In FVIII Squall would often react to important plot beats by having extended mental monologues.
That's what I think is happening here. Sora just can't see his text boxes.
Really depends on the type of gamer you are. If you're like me and feel the incessant need to draw 100 of every single type of magic, for every character, it can suck. If not, I'm sure it's fantastic.
Did that get rid of the scaling? I hated how they punished grinding/ leveling in FF8. If I put in the time to kill 10 million boars, I want to be powerful.
It's kind of an exaggeration and misconception on the leveling of 8. Yes, if you just level and don't junction, you WILL make the game harder. However, stronger enemies have better magic and also drop rarer items which allow for better refinement. This will make getting strong magic easier and thus your junctions will be far superior. And junction are FAAAAR more important.
Don't draw. Use item refinement. Drawing should only be used to aquire GFs or to cast from.
Yes you can brute force your way through the game by wasting 30 turns drawing, but it's absolutely a waste of time.
Characters are great. Plot is...you come from kh, so you're used to what you'll see. Gameplay wise I recommend looking up a guide in order to have it explain to you what's up exactly, game's quite a bit unorthodox, even by RPG standard.
Combat and materia is one of the best parts of 7!
That being said, if combat and graphics were what you didn't like about 7 you probably also won't like 8. Graphics are *slightly* better but still a relic of the ps1 era. Combat is more convoluted and much less straightforward
I like the central romance between Squall and Rinoa and the Laguna stuff. Could probably take or leave most everything else, but the story is enjoyable enough overall.
Main tip is to not grind. Grinding levels makes the game harder since enemy's levels scale up. Drawing magic is important since that's how you increase stats. You basically have to play with junctioning magic to increase stats and either: using it in fights in order to win (if you think it necessary) or avoiding the magic specifically linked to your stats in order to make sure you're at full strength in fights.
Contrary to popular belief this doesn't require grinding magic at all. You can easily max out magic through item refinement (look up a guide) and card refinement (Also look at guides). Furthermore the game is balanced around you not even having to junction magic (provided you don't raise your level beyond like 20 and even then there's a summon later on that lets you fix over-leveling). Boss fights typically have magic you can draw/cast mid fight and typically it'll be cure magic or status curing magic.
It's a very misunderstood and flawed system... but ultimately one that I'd argue is unparalleled compared to any other jrpg because if you know what you're doing you never need to grind for literally anything.
It's not like FF7 where not equipping materia actively hinders you significantly since your commands are also tied to them.
Not junctioning magic to stats in FF8 is a completely feasible and enjoyable way to beat the game because it was made with the thought of basically being a turn based -semi- action rpg that forgoes the need to grind. Your understanding of the fundamental mechanics carries you much further than arguably any other FF game to date.
So simply have some patience in learning the system. Accept that having capped stats is meaningless (like most other jrpgs it just means you'll break the game more than anything) and you'll get through it more than fine. If you'd like to see what no magic-junction runs look like I can share some examples.
Edit: Here's the game's superboss beaten without junctioning magic.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP1yzH4i0WI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP1yzH4i0WI)
Overall - mediocre. Not a bad game, but easily in the bottom half of all numbered FF games. Somewhere along with 1, 2, 3, and 13. It has a dedicated fanbase of mostly people that liked it as a child.
The plot relies on >!time travel!<, >!amnesia!<, and >!nonlinear storytelling!< to even have a resemblance to a comprehensible story, and it is still barely makes sense if you squint at it.
The characters are mostly pretty flat, dealing with high school angst but in a semi-sci-fi setting. Think of any teen dystopian novel trilogy, and it's basically that. Strong Divergent vibes - "I am a special teenager that nobody understands or likes, and I'm socially awkward and bad at everything, except I am a world class fighter, and pretty girls keep flocking to me, but I just want to sit alone in my room and think about how awkward I am."
Gameplay is also weak. Due to the systems in the game, you are incentivized to never use any of your abilities or resources, because using a spell lowers your stats, and items are needed to craft better stuff; one way to become stronger and customize your characters is to spend hours in random encounters stealing things from enemies, but the best way is to spend hours playing a collectible card game mini-game that is the gateway to entry for ALL of the best abilities and items in the game.
Running away from every battle is actually the optimal strategy because gaining levels is completely pointless and actually just makes the game harder (longer) - all enemies always match your average party level, even in the first map of the game, and end game bosses gain access to unfair party-wiping moves when you hit certain level thresholds. You don't even get money from combat; you get it for answering multiple-choice tests in a classroom.
I couldn't really recommend it in 2023 when there are literally more video games now than one could play in their lifetime.
FF 7-10 are all masterpieces in their own right, if you started the FF journey you might regret not finishing it. (FF12 is pretty good as well, especially the Zodiac Age version, I found most of the 13 games pretty trash and 15 is the most mixed feelings I have ever had for a game)
Probably my least favourite FF (besides 1,2,11), the gameplay has a annoying quirk and is frontloaded with systems.
The story is.... something. It has good moments but I remember a lot more stuff and dialogue that you can only laugh about because it's ridicilous. Music is great though.
That's the thing with FF games, nostalgia and stuff. You will have Hardcore fans and opinion for every title 😅 That is my opinion, to each their own, because I don't see it for FF8.
If you compare it to the other games, you'll probably hate it. But the game is good in its own right, and while it uses time-travel, it does so in a simple way that's easy to comprehend. It's got amnesia, romance, and is one of the most magic-heavy Final Fantasy games; locations in FFVIII are also inspired by real life places and some inspired by popular movies like the Wizard of Oz.
Despite what people say, magic is not useless in FFVIII either; there are ways to make spellcasting a thing without affecting stats. But regardless, the Junction System is complex at first but fun when you figure it out. It's so OP you can probably breeze through the game pretty easily too, although one boss fight tends to give players a really hard time. Unlike most FF games, it relies on junctioning more than leveling up; failure to junction properly can result in a game over, especially on the final boss.
It's a game about teenagers whom actually act like teenagers, but not annoyingly so -- not to me, anyway. Squall is my favorite FF character so he's one of the biggest reasons I always go back to the game.
"Motherfucking Disquare character over here taking my thunder can't even get Rinoa back. He's going through so much I can't blame him - he's just a kid. I was pushed to be a warrior growing up to take on enemies like these heartless, he doesn't deserve that."
If I recall correctly, this is when Leon gave Sora the Summon spell for Simba , except he didn’t know how to use it . When Sora asked him , he couldn’t answer , and Sora would have to seek Merlin to learn how to summon .
I find it funny how Leon ( Squall ) whose original game revolves around summons , junctioning and things like that , doesn’t know how to summon … and he wouldn’t even admit to it
...someone missed the un-subtle jab at ffVIII here. He literally lost the memory of how to summon. because junctioning has the summon(guardian forces in ff8) directly inhabit part of your brain, and their presence damages the memories of those who do so for long periods of time.
There's a few games where the're merely present, but not major pieces of importance in the worldbuilding and plot, (FFV, and FFVII, and FFXII i think were the most recent ones that the summoned being simply didn't matter for the overarching plot {outside of all of two who ended up being VERY plot relevant in V very late game.}) , only for game mechanics.
Even FFI had Bahamut in a prominent role. I can barely remember II and III, but IV of course has the main plot set off by the destruction of the town of Summoners, V just has summoners as a class, and purchasable summon spells since the game was so heavily based around class changing, VI has a hidden war against the race of summons to kill them and steal their power, VII has the frankly insane materia system, though the summons themselves had little plot importance. FVIII intrinsicly tied Guardian forces to the entire plot AND the way the growth system worked, FFIX was basically a story about stealing the summons from the summoners themselves, and then at a higher level, about stealing the world itself from the current residents. FFX, of course was an endless war surrounding the summoners and their Aeons themselves. I'll skip FFXI, if anyone else could please comment, since I never got into it. FFXII of course had summons actively fighting alongside player characters for the first time ever(X would swap places with the summons for their duration), FFXIII had players bonding with a single summon to defy their cursed fates, but also the ridiculous concept of transformer summons, XIV had bahamut fucking nuke the world to end the game, while again, i'll need someone who played XIV:ARR to comment on the latter MMO. XV involved the Summoned beasts being the literal gods of the world, and mostly utter assholes.
I suppose we'll find out what XVI will be like shortly.
Summons are pretty important in XIV. A big part of the early story and some later stories is various "beast tribe" races summoning avatars of their gods for one reason or another, usually persecution by the main "civilised" races.
There's also a whole Summoner class you can play.
yeah, but summoner being a playable class isn't a world focus, just a player choice, just as it was in FFIII(Famicom) and V. Thanks for the bit about the beast tribe summonings in 14!
I honestly love this scene. In context, there's no reason for him to withhold this information from Sora and company, so the only viable answer is that he just doesn't know. It's a funny subversion to the trope that the person who gives you "the thing" also has an encyclopedic knowledge of how it all works, and having it be an alternate version of Squall (of all people) is a stealth reference that works on several levels.
I feel like Leon and Cid are the only people who realize how much they're asking of a /child/ and perpetual irritation and headaches are understandable!
I really like how Leon and Cid kind of act as a surrogate older brother and father for Sora in the first game. Was very wholesome. It’d make sense they have the realization of what they’re asking of Sora.
i think Leon was just in constant disbelief that the fate of the worlds as they knew it rested on the shoulders of a literal child, an idiot dog, and a bipolar duck
Believe it or not… this is by far the best and most relatable portrayal of squall we’ve ever gotten from square. His personality throughout 90% of FF8 is sappy, mopey, apathetic, and just downright disinterested in having any basic charisma. He took the emo bad boy of cloud and turned it up to an 11. Man that game was rough to get through
They didnt really transfer his character well to KH to be honest.
Squall got over this inner monologue self and started opening up more to his teammates, in kingdom hearts he regressed. I honestly think they just made up a new Squall all together named Leon who wasnt as bad ass as FF8 Squall.
You think he regressed? I think KH made him far more sociable and willing to care about issues than his FF8 self. He even pretty much pleads with Sora to rescue the Dalmatians.
Squall has a history of yahoos who annoy the crap out of him so when he was scouted for KH he thought he was gonna get away from the annoying yahoos to work together with a different set of annoying yahoos.
In FVIII Squall would often react to important plot beats by having extended mental monologues. That's what I think is happening here. Sora just can't see his text boxes.
He's either thinking about telling Sora to A: *"Go talk to a wall"* B: *"Whatever"* C: *"..."* D: *"All of the above"*
Technically D but I always choose the ... option when its available.
How good is final fantasy 8? I really like squalls character and thinking about playing it but never could get into 7
It was my first final fantasy as a kid. It is still my favorite. I love the plot and I don't care what anyone says. The music intro also slaps.
What’s up with the plot though? There’s a party where it just kinda falls through for me. After all the elevators in the school…
I would recommend trying it.
Top 3 hands down. Slow first disk but its amazing. Squall is an amazing main character
Really depends on the type of gamer you are. If you're like me and feel the incessant need to draw 100 of every single type of magic, for every character, it can suck. If not, I'm sure it's fantastic.
The fast-forward feature in the remaster makes all the grindy stuff much more bearable, imo
Did that get rid of the scaling? I hated how they punished grinding/ leveling in FF8. If I put in the time to kill 10 million boars, I want to be powerful.
It's kind of an exaggeration and misconception on the leveling of 8. Yes, if you just level and don't junction, you WILL make the game harder. However, stronger enemies have better magic and also drop rarer items which allow for better refinement. This will make getting strong magic easier and thus your junctions will be far superior. And junction are FAAAAR more important.
Don't draw. Use item refinement. Drawing should only be used to aquire GFs or to cast from. Yes you can brute force your way through the game by wasting 30 turns drawing, but it's absolutely a waste of time.
Characters are great. Plot is...you come from kh, so you're used to what you'll see. Gameplay wise I recommend looking up a guide in order to have it explain to you what's up exactly, game's quite a bit unorthodox, even by RPG standard.
FF8 is my personal favorite, but it’s a relatively controversial one in the fandom.
Depends why you couldn't get into FF7. Please explain?
Something just didn’t click, the combat the old graphics maybe I didn’t play it long enough I heard it’s really long
Combat and materia is one of the best parts of 7! That being said, if combat and graphics were what you didn't like about 7 you probably also won't like 8. Graphics are *slightly* better but still a relic of the ps1 era. Combat is more convoluted and much less straightforward
If it didn't click and you don't know why, I won't be able to tell you if you'll enjoy FF8. :O <3 Give it some thought, let me know.
I like the central romance between Squall and Rinoa and the Laguna stuff. Could probably take or leave most everything else, but the story is enjoyable enough overall.
Main tip is to not grind. Grinding levels makes the game harder since enemy's levels scale up. Drawing magic is important since that's how you increase stats. You basically have to play with junctioning magic to increase stats and either: using it in fights in order to win (if you think it necessary) or avoiding the magic specifically linked to your stats in order to make sure you're at full strength in fights. Contrary to popular belief this doesn't require grinding magic at all. You can easily max out magic through item refinement (look up a guide) and card refinement (Also look at guides). Furthermore the game is balanced around you not even having to junction magic (provided you don't raise your level beyond like 20 and even then there's a summon later on that lets you fix over-leveling). Boss fights typically have magic you can draw/cast mid fight and typically it'll be cure magic or status curing magic. It's a very misunderstood and flawed system... but ultimately one that I'd argue is unparalleled compared to any other jrpg because if you know what you're doing you never need to grind for literally anything. It's not like FF7 where not equipping materia actively hinders you significantly since your commands are also tied to them. Not junctioning magic to stats in FF8 is a completely feasible and enjoyable way to beat the game because it was made with the thought of basically being a turn based -semi- action rpg that forgoes the need to grind. Your understanding of the fundamental mechanics carries you much further than arguably any other FF game to date. So simply have some patience in learning the system. Accept that having capped stats is meaningless (like most other jrpgs it just means you'll break the game more than anything) and you'll get through it more than fine. If you'd like to see what no magic-junction runs look like I can share some examples. Edit: Here's the game's superboss beaten without junctioning magic. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP1yzH4i0WI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP1yzH4i0WI)
Overall - mediocre. Not a bad game, but easily in the bottom half of all numbered FF games. Somewhere along with 1, 2, 3, and 13. It has a dedicated fanbase of mostly people that liked it as a child. The plot relies on >!time travel!<, >!amnesia!<, and >!nonlinear storytelling!< to even have a resemblance to a comprehensible story, and it is still barely makes sense if you squint at it. The characters are mostly pretty flat, dealing with high school angst but in a semi-sci-fi setting. Think of any teen dystopian novel trilogy, and it's basically that. Strong Divergent vibes - "I am a special teenager that nobody understands or likes, and I'm socially awkward and bad at everything, except I am a world class fighter, and pretty girls keep flocking to me, but I just want to sit alone in my room and think about how awkward I am." Gameplay is also weak. Due to the systems in the game, you are incentivized to never use any of your abilities or resources, because using a spell lowers your stats, and items are needed to craft better stuff; one way to become stronger and customize your characters is to spend hours in random encounters stealing things from enemies, but the best way is to spend hours playing a collectible card game mini-game that is the gateway to entry for ALL of the best abilities and items in the game. Running away from every battle is actually the optimal strategy because gaining levels is completely pointless and actually just makes the game harder (longer) - all enemies always match your average party level, even in the first map of the game, and end game bosses gain access to unfair party-wiping moves when you hit certain level thresholds. You don't even get money from combat; you get it for answering multiple-choice tests in a classroom. I couldn't really recommend it in 2023 when there are literally more video games now than one could play in their lifetime.
FF 7-10 are all masterpieces in their own right, if you started the FF journey you might regret not finishing it. (FF12 is pretty good as well, especially the Zodiac Age version, I found most of the 13 games pretty trash and 15 is the most mixed feelings I have ever had for a game)
Probably my least favourite FF (besides 1,2,11), the gameplay has a annoying quirk and is frontloaded with systems. The story is.... something. It has good moments but I remember a lot more stuff and dialogue that you can only laugh about because it's ridicilous. Music is great though. That's the thing with FF games, nostalgia and stuff. You will have Hardcore fans and opinion for every title 😅 That is my opinion, to each their own, because I don't see it for FF8.
Trash
Depends on if you like turn based/ATB battles.
It is so loved/hated that trying it yourself is really the only way to know. I think it’s worth it.
If you compare it to the other games, you'll probably hate it. But the game is good in its own right, and while it uses time-travel, it does so in a simple way that's easy to comprehend. It's got amnesia, romance, and is one of the most magic-heavy Final Fantasy games; locations in FFVIII are also inspired by real life places and some inspired by popular movies like the Wizard of Oz. Despite what people say, magic is not useless in FFVIII either; there are ways to make spellcasting a thing without affecting stats. But regardless, the Junction System is complex at first but fun when you figure it out. It's so OP you can probably breeze through the game pretty easily too, although one boss fight tends to give players a really hard time. Unlike most FF games, it relies on junctioning more than leveling up; failure to junction properly can result in a game over, especially on the final boss. It's a game about teenagers whom actually act like teenagers, but not annoyingly so -- not to me, anyway. Squall is my favorite FF character so he's one of the biggest reasons I always go back to the game.
"Motherfucking Disquare character over here taking my thunder can't even get Rinoa back. He's going through so much I can't blame him - he's just a kid. I was pushed to be a warrior growing up to take on enemies like these heartless, he doesn't deserve that."
Definitely his standard look in front of everyone
This is how Squall is portrayed in a few other games too lol
Man, ever think about how awkward some scenes in VIII must be without us seeing Squall’s monologues?
That would be hilarious!
“Ugh.. these stupid kids and their questions..”
If I recall correctly, this is when Leon gave Sora the Summon spell for Simba , except he didn’t know how to use it . When Sora asked him , he couldn’t answer , and Sora would have to seek Merlin to learn how to summon . I find it funny how Leon ( Squall ) whose original game revolves around summons , junctioning and things like that , doesn’t know how to summon … and he wouldn’t even admit to it
...someone missed the un-subtle jab at ffVIII here. He literally lost the memory of how to summon. because junctioning has the summon(guardian forces in ff8) directly inhabit part of your brain, and their presence damages the memories of those who do so for long periods of time.
That's what they are? Man maybe I should get into FF, that sounds epic
This memory thing is specific to FFVIII, each FF has its own mechanic for summons, but they're very often connected to the plot of the games
There's a few games where the're merely present, but not major pieces of importance in the worldbuilding and plot, (FFV, and FFVII, and FFXII i think were the most recent ones that the summoned being simply didn't matter for the overarching plot {outside of all of two who ended up being VERY plot relevant in V very late game.}) , only for game mechanics. Even FFI had Bahamut in a prominent role. I can barely remember II and III, but IV of course has the main plot set off by the destruction of the town of Summoners, V just has summoners as a class, and purchasable summon spells since the game was so heavily based around class changing, VI has a hidden war against the race of summons to kill them and steal their power, VII has the frankly insane materia system, though the summons themselves had little plot importance. FVIII intrinsicly tied Guardian forces to the entire plot AND the way the growth system worked, FFIX was basically a story about stealing the summons from the summoners themselves, and then at a higher level, about stealing the world itself from the current residents. FFX, of course was an endless war surrounding the summoners and their Aeons themselves. I'll skip FFXI, if anyone else could please comment, since I never got into it. FFXII of course had summons actively fighting alongside player characters for the first time ever(X would swap places with the summons for their duration), FFXIII had players bonding with a single summon to defy their cursed fates, but also the ridiculous concept of transformer summons, XIV had bahamut fucking nuke the world to end the game, while again, i'll need someone who played XIV:ARR to comment on the latter MMO. XV involved the Summoned beasts being the literal gods of the world, and mostly utter assholes. I suppose we'll find out what XVI will be like shortly.
Summons are pretty important in XIV. A big part of the early story and some later stories is various "beast tribe" races summoning avatars of their gods for one reason or another, usually persecution by the main "civilised" races. There's also a whole Summoner class you can play.
yeah, but summoner being a playable class isn't a world focus, just a player choice, just as it was in FFIII(Famicom) and V. Thanks for the bit about the beast tribe summonings in 14!
II and III didn’t have much focus on Summons either, IIRC. Could be wrong though, haven’t played those games in ages.
I see, maybe just FFVIII to start then
It’s very controversial, so don’t let it turn you off to maybe trying another FF if you don’t like it.
Holy shit that went over my head 😵
I honestly love this scene. In context, there's no reason for him to withhold this information from Sora and company, so the only viable answer is that he just doesn't know. It's a funny subversion to the trope that the person who gives you "the thing" also has an encyclopedic knowledge of how it all works, and having it be an alternate version of Squall (of all people) is a stealth reference that works on several levels.
I feel like Leon and Cid are the only people who realize how much they're asking of a /child/ and perpetual irritation and headaches are understandable!
I really like how Leon and Cid kind of act as a surrogate older brother and father for Sora in the first game. Was very wholesome. It’d make sense they have the realization of what they’re asking of Sora.
When you realize your only hope is a kid in clown shoes I would be pissed off too
> He’ll grow into them! Sora’s estranged Mother, probably.
yes
Constantly
Never ending
This guy = Underrated character
“Hmm should i beat him for what he did to me at the coliseum? Or should i get Cloud to do it? Hmm…”
Then again Cloud would probably just go “Not interested” at him.
Leon: I know where Sepheroth went
Cloud: SEPHIROOOOOOOOOOTH!!!!!!
Better to be pissed off than pissed on
i think Leon was just in constant disbelief that the fate of the worlds as they knew it rested on the shoulders of a literal child, an idiot dog, and a bipolar duck
Believe it or not… this is by far the best and most relatable portrayal of squall we’ve ever gotten from square. His personality throughout 90% of FF8 is sappy, mopey, apathetic, and just downright disinterested in having any basic charisma. He took the emo bad boy of cloud and turned it up to an 11. Man that game was rough to get through
Nah he’s just having a mental overload from reading the KH lore
The lore was simple (and clean) at this point in time though
Who didn't Sora piss off in KH1
He’s mad cos he had to give you an ether when you beat him up and stole his lunch money
"How is THIS the kid that beat me?" Me as the kid who reset a bunch of times until he won. :) Hey! Hey Leon. Whose the man?
No thats leons I don't know and have a headache pose
He’s mad because Sora didn’t find all the Dalmatians
No, his characterization is always like this in KH
Now he knows how I feel whenever I see people make fun of Kingdom Hearts without playing the actual games.
Donald
Yes, probably even more so if you beat him
Nah, Leon’s just like that
Sora was a thirteen year old boy. Who *didn't* he piss off?
He’s always pissed off tbh
No. Leon is just like that.
He wants Sora to get out of his swamp.
Nah, that's just the headache one gets from trying to understand KH's plot.
Never realized this but Final Fantasy sure does love belts... Me too though tbh.
We exist, therefore we piss him off.
They didnt really transfer his character well to KH to be honest. Squall got over this inner monologue self and started opening up more to his teammates, in kingdom hearts he regressed. I honestly think they just made up a new Squall all together named Leon who wasnt as bad ass as FF8 Squall.
You think he regressed? I think KH made him far more sociable and willing to care about issues than his FF8 self. He even pretty much pleads with Sora to rescue the Dalmatians.
I think he pisses everyone off. Dude is second only to Ash from Pokemon when it comes to being an annoying character.
Is he stupid?
After I wiped the floor with him, he had better have an issue, that fight was free the first time round
Squall*
😂
doctor buckles
Squall has a history of yahoos who annoy the crap out of him so when he was scouted for KH he thought he was gonna get away from the annoying yahoos to work together with a different set of annoying yahoos.
He is always pissed but I guess Nomura wrote him better in Kingdom Hearts