Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift

Game: Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift
Platform: Nintendo DS
Developer: Square Enix
Release Year: 2007
Stephen's Rank: 9/10 

Final Fantasy Tactics A2 is a turn based combat strategy game for the Nintendo DS.

Basic Plot

You play a young boy named Luso Clemens who finds a strange book in the school library which has blank pages, and is sucked inside it. He finds himself in a strange world called Ivalice.

Upon arriving in Ivalice he chances upon a battle between a group of people who call themselves a "clan" and a giant bird called Klesta they're trying to defeat. Their leader, Cid, asks Luso to join his clan to protect him. He swears loyalty to the clan in front of a Judge and gains protection from death in doing so.

The story involves Luso working together with his new clan to try and find a way home. He decides to help the people of Ivalice while he searches.

A wise sage called Lezaford tells Luso that if he continues questing with his clan he will fill the pages of his grimoire (the book that took him to Ivalice) and in doing so he will find a way home.

On his journey Luso and his clan battle against a strange organisation known as The Khamja who are plotting and doing evil deeds around Ivalice, which comes to a head in the end of the game.



Gameplay

Final Fantasy Tactics A2 is a turn based combat strategy game. The game is broken up into two main stages; an over world which allows the player to travel to different battles and towns, and the battlegrounds themselves.

In the over world the player can move around freely without being engaged by enemies. The world is broken up into "areas" such as "Camoa" or "Baptist Hill". Each area has a small number of tiles which may or may not contain a battle depending on what quests the player has picked up. The overworld also contains towns and cities, as well as some other areas such as the Lezaford's house in the Aldanna Range or the witches hovel in Tramdene Fens. Towns provide you with two primary functions; the pub and the shop.

The over-world. The area shown is Camoa.

The pub is where you get quests from. It's also where you can read notices and rumours. I find this a bit confusing; they're both just notes which you can read with some backstory to some side quest, which sometimes trigger quests in the quest list. You can also sign up for clan trials to obtain new clain privileges here.

There are two currencies in the game world. Gil is like "gold" and is used to buy items and sign up for ordinary quests. Clan points are used for competing in clan trials, as well as for buying extra tokens at the auction house (more on that later). Both are obtained by completing quests. I generally find I have a massive stockpile of clan points but just enough gil to buy all of the recipes I have available.

The shop serves to provide your party with weapons, armour, and items. When you first use the shop it is mostly empty. During battles you obtain ingredients of all shapes and sizes which can be combined together in the bazaar (an area of the shop). Once you create the recipe for an item is available to purchase from the shop from then on. There are some exceptions as there are items which you can only purchase one of unless you re-create the recipe in the bazaar. This is a pretty fun and satisfying minigame that takes place between battles and allows you to build up your equipment over time. It also allows you to manipulate the rate at which you unlock recipes by using the Thief job (and stealing additional ingredients during a battle) as well as making sure you check chests and urns on every battle field. There are other ways to obtain items, both from battles and from the auction house.

At this point it's worth explaining the game world a bit further...

In Ivalice there are beings called Judges who are assigned to clans. A clan is a group of adventurers who complete quests for the various people of Ivalice. A judge provides the clan with immortality in battle; a clan member can be defeated in battle but does not permanently "die" as long as they have the protection of a Judge. The sacrifice is that the Judge imposes a law on every battle which the clan must adhere to. If the clan breaks the law, they forfeit their protection for that battle. An example of a law might be "You cannot use fire". This means you need to avoid using spells or weapons which do fire damage in order to stay under the protection of your judge.

The flip side to laws are clan privileges which are bonuses that the clan receives as long as they are under the protection of their Judge. An example of a clan privilege is "Regen" which causes every clan member to renegerate a small amount of health at the start of their turn. Clan privileges are also lost if you break the law during a battle, and new privileges are unlocked by completing special quests called clan challenges.

In each battle you take control of between one and six members of your clan. Your clan can contain up to twenty four members in total but because you generally only take six into battle you'll have a main "team" and then back-up members to fill different roles.

Clan members gain strength in two ways. Each clan member who participates in a battle gains experience which over time allows them to level up. You can go up to level ninety nine. This means that your primary party will become a lot stronger than the rest of your clan over time. This purely increases the health, attack damage, speed, resistance, and magic damage that your party does.

Each clan member also chooses a job. A job is simply a character class, and each clan member can use one primary job but also access the abilities of a second job. For example; you could have a Hume Soldier in your party who also has access to whatever White Mage abilities he or she had previously learnt. This allows for some pretty interesting combinations. On top of that each clan member also has a reaction ability and a passive ability. Reaction abilities are triggered when the clan member gets attacked in combat. An example is "Counter" in which the clan member will counter-attack any opponent who attacks them from melee range. Passive abilities are active all the time and include skills such as "Dual Wield" which allows you to equip two weapons and "Shieldbearer" which allows you to hold a shield regardless of your primary job. Some jobs have special requirements before they can be used, often including have a certain number of previous abilities in another job (for example you need White Mage abilities to use the Seer job).

Example of a battleground with the clan members to the right.

Each job has a set number of abilities which can be learnt. The trick is that you need to find certain pieces of equipment which "teach" you the ability if you wear them. So a Thief might equip a small sword called the Rondel, which teaches them the ability "Loot Lvl 2". The way this works is that after every battle your entire clan (regardless whether they are in the battle or not) will receive skill points. Usually 30 points for a normal quest and 80 for one that follows the main story. Say, for example, that "Loot Lvl 2" requiers 200 skill points. This would mean you'd have to equip the sword for seven normal battles before your Thief "learns" the ability. Once it is learnt you can access the ability without holding that item anymore as either your primary or secondary job. It sounds a little complex but it's not and the game slowly introduces these concepts over time. It interlinks the concept of loot with character development in a really nice way - you have to find good items to give your clan members good abilities.

On top of that, each clan member can be one of several races. Unlike Earth, Ivalice is home to a variety of beings and each race has their own set of jobs which can be picked up. Here is a list of the different races along with the jobs they can pick up:

Hume (human): The most common race in Ivalice and with the largest and arguably the most powerful set of jobs available to them.

• Soldier; A melee warrior.
• Thief; A light warrior with the ability to steal items from foes. This allows you to obtain ingredients for the bazaar faster than you normally would be able to.
• White Mage; Classic healer.
• Black Mage; Classic elemental damage dealer.
• Archer; Ranged warrior.
• Paladin; Defensive melee warrior with special offensive ability against the undead.
• Fighter; More powerful melee warrior than the Soldier with a variety of powerful attacks.
• Parivir; Stealthy warrior, reminds me of a samurai.
• Ninja; Quick melee warrior with low defence. Can learn "Dual-Wield" which is extremely powerful (two attacks instead of one, and allows you to learn more abilities at once).\
• Illusionist; A wizard who can cast spells that damage every enemy on the battleground with a variety of damage types (elemental, holy, earth, etc).
• Blue Mage; A mage who learns the abilities that monsters cast on them. The trickiest class to master and you will definitely want a Beastmaster in the party to help you achieve this.
• Hunter; A powerful ranged warrior with the infamous "Ultima Shot" ability.
• Seer; Similar to the Red Mage but with more powerful versions of the spells. Has the "Magick Frenzy" ability which allows it to cast a spell and then attack that enemy with a weapon.

Moogle: These are small, cute, furry humanoids who say "Kupo!" all the time (it gets pretty annoying).

• Animist; A healer/support caster.
• Thief; Same as Hume.
• Black Mage; Same as Hume.
• Moogle Knight; A melee warrior with versatile abilities. Similar to the Fighter.
• Fusilier; Ranged gun-wielding warrior with a huge attack range.
• Juggler; Ranged support who uses cards as a weapon. Has an arsenal of buffs and debuffs.
• Tinker; Worst job in the game. All abilities are based on luck, and if the luck is against you then the spells will damage your party instead of your enemies.
• Time Mage; Can alter time. Very useful; especially "Haste"/"Hastega" and "Quicken".
• Chocobo Knight; Rides a chocobo and gains abilities based on the colour of the chocobo.
• Flintlock; Similar to the Fusilier but has to "prime" before they can fire their weapon. Makes it pretty useless.

Nu Mou: Chubby rabbit like creatures with an affinity for magic.

• White Mage; Same as Hume.
• Black Mage; Same as Hume.
• Time Mage; Same as Moogle.
• Beastmaster; Can control monsters in battle. Important if you want to train up a Blue Mage.
• Illusionist; Same as Hume.
• Alchemist; Spell casting class which does good damage against a single enemy and utilises poison damage.
• Arcanist; Specialises in dark and holy damage.
• Sage; Powerful caster.
• Scholar; Casts spells which damage every unit in the battle (including allies...).

Bangaa: Kind of like a cross between a lizard and a dog... physically strong.

• Warrior; Much like a Soldier.
• White Monk; Combines defensive abilities, bonuses against undead, and some healing into a melee warrior.
• Dragoon; Wields lances with a long range and has a variety of powerful attacks.
• Defender; Similar to a Paladin.
• Gladiator; High damage dealing melee warrior.
• Master Monk; Has a variety of powerful attacks.
• Bishop; A healer class.
• Templar; A melee damage dealing extension of the Bishop.
• Cannoneer; Ranged warrior who uses shoulder cannons.
• Trickster; Ranged damage dealer support unit.

Viera: Always female and have rabbit ears.

• Fencer; A melee damage dealer with utility abilities.
• White Mage; Same as Hume.
• Green Mage; Has a variety of support abilities and is quite physically strong too.
• Archer; Same as Hume.
• Elementalist; Has a variety of elemental damage dealing spells.
• Red Mage; A mix of both Black Mage and White Mage abilities. Also has the Doublecast ability which lets them cast two spells at once.
• Spellblade; Melee warrior who imbues their attacks with various debuffs.
• Summoner; Powerful casting class with a mix of healing and damage dealing.
• Assassin; Has both ranged and melee weapon abilities.
• Sniper; Improved version of Archer.

Seeq: Portly round people who are physically powerful.

• Beserker; Damage dealing hand to hand combat.
• Ranger; Lays traps.
• Viking; Wields axes and has some magical ability.
• Lanista; Powerful melee warrior with lots of utility.

Gria: Always female and have wings that let them fly in battle (useful for getting across certain areas or up high).

• Hunter; Same as Hume.
• Raptor; Similar to Fighter, melee damage dealer.
• Ravager; AOE melee fighter.
• Geomancer; Utility spell caster.

There are also secret or special jobs available to certain characters in your party including the Heritor for Adelle, and the Bard for Hurly.

So there's a lot to decide when you choose who is going to be in your main team and there is a lot of replayability if you wanted to experience how other jobs work after your first play through.

Combat occurs on a small battleground which consists of tiles. Each clan member and enemy takes turns at moving and/or using an ability. Positioning is important; you do more damage to an enemy if you're standing behind them than in front.

There is one other activity which occurs in the over world every 200 days which is the auction house. This is a minigame within the game which gets the player to bid "tokens" against several AI opponents and try and stay in the lead. Tokens are worth 1, 2, 3, or 5 and you can "run out". The game involves trying to stay ahead of your opponents without running out of tokens (and therefore losing in later rounds). There are bonuses within rounds which give players an extra 5 token for finishing in a particular position at a particular stage. For example; on the third stage of bidding there might be a reward for being in 2nd place. Auction houses are situated in all the main cities and by winning an auction you take control of the corresponding "area". It's a little confusing at first but ultimately when you win auctions when you already control the area you are eligible to win powerful items of equipment. It's a great way to pick up some of the top end weapons and armour you might not have been able to source from the bazaar.

Comparisons

There are elements of many games but I've never played anything exactly the same before. It has the same feeling as one of the other Final Fantasy games in terms of the story, game world, and the characters. I like that. On the flip side, the battles themselves remind me more of Advance Wars in the way they play out. It's quite pleasing for me to be able to say there isn't anything else out there which is quite like this game.

Positives

The one thing that drives me nuts about previous Final Fantasy games are the random monster encounters in the overworld. You can't go anywhere without being constantly attacked by enemies. It makes exploring and travelling around the game world a painful and tedious experience. It's like playing a game of Pokemon where there is tall grass EVERYWHERE. Not fun. Final Fantasy Tactics A2 fixes this issue by changing the focus away from the overworld and making it all about the battles. The game world is tiny, and easy to travel around. It is a breath of fresh air in a genre that I was about to give up on.

The combination of interesting and challenging battles, plus the metagame of collecting items and choosing jobs for your clan members is totally enthralling. I've loved playing this game more than I would have ever expected and highly recommend it.

Negatives

I hate the sky ferry. You have to use it a lot and I just wish I could travel between continents quickly but instead you have to listen to some lady talk over and over again on each side. The music in the terminal is also the only annoying music in the game.

For anyone who's played Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, they've removed the law card mechanic where you could apply different cards to help you in different situations. That could be seen as a negative as it was a really interesting mechanic which added a new level of strategy to each battle.

Memorable Moments

All jobs are not equal! There are certain some "poop" jobs and some amazing ones, and there are certain combinations which are overpowered:

• Humes can combine the "Magick Frenzy" ability of the Seer (which lets you cast a spell and then attack) with the Illusionist job. Illusion spells hit every enemy on the map, meaning you can damage every enemy with both your spell and your weapon. This is even further enhanced with the Illusionist passive skill "Half-MP" which halves the magic points required to cast spells. If you also use the clan privilege "MP Channelling" during a battle you can cast this deadly combo every single turn. This is the most overpowered combination in the game + the fact that Humes can learn Dual Wield means they pick up most the skills faster too.
• My personal favourite job is the Viera job Summoner. All Summoner spells affect a wider area and they are a mixture of damage dealing and healing. My personal favourite spell is "Kirin" which puts health regeneration on everyone in an area. I cast this before most battles and one cast can hit the whole party.
• My main character is a Blue Mage/Hunter. I chose Blue Mage for the challenge of learning the abilities plus the utility of the spells, and Hunter is ideal because it gives you a solid damage dealing class. If you learn the Illusionist "Half-MP" passive ability and also use "MP Channeling" as your clan privilege you can use "Ultima Shot" every single round.
• Beastmaster is terrible, and to me it was only included to help you train up your Blue Mage.
• Tinker is the worst class in the game. The spells randomly affect either your allies or your enemies. It's a gamble, and the odds just don't stack in your favour in a long battle.

I am still playing this game as I write this blog. I play it mostly on the train on the way to work but also sometimes before bed and in the weekends. It's addictive, satisfying, the best Nintendo DS game I've ever played (better than Pokemon Platinum in my opinion).

A big thank you to DRTwoadism (Hamish Woodman) for recommending me this game!