FINAL FANTASY X PLATINUM REVIEW

The game starts off following the adventures of a young blitzball (underwater football) player named Tidus. His homeworld is being destroyed by a great water-like sphere named SIN when the game starts, and you soon find yourself being transported 1,000 years in the future after the short tutorial. He meets a young summoner named Yura, and many other characters that join your party and soon the player is sucked into the vivid storyline with Tidus on his quest to rid the world of a huge evil.

Those who are new to the final fantasy series will find the controls and the games battle system a little daunting at first- as like all the final fantasies nothing is very simple. FF veterans, however, will get to grips with the game rather quickly despite the obvious (and rather large) changes made. One of these is the new experience 'sphere grid'. This maze like grid allows you to spend experience points, which you earn by defeating enemies, on spells and stat upgrades of your choice. This includes HP (health) and MP (magic points).

There are seven characters for Tidus to find that play on your team. In the random battle encounters that occur in isolated areas or on the world map, you control four of these characters at one time to defeat the monsters you are thrown against. While battling, however, you can exchange characters to suit your needs. Characters can cast magic, special attacks or use items while in battle, and different characters use different tequniqes. For example- the heroin Yuna can 'summon' huge beasts, which can be controlled like a team member, but no other person can. 'Controlling' summons is yet another thing that is new to final fantasies.

There are three gameplay modes in final fantasy ten. The 'Field screen'is where you run about talking to people and buying items. While bystanders and villagers have written dialog when spoken to, like usual, the PS2 allows the main party members and important characters to talk in full English, which a year or so ago would of been considered as a huge privilege in RPG's- and still is, so I hope we see more of this in future role playing games. What I don't want to see is the way the characters' mouths move- this really isn't a good Japanese conversion at all. Tidus is also 100% American, which isn't too "awesome!!" or "cool!" The world map is your chance to walk about the fully 3D world where Tidus lives. It's basically the area in-between two destinations- so you come out of one village, travel across the world map (while fighting random battles along the way) until you come across another village you can enter. The Battle screen is the third gameplay mode and is where you fight monsters with attacks, skills, magic and summons. Monsters will attack back with similar moves until one side (you or the enemies) die. You cannot control the movement of players, only their actions.

There are also some mini games in final fantasy ten, just like all the other final fantasies. Three main ones include Chocobo racing (Final fantasy seven, anyone?) which involves the player racing huge ostrich-like yellow birds that surprisingly cannot fly. Earlier in this review I mentioned underwater football, or 'blitzball' as it's called. This is played in a giant ball of water, suspended in air. Players may control either Tidus or wakka (another one of your party members) when playing this early on. Later on though, you may recruit more skilled players and enter in the Blitzball league. Finally, there is a monster arena where you battle monsters to the death, except when you first arrive there are no monsters- so you are asked to capture some with some special capture weapons. These mini games are a refreshing break from the strong storyline, but they don't capture the player's attention for long as the novelty soon wears off.

So the verdict- 9/10, a well deserved score for a game that deserves to be in your collection. The graphics are mind blowing, the gameplay is seriously addictive, the game will take ages to master and with 30+ hours of gameplay, its definitely one too spend your money on. And if you are a fan of RPG's, this game will be one of your all time favourites. The trouble is the speech is just too glitchy as the characters lips don't move well with the script. The same problem goes with the bodies as they shiver a bit (who left the air conditioning on? brrrr!). The presentation can be a bit annoying, as the entire game requires a widescreen T.V. for it to look good. Without one you'll be watching two big black lines at the top and bottom of your screen. But to be honest, it really is hard to find anything bad to say ... it's well worth the money. Buy it. Now.