Yes, by the end, it's absurdly easy to exploit the combat system. However, there were some nice touches. Enemies ALWAYS leveled with you, so while some battles remained easy after you got the hang of things, there was still the enemy type that could get a 1 hit kill on you. Tyrannosaurs did lots of damage back in the garden, and they still do lots of damage out in the wild. But by then, you've got all sorts of spells and the strongest of them junctioned to the appropriate ability, etc.Originally Posted by Board of Command
I still think the limit system had that appropriate feel to it. Early on, your whole party falls into the yellow, and then you're furiously recycling through the characters to hear that characteristic chime. Leave the battle system on Active, and you get a slight panic feeling during an pivotal boss fight up to about the midpoint.
Granted, they could have made the game harder. I always appreciated what the first Lunar had done. Every boss's level was always 1.5 times your own. No matter how much power leveling you did, the boss was always that much better than you. If they had applied this to FF8, it would have had the challenge where you needed to exploit the system. It worked well for the two games of Disgaea. The creators pointed out the whole idea was to exploit the combat system, FF8 just never made itself hard enough.
EDIT:
I like both FF7 and FF8. They each have their good points. I think 8 had a better soundtrack and a more cohesive story (many of 7's quests have no connection to the main storyline, where in 8, everything connects back to Ultimacia, the past, and where everyone grew up). 8 was another graphics leap, and the character, mech, and costume design really had one up on 7.
On the other hand, 7 has just so much to do. There's always another Weapon to fight, always another sidequest, always another rare materia to dig up and master into a copy, another city to revisit after a major event.
Reply With Quote