Squall Leonhart trains at Balamb Garden, where a military education becomes entangled with a much larger struggle involving sorceresses and divided loyalties. Its most distinctive system is Junctioning: Guardian Forces let characters connect stocked magic to statistics, changing their capabilities outside ordinary level gains.
Drawing magic from enemies and finding other ways to obtain it become part of building an effective team. Battles still unfold through action gauges and menu commands, while the optional Triple Triad card game offers a different kind of tactical distraction. Behind these systems sits an intimate story about emotionally guarded people learning how to depend on each other.
