I'm at 90hrs, max lv. Doing side quests. But it feels like monster hunter to me. It's great in all aspects except the story is non existent. Wait til you guys hit chapter 13...
I made it to the linear levels, and it sucked bad. My grandmother not only could play that level, but she could have designed it. It set gaming back about 20 years. First they strip your powers and give you something you have never played with, but it wasn't even scary, it wasn't a puzzle, it was just just walking down corridors, and then walking back down the same corridor, and getting your pass card updated like 8 times. There is some all powerful voice over the whole time that makes no sense whatsoever. And I had to read on top of it. Oh my god, I wanted to shoot myself. I really have no idea what they were going for. Someone should lose their job over that. Even the twist at the end of it is just not very developed. I made it to the 10 year mark though, and that's been at least interesting to see the changes.
Quick question for those deep in the game. Can you go back and do ANY of the sidequests no matter how far you've progressed in the main story/chapters?
I've only watched Let's Plays of it since it didn't seem like a buy. I've been waiting for this game since they announced it when the PS3 was released. It's a letdown, frankly. I was expecting a Final Fantasy GTA. Considering Versus was heavily city-scaped and the whole "Fantasy based on reality" thing, I was expecting the Shinjuku-styled buildings to be a major player on the theme but you spend most of your time in the plains. The modern buildings were barely relevant. You could've replaced them with gothic architecture and it wouldn't have made a difference. I was expecting them to make the setting one 1:1 scale city. Considering the main complaint about XIII was the lack of cities, I thought they'd turn that around 100% and set the entire game in that city. The story would likewise be an urban stroll, a more soap story than save the world kind. Rather than dungeons, you'd be going through malls and buildings (they'd one up Western open worlds this way). The story is an obvious mess. They didn't know what to do with the main girl which is a mystery why they bothered replacing the original sword girl considering she was a more interesting character. Your fake friends are gay as hell; they just are. The only good parts were Cindy and the dragoon girl (who deserved to be on your permanent party). Need I mention the comedy ending most people ended up with considering they never really used the camera?
Yes. First half of the game is an open world with all the side quests. Second half is linear but whenever u find a bed to sleep, which is pretty common, you can teleport "back in time" to the open world.
