Well, after I saw that ccoa was the source of the unseen force drawing me here today, I thought for a moment to simply ignore this thread and walk away, chuckling to myself. Goodness knows she knows where I stand, as we've debated this game to no end. Alas, I can't keep myself away.
As I've said in many places before, I think there is too much demand for character development in places it doesn't belong. It's a long standing RPG tradition that, along the road, there are a hundred throwaway villains with, as far as the audience is concerned, no back story at all. Typically, as gamers, we don't even bat an eyelash, because we have no reason to know, much less care about, who these people are. On the occasions that these dime a dozen villains are developed, we are often trapped in what amounts to nothing more than a developers efforts to make their story seem deeper or more satisfying than it really is by making characters who are absolutely inconsequential to the story itself glimmering paragons of plot and character development. It's usually painful. The fact is, when the character has little to do with the story, nobody expects them to be developed.
That being said, I think FFXI meets that expectation, but nobody notices it. FFXII isn't about Vaan or Penelo, Fran or Balthier, not even Basch. Hell, I could argue that it's not even about Ashe. FFXII is about Ivalice and its people - and I'll be damned if you can suggest Ivalice is under-developed. I think that the game could have changed casts entirely, repeatedly through the game, and I would have enjoyed it still.
Even saying this, though, I don't see how the characters are under-developed, even contrasted to other characters from other games. I mean, we don't necessarily spend a lot of time traipsing through everyone's past, but what value would be in such an adventure? What do we not know that we need to about these characters? Certainly, I hope it's not true that you simply don't understand them, or missed some key hint about their personality, slipped serrupticiously between the lines as the game is wont to do. I felt I knew enough about every single one of them (well, I would have like to know a bit more about Fran) by the end of the game, and I didn't need exhaustive back stories to get to that point. Even then, we know quite about about Vaan and Penelo's past, to know where they are in the present of the game. Is it not fair to present a character who's life, up to the point when we meet them, wasn't profoundly different from any one else's? I understood, from the very beginning, where they were coming from. I understood their individual motivations for going along on the journey. Are they bad characters because they don't constantly surprise you with zingers from their apparently absurdly complex and disconcertingly relevant past?
The characters who do have "zingers", like Balthier and Basch (and, although it comes up earlier in the story, Ashe), are also, to me, very interesting characters. Balthier was pretty enigmatic to me for the first half/three quarters of the game. I didn't understand why he had come along, though it was clear he indeed had a strong motivation to do so. Later revelations made it clear to me why he was along for the ride, in a way that I think was believably and artfully done. Basch also interested me to no end. Before the Balthier/Gabranth connection became clear, I assumed he was deceiving the group. I mean, I'd watched him kill the king myself. He also took his pretty time outright denying it, simply imploring the group that they didn't understand. Indeed, had he explained that Gabranth was his evil twin, and everyone took that explanation as truth, I would have been disappointed. Again, the way things turned out with Basch satisfied me to no end. The man was exactly as he seemed to be.
Apparently that's the worst sin a character can commit.
Why were Penelo and Fran there? Because Vaan and Balthier were. I don't see any reason for any more explanation than that. To propose that every single character be relevant to the plot is the definition of contrivance. They are relevant to the cast.
I couldn't have asked for the cast to be developed more.
The fact is that the characters - villains included - we pretty damned realistic in a lot of ways, and not caricatures like most RPG characters. There was no bizarre jagged, sometimes dotted, curly line connecting everyone and every thing. Everyone was there for their own reasons, and for nothing more.
ccoa, I don't know if you were too distracted in your long adventure of grinding, but I wonder if you followed the story at all. The attack on Mt. Bur-Omisace was, from where I was sitting, perfectly logical in the context of the plot. I mean, if you are proposing that the empire should have sat back and allowed all of their efforts at luring the Rozarians into war be undermined without opposition, I suppose we understood the story differently.
Speaking of grinding, I simply don't think it's necessary for a normal, non-completionist play-through. I beat that game right around the 65 hour mark, which is certainly not the fastest it can be done, but I can say honestly that the only grinding I EVER did was for about an hour in the mine on Bhujerba. Now, did I always have the most up-to-date equipment? No. It wasn't necessary, either. I did many of the hunts, and a handful of side-quests. I never really got into the meatier aspects outside of the central plot, and I never had to grind money or experiance. It may not shock you that I thought the game was challenging - but I never hit a spot I couldn't do in two tries or less.
We've talked about the gambit thing before, and as many people have said before, you really don't have to use them the way you do. I mean, you set your characters up on all-encompassing auto-pilot (I don't know how you do that, anyway, btw) and then complain that the game is played on auto-pilot. I never really set up gambits on my "main" character. The other two party members were always mostly automated, but the only things I had set up on mine were atuo-attack closest target, auto-cast libra and use pheonix downs on anyone who's dead. Everything else, I did myself - and damnit, I enjoyed myself. I daresay I liked the micromanagement. Don't think I was a purely offensive lead, either, no - I was healing, curing conditions, casting buffs, the whole nine yards. Could I have tried to set up all three of them to be played automatically? Sure, but what fun is that. I'm sorry you ruined the game for yourself, but that's like using cheat codes or hacking save-states. Yeah, you can do it - you may even be encouraged to do it - but you're in charge of how much, how often, or whether you do it at all.
I know I'm not the only one who never had to grind, didn't fully automate the game, and still managed to beat it. I'm not saying that you just sucked, but I'm also not saying I was especially good at it. I'm never especially good at much of anything.
But I was disappointed by a few things, sure. I wish Black Magic and summons had been a bit more useful (though, to be honest, I use summons on a LOT of hunts I couldn't otherwise beat). I wish the optional content didn't compose more than 50% of the game's potential length (I don't like beating something that feels pathetically unfinished).
The transitions between areas didn't bother me. I felt it was pretty well understood, for one thing, that when you move from one area to another, you aren't really just stepping from a jungle to a snowy mountain - The transition from Dalmasca to the... marsh place (I forget the name) was what made this abundantly clear early on - when you stand in Dalmasca, looking out at the zone you are just about to enter, it is clearly miles and miles away. Somehow, I don't think you would have appreciated having to personally walk every step of the way. Not that such jarring transitions aren't standard fare in pretty much every single RPG ever made.
What I did like was the characters. I liked the plot. I liked the areas (sorry you hated them, but that game was like frikkin sight-seeing for me). I liked the dialogue and voice overs (Perfection? Pretty darned close). I liked the combat system, and I liked the pacing. Really, I liked most aspects of pretty much everything, and I wish you felt that same for no other reason than the fact that the game was an inspiring experience I won't soon forgot.
Incredible game. Do I want 13 to follow in its footsteps? Not necessarily. Still, I'm happy I got to play it.
) But well... Even though of this, you are able to defeat your enemies with what you have. For their first try... they have done a fairly good job.