Final Fantasy XII

 PlayStation 2
User Score
7.6

Generally favorable reviews- based on 1542 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,062 out of 1542
  2. Mixed: 214 out of 1542
  3. Negative: 266 out of 1542
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  1. TCH
    Jun 1, 2008
    2
    I've read the reviews that claim this is amazing once you get inside, but I'm unconvinced and not inclined to bother. Very boring gameplay to begin; far, far, far too many beautiful but ultimately pointless and annoying cutscenes (skip 3 in a row, anyone?); and WTF? no option to invert the view controls. That for me is a deal breaker - it requires (I assume) virtually no effort I've read the reviews that claim this is amazing once you get inside, but I'm unconvinced and not inclined to bother. Very boring gameplay to begin; far, far, far too many beautiful but ultimately pointless and annoying cutscenes (skip 3 in a row, anyone?); and WTF? no option to invert the view controls. That for me is a deal breaker - it requires (I assume) virtually no effort on the part of developers, just a modicum of respect for the way my brain prefers to work. Can't rank it higher, no matter what others say.… Expand
  2. ZidaneT.
    May 14, 2008
    2
    this game was a pain to play, it was just so boring for a final fantasy which i expected to be fun. if a game is not fun then whats the point to playing? the main part of a game is that it should be fun. i felt nothing for the main characters and i never grew attached to them like i have to previous final fantasies like ff9 or ff7. there was no love story no chemistry nothing.
  3. AnonymousMC
    Feb 7, 2009
    2
    Excellent graphics, and the grid system adds a level of customization to characters. The world has very good looking and very varied looks. FFXII does a lot of things better than any JRPG before, however it is very lacking in the most important area: Story. The characters are uninteresting, unmotivated, and bizarrely uninvolved.
  4. TomW.
    Jan 4, 2007
    2
    Progress is a good thing - throwing random elements into a battle system and robbing it of any difficulty (aside from the annoyance you face when operating it) is not progress, it is laziness. SE, you can do far better than this, even if you have lost all of your real talent to MistWalker. I won't get into the story here, because others before me such as mdzN^^ and Jowy A. put it way Progress is a good thing - throwing random elements into a battle system and robbing it of any difficulty (aside from the annoyance you face when operating it) is not progress, it is laziness. SE, you can do far better than this, even if you have lost all of your real talent to MistWalker. I won't get into the story here, because others before me such as mdzN^^ and Jowy A. put it way better than I ever could.… Expand
  5. DavidL.
    Feb 9, 2007
    2
    If you have never played an FF before, you will like this game. If you have, you will probably hate it. If you have played ALL the FFs, you might like this game just for the sake of change. Overall, bad story, you don't care about your characters. They are all near-clones of each other so there is no identity. Gameplay is decent but magic and summons are underpowered to the point of If you have never played an FF before, you will like this game. If you have, you will probably hate it. If you have played ALL the FFs, you might like this game just for the sake of change. Overall, bad story, you don't care about your characters. They are all near-clones of each other so there is no identity. Gameplay is decent but magic and summons are underpowered to the point of uselessness. It's like an offline MMORPG.… Expand
  6. GDawoo
    Apr 16, 2008
    2
    The gameplay is very boring. If you're playing the game right, how it wants you to, you're not doing anything but watching your characters. A huge dissappointment.
  7. LukeD.
    Jun 6, 2008
    2
    This game was just terrible. Simple. There is no awesome nemesis, no interesting main character (ok, Vaan is the main character but he's just not memorable or has anything about him remotely... interesting), and no involving storyline. The rest of the final fantasy series has always been original, involving and epic, but this seemed to go for epic and ignore the rest. I must admit i This game was just terrible. Simple. There is no awesome nemesis, no interesting main character (ok, Vaan is the main character but he's just not memorable or has anything about him remotely... interesting), and no involving storyline. The rest of the final fantasy series has always been original, involving and epic, but this seemed to go for epic and ignore the rest. I must admit i gave up after about 14 hours of gameplay because it just wasn't fun. If by 14 hours your playing a game that just seems a chore, thats a pretty strong singla your wasting your time. It's got good graphics though, which is pretty much the only benefit. One more thing! You get all the characters so early, there just doesn't seem anything to work for. I don't get what Square Enix was doing making this, it was embarrasing.… Expand
  8. ThomasG.W.3
    Sep 25, 2008
    2
    Maybe now that the undeserving hype has died down, we can start seeing some realistic reviews on this crap game - I mean even the producer offered an apology for the nearly non-existent story, citing development time constraints! If a bunch of static, uninteresting characters standing around shouting their first, middle, and last names at each other repeatedly is your idea of "epic" Maybe now that the undeserving hype has died down, we can start seeing some realistic reviews on this crap game - I mean even the producer offered an apology for the nearly non-existent story, citing development time constraints! If a bunch of static, uninteresting characters standing around shouting their first, middle, and last names at each other repeatedly is your idea of "epic" writing, then FFXII is the game for you. If, however, you're not a Squeenix zombie and actually have a brain in your head, then stay far, far away from this RPG beta. Epic...right. A dead person could have written a better story.… Expand
  9. BugW.
    Dec 11, 2006
    2
    The camera sucks and the battle system is stupid. I wish they would have made it more like FFX.
  10. birrml
    Jan 4, 2012
    2
    This game = horrible! Vaan, can anyone say Tidus? Actually, the even lamer version of Tidus... WTF is up with the gambit system? I would rather play some stupid hack n slash where I mash a button, as opposed to running around doing nothing but watching animations on screen. I didn't get far enough into it to know where the story goes, nor do I really care. The gameplay is just so stupidThis game = horrible! Vaan, can anyone say Tidus? Actually, the even lamer version of Tidus... WTF is up with the gambit system? I would rather play some stupid hack n slash where I mash a button, as opposed to running around doing nothing but watching animations on screen. I didn't get far enough into it to know where the story goes, nor do I really care. The gameplay is just so stupid and boring that I just can't immerse myself into the story. By the time I get to the next cut-scene, dialogue, etc, I am so bored that I am more worried about finding a save point (just in case I get bored enough to try and play this again) than pay any attention to what any of these people have to say. FF XIII, same thing, a button masher disguised as a 'fast-paced turn based system'. Square, rid yourself of that disease known as Enix, and please have some sense in creating the great games you were once known for! If you really want to change your battle system, take notes from the Shadow Hearts franchise. Those games had by far the best turn based mechanics, EVER! Not the dumbed down 'play the game for you' mechanics of this trash!… Expand
  11. leofravoline
    May 10, 2022
    2
    Não é final fantasy apesar dos elementos estarem todos lá. Ele é vagrant story 2, que é um jogo que eu particularmente não gostei. Não consigo me importar com a história ou com os personagens. Vaan é um protagonista tenebroso.
  12. Meli
    Jan 9, 2007
    1
    There is nothing I can say here that hasn't already been said, but I will echo the complaints of a shoddy battle system and an extremely disappointing story that relies upon pseudo-philosophical apologetics and apologists to power the hype-wagon that has sold the game so far. Very sad, really.
  13. Gaiduk
    Sep 6, 2015
    1
    There are so many NPC, but they're all so stodgy persons (I'm sure they are creators' alter ego), subquests and all story so uninspiring. And too many shining magical visual effects - it's stupid unless you are 7 years old . If you want to kill fondness for Final Fantasy universe in himself once and for all, you shoud play this. FF Tactics was last FF-world enduring masterpiece.
  14. theNILE
    Oct 7, 2013
    1
    EVERY single character in FF12 is bland and boring, the most important characters are actually the worst ones and the least developed. You don't really get to learn much about any character's life or history and you never really care about them. There are very few NPCs to interact with and even they don't have anything good to say. Most areas are really boring because there is nothingEVERY single character in FF12 is bland and boring, the most important characters are actually the worst ones and the least developed. You don't really get to learn much about any character's life or history and you never really care about them. There are very few NPCs to interact with and even they don't have anything good to say. Most areas are really boring because there is nothing interesting in these areas and most of the game is just fighting your way through some boring enemies and when you actually get to the point where it seems like the game might actually provide something substantial story-wise, you get dirt thrown in your face, a cut-scene where nobody says anything. When you level up, you just level up, woopdeedoo. The final boss is a piece of cake. There is zero memorable about FF12 except the lovely sun in one area and Penelo's face.… Expand
  15. IGNsus
    Mar 27, 2014
    1
    Final Fantasy XII is a rather innovative title in the long-running series, but not a very good game. There is less user involvement in battles, and the game has questionable design decisions, such as not being able to obtain the strongest weapon due to your looting random chests earlier in the game. The biggest problem with FF XII is the inconsistent pacing. At times the story moves farFinal Fantasy XII is a rather innovative title in the long-running series, but not a very good game. There is less user involvement in battles, and the game has questionable design decisions, such as not being able to obtain the strongest weapon due to your looting random chests earlier in the game. The biggest problem with FF XII is the inconsistent pacing. At times the story moves far too quickly, at times it moves like molasses. Worst, the dialogue has no depth. We're told and shown how unfortunate the characters are, but we don't really feel for any of them. Further, there are also two completely unnecessary characters on the roster, and those characters take up way too much of the story.

    Commendable for changing the stale FF formula; it's a shame the game is awful.    … Expand
  16. Broyax
    Apr 11, 2017
    1
    Les Final Fantasy sont toujours aussi réussis graphiquement et ce en dépit d'une touche artistique tarabiscotée et d'un goût souvent douteux. Ils sont également toujours aussi lents et chiants et ce 12ème épisode ne déroge pas à la règle. Le système de combat foireux en temps pausé temporisé n'est ni en tour par tour ni en temps réel, il ne garde que les défauts des deux approches sansLes Final Fantasy sont toujours aussi réussis graphiquement et ce en dépit d'une touche artistique tarabiscotée et d'un goût souvent douteux. Ils sont également toujours aussi lents et chiants et ce 12ème épisode ne déroge pas à la règle. Le système de combat foireux en temps pausé temporisé n'est ni en tour par tour ni en temps réel, il ne garde que les défauts des deux approches sans aucun avantage.

    C'est étonnant qu'on range ce genre de jeu dans la catégorie "RPG" ou jeu de rôle en français, car ce "jeu" est un putain de couloir dirigiste et scripté qui n'a rien d'un RPG à dire vrai ; il ne suffit pas d'un inventaire et d'une montée de niveaux pour en revendiquer l'appellation (non contrôlée ici).

    Pour le reste, c'est niais à mourir et convenu à vomir, les personnages imposés sont débiles et ont tous des tronches d'ados de 12 ans (ça va de pair me direz-vous). Ah j'allais oublier : la musique non désactivable est insupportable !    … Expand
  17. Lorithian
    May 25, 2020
    1
    The inverted camera made this game unplayable for me. It may be a great story but I will never know.
  18. EternalP.
    Jan 14, 2007
    0
    This game hurts the team. Maybe not the Square team, but you know what I mean. Wasted 25 hrs to realize the game goes nowhere and is completely boring as hell. I could sit the controller down and have my dumb ai party beat the game for me without even leveling up. Old school rpg gamers, don't bother. Newbies to the genre (PS2 and up) and kids keep this crap going hard.
  19. Darkbhudda
    Mar 8, 2007
    0
    The camera is inverted from the standard way other games use it. There is no option to change it, making this game impossible to play for me.
  20. MattL.
    Feb 4, 2007
    0
    Final Fantasy has been ruined by "Change". No break screen? Final Fantasy's signature is the "Break Screen". Without that it isnt Final Fantasy. It's just a Knock off Star Wars Game with a Poor Storyline. How can people like this crap. Don't let good graphics blind your judgment.
  21. BrandonN.
    Jul 23, 2008
    0
    This game sucked and is probably the worst out of the other ones... first off turn based hello I don't wanna end up walking around and just clicking one button and watching a useless and boring combat system... SE I had high hopes for you but you created a piece of crap I hope FF13 is a huge improvement over this garbage
  22. AkeemG.
    Jan 29, 2009
    0
    This game is a disgrace to all of the other final fantasy games that came before,every thing about this game is just completly awfu! Ever since suare soft ceased to be the producer of final fantasy games and allowed Square Enix to take over every thing about Final Fantasy went straight down the F!%$@#G toilet.At first I thought that final fantasy X-2 was the worst...but I was F*&%$#@G This game is a disgrace to all of the other final fantasy games that came before,every thing about this game is just completly awfu! Ever since suare soft ceased to be the producer of final fantasy games and allowed Square Enix to take over every thing about Final Fantasy went straight down the F!%$@#G toilet.At first I thought that final fantasy X-2 was the worst...but I was F*&%$#@G wrong wasn't I.Final Fantasy X-2 was one of the worst Final Fantasy games ever made but it is still a million times better than Final Fantasy XIII.No one can ever deny that the best Final Fantasy games in the world were the ones produced by SQARE SOFT for the play station one.This game is so horrible that I am not even going to bother write a detailed review about it,all you need to know is to stay as far away from this game as possible and do not buy it because it is a waste of money.… Expand
  23. Broxigar
    Apr 26, 2012
    0
    Everything about this game speaks of mediocrity. I've tried to play this game three times and it is simply impossible to do. I was a huge final fantasy fan and I picked this game up on it's release and played for a few hours before becoming disappointed and not touching it for a year. I tried again and struggled up to the Stillshrine of Merriam where I simply couldn't get any furtherEverything about this game speaks of mediocrity. I've tried to play this game three times and it is simply impossible to do. I was a huge final fantasy fan and I picked this game up on it's release and played for a few hours before becoming disappointed and not touching it for a year. I tried again and struggled up to the Stillshrine of Merriam where I simply couldn't get any further because I didn't grind. I picked it up again and March to play through because I simply wondered if I did not give this game a fair try. I spent hours grinding in the Lhusu mines and didn't struggle any longer but then of course it just became so boring. I'll try to give a run down of what I experienced in my last game.

    The characters were indeed as bad I remembered, Vaan is in the top 10 of worst video game characters PERIOD. No one on the cast was really likable as none of them have any development. Baltheir, the character many cite as the best, is little more than a generic jerk. It's clear that Bashe was intended to be the main character at one point and when they scrapped that for Vaan they were unable to fix the dialogue and characters before releasing the game. The bad guys get multiple times more character development than the characters you use do.

    The combat is BORING. You don't actually do much of anything you sit there and watch your character do all the work. There are no interesting abilities, gone are monk, dragoon and other abilities you might be familiar with and instead you get 3 abilities you need a math degree to use properly and another "dark" attack that takes health to use which is basically juts an auto attack. In fact magic is gimped in a variety of was, the biggest being you don't get the gambits you need for it until the end of the game. Because magic is gimped what you get is a "tank" a melee attacker and a healer which is quite boring. And for a game that has a "aggro" mechanic it's terrible, you have no way to control it until you get decoy which is just a spell you're going to have one of your characters spam on your tank every time it runs out which automatically makes him have all the aggro. The story seems confused and disjointed. It starts out with a good back drop but then stagnates. FFXII all but lacks the epic sceenes and emotional story twists one would come to expect from this series. It didn't help that some environments like the Sand Sea were so pointlessly huge that by the time you got to your destination you could forget why you were going there in the first place.

    Grinding, why would they go back to this? I didn't play any other RPG on the PS or the PS2 that required me to grind. Why after 7, 8, 9, and 10 would they go back to the SNES era of grinding in order to progress?

    I've never made it past the Stillshrine of Merriam it simply becomes impossible to care about getting further the combat is pointlessly boring, the story moves slower than a snail, and I really don't care what happens to any of these characters. This game is one of the biggest disappointments in the history of gaming, by no strech of logic can I understand how this game has such a high score. I started this review calling it mediocre and it is, but for a game so boring and pointlessly long that I can't even complete this game deserves the low score I'm giving it.    … Expand
  24. kawrght
    Jun 3, 2013
    0
    positives:the game doesn't need you. just let your teams AI do the battling for you and you will win every time.
    negatives: boring to the extreme, every person in the game has no personality, they look boring with knockoff clothes from previous characters in the franchise, they even ACT boring and SOUND boring, most of the time they even sound like they only had one voice actor, its that    positives:the game doesn't need you. just let your teams AI do the battling for you and you will win every time.
    negatives: boring to the extreme, every person in the game has no personality, they look boring with knockoff clothes from previous characters in the franchise, they even ACT boring and SOUND boring, most of the time they even sound like they only had one voice actor, its that bad and unmemorable, the maps look like flat pieces of barely painted paper, i'm not joking they literally look like flat pieces of paper. the mini map is useless, the maps feel and look barren which isn't helped by the games old school walk to encounter enemies system. the enemies themselves look very boring and generic, the shopping is a confusing mess-what happens is the enemy drops an item, you sell that item and get gold. sounds interesting? nope. you get so little gold that it would take a long time to actually buy something simple as a potion. the leveling/skills system itself is a mess- basically you upgrade via walking on a skills map, like a board game, however skills you would need, say sword for a melee character or magic for a magic user are at the other end of the AP map! and you can only move one space at a time so you can't even just select what you want. the AP requirements for the spaces on the upgrade map is also unbelievably high with most requiring high two or even three digits! this doesn't sound like a lot but you only get 1 AP per battle!for the whole game!!. the story is boring and unmemorable. its only positive point is the summons, who are all cool but brings me to my biggest downpoint, the whole games quest system for everything even the story IS A FETCH QUEST. nearly all of the missions in the game involve going to someplace or fetching something. even monkey quest(a ps1 game lauded for being a fetch quest game) did this better, this isn't some zelda like you must find this before you can advance no the game literally just tells you to go here and get that! or just go there if its feeling lazy! this wouldn't be so bad if there was some kind of transport system but save for one map there isn't! not a vehicle or chocobo in the whole game! you have to literally walk everywhere!the game itself is unfinishable as well. i don't mean unfinishable good like a free roamer, i mean unfinishable as its too long! i was playing for half a year and only got about half way through at most. with a busted gold system and busted AP leveling system this is the one and only game where i say cheating using an action replay or xploder cd or finding a glitch/bug is a requirement!and even then with it being boring to the extreme and unfinishable and not even requiring user input in battle would you even want to try playing this game? if it wasn't for the final fantasy name attached this game would get a lot more hate than it does, i mean its so bad its on par with superman 64/aquaman battle for Atlantis for title of worst game ever made.    … Expand
  25. Kakashi2
    Jul 19, 2013
    0
    Preview:
    I was really surprised by how high the metacritic rating for this game was. It actually inspired me to create an account just so give my take on this game. First, I'm a huge ff fan. Here is my ranking of the ff games I've played from best to worst. Ff6, ff tactics, ff9, ff7, ff8 (squalls dead theory), ff4, ff1, ff10, ff 2, ff 3, FF12, ff 13, ff tactics advanced. So you can see I    Preview:
    I was really surprised by how high the metacritic rating for this game was. It actually inspired me to create an account just so give my take on this game. First, I'm a huge ff fan. Here is my ranking of the ff games I've played from best to worst. Ff6, ff tactics, ff9, ff7, ff8 (squalls dead theory), ff4, ff1, ff10, ff 2, ff 3, FF12, ff 13, ff tactics advanced. So you can see I don't think that highly of final fantasy 12 compared to other games in the series. Ill simply break it downs to pros and cons. Pros: The graphics are some of the best on the ps2. The art style is very good. Of course, there are some good musical tracks which are good, but pretty similar to the rest of the series. Cons: This game feels like it was a ten hour long game and the designers decided to make it a 200hr long video game. There is simply too much padding and filler in this game. The story is okay (convoluted like many of recent square enix games). But how the story is told is just awful. It is a slow progressing political story but it near impossible to follow it on your first play-through since it literally can take 5 to 10 hrs to get to the next story point. To walk from one side of the map to another it seems like it takes 45 minutes to do so. I suppose if you want to get lost in a game, this game has the potential because it is so big but I prefer quality of quantity. Also the main character is terrible. He is very uninteresting and so secondary to the plot it makes you curious what point he serves. Also how people equip armor in this game may be my least favorite of the series. It's possible for your character to have a weapon that he/she cannot use because you have not got that exact square of this semi random grid. Overall, there are some fun aspects to this game but most of the gameplay seems like it was tailored to waste your time. Too much padding between towns, dungeons are way too big and there are too many of them. The towns aren't fun because the leading character is so unlikable. I understand that the series is trying to adapt and change but I think this game was a step back for the series. That's why I wish the critic score would reflect that.    … Expand
  26. TheObjectivist
    Aug 13, 2015
    0
    There is certainly no poorer Final Fantasy, and perhaps no worse RPG.

    Devoid of life, effort, story, or care, this soulless entry into the Final Fantasy Series offers nothing past a story you are thankful you can skip, poor design that makes the game have no balance, bland and uninspired characters, tedious battling, and absymal graphics. This game does not just fail in one area. It    There is certainly no poorer Final Fantasy, and perhaps no worse RPG.

    Devoid of life, effort, story, or care, this soulless entry into the Final Fantasy Series offers nothing past a story you are thankful you can skip, poor design that makes the game have no balance, bland and uninspired characters, tedious battling, and absymal graphics.

    This game does not just fail in one area. It manages to fail in every last area that defines a game's quality. It wastes your time, and sucks the life from you as thanks.    … Expand
  27. nightocelot
    Jul 25, 2023
    0
    Litteraly, after about 8 hours you don't give a damn about a single soul in this game.
    Though characters design seems really good (accept Penelo, she's epicly unremarkable).
    Along with copy-paste like levels that feel like one repetitive corridor the whole experience is dull and forgetable.
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Awards & Rankings

3
#3 Best PS2 Game of 2006
1
#1 Most Discussed PS2 Game of 2006
2
#2 Most Shared PS2 Game of 2006

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
92

Universal acclaim - based on 64 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 61 out of 64
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 64
  3. Negative: 0 out of 64
  1. GamesRadar+
    80
    The story soars, but not so often. The dungeons are long and meandering. The gameplay is effective, but not engrossing. It's a staggeringly well-made game that throws more at you than any other RPG on the PS2... but well-made doesn't necessarily mean "fun."
    Read full review
  2. eToychest
    97
    This is absolutely my favorite Final Fantasy title, a claim I probably would have laughed at two years ago when rumors about the game’s battle system began to circulate.
    Read full review
  3. Gaming Age
    91
    One of those rare games that can be appreciated by both hardcore and casual fans alike, Final Fantasy XII may very well be Square's last great adventure, and a fitting sendoff, for the PlayStation 2.
    Read full review
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