but FF8 has some of the best music in the whole franchise.

Deling City's theme

Balamb Garden (literally the most serene FF song of all time)

Fisherman's Horizon, of course

Laguna's battle theme

And I actually love Rinoa's theme, though others may disagree


FFX has a lot of great music, as well. This is why the series has really paled in comparison to what it once was. No one SE has hired since Uematsu left has been able to match his brilliance in music composition.

FF8 is much better than FF7, IMO. Not story-wise, obviously (8 has some pretty weak plotting), but in every other way.

I liked Fisherman's Horizon

Quote from: SecondClass on January 06, 2016, 07:50:08 PM

FF8 is much better than FF7, IMO. Not story-wise, obviously (8 has some pretty weak plotting), but in every other way.

I dunno about you, but I thought that whole gathering magic thing was veeeeeeeeeery annoying, rather than the typical MP.

YouTube

Listen to the remastered version

Oh, really? I loved that whole dynamic, and their actual willingness to try out different things. I felt that the need to draw magic spells from enemies was balanced by the fact that you can junction magic to skills. As soon as the headmaster gives you the magic lamp, you can fight Diabolos, card him, and get 100 black holes from refining the card. Each of those can be refined into 30 demis, and then you just junction 100 to each character's strength and totally max it out. That kind of management to payoff ratio has always appealed to me in games. I feel that the magic systems in the earlier games were a lot more basic, and FF8 increased the complexity in an interesting way.

That, and the fact that there are leveled enemies, means that leveling up actually hinders you in FF8. That's why the carding enemies mechanic is so integral. Your GFs get xp, but you don't. The whole refining cards into items and spells mechanic was very fun for me.

But yeah, my main complaint with the game was easily the story. The characters were really solid and interesting, but the plot did nothing to serve them. It was pretty interesting in the first disc, but after the Timber mission, it started falling apart. The setpieces, combat, locations, and characters made up for the weak plotting in my mind, though. Oh, and the Laguna parts were actually really good story-wise, I wish more time was spent there.


and jeez, that's a pretty amazing remaster. It makes me excited for the inevitable release of a FFVIII remake at some point in time