Like most people who fell in love with RPGs as a teenager, I was hooked by Final Fantasy. At first I only snuck small glances at the series, watching friends and neighbours blow up reactors in Final Fantasy VII in wonder. Then my younger brother got a PS1 for his birthday, and I took over the console with Final Fantasy IX when he got bored and went outside (yuck). From then on I made sure to play as much of the series as possible, and that meant Final Fantasy X when the PS2 came along. I was convinced games would never look better, and adored this epic adventure with Tidus and his considerably cooler friends. It’s been over a decade since I last thought about this game though, so what better time to dive into it and its sequel with Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster on the Switch 2.
The package of X/X2 HD Remaster contains a whole lot of game, but as a sane person I started with Final Fantasy X. This follows Tidus, a cocky young Blitzball player who gets sucked through time by a big mean whale. There he meets the summoner Yuna, who is off on a quest to stop this whale that’s called Sin. There’s a whole religious order who are trying to do this, but at the cost of a life to bring peace. Themes of religion, duty and technology run through the game, and even by modern standards its thought provoking and moving in all the right ways. The characters are mostly great too, except Tidus of course who is somewhat insufferable.
The turn-based combat of Final Fantasy X is probably the most polished in the entire series, with wonderful pacing and plenty of ways to take on encounters. This combat variety leads to dozens of bosses which serve as tutorials to mechanics, and require you to find clever ways to take advantage of weaknesses. I remember struggling with multiple massive foes on early playthroughs when I wasn’t used to much other than mashing powerful attacks in this genre, and this is an RPG that actually requires thought and experimentation.
At the start of the game your characters all have very distinct roles in battle, Wakka smacks the flying enemies with a ball, Yuna heals and summons, and Auron hits armoured enemies like a truck full of rocket launchers. As you progress and level up characters with the Sphere Grid though you can choose to learn all sorts of once exclusive abilities with anyone. It’s absolutely some of the most satisfying growth I can think of from an RPG, with so much freedom and plenty of ways to maximise your grid use to become unstoppable.
So much of Final Fantasy X holds up today, but there are a few exceptions. The temples you visit are full of the slowest paced puzzles you could ever imagine, and they’re actually worse than I remember. There are also random encounters which will be divisive in 2026, but you can turn them off or double them at any time with a handy shortcut. There’s also a double speed option and an invincibility option you can toggle, so you can tailor the experience to your whims.
While I was incredibly familiar with Final Fantasy X, my experience with X-2 was rather limited. I owned the game and played a few hours of it, but with hundreds of PS2 games to choose from it drifted back to the box too soon. Now I’ve played the whole thing, and think I might actually prefer it to the first game.
Set immediately after X, its sequel follows Yuna, Rikku and newcomer Payne. With the threat of Sin gone, this trio have now become Sphere Hunters. In this new safer world spheres hold videos of the past, and also allow you to change outfits. There are some fairly heavy reasons that YRP are looking for spheres really, but I won’t spoil them here. The gals don’t let overarching issues get them down anyway, and instead have a gloriously girlypop adventure that’s just pure fun from start to finish.
There are two things I love from the classic series that Final Fantasy X doesn’t have, active time battles and a job system. Both of these return for X-2 though, with constantly moving combat and the introduction of Dress Spheres. Dress Spheres are just different classes you can switch to at any time, but they come with ridiculous magically changing outfits. These are so much fun to experiment with, because the variety is pretty vast even in the opening hours.
You begin the game with three perfectly useful classes to play around with, the warrior, the gunner and the thief. Before long though you’ll end up with more obscure and fun classes like the songstress and the festivalist, the latter of which I used constantly and fired goldfish and sandals at my enemies. All the classes can be leveled up, with dozens of skills to unlock as you go and so ways to succeed in battle to discover.
The structure of Final Fantasy X-2 is perhaps the biggest change from the previous game though, as it’s split into individual missions. Many of these are completely optional and it’s up to you almost entirely to decide where you go and when, with plenty of missables that completionists will struggle to ignore. Whole jobs are locked away behind completely wild sequences of events that you will miss without a guide, and I found the best way to play was to just ignore the call of extra jobs and push on without a care. Some will really be frustrated by the setup though, and even I must admit it’s absolutely what put me off the first time I played.
Whereas Final Fantasy X doesn’t have much added in this enhanced version of the game, X-2 has plenty of bonus content. Two new jobs (including my fave the festivalist) are included in the game, alongside a new monster battling mode where you catch familiar jellies and bats to fight in a colosseum. You could easily get lost in this if you wanted to, as it’s a seriously fleshed out mini game.
Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster is a wonderful way to experience two incredible RPGs all over again or for the first time, and it’s made all the better by the spruced up visuals and gorgeously remastered soundtrack (which is still one of the best of all time). I must admit some of the visual changes really shocked me though. I never got used to Tidus’ weird new face, which is sort of chubby and alien. It’s not quite a perfect remaster because of little things like this, which distracted me in cutscenes constantly.
Final Fantasy X/X2 HD Remaster brings two all time greats to the Switch 2, and they still hold up today. I almost cried when the opening theme played, and I honestly didn’t realise I cared so much about Final Fantasy X until this replay. These are some seriously special games, and no amount of issues could stop me from recommending them to pretty much anyone interested.
