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| Liz Maas |
Purple Chocobos? SOLD.
11.03.11 - 12:44 AM
One of the most recent updates on Final Fantasy XIII-2 brought us Xanadu, the floating city with a casino and chocobo racing. You can bet on these races, or race your own chocobo, but it's not like Final Fantasy VII where you bred your own feathery friends. Nevertheless, there are still chocobos of many colours:
I call dibs on the purple one.
Anyway, you choose your chocobo and which race you want to enter. Races are of different levels with different items to be won, and there's even 'secret' races that you can participate in if you meet certain conditions. When choosing your chocobos, you'll want to pay attention to stats like speed stamina and race points, the latter of which are used up to enter your bird into the race. At the beginning of the race you choose their starting position and an item. You can also make them dash anytime during the race, but it drains the boost gauge.
Other tidbits come from Japanese press who got a chance to play the first three chapters of the game, such as GameWatch and Famitsu. Many months ago, Square Enix warned that fans might want to hold onto their Final Fantasy XIII saves. XIII-2 won't import this save file, but rather, if you have one you'll see more from FFXIII if you watch the narrative summary of the game in XIII-2.
Other notables include a seamless transition between towns and fields and minor load times, except when travelling between time periods in the Historia Crux. You'll also meet a wandering merchant named Chocolina who sells you goods no matter the time period, and the ability to purchase equipment and items not only for characters, but growth items and accessories for monsters. The crystarium system makes a return, but is now a single one shared by all the roles, where you decide which ones you'll level up.
Oh, and check out the packaging for North America. Lightning fans, rejoice:
Final Fantasy XIII-2 releases in Japan next month, and on January 31st in North America.
