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I'm writing this because I love FF8. It's easily my favourite game of the series. I've beaten it from beginning to end probably around 20 times. Recently (about a year ago), I managed to get Lionheart on disc 1, and that was a blast to play through the game with squall's ultimate weapon.
Usually most controversy around the final fantasy series circles around 7 amd 8. The vast majority of fans love 6, 9, and 10. But most fans of 7 thought 8 stinks, and most fans of 8 thought 7 stunk.
Of course, the largest factor in the enjoyability of these two games is nostalgia. Whichever FF was the first game you played, you end up loving it the most.
I'm not here to review these games, there's like a billion reviews that already exist on the internet, I doubt I'm going to bring up anything new.
I'm kind of hopping around here, but the reason this blog exists, is because today I got really depressed thinking about how my fourth favorite game of all time + Show Spoiler +1. Morrowind
2. Final Fantasy Tactics
3. Link to the Past
I'm always going to love FF8. The card game, Eyes on Me, the part where Squall catches Rinoa in space, Zell choking on hotdogs, the cutscene of the two gardens crashing into each other. I have many fond memories of this game that will be locked in my heart forever. It's just really saddening to know it wasn't that good of a game after all.
And yeah, objectively FF7 blows too. All in all, both of these games were just decent fillers between 6 and 9.
 
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You convinced me to spend this evening playing through FF8. Never did manage to finish it, fucking draw / junction system blows like you say, couldnt understand it, fell into the "spam GFs!" method. Restarted recently. Going to continue now.
1/5 for saying FF7 sucks.
And yeah, concerning ease. I can smash the shit out of 7/10/12 because i literally know the ins and outs of those games, i know everything, what to steal, where to find the hidden shit, how to skill up etc. Its just knowing the game that makes it easy. FF8 is hard as fuck because i have no clue how the draw system works.
I actually think thats FF8's biggest downfall, the draw / junction system is really difficult to grasp (im sure once it clicks in ur head its easy though) but alot of people just get fucking stumped by it. Im not a stupid person, but fuck me if i know how that works.
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One of the reasons you're saying that FF8 sux is because it's easy.
First remember that it is easy for YOU, that played about 20 times and know all the ins and outs of the system! Everyone who plays it for the first time won't know everything about junction and probably wont ever card mod... so that's not really a reason to say a game sux... every game turns out a little easy after you play alot.
I think both games are great (FF7 and FF8), but I do prefer 7 over 8 XD
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FF8 is easy?
I thought so, until I tried my very own challenge: defeating Omega Weapon without Mega Potions, nor Rinoa, nor "Invincible" items.
That battle was tough, I recommend it to anybody up for a challenge.
The key is to have Zeal use defense to survive the Terra Break, and then quickly revive and heal your team as fast as possible to survive the incoming "9998 damage" attack.
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Fan of 8 and hated 7.
I never spent a lot of time with the draw system so I never really made it 'super easy', but I've heard it can be (as you stated). Even then I don't play FF games for their systems - it's an added bonus when it works well and if it isn't my favorite, well...I don't really care. Like I hated FF13's system. But that's not what I hated the game. Everything else I hated too.
But you just giving up and saying 'my favorite game is bad' (and also saying 7 was bad too, which...even though I don't like it, I can't say it was terrible <_< ) is unnecessary. I feel like you're just giving into the criticism so instead of people shaking their head at you when you say 'I love FF8', you'll say 'I love FF8 but I know it sucked!' and then they'll nod in understanding. Like who cares? You liked the game. It was a good game. 'Objectively', all the Final Fantasies are fucking fantastic games and I don't know why you think differently. They're all highly rated (look at the critic scores) and appreciated, even if some are "worse".
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Why would I care if someone shakes their head in disapproval or nods their head in understanding in response to my opinions? I say things because I believe them, regardless of however other people might take it.
Despite my love for it, I believe that ff8 wasn't a very good game. I don't write this hoping for approval, or a giant flame war between final fantasy fans. I write it simply because something that I once loved so much as become a little less enchanting. I write it because I'm hoping someone else will read it, and relate it to something in their own life. And in that moment, despite any other differences we might have, there is a brief connection between us.
That is all.
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On November 10 2013 04:16 fabiorlopes wrote:
One of the reasons you're saying that FF8 sux is because it's easy.
First remember that it is easy for YOU, that played about 20 times and know all the ins and outs of the system! Everyone who plays it for the first time won't know everything about junction and probably wont ever card mod... so that's not really a reason to say a game sux... every game turns out a little easy after you play alot.
I think both games are great (FF7 and FF8), but I do prefer 7 over 8 XD
I think everyone figured out fairly quickly that keeping squall or Zell in the yellow is a really easy way to clear the game. Especially because of the "Do over" option. I guess it can be quite challenging for new players if they're attempting to draw maximum amounts of magic or something. But really, aura + Zell made this game a cakewalk.
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I remember hearing lots about FF 7 when I was younger and it wasn't finally until I played it that I understood how great of a game it really was, in my opinion. I loved the fantasy of it, the story, there was something that connected me to the main characters. I played through FF 7 once and liked it so much that I bought a PS2 specifically for FF 8. I would have to rate FF 8 as the game I had the most fun playing. I eat, slept and breathed the story, the characters and every time I turned it on it was like sitting down with an old friend. I might not have been the best at it, but I loved it for what it was and I think that's the best way to approach these games. Reading this blog and the comments have brought back so many memories for me and I thank you all for that.
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Yeah, it objectively blows compared to a lot of the other games, but hey, most games without a jump command suck imho. 
Okay, with that out of the way, I think that despite its flaws, the game is extremely fascinating on a character level. You take a bunch of teenagers and train them to be merciless assassins, and you hope this will end well? The main gang is plagued by a plethora of psychological issues, and while I'm kind of sad they didn't get into it that much in the game, the potential is really what makes the game for me.
I think Seifer is one of the most fascinating, multifaceted, and honest characters ever created. Whenever I play the game, I'm always struck by how much I can sympathize with him; even if all his excuses for doing what he did are bullshit, I can easily understand how things ended up the way they did with him, and I find that's quite difficult to achieve for a video game antagonist. (Also, well, I think it's quite clear that I don't believe he was mind-controlled at all, neither do I think he went crazy, which I think is always a cop-out excuse for an antagonist anyways.)
Gameplay-wise, the game is easy as fuck if you just grind a bit at the beginning and learn to play the card game. You can finish Lionheart when you make it to Galbadia Garden, and then it's smooth sailing from there on out (esp. after you max out and junction Ultima to attack).
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final fantasy viii is definitely one of the worst. I mean, all the ff games have severe problems with both their stories and their game play, but ff viii is so obtuse for no reason. The draw system requires more grinding than should be allowable for a game, is fairly arbitrary, and trivializes the game. Add to that the absolutely nonsensical story that goes from poorly paced to completely jumping the shark in disc 3, and there's not a lot of redeeming features beyond nostalgia.
ff vii isn't too great either, but it's way above viii
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On November 10 2013 04:57 Fumanchu wrote:Show nested quote +On November 10 2013 04:16 fabiorlopes wrote:
One of the reasons you're saying that FF8 sux is because it's easy.
First remember that it is easy for YOU, that played about 20 times and know all the ins and outs of the system! Everyone who plays it for the first time won't know everything about junction and probably wont ever card mod... so that's not really a reason to say a game sux... every game turns out a little easy after you play alot.
I think both games are great (FF7 and FF8), but I do prefer 7 over 8 XD I think everyone figured out fairly quickly that keeping squall or Zell in the yellow is a really easy way to clear the game. Especially because of the "Do over" option. I guess it can be quite challenging for new players if they're attempting to draw maximum amounts of magic or something. But really, aura + Zell made this game a cakewalk.
Especially since you can just loop Punch Rush and Booya for pretty much fractions of a second off your limit timer. Having a party of Irvine, Zell, and Squall completely breaks the game.
On November 10 2013 04:21 Ahelvin wrote:
FF8 is easy?
I thought so, until I tried my very own challenge: defeating Omega Weapon without Mega Potions, nor Rinoa, nor "Invincible" items.
That battle was tough, I recommend it to anybody up for a challenge.
The key is to have Zeal use defense to survive the Terra Break, and then quickly revive and heal your team as fast as possible to survive the incoming "9998 damage" attack.
That is your own added difficulty though, of course adding limitations will make it harder. That is the point of adding limitations. It does make the game a whole lot more fun though.
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FF8 is one of the best FF, and it sucks at the same time =)
The good part is the power up'ing part, the bad part is the story to follow and the easiness. As the good part is finding good junctions and power up'ing your party, you're constantly too powerful for everyhing and FF8 designers were pretty bad because they never thought about this.
In FF12, where you can also power up very very soon, there are still some challenges left. In FF8 there is none, so after the intense grinding you feel a terrible emptiness; and yo urealize it was all for nothing as you could have beaten the game with your first weapon at lvl2 ><.
Compare this to FF10, a game very linear in the sense as you can't really be more powerful than the dev expected you to be, but on the other hand you always have something hard to kill waiting for you somewhere.
FF8 is always awesome to replay tho, as FF10, because the power up part rock. As FF12.
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On November 10 2013 03:30 Fumanchu wrote:I'm writing this because I love FF8. It's easily my favourite game of the series. I've beaten it from beginning to end probably around 20 times. Recently (about a year ago), I managed to get Lionheart on disc 1, and that was a blast to play through the game with squall's ultimate weapon. Usually most controversy around the final fantasy series circles around 7 amd 8. The vast majority of fans love 6, 9, and 10. But most fans of 7 thought 8 stinks, and most fans of 8 thought 7 stunk. Of course, the largest factor in the enjoyability of these two games is nostalgia. Whichever FF was the first game you played, you end up loving it the most. I'm not here to review these games, there's like a billion reviews that already exist on the internet, I doubt I'm going to bring up anything new. I'm kind of hopping around here, but the reason this blog exists, is because today I got really depressed thinking about how my fourth favorite game of all time + Show Spoiler +1. Morrowind
2. Final Fantasy Tactics
3. Link to the Past really wasn't that good of a game. I mean the draw system was a terrible implementation, the junctioning system completely ruined the game and made it ridiculously easily ESPECIALLY when coupled with card mod, and with the exception of doom train, eden, and aura, the gf's and magic were completely useless. The story wasn't all that interesting, the sidequests were weak and the rewards from said quests were rarely worth the trouble. Odin is awesome, but c'mon the dude fucked me over so many times when I was trying to farm for rare items. "Wow I finally ran into a blitz, time to....ZANTETSUKEN". I'm always going to love FF8. The card game, Eyes on Me, the part where Squall catches Rinoa in space, Zell choking on hotdogs, the cutscene of the two gardens crashing into each other. I have many fond memories of this game that will be locked in my heart forever. It's just really saddening to know it wasn't that good of a game after all. And yeah, objectively FF7 blows too. All in all, both of these games were just decent fillers between 6 and 9.
FF7 does not blow. Yeah, the battle mechanics could have been better, but it's not as terrible as in FF8, and the story is amazing. I have yet to find a game that captivated me as much as FF7. FF9 was probably a better game if you look at all aspects, but even then it's highly debatable.
I wish FF6 was remade, and I'm not only talking about graphics. If you put FF6 in FF9's clothes, with an equal amount of character interaction, and storyline depth, and added some depth to the battles, then I think it would surpass 7 and 9, but as of right now it's not immersive enough to be comparable.
Anyway, I think FF8 was pretty good too, apart from the mechanics, but unfortunately the 2nd part of it fell short. Remember the "Basketball court scene"? That completely ruined it for me. It's pretty clear that they got lazy on that game. I think FF8 could have been a lot better. It had a lot of potential, but the team could have used some more imagination, or maybe just more time. I never finished FF8, which says a lot, since I finished FF9 like 3-4 times, despite the fact that I played it when I was over a year older, and arguably more busy.
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I've played most other games in the FF series, except not FF8... but I'm in the same boat as you as far as your favorite game objectively being bad 
Mine is Quest 64:
+ Show Spoiler +
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It's kind of funny, as soon as I read this my first kneejerk reaction was to vehemently defend the games. And I know that's not based in logic, because you're probably objectively right, it's just a strong emotional response because I love FF so much.
I think I understand to some extent how religious people feel when they get attacked, it's really hard to remain objective when you're so emotionally attached to one side of an argument...
I think the ability to draw people in, make you connect with the characters and really get you emotionally involved in the game is something that the entire FF series does really well (I've played 7,8,9 btw).
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On November 10 2013 12:21 FuRong wrote:
It's kind of funny, as soon as I read this my first kneejerk reaction was to vehemently defend the games. And I know that's not based in logic, because you're probably objectively right, it's just a strong emotional response because I love FF so much.
I think I understand to some extent how religious people feel when they get attacked, it's really hard to remain objective when you're so emotionally attached to one side of an argument...
I think the ability to draw people in, make you connect with the characters and really get you emotionally involved in the game is something that the entire FF series does really well (I've played 7,8,9 btw).
R.I.P. Aeris x.x
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FF 8 was my favorite FF game all time. The story was awesome too me. The junction system while stupid was kind of interesting. And you have to admit all those FF games tried to do something diffrent with the battle system. But yeah I can see why people wouldn't like it as much.
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Square should remake FF6. It's such a beautiful game that involves you like no other game out there - I have yet to see another game pull off such a long, fantastic ending like this one. The soundtrack is a masterpiece!
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never really got into the FF battle system, I didn't find them to be that good anyway.
it's the story etc that really get me to be a fan of the FF series.
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On November 10 2013 04:02 Capped wrote:
FF8 is hard as fuck because i have no clue how the draw system works.
I actually think thats FF8's biggest downfall, the draw / junction system is really difficult to grasp (im sure once it clicks in ur head its easy though) but alot of people just get fucking stumped by it. Im not a stupid person, but fuck me if i know how that works.
Finished the game in a bit over 10 hours with my party being level 9-14. It's really not that hard because of the draw system + monsters always being around your level. Pretty sure you will manage as well.
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EPT
