39,327
edits
Final Fantasy XIII-2: Difference between revisions
m
update links
m (update links) |
m (update links) |
||
Line 6:
'''This article assumes you have played ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'' and will have unmarked spoilers from that game.'''
The next game<ref>we completely avoided what happened [[Final Fantasy X
Three years after the end of ''Final Fantasy XIII'', the residents of Cocoon are attempting to rebuild their lives following the loss of the Cocoon fal'Cie. Lightning is missing, assumed to have [[Heroic Sacrifice|sacrificed herself]] in order to stop Cocoon from falling and killing everyone inside. Only one person believes otherwise: Serah Farron, who swears that her sister emerged alive but disappeared into thin air a moment later.
Line 15:
=== This game has examples of: ===
* [[Hundred-Percent Completion]]: The game requires you to [[Guide Dang It|completely fill out every map and monster]]<ref>You only need to kill each monster once, not Librascope them to completion, but you will need to get their variants, another thing the game ''doesn't tell you''.</ref> and [[Last Lousy Point|obtain all of the Fragments]] in order to view the Secret Ending. However, in order to do this, you ''will need to'' [[Guide Dang It|obtain several of the hidden monsters]] that would help against the [[Nintendo Hard]] status of the game.
* [[Action Commands]]:
** During battle, you'll be asked to input commands via the Cinematic Action system, which allows you to do things like climb on enemies, and other cinematic stuff. Mostly, they do superficial stuff, like buffing the party, staggering the boss or just to take it down in a flashy way. Doing the last on will get you an adornment for each boss; doing them all will get you an achievement.
** Monster allies' [[Limit Break|Feral Links]] require the input of commands in order to increase the synchronization, which increases the chance of obtaining the monster killed by the Feral Link. Makes you wonder why support Feral Links even have synchronization...
Line 27:
** In a more meta sense, the final datacore granted from the final bonus fight of Final Fantasy 13, [http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Datalog/Analects#XIII._Fabula_Nova_Crystallis "Fabula Nova Crystallis"], can be interpreted as spelling out 13-2's plot in a very general sense.
* [[Alternate Universe]]: Yaschas Massif and Academia have alternate dimensions that appear as a result of solving paradoxes in other locations, and they are marked with an X in the year name. (Ex. 01X AF) You can still go back to the original version of the area, though.
* [[Always Save the Girl]]:
** {{spoiler|Caius' stated goal is to find a way to prevent Yeul from her fate of dying and reincarnating every few years, something she has done for ''millennia,'' with him standing by her side the entire time. His solution is to directly cause a [[Time Crash]] and ''destroy time'', thus cutting off the source of her shortened lifespan.}}
** Noel believes in this. {{spoiler|His track record isn't very good though.}}
* [[Ambiguous Robots]]: Some of the monsters that look and act organic are upgraded with items like bolts and chips. These are usually the same monsters that were identified as biological weapons in the first game.
* [[And I Must Scream]]:
** {{spoiler|Caius, Yeul, and Serah}} are all ''walking'' examples of this trope because of Etro.
** At least three endings involve this trope. For the record, they are {{spoiler|the normal ending with Lightning, the Oerba Paradox Ending, and Augusta Tower 200AF.}}
Line 39:
* [[Anyone Can Die]]: [[Up to Eleven|To where it becomes]] extremely dark.
** Noel's backstory is that absolutely everyone can, ''and has'', died. He was the last human ever to be born, and so he's jumping around the timeline trying to prevent his backstory from happening.
* [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit]]/[[Lazy Backup]]: No matter how many monsters you've captured, only one can fight in battle at a time and only three can be placed in your Paradigm Pack and used in battle. If that monster dies, all monsters in your Paradigm Pack are dead and must be revived. Thankfully it also works in reverse and just reviving one of the monsters revives all 3: the same applies to healing<ref>This works as a ''percentage'' of health. For example, if one monster has 35 percent of health left, all three in the pack have 35 percent as well. This becomes useful when you want to heal a Sentinel and replace it with a low-HP monster.</ref> and buffing as well.
* [[Arc Number]]:
** Although the number thirteen doesn't appear as often as in the previous game, the Thirteenth Ark appears towards the end of the game. This means that it's now also an [[A Worldwide Punomenon|Ark Number]].
** Almost all [[DLC]] monsters have exactly 12 Crystarium nodes, which means that they max out at, you guessed it, level 13.
** Snow also says he's going to explore the "13 different ages" in one of the paradox endings.
** The clock in Valhalla strikes 13, the hardest Hands of Time clock faces have 13 numbers on them, and the face of the clock in one of the card games in Sazh's [[DLC]] goes up to 13.
Line 57:
** Long Gui is back. It can step on you.
* [[Audible Sharpness]]: Swinging your sword on the map screen results in a distinctive "sharp sword" sound.
* [[Awesome but Impractical]]: The [[Infinity+1 Sword]] for both Serah and Noel is this. The Strength and Magic stats depend on how many Fragments you have, so they can be rather weak when you first get them. By the time you'll power it up to have the highest stats, you'll most likely have almost every Fragment in the game, and there isn't much else to do. It also doesn't have any particularly good skills like other slightly weaker high-end weapons do (such as ATB+1 and ATB+50%) and they have no synth abilities.
* [[A Worldwide Punomenon]]: {{spoiler|[[Final Fantasy X|Jet]] [[Final Fantasy XII|Bahamut]]. You can practically make parallels between both cases for this game.}}
** {{spoiler|Even better, [[Final Fantasy IX|Garnet]] [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|Bahamut]] and [[Final Fantasy VII|Amber]] [[Visual Pun|Bahamut]].}}
* [[Bad Future]]:
** Noel has come back in time to prevent this from happening.
** Most of the Paradox Endings lead to this.
Line 77:
* [[The Beast Master]]: Serah and Lightning have the ability to tame monsters and have them fight with them. Of course, some monsters cannot be tamed.
** Caius has an army of monsters to fight for him in the opening cutscene, but he never makes use of this power again other than that...
* [[Beef Gate]]:
** In order to unlock the gate in the Archylte Steppe to reach the Vile Peaks, you'll have to defeat three Gigantaurs (one at a time, not all at once), which are very powerful the first time you visit the location.
** A near-''literal'' one can be found in Academia 400 AF. While you're following Caius, the path you're ''not'' supposed to take is blocked off by a large Undying. You know, the Cie'th that were [[Bonus Boss|Bonus Bosses]] in the original game? At this point, your attacks will barely make a dent in it even when Staggered, and all its attacks one-shot you. Yeah, I think the game is reminding you to [[Continue Your Mission, Dammit!]].
Line 86:
{{quote|Meanie Miss Farron! Meanie Miss Farron!"}}
* [[BFS]]: Caius' sword is about as big as he is. He can still swing it pretty fast.
* [[Big Damn Heroes]]:
** Hope when you first meet him.
** Snow has one in one of the [[Multiple Endings|Paradox Endings]]: {{spoiler|In Academia 4XX AF, Snow arrives with the "time police" to arrest Alyssa for conspiring with Caius. After informing Hope that he will be assassinated in three days, he invites Serah to come with him on his journey to defeat all the different Caiuses spread across the timeline. Serah happily agrees, and the two set off on their own adventure.}}
Line 111:
{{quote|'''Gilgamesh''':"I've been waiting in this Coliseum for so very long now! I was starting to worry that you'd never download this part of the game, and I'd be stuck in digital limbo!" ''(cue confused expression from Serah and Noel)''}}
* [[Break Meter]]: The same mechanic as the first game makes a return.
* [[Brick Joke]]:
** An Undying Cie'th was [[Bait and Switch Boss|killed by a Tonberry]] in XIII. The same one shows up in XIII-2 as a boss in Episode 4.
** The ''mirror''. It played no role, and was practically there as a prop. That same mirror is a [[Unusual Euphemism|euphemism]] for {{spoiler|a parallel dream world where all desires could come true.}} It was further evidence that everything was bleeding into each other, and where you got your first artefact.
* [[Bridal Carry]]: Caius to Yeul during the opening credits, which was also a [[Final Fantasy VII|familiar sight]] to some players.
* [[Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu]]:
** {{spoiler|You can choose to kill Caius or he kills himself on your sword, stabbing his heart. Which was also the heart of the Goddess of Time. Which causes [[Time Crash|time itself to collapse]] and the world to end. Which was the villain's objective all along.}}
** Also in half of the Paradox Endings. Just to list: {{spoiler|if you kill Atlas, a war erupts and you're killed in it; if you kill the giant Flan, it takes over the world; if you kill the Proto fal'Cie with the Paradox Scope activated, Serah, Noel and Mog are captured by it and have machine copies made of them; if Serah kills Caius with the Paradox Scope activated in the Void Beyond, time ends.}}
* [[Broken Bridge]]: The time gates themselves serve this purpose, only opening up the next area once you've advanced the plot enough to uncover the various Artefacts. There are also numerous other examples in the form of barricades, fallen rubble, time distortions, and so on. There's even two Broken Bridges that are almost literally broken bridges - they're bridges phased out of spacetime that you can't cross until you get Mog's improved search ability.
* [[But Thou Must!]]: {{spoiler|The very final Cinematic Action scene. The resulting cutscene is the ''exact same,'' regardless of which option you pick.}}
* [[Butt Monkey]]: Mog. There are parts of the game where advancing the plot involves picking the little guy up and tossing him.
* [[Capital City]]: Academia
* [[Cartography Sidequest]]: An NPC will reward you for filling in most area maps 100%. [[Last Lousy Point|Doing so is sometimes difficult.]]
* [[Chained by Fashion]]:
** Gogmagog and its palette swap, which are described as charms and seals placed upon it.
** The giant monster you ride in the Sunleth Waterscape has chains on its head for some reason.
Line 134:
* [[Collection Sidequest]]: The Fragments, of which there are 160. [[Last Lousy Point|Some are easier to get than others, naturally]].
** Some of the fragments are actually rewards from collection sidequests, like having fully explored every map or having defeated every monsters.
* [[Continuity Nod]]: Near the beginning of the [[Final Fantasy XIII|last game]], when the heroes are turned into l'Cie, a short [[Deliberately Monochrome]] cinematic shown Ragnarok atop Cocoon. In this game, it's explained that the same cinematic is part of a ''much longer'' prophecy: {{spoiler|It shows Cocoon falling, with the crystal support being shattered and crashing down into Pulse.}}
* [[Color Coded for Your Convenience]]:
** The various roles are color coded, so you can tell at a glance which character or mon has which. They even color the nodes in the Crystarium when you level up the role.
** Several of the time labyrinth puzzles use color coding to make the gameplay more obvious. Clock puzzles color code the numbers so you can tell at a glance which number is which. Crystal constellation puzzles color code nodes that can be linked. And falling platform puzzles have red and white platforms to tell you which can be crossed once and which twice.
** The three stats are color-coded, to make it easier to tell which one gained a bonus when you advance in the Crystarium. Hit points are green, attack is red, and magic power is purple.
* [[Colossus Climb]]: Noel does this via [[Action Commands]]. He runs up Atlas's visible arm and takes a flying swing at its (invisible) head.
* [[The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard]]: You fight Caius multiple times throughout the game. Notably, you fight him once in Oerba 200 AF, again in the Void Beyond ({{spoiler|without Noel}}), and again in {{spoiler|the Dying World}} (this time {{spoiler|without Serah or a monster companion}}). Now, in order to get three of the Paradox Endings, you need to fight him again with the Paradox Scope fragment skill active. With the Paradox Scope active, Caius suddenly gets more health, the ability to apply ''health regeneration'' on himself, and his attacks are quick, relentless, and very powerful, leaving very little room for his victim to do much at all until he stops. And the worst part of all? ''You need to fight him twice in the same battle in all instances''. It's [[Nintendo Hard]] taken [[Up to Eleven]].
* [[The Computer Is Your Friend]]:
** {{spoiler|Future humanity is secretly ruled by an AI.}}
** {{spoiler|The Paradox Ending at Augusta Tower has the supercomputer kidnap Serah, Noel, and Mog, brainwash them, and turn them into weapons.}}
* [[Cool Sword]]:
** Caius' sword looks amazing. It's huge, improbably shaped, and ''purple''. With a glowing red eye.
** Lightning's new sword doesn't look too bad either. They gave it a more medieval fantasy look to match her new armor.
** Noel has a large sword that doubles as a sheath for a smaller one. It's very ornate and can also be transformed into a spear when necessary.
** Serah's weapon is actually Mog, who can also find objects that are lost in Paradoxes. {{spoiler|Even when Serah loses Mog (kinda), her weapon turns translucent.}} It also switches between a bow and a sword depending on the distance in combat.
* [[Crutch Character]]:
** Serah is this in comparison to Noel. Early in the game, she has better stats than him, but Noel begins to outpace her later in the game.
** Most monsters that are "early peakers". They have fantastic growth and can carry you through a chapter or two of the game, but since they're capped at level 20, they'll soon get outpaced by increasingly stronger enemies and better monsters.
* [[Cursed with Awesome]]: The Heart of Chaos. {{spoiler|It allows the user to have power of chaos itself and [[Immortality]]. Caius has it as a gift from Etro herself as being the sole Guardian of Yeul, and only the person who kills him can take it. This concept quickly makes a left turn into [[Deconstruction]] when Caius is later known to have [[Death Seeker]] tendencies after living for an ''extremely'' long time and witnessing Yeul die countless times.}}
* [[A Day in the Limelight]]: The three [[DLC]] story packs for Snow, Sazh, and Lightning.
* [[Damn You, Muscle Memory!]]:
** In this game, spells are ordered in the battle menu by power level (so first all the normal spells, then the '-a's, then the '-ga's) as opposed to the original XIII's ordering by element. (Fire, Fira, Firaga, etc.) For those who played the first game a lot, this can take some getting used to.
** On a similar note, many enemies from the first game return, but most of their weaknesses have been changed.
* [[Darker and Edgier]]: Compared to its [[Final Fantasy XIII|predecessor]]. It's like ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'' dark. Notable in that a lot of people initially assumed that, like the [[Final Fantasy X
* [[Darkest Hour]] --> [[Hope Spot]]: {{spoiler|The ending, dear God. Serah is dead, Lightning becomes crystallized, Vanille and Fang are still in crystal stasis, and Snow is somewhere outside of the timeline. Meanwhile, Noel and Hope are smack dab in the middle of a [[Time Crash]]. Oh, and Etro? Noel inadvertently killed her.}}
* [[Decoy Protagonist]]: Most of the advertising suggests that Lightning is the central hero of the game, even though the true main character is her sister Serah.
Line 173:
** A lot of the monsters labeled with "Early Peaker" have a low max level and pretty high stats compared to other choices. However, most of them lose out in the long run.
** The [[DLC]] weapons are really useful up until you start to do sidequests near the endgame.
* [[Discount Card]]:
** One of the Fragment Skills will reduce the price of items.
** Played for [[What Do You Mean It's Not Awesome?|funny]] when Serah, Noel, and Mog receive the "reward" for solving Bresha Ruins' paradox: {{spoiler|a 10-year supply of toilet paper}}. [[Crazy Prepared|And you get to keep it in your inventory]]!
Line 188:
* [[Earn Your Happy Ending]]: Despite there being multiple endings, this game has more "[[It's a Wonderful Failure]]" endings than any other [[Square Enix]] game. Compare this to its predecessor, which had one [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]] after another {{spoiler|globally retconned out in this game.}} And there is only ''one'' perfectly happy ending, which is ''not canon''.
* [[Eldritch Abomination]]: Gogmagog and the Undying Cie'th Raspatil.
* [[Elevator Action Sequence]]: In Augusta Tower 200AF, you're forced into several fights in a row while riding the elevator. All while going up one floor, which after the sequence, takes nothing more than a few seconds.
* [[Empathic Environment]]: Bresha Ruins 005 AF starts out sunny. After Atlas begins his rampage across the ruins, it begins to rain. After defeating Atlas and stopping his rampage, the area becomes sunny again. [[Comically Missing the Point|Apparently, the environment cannot make up its mind]].
** It is ''always'' dark and raining in Academia 400 AF.
** It's usually bright and sunny in New Bodhum. The two exceptions are during the intro, when monsters are attacking the town, and in the year 700 AF, when all humans have perished.
* '''{{spoiler|[[The Ending Changes Everything]]}}'''
Line 197:
* [[Eternal English]]: One of the [[All There in the Manual|datalogs]] [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] this by noting that the human language has not changed in over a thousand years, although curiously enough, Cocoon and Pulse use different alphabets. The datalog [[Hand Wave|speculates]] that the reason for the unchanging language is because language was something that the fal'Cie gave humanity.
* [[Expy]]:
** Gogmagog looks a lot like [[Final Fantasy X|Anima]] or [[Resident Evil|Nemesis]].
** Atlas looks like (and has the same model of) a miniature [[Final Fantasy XIII|Titan]].
** Noel himself is basically a [[Gender Swap|gender-swapped]] [[Final Fantasy XIII|Fang]], [[Lampshade Hanging|which is lampshaded]] in a conversation between Snow, Serah, and Noel. Others feel Noel is [[Kingdom Hearts|Sora's lost twin brother]]. [[Final Fantasy X|Or the lost child of Yuna and Tidus]].
Line 209:
** Snow to Noel when fighting the giant flan.
** Noel throws Serah's sword (i.e. Mog) at the Proto Fal'cie Adam during a Cinematic Action sequence. [[Butt Monkey|Mog gets paralyzed from electrical shock for a few seconds afterwards]].
* [[Feather Motif]]:
** Lightning gains one to replace her rose motif in the first game.
** When you buy the Arcus Chronica for Serah and the In Paradisum for Noel from Chocolina, white and black feathers appear respectively every time they attack an enemy.
* [[Fetch Quest]]: Roughly half the sidequests available are you running down an item or two for various NPCs.
* [[Final Boss New Dimension]]: The last two bosses in the game are fought in Valhalla.
* [[Final Boss Preview]]: Caius is the first and last opponent fought in the game. Partially subverted since it's {{spoiler|Bahamut is the first and last boss fought}}, but the trope counts since {{spoiler|Bahamut is the Eidolon of Caius and Jet Bahamut is the [[One-Winged Angel]] form of Caius.}}
Line 220:
** Switching the view of the Historia Crux will allow you to see the panorama images for each era.
* [[Five Races]]: Although the first game consciously avoided using this trope to be unique, it returns in full usage in this game, with The Academy functioning as High Men (a society of thinkers who live in isolated enclaves, ruled by an near-immortal man with vast knowledge of the world), the Steppe Hunters being Stouts, and Mog and Chocolina being representative of Cutes. Fal'Cie retain their status as Fairies, and add Yeul to their ranks.
* [[Floating Continent]]:
** Valhalla has a few surrounding the periphery. Most of them are destroyed in the battle with Caius.
** The 13th Ark
Line 241:
* [[Gameplay and Story Segregation]]: [[Averted Trope|Averted]] when it comes to fighting Caius. There are a total of five fights against him in the story. In each fight, he cast reraise on himself and the the first four battles end after it revives him. The next cutscene typically involves him standing up and kicking your ass. [[New Game+|The Paradox Scope]] lets you continue fighting him after Reraise activates and Caius proceeds to use the same strength he demonstrated in cutscenes. Beating Caius in these fights results in a [[Nonstandard Game Over|paradox ending.]]
* [[Gameplay Grading]]: Like the last game, your battles are ranked from one to five stars. This is important since not only do higher ranks increase item drops and the Feral Link gauge, but some achievements/trophies are only awarded for get five stars on certain boss battles.
* [[Genre Busting]]:
** The soundtrack. Examples: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBZvtVpynXA LIMIT BREAK], [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGZzR5Zmlpo Colliding Worlds], and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZc-pzCKgjE Groovy Chocobo]. The first two are a few of several tracks vocalized for the game, somewhat like ''[[Persona 3]]''.
** The game too, to an extent. Basically, ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'' and ''[[Chrono Trigger]]''/''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' hopped in a hot-pink convertible together and got in a hit-and-run accident with ''[[Pokémon]]'' and a ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'' game.
* [[Genre Shift]]: ''[[Final Fantasy XIII]]'' had [[Lighter and Softer]] music with vibrant strings layered onto a common style most often associated with past Final Fantasy titles, [[Soundtrack Dissonance|which contrasts]] the "[[Earn Your Happy Ending|brighter future]]" theme akin to ''[[Final Fantasy X]]''. This game is the exact opposite: [[Darker and Edgier]] soundtrack with strong emphasis on individual instruments optionally layered with a subtle rap-like voice-over, which contrasts the apparent theme of [[The Power of Friendship|how relying on others is extremely helpful]].
* [[Getting Crap Past the Radar]]:
** A close look at Serah's black modesty shorts shows that they fit her REALLY well.
** Some of the quiz questions in Academia 4XX demonstrate Square-Enix's newfound love of [[Double Entendre|Double Entendres]] (see also [[Final Fantasy XIV]])
Line 259:
* [[Grandfather Paradox]]: {{spoiler|Who caused the AI humanity creates to turn against them and finish the Artificial Fal'cie? The Artificial Fal'cie, of course. Must have been inspired by [[Final Fantasy VIII|Ultimecia]].}}
* [[Guest Star Party Member]]: Snow joins your group as a non-playable character in Sunleth Waterscape 300 AF.
* [[Guide Dang It]]:
** You most likely can't find all 160 Fragments without consulting a walkthrough at least once. The worst ones are either Fragments related to Paradox Endings, which already have their own [[Guide Dang It]] moments, or the ones that are hidden on the map, and require searching everywhere and checking every nook and cranny to find.
*** Nearly every artefact in Academia 4XX AF. Obtaining most of them involve answering a number of inane (and even some luck-based) questions ''in a row'', tracking down Captain Cryptic with infrequent and vague clues from pedestrians, and ''filling the entire bestiary'', which is itself a huge [[Guide Dang It]], especially monsters like {{spoiler|Tezcatlipoca, a unique Woodwraith who spawns only in a single spot in Academia 500 AF, on the northeast platform close to the final boss fight. If you already fought Xolotl and Miquiztli at that spot instead, you have to ''reset the entire area'' and go all the way over there again.}}
Line 276:
* [[Ironic Echo]]: When you first arrive at Academia 400 AF, you are given a [[Scenery Porn|very nice overview]] of the city. If anything, the city is a [[Captain Ersatz]] to ''[[Final Fantasy Versus XIII]]'''s own city, but that's not the main idea. {{spoiler|Proto fal'Cie Adam makes its introduction in this timeline by [[Final Fantasy XIII|arriving in an airship modeled after Etro, complete with a slow-moving tendency and greenish flashing lights]]. It then proceeds to remain above The Academy in the front of the map for rest of time.}}
* [[I Will Find You]]: Serah towards Lightning and, later on, {{spoiler|Snow}}. Noel towards {{spoiler|his}} Yeul, as he believes he will reunite with her in the future.
* [[I Will Wait for You]]:
** Serah waits for Snow to return in New Bodhum at the beginning of the game.
** At the start of the game, Lightning is locked in combat with Caius, and neither of them seem to be able to gain the upper hand over the other. When she sends Noel to go find Serah, the implication is that Lightning will be fighting Caius for ''the entire span of the game''.
Line 284:
* [[Improbable Weapon User]]: Serah uses a MOOGLE as a weapon. Granted, though, it does change into an actual weapon.
** Noel's sword is actually two swords attached to each other that can turn into a spear.
* [[Infant Immortality]]: [[Averted]].
** {{spoiler|1=In Acedemia 400 AF, some of the NPCs transformed into Cie'th are children. Heartrendingly, you can sometimes pass adult female NPCs and hear them begging their children not to leave them, or reassuring them that they're right there.}}
** Yeul isn't exactly an infant, but she never lives to be older than fifteen. And she's constantly reincarnated.
Line 306:
* [[Lightning Can Do Anything]]: Well, [[Incredibly Lame Pun|she probably can if the writers feel like it]], but here it manifests more accurately by the fact that enemies and event-based item boxes appear in form of a bolt of reddish-purple lightning striking their spawn location.
** This seems to be how the Proto-Fal'cie instantly converts people into Cie'th.
* [[Limit Break]]:
** [[Mon|Mons]] have a Synchronization gauge that fills up as they fight with you. Once it's full, you can unleash their Feral Link.
** Serah and Noel both can get their Full ATB Attack (Serah's is Ultima Arrow and Noel's in Meteor Javelin), but they're only useable once per fight.
Line 314:
** Unique monster crystals that can only be gotten by throwing Mog at specific spots used to be this in the sense that if you picked the wrong Crystarium upgrades for them or infused another monster with them (which was the only way to pass on the useful Pack Mentality skill), you couldn't get another one, but thanks to Snow's [[DLC]], all versions of Valfodr have 2 of the unique monsters as their drop items and thus you can get as many extras as you want.
* [[Lotus Eater Machine]]: {{spoiler|Serah and Noel get trapped in separate ones. Vanille and Fang free Serah from hers, and Serah saves Noel from his.}}
* [[Magikarp Power]]: A few monsters can fall straight into this trope.
** The biggest example is Twilight Odin, who is weak when you first get him. With enough sufficient leveling, he can become an absolute monster. Too bad he's overshadowed by other monsters that attack faster than him, do more damage than he does at equal or lower strength values and don't waste time posing after every 4 attacks.
** The Cait Sith you get as one of your two first Mons can, with time and patience, be one of the best Medics in the game.
Line 333:
* [[Monster Compendium]]: With a sidequest for [[Hundred-Percent Completion]], to boot.
* [[Mood Dissonance]]: Chocolina, who's always cheery no matter where she is (with a few exceptions. In {{spoiler|Academia 400 AF, she's depressed that everyone's being turned into Cie'th. Right before the finale in Academia 500 AF, she also gets a little downcast when she realizes that if Serah and Noel resolve the final paradox, she may never see them again.}})
* [[Mood Whiplash]]: Do ''not'' expect any mood in this game to last for long, especially if you're going for post-game 100% completion.
* [[Mr. Exposition]]: Mog
* [[Multiple Endings]]: Subverted in that the majority of the multiple endings don't actually affect the gameplay, and there is only one true ending.
Line 351:
* [[Nintendo Hard]]: This game has been attracting attention for its ''insanely'' hard bosses.
* [[No Sidepaths, No Exploration, No Freedom]]: Intentionally and deliberately averted with areas more complex and intertwined than before.
* [[Now Where Was I Going Again?]]:
** The characters will be happy to remind you what's going on nearly every time you enter a gate. This is useful if you've been sidetracked [[Gotta Catch Em All|catching]] [[Mons]], [[Sidequest|Sidequests]], or by [[Sidetracked by the Gold Saucer|Serendipity]], but a tad annoying if you've played straight through and just heard similar dialog less than five minutes before.
** You can see sidequests you've accepted via the menu.
** When you load your game from the title screen, a brief [["Previously On..."]] will play, reminding you of the story so far.
Line 361:
* [[One-Winged Angel]]: Of course, [[Trope Namer|this being]] ''[[Final Fantasy]]'', {{spoiler|Caius can transform himself into a dark dragon called Chaos Bahamut and Jet Bahamut in the final battle.}}
** Special mention for {{spoiler|Jet Bahamut: He brings along Garnet Bahamut and Amber Bahamut, and constantly re-summons them throughout the fight. That's right, the last boss is [[Actually Four Mooks|actually three dragons]].}}
* [[Palette Swap]]:
** Several bosses are directly re-used from ''13'', only with a new paint job--for example, Atlas uses the mostly unused Titan character model.
** On a larger scale, many monsters are "family" monsters which reuse very similar or exactly the same models, with new textures. This is actually ''useful'' in some instances, as it's possible to find monsters with the Pack Mentality auto-ability, which makes them stronger if all three monsters in your Paradigm Pack are from the same family.
** Most of the NPCs are palette swaps of each other, with only clothing and hair color changed.
Line 369:
** If one goes to a very tiny spot at AF 400 Academia just before you fight Zenobia, and turn on a turbo fire controller (or mash the X button A LOT), then you can accumulate LOTS of Crystanium points.
** For monster materials, Archlyte Steppe -Year Unknown- just throws them at you.
* [[Painting the Medium]]:
** If a particularily strong rare monster appears, it does so in form of a small black hole, which causes horizonal static lines to appear on the screen.
** Augusta Tower 300 AF is suffering from malfunctions due to the paradoxes; the screen is covered with hazy lines while you're there.
** In the secret ending, {{spoiler|Caius talks about the player having seen all eight endings.}}
* [[Pink Girl, Blue Boy]]: Serah wears pink and white, whereas Noel wears blue and black.
* [[Pop Quiz]]: There is a man named Captain Cryptic who asks Serah questions about the world they live in.
* [["Previously On..."]]: Every time you continue the game, some clips are shown of what happened the last time you played. It seems to be a random collection of clips from previous cutscenes, and sometimes doesn't really help the player remember what happened before.
Line 384:
* [[Red Oni, Blue Oni]]: A menu-based variant. When you initially progress through the game, you have a blue menu. Whenever the "Paradox" Fragment is turned on, the menu will become red.
* [[Replacement Goldfish]]: After Snow leaves to find Lightning, Serah adopts a cat and names it Snow.
* [[Ret-Gone]]:
** {{spoiler|Lightning, of all people, in the "main" timeline.}} Makes seeing snippets of the ending of ''XIII'', only with that particular character missing (and Serah being the only one who notices anything is wrong--something she's considered mildly ''insane'' for believing) absolutely horrific. Doubly so since the player presumably remembers the original ending to the game.
** Ironically, this is [[Inverted]] as well in a big way. {{spoiler|Namely, Etro did the inverse, saving the party from ''XIII'' after the fight with Orphan, which causes [[It Got Worse|a few problems.]]}}
* [[The Reveal]]: Turns out, it's the moogle's bobble that allows them to fly. The wings are just for show.
** {{spoiler|The Eyes of Etro drastically shorten the lifespan of those who bear them.}}
* [[Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory]]:
** Serah and Noel, alongside a few others.
** Somewhat averted {{spoiler|in Noel's case. Memories relating to his native era aren't impervious, as Serah figures out in a brief narrative moment roundabouts Academia 4XX AF.}}
Line 419:
** Also causes a bit of [[Fridge Brilliance]]: {{spoiler|Why is it that, even after finalizing the plans for the creation of Bhunivelze, Noel doesn't disappear? If you had been able to truly win, the future that Noel comes from would be erased...}}
* [[Stat Grinding]]: Like the first game, the Crystarium works like this.
* [[Stepping Stones in the Sky]]:
** During the opening battle between Lightning and Caius, this happens twice. First traditionally, and then on pieces of metal frozen in place with a gravity spell.
** [[The Very Definitely Final Dungeon]] is basically this, complete with [[Unexpected Gameplay Change|an out-of-place platforming segment]].
Line 446:
* [[Time Paradox]]: The theme of the game.
* [[Time Travel]]: The Historia Crux system allows the player to travel through gates that lead to different time periods, akin to ''[[Chrono Trigger]]''. It is slightly extended from the CT system, however, in that there are several alternate versions (in some cases up to 4, but a few are just for Paradox Endings) of most time periods.
* [[Took a Level In Badass]]:
** Serah is an active participant in the storyline instead of a sort of [[Posthumous Character]].
** Hope. From the whiny and weak kid in the first game to {{spoiler|the de facto '''leader of the world'''}} in this one. And he saves Serah and Noel multiple times.
Line 454:
** Beware the latest [[PlayStation 3]] and [[Xbox 360]] trailers, which are spoiling things way too much. For example, {{spoiler|1=the [[Xbox 360]] trailer reveals scenes which lead us to think that Noel and Yeul are going to die. The [http://youtu.be/7ikNX-p8hEI?t=2m25s XBOX360 trailer] goes as far as showing Caius stabbing Noel in the back, leaving him to die.}} Of course, we know that we should [[Never Trust a Trailer]], or that with the multiple endings the game will have, we only see one of the paths our choices may lead us... Still, it's going a little too far.
** The [http://youtu.be/TludyEtj7OA?t=2m27s latest PS3 trailer] (released at the same time as the above) has another (and different!) spoiler: {{spoiler|it confirms that Lightning and Serah eventually reunite through the time travel paradigms}}, which seemed to be a little bit too far for trailers 3-4 months before the release.
* [[The Unexpected]]:
** Available through the [[DLC]] is Lightning's former superior, Lieutenant Amodar. He's a Commando-role "monster".
** Jhil Nabaat is an available combatant.
Line 465:
* [[Building Swing|Vine Swing]]: In the Sunleth Waterscape.
* [[Variable Mix]]: Most of the area themes have an "[[Speedy Techno Remake|Aggressive Mix]]" that kick in when monsters show up.
* [[Video Game Cruelty Potential]]:
** Using the Moogle Throw will have Mog squirm and panic. It's rather cute though. Actually throwing him can have him bounce off obstacles and fall down cliffs. Good thing he seems to be [[Made of Iron]].
*** This is also made more amusing by the fact that whenever you throw him, all NPCs nearby gather around him regardless of whether they're hardened soldiers or little kids when they just express some casual wonderment when he's flying around.
Line 480:
* [[What Happened to the Mouse?]]: Several major players in the storyline vanish outright and are never mentioned again. Case in point, no mention of {{spoiler|Alyssa}} after {{spoiler|her betrayal}} outside of a Paradox Ending. This is almost acceptable with her {{spoiler|since her betrayal was apparently due to her discovering that the heroes succeeding in their next adventure would [[Ret-Gone]] her}}, but less understandable when {{spoiler|Snow}} gets the same treatment.
** Noel's fate in the canon ending is left dangling, as {{spoiler|the world is consumed with chaos, we never see what happens to Noel, not even in any of the downloadable content.}}
* [[Whole-Plot Reference]]:
** Watch the trailers for ''[[Final Fantasy Versus XIII]]'', and then play through this game. [[Mythology Gag|Notice any parallels]]?
** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eUlt89pbMl8 The Fabula Nova Crystallis mythology] is [[Mythology Gag|surprisingly accurate]].
* [[Xanatos Gambit]]: {{spoiler|Caius pulls off an amazing one: Either his plans to destroy Time succeed (by killing Etro directly, or by forcing open the Unseen Gate), or the heroes kill him... which would destroy Time as well. Lightning realises the futility of fighting against him under these conditions, and allows herself to be defeated.}}
| |||