I would over say that fft is better. what I saw on ffta it was not that good looking of a game.

[vengence52003]

when you play in ffta you need items to go on missions and it isnt as fun as fft

FFT is a better game simply because there are no laws forbidding you from using certain weapons or magics.

[LocoColt04]

Ah, but I jest. While I do agree that FFT is the better title, FFT:A was more challenging with its law system. I actually thought it was quite a good idea, and actually gave me incentive to play the game. It was a little short for my tastes, though.


By the way guys, give some actual meaning (i.e. depth) to your posts, or I'll have to close the thread. It's getting a bit too spammy in here. >_<;;

Originally Posted by myself, ten months ago

Okay, I almost hate to do this, but I have to stick up for FFT:A.

Yeah, FFT is much better, but you can't really compare the two, either. The only thing they had in common is the fact that they're both strategy games and both involve Ivalice. FFT:A was in fact a great game, because it had a completely different style of challenges, like law cards and such. Yeah, it's a bitch, but that's what makes the game good. It makes you pissy when you break a law and get a yellow card. It makes you frustrated when you don't have the money to bail your characters out of jail. It makes you actually work, which is something a lot of gamers these days have issues with.

I'm not saying that FFT didn't make you work either, so don't get ahead of yourself. You just can't put the games on an even plane of reference and then attempt to compare them. Notice how the only FFT:A votes come from people who have never played FFT. OF COURSE FFT is better. But FFT:A isn't a sequel like everyone thinks. If anything, it's more of a sub-game than a sequel. Like a side-quest or something. It's FFT's lesser sidekick. Which blows, because when you take FFT:A by itself, it's a really good game. Just not as great as its namesake.

I think if they had removed Ivalice and the "Tactics Advance" title from FFT:A, it would have been seen as a much better game, because it wouldn't have to suffer through horrid comparisons like this one.

Word.

[awall]

If you originally posted that 10 months ago, it means that I've been lazy about reading the beginning of the thread. I'm gonna have to agree with you completely - FFTA was a great game, but it simply cannot live up to its namesake. But rather than use words like "better" and "worse," I prefer to think about each game does better than the other.

FFT
Great storyline. The only Final Fantasy that actually focuses on the entire world (well, okay, just one continent) rather than only on your party. I felt like Ramza was part of a world, rather than the world being there just to give the player something to explore (like it is in so many other FF's). The world thing doesn't really apply to FFTA, because in that game the world really does exist simply for the player to explore - and intentionally so - but the story simply isn't nearly as deep and mature as FFT's.
Game Balance. Barring stuff like Orlandu and Chantage and whatnot, the game is extremely well balanced with only a few places where one item/ability becomes too good/completely useless (movement abilities, Calculators). I know I gripe about these a lot, but for the most part the jobs are fairly well balanced. FFTA, by contrast has relatively cruddy balance. Assassins, Sages, Gunners, and Morphers blow away the competition. Certain abilities are simply better than others, and in much greater quantity than FFT (Strikeback > Reflex, Return Fire > Block Arrows, WeaponAtk+ > Doublehand, Air Render > Fight, Stop > Disable > Addle > Silence). As I said, FFT isn't without blame here, but it's all around better balanced than FFTA.
Difficulty. I hate to say it, but most FF's these days simply aren't hard. FFX was the last game that I really had to work at, and even that gets easy if you're not careful. FFT, however, is a MONSTER! There are battles that I've only won because of insane luck, and let me tell you - when you win those things, you feel a sense of accomplishment that FFTA simply cannot provide. And for those of you who think FFT is too easy, try beating it without using any of the above mentioned broken stuff, and without turbolevelling. With normal levelling, you should be about 75% of the enemies' level for most plot battles, whereas in FFTA, you usually match (if not exceed) their level. Also, FFTA has this annoying habit of only putting 3-4 enemies in a battle.
Elegant Mechanics. 7 stats. Each serves a completely different purpose. Beautiful. If you're bored sometime looking for an interesting read, look at Aerostar's Battle Mechanics Guide and prepare to be awed at the elegance of this game (and also at the work that was put into the guide).

FFTA
Variety of enemies. About 85% of the classes in the game show up in battle against you at some point. Compare this to FFT, where over 50% of the enemies in the game are Knights and Archers. Ugh.
Ememies aren't cowardly. You never have to kill enemies in FFT - just reduce them to critical HP and they'll go hide in the corner and leave you alone. On one hand, this makes many battles doable that wouldn't otherwise be. But hell, I wish that enemies had at least some semblance of courage. If you could win the battle by attacking yet you still choose to hide in a corner, then something is seriously wrong. On the other hand, at least enemies in FFT know not to attack somebody if there is a 0% chance of hitting. FFTA enemies walk into Strikeback all the time.
More fun with knockback. That was a whole feature to FFT that you never really got to use unless you had a Squire with Throw Stone. Knockback is much more abundant in FFTA, and therefore can be used more strategically.
Dispatch Missions in FFTA actually have a point. Other than JP building, all those treasures you find in FFT just sit there and look pretty.
On a related note, FFTA gives you the ability to train a party of like 10-12 characters effectively. It's really hard in FFT to train more than 5, or maybe 6.

So, you notice I'm ignoring stuff like the Judge. Why? Because there's simply no comparison from FFT. Trying to equate the judge from FFTA to anything in FFT is like apples to oranges. If you're gonna compare the two games, do it based on something that both games have. Compare the games based on what they are rather than what they aren't.

And like Cesar said, put more content in your posts.

I say FFT since it has way cooler characters, the magic in it doesn't do horrible damage untill after you've beaten the game, has a way better story, and the classes are much cooler.

Final Fantasy Tactics had a stronger and better storyline, I didn't like the Law System. Color Magic was a really annoying time for me when I had to get into a battle, even though you can destroy them, thats wasting time and cards that I may need for a more difficult battle. Final Fantasy Tactics was much more a challenge than a game i could play through the week. All the races were alright but what is Ivalice turned into? It was a change they wanted to make it seemed like and I just really didnt care too much for it...

[yunie666]

i gotta sat ffta because the law system was great, when there were like 3 laws and you could hardly do anything unless you had almighty law card on something and completing every single misson was good. However i think the races should have been able to do more jobs like a bangaa doin a white mage job. Finally i think the game went rather quick but they all do on a gba.

i dont even think theres a dispute. fft was a lot better than ffta. fft had a better story, and better characters. the law system sucked in ffta and the whole game was rididculous.

My FFT was stolen, sniff... sniff..., and I don´t know if its still for sale...

[King Fenii]

Gawd. I want to play FFT as well! I'm thinking of starting to play FFT:A as soon as I'm done with the Lunar Ruins on FFIV:A. But being such a big fan of FF, I want to play FFT as well. Seeing I live in Europe and can't buy the game in a store, I want to know if someone knows an alternative for me...

[cloud711]

They should make a direct sequel to Final Fantasy Tactics. Even though they won't, I think people would cream their pants for it. And I don't mean a sequel like FFT:A that was much different and only released for a handheld, they should make a true sequel. Maybe not with the same characters and everything, but start it as a separate series from the main FF series. People would eat it up.

[Ulteka Mako]

I am going to go with FFT. I like it more then FFTA, because it had more classes, and you didn't have laws in it ethire. The laws would just make me mad. Plus I like that storyline better in FFT also. It made more sence, and it was Midevil looking.

The bosses were cooler, and better looking to. The whole story of the Zodiac Brothers was a good plot for the story. They got easier and easier as I kept beating them though. It was truly a better game then FFTA.

FFTA had their stoyline as some weird kid that had no friends, and he made up a dream world, and everyone was in it. He made it based on his favorite game. Final Fantasy..... Don't get me wroung. I liked FFTA. But it just wasn't as good as FFT.

i would have to route for FFT because its quite good and FFTA is just pathetic, very upsetting FFT has a better story plot

FFT is better because it has an interesting storyline and lifelike people. FFTA was aimed at children. I mean, it WAS for a handheld so they thought they'd make it into a kiddy game. It was so annoying to play. Hell, you start the game off with a freakin' snowball fight.
"Oh, boo-hoo I have a teddy bear and kids pick on me."
That doesn't sound like FF to me. They really dropped the ball on this one.

[ベト]

FFT because you can get cloud.

[relm]

It's so sad to see that very few of you have played FFTA.
I, on the other hand have never completed FFT, but have played FFTA. I think the graphics on FFTA are friendlier to look at. And just the overall feel... I would just have to say FFTA.

[Maridia]

Well I would have to say that I prefer T over TA. I loved Tactics, but TA was not fun for me. I found it just wasn't fun, not to mention that even the first battle is a snowball fight. Now in tactics it's outside a church, with knights. One is much more fun and epic than the other, and I would have to pick Tactics in a second.

[Karel]

Dudes.. how can you compare FFT with FFTA.. hmm let's go over the basics

Battle music/music general- FFT Godly.. uncomparable

Secrets- I love the secrets and Deep dungeon Weapons and other things.. including Cloud.. which wasn't all that thrilling.

Poaching- God I loved poaching. and I hated it.. Every normal beast was poachable and gave normal or rare items

The characters- come on? TG Cid, The Pimp Elmdor, Wiegraf was also a pimp, Everyone in the game had some sort of role that was played rather well. Over all they had so many characters.. Good/bad/evil/eventic

That's my two cents

I like FFTA better, its just...More articulation with my character, and I can do so much, plus if I kill cloud people will hate me >.<

Although I do wish tactics adv, would let you change the clothes of the main character...