"Wasted potential, but still fun!"

Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings is the latest installment in the Final Fantasy series (as of December 2007). However, it's unlike most Final Fantasy games and differs in several key areas.. for better or for worse.

When I heard that there was a new Final Fantasy game being released for the DS, I was.. ecstatic. I simply had to have it. However, this game didn't quite live up to my expectations.

Plot: 5/10

What can I say? The game's story is your basic Final Fantasy plot with a few twists, which I saw coming from a mile away.

First of all: crystals. I am sick and tired of those stupid crystals that pop up in 3/4 of all Final Fantasy games. In III: I had to stop the crystals from being destroyed. In IV: I had to protect the crystals. In V: I had to stop the crystals from, yet again, being destroyed. Yes, I know what you're thinking. But, Kironide, there weren't any crystals! Just because they're called auraliths now doesn't mean they're not crystals anymore.

The characters.. they sadden me. There's no character development at all. Kytes is the same in the beginning of the game as he is at the end. The only character that displays a significant change is, well, Llyud, and that's solely because the plot forces him to.

Graphics: 7/10

It really breaks my heart to give the graphics a 7/10, especially this is a Final Fantasy game. Okay, I'll admit the cutscenes are beautiful. They're what I would expect from a Final Fantasy game. The cutscenes simply astound me, as they always do.

However, outside the cutscenes, the graphics aren't so good. The sprites look like they were ripped from FFTA (and some probably were). When the game 'zooms in' on a group of characters.. well, let's just say it's rather saddening that, at times, a simple rock looks better than the characters do. The sprites are blocky and are what I would expect from a GBA game, not a DS game.

On the battlefield, due to the large number of units present, it can be vital to be able to tell one from another. However, due to the graphics, this really isn't the case: at times, everything's just a big blur of blocks.

Gameplay: 7/10

*sigh*

I'm seriously disappointed. This is not at all what I expect from a Final Fantasy game.

Revenant Wings is basically a real-time strategy game. Essentially, you control up to five characters (out of a possible nine) on the battlefield. Each character has their own skills (which have no MP cost, but you have to wait before you can perform one particular skill after you've already used it) and stats. Also, at the beginning of each battle, espers are summoned: each character 'controls' two espers. However, if you capture a summoning gate, you can summon additional espers. Each esper takes up Affinity, so you can't summon hundreds of espers and just rush the enemy. When an esper is defeated, you regain its Affinity. To control your units, you can either select them individually, select a character and all espers under that character's control, or use the stylus to draw a box around units you want to control. After that, you can either tap an enemy to attack it, tap the ground to walk to that place, tap a summoning gate to have your characters capture it, or tap minerals/rocks/chests to mine/open them.

There's sort of a rock-paper-scissors system: flying beats melee, melee trounces ranged, and ranged kills flying. It's a simple system, and quite easy to abuse. A Rank I flying esper has no trouble at all standing up to a Rank II melee esper.

To summon an esper, you have to form a pact with it first with the Ring of Pacts. You start off with five basic espers (if I remember correctly). To form a pact, you have to use auracite. A Rank I esper requires one piece of auracite, a Rank II esper requires two pieces, etc. The Ring is essentially an interconnecting network. You can only form a pact with an esper if you've formed a pact with an esper that it's connected to. The downside of all this is that in the beginning it's fairly difficult to use enemy weaknesses to your advantage, because you probably won't have enough auracite to form enough pacts with espers of all four elements.

After you form a pact with an esper, you can place it in your esper troupe, which is a lineup of five espers. At first, you can only put Rank I espers in your troupe, but as you acquire espers of higer levels, you'll gain the ability to put higher-ranking espers in your troupe. In battle, you can only summon the espers in your troupe.

The annoying thing is that you're forced to have a Rank I esper in your troupe, which means that when you summon espers at the beginning of a battle, most of your characters will be stuck with Rank I espers.

After you get through the bulk of the game, you acquire four more characters, for a stunning total of nine. However, five out of the nine characters are ranged, which makes your party quite vulnerable to melee attacks if you use the new characters. Also, you're pretty much forced to use Penelo, the only healer you have.

The strategy leaves lots to be desired. The thing is, you'll probably always just draw a box and select all your espers, because, well, there's not much of a point in splitting up. In fact, doing so will just get you killed faster. There's one strategy that works for the entire game (except for one boss, I guess): you select all units, and tap an enemy to attack it. Rinse and repeat. And, uh, even if your espers die, you can just re-summon them. Far too easy.

There's a big world map, and you fly around in your airship to wherever you want to go. You essentially enter a location, kill enemies/fulfill set conditions, and go somewhere else and do the same thing over and over again. There are no towns: only a small marketplace on your airship that you eventually unlock with three shops. You can accept 'bonus' missions after a few chapters from a noticeboard, some of which have rewards (not counting the treasure you normally obtain). The gameplay essentially focuses on battling.

Gambits are essentially skills you tell the AI to automatically use once the time limit's up. You can only set one skill as a gambit, which is especially annoying with Kytes, because he'll acquire quite a large array of spells, all of which you want to use. That means that if you use Kytes in your party, most of your time is going to be spent selecting him and using whatever area magic he hasn't already used.

Other than materials used in forging equipment, the equipment itself, and auracite, there are no items. Your HP is restored to full after each mission, which is rather nice.

Music: 9/10

Unlike the gameplay/graphics, the music does meet my expectations. It.. well.. it's beautiful. It puts a new spin on the classic Final Fantasy theme that we've all come to love. As always, the music never gets boring, and it gives a sense of depth to the game.

Replay Value: 5/10

I don't see how you would want to replay this. There isn't anything that you can't accomplish in one playthrough easily. Also, a main part of the enjoyment derived from playing this game comes from the story: the second time through, it's just not as enjoyable.

Rent it or buy it?

I'd say buy. Even with all of its faults, this is an excellent game that deserves a place on your shelf (or wherever you keep your DS games). This is not a bad game by any means: it's just a game that needs a little more work. If any of you readers are Star Trek fans, well, it's like Nemesis: it has a lot of potential, but that potential was, sadly, wasted.

Final Score (not an average): 7/10

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 01/01/08, Updated 01/03/08

Game Release: Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings (US, 11/20/07)