What's the deal with the sidequests?

[daninthemix]

As in, there seems to be no indications on the map as to quests givers or quest targets. Furthermore, some of them are invisible (!) So did the developers just assume that people interested in the sidequests would either:

1) Be constantly referring to a walkthrough as they played
2) Scrutinise every inch of every map looking for invisible things / people / quests / etc, and then do it again looking for the objectives?

Or am I missing something here?

[GravityLoL]

yes, you miss: Fragments.

Fragments are rewards for doing sidequests and if you gather them all, you get achievemnt and unlock secret ending , and if you watch all endings of the game, you have next achievement.
also, you get sometimes useful items and face powerfull opponents so they help you level up.

about invisible characters, just use Mog magic and done

[talgaby]

The "ultimate" weapons are also fueled by fragments, so the more you get, the better they get.
Although this also means that you get the best weapons after, well, doing everything in the game, limiting their use to play post-post-post game pokémon training for fights you don't have to do any more since you already won them…
Yeah, this game wasn't exactly thought completely through when they crammed in every missed feature from previous titles.

[Kebess]

Originally posted by GravityLoL:

yes, you miss: Fragments.

Fragments are rewards for doing sidequests and if you gather them all, you get achievemnt and unlock secret ending , and if you watch all endings of the game, you have next achievement.
also, you get sometimes useful items and face powerfull opponents so they help you level up.

about invisible characters, just use Mog magic and done

Really? Did you even read the OP?

@OP:
Yep, that is really a bad design. You are actually supposed to have some sort of guide for most of those quests. Not because they are difficult, but because they are silly, in the sense that you have to find this one object hiding in some random place with zero clue on what place that is. Very silly indeed, and it gets even worse with some Fragments.

EDIT
On an unrelated note, I've been playing the Witcher lately and it makes me realize how poorly many aspects (if not most) of this game is designed. Sure, the Witcher is very different from FF but still, they are both RPGs, and have things in common. The contrast in quality is just crazy.
All this to say, if you are looking for high quality, you aren't gonna find it in this game. So you're better off "dealing with" things, or quitting, ;)

[GravityLoL]

Originally posted by Kebess:

On an unrelated note, I've been playing the Witcher lately and it makes me realize how poorly many aspects (if not most) of this game is designed. Sure, the Witcher is very different from FF but still, they are both RPGs, and have things in common. The contrast in quality is just crazy.
All this to say, if you are looking for high quality, you aren't gonna find it in this game. So you're better off "dealing with" things, or quitting, ;)

Witcher is pure dark RPG while FF's are jRPG's, kinda different genres so it's normal that both titles have different mechanics and such.
Both titles also aim at totally different players and such. I know it's not the thread for this but i just wanted to point it out.

[watcherzero]

Its not as vague as you think, once you accept a quest it appears in your fragment list and the photos that accompany each quest are actually where you have to go.

[Scarlet Crusade]

Originally posted by watcherzero:

Its not as vague as you think, once you accept a quest it appears in your fragment list and the photos that accompany each quest are actually where you have to go.

Very this.

Also at your original post, point 2 will most definitely get you the vast majority if not all quests done without the use of a guide. My first playthrough was completely blind and I was able to do the fragment quests without much issue. Just explore the map, listen for the square cube sound (it's very distinct), and keep an eye out for "invisible" objects, they have a small glisten/glow/outline effect that you can see once you've trained your eyes.

The only thing that I find completely ridiculous that you'd absolutely need a guide to figure out is hidden adornments on the maps you get with Improved Moogle Throw. Those are hell incarnate. The unique monsters you can find with Improved Moogle Throw are at least a bit obvious, you're throwing at a particular thing, like the red flower patch for Chichu, the sciencey equipment for Silver Chocobo, the meteor Noel rode in on for Cactuarina, etc. The hidden adornments? Completely invisible. No indicator that there is one in the area. Just throw in a random location, and if you get a Remedy, you might be close, maybe, if the game feels like you're worthy. If you get Succulent/Malodorous Fruit, you're probably like two pixels off, again, if the game feels like it. Otherwise, you might get 1 gil for about 200 throws, then in that same spot you've been getting 1 gil? ADORNMENT!! :D It's very silly.

[Kebess]

Originally posted by Scarlet Crusade:

Originally posted by watcherzero:

Its not as vague as you think, once you accept a quest it appears in your fragment list and the photos that accompany each quest are actually where you have to go.

Very this.

Also at your original post, point 2 will most definitely get you the vast majority if not all quests done without the use of a guide. My first playthrough was completely blind and I was able to do the fragment quests without much issue. Just explore the map, listen for the square cube sound (it's very distinct), and keep an eye out for "invisible" objects, they have a small glisten/glow/outline effect that you can see once you've trained your eyes.

The only thing that I find completely ridiculous that you'd absolutely need a guide to figure out is hidden adornments on the maps you get with Improved Moogle Throw. Those are hell incarnate. The unique monsters you can find with Improved Moogle Throw are at least a bit obvious, you're throwing at a particular thing, like the red flower patch for Chichu, the sciencey equipment for Silver Chocobo, the meteor Noel rode in on for Cactuarina, etc.

Really? How is literally "scrutinizing every inch of every map looking for invisible things / people / quests / etc, and then do it again looking for the objectives" a good thing?
Not only would that make you overlevel the game even faster than I did, but it would make things so damn annoying and boring that you'd inevitably get frustrated and probably quit. (as a reminder, being frustrated because of a game shouldn't be considered normal)

Finding Chichu was "a bit obvious"? Really? Because it's obvious to throw Mog at some random flowers.. sure. Or at a hologram for the Silver Chocobo, why not. I find your definition of "a bit obvious" very stretched, :)

[Scarlet Crusade]

It may be just because I've played so many games at this point, I expect certain things. These things were pretty obvious to me, I'm not sure what to tell you. There's no other red flowers in the almost entirety of that area, so I felt that it was important somehow. When I got Improved Moogle Throw, I decided to give it a shot. Hey, got a Chichu! So I started throwing Mog at anything and everything that seemed a bit conspicuous. Usually works out just like you'd expect it to, or at least how I expected it to.

After everything was so obvious and hard to miss in FFinal Fantasy XIII, that they actually hid things on the map and that you had to look closely at things to find things was a relief for me in Final Fantasy XIII-2. I enjoyed actually having to hunt for treasure again. It was exhiliarating. That the game doesn't give you a shining beacon to find everything, I like that. As for the overleveling, not really. The biggest culprit of that is bestiary maxing, getting checks on everything, that will overlevel you more than anything else. Especially if you're the "gotta catch 'em all" type, even though you can come back later when you have fragment skills that make your life much easier and less grindy.

[Kebess]

Originally posted by Scarlet Crusade:

It may be just because I've played so many games at this point, I expect certain things. These things were pretty obvious to me, I'm not sure what to tell you. There's no other red flowers in the almost entirety of that area, so I felt that it was important somehow. When I got Improved Moogle Throw, I decided to give it a shot. Hey, got a Chichu! So I started throwing Mog at anything and everything that seemed a bit conspicuous. Usually works out just like you'd expect it to, or at least how I expected it to.

After everything was so obvious and hard to miss in FFinal Fantasy XIII, that they actually hid things on the map and that you had to look closely at things to find things was a relief for me in Final Fantasy XIII-2. I enjoyed actually having to hunt for treasure again. It was exhiliarating. That the game doesn't give you a shining beacon to find everything, I like that. As for the overleveling, not really. The biggest culprit of that is bestiary maxing, getting checks on everything, that will overlevel you more than anything else. Especially if you're the "gotta catch 'em all" type, even though you can come back later when you have fragment skills that make your life much easier and less grindy.

That is a very subjective analysis. No point for me to argue it. I simply disagree, because I prefer "intelligent" challenges in games, not the ones that force me to scrutinized every inch of every map. I find it to be a very lazy design, and it gets me mad very fast too, so I avoid doing that usually. I consider it to be a total waste of time.

[Big Boom Boom]

FFXIII was so on rail you can't miss out the obvious in your face quest objective.
Fan base: SE sucks, quests should be more hidden.

FFXIII-2 side quests is so hidden you only have some description and a photo to go on
Fan base: SE sucks, quests should be more obvious.

Also, Insults x 99, get.

[talgaby]

Originally posted by Kebess:

Really? How is literally "scrutinizing every inch of every map looking for invisible things / people / quests / etc, and then do it again looking for the objectives" a good thing?

Ah, you must be new to RPGs then. Well, RPGs that are not mindless hack & slash (which aren't RPGs really but since PSX made them popular we address them as such). Role-playing games (Western and Eastern) used to be a lot about heavy exploration to find additional stuff/prolong game time. This was also the thing that most whiners missed from XIII so Square put it back.

[Kebess]

Go look up the definition of RPG first, then we can start arguing. At this stage, it's pointless ;)

[talgaby]

*looks at own game list, four digits of play time on Steam cRPGs alone* I think I'm kinda good in knowing cRPGs, thanks. ^^

[daninthemix]

Originally posted by Kebess:

@OP:
Yep, that is really a bad design. You are actually supposed to have some sort of guide for most of those quests. Not because they are difficult, but because they are silly, in the sense that you have to find this one object hiding in some random place with zero clue on what place that is. Very silly indeed, and it gets even worse with some Fragments.

Thanks for letting me know. It might...*might* be tolerable if every area without fail provided you with a free chocobo for hassle-free travel right at the point where you warp in. But factor in random encounters and there's simply no way I'm wasting my life on these opaque fetch quests.

Terrible, terrible design.