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Final Fantasy VIII |OT| Gabe Finally Passes the SeeD Exam

Trojita

Rapid Response Threadmaker
As a frequent defender of this game and how its flaws are eminently fixable, if I were redoing this game I would have made many more draw points, and had them give out much more magic.

When you first start the game, it feels like there are three ways to acquire magic (drawing from monsters, drawing from draw points, and refining cards), but drawing from monsters is so much more efficient (though grindy) that it becomes natural to do it that way. The draw points should instantly give you up to 100 of whatever they offer, and should recharge much more quickly.

When I read about Hiroyuki Ito re-positioning and re-assigning a whole bunch of treasure chests in the FF12 Zodiac version, I wondered what he'd do with this game. I suspect it would be more fun with more draw points.
Wouldn't that make the game even more broken?
 
Absolutely loving my umpteenth play through. It's been a long time since I played proper without just spamming GFs and I've only ever collected every card once, the first time I played this game so the steam achievements gave me a little nudge to just do one long complete play through again. I should be able to get every achievement in this run except for the no lvling Squall one. I'm getting Lionheart and Erghz in the disc one territory too for funsies. I just farmed my adamantine from adamantoises for the first time (usually mod one of the brothers cards). Good fun.

Are these ports of the old Windows 9x versions, or are they new ports? Should I hold out any hope for FF9?

Sadly IX will not likely come. They did VII and VIII because they already had ports as you guessed.
 

Cheddahz

Banned
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I was able to draw a bunch of triples off of Odin, so my strength is like crazy now
 
It's possible that Final Fantasy IX could become ported to Windows.
But it would likely take a lot of sales to garner Square's interest.
 
So the game was pretty OK until like 3/4 of the game...

Edea was just an orphanage woman?! Why does Squall suddenly act like he can't breathe without Rinoa?! I'm going to space?!
Some of the revelations are just so badly done, IMO. Shoving Rinoa down my throat when she's my least favourite character is really irritating too.

The game's more enjoyable than, say, XIII, but it's one of my least favourite post-VII FFs so far.
 

Onemic

Member
In my top 3 FF games of all time.

Even though the story gets wonky, and if you truly understand how to use the junction system you can make the game extremely easy, the experience of the world and its people is up there with FF6, 7, and 10

Also has by far the best soundtrack in any FF game created.
 

Clear

CliffyB's Cock Holster
Every time I read a thread mentioning FFVIII, I feel the overwhelming urge to play it again.

Which is nuts considering its still my most most completed JRPG by a significant margin (I have literally lost count at this point), and its age.

I love this game so damn much, and I still believe it has -on balance- the best climax of any FF title. A perfect mix of a cool end dungeon, an exciting boss fight and a truly epic cinematic conclusion. Even the credit scroll and tag is awesome.
 

aceface

Member
For me the ending allowed me to forgive all of the story's flaws. Not everyone would be so forgiving, I understand, heh.
 
Got Lionheart and Erghetz on disc 1 section and settled for Rinoa's second best weapon, Cardinal since I don't feel like trying to get 20 Elnoyle cards. Man does it put on the hours to grind what you need to get Lionheart so early. My GFs sure have a lot learned though! If I can get two Ochu cards I can get Quistis' second best weapon too and I think I'll be ready for Irvine's by the time I get him. I'm surprised how much I'm having fun doing mundane grinding but it is my favorite game ever, after all.
 

jaxword

Member
I ended up enabling "Original Graphic Mode" and it made the world map look like the PS1 versiom

FF community trivia: FF7 and FF8 PC both have massive amounts of fan mods that change the game to be the same as the Playstation versions. They also have mods that go the other way and improve the graphics far beyond what the original games had.
 
I have all of the GFs besides Doomtrain, is he worth getting (the process to get him seems like a pain)?

He's awesome not for damage, but because he causes a whole slew of negative status effects on every enemy on the screen. He's invaluable against certain enemies and bosses. If you have fought marlboros and been the victim of "Bad Breath" it's similar to wielding that ability :D No coincidence that marlboro tentacles are one of the ingredients ;) That is probably the hardest ingredient and I recommend either fighting them in the Esthar plains and trying to get Odin to kill them instantly if you have him and run away if he doesn't come out, or play cards and collect Marlboro cards, it's 4 cards per tentacle.
 

hodgy100

Member
incase anyone is curious you can access the games shaders at "Steam\steamapps\common\FINAL FANTASY VIII\shaders" they are stored as is and are compiled at runtime so open them up in a text editor and see what you can do if you want to :p Ive only achieved a wobbly UI so far :/

 
I just can't get the controller set up properly. The d pad isn't usable in menus and the 360 analog triggers aren't recognized. Did they do any updating to this other than to make it run on modern systems?

It looks like shit too, maybe I will enable the original graphics. I am already running it in a window at 1024x768 and it still looks worse than the PS1 version.

I guess it's not fair to compare it to playing on the beautiful Vita screen but I would like updated controls.
 

matthwq

Banned
Got this running on my Mac last night. Seriously took all day -- Wine is apparently too complex for me!!

Super glad I have my favorite FF again, but it stinks that the old PC midi files are in place instead of the actual music. :(
 
Chocobo world breaks this game so bad. You can infinitely get items from it by constantly saving and reloading the game. More game breaking then the disc 4 card exploit or infinite money.
 

Unai

Member
Gaf, I don't know what to do anymore.

I bought this game on Steam and started playing it. I get passed disc 1, but then I used the magic booster and saved, and I regreted it.

A few days after that, I finally bought my vita, and so I started playing the psn version, and then I spended tons of time grinding cards until I have 20 Elnoyle cards. The stages are much beautiful in that tiny OLED screen, the characters no so much. The controls are also better because I have analog movement and proper prompts on scren.

Now I missing the achievements, screenshots and Chocobo World. I don't usually go out of my way to get achievements (I'm yet to 100% one of my 200+ Steam games), but for some reason I was really into them in this particular game.

I really don't know if I keep playing the vita version, keep playing the steam version or started a new save on PC because I of the magic booster thing.

What do I do?
 

Cheddahz

Banned
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I didn't go after Doomtrain (only GF I ended up missing) and I got the achievement for not leveling up Squall as well (only 0.2% of FFVIII players have gotten it). FFVIII still remains my favorite game of all time and I'm really glad that I decided to replay it again
 
Gaf, I don't know what to do anymore.

I bought this game on Steam and started playing it. I get passed disc 1, but then I used the magic booster and saved, and I regreted it.

A few days after that, I finally bought my vita, and so I started playing the psn version, and then I spended tons of time grinding cards until I have 20 Elnoyle cards. The stages are much beautiful in that tiny OLED screen, the characters no so much. The controls are also better because I have analog movement and proper prompts on scren.

Now I missing the achievements, screenshots and Chocobo World. I don't usually go out of my way to get achievements (I'm yet to 100% one of my 200+ Steam games), but for some reason I was really into them in this particular game.

I really don't know if I keep playing the vita version, keep playing the steam version or started a new save on PC because I of the magic booster thing.

What do I do?
Play the Steam version. Chocobo world is an easy way to break the game.

Load chocobo world.
Load game.
Go to save menu and get the items from Chocobo world.
Send it back to the world.
Save and exit game.
Reload chocobo world and repeat.

You can get every item in the game doing this and tons of it. Just got to let the CPU automatically grind for you in Chocobo world with events off.
 

terrisus

Member
Just a heads-up to anyone who may be considering purchasing this, that - unlike Final Fantasy 7, which did not require this - Final Fantasy 8, even when purchased through the Square-Enix Store, requires the Steam DRM to download, install, and use this program. This despite the fact that there is no mention whatsoever of the Steam DRM being required to download, install, or play this game anywhere on the product's page or in the purchase process.

I finally was able to get a refund due to this today (although now I get to wait another week for it to actually be credited back), but just figured I'd give anyone here who cares about that sort of thing a heads-up, that, as far as DRM-free versions, you're still going to need to track down the CD version from 2000 for that.
 

Culex

Banned
I always liked 8 over 7. Plus, the thread about Squall actually being dead and dreaming about the game blew my mind (if only it were true!). Wish I could find the link to the site
 
Yikes. Spent an hour playing cards against the running kid in Balamb Garden and accidently lost Ifrit. Fortunately I got lucky and won it back somehow with a shit hand full of bombs. He had grats and other trash. But damn, it feels like a punch in the gut when stuff like that happens. And it's funny because right before that match I thought to myself, "You should really save or you will be sorry."
 
I always liked 8 over 7. Plus, the thread about Squall actually being dead and dreaming about the game blew my mind (if only it were true!). Wish I could find the link to the site
whisper..
Ultimecia was
Rinoa
...

lol always liked that though regardless of being false, don't like the Squall is dead thing
 

TheSeks

Blinded by the luminous glory that is David Bowie's physical manifestation.
So, is there a card-game directory where you can find cards by discs and players? I've gotten 3-4 more Biggs and Wedge cards from Dr. Kadowaki in Disc 1, but I think I've exhausted her and I'm not sure if she has more.

Plus, It'd be nice to see what cards refine into at a glance.
 
Play the Steam version. Chocobo world is an easy way to break the game.

Load chocobo world.
Load game.
Go to save menu and get the items from Chocobo world.
Send it back to the world.
Save and exit game.
Reload chocobo world and repeat.

You can get every item in the game doing this and tons of it. Just got to let the CPU automatically grind for you in Chocobo world with events off.

Explain more please. And does anyone know how this runs on a surface pro 2?
 

kinoki

Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
Final Fantasy VIII was actually the first FF-game I finished and saw the end credits for (I finished VI before but played on a chipped EU SNES and that broke the ending).

But no matter how many times I play it I keep forgetting the plot twist so it's always a delight to play. :)
 
Explain more please. And does anyone know how this runs on a surface pro 2?

Basically the whole step is this:

You want to get some Rank A and B items in Chocobo world, so you leave it on doing it's own thing for a while with events off.

When you reach disc 2 and gain access to the Chocobo forest you can play a mini game. Upon completion you will be able to link up the Chocobo world to your game.

Linking up the Chocobo world with your game will net you items depending on how much items you have in Chocobo world.

By constantly saving after getting the item from chocobo world and sending it back, you would be able to reload the game and get even more items.

Basically start up chocobo world, start and load game, get items from chocobo world, send chocobo back, save, repeat.

You can literally get all the best items in the game with this and in stacks. It also gives stats up items.
 
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