It’s been almost 7 years now since Squaresoft made RPG’s more than a niche genre, with the release of Final Fantasy VII. Before FFVII, the series toiled with just 3 installments released in America (I, IV, and VI, with the last two titled II and III here on SNES), but afterwards, the series is mentioned in the same breath as Metal Gear, Resident Evil, Zelda, and Grand Theft Auto, as one of the top franchises in gaming. While most other RPG’s are doomed to obscurity, you can count on FF games selling big numbers, establishing Square (now Square Enix) as the dominant RPG publisher on this continent. When the PS2 released, the technology offered gave Square the chance to do things they never could do before – voices, fully rendered worlds, and a full-on orchestrated soundtrack. So when Final Fantasy X released, it was expected to be different, and it was. Not only that, it wound up being one of the best in the series, and on a personal note, one of my favorite games ever. Thanks to unique gameplay elements, a great storyline that involves a bit of thinking and mental backtracking, and a brilliant soundtrack, FFX is a masterpiece, and a game that I’ll definitely still be playing years from now, just like its equally outstanding sequel. I don’t even think of RPG’s as my favorite genre by far, but FFX is in my top 5 ever – that’s got to count for something…other than my possible bad taste, I dunno. Anyway, Final Fantasy X is my favorite PS2 game and without it, I wouldn’t be close to a Final Fantasy fan.
Final Fantasy X's storyline revolves around 'Sin' - a gigantic creature that wreaks havoc on villages and towns across the world of Spira, supposedly as punishment for the misdeeds of their forebears. This is according to Yevon, which serves as not only Spira's governing body, but also the lone religion of the world, calming a terrified people into the belief if they atone for their sins, Sin will one day go away. In the meantime, summoners have become the only saviors of the world - their job is to bring The Calm, or otherwise calm Sin, if for a little while, and let Spirans live in peace until Sin returns - if it returns, as Spirans hope each time that they've atoned enough.
The story follows Yuna - a 17-year-old summoner fresh on the pilgrimage trail - that is, she's ready to embark across Spira, acquiring 'aeons', and gaining the strength to topple Sin and bring another Calm. Yuna has quite a burden, however, as her father, High Summoner Braska, was the last to calm Sin, 10 years prior. With that kind of pressure, the confident and determined Yuna begins her journey to bring peace to Spira, if only for a little while.
Strangely, however, Yuna is not your playable character, despite being the individual the storyline mostly follows, until late in the game. Instead, you play as Tidus, a blitzball player from Zanarkand, a gigantic, lit-up city that never sleeps - the opposite of Spira, which has no advancements in technology due to Sin and its rampaging, and due to technology being shunned by Yevon (it's like Amish, only...well you'd just have to play the game). One day, Sin attacks Zanarkand, and Tidus, along with his mysterious friend Auron, get sucked into a vortex of sorts, and separated. Eventually, he aligns with Yuna and her guardians in Spira - Wakka, another blitzer who becomes a brother to Tidus, Lulu, a black mage who seems to suffer from never-ending PMS most of the game, and Kimahri, a talking beast known as a Ronso, and they depart together on Yuna's pilgrimage to defeat Sin, not knowing all hell is just about to break loose.
While not the true main character, Tidus is a vital character, as he serves as a narrator, and his presense in itself confuses the party due to his claimed hometown. Only Yuna really seems to not be either confused or in disbelief about Tidus and his claims, and that bond serves as the main wrinkle in FFX's storyline. Without revealing too much (even if the game is over 2 years old now), FFX's story goes from typical to completely insane and loaded with plot twists over the course of the game, running the gamut of emotions - despair, hatred, betrayal, corruption, faith (or lack thereof), anger, sadness, fury, happiness, redemption, rebellion, friendship, and most importantly - love, to craft a tightly wound, dramatic story full of characters who are genuinely likable and worth giving a crap about when something bad happens. It's also not a story that is easily deciphered - some thinking is required to grasp many of its more confusing elements. Thinking backwards, and multiple replays is the only way to make sense of it all...but it does make sense.
Though it's still a traditional RPG, Final Fantasy X throws many trademark conventions out the window and makes a bold attempt to try something new and fresh, and it works well. Most notably, the traditional leveling system is taken away in FFX, replaced by the Sphere Grid. Think of the Sphere Grid as a gigantic board game, where you can move along slowly and grow stronger as you progress. Instead of experience points winning battles, you get AP, which translates into Sphere Levels to move across the board. With the right amount of Sphere Levels, a character can move across the Grid, learning skills and upgrading themselves.
It's more than just that - though, it's a sneaky way for Square to sneak in a trademark of games like Baldur's Gate and let you decide what kind of characters you want. While you're on a set path and it's a wise idea to stay on that path until you finish their section of the Grid, you can cross over to other grids, by using Level Key Spheres, or any of the spheres that let you move around to other sections of the board (Return Spheres, Friend Spheres, and Teleport Spheres, to be exact), you can learn other abilities to round out your party. For instance, if you manage to finish off Yuna's section of the grid, and learn the important white mage skills that she's best used for, you can take her along to Lulu's section and learn some black magic, to make her an incredibly valuable member of your party even without using her summoning abilities, with the ability to both heal friends and decimate foes. The lone risk is that you can definitely cripple a character by taking the wrong path, making them useless until you can earn enough Sphere Levels to backtrack, or have a Return Sphere to recover from the error. By any means, the entire process is excellent and unique, and while the linear path set for you is the best way to progress, the game leaves it to you to create a party the way you'd like to.
Also new is the battle system - the ATB, or Active Time Battle, which was a staple of FFIV through FFIX, and onto FFX-2 (though in a different, more useful form), has been tossed out the window in FFX, replaced by the CTB, or Conditional Time Battle. Taking shape as a true turn-based system, CTB actually moves faster than any ATB aside from the manically fast FFX-2. This adds a whole new element of strategy that hasn't been in many FF games - as you not only can see the turns before they happen, letting you map out strategy before being attacked, but also, you may swap party members in and out at your leisure. See some enemies that might wipe the party out? Swap in Yuna and let her summon and take the heat off the troupe without seeing Game Over.
That's another thing FFX did that hadn't been done before - summons are actual characters that you control until you dismiss them. Once Yuna summons the aeons, they come from wherever aeons come from, and you are able to make decisions for them, rather than just being a quick, uncontrollable appearance in other Final Fantasy games. They can even learn abilities (if you acquire the correct items), and grow stronger as you progress depending on how things go on the Sphere Grid. However, because of this, it's not quite as easy to abuse the aeons, unlike, say Final Fantasy VIII, which let you abuse the Guardian Forces so much that they should have been taken away for bad parenting, or they'll die a fast death, as they're definitely not invincible, and not as agile either, thus unable to take lots of damage. It's wise to swap an aeon in, do its thing, then dismiss it and move along.
Limit Breaks, a usual staple of this series, are replaced instead by Overdrives, or special moves that do more damage to enemies. Everyone has a different one; Tidus has 4 separate sword-based attacks, as does Auron, Lulu has a Magic Fury, where she can fire a spell off numerous times, Kimahri can use his Blue Magic he's learned, Rikku can mix multiple items for a special item (similiar to the Alchemist dressphere in X-2, that lets you mix anytime you want), Wakka has a reels deal somewhat similar to Tifa's Limit Break from FFVII, and Yuna has Grand Summon, that lets you summon an aeon with a full OD gauge of its own, to pummel fiends easily. In the case of Auron, Tidus, and Lulu, you actually are involved in how the OD works - for instance, Auron's OD's can be made stronger by inputting commands in a Simon Says-style button pressing system. You can even adjust how the overdrive bar fills, be it by taking damage, winning battles, or each time you do a physical attack. It's a very involved process that's better than the more hands-off Limit system (though FFVIII's limit system was also quite good) by far.
The final major change is the total elimination of the traditional world map. I've always thought of the world map as a waste of time anyway - it's not as if you can go anywhere or do anything, you're still tied down to a linear path. In FFX, they just put you down on the world itself, and you travel along in a linear path. Given that we're on an important pilgrimage, in a set pattern and direction, it makes sense to force you down a pathway. Of course, later in the game, the usual FF airship becomes available, with hidden areas to discover, making up for the linearity of the majority of the game. Some scowl at this lack of the world map (or just a re-imagining of it), but hey, you're just turning into your parents, resisting change.
There aren't a whole lot of mini-games in FFX, but instead it's packed with perhaps the most involving one ever - Blitzball. Blitzball is so in-depth that it could be its own game - an RPG-style sports game that mixes soccer with basketball, only taking place underwater and full of status-effect attacks. It's a complicated process at first, with numerous stats to measure and analyze before making moves. The tutorials included do a great job of teaching, thankfully. The thing to keep in mind - even though the Blitz game that you're forced to play in Luca at the start of the game might be a pain, play more, and you just might find yourself getting addicted to the strategic and highly tactical game. If you want to acquire all of Wakka's overdrives, you must play it, so be forewarned.
What FFX does have a lot of is sidequests, which all tend to connect in some fashion. The most evident is the collection of Al Bhed primers, which deciphers the unique language that race of people speak - find them all, and you will gain a very nice item from Rin, the owner of the Travel Agencies you'll encounter all over Spiran lands. Otherwise, there's the monster arena, where you capture monsters across the world, netting you nice rewards and helps the monster arena create original monsters that are downright ridiculously hard unless you've done some other sidequests.
There's also a lot of cool hidden stuff, like a few hidden aeons, and a couple of hidden ruins you can explore to find some nice weapons and armor, along with some insanely hard enemies as well. However, the Legendary Weapons is where it's at. While acquiring the weapons is easy enough, as there are clues all over Spira hinting at their whereabouts, you have to find sigils and crests across the world to unlock their full potential to be a monstrous tool of destruction. Imagine Yuna, with a full array of white and black magic, doublecasting flare, ultima, or holy - for only 1 magic point cost. The sigils are the most difficult items to acquire, asking for many insane objectives to be completed (those who've played surely have cursed many, many times at dodging lightning at the Thunder Plains, or the Chocobo racing deal in the Calm Lands). If you do manage to unlock the full power of each Legendary Weapon, the game does cease to be challenging - at least you can't get all these items until you've beaten 95% of the adventure. But these are absolutely required if you plan on completing the monster arena sidequest.
I really can't say enough about Final Fantasy X without falling into slobbering, unwashed fanboy mode. Nearly everything about this game I love - hell, I can recite the entire game in my head, remembering every aspect of the story. The battle system is bliss, the sphere grid is an outstanding way to customize characters however you want, the story is gripping and full of believable plot twists, even if they are predictable at times. While the game does tend to be a slow starter, as after the initial scenes in Zanarkand the game is a tutorial of sorts for the first 5 hours, once you get past that portion, FFX becomes a tour de force in storytelling, adding a new wrinkle to the usual 'save the world' RPG storyline. Add this in with one of the most bittersweet endings in game history and you have an epic piece of software from Square, and the most complete Final Fantasy product they've ever released. While the more linear path might be a bit odd, given that the party is on a direct pilgrimage to defeat something that's terrorizing the world, it makes sense. Look - I'm not a huge RPG fan at all, but after playing through Final Fantasy X so many times, it's made me a fan of the genre. And if the idea of a game is to win over new fans, Square got me hook, line, and sinker in every possible way. I'm not blowing smoke out my rear either when I say this is one of my favorite games ever made.
Spira is a beautiful world, and the visual engine of FFX demonstrates this perfectly. While not as shiny or fancy as newer games, this one excels in the more important area – artistic value. From Waterfall Way in Besaid (which is the single most beautiful area you will see in this game, and FFX-2 for that matter), to the majestic Bevelle, the game is beautiful and full of style. It also hammers the point of the game in – there’s this wonderful world of Spira, full of color and sights, but nobody is able to enjoy it because of Sin. Better yet, the game is fully done in real-time, with a moving, shifting camera, which deviates from the pre-rendered backgrounds of Final Fantasy VII through FFIX. While there is no free look (this will be/is already in Final Fantasy XI and XII, however) the camera never gets to be a problem given the lack of real-time fighting. Character designs are realistic, with the lone exception of the Ronso’s, who are, you know…not human. Each character is unique looking and full of features, such as realistic body motions, expressions, etc. In some parts, there’s moving, shifting eyes and even better animations, though FFX-2 improves on these greatly.
The summons and magic spells are the star of the graphical effects, though. The lengthy summon animations are awesome, though they do tend to run on awfully long (summoning the Magus Sisters, as awesome as it is…takes a long, long time), you can adjust them accordingly to happen faster. Aeon overdrives are even more impressive, though those too tend to run very long (see Magus Sisters again) On the other hand, magic spells, especially the big ones like Flare, Ultima, or Holy, are equally awesome, and not nearly as long either.
And of course, there’s the CG scenes that are some of the best in the biz. There’s a ton of them, and they seamlessly run into the regular game engine with nary a second for loading. They don’t all run totally long (the ending CG is the longest by far, though there’s a couple that last a few minutes), but what you get is great and in most cases tells the story of the game in a grander fashion than any regular in-game cutscene. These are surpassed only by FFX-2 (though there are less of them in the sequel, but they run all quite long with a pair of exceptions), but they must be seen to believe the quality of the work.
The audio also excels with one of the best original game soundtracks ever arranged. The 90 some odd compositions range from okay to epic, and stands out as some of the best ever from famed FF composer Nobuo Uematsu, if only because they finally could shed the Midi world for the DVD format for maximum musical goodness. The result is something magical, with numerous standout themes and arrangements that, when played alone on the soundtrack, can bring you right back into the game, remembering the events of the game when it’s playing. Many of them carry one central melody throughout (the Hymn of the Fayth, which ties into Yevon), but each one sticks out despite it. As always, the closer you get to the end of the game, the more epic and sweeping the music gets, most especially here. There’s even an awesome heavy metal-esque tune called Otherworld that puts most ‘metal’ music of today to total shame in every way.
A first for Final Fantasy game is the inclusion of voice acting. Finally, we can be shed of boring bubble boxes and hours of text reading to move along the story, when instead, voices tell the tale 10x better. It’s all handled exceptionally well by pretty much every voice actor. The co-leads are James Arnold Taylor, who voices Tidus (and you’ll recognize his voice from playing Ratchet in Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando), and Hedy Burress takes the role of Yuna. Both do admirable jobs, though you can sense the inexperience of Burress as a voice actress thanks to weird pauses and the ‘constant asthma attack’ approach to her lines, as opposed to Taylor who’s done a number of VA jobs. It’s as if she’s trying to really emulate the shy, quiet, and reserved summoner, but tries a little too hard. It’s amazing to see how much better she is at the role in Final Fantasy X-2 after playing through this again. One funny thing – the voice actor for Jecht, who’s Tidus’s father, is played by the fellow that voiced Odie on the Garfield cartoons. No kidding. Even better, John DiMaggio plays both Wakka and Kimahri in dual roles – for those in the know, DiMaggio was Bender on Futurama. How cool is that? All the other parts are played well, such as Seymour and Auron; especially Auron, who ends up stealing the show from the outset…definitely one of the best FF characters ever conceived.
The Bottom Line
While the PS2 RPG crop hasn’t been quite as deep as the PlayStation era, Final Fantasy X is unquestionably the best of the bunch. While the game continues Square’s trend from moving away from traditional FF elements and turning the series on its ear (something that FFX-2 even blew away), it all works out in innovative, creative ways, making the series fresh again in its tenth installment. Thanks to a great, complex story and some outstanding characters, FFX is a joy to play as well as watch when the cutscenes kick in. If you like your RPG’s to take risks and do something different and fresh, Final Fantasy X is the right idea – and for 20 bucks these days, there’s depth no other Greatest Hit can offer in this game. Coupled with Final Fantasy X-2, the Spira story is epic, thrilling, and well worth the time spent on it – and 2 of my favorite games ever pressed onto a disc or stuck into a cartridge.
Final Fantasy X-2 review (Final Fantasy X spoilers within, read at your own risk)
http://www.epinions.com/content_119883533956 
