Lightning

Lightning

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Street Fighter eat your heart out Final Fantasy: Dissidia and its prequal Duodecime take the stage!

Released in 2008, Square decided to appease its fans even more! By adding characters from every title thus far and throwing them all together in a fight for light or darkness. Final Fantasy Dissidia, took the main character from every game (I-XII) and their villain and pitting them against each other in combat. This was awesome because now you could answer age old questions like, which two born and raised Soldiers would win a fight, Sephiroth or Squall, and so on and so forth. Released for the PSP this game still had graphics and gameplay worthy of the PS2.

Plot
The story revolves around two gods: Cosmos, the goddess of harmony, and Chaos, the god of discord. The two have been locked in eternal conflict with "World B", a mirror dimension to the realm of "World A" where the first Final Fantasy takes place, summoning several warriors from other worlds from the main series to battle in a never-ending cycle of death and rebirth until the balance tipped in favor of Chaos. As the war seems to be nearing its end, the ten warriors of Cosmos band together to strike back at Chaos's minions and restore balance.
Having lost much of her power in the previous cycle, Cosmos gives the ten warriors the task of retrieving the ten crystals that will help them defeat Chaos. They each set out on a journey called a "Destiny Odyssey," where their respective stories are told and interlink with one another. During their "Destiny Odysseys," the heroes encounter their personal villains, defeating them through epiphanies about themselves that help them obtain their crystals.
Following the "Destiny Odysseys" is the "Shade Impulse," where all ten warriors are in possession of their crystals, but arrive too late to save Cosmos, who is killed by Chaos. The heroes begin to fade away, but are saved by the power of the crystals, allowing them to use what time they have left to strike back against the villains and defeat Chaos once and for all. In the end, finding themselves in World A, the other warriors return to their respective worlds while the Warrior of Light embarks on another adventure, while Cosmos revives to reign over World B.

Characters:
There is a hero and a villain from each prospective game, but not all the games heroes had names, so they created them for them.
Final Fantasy I:
Warrior of Light: Hero      Garland/Chaos: Villain
Final Fantasy II:
Firion: Hero                     Emperor Palmecia: Villain
Final Fantasy III:
The Onion Knight:Hero   Cloud of Darkness: Villain
Final Fantasy IV:
Cecil Harvey: Hero          Golbez: Villain
Final Fantasy V:
Bartz Kaluser: Hero         Exdeath: Villain
Final Fantasy VI:
Terra Branford: Hero       Kefka Palazzo: Villain
Final Fantasy VII:
Cloud Strife: Hero            Sephiroth: Villain
Final Fantasy VIII:
Squall Leonhart: Hero      Sorceress Ultimecia: Villain
Final Fantasy IX:
Zidan Tribal: Hero            Kuja: Villain
Final Fantasy X:
Tidus: Hero                      Jecht: Villain
then there were two special unlock able stories from XI and XII that were more considered side stories, not part of the main plot.
Final Fantasy XI:
Shantoto
Final Fantasy XII:
Gabranth

This game was enjoyable, the fighting style was fun and exciting and the stories and seeing FF characters who had never crossed into each others world before actually mingle and talk to each other! There was a second installment that acted as a prequal to the first game Final Fantasy Dissidia: Duodecim or .012. This title shows fans what happened in the "previous cycle."
Including the cast of the previous title this game focused mainly on the additional cast added from this game.
The new cast includes:
Kain Highwind: Hero Final Fantasy IV
Gilgamesh: Villain Final Fantasy V
Tifa Lockheart: Hero Final Fantasy VII
Aerith Gainsborough: Hero Final Fantasy VII
Laguna Loire: Hero Final Fantasy VIII
Yuna: Hero Final Fantasy X
Prishe: Final Fantasy XI
Vaan: Hero Final Fantasy XII
Lightning: Hero Final Fantasy XIII
This tells the story of why these characters were not summoned back into the next cycle which was the first game, but what they sacrificed in doing so.

Plot
The game's main story revolves around the twelfth cycle of the eternal conflict between the gods Cosmos and Chaos, who have both summoned several warriors from different worlds to fight for them. With the battle turning in favor of Chaos, Cosmos entrusts her warriors with the task of retrieving the crystals that will help them defeat Chaos.
The main focus of the story is a group of six warriors—Lightning, Vaan, Laguna, Yuna, Kain, and Tifa—who must deal with an army of crystalline soldiers known as Manikins, which pose a threat due to their ability to negate the gods' power to revive the warriors after they are killed. Believing their defeat to be inevitable, Kain and the Warrior of Light defeat most of their own allies to protect them from the Manikins. Lightning opposes this plan and leads the other active warriors to stop the Manikins once and for all by sealing the portal from which they emerge. Though they succeed, Cosmos is reduced to a weakened state after using much of her power to diminish the Manikin army, while Lightning and her group succumb to the Manikins' power and fade away, setting the stage for the next cycle.
In addition to the main story is a set of "Reports," most of which follow the other warriors who participate in the thirteenth cycle, explaining their roles before and during that cycle. Prominent characters in these reports include warriors of Cosmos—Terra, Cloud and Tidus—who fight for the side of Chaos during the twelfth cycle, and Chaos' warrior Jecht, who appears on the side of Cosmos, with the reports detailing how these characters came to switch sides.

I highly suggest playing these if you are a FF fan, while the character building can be monotonous, mastering each character and there abilities can be quite fulfilling.

Last review as this is the most recent released title in the series thus far, and my all time new personal favorite. Final Fantasy XIII.

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