Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age

 Xbox One
User Score
7.1

Mixed or average reviews- based on 46 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 31 out of 46
  2. Mixed: 2 out of 46
  3. Negative: 13 out of 46
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  1. Aokana
    Mar 15, 2021
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. one word. BORING.

    The games "Gambit" system leads to an overall boring game-play experience once your a few hours into the game. Here's the jist of how to survive 99% of the stuff in this game. Step 1 Set up gambits so that the party will heal itself once under 50% hp, followed by revive KO'd members in case they can't keep up or insta death abilities, then set attacking nearest mob, with some skills like Steal or poach set under specific means if you want. If you really want to get spicy you can set specifics for magics like "If enemy weak to fire, use fire". After that Engage the Speed multiplier (Devs knew you'd get bored so they let you run the game at 2X or 4X speed). Then just steer your party around. Stop every 10mins or so to spend License points. Repeat. Spam mist skills on boss fights then let your gambits take over and finish it.

    Speaking of License points. One of the dumbest "growth" systems I've seen. You need to have a the right license for the right gear. Now I get locking down gear to classes like a ninja isn't going to go around wearing heavy plate mail. But a knight NOT equipping the armor you bought/found because oh, you don't have gear 4, you have 5, 6 and 7 but not 4... sorry you just can't use it till you unlock that license is asinine. you can't carry over skills to another job and can only change jobs seldomly by going to the hunting guild. Which pigeon holes you into doing a holy trinity setup Tank, DPS, Healer rather than doing something unique and fun like giving your whm a katana. The games world was initially introduced in Final Fantasy Tactics which also uses a job point system but in Tactics you equip a subjob to share abilities and you can learn things like "Equip Armor" which allows your squishy Black Mage to equip knight armor which gave that game so much diversity on how you could build your characters in comparison.

    The story is so sparsely told and leaves very little in the way of character development. Like Im 20 hours in and all I can surmise of the the characters is Vaan wants to be a sky pirate, Penelo is just following Vaan because... Childhood friend syndrome? Balthier actually is a skypirate and keeps saying he wants to rake in the treasure but never actually seems to. Fran just wants to make little Balthier bunnies? Then Ashe and Bash are like legit trying to reclaim the Kingdom. But Vaan's supposed to be the pro-tag right... so the game is centered around a kid who's only along for the ride because everyone is too nice to tell him to go home basically or because feels bad because Vaans older brother was killed by Bash's twin brother in order to frame him. There is actually a good overall arching story revolving around the game worlds politics its just wasted since so many people in your party that are just there because of happenstance or should be told to go home instead. Maybe this gets flushed out but I won't find out because I literally can't play this game for more than half an hour before I fall asleep on the couch.    … Expand

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
80

Generally favorable reviews - based on 4 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3 out of 4
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 4
  3. Negative: 0 out of 4
  1. TrueAchievements
    Jun 3, 2019
    70
    Despite it all, I'd still say Final Fantasy XII is a good game. Its combat is almost entirely automated, but it's designed by you thanks to the programmable Gambit system, while character progression through the job system is deep and open to creativity. Running up to enemies and having the AI fight your battles for you may not sound great, but it is absolutely is. I'd be happy to play another forty hours, but preferably without any more story.
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  2. TheXboxHub
    May 14, 2019
    80
    With so much to do in the story, without trying to complete the Hunts and side missions, I can have no hesitation in recommending this game to RPG fans.
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  3. Generación Xbox
    May 14, 2019
    95
    Although the story could be better, it offers an exquisite gameplay perfect for lovers of the saga.
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