The game advertises itself. As if it has to.

Game Info.

Genre Strategy

Publisher/Developer Nintendo/Square Enix

Release 9/08/03

The main characters are four outcasts at an elementary school. If you're a real gamer, you probably know what that's like. They get bullied on like crazy, and on top of that, their family lives are in a wreck. Life for them in the real world pretty much sucks. So when one of the boys finds a book about the Final Fantasy world of Ivalice, and it all the sudden transforms their world into it, no one has complaints. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to screw around in this upside-down society sustained with endless combat, and maybe find a way back home.

Gameplay
Tactics Advance is the "sequel" in spirit to the PlayStation 1's Final Fantasy Tactics. Like nearly all FF games, FFTA's plotline and setting have basically nothing to do with the game's predecessor, but their gameplay is obviously what relates them. If you know Fire Emblem or Tactics Ogre (not Ogre Battle, though), then you basically know Final Fantasy Tactics or Tactics Advance. If you're unfamiliar with the whole genre, basically the games play like a series of ultra-complicated chess matches with an over-arching storyline. Instead of having a class system that dictates how your units move, the classes in strategy games affect how your characters attack, how often they attack, how much damage they take when attacked, and so on. But that's almost oversimplifying it.
Like I said, gameplay-wise, this game, generally speaking, takes everything from Final Fantasy Tactics. The most major difference this time around is the addition of laws and Judges. Various laws circulate every time you move on the map. These can be anything from "don't use Hunter Skills" to "don't use the 'fight' command". In pretty much every battle, a Judge will drop down from the sky before things get started. If any player on either side should forget one of the current laws and commit a criminal offense, the Judge will come in and either ticket him with usually a gold fine or a small stat reduction, or sentence him to prison. This is a controversial change to the much-beloved FF Tactics gameplay, but many players will agree that it challenges you in an interesting way and keeps each battle somewhat unique. A minor, however notable change to the FFT gameplay would be that spells no longer take time to charge, giving players a much stronger incentive to train kick-ass mages.
While you can't recruit monsters to your team like you could in old Ivalice, new Ivalice's five races, Humans, Moogles, Nu Mou, Viera, and Bangaa, bring a new and enjoyable twist to the class system - each race has a set of base stats, and members of certain races can only ever become certain classes. For instance, only Vieras can become Summoners, and only Nu Mou and Moogles can become Time Mages. Choosing your favorite classes and learning abilities are probably the most enthralling aspects of the gameplay. If only you could rename or customize the looks of your characters, FFTA would feel completely customizable, and I know most RPG enthusiasts love that in a game.
The multiplayer mode is sort of a joke. Instead of just letting you pit your team against your friends', the game presents you with little 2-on-1 battle missions that are basically unrewarded and wholly unsatisfying. I suppose this should drop the score here, but the game could honestly just have been 1-player and I would've been happy.
8/10

Control
As Square games are notorious for, this game's menus take a while to get used to, but navigating them is rewarding. Unlike FF7 or FF8, there aren't any lame character-building systems like Junctions or Materia that only seem to complicate the way the game's played and waste your time. Like FF9, however, FFTA features an equipment-based system for acquiring new abilities. Equip a certain weapon, hat, or shield (etc.) to a character and he'll receive new abilities. Keep that item equipped long enough and he'll master the abilities, being able to use them without the item equipped. Some players I know dislike this system as it restrains you from equipping just "the best" items to your teammates, but I think they fail to see the point, and that is that it helps prevent lame equipment from existing, keeping the collecting aspects of the game fun.
9/10

Graphics
Unlike the PlayStation FFT, Tactics Advance's stages are viewed from a set angle. Rather, you can't rotate the perspective so as to get a slightly better view of what your troops are up to. While this seemed like a major drawback at first, I've since noticed that the levels are almost always designed to work best with the given perspective. It's somewhat rare that an enemy should be able to hide behind an object or the terrain in battle. Although, this can be seen as a drawback, I won't deny that.
Otherwise, the graphics are pretty nice. The character designs are all totally original and look great in the large portraits that are displayed. When characters attack, the weapon that they have equipped shows up, which is a nice touch. The magic animations are okay, if a little basic. A small few are very cool to watch, but it's a shame more of the GBA's abilities weren't put to use here, especially since I know Square loves to do that kind of thing.
8/10

Sound
While the game's soundtrack is well-composed, and I do appreciate that, it's limited to no more than 5 or 6 songs throughout the game. It's not really unbearable, but sometimes I just wish I didn't have to hear the same songs over and over again, especially in such a long game.
7/10

Replay Value
Speaking of which, this is probably the longest storied game I've ever played, and yet it's on the Game Boy Advance. Levelling-up and training your characters are drawn out to an extreme - some abilities could take as many as 20 or more battles to master. While this would seem tedious, it actually pulls you in quite effectively. Making your team the ultimate is a whole lot more varied and rewarding than even in Pokémon. It's the number one reason this game kicks ass.
9/10

Overall
The characters are appealing and the world design is fresh and vibrant. Unfortunately, an interesting premise never really takes off. You can lose track of the story pretty easily, and by the end it doesn't really matter at all what you're doing in the context of the plotline. Although, I have to say, the game design and battle system you're left with are pretty damn near spotless. I still find the game as a whole incredibly fun and engaging, and I feel safe saying it's one of the strongest handheld titles to date.

FINAL SCORE: 9/10
=Amazing=
Send feedback to: sam@ngeb.net