Ever wonder what it would be like to pit characters from different Final Fantasy games against each other? Who would win the title of the most badass emo character, Cloud or Squall? Is Sephiroth as badass as everyone thinks he is or is he, at his core, simply a momma’s boy who can’t hack it? Well now you can find out, thanks to Dissidia: Final Fantasy for the Sony PSP.
More after the break…
Squall prepares to deliver the final blow on Tidus.
A huge crossover fighting game, something along the lines of a Final Fantasy version of Super Smash Bros, it pits 10 heroes, one from each of the first 10 Final Fantasy games against their 10 villainous counterparts. You’d have to wonder, however, whether Square-Enix can pull something like this. After all, their last non-RPG Final Fantasy game, Dirge of Cerberus was pretty bad, at least gameplay wise. Needless to say, the thought of Dissidia worried me and the demo wasn’t really a clear indicator of what the game would be like, given that it was severely limited. To my relief, however, Dissidia: Final Fantasy delivered.
I was truly amazed at how well the game worked, given that, at its core, it is simply Final Fantasy fanservice (unfortunately not the sexy kind…unless you’re attracted to the whole bishonen thing, of which there is an abundance), though it is fanservice at its finest. However, I will warn everyone now, Dissidia is a game geared towards RPG fans…specifically Final Fantasy fans. While an excellent fighting game in its own right, it follows many of the conventional RPG traits that made Final Fantasy so great in the first place. The character customization, the leveling system, the storyline…everything screams Final Fantasy. For those of you looking for a simple brawler, you will not find it here. Dissidia is a complex fighter, filled with depth.
Jecht confronts Tidus in his Destiny Odyssey storyline.
The biggest flaw in the game, of which there are only few, is that the characters are given very little backstory in game. Dissidia expects you to know both the heroes and the villains before you get started, so for those of you that haven’t played every single Final Fantasy, or at least the first ten, a little research may be in order. However, it is nothing that will make the game unplayable, just a little confusing at most.
The gameplay mechanics themselves are well executed. Attacks are classified into two different categories: BP (Bravery Point) Attacks and HP Attacks. A BP counter, displayed right above a character’s HP meter keeps track of how many Bravery Points you currently have. Only HP attacks are capable of draining an opponents HP, the amount of damage delivered equal to that of your current BP. BP Attacks drain your opponent’s BP meter depending on the amount of BP damage delivered and adds it to your own BP meter. Bringing an opponent’s BP down to zero will force them into Break mode. As long as a character is in Break mode, they are incapable of dealing HP and BP damage and any attacks against them deal critical damage. In addition, forcing your opponent into Break mode adds the BP collected in the BP Pool counter at the bottom of the screen to your own BP meter, giving you a major BP boost. Finally, once your BP is higher than your opponents HP, your BP counter will turn purple, indicating that you have enough BP to deal a killing blow to your opponent with an HP attack. Also, you have an EX meter that slowly fills up during the course of the battle and special EX Cores that increase that meter substantially. Once your meter is full, you can go into EX Mode, which enables you to use a special EX Burst attack (similar to Limit Break, Trance, Overdrive, or whatever Final Fantasy lingo you’re familiar with), which is triggered when you successfully complete an HP attack. Sounds complicated? Maybe a little, but it’s not all that difficult to pick up.
Cloud of Darkness delivers an EX Burst attack against Tidus.
Character customization plays a huge part in the gameplay. Just like in Final Fantasy, and most RPGs, equipping weapons, armor, and accessories boosts your character’s stats. Also, there are several different abilities to choose from, starting with basics like the ability to block or dodge, and eventually getting more powerful abilities, such as new techniques the more you level up. You also have CP (capacity points), which determines how many abilities you can equip to your character at any given time. CP increases the higher your level gets and the CP cost for certain abilities is lowered after gaining enough AP (ability points), earned by winning battles and fulfilling certain requirements in Quick Battle. Leveling up can be done one of two ways: playing through story mode or battling using the quick battle mode. Given that this is a Final Fantasy game, expect to have to grind every now and then in order to level up, especially if you want to be strong enough for the story mode.
The game’s Story Mode deals with a seemingly endless battle between Chaos, the God of Discord and Cosmos, the Goddess of Harmony. However, the villains seem to gain the upper hand, with heroes slowly starting to fall. With the odds seemingly tipped in Chaos’ favor, Cosmos has summoned the ten remaining warriors to gather ten crystals in order to stop Chaos. This is where the game begins. Split into several parts, the main storyline is composed of ten Destiny Odysseys, which deals with each character’s individual search for their own crystal. Each Odyssey consists of five stages, each with multiple enemies of increasingly harder difficulty. Beating a Destiny Odyssey story unlocks the second part of the story, Shade Impulse, which is similar in structure, but rather than have you go through each character’s own storyline, the story for Shade Impulse includes everyone in one overarching story and it allows you to choose whoever you wish, rather than making you go through everyone’s individual scenarios like Destiny Odyssey does. Be forewarned, however. Although Shade Impulse is unlocked once you beat only one of the ten Destiny Odyssey storylines, it’s advisable to proceed only once your characters are at a high enough level. It is brutal.
Golbez forces Cecil Harvey into Break mode, adding the BP at the bottom of the screen to his own BP counter.
In addition to the Story Mode, Dissidia comes packaged with several other gameplay modes. First off, there’s Quick Battle mode, which allows you to battle with and level up customized characters. Arcade Mode allows you to choose any of the 20 characters, each with preset and uncustomizable abilities and equipment and pits you against 5 randomly selected, CPU controlled characters for a chance to win treasures that can be used to customize your character further for Quick Battle and Story Mode. Finally, there’s the Multiplayer mode, which, unfortunately, is ad-hoc wifi only, meaning that you can only battle against someone nearby, which is a major let down, especially if you don’t know anyone who owns the game. However, the ability to trade personalized “friend cards,” which gives you the ability to battle against your friend’s customized characters even when they’re offline is definitely a great idea.
As I stated before, the gameplay itself flows really well. The fighting system is intuitive and the game rewards you for pulling off some of the more slightly difficult feats in the game by giving you more AP and DP (destiny points), which are crucial in aiding you. DP in general is quite valuable in Story Mode, as you waste DP according to how many moves you make in a stage and take a penalty for however many DP below zero you wind up having in the end. However, higher DP means more points and a better reward so there is definitely a major positive for gathering DP. The fights in general are fast paced and force you to think on your feet, especially when facing high level opponents. The Story Mode can get repetitive at some points, especially since you have to go through it more than once if you want to unlock everything. But when you start fighting tougher opponents, you’ll be glad you went through all of that.
Again, this game is geared mostly towards Final Fantasy fans. It does such a great job of delving into the characters’ personalities, but it does require, at the very least, some knowledge of the characters. However, I also found it has given me a greater appreciation for the Final Fantasy series and has really made me want to play Final Fantasy VI, mainly because Terra Branford is such an endearing character and Kefka Palazzo is such an incredibly awesome villain (for those of you who don’t know him, think of a Final Fantasy version of the Joker). If you’re not an RPG fan, you may find this game more annoying than fun, seeing as how so many RPG elements go into this game. However, if you can look past that, then Dissidia is definitely worth checking out. Also, for those of you really hardcore RPG fans, there is an option you can unlock called Command Mode, which changes the battle system to an automated command-based system. Personally, it’s not my cup of tea as I feel the default combat system fits perfectly. But it’s definitely worth checking out. Also, I’m somewhat disappointed that the Villains don’t really get their own story mode, aside from them being playable in the Distant Glory and Inward Chaos modes available after beating Shade Impulse.
Final Thought: Overall, the game is great. I warn non-Final Fantasy and non-RPG fans to tread cautiously due to just how much fanservice is involved here. Still, I recommend trying it out.
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One thing to correct you on, there are 22 characters to play with (10 hero characters, 10 unlockable villains and 2 unlockable characters after you beat both distant glory quests which makes available Shantotto and Judge Gabranth to purchase which are from FF Xl and FFX11 respectively).
You didn’t even mention the summons and how they can play a pivotal role in a match, how you can only equip one summon at a time or about the huge number of them there are in the game.
One other thing that disappoints about the game is the lack of a tutorial mode in which to practice with some of the characters’ moves.
I agree with you that the lack of a villains story arch leaves me for want of it. I want to see how some of the villains behave, act and think behind the scenes. We already know the life story of the heroes but we rarely if ever get an in-depth or first hand view into the villains mind, this would have been a real treat. In respects to the heroes though, I think it’s brilliant how Dissisia has managed to intertwine nearly all of the stories with each other and release a little more information about what’s going on as you pass each heroes story.
And on a side note, I always had trouble determining which was more emo, Cloud or Squall. Now, seeing their characters and inner thoughts in this game, I think I’d have to say it’s Squall. Also, everyone has to look for crystals?!? Well ‘duh’ I suppose, I just wish one of the characters (maybe Zidane) would have made a snide remark after Cosmos told them the game plan. Something on the lines of, ‘well, who didnt see that coming, seriously’. Would have added some nice comic relief and a good inside joke for all Final Fantasy fans. It is Fan service after all, and damn fine fan service it is.
I’m well aware that Shantotto and Judge Gabranth are unlockable, but they are technically secret characters. But I figured, why ruin the surprise. So thanks a lot. You ruined the surprise, xpress. lol.
Also, yeah, summons play a huge role and I could have gone into great length to describe them. But I felt that the review was already too long for its own good and it seemed rather unnecessary to explain every single detail, so some things were cut for length, hence why I didn’t go into detail about equipment or accessories either. Let the player discover for themselves just how many options they have to improve their characters.
I do appreciate your thoughts on the subject, however. Dissidia is quickly becoming my favorite game but that doesn’t mean its perfect. There are definitely some improvements to be made. Hopefully, if this game does well enough, maybe Square-Enix might give us with another Dissidia, maybe one that delves deeper into the Villains’ storylines.