Final Fantasy Dissidia Duodecim 012 - PSP
To be honest, I'm somewhat disappointed. The first Dissidia is my favorite PSP game and one of my overall favorite games. I've spent about 100 hours on the first one. The sequel just feels like a roster update. I've only played about 5 or 6 hours so far, so maybe it gets better.
There are only 4 new backgrounds, the other 14 (plus 14 "Chaos versions") are from the first game, at least right off the bat. The camera angles on 2 of the new BGs can be horrible at times. The 5 new characters are fan favorites, but Lightning is even slower than Cloud, and Yuna's attacks block the screen momentarily (with Aeon summons), which make it difficult to tell whether or not the attack was dodged, thus leaving you open to counterattack.
I'm iffy on the assist character at this time, I need more experience with it to see how I feel about it. 5 hours in, and the "overworld" they added to this game feels more like a hub and looks more like a randomly constructed dungeon than a huge landscape to explore. Things started to pickup around hour 3 though, at least there are enemies scattered about now.
The story is basically a retelling of the first one: a bunch of characters trying to earn crystals to defeat the bad guys in a never-ending cycle. It seems a little disjointed this time, as they throw "reports" at you that have a little story and some random missions thrown in. There's no grand suprise this time around, as the story is thematically the same. The dialogue and stuff is all new, but it's the same idea... Watching Kefka's lunacy is as fun as usual, and I think the creators of this game knew that, since he seems to lord over nearly every scene (thus far).
Still, I find myself playing until my hands are beyond cramped, and being drawn back every few hours, so it's not too shabby. A good thing they have in here is the ability to transfer over your character data from the first Dissidia, so you don't have to start your old characters over from level 1.
