A few questions mostly to do with the ravishing art direction in this game:

1) As character designer, did Akihiko Yoshida have any part the other aspects of the game appearance--the cities and other locales? If not, are the 2 art directors or art designer ( http://squarehaven.com/people/by-game/?gid=91 ) responsible for the brilliant world environments?

2) Anyone know of a website with an extensive collection/gallery of Akihiko Yoshida's work?

3) Similarily, anyone know of a website with an extensive collection/gallery of FFXII's non-CG work, like the picture below?

4) Was there ever an art book release for FFXII?

5) This is tangently related to my first question: did Akihiko do any of the non-CG FFXII art work, like the one below or is that Yoshitaka Amano?



Thank you.

3) ...// Ambrosia \\... (http://ffxii.ashe.nu/official.php) is the best site I can think of offhand for official artwork - it contains basically all the art scanned from the incredible Final Fantasy XII: Omega Ultimania Guide. Some of my favorite scans are of images of Ashe's wedding and funeral dresses, which I haven't seen elsewhere. (I actually own this one)

4) There was an artbook included with a limited edition American strategy guide, but it almost exclusively contains CG images and renderings. The guide I listed as an answer to question three has a great deal of illustrations in it (not CG) and is absolutely lovely.

Square also released a Battle Ultimania guide, a Scenario Ultimania guide, and a new International Zodiac Job System Ultimania guide, released this month for the International Version of the game. I haven't seen this one in-depth yet, but the cover (http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-lz-49-en-70-28b8.html) is great.

If you really want an artbook (a tangible one, not just .jpegs), buy the Final Fantasy XII: Omega Ultimania artbook (available on eBay, that's where I got mine). I'm not familiar with the International version, so I can't recommend that one. The former has a LOT of non-CG artwork of various places in Ivalice and airships, as well as character drawings. It's worth the money if you're really into video game art.

Mary, thanks so much for your reply. Tons of great info!


3) ...// Ambrosia \\... (http://ffxii.ashe.nu/official.php) is the best site I can think of offhand for official artwork - it contains basically all the art scanned from the incredible Final Fantasy XII: Omega Ultimania Guide.

Brilliant link. Thanks! So I can get an even closer idea of what's in 'Final Fantasy XII Ultimania Omega,' when you you say the site has "basically all" of the art from the book, if you're to roughly guess, how many pages of art work in the book remains unscanned? Out of this 670 page book, I'm trying to figure out how much art work I'll be getting. And is it mostly color?



4) There was an artbook included with a limited edition American strategy guide, but it almost exclusively contains CG images and renderings. The guide I listed as an answer to question three has a great deal of illustrations in it (not CG) and is absolutely lovely.

Yea, heard it wasn't so special. Any chance you know of a place to get scans of that booklet nonetheless?



Square also released a Battle Ultimania guide, a Scenario Ultimania guide, and a new International Zodiac Job System Ultimania guide, released this month for the International Version of the game. I haven't seen this one in-depth yet, but the cover (http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-lz-49-en-70-28b8.html) is great.

Totally with you on the cover--it's very charming; would love to find a larger res image of it! Have you personally seen the Battle or Scenario guides?

I'm also curious about these 2 FFXII books--do you know if they're any good in the art department?:
http://otaku.com/cgi-bin/itemview.asp?itemid=70678a
http://otaku.com/cgi-bin/itemview.asp?itemid=68709h



If you really want an artbook (a tangible one, not just .jpegs), buy the Final Fantasy XII: Omega Ultimania artbook (available on eBay, that's where I got mine). I'm not familiar with the International version, so I can't recommend that one. The former has a LOT of non-CG artwork of various places in Ivalice and airships, as well as character drawings. It's worth the money if you're really into video game art.

I think I'll be ordering it. It sounds and looks (based on the scans) quite close to what I'm looking for. What did you pay for yours?

Thank you again!

1. not sure
2. not sure, look him up on wikipedia, he's made a bunch of other great stuff
3. not sure
4. answered
5. Not sure, also not sure who drew that, look closely in the corners for a signature

Ambrosia has the CG scans - They're under "Collector's Edition Bonus disc" but as I have the artbook that came with the guide, I can tell you that they're all included in that gallery somewhere.

I've never seen those two books you provided links for, but they just don't seem to offer any new content, at least the second one. Nearly all the visual media for FFXII is available online in some form, and the book isn't ringing any bells as far as "these scans were from this book..." etc. Omega Ultimania is the only book I've really heard of offering illustrations, to my knowledge. I was absolutely ecstatic to find the Ambrosia site; even though I had a copy of the actual book, it's much more convenient to have them on a computer than dragging a book around every time I want to look at them.

The price of the Final Fantasy XII: Ultimania Omega book is not that high (in my opinion, and I buy lots of books from Japan), usually between $25-30, but the shipping is always $15-20; I've never seen shipping on it lower than that. Maybe someone selling it through the eBay store will have lower prices. It's not a large book, roughly 8x6, but it has 672 pages.

The Final Fantasy XII: Battle Ultimania Book I have through a torrent, so it's all .jpeg files. It's almost 600 pages. It gives a lot of monster and esper info, but no maps, which bums me out. I don't believe Omega has any maps either, but I don't have it with me at University, so I can't go check. Omega is all color, and there is a section devoted entirely to art, but the site has pretty much all of it. There are a few illustrations I've seen floating around online of stuff I haven't seen in any book, but I think they're illtrations for the ending (I haven't had time to beat the game yet, so I don't know).

The Final Fantasy XII: International Zodiac Job System Ultimania book is only 336 pages in comparison. I honestly don't know much about it, though I read it's basically a supplement to Ultimania Omega and serves to illustrate the differences between the first game and the International Version.


And this is for you:



I'm still looking for an obnoxiously high-res one, but this one works for right now.

Well I'm sold on it--ordering the Omega book once I submit this reply.



The Final Fantasy XII: Battle Ultimania Book I have through a torrent, so it's all .jpeg files. It's almost 600 pages.

Could I hassle you in the hope of uploading the book somewhere for download?



And this is for you...
I'm still looking for an obnoxiously high-res one, but this one works for right now.

Aren't you just a winner! Thanks for that! Quite purty! Do post in the future should you find an obnoxiously giant one.

Cheers!

Mary, I just came across this site that may be of interest to you: http://www.creativeuncut.com/art_final-fantasy-12_a.html

It has less images than Ambrosia but the ones it does have are of drastically better color quality (more vibrant) and sharper and without a website waterprint.

There's also a section on the site (although it provides no source) that partially answers my first question: "FFXII demanded a larger role from [Yoshida], not only as head of character design, but as supervisor over background design for the game's many cities, dungeons, and fields. His team visited Turkey to style the game's Mediterranean setting from, and studied areas in India and New York City, as well as Arabic and ancient Roman cultures for inspiration."

That last picture showing Penelo is pretty great! :)

I got the Omega book bout a week ago. It's perfect. Really love flipping through it--such a convenient, splendid way to relive the game. Thanks again for the tip on it Mary.

That's great! I love buying Japanese import books. I have them for FF8, FF12, Magna Carta, and The Legend of Dragoon. They're just so beautiful, and as someone obsessed with collecting official artwork, they're perfect for me.

Wow, i'm planing to order the Ultimania too, the pages of 671 really attracts me since i'm starting to love ff12 as much as ff7... ><

But i'm ordering ff12 ultimania omega (http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-2921-71-lz-49-en-84-j-70-1rdr.html) along with the Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings Ultimania (http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-2921-71-lz-77-2-49-en-15-Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings-84-j-70-21mz.html)(576 pages) from Play-Asia (http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-2921-71-d-49-en.html) using a coupon which enables to have $5 discount with the purchase of $50 ++ items...