Reflections: A Look Back at Final Fantasy X
- Thread starter Hyunickel
- Start date
- Tagged users None
FFX is one of my absolute favourite games (along with VIII and IX). It was my first Final Fantasy and totally got me hooked on the franchise. When I remember FFX there are so many things that make me want to replay the game, there's so much to love in it.
The Sphere Grid. This system is my favourite of all the FF games I've played. I loved the way the characters were given their set roles in the party from the start, but that the Sphere Grid allows you to mix that up as much as you want. I once played through it with Tidus as a Black Mage, Yuna as a warrior, Wakka as a thief etc and nobody in their original roles. It actually worked as well, in fact better since I learned that making Yuna a warrior makes her summons absolutely kick ass. Now I always make her as powerful as possible.
The story. Pretty much every time I play a game, I play it for the story, and FFX is no different. The story of X is so amazing, so heart-warming and so bitter-sweet that it's hard not to love. I can't fault it at all. My only wish is that I could loose my memory of it just once so that I could play it again and feel all the plot twists and turns and all the history of Spira as it builds up during the storytelling again. IT really is a brilliant journey through not only the world of Spira but also a journey though the characters development, their pasts, their feelings and ultimately what they are willing to sacrifice for the world.
The characters. I don't love all of FFX's cast, but I enjoy a fair lot of them, and my all time favourite character just happens to be the lead. I like Yuna, I think she's such a strong woman and courageous and brave well beyond her years. At first glance she seems meek, almost timid and gentle, but underneath that there's so much passion and strength. She's one of the strongest female characters in the franchise imo and I love seeing her progress through the story. I like Auron too, but mostly just for being so funny, especially when it comes to Al Bhed and Wakka. Lulu is also a great character who I don't think gets as much recognition as she should, she's really not all that cliche, and her past with Chappu is so sad that it makes me glad she gets her happy ending in X-2. I really like Rikku, she, like Yuna, is also not what she first appears. At first you'd think she's just this ditsy blonde girl who wants to have fun, but it's really mostly a façade to hide all her pain and sorrow. At the age of 15 to have lived through such mass hatred of her race, to have been secluded on a desert island and then have to watch as it's destroyed and so many of her people are murdered right before her eyes. People don't give Rikku enough credit.
Tidus. He gets his own paragraph because I seriously love him. I know a lot of people don't like Tidus, they say he's whiny, they say he's a crybaby and isn't hard enough. But what I love about him is how real he is, and how he is brave, and he is strong, and he shows far more strength of characters than the other main characters of the series. I mean, he's this ordinary guy, from a world quite like our own, and right from the start he's had his whole life taken from him, all his friends, his home, his job, his entire world. He handles this pretty well I'd say, he doesn't whine, he gets on with it, and is determined to get home. Through their journey through Spira Tidus goes through quite the change, and it's not surprising, with all the hardships he faces (finding out about Jecht, then finding out about Yuna, then finding out about himself, facing his father at the end). He starts of as your typical sporty guy who probably likes a drink with his mates and really doesn't take responsibility for much seen as he's given everything on a plate. But through his journey he learns there's so much more to life, and that not everything is what it seems but that it's alright anyway. He doesn't whine, he doesn't give up, no matter how much revelations and heartaches he faces, he keeps strong and carries on.
For me Tidus is the best example of a hero. A hero we can relate to, who is like us, and who doesn't run away in the face of his own faults and his own destiny.
So that's pretty much why I love the game, the main things I love about it anyway. The world is beautiful and it's kind of hard to believe it's a PS2 game sometimes, when I've seen PS3 games with graphics no better than it. The world of Spira, with all it's history and secrets, is a wonder to journey through every single time I play it.
The Sphere Grid. This system is my favourite of all the FF games I've played. I loved the way the characters were given their set roles in the party from the start, but that the Sphere Grid allows you to mix that up as much as you want. I once played through it with Tidus as a Black Mage, Yuna as a warrior, Wakka as a thief etc and nobody in their original roles. It actually worked as well, in fact better since I learned that making Yuna a warrior makes her summons absolutely kick ass. Now I always make her as powerful as possible.
The story. Pretty much every time I play a game, I play it for the story, and FFX is no different. The story of X is so amazing, so heart-warming and so bitter-sweet that it's hard not to love. I can't fault it at all. My only wish is that I could loose my memory of it just once so that I could play it again and feel all the plot twists and turns and all the history of Spira as it builds up during the storytelling again. IT really is a brilliant journey through not only the world of Spira but also a journey though the characters development, their pasts, their feelings and ultimately what they are willing to sacrifice for the world.
The characters. I don't love all of FFX's cast, but I enjoy a fair lot of them, and my all time favourite character just happens to be the lead. I like Yuna, I think she's such a strong woman and courageous and brave well beyond her years. At first glance she seems meek, almost timid and gentle, but underneath that there's so much passion and strength. She's one of the strongest female characters in the franchise imo and I love seeing her progress through the story. I like Auron too, but mostly just for being so funny, especially when it comes to Al Bhed and Wakka. Lulu is also a great character who I don't think gets as much recognition as she should, she's really not all that cliche, and her past with Chappu is so sad that it makes me glad she gets her happy ending in X-2. I really like Rikku, she, like Yuna, is also not what she first appears. At first you'd think she's just this ditsy blonde girl who wants to have fun, but it's really mostly a façade to hide all her pain and sorrow. At the age of 15 to have lived through such mass hatred of her race, to have been secluded on a desert island and then have to watch as it's destroyed and so many of her people are murdered right before her eyes. People don't give Rikku enough credit.
Tidus. He gets his own paragraph because I seriously love him. I know a lot of people don't like Tidus, they say he's whiny, they say he's a crybaby and isn't hard enough. But what I love about him is how real he is, and how he is brave, and he is strong, and he shows far more strength of characters than the other main characters of the series. I mean, he's this ordinary guy, from a world quite like our own, and right from the start he's had his whole life taken from him, all his friends, his home, his job, his entire world. He handles this pretty well I'd say, he doesn't whine, he gets on with it, and is determined to get home. Through their journey through Spira Tidus goes through quite the change, and it's not surprising, with all the hardships he faces (finding out about Jecht, then finding out about Yuna, then finding out about himself, facing his father at the end). He starts of as your typical sporty guy who probably likes a drink with his mates and really doesn't take responsibility for much seen as he's given everything on a plate. But through his journey he learns there's so much more to life, and that not everything is what it seems but that it's alright anyway. He doesn't whine, he doesn't give up, no matter how much revelations and heartaches he faces, he keeps strong and carries on.
And in the end he sacrifices himself to save a world which isn't even his own.
So that's pretty much why I love the game, the main things I love about it anyway. The world is beautiful and it's kind of hard to believe it's a PS2 game sometimes, when I've seen PS3 games with graphics no better than it. The world of Spira, with all it's history and secrets, is a wonder to journey through every single time I play it.
I made a thread a while back about how much I loved this game. It's up there with any of my favourite movies, books, songs etc. As a final fantasy game it's awesome and definitely one of my favourites within the series. As a game in general it's still one of the best the ps2 had to offer and as an experience it can be life changing. FFX is one of those games/experiences for me that epitomises a time in your life. Whenever you hear the soundtrack or see/replay a scene you are instantly transported back to the moment you first experienced that particular scene.
I know it sounds corny or sad to say a video game 'changed your life' but for me it definitely enriched it and I could go out on a limb and say my teenage years would of been a lot emptier without Spira's story.
I know it sounds corny or sad to say a video game 'changed your life' but for me it definitely enriched it and I could go out on a limb and say my teenage years would of been a lot emptier without Spira's story.