We finally started Zodiac Age a couple days ago! XII was the Final Fantasy of our childhood, so it was inevitable that we'd return to it at some point. Our interest in it was recently rekindled after an FFX challenge run got Saori thinking about FFXII challenges, which in turn made me wonder what we might think of the story today. We only started truly appreciating the game's writing a few years ago, so I'm really excited to look at one of our most beloved RPGs with a fresh perspective!
To start off, I'll let Saori talk about some gameplay-related things.
hey folks. so yeah, those ff10 videos got me pretty curious about what ff12 challenges i could use to spice up our playthrough. what i ended up settling on was: new game -, single non-repeating jobs, with no espers (except for that one time you have to summon belias). new game - because it's a classic that requires you to play the game differently; single jobs because i wanted to get the izjs experience, which i remembered being pretty tough when i tried that version out back then; non-repeating jobs because i didn't want to just have a bunch of machinists; and no espers to reduce overlap between jobs... and also prevent shikari from becoming a second machinist later on. also, to preemptively make me not lose my mind trying to optimize which job should get which esper, lol.
speaking of jobs! the other day, i was talking to nitori about how interesting it's been to see the liscence board mechanic evolve as the game gets rereleased. i was never a big fan of its original incarnation, since it had the ff5 freelancer problem of every character turning into a master of all trades by the end of the game. izjs's splitting of the board into 12 jobs was a pretty big change, and i think a step in the right direction... but man, suddenly the problem was that the characters felt too limited instead! having access to at most half of the jobs meant that you'd necessarily miss out on some options, and you had to permanently decide what your lineup was going to be right at the very start of the game! some good ideas, then, but it could still use some work.
i wasn't surprised when it was announced that zodiac age would let you have two jobs per character, then. you can now have access to every job, and the ability to have a second one unlocks a bit into the story, so by then you'll know if you made some weird picks the first time around. this still strikes me a crude way to fix those issues, but well, everything's fine now!
...except that you still can't switch jobs. this is a problem if you're doing a single-job challenge, like i am now, or if you arbitrarily decide to only use the girl characters, like i did as a teen (can you tell that i'm trans lmao)...
although, i don't blame the za devs for not implementing job switching, since i knew it'd have to be handled pretty carefully. like, you couldn't just have characters keep their liscences, even if the ones not in the job they switch to got turned off or something, because that meant you could unlock esper-locked liscences without using espers! (e.g. switch from a job where liscence
Lis esper-locked to one where it isn't -> unlock it in the second job -> switch back to the first -> it's now unlocked without the esper). so you'd have to refund liscences that are locked in any job, at least. and probably espers too, so that people aren't boned if they give someone an esper with jobJin mind, only to change their minds later and be stuck with what that esper unlocks in the second job. also, it'd be nice if the way you changed jobs was limited in some way, too, since you presumably don't want people switching in the middle of a dungeon. i think that, at the end of the day, you should still have to commit to your job choices, so maybe make it so that... you can only change them at save points? oh, no, you can only change them in rabanastre! yeah, that'd work, since it's the main hub of the game and your visits there bookend each "chapter" of the game. hmm, yeah, i think job switching could actually work like this! it's really too bad they couldn't add it............except that they DID add it in a patch, AND it basically works exactly like i just described lmao. basically the only difference from what i came up with was that every liscence you bought gets refunded, not only the esper-locked ones, which... is probably easier to implement from a technical standpoint, and also further disincentivizes you from switching around too much since rebuying your liscences every time probably gets obnoxious. ok i think if i say "job" or "liscence" any more they'll stop sounding like words, so i'll leave it here. actually hold on, is it liscence or liscense...? oh also, could anyone tell me the difference between FXAA and SMAA? thanks
Let's see... looks like it's "liscense" in this game. [saori note: oh god dammit] Haha, it's ok.
So, the story! We're still very early on (Penelo's about to join for the first time), but I'm already struck by how much more understandable Vaan seems to me now. He's initially presented as immature, especially in comparison to Penelo — while he's sneaking into the sewers to kill rats and dreaming of becoming a sky pirate, she's dutifully taking care of the other kids and running errands for Migelo.
But their individual attitudes towards Dalmasca's newfound Archadian rule are also reflected here, and they act as a microcosm for the Dalmascan populace's different outlooks towards the empire. Penelo (and adults in general, as seen with Migelo) don't like the empire, but... well, what are they going to do about it? This is how things are now, and that's that. Vaan, on the other hand, can't accept that. He's furious at the imperial soldiers' disrespect for his people, and baffled by everyone else's acquiescence. How can they just accept being walked on like that?
And his perspective is indeed framed as childish. His lashing out causes trouble for the other characters, who have to bail him out of trouble, and it's often implied that the only reason it doesn't make sense to him is because he's too naive to understand the political reality that led to this. Not to mention the NPC children running around the city, many of whom express the same confusion he does.
The crucial thing, however, is that even if his understanding of the situation is childish and naive... he's still right.
After returning from the Westersand, we're treated to Vayne's inaugural address as the new Dalmascan consul. He speaks well, honoring the late King Raminas and beseeching his audience to consider the peace their former ruler would surely have wanted. As it puts it, the shadow of war is "a pall only you may cast off"... as if he didn't have anything to do with this? As if it wasn't the empire to which he is crown prince that invaded Dalmasca; as if the treaty wasn't signed at gunpoint? His speech is complete and utter bullshit — and it works. It works, because it uses Raminas' name to rouse the people's nationalist fervor, and the circumstances of his death to redirect that fervor away from thoughts of rebellion. After two years of enduring the disrespect we witnessed just minutes prior, in the previous cutscene, who wouldn't be taken by this?
Well, Vaan and Penelo... and Migelo, who we see in the following sequence. He introduces himself to Vayne as the patron of the inaugural banquet, groveling as we've already seen him do to avoid trouble. But Vayne objects to his behavior, rejecting the mantle of royalty and asking that he be addressed simply, by his name. Migelo refuses to do this, of course, and not because he's a humble old man. No; it's because he's smart enough to correctly identify that this, too, is a display of power on Vayne's part. The soldiers around town need to play the part of the masters, because if they didn't, their power over the populace would go with it. But Vayne? He stands so much higher than everyone else that even as he brings himself low like this, he knows that not only will his power remain secure, others will humiliate themselves to raise him back up. So it is with Migelo, who keeps his head down even after the royal leaves.
When Vaan questions this farce, Penelo chastises him for not getting it. But he does get it. Even if he can't put it into words, he knows exactly what's going on here. And even if he doesn't know what he'd do were he in Migelo's place, he knows he'd do something, anything. Just not this.
As we grow older, our understanding of the world calcifies. We become used to the way things are, accepting even the most grievous of injustices as inevitable; indeed, one could define maturity as an acceptance of their own powerlessness. But this conversely means that children, in their ignorance, are uniquely equipped to look past the politics, the propaganda – all our rationalizations – and see the reality of this violence for what it is.
We tried talking to the NPCs around town, and one that stood out to me was a child in... Lowtown, I believe. They said something along the lines of "if the empire was the bad guys before, how come they're the good guys now?" An innocent question, as you'd expect from someone that age... but actually — yeah, how come?