Customer Reviews

Final Fantasy X-2 Official Strategy Guide

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(13)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

This is one of the most exhaustive guides I've seen. No doubt the occasion for this is the sheer size of the game. For the most part it does a good job of documenting the nooks and crannies of the game and providing a line of play that will maximize the completeness score (which affects the precise version of the ending you will see and very little else). It is heavily illustrated - mostly with pictures of Yuna, Rikku, and Payne - and comes as close to making sense of the complicated dress sphere based magic system as anything I've seen.

For all this, and there is even more, I feel the guide is flawed. There are a small number of glaring mistakes that might be due to a difference between the Japanese and US versions of the game, or might just be mistakes. And there are one or two glaring omissions. The largest omission being the scant attention given to the 100 level dungeon that becomes available late in the game.

I understand the woes and pressures of publication, and honestly wouldn't have let these issues bother me. There is a deeper problem with the guide that I think is its major flaw. I use strategy guides in a 'use as I go' pattern. If something puzzles me or seems over my head, I look it up. What I would never do is study the entire guide, take notes, and develop a preplanned attack. I prefer to interact spontaneously whenever possible.

This guide is more of a textbook than a strategy guide. If you use it as I would, there is real danger that you will miss a subtlety or an order of play, only to find out about it 50 pages later. Of course, the other side of the coin is that, without the guide, you would have made even worse mistakes. So while I'm willing to deduct a star for ease of use, it still it the best assistant available for what is an incredible game.

Final Fantasy X-2 is a spectacular game, but trying to master it without is guidebook is near impossible! Nice user-friendly walkthroughs and text make this one of the better guides Bradygames has ever created!

What probably stand out most is how thick this book is! It's HUGE and since its over 350 pages I expected quite a bit from it. It delivers quite nicely and helps you master the game to 100%

The characters section of the guide goes into each character introducing you to the ones used in your party and what role they play in the game. No problems here.

The Dresspheres chapter is beautifully done telling you what abilities you get, how to get them and they even suggest when you should get them. All the Garment Spheres explained and a detailed screenshot and listing of what abilities and power ups you can gain for it.

The battle system is explained VERY nicely. While the battle system doesn't require that a whole section of the guide is dedicated to it, for those new to the world of Final Fantasy it helps, especially considering the battle system differs from Final Fantasy X.

The walkthrough is perhaps where the guide begins to fall and it's understandable to see why. Since Final Fantasy X-2 has no set path (its VERY non-linear) it makes the walkthrough nearly impossible to organize. All sidequests are incorporated into the walkthrough as well as several secrets. The walkthrough touches on one area and then doesn't return to it for a while. So if you're one who uses a guide as you go, it's difficult to do with this guide.

The information in the walkthrough is all over the place. Plus, the table of contents doesn't help you find what part you're at so get ready for a lot of page flipping. However, for what it's worth, the guide doesn't spoil any of the plot and it helps you obtain all the endings as well as 100% completion of the game thanks to the handy-dandy flow chart in the back, ensuring that you do everything you possibly can in one area. Not to mention the maps are highly detail. Each area shows enemies stats perfectly without having you flip to the back of the book (and page flipping in this particular guide is a real pain!).

Final Fantasy X-2 is full of mini games and this guide has an entire section for them. Every mini-game is explained in great detail with tips that will help you through. Again, it's nice because you'll get everything.

The bestiary is detailed explaining all stats but that information is also all over the place. Each fiend has their own box where their stats are detailed. A nice easy to use bestiary but again, a lot of pages to flip through.

Lastly the guide comes with a two sided poster. One side with a mixing chart the other just a poster. The mixing chart is actually in the guide so I wouldn't worry if you lose it or anything.

Overall, the guide is pretty good.

The good:
+Detailed Walkthrough
+Nice for those new to Final Fantasy
+Clear Screens
+Mini-Game Coverage
+Detailed Bestiary
+A Flowchart for 100% completion.
+Helpful Boss Strategies

The Bad:
-This information is all over the place!
-A LOT OF PAGE FLIPPING!

I cannot believe some of the high ratings people have given this book. This is by far the worst guide I have ever read. There are so many things wrong with it I can't even imagine how anyone would see it as worthy praise. I can't even see how Dan Birlew would allow this to go into print with his name on it.

First of all, there are several instances where it does not give important information. As any one of the other bad reviews will tell you, there is an amazing item in the game that can only be found by talking to some guy in Kilika in every single chapter . . . and the book doesn't tell you this until the last chapter. A little late, don't you think? But that mistake has already been pointed out, so I don't want to beat it to death. However, there are several other important oversights.

Take the "Blue Bullet" skills, for instance. The book lists all the skills and the enemies from which you can get them, but it doesn't tell you HOW to get them. For example, it does not tell you that a Malboro only uses "bad breath" after its health has been affected ten times. Also, it does not tell you that support skills like "mighty guard" and "white wind" can only be learned when the enemy is confused. I wasted so much time trying to get these enemies to use their skills on me and finally had to resort to online guides.

Also, the book says that the only way to get the Mascot dressphere is by getting all 15 "episode completes" in chapter 5, but it doesn't specifically say how to get these "episode completes." The first time I went through the game I only sold 9 out of 10 of Tobli's tickets because the guide said the only reward for selling all ten was an item. Not until later did I learn that 9 out of 10 wasn't good enough for an episode complete. The second time through the game I skipped some annoyingly long CommSphere scenes in chapter 4. The book said that this prevented 100% completion, but it did not say that it prevented episode completion. 3rd time through I skipped animations that I had already seen twice . . . that's not allowed either, apparently. You'd think the book would tell you if you had to sit and watch the whole scene.

But wait; there's more. There is a dungeon in the chocobo ranch that the guide never explains how to open. It does say that at the end of it you can get an important item, but that's all it says. Never is anything mentioned about how to get through this difficult dungeon or how to open it. Along the same lines there is a dungeon in Bevelle with normal enemies that are tougher than the final boss. All the book says about this dungeon is, "characters should be at level 99 with over 9000HP." One would think that specific strategies might come in handy for such difficult enemies. After all this is suppose to be "STRATEGY" guide.

But even if the book isn't giving me all the information, at least the info it is giving me is correct, right? Wrong. Almost on ever page there is some sort of misprint in text or organization or maps, and these are not little mistakes. They are huge and are immediately obvious to anyone who plays the game. For instance, there is an enemy called a Node that will give you a very important item if you defeat it. The book says it has 30,000 HP so I figure I'd give it a shot. An hour later the enemy is still alive after pummeling it with my strongest spells, so I Scan it. Turns out it has 300,000 HP not 30,000. What a difference one zero can make.

And as long as we're pointing out the mistake in calling this a "strategy guide," I'd like to call into question the strategies that it does list. Quite often, the strategies are overly complicated or require levels that characters haven't yet reached. Spending time leveling up characters is not strategy; it is merely a substitution for strategy. Heck, I don't need a book to tell me that being level 99 is better than level 30.

In conclusion, this book is NOT a strategy guide because it either does not list any strategy or the strategy it does list is questionable. This book is NOT even a walkthrough because it skips important steps. It is obvious that no one at Brady Games actually tried to use this guide. If they had they would have realized that this book is nothing more than a waste of 347 pages and a waste of 16 dollars. I do not advice anyone to buy this guide! If you are reading this review you obviously have the internet, so use an online guide. These guides are copious and constantly updated by input from the users. Perhaps if everyone starts using these online guides the competition would hold the official guides to higher standards.

First of all the good thing about this book is that it has a lot of color pictures. Other than that, this book is a bit of a mess. The problem comes from the layout of the book. The game itself is a nonlinear game, and the book tries to be a nonlinear book. THe problem with that is that it jumps around too much. Using this book, it's difficult to follow the course of action, and impossible to get a 100% complete. It would have been better if they had chosen a certain course, and then presented a walkthrough for that course.

Another thing which wasn't very good in my opinion was that the item list wasn't very helpful. If an item isn't sold in a store, then you wouldn't know how to get it. You'd have to spend about 15 minutes looking through the creature list to find out if you can get it from a creature or not. If you can't, then it would be impossible to find where to get it using this book. You'd have to find it by chance.

Basically, I found that this book gives you lots of information that you already know, or is in the game, or is easy to figure out. The really difficult things are hardly covered and the detailed information that you need isn't even covered. I would pass on this. You can find better guides elsewhere.

We (my husband & I) suspect strategy guide publishers just don't care. Time after time we have used strategy guides from Brady Games and Prima Games, and, each time, found dozens of mistakes - some of them very crucial. This guide is no exception. Unfortunately, it's the only option if you want a printed guide, so either you buy this one, or you have to work with what's available online (which is often faulty as well).

All we ask is that somebody who works for these publishers use the guide to play through the game before it goes to press, to check for mistakes. That's all! The mistakes in the guides are so obvious going through and playing these games, it would seem impossible they could be missed if someone just took the time to check them out first.

But enough of that rant. I'm sure you want some specifics.

This guide has some helpful maps and pictures, which is a plus. But often the information it provides isn't specific enough. It tells you to find a particular person in an area, but it doesn't tell you exactly where that person is. It tells you to find treasures in an area, and sometimes it won't tell you where specifically those treasures are. And the worst bit is that it has two checklists of things to do to gain 100% completion in the game (which is required to get the "perfect" ending), and the two checklists conflict! We had to start the game all over because the checklist in the back of the book listed something we should've done in the game's Chapter 1, but that action wasn't listed in the main walkthrough. And now that we're into Chapter 5 of the game, we're finding tons of instances where it says, "If you've spoken to so-and-so once each chapter, now so-and-so will give you this really cool item," and it hasn't mentioned this at all up until this point! What good is a walkthrough if it expects you to read and memorize the entire book before you begin?

It's quite frustrating. I tell you this as a warning - because there is no other choice. This is the only published walkthrough out there for this game, so if you want a walkthrough, you might as well buy it. Just don't expect it to be as helpful as you'd like.

And expect to get really irked with it. A lot.

I was so worried when I was deciding whether I should buy this guide, but I glad I did. It wasnt so bad as most people had said. I would make a comment on those people would said this is not an accurate book. IT IS AN ACCURATE BOOK!

What most people failed to do is read the completion guide at the front and at the back. My brother just read the front and ignore the completion guide list at the back, and he didnt completed 100% On the other hand, I had completed 100%, first time, no help from online (some online strategy were useless), with this guide. So i didnt know why many didnt benefit from this guide.

However, I need to admit some stuff that this guide lacks.
1. You need to flip front and back to check the requirement for 100% completion. Example, the front did mention rest in every chapter while the back forgot to mention it in first chapter.
2. the completion percentage was not correct towards the end but if you follow all instruction, believe me FFX2 are not that unmerciful. You will be able to get 100% the first time you played. I did!
3. Some people complain that the guide didnt tell you where to get the item, come on, that's not true. All the while, they tell you what would you get and where were they. only those miniscular items were left out.
4. Ommission issue, yes, this guide did not have a good strategy on the Via infinito bosses and chocobo dungeon. You have to get the dungeon map online and also how to fight the strong bosses such as paragon, trauma and chac. However, the online strategy, to me, are not as effective as they claimed would be. I figure out simpler way to deal with them myself based on analysis and investigation.

So to sum it up. If you dont have the money to buy the more expensive original guide, and you want 100% completion, you should buy this. It helps and if you are careful, you will get 100% completion. I was a good example. Thanks.

If you want to get 100% completion in FFX-2 you will need this guide. Unfortunately, Brady Games cut a few corners in the making of this guide, most likely to insure a concurrent release with the game. As a result, there are numerous typos and errors, such as mislabelings, omissions, and incorrect information. The most unforgiveable of these mistakes is guide's failure to tell the reader about certain side quests. When I reached the chapter 5 section I was greeted with: "If you had talked to this person in Kilika Port, you can get one of the best items in the game!" This was the first time in the guide that anything had been said of such a side quest. As I went on through the chapter 5 section, I was disappointed to see that there were a multitude of these little side-quests that the author had failed to mention previously. As a result, I only got 95% completetion percentage my first time through the game.

Still, without the guide, I would have had only about 40% of the game complete. Don't get me wrong; this guide is very helpful and well worth 15 dollars. I just wish more care and editing had gone into the guide.

As a number of people have already stated, this guide is subpar. While i will admit that some parts are definately helpful, this does not make up for what the guide lacks. There are a number of tasks the guide neglects to mention that are required for a number of items that could otherwise be found. The author has the uncanny ability of leaving out important points until chapter 5 or later, at which point he mentions, "oh, but if you'd done THIS in chapter 1, you chould get THIS..." Of course, now in chapter 5 and 150 hours into the game, this does little to help a gamer out. Important notes should you buy this guide: (1) During EVERY chapter, check back with the completion guide at the end of the book. They've conveniently neglected to mention everything one should do in the correct chapter, but included it here. (2) Read through all the side quests before beginning in order to circumvent the above problems. (3) Spend your money on something more worth while.

I found the guide to be very useful but there were some omissions that I found to be annoying.

The Goods:

1) Complete skill list for each dresssphere and garment grid. Great info and very well-done!
2) Breakdown of quests by chapter
3) Mini-game section. Especially useful for multi-chapter games.
4) There is an index-thingy printed on each page so you know which chapter you are reading about at all times.

The Bads:

1) Accessory list doesn't mention where the accessories can be found. You have to page through the entire walkthrough to find a specific item.

2) You can do things in the game that make it so you can't get an item without being warned. For example, it isn't made clear that you must talk to one certain person in each chapter to get the "Invincible" accessory until you get to chapter 5 and realize you are out of luck...Start over or go without it.

3) Towards the end chapters the authors get lazy and stop including complete maps, so you have to go to previous chapters to find your way...sloppy.

Overall a great guide and I would give it a 4.75 if I could.

This was so incredibly nice to have. I got to the very end of this game and had no idea how to beat it, so my sister and I went out and bought the guide. We started a new game and used the walkthrough inside it. It shows you step by step how to complete every quest and side quest, where to find all of the dress spheres, and about everything you could possibly need to know. Also, it doesnt give any spoilers, so you are safe there. It tells about all the charators, weapons, and boss's as well. This can be a really confusing game so I you should definatly BUY THIS GUIDE NOW!!!