The Shrine

The airship fleets of every free nation form a combined offensive against the Imperial fleet and its massive flying fortress of a flagship. This occurs as the fleet of the Emperor is settling over the area which is to be the new capital where he plans to use the power of a crystal to gain great dominating power over the world. With that great power, from his new capital, the emperor plans conquer all the nations and reign supreme with a Godlike authority.

The opposing fleet of the other nations of the world opposing the Empire have sent all of their military airships to take part. A spectacular battle occurs and a crew aboard a pirate ship enter the flagship of the Emperor's fleet. Among the crew is a well dressed pirate who prefers the use of a gun and dresses better than anyone else in the crew, he is also a womanizer; there is also, the main character, a carefree teenaged passenger who had always dreamed about having his own ship, and his young and equally carefree childhood female friend; also in the crew is a mysterious female character whose past is somewhat of a mystery, she holds special powers; then of course, allied to them is the young Imperial Prince who opposes the direction which his Empire has taken, and is willing to use force to fight for what he believes in. They penetrate the ship and make their way to the front.


The final battle ensues. First the main characters defeat the end boss who was in his mortal form. The game boss then proceeds to use the crystal and the characters must now fight a second much more difficult battle. To finish things off the end boss fuses himself with a godlike being and fights the party for a third and final battle.

The characters are victorious and the prince who fought alongside them becomes the new King of the Empire. The carefree teenager finally gets his own ship. The well dressed womanizing pirate retains his freedom.


Which game ending am I writing about, Skies of Arcadia or Final Fantasy 12?

Neither.

By the way, it was only the Resistance fleet at the final battle, and they'd have won with or without the interference of the party anyway.

Don Wang wrote:Neither.

By the way, it was only the Resistance fleet at the final battle, and they'd have won with or without the interference of the party anyway.

Yeah, I didn't use overly specific terms (like resistance) for a reason. Though you get the point, both games are strikingly similar in a lot of respects. A lot of the characters are reflective, as is the airship battle at the end, as is the final battle with Ramirez and Vayne.

When you get down to it, the theme of Skies of Arcadia is that it's a game about flying around.

FF12 (and Grandia 3) are more like games that's supposed to be about flying that is not about flying.

That was my one dissapointment about this one actually. I really did want to fly the airship around that world.

Just to add some stuff on the topic of the game:


There is a sequel coming out for DS in the not so distant future, I hope that it allows for some flying around even though the game is graphically equivilent to Chrono Trigger or Secret of Evermore.

The sequel should not be taken as part of the Ivalice series though. Matsuno is gone from Square. The new guy doing the game is already totally messing up the mythology by adding in all the other traditional Final Fantasy Espers into Ivalice. Ivalice has 12 Espers which correspond to the Lucavi which made first appearance in FF Tactics. Of course, the writer may explain a reason for the new ones, though I highly doubt it; in interviews he did not appear to solidly grasp the world of Ivalice.

Skies of Arcadia and FF12 both star a band of 6 "Sky Pirates." Or rather some of them are Sky Pirates and the others are associated.

Vyse = Vaan
Gilder = Balthier
Aika = Panelo

Though the Skies of Arcadia characters have stronger personalities. Then there is Enrique who is the same as Larsa; to add.

The major difference is that Skies of Arcadia actually HAS a lot of piracy in it, FF12 has none besides one of the earliest scenes in the game.