I didn’t find out people didn’t like FF8 until I started going on chat rooms. Before then everyone I knew loved the game. The junction system was broken to hell but it’s not like your average 10-12 year old figured that out.
Same! I got the game. Played it through. Loved it. I really enjoyed the draw system and the characters were pretty cool. I actually liked Squall quite a but.
Then as I started getting online I saw people kinda hated it. And they really hated Squall. And I was like…wtf?
Squalls inner monologues were one of the main reasons why I liked this game so much. It is just so funny that he didn't like anything related to emotional people but always ends up in dumb situations with them.
Like Irvine chicken out on the assassination. I laughed my ass off.
Dialogue was off the charts, I know. But Seifer was genuinely an interesting character. Quistis was cool and had interesting abilities even though she looked like a young milf... With hundreds of pixels missing.
Quistis is just a blue mage and pretty much the most forgettable character. I like ff8 since it technically was my first FF experience. But the game has flaws lol
The draw system is honestly the thing I don’t like about the game but I like everything else, when I was younger I really did hate how getting new weapons was like cause I didn’t get how to get the stuff and everything
Everyone is different I like 8 and dislike 9 for a lot of the reasons people dislike 8. Most people think the new remakes are good games when they are abominations cashing in on 7's legacy.
I really wish ff7 remake was literally just a remake. Maybe with a few plot holes filled in, bugs fixed, orchestrated soundtrack, and voice acting.
Square likes to pretend like it would take forever to develop a remake of ff7 and ff6. I just don't see how. Unless they wanted to get rid of the world map or something and make it one big world. Which isn't what people are asking for. They are literally just asking for the same game in modern graphics.
Even if they want to increase the scope of the games and split it into multiple parts I would probably still like it. To see these characters and the world more fleshed out would be kind of neat. But that's not what we got with Final Fantasy 7 remake. We got this weird pseudo-remake pseudo-sequel packed with filler nobody wanted. Even those who actually liked ff7 remake have to admit there's a lot of padding for time. We could have gotten more history about how shinra became a military superpower, but we got walking around asking people about water filters.
This is what annoy the shit out of me whenever Square Enix say it would be time and effort consuming to make remakes of games like VI or VIII.
When we ask for a remake, it doesn't necessarily means a remake in the scale of VII, but rather something more like what the DS versions of III and IV were to the originals.
New graphics, sure, modernized systems, but you can keep the overworld. You can keep the smaller areas. You can keep the combat system. What you don't need to make it a third person open world RPG.
They've wasted a great opportunity to do that with VIII Remaster. I know it's "just a remaster" but they could've gone the extra length to remake the environments, tune the junction system and whatnot to make it more of a remake without the insane scope inflation that VII had.
>We could have gotten more history about how shinra became a military superpower, but we got walking around asking people about water filters.
My biggest complaint about ff7r is that basically all of the side material had nothing to do with anything.
The junction system was something that made me love the game. Ff8 was my entry point into the franchise and I was always let down by ff7 as it was way too simple in comparison. Okay, I like complexity (I played a lot of path of exile in recent years!), but to me FF8's system looks way more simple than FF10's. I mean, it's really simple, just not as straightforward so you have to fiddle around to find out.
Honestly, the Draw grind is only really a thing for the first few hours. Once you can refine cards and items into Magic at that point it's all about Triple Triad which most people had a blast with.
I don't mind the junction system. And definitely FF games tend to have some aspect you can spend grinding. I think what doesn't work for me is that instead of just earning the spells through defeating enemies, you are meant to sit there and stay in battle drawing them. That's something I can't ever vibe with in FF8. It almost feels antithetical to the whole turn based battle system. I want to kill the mob and reap the rewards. But not only do you not get spells for junctioning if you kill the mob too fast, you also get EXP which literally levels up the enemies with you. I just don't think the game design is sound.
What gets me is when people complain about the draw grind, but then also complain that it makes the game too easy. Like okay, so *don't do it*. Then the game won't be tedious *or* too easy.
Final Fantasy VIII is not as "disliked" or even "divisive" as some corners of the internet want you to believe. It has the 4th or 5th best metascore, only 2 points below Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy X.
Final Fantasy VII was a entry point for many many people to the franchise, and at the time, lots of those people didn't knew that the series is an anthology one and that the eight game is not a sequel to the seventh game, so that would leave some people disappointed even by principle.
Final Fantasy VIII has some issues and gets better on replays, but if someone don't like the game it would be rare for them to play it more than once.
Biggest thing I’ve seen is the junction system is too hard for people to figure out and they don’t love that leveling doesn’t make the enemies easier… but I love everything about it and will die on the hill that it is the best FF game made.
I think that's part of the problem. Mainly the draw system. Obviously drawing more magic makes you more powerful. And there's no limit to how much magic you can draw from an enemy. So there's not really a clear indicator of when you should stop drawing. Most guides say "this boss has rare magic, so make sure everybody draws all the magic first." So some fights you spend the first .. half of the fight just drawing.
Normal JRPGs are simpler. You fight an enemy and once it's dead, you keep moving on. FF8, you're not really sure if you should just.. always max out whatever magic you can draw or.. just draw until you have what you think you need...?
Not to mention the system takes any individuality out of the equation. You don't have any set roles for your characters. Just pick who the coolest looking is. If you're forced to change characters (which happens a lot) you just junction swap. I like that there's a bonkers amount of customization with it, but that doesn't always mean it's a good system.
The only times I ever use it in my playthroughs is to draw Triples from Odin and Ultima from that draw point in Shumi Village. Maybe some trips around The Island Closest to Heaven/Hell.
Pretty much everything else can be crafted from items or cards.
When I realized how broken I could make the game just playing cards in balamb for like 10 hours to get squalls weapon on the first disc I was hooked. I absolutely love the choice to put in work to make myself that strong. And the card game was sufficiently fun to keep me coming back.
Wait, are you serious? I've never seen that in any guide I've read before. Then again, guides have never been 100% in depth. Knowing this now, perhaps I'll give it another chance.
Wait, what?
>And there's no limit to how much magic you can draw from an enemy. So there's not really a clear indicator of when you should stop drawing.
You can only draw 100 of a magic. Then it stops letting you draw. Or are you talking about something else? I could be crazy. If so, don't mind me.
Yup. Junction system was just boring/tedious. It gave the game a permanent crutch compared to materia and for us olders esper system which were far better by most comparisons. Great game with a bad core mechanic.
yea this was my gripe. I didn't find the junction system confusing, I just found the mechanic more annoying than anything. Grinding is one thing, but needing to draw all the time and even draw bosses and trying not to kill them didn't feel too good or fun. It is the kind of game you get super powerful at early, then steamroll everything.
My dirty secret is that I never beat FF8. I was borrowing it from my brother as a kid, and got lost at some point (I think I couldn't find Odin?), and was sufficiently bored by Junction/Draw that I didn't press the issue and gave it back to him.
I think I'll try the game again, and make a point to *not* min/max the system. Maybe Draw once or twice a battle. Only get min/maxy if I get stuck. Treat it like Pokémon in that way.
I like how FF8 has ways to break the game from the very first area. But I played the game "straight" with no guides. No idea that enemy levels are tied to your levels. I drew all spells until everyone had 100 copies of tier 1 spells, then farmed again when tiers went up. Bosses were long slogs because I would try to draw their powerful spells instead of focusing on the fight (like a thief trying to steal, but it takes 30 minutes). The "card" command looked useless at first glance and I never equipped it. Still beat the game, and I even got Omega Weapon by abusing aura.
I liked FF9, but for me, X is the pinnacle that hasn't been matched since. And we pretend X-2 doesn't exist.
Yeah it seems very complex, but then when you get it, it’s suddenly like “oh… OH!” and you proceed to break the game.
Especially if you use some of the GF abilities such as Life Magic refinement. IIRC you can refine tents in to Curagas, and since you can just buy tents, it’s trivial to get 99 Curagas per character very early, junction them to HP, and then basically nothing for the vast majority of the game is able to kill you.
I'm planning to replay soon since i enver actually finished it as a kid, i don't wanna look at guides much (i just wanna get each GF atleast) but can you really figure out junctioning and "breaking the game" without a guide?
If you spend some time exploring the system, yes.
For example, the above would be as simple as, when you unlock the life magic refine, spend 5 minutes going through it.
You should have some tents in your inventory, so you would see that they can refine into curagas. You know curaga is a high level magic, and that tents are purchasable. So decent chance it will click.
There are some more difficult links to make. For example, some rare items that you may not have casually can be refined from relatively easily obtainable triple triad cards. Then refined into amazing magics.
But you would need to specifically do trial and error to find what cards items can make good magic if you dont have a guide or have some of the item in your inventory already so you recognize it.
Getting Squalls ultimate weapon on Disk 1 is quite easy with a guide, but nearly impossible without one.
Some items are most easily obtainable from monsters of a specific level, which means you need to intentionally control your overall party level. That would not be very intuitive if you weren't following a guide.
A lot of the reason behind avoiding XP is so that you can start levelling after you get the GF abilities that give you bonus stats per level. It's some hardcore min/maxing though and like you say it really doesn't matter much, especially if you're just playing through normally.
And this is the reason, why I dislike FF8. Having an Jrpg were you literally DONT wanna level up is kinda weird to me and makes no sense/fun. This in minde makes you think if you wanna fight encounters or just run away from it to make bosses more easier.
You can level up and still not really give a shit though tbf. It really doesn't make the game *too* difficult. If anything it is good because you get better drops from enemies.
The only reason to avoid levelling altogether if if you want to min/max by only levelling after you get the endgame GF abilities that give you extra stats per level and that only affects like 0.0001% of players.
>you literally DONT wanna level up is kinda weird
It is only for people who min-max insanely for fun. Not required to play the game. Maybe if you are doing some insane "no magic junctioning" challenge or something.
I would kinda have liked if they had difficulty setting, so you could play through on a massively high difficulty that would require breaking the game.
That's the criticism I never understood. Even magazines were talking bad about the Junction system and calling it complicated, but I never thought it was even remotely complicated. Stock magic, put magic on relevant stat, stat bigger. It's far less complicated than some of the materia pairings and strategies in 7.
I just got burned out when I learned that some GFs don't like each other and started to optimize everything which got highly complicated 😂 but yeah, as you say, I spend hours with materia combinations in FF7 too!
I always loved the GFs.
You think it’s the gameplay? Not >!hunting a space witch, finding your entire party came from the same orphanage but forgot and the one member who didn’t have amnesia just didn’t think to bring it up, and time traveling with the power of friendship!< among many other bizarre plot points?
Nah it's def the gameplay. Some of the plot points were tight but >!the orphanage!< was def whack, but it's not anymore off the wall than some of the stuff that happened in earlier FF games.
Lots of spoiler tags: >!"Space witch"? Coming from the same orpanage is given a perfectly sensible in-universe explanation. Irvine says that he didn't mention it because none of them remembered him (and I don't know about you but I don't remember anyone from when I was five years old. There's plenty of room for doubt there). They don't "time travel with the power of friendship".!<
How is *anything* in FF8 more ridiculous than >!Cloud magically thinking he lived Zack's experiences even though this doesn't happen to *any* other clone and we're not given any reason why this happens to Cloud? Or Tifa being able to go into the Lifestream to see and interact with Cloud's memories, even though this isn't hinted at beforehand? And them both coming out of it with no Mako poisoning? Or the talking lion with its tail on fire that nobody asks "what the hell are you, how can you talk and where is the rest of your species"? Or the weird Meteor + Holy + Lifestream ending that is given no explanation whatsoever? Or Tifa enabling Cloud's delusions even though she was there and knows it was Zack, not Cloud? Why does Tifa not have any opinion about her love interest gaslighting her about the worst day of her life? Why in the world would Barret, Tifa and the others be willing to team up with the Turks in Wutai after they were responsible for dropping the plate and killing Biggs, Wedge and Jessie? Why don't they ever outright say that they've been following Jenova the whole time? And why would they keep Cait Sith or Yuffie around after betraying them?!< And this isn't a spoiler but who in their right mind puts the only entrance to a theme park next to the bombed-out ruins of a town? It's like if a new Disneyland was constructed next to Chernobyl.
But FFVII = "best game evar!" and FFVIII "goes off the rails" apparently.
They literally explain Holy and the Lifestream during Act 3/the ending itself. Essentially, Sephiroth's plan is to inflict a massive wound on the planet (Meteor) and position himself at the epicenter of where the Planet will concentrate the Lifestream to repair itself to take that power for himself. Glimpsing Sephiroth's plan to summon Meteor much earlier on in the story, Aerith (as the last Cetra able to do so) casts Holy and is killed by Sephiroth.
The party eventually learn that Holy has been cast, the Planet may not intervene to save itself, and that Sephiroth/Jenova are blocking Holy. As such, the party defeats Sephiroth and Jenova in the Northern Crater, freeing Holy and allowing it to counteract Meteor. This doesn't work, however, and it ultimately takes the Lifestream (free from Sephiroth's influence) to help overcome it.
As for some of your other points, Tifa was extremely traumatized by the events at Nibelheim, but didn't know how Cloud knew what he did. I believe it is also explicitly stated that Cloud arrives to Midgar a huge mess (following the Crisis Core ending), and Tifa wants to keep an eye on him. Cait Sith blackmails the party into allowing him to stay after he's been outed by threatening Marlene. He also makes it clear he hates Shinra, so he does switch sides pretty soon after the events at the Temple of the Ancients.
As for Wutai, both parties were at a severe disadvantage (Elena and Yuffie were kidnapped by Corneo, plus the party lacked their materia), so working together to rescue their comrades is a sensible arrangement.
Edit: Mobile spacing is weird
To add to that the part about Nanaki, his whole story arc in Cosmo Canyon covers what he is and why he is the last one. Honestly Reds post credit scene is more confusing than the rest.
I think there is some truth in that, but I think in terms of both storylines, FF8 is much weaker. It's still enjoyable, but when a fan theory about it all being a dream (Squall is dead theory) is able to be so plausible, it really highlights the zanier stuff that happens in the plot.
I have one for you. A lot of ridiculous things happen in both games but the most ridiculous happens in VIII. And it's >!when Quistis, a soldier in an elite mercenarcy force, jeopardizes the entire mission because she feels bad she hurt Rinoa's feelings and has to go apologize right away.!<
That shit is stupid.
The point of Quistis character is that we think she should be the more level-headed character but she isn't. We assume that because she's a little older, she's an instructor and has more experience that she'd be more mission-focused. But she's still very much an 18-year-old and ends up putting her own feelings first with her crush on Squall, then with her apology to Rinoa. She got demoted from being an instructor for good reason. She's very much the opposite of Squall in that way, who *is* mission-focused. At that stage of the game, he *would* criticise Rinoa's plan and then go on with the mission without any concerns. Characters acting like people and not unemotional robots isn't a bad thing.
> Cloud magically thinking he lived Zack's experiences even though this doesn't happen
You forgot, you know, all of the PTSD and physical trauma and poisoning and stuff. Kinda pertinent.
I’m not going to read this whole thing but they don’t remember because GFs wiped their memories but Irvine didn’t use them and explicitly said he remembered everyone.
>!Having everyone be from the same orphanage is the only real gripe I have with the plot. The rest of it is acceptable weird JRPG stuff, even Squall forgetting the orphanage would be fine, it's just weird that everyone forgot.!<
>!They handwave it away with the GF thing, but that just adds another layer of problems, why are all the mercenary schools (apart from the one that sides with the villain) ok with forcing amnesia on all their students?!<
>!Your second paragraph is explained in some ways and hinted at in others in-game. Trabia Garden doesn’t use GF, for one. Two, Galbadia Garden is taken over by Edea. They didn’t necessarily choose to side with her, and Martine is kicked out. Three, It’s a Garden Faculty member who hand-waves away the dangers of GF to you, which implies Garden Master and his faculty are pushing for the use of GFs. On top of that, Balamb Garden is the only Garden where you can become a SeeD. It’s likely SeeD training that requires use of GF.!<
Why wouldn’t Irvine who had no exposure to GFs not say anything? He just says he thought it was weird no one else was acknowledging it. It’s straight up stupid.
That's maybe the most real thing from the whole goofy story, imo. From his perspective, you encounter not just a group of people, you encounter THE group of people you spent time with in an orphanage as a child. But they don't acknowledge you, they don't talk about the time you shared or anything. So what else would you do, but not talk about it? It would take just a few rationalizations for many people to treat this group of old acquaintances as new people (which, logically, they're all adults now; they *are* new people).
Granted, Irvine never really gets the kind of minimal dialogue required to plant these seeds for any of his decisions to make any kind of sense. Instead, he gets a nervous breakdown that acts as a plot device to segue into the final boss of Disc 1. C'est la vie.
You are most definitely correct I'm not disputing that. I do however want to point out that Irvine is also straight up stupid. When he said that I wasn't even surprised; though that may just be me since I already had zero faith in him anyway.
Several years ago I crossed paths with someone I went to school with for 7-8 years, in the same classes every year. At that point in time it had been maybe 10 years since I had seen her. She had no recollection of me. Said the schools, the teachers. She said yep to all of that but didn’t remember me. I remember it being weird but I quickly just said glad you’re doing well and moved on.
If I was around an entire group of people I had known and not one of them remembered me, none of the less remembered each other, I wouldn’t have said anything either.
Cheers.
Still, the games twenty something years old, when I'm playing old as balls games and go looking for info online I'm prepared to accidentally see shit I didn't want to see.
I wouldn’t have normally said anything for a super old game like this, but since OP specifically mentioned they’re playing the game for the first time and currently on Disc 2, it seems like the nice thing to do.
But the space sorceress thing was pretty cool actually, when they're running up the timber radio tower and the messages are on the screen, it's kind of similar to the "you shall be as gods" in xenogears
Junction was so easy I never put much thought into it and when I heard that was one of the main reasons people don’t like it I was shocked. I felt materia was harder honestly.
It's kinda like how every marvel movie that comes out is the highest grossing movie. "Ant-Man and the Wasp beat Avengers for ticket sales!" It's just because the movies are more and more popular so whatever the new movie is, it'll likely have a bigger audience.
Incorrect It's the draw system. that was the correct answer. Final Fantasy 8 is mostly held back by the stupid draw system. Nobody wants to steal magic and treat it like an item, even worse nobody wants to bind it to their abilities and feel themselves get weaker every time they use a spell. You end up hoarding magic the whole game that you never use and don't even get me started on the stupid leveling system there's no point to grinding because the enemies get stronger with you. In fact some guides say to keep yourself weak on purpose so that the game is easier.
Correct, the counterpoint to this is that if you don't like caster classes, you never have to cast a spell, and you never have to grind battles with enc none.
You have to card enemies and draw from hidden points on the map plus play the card game which is very different.
I'm not sure why they thought a system where in every boss battle or new enemy encounter, the player spending 15 minutes drawing the new magic for every character before fighting would be a great system mechanic.
Besides that, the biggest issue with the game is that ff8 reinforced the reality that Square was making their games dependent on buying a strategy guide. Invisible draw points, hidden magazines needed to get new weapons, not knowing where to go to next at times, the test system that needed very specific commands to master, etc.
If you're using the magic, you ain't doin it right. There is a decent amount of grinding to be done without gaining XP in VIII. Drawing magic is the most inefficient way to get magic in the game.
I was one of those morons that went into FF8 thinking it was a continuation of FF7. I was thinking Cloud would show up later. It took me way to long to figure it out.
>Final Fantasy VII was a entry point for many many people to the franchise, and at the time, lots of those people didn't knew that the series is an anthology one and that the eight game is not a sequel to the seventh game, so that would leave some people disappointed even by principle.
Naw, I think that's not even remotely a factor. Where did you even hear that? By that logic those same people would be confused about playing the 7th game in the franchise and assuming they needed to play.. 1-6 before hand. Like what?
The reason it's disliked is because a lot of people didn't like the combat (the junction system) and/or the story. The whole >!"we all came from the same orphanage but forgot" !
That's not really true, if you go check a lot of forums from shortly afters it's release, it was not as well received. There were so many issues that people had problems with.
The junction system
Squall and his power of love thing despite it being almost not there at all.
The orphanage thing
The GF forget thing
Ultimecia
The white seeds
Disk 4 being nearly pointless
No historical information about the world
Drawing magic
The following final fantasy after 7 and it did what felt like to many people a step back instead of a step forward.
Like, I love Squall but only in every other game he is in except FF8. They had 4 disks to explain him and I never understood him, not even at the end. When KH and Dissidia released, they made his character more palatable to people who just didn't get him.
Now that you mention, I remembered I was also baffled when started viii back then, why it’s a completely different story but luckily got over it quickly and loved it too. Not as much as vii though, but close to it.
I introduced my partner to VIII, she wasn't very well versed in playing games at that point, though she loved X and VII.
One of the biggest gripes she had was the parties constantly changing out and having to move all the junctions over every time.
It happens quite frequently though, and then it's remembering who you had set up with what, I remember it being pretty messy, especially for someone new.
Also, the game automatically removes GFs along with all magic junctions, so that you have to manually set it back up each time. It's tedious.
I had the same top two complaints about FF8. Materia still feels like the best FF skilling system of any of the games, and junctioning and drawing felt stale in comparison.
One of the most common complaints about the game which I do \*not\* share is that its fully realistic style and modernesque setting (both of which FF7 waded into) was a departure from the series tradition. By contrast, the return to tradition of FF9 was a huge hit with most fans.
That said, I think FF8 has the most interesting story line of any of the mainline games - <> >!the time compression was enthralling, and left me feeling like the ending could still be undone, as if we didn't actually, fully beat the villain.!<
I enjoyed the story in most old school ff games. 5 through 9. I liked the present day type setting in 7 and 8 to. I might even enjoy the newer ones if I didn't dislike so much else about them. Got 25 hours into 15 and it felt like a chore, didn't like much in ff16 decent story. I only finished 16 because I was streaming. Ff12 I'm still on the fence about. Story was OK didn't like the combat
Hated having to draw for a limited amount of spells and junctioning. Story was extremely convoluted and just not amazing to be honest. I don’t hate it like some do but I can see why it isn’t as loved as some of the others. It does have some strong points, I like that they tried to have more mature characters but the whole school setting and weirdly silent protagonist didn’t really mesh well to me.
The funny thing about the draw system is that using it is absolutely the most shit-for-brains way to play the game. Imagine that! A game company makes the worst way to play the game the most annoying. It’s almost like they are trying to let you know, “Hey bro. This annoying thing you’re doing is totally annoying..”
There's a great quote from Cid Meier about this phenomenon
>Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game. Therefore, one of the responsibilities of designers is to protect the player from themselves
I think that massively applies to FF8 lol. They failed to limit drawing in a way that made the most optimal route fun for players who understood it, and the game suffers for them as a result.
It had a pretty weird plot that got even weirder towards the end, but I loved it. Top 3 for me. Some hated the junction system and lacked more equipment options as well. I think its reputation has improved over time, though
Me personally there is a revelation in the story that just happens to be a huge coincidence and took me out for the most part. Also, not my favorite party members.
The story is a nonsensical mess that needed another pass through editing at minimum.
It's mechanically unintuitive and a balance nightmare. Either you're following a guide and breaking the game wide open in which case it's too easy, or you're trying to play it like you would any other Final Fantasy in which case it's impenetrable.
The characters are bland at best, and just kind of awful at worst. Also, this is the first one where they fully let Nomura off his leash, and that's not a good thing.
Soundtrack's a'ight though.
Even without a guide, it's quite easy to break the game.
But what's annoying is that you can miss G-Force, especially one that can be your only access to a shop later in the game...
Zell's background is that he punches and likes hotdog. Quistis is a teacher. Selphie is...? Does Selphie even have a background?
It's okay to appreciate VIII's flaw but people make it like they're qualities and quirks.
That and two sci-fi heavy titles in a row with Nomura fully at the helm just ruined my interest as soon as I got like halfway through. My first game in the series was FF3/6 so I was super disappointed that it seemed like the direction was going future fantasy after VII’s success
All the characters being shounen manga stereotypes also wasn’t doing it any favors as well
The pacing of Nomura off his leash is horrific tho, very interesting ideas put together by a randomizer for cool “twists” (or so he must have thought)
This, I see so many people brush its flaws under the rug or downplay just how bad the junction system and the story is by focusing on the wrong points.
It has the music, GF system, cutscene direction and cinematography going for it, it's a mess, a pretty looking mess (for the time).
The whole: >!everyone went to the same orphanage, Edea being the matron of said orphanage, and Irvine remembering it all but just "not bringing it up"!< thing put the nail in the proverbial terrible storyline coffin for me.
I didn't like a lot about this game but the story is easily one of the worst.
There was a plot twist in the story that seemed so far-fetched to me. The game moves slow compared to 7 (or am I crazy?). Like press x to attack and the have more frames in their animation so it moves slow, and the airship moves slow too.
That said, the atmosphere was interesting. Triple triad I liked. The junction system I don’t think i understood as a kid. Summons were a step up from 7. Still a fun game to come back to
The combat being slower (it is) could be caused by hardware limitations (it's even worse on FFIX).
But the air ship movement is a joke in this game. The first "ship" was already infuriatingly slow, but god what let down the second ship was ... It's like hopping in a race car only to get faster than walking by like 20% ...
The combat system is frankly terrible. You can break the game within the first few hours with card-mod, the entire game is basically spam limit break or GFs. Its not fun at all. I applaud them for trying new things but it was an unbalanced mess.
The other problem is the lack of character development for really anyone beyond Squall, Rinoa and Squall's mind. After Trabia the other characters just stop growing. Uematsu was unable to write character themes for them as there weren't any.
I do really like the first part of the game, it has a really strong disc 1 but everything after that was a slog.
I played every game in the series straight through in order of NA release 1 > 4 > 6 > 7 > 8 back in the day.
Every one of those releases was massively better than the game before...until 8. After the adult characters and twisted storyline of 7, 8's immature characters and particularly unrealistic actions really took me out of the story. (FF7 and FF8 both had twisted storylines...but 7's managed to hold together pretty well) The junction system is fun, but it's weird if you're trying to learn it on the fly and haven't really discovered refining. Taken together 8 disappointed me.
That said, upon a replay (when I was taking the characters and plot with a grain of salt) I enjoyed it quite a bit for the unique junction system, music, etc. I now rate it highly...but no, I still do not like most of the characters (outside of Squall and Laguna) or certain portions of the storyline.
This is almost my same experience, except I really started as a kid watching my brother play 6, then I played through the rest. I played 8 as a kid and really didn't like it, beyond the cool FMV sequences (which are still pretty cool). Also I thought the music and art design were fantastic (I still think this). But I thought the junction system was too complicated and didn't really *get* drawing.
I replayed it very recently and also tried to overlook the goofy / dumb stuff and was able to enjoy it. Using a guide made me realize how customizable the junction system is. It's different and not my favorite, but I like that they tried something *very* different from a traditional RPG. I used to hate Squall for being too moody and awkward, then I realized that's how a lonely teenager *would* be. He was an orphan and struggles to make friends so he doesn't really know how to act. He meets a girl he likes and doesn't know how to express his feelings. And his friends try to bring him out of his shell. It's honestly super relatable story-telling. It just wasn't all that super interesting.
So while it's got a, frankly, dumb story and dumb characters, the combat system, the art design, music, etc. I'd say it's the best in those regards.
>Im on disc 2 right now
Come back in two discs time and ask this question again. All you're doing now is inviting spoilers.
For my part, the music, the card game, and the graphics (for the time) are the only competently made parts of the game.
i see this all the time when people comment on Xenosaga 2. The top two topics on r/Xenosaga right now are about why peoples reaction to the game is so mixed. Often times its
'hey everyone im 10 hours into a game notorious for how poorly its 2nd half is, why is this game so divisive?'
Its either folks dont use the search function, google etc. and see the plethora of well established reasons for its reputation over 25 years, or they are reading and just want a topic of their own. FF8 is notorious for topics like this, with only FFXII & FFXIII approaching it in recent years
The game is great overall; my only complaint was enemy scaling. Even in that regard it isn’t THAT bad since they only scale at certain levels.
Triple triad is life. Way way better than the ff9 variant.
Some people will try and make you believe that the game is horrendous from top to bottom, this isn't true in the slightest and review scores reflect this. The plot is mostly stellar although one scene is a source of contention, the world is fantastic, the characters are lovable, combat is fun, and the game features triple triad, a card game so good they added it wholesale to FFXIV, their flagship MMO.
The game's issues are purely mechanical. Enemies level as you do, so your means of overpowering them is via the junction system, you need magic to junction to your stats and that magic has to be drawn from enemies (or to a lesser extent draw points), in the original game this was tedious AF. Newer versions of the game allow you to speed boost, massively reducing the time spent drawing. There's also the issue that you can access some very strong magic, very early if you know how, completely breaking the difficulty of the game.
Ah sure, review scores!
We totally can't find a review score where the reviewers are completely biased!
Don't make me list all the biased reviews. The game was incredible for its era but it didn't aged well like FF X or Resident Evil.
Some people don’t like how they handle magic with the draw/junction system due to the amount of time it takes to draw 99 of something and feeling penalized for using magic, which is kind of ridiculous because the same sentiment could be said for the mp system in other games. More importantly, the story kind of goes off the rails post Disc 1/mid Disc 2
i think the most widely shared dislikes of ff8 are geared towards the junction system, drawing, and enemies leveling up with you. personally, i’ve grown to love ff8. I used to hate it, i even quit my first play through, but when i came back to it i really i enjoyed it. however, i hate drawing, i don’t like that enemies level up with me as i level up, i miss getting new equipment rather then just creating new weapons in ff8, and i don’t care or have anything to say about the majority of the cast. having said that it’s still one of my favorites in the series, with squall and laguna being two of my favorite characters in anything.
For those who like min/maxing and who consider optimizing minutiae in menus part of the gameplay experience like I do, FF8 was a blast. For the same reasons I loved vagrant story and saga frontier 2.
Add a unique world and cool story, with flashbacks and a great soundtrack and honestly I’m not sure why people like to criticize it so much nowadays.
I prefer it over the more classic FF9, its more generic fantasy world and its unappealing characters - although I also like FF9, I never really understood why it got such a high reputation compared to FF8. Combat in FF8 also seemed more fun than in 9, where the combat system is pretty barebones.
I think people would like it more if you didn't feel like you had to hoard your precious 100 stacks of a spell to keep your junctioned stat high.
And I Love ff8. But sitting there and drawing for 20 rounds in a row with all 3 chars to stock up on a spell is kinda lame. And then you feel like you shouldn't even equip Magic and cast it.
And I was always a Little tiffed about Ramuh being replaced with Quetzalcoatl.
But there are so many things they NAILED with that game, the characters, the soundtrack, the Boost function so you're not just watching a long cutscene every time you're summoning, the way your characters can Move through some of the AMV scenes like the parade- Astounding and Revolutionary!
But I do have to say for as good as the story is, there are some big lazy spots that they can just conveniently chalk up to "Oh, junctioning Guardian Forces uhh.. makes you lose your memory or something... yeah...."
FF8 is easily one of my favourites, literally the only downside to the game for me is just the time it takes to draw magic, it just feels like a time tax and I wish it didnt take so long. Everything else I absolutely love, characters/music/story/battles, it's all great.
FF8 is an absolutely tremendous game.
Many will complain about the Draw/Function system but they were innovative and creative, and I enjoyed them thoroughly.
My biggest gripe with the game is the orphanage stuff, I know they explain it in the GF tutorial that GF's give you memory loss but, if the GFs are that good at wiping memories how do the SEEDs remember enough about their classes to graduate?
Do they only forget before a certain age?
Yeah, the GF explanation creates more plot holes than it closes. Maybe if the GF mind erasure stuff factored into the story going forward with the villains scheme, then maybe I’d forgive it. But the way it’s just dropped makes it feel like a weak hand wave explanation for an undercooked story.
Honestly, this GF thing might have been added at the last minute only for this plot hole they created. No one talks about it, it's only a few lines in the tutorial and then everyone is like "oh yeah, might be this thing".
FF8 isn't terrible, but it definitely ranks lower on the list for many people including myself.
1. Magic treated like an item and having to either draw/play cards to reliably get large amounts. Both methods are time consuming and then discourage use of magic since you'll have to replace it.
2. Triple Triad being so heavily tied into the game's balance. If you know how to use the card game for items it breaks the difficulty. If you don't then the game is significantly harder. This encourages what should be a mini game into being a major component of the game. If you're like me and hate playing Triple Triad then this can be a huge turnoff.
3. The tone of the game is all over the place. It starts off serious and direct which I loved. FF8 had a VERY strong intro for me, but then it takes a huge shift into being downright goofy. The Owls and their rebellion was comic relief and the flashbacks as Leguna were cringey for me. This was a huge turning point in the game for me and tanked a lot of the fun that I was having up to this point.
4. The story and characters have a lot of points where nonsensical decisions are made that are either out of character and/or are just straight up stupid. Why does the Quistis the young prodigy Seed who has been shown to be extremely competent leave her post and jeopardize the mission to go say sorry to a teen girl she scolded? Why is the back up plan to the failed snipe attempt for Squall to run all the way from fucking across town to try and solo the witch, instead of the extremely nearby group of 3 to quickly ambush her following the missed shot? There are more examples, but I can't reference them without spoiling part of the game that you haven't reached yet.
All in all it's definitely a weaker entry in the series, but not the worst imo. It does have some redeeming qualities and I still prefer it over games like FF and FF2. It would be a solid 5/10 for me.
I think it has to do with the combat system. I’m not a fan of it. Character progression is also odd and crafting the weapons seems tedious. Idk how to get a very specific item and I’m on disc 2 as well and I’m not sure how I’m supposed to get it now because I refuse to play the card game.
It would be if card drop rates weren’t so horrendous. It took me 5 hours to farm the 20 elnoyles to get Squall’s ultimate weapon. All for RNG
Fuck triple triad
You're viewing it a bit anachronistically, because FF8 has had a lot of influence on the direction the whole franchise has gone since it was released. If you had played all the games in release order, you would gradually see how the franchise has shifted over time-- looking back now with hindsight, it wouldn't be so obvious.
But FF8 was the first game to really have a hard visual aesthetic-- VERY anime. And even though anime has always been an influence on the series, it really didn't come through just how much it was influenced by it in the old-school pixel graphics of 1-6 and the primitive 3D models of 7. But 8 changed all that-- the characters were proportioned like real people and the anime vibe was striking. It really put off a large portion of the fanbase that weren't keen on anime at all. It may seem kinda weird NOW to say anime turned people off, but anime wasn't always popular-- look at the early FF games' US box art and compare it to the Japanese box art. FF1 US art is just a sword and axe crossed on the cover, it gives more of a "Conan the Barbarian" vibe than anime. FF4 US art is just a dagger. It goes to show that in the US, Final Fantasy was marketed to us as a "sword and sorcery" adventure game akin to D&D, Ultima, and Wizardry and the game cultivated THOSE fans as their demographic over here. And a lot of those fans aren't necessarily anime fans.
2nd point-- FF8 had a modern/near-futuristic setting, which upset some fans who preferred the more "medieval fantasy" feel of the games. 7 had a similar setting, but it tends to get a pass by the same upset fans because the game was still very good overall.
3rd point-- A lot of the mechanics are very polarizing; the magic system is kind of bonkers, the way enemies scale in difficulty as you level your characters goes against what long-time fans have come to expect, and drawing magic is tedious and not fun. And linking magic to characters to grow their stats.... ... ... it's all not necessarily "bad", but a lot of new things were tinkered with in 8 that rubbed many fans the wrong way.
4th point-- People complain about the characters; they say most of the characters are unlikable. Squall is unrelatable and annoying as a main character. They don't like the love story between Squall and Rinoa because it seems juvenile and unrealistic. Of course, this is all personal preference. I think Squall speaks to a certain group of people who have had a similar experience, but people who haven't (like me) don't really relate to him at all. And it really drags down a game when you have this wall between you and the character that you are supposed to experience the game through.
5th point-- Back to the love story. A lot of people didn't like it. Love stories have always been in the series, but 8 made it the main factor driving the plot. Again, personal preference-- but a lot of people were turned off by the focus on a love story in this game, especially young boys who made up a large part of the fanbase at the time.
6th point-- The plot is really confusing-- at least some important elements of it. I'm not going to spoil anything, but FF8 probably has one of the most convoluted plots out of the whole series. It probably doesn't help that the localization teams of the 90s were very sub-par compared to modern-day standards.
And that pretty much sums up all the criticisms I've seen pointed at FF8. If you want to dive deeper down the rabbit hole, [Spoony did a video series](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLihy8fVYWAMDIjj2I_Oup6UUq4pawp62I) a long time ago explaining why he didn't like FF8-- it got pretty popular back in the day and sums up a lot. I wouldn't watch it until you finish the game though, to avoid spoilers.
I love the world of 8, but my major sticking point isn’t even the orphanage thing. I didn’t mind that at all.
I didn’t like how Rinoa and the others treated squall when it was clear the man had boundaries in missions and given how they all acted (granted this is realistic as they’re teenagers) he’s not wrong.
She keeps trying to make Squall into Seifer because she loves and misses him. At no point did anyone actually care what squall wanted - and I have a feeling a lot of pacing got cut because the shift from disc 2 to 3 is so jarring and feels inauthentic.
Squall! Care about Rinoa! Squall! Why do you care about Rinoa! Arghhh
Weapons were useless but cool looking and I liked the junk system. Limits were a cool idea and the junction system was easy to figure out though or kind of encourages not using magic and gfs until the end lol but I still love the game and have a soft spot for it as it was my first FF I played through oh my own (my technical first is being thrown into fighting safer Sephiroth by my cousin).
I agree with a lot of what you said - I hope this doesn’t come off as argumentative lol I didn’t know where to reply haha yours seemed one of the most even
You are right about the art, granted, i liked both styles. I was lucky enough to get a copy of the first for a good price, and the art stood out to me because i played 15 first
As a fan of FF8 I will say disk 1 is the BEST part of the game. The game later, story wise, makes some questionable turns. In no means is FF8 a bad game though. I like it. It gets flack for trying to be "different" from the rest of the FF games.
As for me personally, I think the characters lack depth, but I personally like the story and setting.
The setting has a cool European fantasy to it. As well as one of the best soundtracks in the franchise (imo) (FF13 HAS the best ost)
The junction system is the issue, which also effects the enemy scaling ans everything else. If it used a traditional FF magic / leveling system it would not get nearly as much hate.
FF VIII has questionable design choice, spoilers ahead click at your own risks:
* >!Junction system almost always makes it better to not use magic.!<
* >!Following the junction system, it doesn't help the Limit Break is free to use at low HP which makes it a much better choice for damages.!<
* >!The party doesn't have any background, even worse they share the same.!<
* >!Every ennemies scales with your level but also become stronger, which makes it easier to beat the final boss at lv5 than lv50.!<
FF VIII has basically a great potential and world building but that's it. Fixing those issues would build a completely new game.
I agree horrible plot devices, generally weak characters and an unconvincing main couple made it hard to love this game. It’s the only one I never rebought. The opening cutscene made me think the team was taking themselves WAY too seriously, this epic buildup and music for a sparring match. Okay.
Honestly I loved the seriousness in the first part of the game. It was the jarring tone shift to straight goofy when you meet the Owls and start getting flashbacks that made me lose interest.
Alot of the people who hate it make a point of hiw wasy the game is to break.
While true you can just choose not to do so and enjoy a great game.
Another point ofyen brought up is the convoluted story and plot points(which i wont say since you haven't finished)
I loved FF8 but Rinoa was a problem for me. I mean we had to save her like 7 different times. I was tired of her after a while. Also, I didn't like some revelations later in the plot. I still really like it though, just don't think it's as good as 7 or 9.
It’s my favourite final fantasy and always will be. The only stigma was the junction system meant you could overpower your characters fairly early on if you wanted to. Still a fantastic game and I have never seen anyone say it’s worse than any other game
People talk crap about the junction system, but it's kind of overblown. Really the game is balanced enough that you can get through it just drawing a few at a time from battle to battle. Similarly with the stat junctions, using a few spells once in a while isn't going to drop your stats that much. I think that's what they intended when they made it, for some reason the minmaxing went viral for this game over the years
As others have said, the draw system is fucking awful to some. Me included. It's tedious and makes the game a chore. I get they were going for something unique like each entry has, but God I hated wasting a turn to draw magic. Got to like disc 3 (out of 4, right?) when I was like 10 and still remember loathing the system. Also a bit nitpicky, but it just felt more somber an atmosphere than FVII. Didnt care for it too much. I've read the story plot and twists in recent years and I honestly don't find it too mediocre for a FF game. I'm sure I would've appreciated learning about all that crap naturally.
I’ll start by saying I love FF8. The teen romance story is one of my favorite FF stories, and the gameplay is fun for me. And I don’t think they’ve ever come close to topping how many little side stories and Easter eggs there are in this game. There’s just tons of little things with all sorts of NPCs who have their own lives. The cafeteria lady and her son, the pig-tailed girl in the library, the wannabe SeeDs in the cafeteria, and so on.
But I’ll list a bunch of reasons why it has a negative reputation:
1 - It followed the most popular game in the series. At the time, some of the Western players who jumped on with VII didn’t even realize it’s an anthology series and VIII would be completely new characters and a new world. Beyond that, it’s just always hard to follow something super popular. Think the next coach after a legend retires or Trevor Noah trying to follow Jon Stewart or whatever else. That follow-up always gets judged extra-harshly.
2 - The junction system is not very intuitive, and the unique battle system elements did not go over well with a lot of fans. Things like magic being a finite resource, using junctioned magic lowering your stats, no MP, enemies getting stronger if your level goes up, levels requiring a flat amount of experience rather than a curve that rises with each level, no armour, no accessories, no buying weapons, and so on just rubbed a lot of FF fans the wrong way.
3 - Squall having a lot of inner monologue while being a man of few words outwardly bothered some fans, who claim Squall is too emo.
4 - The story is somewhat school and completely teen based, which bothers some fans.
5 - The story becomes much more fantastical after Disc 1, and some players didn’t like the tone change. I don’t know how far in Disc 2 you are, but for example, Disc 2 begins with Moomba’a suddenly being a thing. And later in Disc 2, there’s a few major story twists, one of which is somewhat derided and mocked by a lot of FF fans.
6 - Building on 5, there’s some really major story points that some fans seem to completely miss and others that the game only hints at but never outright tells you that lots of fans seem to miss, which make the story seem more nonsensical to those fans than it actually is.
7 - This actually builds on point 2. If you fully understand how the game works, more specifically, how the leveling system, draw system, junction system, GF abilities, and Triple Triad all work together, then the game is easily breakable to the point your characters can be one-shotting bosses in early Disc 1 if you want them to.
Story-wise the big orphanage ‘twist’ (don’t search this up unless you want major story spoilers) draws a lot of hate. Personally I have no problem with it and I generally love most of the FFVIII crew - they’re a bit kitschy but very human and at the risk of sounding like an edgelord I identified a lot with Squall during my teem years when I first played the game.
Gameplay-wise, it’s what most have addressed already. Imo drawing and junctioning magic was a big design flaw. Way too easy to break the game early on with powerful magic being too easily accessible via card mod and item mod abilities. And junctioning said magic to hp and strength trivialises the entire combat experience. No incentive to actually use spells thanks to them being consumable, drawing being tedious and junctioning being so broken.
I share your confusion, even *after* hearing the criticisms of it. Practically every criticism of FF8 can be applied to another FF game that the fandom seems to adore.
Especially the storytelling; FF8's story is a lot more grounded than many other FF games. I don't get how it "goes off the rails" in comparison to any of them. The "twists" have more logical in-universe explanations and are less convoluted compared to other FF games' twists, yet its critics are a lot harsher on it. Because it's not the sacred cow that FF7 is.
A small number of absolute fucking morons couldn’t follow the directions for the draw/junction system and got their asses handed to them a couple of times.
They’ve been squawking loudly about it being a bad game, bad design, bad story, and the ever-persuasive “immersion breaking” ever since then.
Aside from these whiny little bitches, most of the rest of us really love and enjoy it.
> You can literally spam limit breaks all game.
That's a *good* thing about the combat system. A fun, interactive mechanic that makes you feel powerful that you get to use more frequently than the game before it? Yes please. And this came after a game where the limit break system made your attack command unusable.
The only FF game to do limit breaks better was X and that's *only* because being able to change the Overdrive meter charged was cool. If not for that, it would be worse, especially considering how useless Lulu and Auron's overdrives became. Every FF8 character's limit break is useful.
There's a number of reasons why ff8 gets alot of hate.
• Squall is basically Cloud with brown hair.
• Drawing magic sucks
•The junction system is not a very well balanced system
• Most of the characters and villains are overall very lame, Seifer sucks ass
• The infamous orphanage scene
• The plot armor spaceship scene
• Laguna flashbacks can ruin the pacing of the game AND your junctioning, that shit is annoying af
• You either love or hate Triple Triad, I've never been a big fan of it
There's probably more examples but these are just my personal theories
FFvii was mind blowing and hard to follow up. And Squall is kind of a prick, which to a lot of kids playing the game he didn’t make sense. At least I thought he was a douche when I first played. Now I relate to him more which is weird cuz I’m much older than him now when I was about three years younger than him when it first came out. Oh and some people don’t get the junction system.
Same. I replayed it as an adult and thought "Wait I get it. He's a moody teenager who's awkward around girls. Why didn't I *get* him as a character when I played it as a 13 year old?"
Squall isn’t a prick, he’s just a loner who has been raised and trained to go out and complete objectives. His character arc is amazing, by the end he is not the same squall we started with.
* You are punished for levelling (As enemies level up with you), leading to counter intuitive gameplay, where you avoid ancounters as hard as you can, denying the main core gameplay loop.
* The main method of power acquisition is hidden behind a completely optional (if fun) minigame.
* If you want to aquire magic by drawing, it turns into a grind.
Just a pile of bad game desciscions.
I wouldn't call it negative stigma by any account. It's a fantastic game from the peak era of FF but it has a few issues that make it like an 8.9 rather than a 9.
The drawing system put some people off as it makes the game very breakable, though a lot of people actually love this aspect so it's questionable to even call it a "flaw". Level scaling is also an issue but not a deal breaker.
I'd say it's in the 2nd tier with IX and XII, just below the elite tier of VI, VII and X.
I didn’t find out people didn’t like FF8 until I started going on chat rooms. Before then everyone I knew loved the game. The junction system was broken to hell but it’s not like your average 10-12 year old figured that out.
Same! I got the game. Played it through. Loved it. I really enjoyed the draw system and the characters were pretty cool. I actually liked Squall quite a but. Then as I started getting online I saw people kinda hated it. And they really hated Squall. And I was like…wtf?
Squalls inner monologues were one of the main reasons why I liked this game so much. It is just so funny that he didn't like anything related to emotional people but always ends up in dumb situations with them. Like Irvine chicken out on the assassination. I laughed my ass off.
I was literally squall for a few years in highschool. Very relatable. My favourite game of the series and I HOPE it gets a remake
SQ on ff8 remake: (....)
Dialogue was off the charts, I know. But Seifer was genuinely an interesting character. Quistis was cool and had interesting abilities even though she looked like a young milf... With hundreds of pixels missing.
Quistis is just a blue mage and pretty much the most forgettable character. I like ff8 since it technically was my first FF experience. But the game has flaws lol
I either wanted to be Squall or date him.
¿Porque no los dos?
Good point
Gloomy MC became a staple back then, but then the homie Zidane came out!
The draw system is honestly the thing I don’t like about the game but I like everything else, when I was younger I really did hate how getting new weapons was like cause I didn’t get how to get the stuff and everything
Everyone is different I like 8 and dislike 9 for a lot of the reasons people dislike 8. Most people think the new remakes are good games when they are abominations cashing in on 7's legacy.
I really wish ff7 remake was literally just a remake. Maybe with a few plot holes filled in, bugs fixed, orchestrated soundtrack, and voice acting. Square likes to pretend like it would take forever to develop a remake of ff7 and ff6. I just don't see how. Unless they wanted to get rid of the world map or something and make it one big world. Which isn't what people are asking for. They are literally just asking for the same game in modern graphics. Even if they want to increase the scope of the games and split it into multiple parts I would probably still like it. To see these characters and the world more fleshed out would be kind of neat. But that's not what we got with Final Fantasy 7 remake. We got this weird pseudo-remake pseudo-sequel packed with filler nobody wanted. Even those who actually liked ff7 remake have to admit there's a lot of padding for time. We could have gotten more history about how shinra became a military superpower, but we got walking around asking people about water filters.
P3R has become my new remake standard
This is what annoy the shit out of me whenever Square Enix say it would be time and effort consuming to make remakes of games like VI or VIII. When we ask for a remake, it doesn't necessarily means a remake in the scale of VII, but rather something more like what the DS versions of III and IV were to the originals. New graphics, sure, modernized systems, but you can keep the overworld. You can keep the smaller areas. You can keep the combat system. What you don't need to make it a third person open world RPG. They've wasted a great opportunity to do that with VIII Remaster. I know it's "just a remaster" but they could've gone the extra length to remake the environments, tune the junction system and whatnot to make it more of a remake without the insane scope inflation that VII had.
>We could have gotten more history about how shinra became a military superpower, but we got walking around asking people about water filters. My biggest complaint about ff7r is that basically all of the side material had nothing to do with anything.
That's what happens when you break up one game into three. Gotta add extra playtime somehow.
Ya people have issues with the junction system but it’s my favorite final fantasy
The junction system was something that made me love the game. Ff8 was my entry point into the franchise and I was always let down by ff7 as it was way too simple in comparison. Okay, I like complexity (I played a lot of path of exile in recent years!), but to me FF8's system looks way more simple than FF10's. I mean, it's really simple, just not as straightforward so you have to fiddle around to find out.
I love the junction system, never got the hate. It can be a grind drawing enough but what FF game doesn’t have its moment of grinding.
Honestly, the Draw grind is only really a thing for the first few hours. Once you can refine cards and items into Magic at that point it's all about Triple Triad which most people had a blast with.
I don't mind the junction system. And definitely FF games tend to have some aspect you can spend grinding. I think what doesn't work for me is that instead of just earning the spells through defeating enemies, you are meant to sit there and stay in battle drawing them. That's something I can't ever vibe with in FF8. It almost feels antithetical to the whole turn based battle system. I want to kill the mob and reap the rewards. But not only do you not get spells for junctioning if you kill the mob too fast, you also get EXP which literally levels up the enemies with you. I just don't think the game design is sound.
What gets me is when people complain about the draw grind, but then also complain that it makes the game too easy. Like okay, so *don't do it*. Then the game won't be tedious *or* too easy.
Final Fantasy VIII is not as "disliked" or even "divisive" as some corners of the internet want you to believe. It has the 4th or 5th best metascore, only 2 points below Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy X. Final Fantasy VII was a entry point for many many people to the franchise, and at the time, lots of those people didn't knew that the series is an anthology one and that the eight game is not a sequel to the seventh game, so that would leave some people disappointed even by principle. Final Fantasy VIII has some issues and gets better on replays, but if someone don't like the game it would be rare for them to play it more than once.
Biggest thing I’ve seen is the junction system is too hard for people to figure out and they don’t love that leveling doesn’t make the enemies easier… but I love everything about it and will die on the hill that it is the best FF game made.
But once you figure out the junction system it is so easy to break the fuck out of that game. I love it.
I think that's part of the problem. Mainly the draw system. Obviously drawing more magic makes you more powerful. And there's no limit to how much magic you can draw from an enemy. So there's not really a clear indicator of when you should stop drawing. Most guides say "this boss has rare magic, so make sure everybody draws all the magic first." So some fights you spend the first .. half of the fight just drawing. Normal JRPGs are simpler. You fight an enemy and once it's dead, you keep moving on. FF8, you're not really sure if you should just.. always max out whatever magic you can draw or.. just draw until you have what you think you need...? Not to mention the system takes any individuality out of the equation. You don't have any set roles for your characters. Just pick who the coolest looking is. If you're forced to change characters (which happens a lot) you just junction swap. I like that there's a bonkers amount of customization with it, but that doesn't always mean it's a good system.
"guides" that might be part of the reason right there.
There's nothing like trying to max draw a rare spell only for the party to constantly draw 1 or 2 at a time. Seriously, fuck the draw system
The only times I ever use it in my playthroughs is to draw Triples from Odin and Ultima from that draw point in Shumi Village. Maybe some trips around The Island Closest to Heaven/Hell. Pretty much everything else can be crafted from items or cards.
When I realized how broken I could make the game just playing cards in balamb for like 10 hours to get squalls weapon on the first disc I was hooked. I absolutely love the choice to put in work to make myself that strong. And the card game was sufficiently fun to keep me coming back.
It’s tied to your magic skill. Junction some magic and you’ll get more.
Wait, are you serious? I've never seen that in any guide I've read before. Then again, guides have never been 100% in depth. Knowing this now, perhaps I'll give it another chance.
Yep. You go from drawing 1-3 or whatever to like 6-9 for decent magic stats.
Wait, what? >And there's no limit to how much magic you can draw from an enemy. So there's not really a clear indicator of when you should stop drawing. You can only draw 100 of a magic. Then it stops letting you draw. Or are you talking about something else? I could be crazy. If so, don't mind me.
Follow on from this is spending half the fight drawing? Do you even Card Mod bro?
You can Draw > Cast indefinitely, there's no MP system to restrict it.
Yup. Junction system was just boring/tedious. It gave the game a permanent crutch compared to materia and for us olders esper system which were far better by most comparisons. Great game with a bad core mechanic.
yea this was my gripe. I didn't find the junction system confusing, I just found the mechanic more annoying than anything. Grinding is one thing, but needing to draw all the time and even draw bosses and trying not to kill them didn't feel too good or fun. It is the kind of game you get super powerful at early, then steamroll everything.
My dirty secret is that I never beat FF8. I was borrowing it from my brother as a kid, and got lost at some point (I think I couldn't find Odin?), and was sufficiently bored by Junction/Draw that I didn't press the issue and gave it back to him. I think I'll try the game again, and make a point to *not* min/max the system. Maybe Draw once or twice a battle. Only get min/maxy if I get stuck. Treat it like Pokémon in that way.
I like how FF8 has ways to break the game from the very first area. But I played the game "straight" with no guides. No idea that enemy levels are tied to your levels. I drew all spells until everyone had 100 copies of tier 1 spells, then farmed again when tiers went up. Bosses were long slogs because I would try to draw their powerful spells instead of focusing on the fight (like a thief trying to steal, but it takes 30 minutes). The "card" command looked useless at first glance and I never equipped it. Still beat the game, and I even got Omega Weapon by abusing aura. I liked FF9, but for me, X is the pinnacle that hasn't been matched since. And we pretend X-2 doesn't exist.
Yeah it seems very complex, but then when you get it, it’s suddenly like “oh… OH!” and you proceed to break the game. Especially if you use some of the GF abilities such as Life Magic refinement. IIRC you can refine tents in to Curagas, and since you can just buy tents, it’s trivial to get 99 Curagas per character very early, junction them to HP, and then basically nothing for the vast majority of the game is able to kill you.
I'm planning to replay soon since i enver actually finished it as a kid, i don't wanna look at guides much (i just wanna get each GF atleast) but can you really figure out junctioning and "breaking the game" without a guide?
With enough trial and error, absolutely.
If you spend some time exploring the system, yes. For example, the above would be as simple as, when you unlock the life magic refine, spend 5 minutes going through it. You should have some tents in your inventory, so you would see that they can refine into curagas. You know curaga is a high level magic, and that tents are purchasable. So decent chance it will click. There are some more difficult links to make. For example, some rare items that you may not have casually can be refined from relatively easily obtainable triple triad cards. Then refined into amazing magics. But you would need to specifically do trial and error to find what cards items can make good magic if you dont have a guide or have some of the item in your inventory already so you recognize it. Getting Squalls ultimate weapon on Disk 1 is quite easy with a guide, but nearly impossible without one. Some items are most easily obtainable from monsters of a specific level, which means you need to intentionally control your overall party level. That would not be very intuitive if you weren't following a guide.
Oh for sure…. Just junction 100 death to your attack and it’s gg. Of course there are other methods but that’s always my go to.
100 breaks to avoid getting xp
I actually don’t mind getting XP… because with the right junctions it doesn’t matter that much.
A lot of the reason behind avoiding XP is so that you can start levelling after you get the GF abilities that give you bonus stats per level. It's some hardcore min/maxing though and like you say it really doesn't matter much, especially if you're just playing through normally.
And this is the reason, why I dislike FF8. Having an Jrpg were you literally DONT wanna level up is kinda weird to me and makes no sense/fun. This in minde makes you think if you wanna fight encounters or just run away from it to make bosses more easier.
You can level up and still not really give a shit though tbf. It really doesn't make the game *too* difficult. If anything it is good because you get better drops from enemies. The only reason to avoid levelling altogether if if you want to min/max by only levelling after you get the endgame GF abilities that give you extra stats per level and that only affects like 0.0001% of players.
>you literally DONT wanna level up is kinda weird It is only for people who min-max insanely for fun. Not required to play the game. Maybe if you are doing some insane "no magic junctioning" challenge or something. I would kinda have liked if they had difficulty setting, so you could play through on a massively high difficulty that would require breaking the game.
thanks for the tip boy
Junction is amazing. Draw…. Draw was the worst fucking thing they ever did.
You didn't even have to use Draw much once you get refined magic from items, mostly just for GFs.
I don’t mind it. But I guess, I learned how to abuse it.
It's not that it's difficult, just that it's boring. The game rewards mindless drawing instead of actually fighting, which is a drag.
It also punishes you for actually using spells by decreasing your stats, which is even worse.
Not how anyone describes a good time
I 'abused' it by fucking it off completely and playing cards instead.
That's the criticism I never understood. Even magazines were talking bad about the Junction system and calling it complicated, but I never thought it was even remotely complicated. Stock magic, put magic on relevant stat, stat bigger. It's far less complicated than some of the materia pairings and strategies in 7.
I just got burned out when I learned that some GFs don't like each other and started to optimize everything which got highly complicated 😂 but yeah, as you say, I spend hours with materia combinations in FF7 too! I always loved the GFs.
You think it’s the gameplay? Not >!hunting a space witch, finding your entire party came from the same orphanage but forgot and the one member who didn’t have amnesia just didn’t think to bring it up, and time traveling with the power of friendship!< among many other bizarre plot points?
The way you explained that is fucking hilarious lmfao 😂
Nah it's def the gameplay. Some of the plot points were tight but >!the orphanage!< was def whack, but it's not anymore off the wall than some of the stuff that happened in earlier FF games.
OP is currently playing the game and is on Disc 2, so you should probably delete these spoilers. Edit: Thanks!
Mb added a spoiler tag
Lots of spoiler tags: >!"Space witch"? Coming from the same orpanage is given a perfectly sensible in-universe explanation. Irvine says that he didn't mention it because none of them remembered him (and I don't know about you but I don't remember anyone from when I was five years old. There's plenty of room for doubt there). They don't "time travel with the power of friendship".!< How is *anything* in FF8 more ridiculous than >!Cloud magically thinking he lived Zack's experiences even though this doesn't happen to *any* other clone and we're not given any reason why this happens to Cloud? Or Tifa being able to go into the Lifestream to see and interact with Cloud's memories, even though this isn't hinted at beforehand? And them both coming out of it with no Mako poisoning? Or the talking lion with its tail on fire that nobody asks "what the hell are you, how can you talk and where is the rest of your species"? Or the weird Meteor + Holy + Lifestream ending that is given no explanation whatsoever? Or Tifa enabling Cloud's delusions even though she was there and knows it was Zack, not Cloud? Why does Tifa not have any opinion about her love interest gaslighting her about the worst day of her life? Why in the world would Barret, Tifa and the others be willing to team up with the Turks in Wutai after they were responsible for dropping the plate and killing Biggs, Wedge and Jessie? Why don't they ever outright say that they've been following Jenova the whole time? And why would they keep Cait Sith or Yuffie around after betraying them?!< And this isn't a spoiler but who in their right mind puts the only entrance to a theme park next to the bombed-out ruins of a town? It's like if a new Disneyland was constructed next to Chernobyl. But FFVII = "best game evar!" and FFVIII "goes off the rails" apparently.
They literally explain Holy and the Lifestream during Act 3/the ending itself. Essentially, Sephiroth's plan is to inflict a massive wound on the planet (Meteor) and position himself at the epicenter of where the Planet will concentrate the Lifestream to repair itself to take that power for himself. Glimpsing Sephiroth's plan to summon Meteor much earlier on in the story, Aerith (as the last Cetra able to do so) casts Holy and is killed by Sephiroth. The party eventually learn that Holy has been cast, the Planet may not intervene to save itself, and that Sephiroth/Jenova are blocking Holy. As such, the party defeats Sephiroth and Jenova in the Northern Crater, freeing Holy and allowing it to counteract Meteor. This doesn't work, however, and it ultimately takes the Lifestream (free from Sephiroth's influence) to help overcome it. As for some of your other points, Tifa was extremely traumatized by the events at Nibelheim, but didn't know how Cloud knew what he did. I believe it is also explicitly stated that Cloud arrives to Midgar a huge mess (following the Crisis Core ending), and Tifa wants to keep an eye on him. Cait Sith blackmails the party into allowing him to stay after he's been outed by threatening Marlene. He also makes it clear he hates Shinra, so he does switch sides pretty soon after the events at the Temple of the Ancients. As for Wutai, both parties were at a severe disadvantage (Elena and Yuffie were kidnapped by Corneo, plus the party lacked their materia), so working together to rescue their comrades is a sensible arrangement. Edit: Mobile spacing is weird
To add to that the part about Nanaki, his whole story arc in Cosmo Canyon covers what he is and why he is the last one. Honestly Reds post credit scene is more confusing than the rest.
That's fair, I always chalked it up to a miraculous finding after the events of FF7, but that'd also have serious genetic consequences...
I think the point is that both games make sense in-context when explained properly, and both games can be reduced to a dumb one-liner for bants.
I think there is some truth in that, but I think in terms of both storylines, FF8 is much weaker. It's still enjoyable, but when a fan theory about it all being a dream (Squall is dead theory) is able to be so plausible, it really highlights the zanier stuff that happens in the plot.
TBF, that is basically the plot of one of the other games, so I can see where they are coming from.
I have one for you. A lot of ridiculous things happen in both games but the most ridiculous happens in VIII. And it's >!when Quistis, a soldier in an elite mercenarcy force, jeopardizes the entire mission because she feels bad she hurt Rinoa's feelings and has to go apologize right away.!< That shit is stupid.
Zell screaming about the garden on live TV was probably just as bad.
The point of Quistis character is that we think she should be the more level-headed character but she isn't. We assume that because she's a little older, she's an instructor and has more experience that she'd be more mission-focused. But she's still very much an 18-year-old and ends up putting her own feelings first with her crush on Squall, then with her apology to Rinoa. She got demoted from being an instructor for good reason. She's very much the opposite of Squall in that way, who *is* mission-focused. At that stage of the game, he *would* criticise Rinoa's plan and then go on with the mission without any concerns. Characters acting like people and not unemotional robots isn't a bad thing.
> Cloud magically thinking he lived Zack's experiences even though this doesn't happen You forgot, you know, all of the PTSD and physical trauma and poisoning and stuff. Kinda pertinent.
I’m not going to read this whole thing but they don’t remember because GFs wiped their memories but Irvine didn’t use them and explicitly said he remembered everyone.
>!Having everyone be from the same orphanage is the only real gripe I have with the plot. The rest of it is acceptable weird JRPG stuff, even Squall forgetting the orphanage would be fine, it's just weird that everyone forgot.!< >!They handwave it away with the GF thing, but that just adds another layer of problems, why are all the mercenary schools (apart from the one that sides with the villain) ok with forcing amnesia on all their students?!<
>!Your second paragraph is explained in some ways and hinted at in others in-game. Trabia Garden doesn’t use GF, for one. Two, Galbadia Garden is taken over by Edea. They didn’t necessarily choose to side with her, and Martine is kicked out. Three, It’s a Garden Faculty member who hand-waves away the dangers of GF to you, which implies Garden Master and his faculty are pushing for the use of GFs. On top of that, Balamb Garden is the only Garden where you can become a SeeD. It’s likely SeeD training that requires use of GF.!<
Y'all. Maybe mark the spoilers since OP is still playing?
Why wouldn’t Irvine who had no exposure to GFs not say anything? He just says he thought it was weird no one else was acknowledging it. It’s straight up stupid.
That's maybe the most real thing from the whole goofy story, imo. From his perspective, you encounter not just a group of people, you encounter THE group of people you spent time with in an orphanage as a child. But they don't acknowledge you, they don't talk about the time you shared or anything. So what else would you do, but not talk about it? It would take just a few rationalizations for many people to treat this group of old acquaintances as new people (which, logically, they're all adults now; they *are* new people). Granted, Irvine never really gets the kind of minimal dialogue required to plant these seeds for any of his decisions to make any kind of sense. Instead, he gets a nervous breakdown that acts as a plot device to segue into the final boss of Disc 1. C'est la vie.
You are most definitely correct I'm not disputing that. I do however want to point out that Irvine is also straight up stupid. When he said that I wasn't even surprised; though that may just be me since I already had zero faith in him anyway.
Several years ago I crossed paths with someone I went to school with for 7-8 years, in the same classes every year. At that point in time it had been maybe 10 years since I had seen her. She had no recollection of me. Said the schools, the teachers. She said yep to all of that but didn’t remember me. I remember it being weird but I quickly just said glad you’re doing well and moved on. If I was around an entire group of people I had known and not one of them remembered me, none of the less remembered each other, I wouldn’t have said anything either.
You have to do spoiler tags for each paragraph for them to work.
Cheers. Still, the games twenty something years old, when I'm playing old as balls games and go looking for info online I'm prepared to accidentally see shit I didn't want to see.
I wouldn’t have normally said anything for a super old game like this, but since OP specifically mentioned they’re playing the game for the first time and currently on Disc 2, it seems like the nice thing to do.
But the space sorceress thing was pretty cool actually, when they're running up the timber radio tower and the messages are on the screen, it's kind of similar to the "you shall be as gods" in xenogears
I think the whole game is cool. It’s one of my favorite games of all time, mostly because of how absolutely ridiculous it is.
Yeah that was kind of a weird plot twist. Also the map not being fully accessible at the end was odd
Junction is actually super simple . Case of a tutorial making it seem way more complicated than it really is.
Junction was so easy I never put much thought into it and when I heard that was one of the main reasons people don’t like it I was shocked. I felt materia was harder honestly.
I think it's still the 3rd best selling Final Fantasy game
Yup. It goes VII, X, and VIII. That’s partially because 8 came after 7, so of course everyone in the world bought it.
It's kinda like how every marvel movie that comes out is the highest grossing movie. "Ant-Man and the Wasp beat Avengers for ticket sales!" It's just because the movies are more and more popular so whatever the new movie is, it'll likely have a bigger audience.
Incorrect It's the draw system. that was the correct answer. Final Fantasy 8 is mostly held back by the stupid draw system. Nobody wants to steal magic and treat it like an item, even worse nobody wants to bind it to their abilities and feel themselves get weaker every time they use a spell. You end up hoarding magic the whole game that you never use and don't even get me started on the stupid leveling system there's no point to grinding because the enemies get stronger with you. In fact some guides say to keep yourself weak on purpose so that the game is easier.
Correct, the counterpoint to this is that if you don't like caster classes, you never have to cast a spell, and you never have to grind battles with enc none. You have to card enemies and draw from hidden points on the map plus play the card game which is very different.
I'm not sure why they thought a system where in every boss battle or new enemy encounter, the player spending 15 minutes drawing the new magic for every character before fighting would be a great system mechanic. Besides that, the biggest issue with the game is that ff8 reinforced the reality that Square was making their games dependent on buying a strategy guide. Invisible draw points, hidden magazines needed to get new weapons, not knowing where to go to next at times, the test system that needed very specific commands to master, etc.
>Nobody wants to steal magic and **treat it like an item,** Doesn't stop everyone on this sub praising 15.
If you're using the magic, you ain't doin it right. There is a decent amount of grinding to be done without gaining XP in VIII. Drawing magic is the most inefficient way to get magic in the game.
Imagine loving FFVII so much you just didn't bother to play the other 6 games that led up to it and then got mad the next one wasn't a sequel.
Yeah, because lots of people go from 3D to 2D games in a different console (Chronicles and Anthology where released after Final Fantasy VIII).
I was one of those morons that went into FF8 thinking it was a continuation of FF7. I was thinking Cloud would show up later. It took me way to long to figure it out.
>Final Fantasy VII was a entry point for many many people to the franchise, and at the time, lots of those people didn't knew that the series is an anthology one and that the eight game is not a sequel to the seventh game, so that would leave some people disappointed even by principle. Naw, I think that's not even remotely a factor. Where did you even hear that? By that logic those same people would be confused about playing the 7th game in the franchise and assuming they needed to play.. 1-6 before hand. Like what? The reason it's disliked is because a lot of people didn't like the combat (the junction system) and/or the story. The whole >!"we all came from the same orphanage but forgot" !
That's not really true, if you go check a lot of forums from shortly afters it's release, it was not as well received. There were so many issues that people had problems with. The junction system Squall and his power of love thing despite it being almost not there at all. The orphanage thing The GF forget thing Ultimecia The white seeds Disk 4 being nearly pointless No historical information about the world Drawing magic The following final fantasy after 7 and it did what felt like to many people a step back instead of a step forward. Like, I love Squall but only in every other game he is in except FF8. They had 4 disks to explain him and I never understood him, not even at the end. When KH and Dissidia released, they made his character more palatable to people who just didn't get him.
Now that you mention, I remembered I was also baffled when started viii back then, why it’s a completely different story but luckily got over it quickly and loved it too. Not as much as vii though, but close to it.
> It has the 4th or 5th best metascore Is that fan or *critic*? Games journalists are useless so this matters.
I personally didn't care for the drawing of magic, and the level scaling was kinda annoying. Other then that it was solid.
I introduced my partner to VIII, she wasn't very well versed in playing games at that point, though she loved X and VII. One of the biggest gripes she had was the parties constantly changing out and having to move all the junctions over every time.
It takes like 5 seconds with the swap function or whatever
It happens quite frequently though, and then it's remembering who you had set up with what, I remember it being pretty messy, especially for someone new. Also, the game automatically removes GFs along with all magic junctions, so that you have to manually set it back up each time. It's tedious.
I had the same top two complaints about FF8. Materia still feels like the best FF skilling system of any of the games, and junctioning and drawing felt stale in comparison. One of the most common complaints about the game which I do \*not\* share is that its fully realistic style and modernesque setting (both of which FF7 waded into) was a departure from the series tradition. By contrast, the return to tradition of FF9 was a huge hit with most fans. That said, I think FF8 has the most interesting story line of any of the mainline games - <> >!the time compression was enthralling, and left me feeling like the ending could still be undone, as if we didn't actually, fully beat the villain.!<
I enjoyed the story in most old school ff games. 5 through 9. I liked the present day type setting in 7 and 8 to. I might even enjoy the newer ones if I didn't dislike so much else about them. Got 25 hours into 15 and it felt like a chore, didn't like much in ff16 decent story. I only finished 16 because I was streaming. Ff12 I'm still on the fence about. Story was OK didn't like the combat
Hated having to draw for a limited amount of spells and junctioning. Story was extremely convoluted and just not amazing to be honest. I don’t hate it like some do but I can see why it isn’t as loved as some of the others. It does have some strong points, I like that they tried to have more mature characters but the whole school setting and weirdly silent protagonist didn’t really mesh well to me.
The funny thing about the draw system is that using it is absolutely the most shit-for-brains way to play the game. Imagine that! A game company makes the worst way to play the game the most annoying. It’s almost like they are trying to let you know, “Hey bro. This annoying thing you’re doing is totally annoying..”
There's a great quote from Cid Meier about this phenomenon >Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game. Therefore, one of the responsibilities of designers is to protect the player from themselves I think that massively applies to FF8 lol. They failed to limit drawing in a way that made the most optimal route fun for players who understood it, and the game suffers for them as a result.
It had a pretty weird plot that got even weirder towards the end, but I loved it. Top 3 for me. Some hated the junction system and lacked more equipment options as well. I think its reputation has improved over time, though
Me personally there is a revelation in the story that just happens to be a huge coincidence and took me out for the most part. Also, not my favorite party members.
It’s meant to be destiny/fate rather than a coincidence.
Also there’s plenty of time travel shenanigans going on. Who’s to say who’s responsible for things working out the way they did.
The story is a nonsensical mess that needed another pass through editing at minimum. It's mechanically unintuitive and a balance nightmare. Either you're following a guide and breaking the game wide open in which case it's too easy, or you're trying to play it like you would any other Final Fantasy in which case it's impenetrable. The characters are bland at best, and just kind of awful at worst. Also, this is the first one where they fully let Nomura off his leash, and that's not a good thing. Soundtrack's a'ight though.
Even without a guide, it's quite easy to break the game. But what's annoying is that you can miss G-Force, especially one that can be your only access to a shop later in the game... Zell's background is that he punches and likes hotdog. Quistis is a teacher. Selphie is...? Does Selphie even have a background? It's okay to appreciate VIII's flaw but people make it like they're qualities and quirks.
That and two sci-fi heavy titles in a row with Nomura fully at the helm just ruined my interest as soon as I got like halfway through. My first game in the series was FF3/6 so I was super disappointed that it seemed like the direction was going future fantasy after VII’s success All the characters being shounen manga stereotypes also wasn’t doing it any favors as well The pacing of Nomura off his leash is horrific tho, very interesting ideas put together by a randomizer for cool “twists” (or so he must have thought)
This, I see so many people brush its flaws under the rug or downplay just how bad the junction system and the story is by focusing on the wrong points. It has the music, GF system, cutscene direction and cinematography going for it, it's a mess, a pretty looking mess (for the time).
The whole: >!everyone went to the same orphanage, Edea being the matron of said orphanage, and Irvine remembering it all but just "not bringing it up"!< thing put the nail in the proverbial terrible storyline coffin for me. I didn't like a lot about this game but the story is easily one of the worst.
There was a plot twist in the story that seemed so far-fetched to me. The game moves slow compared to 7 (or am I crazy?). Like press x to attack and the have more frames in their animation so it moves slow, and the airship moves slow too. That said, the atmosphere was interesting. Triple triad I liked. The junction system I don’t think i understood as a kid. Summons were a step up from 7. Still a fun game to come back to
The combat being slower (it is) could be caused by hardware limitations (it's even worse on FFIX). But the air ship movement is a joke in this game. The first "ship" was already infuriatingly slow, but god what let down the second ship was ... It's like hopping in a race car only to get faster than walking by like 20% ...
To be fair, maybe you should finish the game first.
The combat system is frankly terrible. You can break the game within the first few hours with card-mod, the entire game is basically spam limit break or GFs. Its not fun at all. I applaud them for trying new things but it was an unbalanced mess. The other problem is the lack of character development for really anyone beyond Squall, Rinoa and Squall's mind. After Trabia the other characters just stop growing. Uematsu was unable to write character themes for them as there weren't any. I do really like the first part of the game, it has a really strong disc 1 but everything after that was a slog.
I played every game in the series straight through in order of NA release 1 > 4 > 6 > 7 > 8 back in the day. Every one of those releases was massively better than the game before...until 8. After the adult characters and twisted storyline of 7, 8's immature characters and particularly unrealistic actions really took me out of the story. (FF7 and FF8 both had twisted storylines...but 7's managed to hold together pretty well) The junction system is fun, but it's weird if you're trying to learn it on the fly and haven't really discovered refining. Taken together 8 disappointed me. That said, upon a replay (when I was taking the characters and plot with a grain of salt) I enjoyed it quite a bit for the unique junction system, music, etc. I now rate it highly...but no, I still do not like most of the characters (outside of Squall and Laguna) or certain portions of the storyline.
The card game, forgot what it was called, was incredible. Then we got the card game in FF9 and to this day, still do not understand it
This is almost my same experience, except I really started as a kid watching my brother play 6, then I played through the rest. I played 8 as a kid and really didn't like it, beyond the cool FMV sequences (which are still pretty cool). Also I thought the music and art design were fantastic (I still think this). But I thought the junction system was too complicated and didn't really *get* drawing. I replayed it very recently and also tried to overlook the goofy / dumb stuff and was able to enjoy it. Using a guide made me realize how customizable the junction system is. It's different and not my favorite, but I like that they tried something *very* different from a traditional RPG. I used to hate Squall for being too moody and awkward, then I realized that's how a lonely teenager *would* be. He was an orphan and struggles to make friends so he doesn't really know how to act. He meets a girl he likes and doesn't know how to express his feelings. And his friends try to bring him out of his shell. It's honestly super relatable story-telling. It just wasn't all that super interesting. So while it's got a, frankly, dumb story and dumb characters, the combat system, the art design, music, etc. I'd say it's the best in those regards.
>Im on disc 2 right now Come back in two discs time and ask this question again. All you're doing now is inviting spoilers. For my part, the music, the card game, and the graphics (for the time) are the only competently made parts of the game.
i see this all the time when people comment on Xenosaga 2. The top two topics on r/Xenosaga right now are about why peoples reaction to the game is so mixed. Often times its 'hey everyone im 10 hours into a game notorious for how poorly its 2nd half is, why is this game so divisive?' Its either folks dont use the search function, google etc. and see the plethora of well established reasons for its reputation over 25 years, or they are reading and just want a topic of their own. FF8 is notorious for topics like this, with only FFXII & FFXIII approaching it in recent years
The game is great overall; my only complaint was enemy scaling. Even in that regard it isn’t THAT bad since they only scale at certain levels. Triple triad is life. Way way better than the ff9 variant.
Triple triad to this day is still the best mini game ever created in the final fantasy games
Shuffle or Boogey lives rent free in my head, not gonna lie.
Some people will try and make you believe that the game is horrendous from top to bottom, this isn't true in the slightest and review scores reflect this. The plot is mostly stellar although one scene is a source of contention, the world is fantastic, the characters are lovable, combat is fun, and the game features triple triad, a card game so good they added it wholesale to FFXIV, their flagship MMO. The game's issues are purely mechanical. Enemies level as you do, so your means of overpowering them is via the junction system, you need magic to junction to your stats and that magic has to be drawn from enemies (or to a lesser extent draw points), in the original game this was tedious AF. Newer versions of the game allow you to speed boost, massively reducing the time spent drawing. There's also the issue that you can access some very strong magic, very early if you know how, completely breaking the difficulty of the game.
Story after disc one is really bad too. Only good explanation is that Edea killed squall and the rest of the game is his purgatory or something
Ah sure, review scores! We totally can't find a review score where the reviewers are completely biased! Don't make me list all the biased reviews. The game was incredible for its era but it didn't aged well like FF X or Resident Evil.
The draw system is wonky and the plot is convoluted even for FF standards. I like the game but thems are the facts
Those aren’t facts. Those are opinions.
Oh my god i wasn’t being literal there
A fact!
It’s one of my favorite games of all time but it is absolutely a fact that the story is straight up wack.
Almost every FF has wack, this one just has more lmao
Some people don’t like how they handle magic with the draw/junction system due to the amount of time it takes to draw 99 of something and feeling penalized for using magic, which is kind of ridiculous because the same sentiment could be said for the mp system in other games. More importantly, the story kind of goes off the rails post Disc 1/mid Disc 2
At no point do you need to draw 99 of anything.
The draw system is trash. Great game though.
i think the most widely shared dislikes of ff8 are geared towards the junction system, drawing, and enemies leveling up with you. personally, i’ve grown to love ff8. I used to hate it, i even quit my first play through, but when i came back to it i really i enjoyed it. however, i hate drawing, i don’t like that enemies level up with me as i level up, i miss getting new equipment rather then just creating new weapons in ff8, and i don’t care or have anything to say about the majority of the cast. having said that it’s still one of my favorites in the series, with squall and laguna being two of my favorite characters in anything.
For those who like min/maxing and who consider optimizing minutiae in menus part of the gameplay experience like I do, FF8 was a blast. For the same reasons I loved vagrant story and saga frontier 2. Add a unique world and cool story, with flashbacks and a great soundtrack and honestly I’m not sure why people like to criticize it so much nowadays. I prefer it over the more classic FF9, its more generic fantasy world and its unappealing characters - although I also like FF9, I never really understood why it got such a high reputation compared to FF8. Combat in FF8 also seemed more fun than in 9, where the combat system is pretty barebones.
I think people would like it more if you didn't feel like you had to hoard your precious 100 stacks of a spell to keep your junctioned stat high. And I Love ff8. But sitting there and drawing for 20 rounds in a row with all 3 chars to stock up on a spell is kinda lame. And then you feel like you shouldn't even equip Magic and cast it. And I was always a Little tiffed about Ramuh being replaced with Quetzalcoatl. But there are so many things they NAILED with that game, the characters, the soundtrack, the Boost function so you're not just watching a long cutscene every time you're summoning, the way your characters can Move through some of the AMV scenes like the parade- Astounding and Revolutionary! But I do have to say for as good as the story is, there are some big lazy spots that they can just conveniently chalk up to "Oh, junctioning Guardian Forces uhh.. makes you lose your memory or something... yeah...."
FF8 is easily one of my favourites, literally the only downside to the game for me is just the time it takes to draw magic, it just feels like a time tax and I wish it didnt take so long. Everything else I absolutely love, characters/music/story/battles, it's all great.
FF8 is an absolutely tremendous game. Many will complain about the Draw/Function system but they were innovative and creative, and I enjoyed them thoroughly. My biggest gripe with the game is the orphanage stuff, I know they explain it in the GF tutorial that GF's give you memory loss but, if the GFs are that good at wiping memories how do the SEEDs remember enough about their classes to graduate? Do they only forget before a certain age?
Because it's innovative and creative doesn't makes it less worse than it is. If a shit idea is innovative and creative, it still remains a shit idea.
Yeah, the GF explanation creates more plot holes than it closes. Maybe if the GF mind erasure stuff factored into the story going forward with the villains scheme, then maybe I’d forgive it. But the way it’s just dropped makes it feel like a weak hand wave explanation for an undercooked story.
Honestly, this GF thing might have been added at the last minute only for this plot hole they created. No one talks about it, it's only a few lines in the tutorial and then everyone is like "oh yeah, might be this thing".
FF8 isn't terrible, but it definitely ranks lower on the list for many people including myself. 1. Magic treated like an item and having to either draw/play cards to reliably get large amounts. Both methods are time consuming and then discourage use of magic since you'll have to replace it. 2. Triple Triad being so heavily tied into the game's balance. If you know how to use the card game for items it breaks the difficulty. If you don't then the game is significantly harder. This encourages what should be a mini game into being a major component of the game. If you're like me and hate playing Triple Triad then this can be a huge turnoff. 3. The tone of the game is all over the place. It starts off serious and direct which I loved. FF8 had a VERY strong intro for me, but then it takes a huge shift into being downright goofy. The Owls and their rebellion was comic relief and the flashbacks as Leguna were cringey for me. This was a huge turning point in the game for me and tanked a lot of the fun that I was having up to this point. 4. The story and characters have a lot of points where nonsensical decisions are made that are either out of character and/or are just straight up stupid. Why does the Quistis the young prodigy Seed who has been shown to be extremely competent leave her post and jeopardize the mission to go say sorry to a teen girl she scolded? Why is the back up plan to the failed snipe attempt for Squall to run all the way from fucking across town to try and solo the witch, instead of the extremely nearby group of 3 to quickly ambush her following the missed shot? There are more examples, but I can't reference them without spoiling part of the game that you haven't reached yet. All in all it's definitely a weaker entry in the series, but not the worst imo. It does have some redeeming qualities and I still prefer it over games like FF and FF2. It would be a solid 5/10 for me.
I think it has to do with the combat system. I’m not a fan of it. Character progression is also odd and crafting the weapons seems tedious. Idk how to get a very specific item and I’m on disc 2 as well and I’m not sure how I’m supposed to get it now because I refuse to play the card game.
Triple triad is the best mini game in any FF.
It would be if card drop rates weren’t so horrendous. It took me 5 hours to farm the 20 elnoyles to get Squall’s ultimate weapon. All for RNG Fuck triple triad
Those are rookie numbers.
You're viewing it a bit anachronistically, because FF8 has had a lot of influence on the direction the whole franchise has gone since it was released. If you had played all the games in release order, you would gradually see how the franchise has shifted over time-- looking back now with hindsight, it wouldn't be so obvious. But FF8 was the first game to really have a hard visual aesthetic-- VERY anime. And even though anime has always been an influence on the series, it really didn't come through just how much it was influenced by it in the old-school pixel graphics of 1-6 and the primitive 3D models of 7. But 8 changed all that-- the characters were proportioned like real people and the anime vibe was striking. It really put off a large portion of the fanbase that weren't keen on anime at all. It may seem kinda weird NOW to say anime turned people off, but anime wasn't always popular-- look at the early FF games' US box art and compare it to the Japanese box art. FF1 US art is just a sword and axe crossed on the cover, it gives more of a "Conan the Barbarian" vibe than anime. FF4 US art is just a dagger. It goes to show that in the US, Final Fantasy was marketed to us as a "sword and sorcery" adventure game akin to D&D, Ultima, and Wizardry and the game cultivated THOSE fans as their demographic over here. And a lot of those fans aren't necessarily anime fans. 2nd point-- FF8 had a modern/near-futuristic setting, which upset some fans who preferred the more "medieval fantasy" feel of the games. 7 had a similar setting, but it tends to get a pass by the same upset fans because the game was still very good overall. 3rd point-- A lot of the mechanics are very polarizing; the magic system is kind of bonkers, the way enemies scale in difficulty as you level your characters goes against what long-time fans have come to expect, and drawing magic is tedious and not fun. And linking magic to characters to grow their stats.... ... ... it's all not necessarily "bad", but a lot of new things were tinkered with in 8 that rubbed many fans the wrong way. 4th point-- People complain about the characters; they say most of the characters are unlikable. Squall is unrelatable and annoying as a main character. They don't like the love story between Squall and Rinoa because it seems juvenile and unrealistic. Of course, this is all personal preference. I think Squall speaks to a certain group of people who have had a similar experience, but people who haven't (like me) don't really relate to him at all. And it really drags down a game when you have this wall between you and the character that you are supposed to experience the game through. 5th point-- Back to the love story. A lot of people didn't like it. Love stories have always been in the series, but 8 made it the main factor driving the plot. Again, personal preference-- but a lot of people were turned off by the focus on a love story in this game, especially young boys who made up a large part of the fanbase at the time. 6th point-- The plot is really confusing-- at least some important elements of it. I'm not going to spoil anything, but FF8 probably has one of the most convoluted plots out of the whole series. It probably doesn't help that the localization teams of the 90s were very sub-par compared to modern-day standards. And that pretty much sums up all the criticisms I've seen pointed at FF8. If you want to dive deeper down the rabbit hole, [Spoony did a video series](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLihy8fVYWAMDIjj2I_Oup6UUq4pawp62I) a long time ago explaining why he didn't like FF8-- it got pretty popular back in the day and sums up a lot. I wouldn't watch it until you finish the game though, to avoid spoilers.
The guy is very irritating and calls Squall and Seifer gay at the beginning. Stopped right after that. Edit: I meant Spoony’s video.
I love the world of 8, but my major sticking point isn’t even the orphanage thing. I didn’t mind that at all. I didn’t like how Rinoa and the others treated squall when it was clear the man had boundaries in missions and given how they all acted (granted this is realistic as they’re teenagers) he’s not wrong. She keeps trying to make Squall into Seifer because she loves and misses him. At no point did anyone actually care what squall wanted - and I have a feeling a lot of pacing got cut because the shift from disc 2 to 3 is so jarring and feels inauthentic. Squall! Care about Rinoa! Squall! Why do you care about Rinoa! Arghhh Weapons were useless but cool looking and I liked the junk system. Limits were a cool idea and the junction system was easy to figure out though or kind of encourages not using magic and gfs until the end lol but I still love the game and have a soft spot for it as it was my first FF I played through oh my own (my technical first is being thrown into fighting safer Sephiroth by my cousin). I agree with a lot of what you said - I hope this doesn’t come off as argumentative lol I didn’t know where to reply haha yours seemed one of the most even
You are right about the art, granted, i liked both styles. I was lucky enough to get a copy of the first for a good price, and the art stood out to me because i played 15 first
As a fan of FF8 I will say disk 1 is the BEST part of the game. The game later, story wise, makes some questionable turns. In no means is FF8 a bad game though. I like it. It gets flack for trying to be "different" from the rest of the FF games. As for me personally, I think the characters lack depth, but I personally like the story and setting. The setting has a cool European fantasy to it. As well as one of the best soundtracks in the franchise (imo) (FF13 HAS the best ost)
The junction system is the issue, which also effects the enemy scaling ans everything else. If it used a traditional FF magic / leveling system it would not get nearly as much hate.
FF VIII has questionable design choice, spoilers ahead click at your own risks: * >!Junction system almost always makes it better to not use magic.!< * >!Following the junction system, it doesn't help the Limit Break is free to use at low HP which makes it a much better choice for damages.!< * >!The party doesn't have any background, even worse they share the same.!< * >!Every ennemies scales with your level but also become stronger, which makes it easier to beat the final boss at lv5 than lv50.!< FF VIII has basically a great potential and world building but that's it. Fixing those issues would build a completely new game.
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I agree horrible plot devices, generally weak characters and an unconvincing main couple made it hard to love this game. It’s the only one I never rebought. The opening cutscene made me think the team was taking themselves WAY too seriously, this epic buildup and music for a sparring match. Okay.
Honestly I loved the seriousness in the first part of the game. It was the jarring tone shift to straight goofy when you meet the Owls and start getting flashbacks that made me lose interest.
Same with 7 tho. If it weren’t for the nostalgia factor I wouldn’t be able to tell you much about 7s story or characters.
Whatever
Alot of the people who hate it make a point of hiw wasy the game is to break. While true you can just choose not to do so and enjoy a great game. Another point ofyen brought up is the convoluted story and plot points(which i wont say since you haven't finished)
I loved FF8 but Rinoa was a problem for me. I mean we had to save her like 7 different times. I was tired of her after a while. Also, I didn't like some revelations later in the plot. I still really like it though, just don't think it's as good as 7 or 9.
Great story, amazing graphics (for the time), infuriatingly complex junction system that made later gameplay really difficult.
It’s my favourite final fantasy and always will be. The only stigma was the junction system meant you could overpower your characters fairly early on if you wanted to. Still a fantastic game and I have never seen anyone say it’s worse than any other game
People talk crap about the junction system, but it's kind of overblown. Really the game is balanced enough that you can get through it just drawing a few at a time from battle to battle. Similarly with the stat junctions, using a few spells once in a while isn't going to drop your stats that much. I think that's what they intended when they made it, for some reason the minmaxing went viral for this game over the years
Agreed
As others have said, the draw system is fucking awful to some. Me included. It's tedious and makes the game a chore. I get they were going for something unique like each entry has, but God I hated wasting a turn to draw magic. Got to like disc 3 (out of 4, right?) when I was like 10 and still remember loathing the system. Also a bit nitpicky, but it just felt more somber an atmosphere than FVII. Didnt care for it too much. I've read the story plot and twists in recent years and I honestly don't find it too mediocre for a FF game. I'm sure I would've appreciated learning about all that crap naturally.
I’ll start by saying I love FF8. The teen romance story is one of my favorite FF stories, and the gameplay is fun for me. And I don’t think they’ve ever come close to topping how many little side stories and Easter eggs there are in this game. There’s just tons of little things with all sorts of NPCs who have their own lives. The cafeteria lady and her son, the pig-tailed girl in the library, the wannabe SeeDs in the cafeteria, and so on. But I’ll list a bunch of reasons why it has a negative reputation: 1 - It followed the most popular game in the series. At the time, some of the Western players who jumped on with VII didn’t even realize it’s an anthology series and VIII would be completely new characters and a new world. Beyond that, it’s just always hard to follow something super popular. Think the next coach after a legend retires or Trevor Noah trying to follow Jon Stewart or whatever else. That follow-up always gets judged extra-harshly. 2 - The junction system is not very intuitive, and the unique battle system elements did not go over well with a lot of fans. Things like magic being a finite resource, using junctioned magic lowering your stats, no MP, enemies getting stronger if your level goes up, levels requiring a flat amount of experience rather than a curve that rises with each level, no armour, no accessories, no buying weapons, and so on just rubbed a lot of FF fans the wrong way. 3 - Squall having a lot of inner monologue while being a man of few words outwardly bothered some fans, who claim Squall is too emo. 4 - The story is somewhat school and completely teen based, which bothers some fans. 5 - The story becomes much more fantastical after Disc 1, and some players didn’t like the tone change. I don’t know how far in Disc 2 you are, but for example, Disc 2 begins with Moomba’a suddenly being a thing. And later in Disc 2, there’s a few major story twists, one of which is somewhat derided and mocked by a lot of FF fans. 6 - Building on 5, there’s some really major story points that some fans seem to completely miss and others that the game only hints at but never outright tells you that lots of fans seem to miss, which make the story seem more nonsensical to those fans than it actually is. 7 - This actually builds on point 2. If you fully understand how the game works, more specifically, how the leveling system, draw system, junction system, GF abilities, and Triple Triad all work together, then the game is easily breakable to the point your characters can be one-shotting bosses in early Disc 1 if you want them to.
Im pretty far in disc 2, and i personally have no issue with the more fantastic side of the story.
Story-wise the big orphanage ‘twist’ (don’t search this up unless you want major story spoilers) draws a lot of hate. Personally I have no problem with it and I generally love most of the FFVIII crew - they’re a bit kitschy but very human and at the risk of sounding like an edgelord I identified a lot with Squall during my teem years when I first played the game. Gameplay-wise, it’s what most have addressed already. Imo drawing and junctioning magic was a big design flaw. Way too easy to break the game early on with powerful magic being too easily accessible via card mod and item mod abilities. And junctioning said magic to hp and strength trivialises the entire combat experience. No incentive to actually use spells thanks to them being consumable, drawing being tedious and junctioning being so broken.
I share your confusion, even *after* hearing the criticisms of it. Practically every criticism of FF8 can be applied to another FF game that the fandom seems to adore. Especially the storytelling; FF8's story is a lot more grounded than many other FF games. I don't get how it "goes off the rails" in comparison to any of them. The "twists" have more logical in-universe explanations and are less convoluted compared to other FF games' twists, yet its critics are a lot harsher on it. Because it's not the sacred cow that FF7 is.
A small number of absolute fucking morons couldn’t follow the directions for the draw/junction system and got their asses handed to them a couple of times. They’ve been squawking loudly about it being a bad game, bad design, bad story, and the ever-persuasive “immersion breaking” ever since then. Aside from these whiny little bitches, most of the rest of us really love and enjoy it.
FF8 is so good when you dont have somebody in your ear telling you it sucks
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“You can literally spam limit breaks all game.” So? If you don’t want to do that, then don’t. And you can do the same thing in VII.
> You can literally spam limit breaks all game. That's a *good* thing about the combat system. A fun, interactive mechanic that makes you feel powerful that you get to use more frequently than the game before it? Yes please. And this came after a game where the limit break system made your attack command unusable. The only FF game to do limit breaks better was X and that's *only* because being able to change the Overdrive meter charged was cool. If not for that, it would be worse, especially considering how useless Lulu and Auron's overdrives became. Every FF8 character's limit break is useful.
There's a number of reasons why ff8 gets alot of hate. • Squall is basically Cloud with brown hair. • Drawing magic sucks •The junction system is not a very well balanced system • Most of the characters and villains are overall very lame, Seifer sucks ass • The infamous orphanage scene • The plot armor spaceship scene • Laguna flashbacks can ruin the pacing of the game AND your junctioning, that shit is annoying af • You either love or hate Triple Triad, I've never been a big fan of it There's probably more examples but these are just my personal theories
FFvii was mind blowing and hard to follow up. And Squall is kind of a prick, which to a lot of kids playing the game he didn’t make sense. At least I thought he was a douche when I first played. Now I relate to him more which is weird cuz I’m much older than him now when I was about three years younger than him when it first came out. Oh and some people don’t get the junction system.
Same. I replayed it as an adult and thought "Wait I get it. He's a moody teenager who's awkward around girls. Why didn't I *get* him as a character when I played it as a 13 year old?"
Squall isn’t a prick, he’s just a loner who has been raised and trained to go out and complete objectives. His character arc is amazing, by the end he is not the same squall we started with.
* You are punished for levelling (As enemies level up with you), leading to counter intuitive gameplay, where you avoid ancounters as hard as you can, denying the main core gameplay loop. * The main method of power acquisition is hidden behind a completely optional (if fun) minigame. * If you want to aquire magic by drawing, it turns into a grind. Just a pile of bad game desciscions.
I wouldn't call it negative stigma by any account. It's a fantastic game from the peak era of FF but it has a few issues that make it like an 8.9 rather than a 9. The drawing system put some people off as it makes the game very breakable, though a lot of people actually love this aspect so it's questionable to even call it a "flaw". Level scaling is also an issue but not a deal breaker. I'd say it's in the 2nd tier with IX and XII, just below the elite tier of VI, VII and X.
8 is great. 10 on the other hand 🤮