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7/17/2025, 3:09:08 AM
It was the last Final Fantasy game where you could choose the party leader and fight the Hunts and even the final boss with your chosen leader and party.
If you wanted to play as Sazh and the boys to take down Orphan, you could run that group the whole way from Pulse to the end. If you wanted to play as Vanille and the girls, you could run that group. The commands that you choose for Sazh and the gameplay experience you have while playing as him and the boys will differ than if playing as Vanille and the girls. And because you can technically build those custom secondary roles, how your party looks might be completely different player to player.
This is indeed the LAST new numbered mainline Final Fantasy game to function this way as a party based, command based RPG. One of the most true ensemble RPG's in the entire series, at least since VI at least, being that it switches perspectives between them in order to explore all of them in protagonist roles. XIV, XV and XVI are each all completely different genres from typical Final Fantasy, and so are most all the sequels/remakes/spinoffs.
A lot of people gave up on the validity of the simple Command based gameplay during that time in the late 2000's when shooters/action dominated and treated it as objectively inferior to direct control action systems because it's "boring". I don't blame them, but it's short sighted/stupid. Same with open worlds/towns/side activities. More and more people today after seeing the mountains of slop, realize that bullshit doesn't functionally contribute to an emotionally compelling game experience. Simple stuff works, running forward through cool ass cyberpunk areas grinding out cool ass cyberpunk machine fiends, with great animation and listening to fun synth/piano/orchestra tracks....it can be just as stimulating as your open world side quest simulator collect-a-thon fish bowl.
If you wanted to play as Sazh and the boys to take down Orphan, you could run that group the whole way from Pulse to the end. If you wanted to play as Vanille and the girls, you could run that group. The commands that you choose for Sazh and the gameplay experience you have while playing as him and the boys will differ than if playing as Vanille and the girls. And because you can technically build those custom secondary roles, how your party looks might be completely different player to player.
This is indeed the LAST new numbered mainline Final Fantasy game to function this way as a party based, command based RPG. One of the most true ensemble RPG's in the entire series, at least since VI at least, being that it switches perspectives between them in order to explore all of them in protagonist roles. XIV, XV and XVI are each all completely different genres from typical Final Fantasy, and so are most all the sequels/remakes/spinoffs.
A lot of people gave up on the validity of the simple Command based gameplay during that time in the late 2000's when shooters/action dominated and treated it as objectively inferior to direct control action systems because it's "boring". I don't blame them, but it's short sighted/stupid. Same with open worlds/towns/side activities. More and more people today after seeing the mountains of slop, realize that bullshit doesn't functionally contribute to an emotionally compelling game experience. Simple stuff works, running forward through cool ass cyberpunk areas grinding out cool ass cyberpunk machine fiends, with great animation and listening to fun synth/piano/orchestra tracks....it can be just as stimulating as your open world side quest simulator collect-a-thon fish bowl.
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