It is ONNNNNNNNN!

Spent my hard earned cash on a copy of X2 and here I am ready for another jaunt around Spira. I may have only been away for a few weeks, but two years have passed in FF land.

Yuna is now part of a treasure hunting crew called the Gullwings, alongside old faves Rikku, Buddy and Brother, along with the new addition, Paine, some kind of female, albino Vincent Valentine.

Game play is pretty different, taking a Grand Theft Auto mission-based tack, but there's still enough familiar stuff in here for me to let the new ridiculously skimpy outfits slide.

Two new factions have sprung up in Spira, the Youth League, a group of revolutionaries whose leader is rocking the bionic limbs look, and New Yevon, who are basically Old Yevon, but with more diluted principles. Kind of like the Labour Party. It didn't take many missions before I was required to pledge my allegiance to one side or the other. And, much as I hate those crazy old Yevon botherers, I just couldn't bring myself to ally with someone with a name like a Fascist scout group. So I joined Bevelle and as a result, can no longer show my face in Kilika, home of the Youth League Movement.

And of course, what would any FF be without some new villains. And this time, head of evil operations is Leblanc, a lady with no nipples and two lame sidekicks. Logos has an Alan Rickman complex and Ormi is clearly the Magus Sisters' love child as he has a distinctly beetley look.


I should point out that the GTA analogy applies to gameplay only. There are no carjackings or firebombings here. Early missions included helping some undeniably thick musicians get into a lift and then touting tickets for their up and coming show to the indifferent public.

That's more like it.

Familiar faces abound. First a mission to Besaid where there's the opportunity to catch up with Wakka and Lulu, the least pregnant looking pregnant lady ever. Seriously, where's she hiding the kid? If I was Wakka, I'd be concerned she'd been cheating with her moogle.

Later a rather depressing trip to Gagazet Mountain, where poor old Kimhari (and we all know how I feel about Kimhari) is feeling the pressure of his new position as Tribal Leader.

And of course, the face that kickstarts it all? Well, it's Tidus of course, or someone who looks very like him. And the poor fella looks like he's in deep shit, stumbling around in a nuclear weapons facility. Naturally, Yuna has to get to the bottom of what's going on . . .

Religious Extremism in FFX

24 hrs in

Who'da thunk it? As if powerful environmental, anti-war messages weren't enough, Squaresoft have only gone and thrown religious debate into the mix. After defeating an Al-Bhed Machina (built like a tank, but taken out by lightning marbles, go figure) Rikku and Wakka take time out for an argument of faith versus secularism. You'd have though that due to their shared misfortune of being named after Ikea product lines, these two would be more tolerant of one another's views, but none of that!

Rikku thinks Wakka's talking a load of airy-fairy twaddle with all this Yevon nonsense. She states her case like Richard Dawkins in a croptop. But Wakka's having none of it. With his spiky hair, ripped physique and attention-grabbing dungarees, he's like one of those punks you meet in rock clubs who seems really cool but turns out to be a straight edge toss bag with a superiority complex. He's a determined Yevon botherer and can't understand why everyone doesn't just convert already.

Afterwards, Tidus attempts to engineer some girl on girl action in a bizarre skidoo-based

Yikes

conversation with Lulu. I quote, verbatim: "So, what do you think of Rikku?" "She's fun to have around." "Is that all?" "Well, I wasn't going to say anything, but sometimes, when she bends over to mix items, I find myself imagining what it would be like to tear those little frilly hotpants off with my teeth." Okay, so they edited that last part out of the actual game, but that's definitely the way that conversation was heading.

And finally, after the protracted walk up to the impressive Macalania temple, we're met with the 'shocking' news that Seymour is actually a Patricidal nutjob intent on enslaving the known world. None of us saw that coming, did we?

Final Fantasy X - 14 hours in

Ah, Tidus, the prepubescent Aryan posterboy we've come to expect from the FF franchise and you're no exception with your terrifyingly defined pecs, oddly tailored clothes and gravity-defying hair. After playing for just over a week, the game play counter informs me I have played for fourteen hours. I refuse to believe it. I don't have that much down time during the week, let alone to fritter away on games. I'm a casual gamer, casual, so it can't possibly be fourteen hours.

Anyway, within the first few I was all misty eyed, basking in the glory of Squaresoft's incredible production values which, in the cut scenes at least, still hold up seven years after UK release. Okay, so the motion capture now looks pretty shonky, with Tidus's flailing arms making him seem like he's valiantly battling a stroke every time he tries to emote, but the image of the Blitzball sphere slowly filling with water is a beautiful one that would shame the visual effects of many a current hollywood blockbuster.

Speaking of crap emoting, I had looked back on this game with rose-tinted spectacles, thinking it a shining beacon of decent voice acting in a medium usually mired in. stilted. speech. But I had forgotten about the staggeringly bad Kirk-like inflections employed by Yuna. I IMBD'd the voice artist, Hedy Burress. Oddly enough, she's never been in anything that wasn't shit.

I had also forgotten that FFX was created in a different time, a simpler time before women were employed in the game industry. A time when it was perfectly okay for one character to be little more than a pair of breasts that do magic. Why not go the whole hog with Lulu's victory move and have her squeeze them together and give the nips a quick lick?


Ah, and I also made a mistake that I remember making when I played this originally (I borrowed it from a friend in 2003 - I didn't buy it, it's within the rules!) and hired Ropp for Blitzball even though he's as much use as a sack of spanners would be in a watery environment.
Also got over excited in the battle with Belgamene and thought 'Nah, my Valefor can do her Ifrit no problem' and got filled in. Again.

But I'm old school, I don't go back to the last save and start again. I just think 'I'll remember that next time I replay . . ."

Acknowledgements