Anyone else out there forced to play this to get some damn closure on this series?
The main problem:This game is not bad, not anymore so than the rest of the series, anyway. However, this game is
extremely stressful and unforgiving for new players. Why? Because you're on a time limit. A clock that is constantly ticking down, while NPCs, Quests, Shops, and Events all move around in real-time.
You might think this similar to Majora's Mask, and yes it is. However the big kicker is that there's no way to rewind the clock. You get a maximum of 13 days to complete the entire game. It clearly states that if you run out of time, you'll need to restart the game. Reloading your last save is not going to recover days of time.
Why's this a huge problem? Because you never have any idea how much time you
NEED. Do you actually have time to do this side-quest or explore this area? Should you be bolting it directly for the next objective, or risk wasting time you can never recover later in the game? The game even warns you that some side-quests might take too long and you should avoid wasting your time on them!
Other problems:The battle system itself is also very unforgiving. Firstly, there's no levels or EXP. I really don't like when RPGs do this. You never really have a good grasp on exactly how strong you are, and more importantly how strong any of the monsters are.
So far I've encountered areas with easy kill-it-in-one-shot monsters, and then dragons that also kick your ass in the same room. There seems to be no real rhyme or reason to whether monsters in a particular area are powerful or not, and you have no idea if you're going to seriously get your ass kicked until you actually engage the mob and find out. There's really nothing that tells you "you're not strong enough to fight that monster"
Pair this up with the fact that you cannot afford to fight battles you cannot win. Or any battles at all actually unless you need an item it drops for a quest. Monsters do not give EXP, and they drop near-negligible amounts of gil. You also cannot heal yourself through any kind of regenerative means. You can carry up to 6 potions (which are also very expensive) but for the most part any damage you take in battle is permanent.
You can't afford to take damage and hope to cure it up later, instead you have to make effective use of Guard. Guard takes up one of your 4 ability slots (you can unequip it if you're bat-shit insane) and, if timed exactly, allows you to negate damage entirely. The timing on this can be rather unforgiving though. You can simply hold Guard, but you'll still take moderate damage. Press Guard too early: 300-400 damage. Press it too late: 900-1000 damage. Press it exactly right: 0-50 damage. You take a big risk by trying to time the Guard exactly. If you press it too late you take a fuck-ton of damage, but you need to also be aiming to negate that damage by hitting it exactly.
If you die, instead of Game Over, you're given the option to "Escape". This will not only revive you and flee the battle, but it'll even refund you any potions or other items you used during the battle you eventually didn't win. Sounds great right? Well the kicker is that Escape has a penalty:
You lose 1 hour from your countdown clock. Argh.
To make this entire ordeal a lot less stressful. I'd like to offer my fellow people some tips I've picked up so far.
- Chronostasis: Use it.
Hope makes it sound like this ability should only be used in emergencies. This is really not the case. Chronostasis freezes the countdown clock for a while. If you need to cover a lot of ground to get to the other side of the city, use Chronostasis to freeze the clock so you don't waste a whole hour of game time getting there.
It only costs 1EP to use. You can recover this much EP from 5-10 monster battles. If you're going to traverse an area with a lot of monsters, use Chronostasis, you'll get the EP you used to cast it back. The clock is frozen during battles anyway, so this doesn't count against you.
- Try to avoid battles you do not need to fight.
Monsters do not give exp, there is no real benefit to grinding them. Fighting a monster that ends up taking away half your HP in one battle means you'll need to waste your gil or limited supply of potions healing it up, or worse: You'll be forced to Escape and waste valuable clock hours.
Only go out of your way to fight monsters if you know you can kill them quickly and without taking any damage. This is to help recover your EP (for Chronostasis) and collect a few more ability items.
- Save: Do it.
Don't rely entirely on the auto save. You can save anytime by hitting start, whether it be before entering a new area or once you accept a new quest.
There are some main story quests where you are not told or shown exactly where you need to go. This isn't a problem with a guide, but without one you risk wandering around aimlessly trying to find whatever the game expects you to find. If you ever suddenly find yourself without a clue on where you should be going: SAVE.
Save your game, do your aimless wandering, and then reload the save game once you know exactly what to do and where to go. Just remember that anything you do is going to be lost. Don't assume that you picked up an item already because you did it before reloading a save.
Similarly, whenever you enter a new area with monsters you do not recognise: SAVE.
If the monster ends up kicking your ass, you are better off re-loading your save game than taking the 1 hour escape penalty.
- 3-star difficulty: Don't do it.
Accept the quest by all means, but don't actually do what you're being asked to do, you'll most likely get your ass kicked. These quests are meant to be done later once you're stronger. How much stronger? Who the fuck knows. Damn game.
- Never waste the clock.
Don't use inns to pass time or recover HP, they waste valuable clock hours. Use restaurants. They're cheaper than using potions and are instant recovery.
The real main point here is that you shouldn't ever be wandering around aimlessly.
If the next leg of your main story quest requires you to wait til 6PM and it's only 1PM, you need to find something else to do. Do not just wait around for 6PM. That's a colossal waste of time.
Run around the city looking for side quests. Side quests increase your stats so they're worth doing. But if you can't find any, it's time to board a Monorail and move to another zone and do something there instead. Any progress you make on the other zone's main quest now is stuff you don't need to do tomorrow.
You, however, must remember to come back, or you may end up wasting an entire day instead of a few hours. Plan in advance how long it takes to get back to where you need to be. If you find yourself running out of time, use Chronostasis, but don't rely on it. Remember that using the monorail to move between regions also costs time, up to an hour. Changing regions will cancel Chronostasis, so don't waste it. You can use Teleport > Chronostasis to get back in an emergency, but that'll cost you a whopping 3 EP.
- If it looks important, it probably is.
While running around try to keep your eyes off the mini-map and instead keep your eyes peeled for things you can interact with on the screen. There are random things you can pick up or people you can talk to that isn't always evident on the mini-map. Sometimes it's literally just something lying on the floor in the middle of nowhere. These are usually for quests. The quests might only be available at certain times of day, so getting the items in advance is advantageous.
There will be NPCs that randomly try to sell you something separately to the usual shop interface. These are almost always for quests. Buy them. It'll save you trying to find this item later when you're not told where to go. I find the quest reward always recompenses you for these purchases. If you already have the items in your possession when you find and accept the quest you can turn them in right away.
- Day 2 is a lot more forgiving than Day 1.
So at the end of Day 1 I felt pretty defeated by this game:
- You get precious little time to actually do anything because the game starts at 6PM.
- The game and city are new so you spend the little time you have wandering aimlessly and learning where to go.
- The first quest requires you to look around for NPCs that aren't marked on the map before you can even get out of the first area.
- By the time you have the first mission out of the way it's likely already 2AM and you have very little time to actually do anything.
The time limit felt extremely punishing, and too stressful to play.
Day 2 on the other hand gives you a full 24 hours (6AM - 6AM) to do anything you want right from the get go. You'll realise that this is a lot more time than you previously thought, as long as you don't squander it.
I found Day 2 lasted me about 4 hours in real-time (including cutscenes, menu time, etc). That's a lot. I managed to get the entire of the first city's main story done, plus a dozen side quests, and during the downtime (you can't do the last part of that story 'til after midnight) I went to the second town, got that story quest going, and did a couple side-quests there too.
Even picked up the FFXIV Miqo'te dress. Meow meow, choco-chow.
![](http://i.imgur.com/UtyKMhO.jpg)
I streamed/recorded the last 2 (real) hours or so of my first day last night for anybody curious what it's like:
http://www.twitch.tv/ketsolais/b/503421838If I decide to tackle Day 3 later tonight I might stream that too.