Q&A with Johnny Mercyside: Part 2

Hey everyone, once in a while I'll do these lazy posts where I'll talk about myself rather than about music or games or whatever. These questions are from my Formspring account, which you can find here if you want to follow me. Here are twenty questions and answers for you that I answered some time ago (although if the answer is different from when I was asked at the time, I'll amend it here).

Q: If you had to cook dinner for someone tonight, what would you make?

A: Probably a pasta bake, I'm not a good cook but I can make that meal.

Q: What's the most unselfish thing you've ever done?

A: I don't really know, I don't go incredibly out of my way to help someone, that's not to say I'm selfish, but nothing stands out as really unselfish. I do small things to many people to help them.

Q: Do you have any scars on your body? If so, how'd you get them?

A: I have a few small scars but the one big scar I have is on my wrist, when my good friend Matt and I were playing wrestling next to a window in high school. He pretended to throw me into the window but I actually went wrist first into the window and have a weird insect shaped slit down my wrist, thats about 3 inches long.

Q: What was the worst movie you've ever seen? From start to finish?

A: Probably Cabin Fever. It was just dire, in my opinion. No shocks, crap gore, crap storyline, awful ending, stereotypical characters, lazy film making. Yet it was a minor success.

Q: Would you rather work at a large company or a small one?

A: There are pros and cons to both, and as stupid as it is, I don't really care as long as they pay well. I hate saying it but it's too important to get good money over job satisfaction in this financial climate.

Q: What's the longest you've ever gone without a bath or shower?

A: Probably a week or something. I think I went a week when we had no hot water, not sure.

Q: If you had your own talk show, who would your first three guests be?

A: Tough one, I'm going with Chris Jericho, Trent Reznor and Jamie Carragher.

Q: Where's your favorite place to buy clothes?

A: Primark, because it's the cheapest.

Q: Do you believe in life after death?

A: It's quite difficult to talk about it, but most of the time I think not.

Q: What do you think was the greatest invention in your lifetime?

A: The evolution of video games.

Q: If you could look like anybody, who would it be?

A: I'm not really sure, I dont really aspire to look like anyone in particular. Of course I'd like to look different, but not like someone in particular.

Q: What was the best concert you went to?

A: I have a joint favourite, seeing Nine Inch Nails the first time, and seeing Muse in Dublin. I cant possibly choose between them, but they were both epic.

Q: What's the origin of your name?

A: My first name? Well my father and my grandfather are both called John, so you could argue I'm John III.

My surname is more complex. This is actually my third surname. My birth name was John Geary, and my father decided to look into the roots of the Geary family crest and found out that the Geary's were actually the O'Gara's, and the O'Gara family crest roots back to a surname called O'Gadhra. I and the rest of my family left my dad seven years ago, and I'm currently using my mothers maiden name, which is Harper. I hope not to change my surname again.

Q: What did you eat for breakfast today?

A: I only really have breakfast on the weekend, I usually get up and go straight to work on a weekday. On a weekend I usually have bacon and egg butties. They're the best.

Q: Do you believe there's intelligent life on other planets?

A: Maybe very very far away there is intelligent life on it, but it's probably too far away for us to track down in some time. There are almost infinite different type of chemical and atomic reactions that there's bound to be something with the right things in the right place elsewhere in the universe. It can't just be here, in such a vast amount of space.

Q: Where would you like to spend your retirement?

A: I don't really know, it's at least 40 years away, I don't know what type of person I'll be then. Would I still like playing video games?

Q: Do you believe in fate?

A: It depends what mood I'm in. When I'm being realistic I don't, but if something very weird happens then I have a more open minded view to the idea.

Q: What's your earliest memory?

A: I remember being in bed with my mum and dad when I was very very young. Properly however, I remember my dad breaking his vinyls and shouting at me when I kept playing with them.

Q: If you could change your name, what would you change it to?

A: I can change my name to whatever I want to. If I wanted to, I would, I've done it enough times.  

Q: If you could rid the world of one thing, what would it be?

A: Money. Money is the worst thing around at the moment, it ruins everything. We should go back to old fashion trading, a lot of different parts of the world resource efficiently in many important materials. We can trade fairly without money.

And there you go. A little insight to what type of person I am and my views on things. Just in case you missed it earlier you can follow me and ask me questions on my Formspring here.

I'll be back on Tuesday to start a new monthly series. You saw me cover the Naughties in music for the past six months. I found the whole thing to be a great experience yet it took way too long. So I've decided to start going backwards even further, into the nineties. So I'm starting with 1999, and it'll just be a one day one article quick review of my thoughts on the year 1999, unbiased and biased. I hope you'll enjoy this dramatically shorter version of what we just went through for six months. I'm hoping as I said to do one year every month, so naturally the start of September I'll do the same format but for the year 1998. Have a good night.

Retro Review: Final Fantasy XII

Hallo everyone, it's unlikely I'll be able to get another retro review in until my computer is fixed, but here is my review on Final Fantasy XII, which I did in April 2008. It's possibly the last review I did, I can't remember doing one since. But as that was the highest vote tally in my first poll, I'll do my first proper review on this site as a video game review. To your right is four options of game review, choose which game you're most interested in. Anyway, onto the review.

 

"It has great qualities, but it’s just when you compare it to the storytelling of previous games, it’s just disappointing."

It's hard to review this game and give it a rating because as everyone who knows me is aware I adore this series with a passion. But, it's a disappointment. I asked my girlfriend, “What would you rating FF12?” She replied, “6 or 7 at the most.” But I gave it an eight, because it's not a bad game. Not by far. It's a great game in fact, but when you put it up on the wall next to Final Fantasy VI, VII and IX it really does not shine out.

The game is set in a world called Ivalice, the world of Final Fantasy Tactics, where the main character Vaan and his childhood friend Penelo dream get caught in a war between Archadia and Rozarria, two nations where the battlefield is about to be set in their kingdom of Dalmasca which was taken over by Archadia two years prior the beginning of the game. Ashe, the princess of Dalmasca and Basch both thought to have died two years ago eventually join forces and create a resistance movement against Archadia. Balthier and Fran are sky pirates along with Vaan and Penelo who get caught in the resistance movement. That's… pretty much the storyline. It's not great to be honest, and when you compare it to some of the others, it's as brief as comparing the Saw series to Cabin Fever. I mean, when people ask me to describe Final Fantasy VII's storyline, I gasp and say “Well… it's complicated.”

The graphics on the game are absolutely fantastic, there are no glitches no patches and they are as smooth as can be – it gives the Playstation 3 a run for its money. There is a small load scene between FMV's and the action but apart from that the scenes move smoothly. The best word to use here as you have probably already noticed is smooth. There is some gorgeous scenery in the game, especially in the latter stages of the game.

The sound is great – the voice acting is better than Final Fantasy X's and the soundtrack is decent. Once again if you compare it to some of the soundtracks of the other series then it stands out as pretty bad.

When it comes to replay value, something that the Final Fantasy series masters, it's not bad. I mean there is actually only one really, which is disappointing. It's called “Mark Hunting” which is basically hunting a monster that is pestering people in the game, they get harder and harder and eventually you go against some of the hardest monsters in the game. There is no “Blitzball” or “Card Game” like in the other series which is disappointing. Even the smaller side quests don't offer much.

The main thing I would like to talk about is the battle system. Ever since Final Fantasy IX the people at Squaresoft/Square Enix believed they had to change the battle system. In the old series, there was an ATB gauge, and until it fills up the characters stand still and do nothing. In Final Fantasy X they got rid of the ATB gauge which made the game flow much more. In X-2 they brought it back but instead got rid of all the waiting and delays and made the fighting flow even more. Final Fantasy XII works in exactly the same way but you can control the character in a 3D environment rather than in a set screen battle like the other games. The world map and battlefield is the same field this time around, the monsters can be seen as you scroll across the deserts, mountains and plains you go through. This sounds like a vast improvement doesn't it? My only problem is, the original way of fighting in the Final Fantasy series was not a problem whatsoever in the first place. I have no idea why Squarsoft/Square Enix think they need to improve the battle system. I've never seen anyone complain about it. Yes it has gotten mocked over time but games do! How many games in the past have got mocked but have kept the system the same over time? Game Developers always think they need to improve the game if it gets mocked, mainly games that contain scrolling or 2D graphics. Sonic went downhill and only makes one or two decent games every five years now because they tried to go 3D – Mario as good as their 3D games are no match for 2D Mario.

The Final Fantasy series has not been “great” since Final Fantasy IX, and this game follows that trend. Look how much time has past since Final Fantasy X – six years nearly? Six years and they make a tolerable but simple storyline with an improved battle system. It really isn't good enough. Where is the plot is twist? The complex storyline? The dark/hidden side of the main protagonist? The great female counterpart? The sick but great villain? The scenes that make you want to cry, that get you hooked on the game? There is nothing. Oh, but the battle system is good and improved. So for the past six years they think that all these things are best to be sacrificed in order to get a super battle system. Also, the storyline is so basic, they make you travel the whole world and stretch out the small storyline by making you have hours of battles in between. Basically, you go to one place which is all the way across the world, fight loads of monsters for hours, get there, beat the boss and *Insert story progression here*. And repeat. It's not good enough. Vaan, supposedly the main protagonist has nothing to do with the storyline, nothing, well he lives where the Archadian army took over. That's it. There's no love story, the villain is disappointing, Penelo is just annoying. The best qualities this game has, is Balthier, the awesome sky pirate who is arrogant, witty and sounds like David Bowie, it's fantastic! The graphics are great the battle system is good too. That's about it.

As you can tell judging on this review I should be giving it less than 8/10 but it is a good game. It has great qualities. All the series does. But it's just when you compare it to its great history of storytelling, it's just disappointing.

Overall: 8/10

 

I do maintain the opinion that FF12 is just a shadow on the Final Fantasy games around it, Final Fantasy 13 is a much better game, although I'm yet to complete it, so can't do a full review on it. I'll hopefully be doing a review in the next fortnight, we'll see how fortune works in my favour first. Have a good day.

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