Niahak's Place

I’m almost through writing the FFL2 FAQ.  Hopefully when I complete it GameFAQs will accept it.  If not, I’ll plan on at least submitting the translated parts, because they’re nifty.  Certain parts in the dialogue differ considerably from the original US release.
I’ve come to the conclusion that FFL2 is the one game I really want to see get an update of some kind.  Why?  You see a huge variety of worlds, each with not only an interesting subplot of their own, but also unique characters and some pertinence to the overall plot.  You see the main character’s father vanish, but you eventually get him in your party – a couple times – and he’s overconfident, protective, but still incredibly powerful.  It could be just me getting obsessed with bad game X again (happens more often than you’d think), but this game actually manages to give me a sense of awe at the sheer scale of what it could be, if they were dealing with more than four greenish colors and a quarter of a megabyte of space.  Having characters travel from world to world is, yes, just another game mechanic, but if it were properly pulled off a game could be truly epic in scale yet still manage to keep each part interesting.  If the game were given sufficiently (but not overly, for then it would be Disgaea) complex mechanics, then those could hold the player’s interest as well.

Is it a decent game on its own?  Sure.  Is it great?  No, it’s crippled by a random growth system and a battle system that is limited and not well-explained.  It’s better than Final Fantasy 2j, which has a similar system from what I hear, because it’s limited growth and it takes a long time to build up to fighting bosses.  Plot is interesting, but characters are often two-dimensional, and as a result of the you-pick-characters system, there’s no character development for anyone except… hmm… The main character, his father, Leon/Antony and possibly Taro/Ronin.

Almost all of this last part is because of size limitations.  If the game were given even the size of a SNES game, it could’ve been much better.  And this is where the paths diverged, for again, this is part of the SaGa series.  The SaGa series is now known for… what?  Overly complex and poorly explained mechanics, broad sweeping stories told indirectly, and a distinct lack of central narrative for a long time.  I’m not a fan of anything past the Game Boy ones.  But I think that FFL2 at least could’ve been made into a truly great game.  There’s still hope, as I know Makaitoushi Saga (FFL1) was remade for Wonderswan Color in Japan.  It can still happen.  Please let it happen to FFL2 and not FFL3.

That’s all.  Possible ofuro rant coming eventually.  Maybe after my final tomorrow.