds slowly, but the intrigue begins in the first ten
minutes. You want to keep playing to find out what happens, not just to get
to the next level.
These days, there are a lot of misdirected people who claim video games have
destroyed the attention span of today's youth. That, because of television
and the Internet, they no longer have the patience for reading novels or any
form of literature. That's not really a valid argument. If anything, the
results that TV, the Internet, and video games have had on today's youth is
that they process information quicker. Show any platformer game to most
parents and they can barely process what's happening on screen, it's coming
at them too fast. It's not that kids today don't have the attention span to
read novels, they simple are not interested in the novels that their parents
read. If you want evidence of that, check out the sales of Harry Potter, or
even current sales for Lord of the Rings.
Our culture has changed as we move further into the digital age. The need to
escape reality, and immerse ourselves in another world still exists; we just
have more options now. Some still choose works of literature (I know I do),
but a good many others now choose video games. The latter choice is quickly
becoming as intricate and compelling as the former. And often as deserving
of the term 'art'.
The next generation of systems have, and will continue to demonstrate, what
today's digital artists are truly capable of. Final Fantasy X is a stellar
example of those capabilities. At the heart of the story is the amazing,
in-depth character development. Characters with personality, who grow and
emerge throughout the length of the game. The story itself is exactly what
fans have come to expect from the Final Fantasy name. It's full of epic
adventure, spiritual journeys, complex relationships, and the power of
courage and friendship. At times it's cheesy, at others poignant and moving.
But it IS a good story, if not a tad linear (although near the end of the
game, it becomes very much not linear.) Of course, I don't expect it to be
made into a movie anytime soon. For the same reasons the actual Final
Fantasy movie followed an original story rather than one of the game plots.
The action points, and plot-twist in a game are often too extreme to
transfer to any other medium. In a game, if a huge creature suddenly attacks
a major city right in the middle of the championship blitzball game, it's
believable. A legitimate plot-twist. In a Hollywood movie, the same scene
would be viewed as being too odd or unexplainable. As an RPG, it needs no
explanation.
The music is perfect, and varied. This is the best score I've ever heard in a game. Over 60 some-odd tracks ranging from classical
music to chanting monks. In Japan kids and adults often run to record stores to
buy soundtracks for games. I'm probably not going to run out and buy this,
but I can finally see why people might. The sound effects are also top
notch. For me, great sound effects in a game are more than just finding the
right sound for the big explosions or battles. It comes down to the little
things. Often background sounds, or usually overlooked nuances. I won't
bother going into a listing of all the bits and pieces, but needless to
say, a lot of time and effort was put into making FFX just right.
Speaking of nuances, there was one part of this game that blew me away: the
dialects. The game designers actually created and worked out specific
dialects for each of the various races and homelands. The people of
Besaid, for instance, all use the same verbal mannerisms, and have their own slang.
Meanwhile, the Ronsos, who speak their own language, each have a similar
accent when attempt to speak English. And far and away the coolest, and most
intricate thing in any recent gaming memory is the new language of Al
Bhed. Created specifically for this game, the language consists of words
manipulated through letter substitutions from English words. The resulting
new words then create the new language, which has it's own proper
pronunciations. The effect is pretty cool. All this work for something that
barely effects the gameplay, it's simply an added touch. A superbly written
and crafted added touch.
So, here I've gone on about many aspect of the game, and I have yet to
mention the thing most associated with the last few Final Fantasy games, the
summonings. After all, an RPG is nothing without a fantastic story, and
tight combat system. So what really sets the good games from the great, are
the creature effects. Gamers often joke about the extended creature
summoning animations that happen in FF games. How they seem to last forever,
and get really tiresome after the first few times. Not that they aren't
spectacular the first time, but you later want to skip them, and often
can't. Well, in FFX you DO have the ability skip (or shorten) the
animations, but I still never did (which should give you a perfect sense of
how cool they are).
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