Barachiel

Death Knight - Human/Orc
Druid - Night Elf/Tauren
Hunter - Dwarf/Tauren
Mage - Draenei/Blood Elf
Paladin - Human/Blood Elf
Priest - Night Elf/Forsaken
Rogue - Gnome/Goblin
Shaman - Draenei/Orc
Warlock - Human/Forsaken
Warrior - Worgen/Troll

The writer of this article lost all credibility when she gloated about how she doesn't watch the cut scenes. Um, how do you know the story is crap if you're not watching it? Maybe you've pre-judged it based on... what? The last game? Oh, that's fair. Truly, your opinions and commentary are worth considering.

@fanguad

Well said. And what burns my toast is all the people claiming how *great* FFXIII's combat was, while its story was crap. Funny, every person I've spoken to in the real world pretty much felt the exact opposite. Between the neverending Tunnel and the "Let the Game Play For You" Paradigm system, the *only* reason we slogged through the game was the story.

So to the author of this article and the legions trumpeting how right she is, all I have to say is, "Speak for yourself."

*snorts* This might be nice if the reward wasn't a joke. 500 Cryptic Points? Only 500? For those of you who don't know, their "prize' is $5 or the same amount the Gold players earn per month for free. Screw that.

@mrantimatter

I have to agree with you. I'm one of the first generation fans (played 1 & "2"/4 as a kid when they first came out), and the sheer amount of bile and vitriol heaped on this franchise of late is mindboggling. Final Fantasy is the Star Wars of gaming. Apparently, you can only be a "fan" if you hate on the series now.

I will admit, Squeenix has made some SERIOUS mis-steps. XIV was an unmitigated disaster. XIII was a disappointment, but it was not the *travesty* I've heard people make it out to be. Is it too linear? Dear God, yes. Does it lead you by the nose too much, and for too long? Undeniable. Is he combat system *too* easy? Depends on your definition, honestly, but yes, I think they went a bit too far.

FFXIII was an average game to me. Decent story, decent gamplay, could have been good but some bad design choices were made way back in the beginning. It happens. But because its Final Fantasy, the series has to be burned at the stake any time a Title doesn't live up to what people expect.

I can honestly say I *loved* Final Fantasy XII. I thought it was a well made modern FF game, at least till the tower. *shudder*. Still, once you got past that, it was good again. And I *loved* the fact that the villain finally had a motivation other than "life is pain! *cuts himself* wouldn't it be better if we were all dead?" (I was kinda sad to see XIII went back there, but at least from the weird machine-god perspective, I understood it; fresh take on an overused idea)

X was merely okay. I'm kinda in Spoony's camp on it, though with less vehemence. It was merely okay. It wasn't a Game of the Bloody Year though.

XIII-2 looks promising. I'll give it a chance. I'll actually plop down for the CE, just to get the soundtrack without having to eat import fees. :)

@Amusednow

... Wow, talk about talking out your arse.

The classes are mirrors. Jedi Knight and its ACs, exactly like Sith Warrior and its ACs.

Jedi Knight == Sith Warrior
Jedi Consular == Sith Inquisitor
Smuggler == Imperial Agent
Trooper == Bounty Hunter

The only differences are cosmetic (names and spell effects). Even the talents are just renamed versions of each other. The factions are balanced, class-design wise.

@ chaki

Actually movies *are* guilty of this too.

Anyone remember the '09 Star Trek? Remember how Nero was a really flat villain, with a paper thin motivation, and just came off as a whiny emo git? Also, there was the huge plot hole of him apparently having *waited* 23 years to wreak vengeance?

Well, if you read the comic prequel, Countdown, you'd know that Nero wasn't just some emo git whining over his world being fried by a stellar scale natural disaster, and blaming some guy he never met for not pulling a miracle out of his ass. In the comic, nero and spock were friends. Nero came his defense in the Senate, and he and Spock conspired on the big cure. A cure that needed help fromt he Vulcans. Spock failed to convince the Vulcan government to turn over the needed equipment,and while he did eventually *get* (read: steal) what was needed, it wasn't in time. They got there in time to see Romulus die. Nero snapped, shifted all the blame on the Vulcan for refusing to help them, and Spock for "betraying" him. In the comic, Nero was set up as Spock's personal Khan. And the movie removed every trace of it.

The whole waiting thing? in the deleted scenes, Nero hasn't been on a vengeance crusade because he and his crew got captured on shore leave, or something. I forget the specifics. They were stuck on Rura Penthe, not just chililng in deep space for 23 years.

@(Unverified)

Testing 1 2 3

@(Unverified)

PS How the @$#% do i get the unverified off this site profile? I'm logged in. It shows my profile name. No other joystiq site does this. *Just* this one.

I was really hoping S-E would have fixed some of that by now, especially after all the fans have cried about how much better the game has gotten. I was foolishly seduced by their false praise, went out, tracked down a physical copy of the game, and signed up for an account.

While I can't same the game is *exactly* like it was back in Beta, I can honestly say my few hours with the "improved" game has done very little to improve my original assessment of it. Sure, there are more patches coming, and its possible by this time next year, it really *will* be Final fantasy XIV 2.0, but the idea that they're going to start charging for this debacle... it's insulting. I'm cancelling my auto-billing at the end of the week, just to be sure they dont' "accidentally" charge me when the game does go "live."