Ask me to pick two moments that sum up Final Fantasy X and I’d probably roll with 1) Yuna dancing on the ocean at Kilika to send the souls of the dead to the Farplane, and 2) Tidus performing a Sphere Shot in Blitzball. The first because it’s a mesmerising performance of grief and transcendence, the second because it’s patently daft in the best of ways. Blitzball, in case you haven’t had the pleasure, is FFX’s central minigame. It’s essentially rugby but played in a stadium-sized water bubble, with stats and status effects cheerfully lifted from the turn-based combat system. Sphere Shot is Tidus’s signature move as a young Blitzball star – it sees him backward-somersaulting in slow motion to perform a kick on goal with a randomised buff.
I once tried to perform a Sphere Shot in my local pool’s deep end, and can attest that this is not how aquatic physics works – at the very least, it should involve more nosebleeds. But it looks dang swish in action, and while Blitzball has its flaws as a virtual sport – why can’t I swim up and down? Why don’t the players drown? Why is not an automatic red card? – it’s an immensely fun addition to one of the great PS2 RPGs, not least for how it slops over into regular exploration. You’ll scout new Blitzball players from all across Spira, and flushing out the local talent gives each settlement in the game that extra element of intrigue.
Final Fantasy 16 Spoiler Free Review – Final Fantasy XVI review PS5 gameplay Watch on YouTube
Final Fantasy has a proud tradition of mini-games of all shapes and sizes, from the hidden number puzzle in the very first game through fishing in FF12 to pinball in FF15. I could have done with some of that while playing Final Fantasy 16. As you may have read in my Final Fantasy 16 review, I found the game to be full of good things with lots of less-good things between them. The story quests can be thrilling but many of the sidequests feel like office admin. The combat sings, but half the fights are with reluctant scorpions and rando bandits who seem to barely understand the mechanics of swinging a sword. A proper side activity of some kind would have been a pleasant relief. Sadly, the nearest FF16 offers to this are those feats of spectacular genre-splicing you encounter during larger Eikon bossfights.
According to the game’s director Hiroshi Takai, excluding mini-games was a deliberate choice to “immerse” you in protagonist Clive Rosfield, who is driven by grief and vengeance and as such, has no headspace for such frivolous distractions. Given that you can send Clive on sidequests to pick flowers and deliver packed lunches, I’m not sure this reasoning holds water – admittedly, the game does lock off these diversions when Clive is in a state of maximum pique. It also doesn’t really speak to how Clive thaws as the story goes on, acquiring a surrogate family and learning – like many a grimdark hero before – that he needs to live for something other than revenge.
I can’t see grumpy old Clive getting into Blitzball, though I would love to watch him try – he has a habit of bursting into flame, so at best, the playing field would evaporate. But I can definitely imagine him developing a taste for a cardgame such as Final Fantasy 9’s Tetra Master, while wandering Valisthea’s many taverns. Latterly upgraded into a standalone mobile game, Tetra Master sees you placing numbered monster cards on a grid to flip those of your opponent. It’s so compulsive it almost stopped me playing Final Fantasy 9 itself. I must have spent five hours roaming the streets of Alexandria during the prologue, tracking down every last Tetra enthusiast and robbing them of their best cards – or rather, slowly earning back the ones they’d won from my hand.