After just one week, I can already say that juggling Final Fantasy XII and XIV is harder than I'd imagined. The biggest reason for this is that every time I get into one it's hard to get away from it to play the other. Like I said before, there are worse issues to have in life. Since both games have been keeping me occupied this week, let's get to the game talk.

If you want to catch up on my prior pieces, here's a link to Issue 25 from last week.

Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age (PS4)

After battling with a tomato last week, I went back to town and continued progressing the story. These early parts didn't stick with me from the original, so everything is feeling fresh right now. I was still unsure if I should be moving forward or trying to build up Vaan more before doing so, but since I didn't remember spending much time with just Vaan in my prior playthrough, I opted to move along with things to see where they went. Thankfully, the game pushes things forward pretty quickly, and I'd honestly forgotten about how well spaced out things were. Before long I had ventured through the desert with Penelo and then crawled through the sewers with Balthier and Fran.

All of the game's systems have been slowly unlocking without being too overwhelming, though I'm familiar enough with gambits and the like that I could stand to have more access available earlier, but it's not too restrictive so far. I've met up with Amalia and am reminded how most all of the guest characters that join you do so under false names. Fun stuff so far, but I plan to have more on this in the coming weeks.

Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood (PS4)

Before I even started Stormblood, I made sure to make a list of all the things I wanted to accomplish and attempt during this resubscription. Once I was updated and had my bearing back, I started in on that list by unlocking Samurai and Red Mage. Both quests were really easy, especially Samurai, but I appreciate not having these locked behind Stormblood's story content like the Heavensward jobs were so I couldn't complain about that.

After doing that, my next tasks were to start on the Hildibrand quests and to finish up Heavensward's 3.1 story quests. I made it through the Battle on the Big Bridge trial and finished the solo duty for 3.1, so I consider that a win for now. Also after playing around with Red Mage and Samurai in a few dungeons and trials, I found both to be enjoyable, but probably not exciting enough to seriously want to take on either full-time. That said, I do still want to give Dark Knight and Dragoon another shot, but will be sticking with Ninja as my main for story quests in the meantime.