Final Fantasy X-2: 20th Anniversary - The RETROspective

[@minakoarisato1506]

My very first ff game holds a special place in my ❤️ and love how girly it is

[@UnsilentOnAir]

I'd say that X-2 is low key one of my favourite Final Fantasy games but there's really nothing low key about it if I make an hour-long video about it.

[@prinnywizzard9608]

I played X-2 loooong before I ever played X, and so I never properly *got* the controversy. The art design was (still) excellent, the battle system was excellent, the music was distinctive & enjoyable... Like, since seeing X for myself (up to the final Seymour fight anyway) and hearing the arguments I can see why X-2, and especially the opening, is so *jarring* - but it's a damn good game in its own right! Edit: PS, I enjoy the sense of humour like the Stone Cold joke :P

[@UnsilentOnAir]

Well, I had a feeling that you'd like this game based on what you mentioned during Racing Lagoon. That was how that game ended up with its own section wedged in here. I'm just hoping I picked the right music to use for that section. But I kept coming back to the opening concert because it's talked about so much, often in the context of "this is why we don't like this game." I really wanted to contextualize that scene and the change in Yuna as a whole when making this. I'm hoping that worked because I feel like people too often take these at face value and I really forced myself to drill down to the next level to find the meaning inside what was happening and being said. Playing X-2 right on the heels of finishing X for this review really helped me pick some of that out so I'm hoping that people take advantage of that with X and X-2 being paired together. Also, glad you liked the jokes. I'm pretty sure the Stone Cold joke was the first one I wrote.

[@pocket7935]

Oof i was hoping this would sell X-2 to me, given that I played ffx to death yet only three playable characters and even with my history of prefering job classes to the sphere tree that only really works with a larger cast of characters that are have certain classes locked to them. Sure luna should have kept the ability to choose whatever class she wants but thats just main character syndrome. Ff4 was my favorite game in the series and i have pumped ridiculous hours into just getting the AP required in that game, idk maybe im just being a bit baised but nothing outside of a few storie beats presented are capable of holding my attention.

[@fippmeister]

X-2 is the game which finally made me lose all interest in the final fantasy fanbase. Back when I first played it not long after european release, most FF forums I paid attention to was all "Wah wah wah, why did my favorite character change _just_ because the entire world changed? Why is there color? Why is there happiness? Why should people in the game world be happier just because there isn't a giant horror monster trying to murder the entire world? Why should we try to have any kind of juxtaposition of fun and light-hearted events so there's any kind of actual impact when bad things happen? I need my depressive and bleak anime of stock characters being constantly beaten down, and I'll explode in a hailstorm of whiny gamefaq posts if anything ever changes." Clearly I'm not fit to consider myself a final fantasy fan, because I enjoyed FFX2 for what it was, instead of expecting it to be the same thing once more, just with the name of the bad guy changed.

[@UnsilentOnAir]

I see we had the same perception of the fan reaction to X-2. I will readily admit that I kept coming back to the Real Emotion concert to rile up those fans. But when I was looking for games to do long-form reviews on, I kept coming back to a similar line of thinking as you because it made sense to me. Doing this review allowed me to spell it out (quite verbosely, it would seem) and dig deeper into the making of the game and the story and themes of it. Granted, some stuff still didn't make any sense, like Yuna becoming a pop star, but it would've undermined everything that happened in X if nothing changed after Sin was defeated. And that's where my criticism of the X-Will audio drama comes in. It's really setting the stage for a complete reset. I'm sure the fans who wanted Square to run it back with X again will get what they want if they make X-3 but I can't help but feel like I won't gel with it.