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29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sometimes You Need a Leg Up, April 7, 2003
This review is from: Final Fantasy X Official Strategy Guide (Paperback)
Many published guides exist for games that simply do not need umpty dozen slick pages of fan information and a simple-minded walkthrough. These are simply marketing maneuvers to increase profitability. But occasionally, a game comes along that is so complicated and secretive that simply following the linear path may win you the game, but miss the real richness and effort put into it. Final Fantasy X (FFX) is one of those games that come along so rarely, and the possession of this strategy guide will greatly enhance play. Technically, this guide is typical in format. It starts with an introduction to the game, its main characters, and the spiritual forces called Aeons. There is a discussion of the unique system for acquiring enhancing abilities, discussions of weapons and armor, key items, shops, etc. Following the walkthrough are sections on side quests, secrets of the game, how to play blitzball (something I never mastered), an extensive bestiary and some interviews with the creative staff. This is a glossy, 270-page dissertation on the game - an alarming amount of information. The walkthrough itself is quite thorough, complete with the customary maps, illustrations, and directions. The discussion, however, is not always in the best order, creating the possibility that over reliance on the guide may lead the player to make some irritating, but not fatal mistakes. Some of the diagrams for the puzzles are also a bit hazy, perhaps deliberately. In any case, this is a complicated game, and even a guide like this will miss some details. I think this is for the best, actually. It keeps the player from simply connecting the dots. There is a real danger that the extra quests, etc., will lead the player to over-level the characters. It is possible to get to the point that the final series of battles is something of an anti-climax. Keep this in mind when using the guide. Some help is a blessing, but too much can spoil the show. Even so, this is the best resource for extending game play. If you want to squeeze the last few drops of value from the game, this is what you need.
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23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best FFX resource, January 2, 2002
This review is from: Final Fantasy X Official Strategy Guide (Paperback)
If their are two reviews by me sorry about that I wasn't sure if the other was posted. Anyway, I believe this is the best Final Fantasy guide I've ever seen. It has detailed maps, great walkthrough, boss strategies, and bestiary, plus much more where that came from. The best part about this guide is that there is no referall to playonline every paragraph, and boss strategy. The guide is actually concerned with helping you get through the game rather than trying to get you to explore a new website. The walkthrough is very detailed. Again, they tell you all the objectives and then explain it all. The maps are detailed showing you the location of every item in an area, and if it doesn't than it tells you in the walkthrough. The guide also doesn't spoil the plot and there are no story spoilers in the guide. The walkthrough also has crystal clear screenshots. Also, enemies in an area are listed so you don't have to flip back through to the bestiary all those 100+ pages. Also the maps are right there in the walkthrough rather than in the back of the book. The boss strategies actually help you. They display the HP and AP the boss haves, the amount of damage needed to trigger an overkill, and the weakness, half damage, immunity, absorbtion listing. The bestiary is quite possibly the best I've seen. They list the number of HP it has, they list how much damage you need to do in parenthasis to get an overkill and they list the number of AP the enemy gives. They also list status effects you can do to the boss, and the sensor reading below. Not to mention the items they drop and how much gil it takes to bribe them, and what you can steal. The only problem is that the bestiary doesn't tell you where you can find the enemy to fight him. The guide has a sphere chart and a listing of all the overdrives and what it takes to make each character learn them. The sphere grid pin-points out everything (Ability nodes, HP nodes etc.) so that you may decide what route they take. Every secret is revealed and all the side quest are fully exploited in the guide. Airship passwords revealed, coordnates also revealed. A poster also comes with the guide and shows you the sphere grid on one side, and the Rikku's overdrive Mix chart on the other. Being that the sphere grid is in the guide you should probably put it up on the mixing chart. Secret Aeons and legendary weapons are revealed, and in the back of the book are exclusive interviews with the creators of Final Fantasy X. If you want to learn of the development of FFX look at these interviews. Lastly, the guide completely covers Blitzball! It covers the teams, free agents, and gives you a stats chart for everysingle player of the sport. Letting you know who to hire and you may want to pass up. It tells you of all the Blitzball Basics. Have I left anything out? Well, aside from character bios and overdrive listings this guide is pretty much all you need for FFX. I can't find too many errors in the guide so I'd say that this is the best FFX guide you can buy.
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
It lacks in depth information, February 18, 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: Final Fantasy X Official Strategy Guide (Paperback)
I have Bradygames FFX OSG and Digicube's Scenerio and Battle Ultimanias for FFX. After reading through Digicube's and Bradygames' guides, I recommend Digicube's vastly superior guides for die hard FF fans who want to know everything there is to FFX. Here are some instances that exemplify the contrasting differences. Affection levels, and how they trigger certain scenes are not clearly explained. Scenerio Ultimania has covered this whereas FFX OSG only tells you it can happen, but not how. Criteria and condtitons to be met are simply left out in FFX OSG. Customisation of weapons and armour do not have lists that shows their names after the process. The maps are confusing in comparison to Ulitmania. Furthermore, maps from Bradygames only show direction, treasure chests and save points. Ultimania's maps shows all the above, and where events take place as well as location of recruitable Blitzball players. Lulu's Overdrive is not clearly explained. Battle Ultimania has a graph chart showing how many times you need to turn the right analogue stick to trigger x amount of spells. Certain spells have limits of 7 (Ultima), even though you turn the analogue stick 25-29 times. Brady Games' guide only tell you to turn the right analogue stick and not how many times is needed, how stats affect the number of turns on your right analouge stick (higher stats=lesser number of turns for same amount of mulitiple casting), nor which spells have limits to mulitiple castings. Kimahri's "Ronso Rage" and its blue monster magic also lacks details. Ultimania shows a list of all the blue magics and which monsters allow Kimahri to learn from. Bradygames' tells you ocassionally which monsters you can draw skills from in its walkthrough section. Digicube released two books to cover FFX. In the past for FF VIII, Vagrant Story, and Chrono Cross Digicube released one book. This shows that this time for FFX the amount of information needed to be passed on to gamers is too large for a single guide to handle. Bradygames is too ambitious to try and cover everything they can in one volume. It is good for beginners and intermediate players of the Final Fantasy series who wants to complete the game for leisure but for serious hardcore fans who want to see everything, find every secret and understand the underlying mechanics of FFX, try Ultimania ... or go www.gamefaqs.com to download the missing information in Bradygames' guide. In the final analysis, FFX OSG is good but Ultimania surpasses it in nearly every regard. What FFX OSG has, Ultimania has in its two volume guide. In addition, trememdous amount of relevent, important information can be found in Ultimania whereas sadly, the same can't be said for FFX OSG.
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