New developments on the Final Fantasy Tactics situation. Turns out that after a few years in my closet, my PS2 has decided to breath it's last and no longer works with controller inputs. You can plug the controllers in, start up a game but damned if it's going to do anything when you push buttons on the controller.
A nice ceremony was held for my fallen brother in arms. Words were spoken, songs were sung and we laid my longtime friend to rest for the final time. But alas, what would this mean for my pilgrimage? If you recall, I had no luck emulating Tactics on my computer and now am not able to play it on a console either. I almost threw in the towel when I decided rules must be bent in order for the pilgrimage to continue.
The good news, Final Fantasy Tactics will work fine and the pilgrimage will commence as originally planned (with Tactics first and then Final Fantasy VIII rather than doing them simultaneously). The downside is that I'm actually going to be playing the updated version Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions released for the PSP on a PSP emulator. It works on my computer at least through the first battle so I don't forsee any further issues with this. It does seem to be a pretty major overhaul including new localization, new cutscenes and I know it contains additional Final Fantasy characters and other bonuses. It's too bad that I can't go with the original but it just doesn't seem to be in the cards. War of the Lions is better than no Tactics at all.
The reason I say disaster is merely postponed is because while this will get me through Final Fantasy 9 (using a rom for the PSN release of 9), I don't know how I'm going to play Final Fantasy X or XII as I don't have a PS3 to play the X release on and XII is a PS2 exclusive. I'll have to cross that bridge when I get there. Perhaps I'll invest in a PS3 and get the X/X-2 collection, which I heard was quite good and would solve the problem of not owning X-2, and find some other option for XII. Idk. I'll keep you up to date. For now, I'm just excited to finally be able to start Tactics.
Game on!
Thursday, April 17, 2014
Monday, April 14, 2014
PSX Emulation
After Sephiroth got ownaged by Cloud, we step aside from the core series and go to the undisputed king of Final Fantasy spin-offs, Final Fantasy Tactics. I'm happy about this since it'll be nice to have a change in genres but also because this is the first game on the list that I actually still own!
As it turns out though, emulating PSX games is not as simple as SNES or NES. I downloaded ePSXe, the most common PSX emulator on the market but it seems that it takes a more modular approach to emulation. Instead of coming pre-packaged with everything you need like SNES emulators do, you actually have to download a whole bunch of separate files to get it to work.
You first need the PSX BIOS file. This tells the emulator which region you want to be playing in. I'm in the US so I need the one for NTSC-U disks. You then need a graphics plug-in. For SNES, these were all built in so I got to play around with my different options and find what worked the best. For PSX, it's more a matter of downloading them all and finding which one sucks the least. There are several available so experimentation is not only recommended, it's required. Sound is thankfully built into the emulator already.
After spending about two hours mixing and matching softwares, I decided to scrap it since the only one that didn't chug along at 10 fps had frequent texture pop-in and skewed graphics. This means that I'll have to play it on my PS2 back home, significantly decreasing the amount of time I'll be able to devote to it and I won't be able to take screenshots from the game.
Because of this, I decided to work through Final Fantasy Tactics and Final Fantasy VIII at the same time (since I have FFVIII on Steam and it works just fine). Expect a lot of jumping around in the next few posts as I bounce between the two highly anticipated games.
Oh and I kind of half-assed my game rankings last time due to some time constraints. Here is the full list in order from best to worst Final Fantasy game.
Game Rankings:
Game on!
As it turns out though, emulating PSX games is not as simple as SNES or NES. I downloaded ePSXe, the most common PSX emulator on the market but it seems that it takes a more modular approach to emulation. Instead of coming pre-packaged with everything you need like SNES emulators do, you actually have to download a whole bunch of separate files to get it to work.
You first need the PSX BIOS file. This tells the emulator which region you want to be playing in. I'm in the US so I need the one for NTSC-U disks. You then need a graphics plug-in. For SNES, these were all built in so I got to play around with my different options and find what worked the best. For PSX, it's more a matter of downloading them all and finding which one sucks the least. There are several available so experimentation is not only recommended, it's required. Sound is thankfully built into the emulator already.
After spending about two hours mixing and matching softwares, I decided to scrap it since the only one that didn't chug along at 10 fps had frequent texture pop-in and skewed graphics. This means that I'll have to play it on my PS2 back home, significantly decreasing the amount of time I'll be able to devote to it and I won't be able to take screenshots from the game.
Because of this, I decided to work through Final Fantasy Tactics and Final Fantasy VIII at the same time (since I have FFVIII on Steam and it works just fine). Expect a lot of jumping around in the next few posts as I bounce between the two highly anticipated games.
Oh and I kind of half-assed my game rankings last time due to some time constraints. Here is the full list in order from best to worst Final Fantasy game.
Game Rankings:
- Final Fantasy VI
- Final Fantasy VII
- Final Fantasy IV
- Final Fantasy V
- Final Fantasy III
- Final Fantasy
- Final Fantasy Adventure
- Final Fantasy II
Game on!
Sunday, April 13, 2014
Omnislashed
Final Fantasy VII is complete! Unfortunately, I was dumb and played the game without using Big Picture Mode on Steam. Because of this, none of my screenshots actually took since not using BPM uses different screenshot hotkeys than using it. I guess you'll just have to take my word for it this time. There isn't a fancy The End screen anyway.
Final Fantasy VII is a grand foray into the brave new world that is 3D gaming but like most early pioneers, it's flawed in many ways. I've mentioned the character sprites many times but I feel I have neglected to mention how gorgeous the rest of the graphics are. The environments are wonderfully drawn and have many little details scattered throughout. Sure, some of the finer details are extremely pixelated and thus, hard to see, but it all comes together to make a great whole. It's too bad that the sprites are such low quality. They stand in stark contrast to the world around them and diminish the picture overall. The eyes that look drawn on, their blank or cheesy expressions and the lack of hands all grate your nerves throughout and prevent you from fully immersing yourself in the dramatic storyline unfolding. Further evidence that the fifth generation of gaming consoles was a necessary but ugly stepping stone in gaming history.
The storyline as a whole is very impressive and marks some serious steps forward for the franchise. It's unfortunate that poor localization and incoherent dialogue mars several of the finer points. The characters often wander into overdramatization and psycho-babble when staying clear and concise would have been a stronger option. While the details can be nit-picked forever as I did with describing the characters a couple posts ago, the story has an interesting point and does feel relatable and personal.
The materia system is a great experiment from a franchise known for it's experimentation but it never quite adds up to Final Fantasy VI. Instead of furthering the trend of using the battle system to further flesh out characters, VII tries to go the way of V by making all characters more or less the same in battle but make them definable in the storyline instead. They take the limit breaks idea from VI but otherwise make characters all the same. Unfortunately, this loses the strengths of VI without ever feeling as exciting and involved as V and thus strikes an odd middle-ground between the two that simply feels as though it failed at both.
Still, the gameplay is fun and despite some antiquated gaming standards of the time, battles are interesting and there are plenty of places to explore and things to do, adding up to several hours of fun. The minigames are hit and miss which is fine because the ones that hit are great. Chocobo Racing was the highlight for me but snowboarding was quite fun as well. It's too bad that the camera can't often keep up, something common in that era of 3D gaming.
Ultimately, Final Fantasy VII's reputation has long since surpassed the actual experience but to judge it for this isn't fair to the game and overlooks many strong, positive traits that the game passed on to future games for years to come. Even if the game isn't as good as it's legacy, the legacy has provided an always raising bar that game developers can strive for and having a lofty goal is always good for the industry as a whole.
Game Rankings:
... Final Fantasy V < Final Fantasy VII < Final Fantasy VI
Game on!
Final Fantasy VII is a grand foray into the brave new world that is 3D gaming but like most early pioneers, it's flawed in many ways. I've mentioned the character sprites many times but I feel I have neglected to mention how gorgeous the rest of the graphics are. The environments are wonderfully drawn and have many little details scattered throughout. Sure, some of the finer details are extremely pixelated and thus, hard to see, but it all comes together to make a great whole. It's too bad that the sprites are such low quality. They stand in stark contrast to the world around them and diminish the picture overall. The eyes that look drawn on, their blank or cheesy expressions and the lack of hands all grate your nerves throughout and prevent you from fully immersing yourself in the dramatic storyline unfolding. Further evidence that the fifth generation of gaming consoles was a necessary but ugly stepping stone in gaming history.
The storyline as a whole is very impressive and marks some serious steps forward for the franchise. It's unfortunate that poor localization and incoherent dialogue mars several of the finer points. The characters often wander into overdramatization and psycho-babble when staying clear and concise would have been a stronger option. While the details can be nit-picked forever as I did with describing the characters a couple posts ago, the story has an interesting point and does feel relatable and personal.
The materia system is a great experiment from a franchise known for it's experimentation but it never quite adds up to Final Fantasy VI. Instead of furthering the trend of using the battle system to further flesh out characters, VII tries to go the way of V by making all characters more or less the same in battle but make them definable in the storyline instead. They take the limit breaks idea from VI but otherwise make characters all the same. Unfortunately, this loses the strengths of VI without ever feeling as exciting and involved as V and thus strikes an odd middle-ground between the two that simply feels as though it failed at both.
Still, the gameplay is fun and despite some antiquated gaming standards of the time, battles are interesting and there are plenty of places to explore and things to do, adding up to several hours of fun. The minigames are hit and miss which is fine because the ones that hit are great. Chocobo Racing was the highlight for me but snowboarding was quite fun as well. It's too bad that the camera can't often keep up, something common in that era of 3D gaming.
Ultimately, Final Fantasy VII's reputation has long since surpassed the actual experience but to judge it for this isn't fair to the game and overlooks many strong, positive traits that the game passed on to future games for years to come. Even if the game isn't as good as it's legacy, the legacy has provided an always raising bar that game developers can strive for and having a lofty goal is always good for the industry as a whole.
Game Rankings:
... Final Fantasy V < Final Fantasy VII < Final Fantasy VI
Game on!
Final Fantasy VII Fight Tactics
Small post today, I just wanted to share my personal strategy when coming up with a party/materia setup for Final Fantasy VII fights. This is my general strategy, although I'll give specifics as well. It isn't necessarily the best strategy and certainly isn't for certain situations but in general, this has gotten me through the game quite nicely.
My party has been made up of Cloud, Vincent and Tifa from the moment I got Vincent. Before him, I used Barret and when Cloud and Tifa were absent, I used Cid, Vincent and Barret. Here's why.
My general setup uses one tank character, one full magic character and one hybrid, leaning more towards magic. My magic character is the backbone of the party, in this case Tifa. As early as I can, I get her a Time materia and attach it to an All. This allows me to cast haste right away on the whole party. One of the things most newbies do is to ignore Haste. This is a HUGE mistake as Haste is easily one of the best spells in the whole franchise. Not only can you attack about 1.5x as much (meaning 1.5x the damage!) but you can respond to devastating attacks much more quickly by healing frequently. Later in the game, I also attach a Restore materia to another All which allows me to cast Regen on the whole party as well. Tifa can then heal as needed and otherwise use some incredibly powerful magic spells and summons as needed. Her Limit Break also rocks.
If my magic character is the backbone, the tank is the rib cage. The most important materia to place on this character is HP Up. This will increase their HP drastically as time goes on. Then, you want to place Cover on them. This will allow them to cover the other players frequently with their bonus HP. Finally, Counter Attack. This all adds up to a character with a ton of health who takes the damage from other characters and responds with a counter attack frequently. My other characters rarely get hurt from single attacks, making healing incredibly simple as well. Another helpful one is the materia that uses enemies attacks since that doesn't diminish this characters physical stats but still gives them some powerful magic, assuming you get it.
Finally, you want to make sure your two non-tank characters are in the back row. I give Tifa a long range materia and Vincent is naturally long-range. This allows them to take only half damage from attacks. Cloud is front row in my game but if you use a character like Barret as your tank, you can keep them all in the back and still do full damage in return. The last character is rather unimportant as to what you give them, as long as they can hold their own. I have Vincent equipped with Bahamut ZERO, another enemy move materia and some spells like Bio and Escape.
If you are having some trouble getting through portions of the game, check this out and give it a try. I haven't died yet in the game nor have I found any battle all that difficult. Results may vary so feel free to post your own strategies below!
My party has been made up of Cloud, Vincent and Tifa from the moment I got Vincent. Before him, I used Barret and when Cloud and Tifa were absent, I used Cid, Vincent and Barret. Here's why.
My general setup uses one tank character, one full magic character and one hybrid, leaning more towards magic. My magic character is the backbone of the party, in this case Tifa. As early as I can, I get her a Time materia and attach it to an All. This allows me to cast haste right away on the whole party. One of the things most newbies do is to ignore Haste. This is a HUGE mistake as Haste is easily one of the best spells in the whole franchise. Not only can you attack about 1.5x as much (meaning 1.5x the damage!) but you can respond to devastating attacks much more quickly by healing frequently. Later in the game, I also attach a Restore materia to another All which allows me to cast Regen on the whole party as well. Tifa can then heal as needed and otherwise use some incredibly powerful magic spells and summons as needed. Her Limit Break also rocks.
If my magic character is the backbone, the tank is the rib cage. The most important materia to place on this character is HP Up. This will increase their HP drastically as time goes on. Then, you want to place Cover on them. This will allow them to cover the other players frequently with their bonus HP. Finally, Counter Attack. This all adds up to a character with a ton of health who takes the damage from other characters and responds with a counter attack frequently. My other characters rarely get hurt from single attacks, making healing incredibly simple as well. Another helpful one is the materia that uses enemies attacks since that doesn't diminish this characters physical stats but still gives them some powerful magic, assuming you get it.
Finally, you want to make sure your two non-tank characters are in the back row. I give Tifa a long range materia and Vincent is naturally long-range. This allows them to take only half damage from attacks. Cloud is front row in my game but if you use a character like Barret as your tank, you can keep them all in the back and still do full damage in return. The last character is rather unimportant as to what you give them, as long as they can hold their own. I have Vincent equipped with Bahamut ZERO, another enemy move materia and some spells like Bio and Escape.
If you are having some trouble getting through portions of the game, check this out and give it a try. I haven't died yet in the game nor have I found any battle all that difficult. Results may vary so feel free to post your own strategies below!
Friday, April 11, 2014
Final Fantasy VII: The World is My Oyster
SPOILER ALERT!
Aeris dies! That's right, folks. That lovable girl who we brought along with us on our terrorist assassination mission got killed. I know, imagine that. But in her death, we received the Highwind, the airship that flies you around everywhere. A fair trade, in my opinion.
Seriously though, Final Fantasy VII has been an interesting trek so far. Not only do I have to deal with the monsters and threats filling the land but also my 17-year-bloated expectations for the title toted as the greatest game ever made by it's own box art. It is impossible to be a fan of RPG's in this day and not hold Final Fantasy VII on a pedestal, even if you've never played the game. Because of this unrealistic expectation of an admittedly old game, every joy is tempered and every failing is a massive disappointment, despite my own efforts.
Still, I'm gonna spout my opinions anyway, because this is my blog, dammit! That and if I don't have my opinions to throw around, what's the point? Basically, the game has been somewhat disappointing thus far. Despite everyone obviously being attached to Cloud and friends, I've found it difficult to care about any of the characters. Basically, they are a bunch of environmental terrorists blowing crap up to prove their point.
You know who else does this...?
So maybe Squaresoft was going for a more ambiguous protagonist/antagonist dynamic. I can appreciate that. But when they bring their kid into it, I simply accept that Barret is the worst parent in the world and have to move past any sense of caring. Yeah, remember Marlene? The little girl that they abandon in the slums of a mega-conglomerate city hell-bent on killing them at all costs? Obviously Barret and Tifa don't.
Aeris dies! That's right, folks. That lovable girl who we brought along with us on our terrorist assassination mission got killed. I know, imagine that. But in her death, we received the Highwind, the airship that flies you around everywhere. A fair trade, in my opinion.
Seriously though, Final Fantasy VII has been an interesting trek so far. Not only do I have to deal with the monsters and threats filling the land but also my 17-year-bloated expectations for the title toted as the greatest game ever made by it's own box art. It is impossible to be a fan of RPG's in this day and not hold Final Fantasy VII on a pedestal, even if you've never played the game. Because of this unrealistic expectation of an admittedly old game, every joy is tempered and every failing is a massive disappointment, despite my own efforts.
Still, I'm gonna spout my opinions anyway, because this is my blog, dammit! That and if I don't have my opinions to throw around, what's the point? Basically, the game has been somewhat disappointing thus far. Despite everyone obviously being attached to Cloud and friends, I've found it difficult to care about any of the characters. Basically, they are a bunch of environmental terrorists blowing crap up to prove their point.
You know who else does this...?
 |
| You were born in the 90's if you remember this image. |
Cloud is the whiny middle-school kid who thinks he's too cool to be a part of anything and ends up just brooding in a corner, hoping everyone thinks he's thinking about smart things. Sure his identity crisis becomes interesting but then that quickly moves into resurrecting Sephiroth and destroying the world. In fact, his puppet identity is the most interesting thing about him. What is that saying? The fact that he isn't really a person, has no emotions and mimics memories from Tifa is the most interesting thing about him???
Let's look at the side characters for a minute. Aeris bounces around picking flowers and flirting with the puppet when she isn't busy talking to the dirt or getting stabbed. Barret is the worst parent ever and has managed to get all his team killed. Who the hell knows what Tifa is doing or why since she started in Nibelheim, learned martial arts and then went to Midgard to work in a bar. Red XIII is a talking dog raised by a guy studying the earth by looking into space. Vincent is a not-vampire who hates Hojo and turns into various Universal movie monsters. Cid, the emotional wife-beater who had no better options. Yuffie who steals their stuff and obviously cares nothing for any of them. Cait Sith, a robot controlled by a guy who works for their enemy but apologizes every time he betrays them. Why do we like these people???
The gameplay has taken a step back by being slower paced than Final Fantasy VI and restricting you to three party members. Some people may like this better but I find it restrained and less interesting. The materia may be fun but is it better than the individually unique characters from Final Fantasy VI or the job system from Final Fantasy V? No. Not even close. Aging design choices have also dampened the game's enjoyability. I recently slogged through the ice area which would have been great if it hadn't been for Marlboro's using Bad Breath, an ability that hits your entire party with frog, poison, confusion, silence and sleep. Thankfully, Cloud was equipped with ice absorbing materia so he managed to survive but if I hadn't done this before the battle, it would have been entirely impossible for me to win the battle. Even with it, it took a good five minutes and a Magic Breath spell to kill him off, an enemy spell that costs 75 magic (out of 300 total). Most of that time was spent staring at the screen, waiting for Cloud to wake up and hit himself so I could actually start healing and hopefully get an attack in. Did I get anything good from that battle? No. Less experience than most fights, a pitiful amount of gold and a battle item. This is just an example of the kinds of fights that still exist in this game, something that never should have been repeated after the first game. Six main series titles and two console generations later, this should be a distant relic of the past.
The game's not all bad, and I don't mean to imply that it is. The storyline is looking up since Aeris died as it finally feels like it has some focus. Up until about Nibelheim, the game felt grounded but then things started to get ridiculous and lose any sense it once had. I already knew that Cloud was a clone of Sephiroth with Zack's DNA and that Sephiroth needed the Black Materia to cast Meteor to end the world but playing the game, I still had no idea what was going on because the storytelling was horrendous. Now that they've stopped playing around with flying sprites and ridiculous leaps in logic, I'm caring more about the character's plights and am excited to start exploring the world with the airship. I'm hoping that there is as much to do in VII as there was in VI.
I'll update you when there's something more to say.
Game on!
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
Side Quest: Final Fantasy: All The Bravest + Bravely Default
I admit, I have been cheating on my Final Fantasy order a bit, playing other games here and there. Playing through a huge list of RPG's can be tiring, especially when you enjoy other genres also. Still, some of my dalliances have been relevant to this pilgrimage. Two such titles were Final Fantasy All the Bravest and Bravely Default.
Final Fantasy All The Bravest has become infamous in modern times for being one of the worst games ever made. While I'm not sure it quite deserves that glorious title, it's certainly a terrible game. Essentially, it's what happens when someone who has zero understanding or respect for Final Fantasy fans makes a Final Fantasy game using the worst of mobile game cliches. The upside, Square Enix dropped the entry price to nothing, at least on Android, so I didn't pay a cent for it.
The "game" basically works on the premise of using a huge amount of Final Fantasy characters (up to 35 if I remember correctly) in battle at the same time, all while using the ATB system at it's fastest. You move through maps representing the Final Fantasy titles, fighting classic Final Fantasy monsters in pixel art form, listening to the awesomely represented music. You get to level up by getting experience, gather Gil by defeating enemies and unlock new characters and weapons. It all sounds great, right? The problem is, all of this is purely window dressing. The game itself consists of nothing more than rubbing the screen of your mobile device. That's it. Battles use absolutely zero strategy and just is a game of attacking as fast as possible. You attack with a character by touching them. So, you could feasibly play the game as a glorified whack-a-mole but there's no reason to do this as rubbing the screen is the fastest and thus, most effective, way of playing the game.
But you get to unlock stuff and get Gil too, right? Well, yes, sort of. Gil doesn't actually do anything so it basically just represents score. You unlock stuff randomly by defeating enemies. The weapons serve as passive upgrades, providing bonuses to attack for various characters. Let me explain why this is ridiculous. Each weapon provides a bonus such as +3 attack for any characters that use that weapon type. The thing is, you can never see the stats for any of your characters. So what does this +3 attack mean? Who knows? It could be great or it could be next to meaningless, there's no way to tell.
But the game lets you get cool Final Fantasy characters in pixel art form, right? Sort of... see, the only characters you can unlock are the classes used in classic Final Fantasy games. If you want to use famous characters like Terra, Cloud or Titus, you have to pay money which gives you a random Final Fantasy character to use in battle. The awesome part is that beyond the artwork, these don't do anything new or different. Since the game provides no strategy, there's no reason to buy them rather than looking up their images online. In fact, you don't get to see any new content unless you pay anyway since the Final Fantasy maps available for 7 onwards (the games that don't use pixel art already) are premium content.
So does this game have any redeeming aspects? Yes, a couple. First is that for each weapon and monster you fight, you get a description in the game's menu. These descriptions are often hilarious and are a lot of fun to read. The other cool thing about this game is the music. It actually provides a soundtrack so you can listen to all the classic tunes on the go. Aside from that, the game is a complete drag. I didn't even mention how every time you die in battle, something that happens from one hit of the enemy regardless of how high level your guys are, you have to wait three minutes per character to keep fighting. You can pay to respawn all your guys right away but... why would you?
On the other hand, we have Bravely Default, a recently released JRPG for the 3DS. So why am I saying this game is relevant to Final Fantasy Pilgrimage? Well, while the game is it's own IP, it's actually the spiritual successor to the DS title, Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light. In fact, it's Final Fantasy in pretty much every way other than name. The game world is plagued by environmental disasters as the four elemental crystals worshiped for centuries are being engulfed by darkness. Sounds familiar, huh? You have to go around and save the four crystals to restore nature to it's proper balance.
To be blunt, the storyline sucks. Beyond being an obvious homage to Final Fantasy, the characters are all so bland as to be irritating, particularly Ringabel, an amnesiac womanizer who can literally think of nothing beyond banging every chick he sees. This stereotype is so cliche in JRPG's already that this extreme example proves the undoing of the rest of the story all by itself. I literally want to stop watching every time this guy speaks. Still, I have to respect the full voice acting and theatre-style cutscenes. Also, this is one of the only JRPG's outside of the Tales series that I can think of to use skits, mini-cutscenes that you can trigger at certain events throughout the game, expanding on the storyline further. (FUTURE ME UPDATE: I have discovered that Final Fantasy IX also uses a similar system. Didn't know that when I wrote this originally!)
That being said, Bravely Default is a ton of fun and I've been enjoying it immensely. While I believe the story is the most important part of an RPG, Bravely Default's combat and job system are so much fun, they make the game worth playing despite the monotonous story. The job system is directly taken from Final Fantasy V but with some slight tweaks. Each character can pick any of your unlocked jobs. This provides them with that class' special attacks, passive moves and special trait. You can then pick a specified number of additional passive bonuses from other jobs and the special moves unlocked from one other job. As you level up each job, you gain either a new special attack to use or a passive bonus. For example, leveling up a monk will provide you some special martial arts attacks or things like HP + 10%. The special traits of each job can spice things up a bit as these provide an incentive to picking your primary class.
One neat difference between Final Fantasy V and Bravely Default is the way in which you unlock new jobs. In Final Fantasy V, you got jobs from exploding crystals and after picking them up, you got the new job. In Bravely Default, you actually have to find people who represent each job and defeat them in battle to get the new job. So a side quest may have you fighting a Valkyrie which, after defeating her, will unlock the job for you to use. It's a small difference but it's very effective as this will force you to see the strengths and weaknesses of each job for yourself.
Combat is also mostly like Final Fantasy but for a not-so-small tweak: the ability to use Brave or Default. Each character has a BP count which represents the number of moves they can make. At the start of each player turn, every character gains one BP. This means that if you attack once with each character in one turn, you will always stay at 0 BP. If you Default, essentially a block, you will save up your BP. Pretty simple. Using Brave, however, will let you stack up to four attacks for each character which they will use all in one turn. While you can save up BP by using Default, you can also go into the negatives for characters by using several Brave's right at the beginning of a battle. This can provide a quick boost to attacks, killing off minor enemies before they get a chance to attack you. However, any character with negative BP at the start of a turn will have to forfeit their turn until they get back up to 0 BP. This means using Brave can be a risk but one that can pay off with massive damage when used correctly. Enemies also have to play by these rules so you have to watch out for enemies that save up several BP's as they may attack with a huge onslaught all at once. If you can send them into the negatives though, you are rewarded with several free attacks against a defenseless foe.
If you have a 3DS, don't be turned away by the lack of a strong storyline. This game is a blast to play and I recommend it to anyone who's fan enough of Final Fantasy to be reading this blog.
Game on!
Final Fantasy All The Bravest has become infamous in modern times for being one of the worst games ever made. While I'm not sure it quite deserves that glorious title, it's certainly a terrible game. Essentially, it's what happens when someone who has zero understanding or respect for Final Fantasy fans makes a Final Fantasy game using the worst of mobile game cliches. The upside, Square Enix dropped the entry price to nothing, at least on Android, so I didn't pay a cent for it.
The "game" basically works on the premise of using a huge amount of Final Fantasy characters (up to 35 if I remember correctly) in battle at the same time, all while using the ATB system at it's fastest. You move through maps representing the Final Fantasy titles, fighting classic Final Fantasy monsters in pixel art form, listening to the awesomely represented music. You get to level up by getting experience, gather Gil by defeating enemies and unlock new characters and weapons. It all sounds great, right? The problem is, all of this is purely window dressing. The game itself consists of nothing more than rubbing the screen of your mobile device. That's it. Battles use absolutely zero strategy and just is a game of attacking as fast as possible. You attack with a character by touching them. So, you could feasibly play the game as a glorified whack-a-mole but there's no reason to do this as rubbing the screen is the fastest and thus, most effective, way of playing the game.
But you get to unlock stuff and get Gil too, right? Well, yes, sort of. Gil doesn't actually do anything so it basically just represents score. You unlock stuff randomly by defeating enemies. The weapons serve as passive upgrades, providing bonuses to attack for various characters. Let me explain why this is ridiculous. Each weapon provides a bonus such as +3 attack for any characters that use that weapon type. The thing is, you can never see the stats for any of your characters. So what does this +3 attack mean? Who knows? It could be great or it could be next to meaningless, there's no way to tell.
But the game lets you get cool Final Fantasy characters in pixel art form, right? Sort of... see, the only characters you can unlock are the classes used in classic Final Fantasy games. If you want to use famous characters like Terra, Cloud or Titus, you have to pay money which gives you a random Final Fantasy character to use in battle. The awesome part is that beyond the artwork, these don't do anything new or different. Since the game provides no strategy, there's no reason to buy them rather than looking up their images online. In fact, you don't get to see any new content unless you pay anyway since the Final Fantasy maps available for 7 onwards (the games that don't use pixel art already) are premium content.
So does this game have any redeeming aspects? Yes, a couple. First is that for each weapon and monster you fight, you get a description in the game's menu. These descriptions are often hilarious and are a lot of fun to read. The other cool thing about this game is the music. It actually provides a soundtrack so you can listen to all the classic tunes on the go. Aside from that, the game is a complete drag. I didn't even mention how every time you die in battle, something that happens from one hit of the enemy regardless of how high level your guys are, you have to wait three minutes per character to keep fighting. You can pay to respawn all your guys right away but... why would you?
On the other hand, we have Bravely Default, a recently released JRPG for the 3DS. So why am I saying this game is relevant to Final Fantasy Pilgrimage? Well, while the game is it's own IP, it's actually the spiritual successor to the DS title, Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light. In fact, it's Final Fantasy in pretty much every way other than name. The game world is plagued by environmental disasters as the four elemental crystals worshiped for centuries are being engulfed by darkness. Sounds familiar, huh? You have to go around and save the four crystals to restore nature to it's proper balance.
To be blunt, the storyline sucks. Beyond being an obvious homage to Final Fantasy, the characters are all so bland as to be irritating, particularly Ringabel, an amnesiac womanizer who can literally think of nothing beyond banging every chick he sees. This stereotype is so cliche in JRPG's already that this extreme example proves the undoing of the rest of the story all by itself. I literally want to stop watching every time this guy speaks. Still, I have to respect the full voice acting and theatre-style cutscenes. Also, this is one of the only JRPG's outside of the Tales series that I can think of to use skits, mini-cutscenes that you can trigger at certain events throughout the game, expanding on the storyline further. (FUTURE ME UPDATE: I have discovered that Final Fantasy IX also uses a similar system. Didn't know that when I wrote this originally!)
That being said, Bravely Default is a ton of fun and I've been enjoying it immensely. While I believe the story is the most important part of an RPG, Bravely Default's combat and job system are so much fun, they make the game worth playing despite the monotonous story. The job system is directly taken from Final Fantasy V but with some slight tweaks. Each character can pick any of your unlocked jobs. This provides them with that class' special attacks, passive moves and special trait. You can then pick a specified number of additional passive bonuses from other jobs and the special moves unlocked from one other job. As you level up each job, you gain either a new special attack to use or a passive bonus. For example, leveling up a monk will provide you some special martial arts attacks or things like HP + 10%. The special traits of each job can spice things up a bit as these provide an incentive to picking your primary class.
One neat difference between Final Fantasy V and Bravely Default is the way in which you unlock new jobs. In Final Fantasy V, you got jobs from exploding crystals and after picking them up, you got the new job. In Bravely Default, you actually have to find people who represent each job and defeat them in battle to get the new job. So a side quest may have you fighting a Valkyrie which, after defeating her, will unlock the job for you to use. It's a small difference but it's very effective as this will force you to see the strengths and weaknesses of each job for yourself.
Combat is also mostly like Final Fantasy but for a not-so-small tweak: the ability to use Brave or Default. Each character has a BP count which represents the number of moves they can make. At the start of each player turn, every character gains one BP. This means that if you attack once with each character in one turn, you will always stay at 0 BP. If you Default, essentially a block, you will save up your BP. Pretty simple. Using Brave, however, will let you stack up to four attacks for each character which they will use all in one turn. While you can save up BP by using Default, you can also go into the negatives for characters by using several Brave's right at the beginning of a battle. This can provide a quick boost to attacks, killing off minor enemies before they get a chance to attack you. However, any character with negative BP at the start of a turn will have to forfeit their turn until they get back up to 0 BP. This means using Brave can be a risk but one that can pay off with massive damage when used correctly. Enemies also have to play by these rules so you have to watch out for enemies that save up several BP's as they may attack with a huge onslaught all at once. If you can send them into the negatives though, you are rewarded with several free attacks against a defenseless foe.
If you have a 3DS, don't be turned away by the lack of a strong storyline. This game is a blast to play and I recommend it to anyone who's fan enough of Final Fantasy to be reading this blog.
Game on!
The Failings of Final Fantasy VII
Fanboys (and girls), avert your gaze. I am about to do the unthinkable: criticize Final Fantasy VII. *gasp*
I know, I know. This could be a hard time for all of us but frankly, it needs to be done. Too long has the game been held up as the mark of gaming perfection when, let's be honest, it has it's flaws. I'm not saying it's a bad game, it just could have used a little more work in a couple areas. Well, just like ripping off a band-aid, it's better to do it quick and get it over with so lets jump right in.
1. The Sprites
I've mentioned this before and people always respond the same way, the game was on the Playstation back in 1997, of course the graphics aren't as good as today. THIS IS NO EXCUSE! The game sprites don't look this way because of the graphical limitations of the Playstation. Look at the environments in the game, the pre-rendered cutscenes, hell, look at the in-battle characters. They look infinitely better than the chibi-designed sprites you see when exploring. Take a look at Final Fantasy Tactics or 8 to see what the Playstation was capable of. This was purely an artistic design and it failed, miserably. It can be hard to take the extremely dramatic story seriously when the characters don't have fingers, noses, mouths or anything else that makes them remotely human.
The in-battle graphics looks pretty awesome, especially compared to older Final Fantasy titles. So what am I criticizing about this? It's not the graphics but the artistically shifting camera that I have a problem with. Not because it moves but because this can seriously impede functionality in battle. It doesn't happen all the time or even that commonly but more often than it should. What happens is that it positions itself so that two characters exist one directly in front of the other. This makes it entirely impossible to tell what character you're selecting. In one battle, I wasted three Phoenix Downs trying to revive my fallen comrade because I kept using them on the living teammate instead. The first thing is why the hell does the Phoenix Down not default to the fallen comrade but even without this, not knowing who you're targeting should NEVER BE AN ISSUE! Artistic camera angles are fun but they should never get in the way of basic gameplay.
The translation isn't as bad as Final Fantasy IV. In fact, it's not even that bad at all. It's more a localization issue than a translation issue. Whatever the case may be, the dialogue simply isn't as well structured as Final Fantasy VI was. People say very strange things frequently and sometimes reactions seem undeserved or exaggerated. It's hard to come up with a great example but everything just feels off, somehow. Characters just don't speak like normal people and it's noticeable. It makes it hard to care about the characters when it gives me dialogue choices that seem to invoke bizarre responses. When asked by Aeris if I like her, I can say "No, I don't." or "It's not that..." What does the second one even mean? Why would I say that in response to a yes or no question? It's not what? Yet, saying this makes Aeris happy somehow. Frankly, if I got that response from somebody I just confessed my affections for, I'd be pretty confused.
I know, I know. This could be a hard time for all of us but frankly, it needs to be done. Too long has the game been held up as the mark of gaming perfection when, let's be honest, it has it's flaws. I'm not saying it's a bad game, it just could have used a little more work in a couple areas. Well, just like ripping off a band-aid, it's better to do it quick and get it over with so lets jump right in.
1. The Sprites
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| Barret's super power: pronouncing symbols! |
2. The Battle Camera
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| Okay monster, let me turn to my left so you can hit my side. |
3. Translation
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| Student... riiiiiiight.. |
The conversation with Cait Sith in Golden Saucer after he betrays you is another one that's just beyond ridiculous. He throws the keystone to the baddies and then asks if you can just forget about it and let him come along. He makes an effort to convince you that he's not all bad by telling you that he's not all that bad. He then says his actions are all in the past and you should just let him come along. Cloud and Aeris have to think about this due to his betrayal about 30 seconds earlier... He then tells you there's no point in killing him because he's just a robot controlled by Shinra. If there was any question before, this is the moment when I would have taken the big sword and slashed this thing in two. Why would you continue to keep a spy around that's obviously working with Shinra? It makes NO SENSE!!! Sure, he says how he's got the kid hostage so they have to do what he says but he doesn't say this until about 2 minutes into the conversation. Why hesitate for that long??? I can only imagine that this is a translation issue or else it's some of the worst writing in the history of fiction.
4. Storyline Consistency
Throughout the storyline, twists and turns as well as character backstory tidbits pop up regularly but sometimes, I can't see how it all fits together. In the beginning, the game makes you think Midgar is the whole world, which is fine. The revelation that the rest of world exists is pretty cool, actually. But while we're in Midgar, we see flashbacks of Cloud talking with Tifa at a playground. Later, we find out Tifa and Cloud are from Nifelheim, on a whole different continent from Midgar. So, what was this flashback? When did these two kids cross the sea to vacation in the slums of Midgar? In fact, why did they go to Midgar at all? Many of the characters implied that they came to live in Midgar later in life. Who moves to a craphole intentionally? Barret took his friend's daughter, swearing to care for her and then takes her to the slums so he could become an environmental terrorist? Was this a sound parenting decision?
Vincent is another one that really bugs me. I know, there's more about Vincent later in this game as well as in Dirge of Cerberus but let's talk about the here and now. Vincent is chilling in some coffin where he can move things magically with his mind. He is obviously supposed to appear as a vampire when you first meet him. What's the point? Why have this obvious implication if it means nothing and has nothing to do with his character? Why does he move coffin lids with his mind and then never show this power again? Seems pretty useful if you can fling baddies around with your thoughts in battle. Also, his Limit Break has him transforming into a werewolf-esque character called the Galian Beast. Somehow, none of the other characters find this the least bit interesting. I've been playing with him for several hours and not once has it come up that this guy turns into a savage beast on a whim. Personally, I'd want to know what was up with this guy before falling asleep anywhere near him. At least the party is accepting, I suppose.
So is Final Fantasy VII all it's cracked up to be? Not really. The game's great, don't get me wrong. But the three character party, bad dialogue, ridiculous looking sprites and constant brooding are huge drawbacks on a game touted as the best game ever made. Frankly, halfway through the game and I have yet to see how this game is superior to VI in any way other than the environmental graphics and cutscenes.
Game on!
Saturday, March 15, 2014
Onwards to Midgar
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| Yeah, that's right. 1997. Takes you back, don't it? |
See, while Final Fantasy VII's graphics may not be impressive now, at the time, it was the most expensive video game ever made. $45 million US dollars were estimated to have been sunk into the three year project. Squaresoft went all out with an intense marketing scheme almost unheard of in video games to this day (save perhaps, Call of Duty.). The graphics were insanely impressive with Full Motion Videos (FMV's) being added to make the game even more life-like. That combined with the three years it took to make the game brought the cost up so high.
Originally, this project was intended to be released on Nintendo's newest console, then known as Project Reality, but obviously this never came to pass. Seriously, I recommend taking a look at some historical writing about the development of the N64 and Playstation, interesting stuff. I'll summarize for you. Sony and Nintendo were originally partners planning on releasing a joint console called the Playstation. There were a lot of early concepts for this, whether it was an add-on to the SNES, a whole new console or something else entirely. Anyway, Nintendo decided that their contract wasn't in their best interests anymore and decided to secretly partner up with Philips instead, going behind Sony's back to do so. This resulted in the Philips CD-i and some of the worst games in gaming history like the Unholy Triforce games and Mario Hotel. Still, Nintendo released their own console as well, deciding to forgo Sony's promised CD technology and stick with the tried and true cartridges. Sony, decided, screw Nintendo, we'll just release the console we had planned ourselves. Thus the Playstation was born.
Not only did this end up really blowing up in Nintendo's face but Square realized that their grand masterpiece, Final Fantasy VII simply wouldn't work on a cartridge-based console. After much effort to try and stay with the company that brought them up from the brink of bankruptcy, Square had no choice but to go to Sony with their new game.
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| Nintendo may not like it, but Sony let's Square do what they want. |
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| Oh Tifa, don't hide your true feelings. |
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| Well... sort of... |
Game on!
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Recap Fantasy Part 2: Tips and Tricks
So I realized that I did tips and tricks for the first Final Fantasy but haven't done any since then. Sure, the first game was by far the hardest but the other games are tough too. Here are a few tips that will hopefully help you out in your own Final Fantasy pilgrimage.
General Tips
-Status effects are the enemy. Many people underestimate these because they don't often cause direct damage. Seriously, status effects are worse than taking direct damage. Being hit with an attack causes a very known and very immediate effect. These are easy to plan for. Being at the culmination of a battle and having an enemy put blind on your heavy-hitter can turn the tide of a battle completely. Confusion statuses are one of the worst, especially in the late game, since your mage can suddenly cast Meteo on your entire party, wiping you out in one fell swoop. To counter this, make sure you always have a small stockpile of every status healing item you can get at that point in the game. I try to have at least 10 at all times. Seriously, these are more important than potions. When the shops start offering these items, it means you're going to be hit by that effect. Preparation is key.
-Always have a designated healer. Especially for boss battles, some people get over-confident and think they can take out that baddie without healing. This is a bad way of thinking. Don't do it. Even if you think a boss is going to be easy, always have a healer and make sure that healing is their first priority. If you can, have a second go-to healer if the going get's rough. It's better to have two attackers that can last forever than four attackers that die in a couple rounds.
-Upgrade equipment ASAP. Whenever you get to a new town, your first thought should be to check which new items are available. If you can't afford some of the heftier equipment, DON'T JUST MOVE ON! Grind some money until you can afford it. The only exception to this is a couple of towns in Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II have equipment that you aren't meant to buy right away. Still, you should be doing the best you can. III on, you should always have your people decked out as much as possible. There's simply no reason not to.
Final Fantasy II
-Seriously not trying to beat a dead horse here but get used to attacking your own people. The best method for leveling up is to go back to the first city and start finding goblins and imps and whatnot. The easiest stats to level up are your HP and MP. Pick one stat for each character. For your HP characters, start beating on each other. For the MP character, use spells to either damage your HP characters or heal, if necessary. Remember, the goal is to end the battle with less than half of your maximum HP or MP. Don't just heal when the health gets down and keep going, this won't help you. When you get down low enough, end the battle. Heal once you're outside the fight. Once you think you're ready, do this a few more times. Trust me, you aren't ready.
-Don't use the inns. Some day I'll talk more about these ridiculous inns in a post but for right now, just know that you can't treat the inns like you do in other Final Fantasy games since the inns charge depending on how much health or MP you're missing. It's way more efficient to use MP to heal up and then go to the inn only when you need an MP recharge. This is way cheaper and will save you a ton of money over the course of the game.
-Don't rely on magic. Having magic is great and will help you through a lot of fights but by the end of the game, it's nearly worthless. Magic just never becomes as powerful as your physical weapons. The best method for avoiding this is to have your magic user wield a bow in the back row. This will let them level up their attack power while you use magic as necessary. Note that you should definitely level up Cure and their MP since the more healing ability you have, the less risky dungeon crawls will be.
Final Fantasy III
-Switch jobs frequently. Yes, there is some cost to switching jobs but this will almost certainly not be a problem for you throughout the game no matter how much you switch. I'm not saying to switch frivolously since you do want to level up their job levels but don't feel attached to one job per character. Certain bosses will be way easier with four black mages or four warriors. One boss you will need to be able to use the Scan ability and need a Scholar to do it. By the end of the game, you're going to want to have two Ninja's and two Sages anyway so don't worry too much about leveling up each job prior to the end.
-Get Ninja and Sage! Technically, these are optional jobs since you have to go all the way to the end of Eureka to get them. These are by and far the best jobs and there is literally no reason to use anything else once you get them. Your fighting characters should be Ninjas and your magic users should be Sages. If you play the remakes of III, this won't necessarily be the case but if you're playing the NES version, do this.
Final Fantasy IV
-If you're playing the US version, there is very little need for tips and tricks. There is the occasional tough boss, don't get me wrong, but all in all the game is extremely easy. If you need help at a certain point, pull up a walkthrough for specific strategies but overall, just follow the general tips and if you get stuck, try leveling up a bit to pull through. Be aware that many of the bosses have special tactics required in order to win. Be willing to change tactics on the fly or you will suffer a few losses. Also, pay attention to the boss dialogue since it often gives clues to these tactics.
Final Fantasy V
-Grinding won't help you as much in this game. Levels are much harder to get and don't provide as much benefit as in other games. The more important thing is to level up your jobs. This is very important. Make sure everyone has certain basics before going too in depth on any one job. Making sure every party member has at least the first level of white magic can be extremely helpful later on. Third level is probably better.
-If you can, max out Hunter, Red Mage and Ninja. Their maximum skills are extremely useful for any job. Hunter's allows your character to do four attacks against random enemies with each attack hitting for about half normal damage. This has endless possibilities and should be obtained if possible. Red Mage lets you use magic twice per turn, devastating against many bosses. Ninja lets you wield two weapons at once. These are all extremely powerful and will help you substantially.
-Don't underestimate the base job. If you are willing to put in the time, the base job actually becomes the strongest by far. Any job you master, the innate skills of that job become available to the base job. That means if you are willing to master several jobs, your base job could have HP and MP +30%, dual wielding any weapon you'd like, using X-Fight on every turn, covering near-death friends... Basically, you'd be invincible. But only if you're willing to put forth the time. And trust me, this would be a lot of time spent.
-Be willing to change jobs. Just like Final Fantasy III, several of the bosses will be much easier if you forgo the traditional party arrangements. If a boss is weak against a certain kind of magic, try using four black mages and just bombarding it to kill it as fast as possible. This can help especially against bosses that use individually weaker all-enemy attacks. Three turns of Bolt 3 is enough to kill Leviathan right away, assuming you can keep your mages alive.
-The tower you go to in order to get Meteo and Holy requires you to split your party into two. Make sure the one on the right is two fighters and the one of the left is two mages. These bosses would be tough even if you had your whole party. Too bad you don't. Note that the mage boss will require some special tactics to defeat or he'll just reset your battle. You'll see what I mean.
Final Fantasy VI
-Use Gau. Several players don't use Gau and some even cite him as the worst character you get. This is far from the truth. They simply don't understand how he works. Basically, every enemy you fight will be available to fight again in the Veldt, the area you found Gau in. When you have Gau in your party, have him use his Leap skill to go with the baddies, ending the battle. Wander around and fight more enemies until Gau returns. When he returns, he will have the abilities of all baddies in the party you were fighting when Gau left and the enemies you were fighting when he returned. By using Rage, Gau can emulate these baddies traits and attacks although you don't get to control him. This requires a strong understanding of the games mechanics and bestiary but if you are willing to put a little effort into it, Gau can be an unstoppable addition to any party. Be aware that any World of Balance enemies you don't fight will be unobtainable if you get to the World of Ruin. Don't worry though, if you fought the enemies at some point in time, they will still show up in the Veldt even once you get to the World of Ruin.
-Check the auction house before the World of Ruin. There are two espers there that can be missed if you don't get them prior to the World of Ruin. It's spendy but it's worth it.
-Explore the World of Ruin. Basically, you can attack Kefka as soon as you get the airship but this would be a really terrible idea. Instead, check out the World of Ruin. There's a ton to do and almost every town has at least one side-quest to accomplish. Here's a basic checklist of things to do.
-Get all your characters back
-Get the two bonus characters (Gogo is in the monster's stomach over in the island to the northeast. Fight it and let it eat all your party members. Umaro is in Narsche, you need Mog to get him. He's not missable though so don't worry about fighting him without Mog, you'll just need Mog in your party when you go back.)
-Fight the 8 dragons. Two of these are in Kefka's tower. The rest are scattered around. Not too hard to find but you'll have to do a bit of looking.
-Fight the Doom Gaze. This monster shows up if you fly around in the airship long enough. Beating him gives you Bahamut. DON'T USE THE VANISH/DOOM TRICK ON HIM!! This will prevent you from getting Bahamut.
-Climb the Magic Tower. This is the place you get Strago although you don't need to climb it to get him. Climb it anyway.
-The vanish/doom trick. The spell is called something different depending on your version. Basically, the two spells to know are the spell that makes you invisible and the spell that insta-kills all enemies on the screen if you're lucky. In the SNES version they are Vanish and X-Zone. Anyway, the trick is to use Vanish on tough bosses and then use X-Zone right away. If Vanish works on the boss, this will automatically kill them since being invisible means spells have a 100% chance of working. Note that this does not work on Kefka or several of the late game bosses. It does work on that annoying boss that requires you to kill your own guys, it works on the three statue bosses and several others. I don't know if it works on the painting boss but that would be awesome if it did. The only guy to NOT use this on is Doom Gaze per my note above as it will prevent you from getting Bahamut. Otherwise, you still get all the gold, EXP and items you would normally get.
If you are stuck anywhere specific, feel free to say so in the comments, I'd be happy to help however I can.
Game on!
General Tips
-Status effects are the enemy. Many people underestimate these because they don't often cause direct damage. Seriously, status effects are worse than taking direct damage. Being hit with an attack causes a very known and very immediate effect. These are easy to plan for. Being at the culmination of a battle and having an enemy put blind on your heavy-hitter can turn the tide of a battle completely. Confusion statuses are one of the worst, especially in the late game, since your mage can suddenly cast Meteo on your entire party, wiping you out in one fell swoop. To counter this, make sure you always have a small stockpile of every status healing item you can get at that point in the game. I try to have at least 10 at all times. Seriously, these are more important than potions. When the shops start offering these items, it means you're going to be hit by that effect. Preparation is key.
-Always have a designated healer. Especially for boss battles, some people get over-confident and think they can take out that baddie without healing. This is a bad way of thinking. Don't do it. Even if you think a boss is going to be easy, always have a healer and make sure that healing is their first priority. If you can, have a second go-to healer if the going get's rough. It's better to have two attackers that can last forever than four attackers that die in a couple rounds.
-Upgrade equipment ASAP. Whenever you get to a new town, your first thought should be to check which new items are available. If you can't afford some of the heftier equipment, DON'T JUST MOVE ON! Grind some money until you can afford it. The only exception to this is a couple of towns in Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II have equipment that you aren't meant to buy right away. Still, you should be doing the best you can. III on, you should always have your people decked out as much as possible. There's simply no reason not to.
Final Fantasy II
-Seriously not trying to beat a dead horse here but get used to attacking your own people. The best method for leveling up is to go back to the first city and start finding goblins and imps and whatnot. The easiest stats to level up are your HP and MP. Pick one stat for each character. For your HP characters, start beating on each other. For the MP character, use spells to either damage your HP characters or heal, if necessary. Remember, the goal is to end the battle with less than half of your maximum HP or MP. Don't just heal when the health gets down and keep going, this won't help you. When you get down low enough, end the battle. Heal once you're outside the fight. Once you think you're ready, do this a few more times. Trust me, you aren't ready.
-Don't use the inns. Some day I'll talk more about these ridiculous inns in a post but for right now, just know that you can't treat the inns like you do in other Final Fantasy games since the inns charge depending on how much health or MP you're missing. It's way more efficient to use MP to heal up and then go to the inn only when you need an MP recharge. This is way cheaper and will save you a ton of money over the course of the game.
-Don't rely on magic. Having magic is great and will help you through a lot of fights but by the end of the game, it's nearly worthless. Magic just never becomes as powerful as your physical weapons. The best method for avoiding this is to have your magic user wield a bow in the back row. This will let them level up their attack power while you use magic as necessary. Note that you should definitely level up Cure and their MP since the more healing ability you have, the less risky dungeon crawls will be.
Final Fantasy III
-Switch jobs frequently. Yes, there is some cost to switching jobs but this will almost certainly not be a problem for you throughout the game no matter how much you switch. I'm not saying to switch frivolously since you do want to level up their job levels but don't feel attached to one job per character. Certain bosses will be way easier with four black mages or four warriors. One boss you will need to be able to use the Scan ability and need a Scholar to do it. By the end of the game, you're going to want to have two Ninja's and two Sages anyway so don't worry too much about leveling up each job prior to the end.
-Get Ninja and Sage! Technically, these are optional jobs since you have to go all the way to the end of Eureka to get them. These are by and far the best jobs and there is literally no reason to use anything else once you get them. Your fighting characters should be Ninjas and your magic users should be Sages. If you play the remakes of III, this won't necessarily be the case but if you're playing the NES version, do this.
Final Fantasy IV
-If you're playing the US version, there is very little need for tips and tricks. There is the occasional tough boss, don't get me wrong, but all in all the game is extremely easy. If you need help at a certain point, pull up a walkthrough for specific strategies but overall, just follow the general tips and if you get stuck, try leveling up a bit to pull through. Be aware that many of the bosses have special tactics required in order to win. Be willing to change tactics on the fly or you will suffer a few losses. Also, pay attention to the boss dialogue since it often gives clues to these tactics.
Final Fantasy V
-Grinding won't help you as much in this game. Levels are much harder to get and don't provide as much benefit as in other games. The more important thing is to level up your jobs. This is very important. Make sure everyone has certain basics before going too in depth on any one job. Making sure every party member has at least the first level of white magic can be extremely helpful later on. Third level is probably better.
-If you can, max out Hunter, Red Mage and Ninja. Their maximum skills are extremely useful for any job. Hunter's allows your character to do four attacks against random enemies with each attack hitting for about half normal damage. This has endless possibilities and should be obtained if possible. Red Mage lets you use magic twice per turn, devastating against many bosses. Ninja lets you wield two weapons at once. These are all extremely powerful and will help you substantially.
-Don't underestimate the base job. If you are willing to put in the time, the base job actually becomes the strongest by far. Any job you master, the innate skills of that job become available to the base job. That means if you are willing to master several jobs, your base job could have HP and MP +30%, dual wielding any weapon you'd like, using X-Fight on every turn, covering near-death friends... Basically, you'd be invincible. But only if you're willing to put forth the time. And trust me, this would be a lot of time spent.
-Be willing to change jobs. Just like Final Fantasy III, several of the bosses will be much easier if you forgo the traditional party arrangements. If a boss is weak against a certain kind of magic, try using four black mages and just bombarding it to kill it as fast as possible. This can help especially against bosses that use individually weaker all-enemy attacks. Three turns of Bolt 3 is enough to kill Leviathan right away, assuming you can keep your mages alive.
-The tower you go to in order to get Meteo and Holy requires you to split your party into two. Make sure the one on the right is two fighters and the one of the left is two mages. These bosses would be tough even if you had your whole party. Too bad you don't. Note that the mage boss will require some special tactics to defeat or he'll just reset your battle. You'll see what I mean.
Final Fantasy VI
-Use Gau. Several players don't use Gau and some even cite him as the worst character you get. This is far from the truth. They simply don't understand how he works. Basically, every enemy you fight will be available to fight again in the Veldt, the area you found Gau in. When you have Gau in your party, have him use his Leap skill to go with the baddies, ending the battle. Wander around and fight more enemies until Gau returns. When he returns, he will have the abilities of all baddies in the party you were fighting when Gau left and the enemies you were fighting when he returned. By using Rage, Gau can emulate these baddies traits and attacks although you don't get to control him. This requires a strong understanding of the games mechanics and bestiary but if you are willing to put a little effort into it, Gau can be an unstoppable addition to any party. Be aware that any World of Balance enemies you don't fight will be unobtainable if you get to the World of Ruin. Don't worry though, if you fought the enemies at some point in time, they will still show up in the Veldt even once you get to the World of Ruin.
-Check the auction house before the World of Ruin. There are two espers there that can be missed if you don't get them prior to the World of Ruin. It's spendy but it's worth it.
-Explore the World of Ruin. Basically, you can attack Kefka as soon as you get the airship but this would be a really terrible idea. Instead, check out the World of Ruin. There's a ton to do and almost every town has at least one side-quest to accomplish. Here's a basic checklist of things to do.
-Get all your characters back
-Get the two bonus characters (Gogo is in the monster's stomach over in the island to the northeast. Fight it and let it eat all your party members. Umaro is in Narsche, you need Mog to get him. He's not missable though so don't worry about fighting him without Mog, you'll just need Mog in your party when you go back.)
-Fight the 8 dragons. Two of these are in Kefka's tower. The rest are scattered around. Not too hard to find but you'll have to do a bit of looking.
-Fight the Doom Gaze. This monster shows up if you fly around in the airship long enough. Beating him gives you Bahamut. DON'T USE THE VANISH/DOOM TRICK ON HIM!! This will prevent you from getting Bahamut.
-Climb the Magic Tower. This is the place you get Strago although you don't need to climb it to get him. Climb it anyway.
-The vanish/doom trick. The spell is called something different depending on your version. Basically, the two spells to know are the spell that makes you invisible and the spell that insta-kills all enemies on the screen if you're lucky. In the SNES version they are Vanish and X-Zone. Anyway, the trick is to use Vanish on tough bosses and then use X-Zone right away. If Vanish works on the boss, this will automatically kill them since being invisible means spells have a 100% chance of working. Note that this does not work on Kefka or several of the late game bosses. It does work on that annoying boss that requires you to kill your own guys, it works on the three statue bosses and several others. I don't know if it works on the painting boss but that would be awesome if it did. The only guy to NOT use this on is Doom Gaze per my note above as it will prevent you from getting Bahamut. Otherwise, you still get all the gold, EXP and items you would normally get.
If you are stuck anywhere specific, feel free to say so in the comments, I'd be happy to help however I can.
Game on!
Recap Fantasy
For those of you just tuning in, welcome to Final Fantasy Pilgrimage, the blog that takes you on an epic adventure through time as we journey through each Final Fantasy title released in the US! It's exciting! It's dangerous! It's Final Fantasy!
Before we continue our journey, let's look at what happened last season on Final Fantasy Pilgrimage.
Final Fantasy
Every masochist's wet dream (can we say that on television?), Final Fantasy will test your frustration, your pride and the tensile strength of your controller as you journey through the open world trying to restore the four crystals. It's old and it's hard as balls but it's great.
Final Fantasy II
It was ahead of it's time but the hardware, not so much. If you want to play this game, prepare yourself for constantly beating up your own people or hundreds upon hundreds of hours of grinding just to make it to the next dungeon. It did have the best story of the NES trilogy though, we'll give it that much.
Final Fantasy III
Remember those name-things we gave our characters last time? Yeah, that was lame. Let's make them nameless again. That was way better. Let's give them jobs though that you can switch any time you'd like! Good idea.
Final Fantasy Adventure
Hey guys, I have this great idea where we put a guy in the middle of the woods and give him a sword. Yeah, and then he moves from screen to screen fighting enemies by swinging this sword. As he goes on, he picks up items that let him move further on until he gets to the last epic boss battle. "Hey, that kinda sounds like Zel..."
Final Fantasy IV
Good guy follows a dark path, realizes he's doing so, redeems himself, picks up friends, loses friends, gets more friends, loses more friends, goes to the moon, finds out he's an alien, saves the planet, BOOM! Final Fantasy IV everyone. You get to use five people in your party!
Final Fantasy V
A long time ago (two years ago) in a land far, far away (San Francisco), they made a lost Final Fantasy game where they had these things called jobs (classes) and you could... like... change them and stuff. Each job could be leveled up. What if we mixed and matched these. Oh but we have to make sure the story sucks and it's brutally difficult. Otherwise, you know... that would be cool.
Final Fantasy VI
Then the new guy steps in and makes the best Final Fantasy EVA!!! Jobs were cool but characters are cooler. Action set pieces rock, mini games rock, opera rocks, street fighter rocks, throw it all in a pot with Final Fantasy, taa-daa!
And now, the conclusion.
Thursday, March 6, 2014
Who Had The Last Laugh?
041.png) |
| These just never get old |
Kefka has fallen and the world is... still pretty crappy. But at least it's short one psychotic clown and in my book, that's a victory. Along with Kefka, this marks the end of the SNES trilogy of Final Fantasy games! To be honest, my primary goal in doing this was to play through all the classic Final Fantasy titles, which to me, is everything before 7. Mission accomplished! That's not to say I'm done, far from it, I'm just saying my main goal is complete and everything later is beyond my expectations. But before I get ahead of myself, let's commence with the review.
Final Fantasy VI is undoubtedly the best Final Fantasy game thus far. The graphics can be startling at first compared to the simple, smooth nature of the other two SNES titles but once you get used to them, they are a vast improvement. Along with the best looking world comes the strongest characters and the most diverse gameplay of any Final Fantasy to this point.
011.png) |
| That's the poooooooower of love! |
Building characters up is also a lot of fun since there are so many different ways to develop them. Along with the standard EXP level ups, which are far more meaningful in this game than in V, giving them different Espers can alter their stats and give them magic abilities. By the end of my game, every characters had almost every spell available to me as I mixed and matched Espers and it's satisfying to receive those new spells. Characters have many different forms of equipment too, some of which can be fun to experiment with. Setzer's Fixed Dice, one of the last weapons you get for him, is a lot more powerful than it seems, sometimes providing max damage (9999) to any enemy!
All of the character's are that way and it makes for the most driven game in the franchise. Still, the game had it's missteps, too. Some bosses required tactics bordering on ridiculous. One boss actually requires you to kill your own party members while two other enemies are attacking you at the same time. Fortunately, these kinds of encounters can be nullified by a game-breaking glitch that lets you instant kill almost any enemy in the game by simply using the Vanish spell on the enemy followed by an X-Zone or Doom.
Also, the nature of character development where any character can receive any spell can start to make the characters seem bland by the end of the game. It never hits a level of Final Fantasy V where they're all interchangeable, but knowing that your mage and your main fighter both have the same spells can be odd.
Finally, despite some great moments in the game, the overall plot is rather underdeveloped, especially by the end. While the fighting against the empire is interesting, the World of Ruin never feels like it has a direct purpose. We're fighting Kefka but is it out of a sense of revenge or some greater purpose? They tell you that he's oppressing people but without any visual evidence of this, it feels rather weak, especially compared to the World of Balance where you see the soldiers in all the occupied towns.
Final Fantasy Rankings:
Also, the nature of character development where any character can receive any spell can start to make the characters seem bland by the end of the game. It never hits a level of Final Fantasy V where they're all interchangeable, but knowing that your mage and your main fighter both have the same spells can be odd.
Finally, despite some great moments in the game, the overall plot is rather underdeveloped, especially by the end. While the fighting against the empire is interesting, the World of Ruin never feels like it has a direct purpose. We're fighting Kefka but is it out of a sense of revenge or some greater purpose? They tell you that he's oppressing people but without any visual evidence of this, it feels rather weak, especially compared to the World of Balance where you see the soldiers in all the occupied towns.
157.png) |
| The SNES in all it's glory |
And with that, we have arrived onto the Playstation era of games. Fortunately, Steam has provided a bit of a delay to my screenshot dilemna by adding Final Fantasy VII and VIII on their marketplace, which I picked up on sale in anticipation of this. The gamepad support is a little wonky and while I got a mod that helps make it better, it's still not perfect, so I may be changing things up with my setup here in a little bit. Still, I've got easy access to screenshots and with Steam's cloud saves, I no longer have to shuttle my save file back and forth from my desktop and my laptop! Yay!
If you are curious about these two games on Steam, my next post will have some information about the mods available. Obviously, changing up the gameplay of these classics borders on heresy but there are some phenomenal graphics mods that can greatly spruce up your experience.
 |
| It's like I'm really there! |
Final Fantasy Rankings:
Final Fantasy 2 < Final Fantasy Adventure < Final Fantasy < Final Fantasy III < Final Fantasy V < Final Fantasy IV < Final Fantasy VI
Game on!
Friday, February 28, 2014
What Makes Final Fantasy 6 Different?
Many people regard Final Fantasy 6 as the greatest Final Fantasy ever made. Some people even consider it to be the greatest RPG ever made. Considering the wealth of wonderful RPG's available on the market and even those available at the time, this is quite the statement to be making. Why do people think so highly of Final Fantasy 6? What makes it stand out from the rest of the pack. Here are just a few of the key traits that makes this game such a deeply-felt classic.
1. Every Character is the Protagonist
When the Final Fantasy team started out with Final Fantasy 6, they wanted to evolve what they had started with 4. In 4, they made dramatic and interesting characters but many felt like side characters while Cecil was undoubtedly the central focus. It worked well for that story but what if they could make a story where the central protagonist simply didn't exist. Instead, every character had an equal level of importance to the story.
All Final Fantasy games have had their memorable moments. Final Fantasy's Mt. Gulag (or whatever translation you'd prefer) sticks out in my mind along with Final Fantasy IV's trip to the moon but Final Fantasy VI was the first to really nail these moments. These are moments where the gameplay shifts just enough to give you this run-and-gun feel that sticks with you. Moments like the Ghost Train, crashing through the imperial base on Magitek Armor, saving Cyan from the dream world, etc. These moments are frequent and greatly loved. They break up the games pacing just enough to keep you coming back for more.
While this isn't a huge draw for me as the fan translations have been very high quality, we have to bring ourselves back to the US in 1994. This is only our third Final Fantasy game and the past two have pretty much sucked. Lines ranging from "You have legs!" to "Wow! You noble looking!" were all over both of these games and they were a huge barrier for English-speaking fans to get really invested in the stories. Final Fantasy III finally had an English-speaking translator who was able to not only convert the lines to English but make them make sense in our context.
This is a huge one that plays along with the first point. Each character fights very differently. Not only do they each represent a different job, as I mentioned above, but they each have a different fighting option available for each move. These moves rarely cost MP and are unique to each character. Sabin, my personal favorite, uses Blitz. Blitz involves activating the move, entering a series of commands usually referencing Street Fighter II, and then activating again to use an attack. These attacks range from blasting a single enemy with a kamehameha to healing your entire party. Celes has the move Runic which makes her use a turn to act as a sort of magical lightning rod, absorbing any magic attacks thrown at the party until her next move. Shadow uses the Ninja's throw, Cyan has a series of progressively stronger moves you can use by waiting for a bar to fill... These are often intentionally more powerful attacks that cost nothing so that the player spends less time hitting Fight over and over again and more time considering his/her moves carefully.
1. Every Character is the Protagonist
055.png) |
| Sorry, Sabin. We brake for no man! |
Final Fantasy IV lacked a strong level of connection to any of the side characters because, frankly, they died too often. Final Fantasy V lacked any sort of meaningful development after the beginning of World 2 and the job system, while a lot of fun, made all the characters interchangeable. Final Fantasy VI eliminates the job system but gives a large cast of central characters representing the different jobs as a way of making up for this. They also don't kill them every other scene which helps. Combine that with frequent character development, fleshed out backstories and some great dialogue and you've got a great foundation for the game.
2. Strong Set Piece Moments
051.png) |
| Gundam's got nothin' on me. |
Set pieces are hard in games, especially ones with open worlds but Final Fantasy VI really got these right and it's all the better for it.
3. Good Translations
001.png) |
| I paid $50 bucks for this game so they'd better! |
It may seem like a small thing but that emotional connection to the story is a fragile thing and when lost, it seriously hampers the enjoyment of a game. With a storyline as hard-hitting as this (for the time), the translations were a requirement and they got it right (for the most part).
4. Differing Battle Styles
048.png) |
| Blitz: Easily the greatest special move EVER! |
This is my personal favorite change that Final Fantasy VI makes. While it later will evolve, along with desperation attacks, into the Limit Break system, none of the games I played have quite hit the pure note that VI has with this system.
Just to give an update on my progress, I am in the World of Ruin, plodding through the overwhelming number of side quests available. My guys are all around level 35 and most have completed their side-quests. I have yet to defeat the 8 dragons (have only taken down the ice dragon in Narsche), need to get Gogo, have several Espers I haven't gotten yet and still need to find Shadow, Strago and Locke.
Game on!
Monday, February 24, 2014
A Brief Return to the Present
I just finished reading this editorial from Gamespot entitled, How to Fix Final Fantasy: (http://www.gamespot.com/articles/how-to-fix-final-fantasy/1100-6417822/). I want to thank Kevin VanOrd for his writing but I have some things to say in response to this.
The main thing I noticed is that this article states very few, if any, concrete methods for "fixing" Final Fantasy, however, it did raise some interesting points that are worthy of elaboration. The focus, for one, and I'm not talking about Final Fantasy XIII's focus. Toriyama, the XIII trilogy's director, showed that he had a lack of understanding regarding not only Final Fantasy design but game design as a whole when interviewed regarding the XIII trilogy. He would frequently bring up other games and talk about what needed to be fixed with Final Fantasy by referencing things like the graphics and action gameplay.
I'm not saying there isn't any room for cross-genre research, certainly not. Gearbox Software showed that this can be used to tremendous effect with their hit Borderlands series. Cliff Bleszinski, of Gears of War fame, stated, with a certain degree of truth, that the future of shooters is RPGs. Even hits like Call of Duty have shown a willingness to incorporate character progression, inventory management and class customization into their games, all clear ideas brought over from the RPG genre.
Toriyama did learn some successful lessons from this approach in reverse, as well. The fast paced fighting structure of Final Fantasy XIII was highly lauded and with good reason. It was a lot of fun to play and battles could become quite frenetic, especially in the major boss fights. This type of gameplay shake-up is exactly the type of thing that makes a Final Fantasy game what it is
It was the other comments made that are concerning. Very rarely did Toriyama ever talk about the storyline or the characters, other than Lightning. Yes, gameplay is very important and many games show that gameplay can supercede a strong storyline as long as it is fun enough. RPG's cannot follow this path. RPG's, by their very nature, require a strong storyline and, more importantly, interesting characters. Why role play a boring character going through events that you don't care about? What's the point? This is the lesson that Toriyama required and that Nomura will hopefully learn.
VanOrd mentions that making relatable characters is important to the series but he talks more about how boring Lightning is than talking about what should be done with Final Fantasy. As any writer will be able to tell you, the most important thing to a storyline is strong characters. Honestly, strong characters can make a boring plot into an enjoyable adventure. Let's look at the classic Final Fantasy games. Was there really anything all that interesting about the overall plots, minus the characters? Every Final Fantasy game is either save the world or overthrow a corrupt government. There is very little deviation. The important aspect about these games are the characters that make you care about what's going on.
This is one reason why I have a lot of hope for Final Fantasy XV. Nomura has shown himself to be a master of characterization. Kingdom Hearts has one of the most overblown, ridiculously convoluted plots in all of gaming history, even taking Metal Gear Solid into account. There are more spin-offs than main series titles. The gameplay is repetitive and often quite derivative. What makes people so enthralled with this magical series is the progression of Sora, Riku and Kairi. Sora's innocence against an otherwise dark world is inspiring and his almost child-like love for Kairi makes even the coldest of hearts melt. Riku's struggle against his fall into darkness shows a strength of will and determination that is admirable and plays a nice balance between brooding and sympathetic. He represents the difficulty of finding what is the "right" path in a world that rarely remains black and white. Even many of the side characters like Axel, Namine, Aqua, Terra and many others show complexity of character beyond what the game may have you believe at first glance.
Many people have been talking about what defines Final Fantasy in recent years. Many comments online talk about the XIII trilogy not being "true" Final Fantasy games but what makes a "true" Final Fantasy game? Is it the chocobos and moogles as Kevin seems skeptical to accept? Maybe it's the airships or Cid who make an appearance in almost every title? Of course not. These things are superficial items that tie an otherwise disparate series together. The true heart of Final Fantasy lies in it's constant desire to innovate gameplay and its ability to create fascinating characters. Final Fantasy XIII succeeded in the first but failed miserably in the second. Every character in XIII is a stereotype and nothing more. Lightning was even announced to be a female version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII. Snow was the closest they got to having a deep character but he was unable to penetrate beyond his dangerous obsession with Serah. Hope was mad about his Mom's death, Sazh was worried about his kid, Vanille wanted to hide her secret (seriously, who didn't see this coming?), and Fang was Vanille with a mommy complex. Characters cannot be so simple as to be summarized in a couple of words. There needs to be more to them than that. The storyline should be important to the characters but they need to have motivations and goals beyond simply what's happening in the here and now.
While I have a lot of hope for XV, it's far from a sure thing. As VanOrd mentioned, Square Enix seems far too concerned about reaching a large audience and not as concerned about making something that people will love. They are what network television in the US is to the cable networks. Appealing to everyone ends up appealing to nobody. They need to return to their roots and make the game they want to play, not the game they think everyone else wants to play. They need to capture the storyline that touches their hearts, not what they think will resonate with the greatest number of people. Passion for your art will inspire passion in others. Sterility will come across as corporate and bland. So far, though, they are innovating the gameplay by melding Final Fantasy XIII with Nomura's Kingdom Hearts series, a blending I am personally very excited for. This will bring in fast-paced action although I'm hoping for character development along the lines of Final Fantasy X, the best development system in the series, in my opinion. The storyline, bringing Final Fantasy into a modern setting, is a fascinating twist on the series, seemingly inspired by The World Ends With You, one of the best RPG's to come out in the last decade. If it's anything like that game, Final Fantasy XV will be exactly the revival we need it to be.
Game on!
The main thing I noticed is that this article states very few, if any, concrete methods for "fixing" Final Fantasy, however, it did raise some interesting points that are worthy of elaboration. The focus, for one, and I'm not talking about Final Fantasy XIII's focus. Toriyama, the XIII trilogy's director, showed that he had a lack of understanding regarding not only Final Fantasy design but game design as a whole when interviewed regarding the XIII trilogy. He would frequently bring up other games and talk about what needed to be fixed with Final Fantasy by referencing things like the graphics and action gameplay.
I'm not saying there isn't any room for cross-genre research, certainly not. Gearbox Software showed that this can be used to tremendous effect with their hit Borderlands series. Cliff Bleszinski, of Gears of War fame, stated, with a certain degree of truth, that the future of shooters is RPGs. Even hits like Call of Duty have shown a willingness to incorporate character progression, inventory management and class customization into their games, all clear ideas brought over from the RPG genre.
Toriyama did learn some successful lessons from this approach in reverse, as well. The fast paced fighting structure of Final Fantasy XIII was highly lauded and with good reason. It was a lot of fun to play and battles could become quite frenetic, especially in the major boss fights. This type of gameplay shake-up is exactly the type of thing that makes a Final Fantasy game what it is
It was the other comments made that are concerning. Very rarely did Toriyama ever talk about the storyline or the characters, other than Lightning. Yes, gameplay is very important and many games show that gameplay can supercede a strong storyline as long as it is fun enough. RPG's cannot follow this path. RPG's, by their very nature, require a strong storyline and, more importantly, interesting characters. Why role play a boring character going through events that you don't care about? What's the point? This is the lesson that Toriyama required and that Nomura will hopefully learn.
049.png) |
| Cyan is probably the most one dimensional character in FFVI and still is better than Lightning. |
In order to care about a world, you must care about it's inhabitants. Why should you care about a corrupt empire taking over cities unless you care about the inhabitants that it affects? There's no reason to get upset about Cecil being betrayed unless you care about Cecil himself. Final Fantasy IV is really the best example of this. The main storyline is mostly ridiculous tripe, if we get right down to it. What's important throughout the game is the evolution of Cecil, the redemption of Kain, the coming of age of Edge. These are what make the game memorable.
In Final Fantasy VI, they went in with the goal of making every character the protagonist. There's a reason this became one of the highest rated games in the franchise. The characters were great. Terra was a bit whiny, sure, but her backstory showed a lot of promise and her evolution over the course of the story from weak, scared victim into powerful force for good was interesting. Locke was well liked because of his charm but also his devotion to his love, Rachel. Edgar and Sabin were both great characters in and of themselves but their duality made them classic.
The other imporant thing to have an interesting foil for the main character(s). It's no coincidence that two of the most important Final Fantasy characters of all time are Sephiroth and Kefka. Up until VI, the bad guys were pretty standard fare. Someone trying to take over the world, bwahahaha. Kefka was almost a parody of this, making fun of previous game's failures to have strong antagonists. He was evil beyond a doubt, poisoning innocents, enslaving Terra, killing anyone who didn't fit into his plans. However, they contrast this evil with a clown-like exterior and giving him probably the best sound effect in all of gaming, his distinctive laugh. Even the empire he worked for seemed afraid of this seemingly unstable villain. He was unpredictable, never making his goals obvious. They also learned that the corrupt government needs to be made up of people with varying goals and values. General Leo, despite working with the Empire, was a strong moral guide for the game, representing the good aspects of government and all that people can accomplish.
031.png) |
| A defining moment in Final Fantasy IV |
Many people have been talking about what defines Final Fantasy in recent years. Many comments online talk about the XIII trilogy not being "true" Final Fantasy games but what makes a "true" Final Fantasy game? Is it the chocobos and moogles as Kevin seems skeptical to accept? Maybe it's the airships or Cid who make an appearance in almost every title? Of course not. These things are superficial items that tie an otherwise disparate series together. The true heart of Final Fantasy lies in it's constant desire to innovate gameplay and its ability to create fascinating characters. Final Fantasy XIII succeeded in the first but failed miserably in the second. Every character in XIII is a stereotype and nothing more. Lightning was even announced to be a female version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII. Snow was the closest they got to having a deep character but he was unable to penetrate beyond his dangerous obsession with Serah. Hope was mad about his Mom's death, Sazh was worried about his kid, Vanille wanted to hide her secret (seriously, who didn't see this coming?), and Fang was Vanille with a mommy complex. Characters cannot be so simple as to be summarized in a couple of words. There needs to be more to them than that. The storyline should be important to the characters but they need to have motivations and goals beyond simply what's happening in the here and now.
While I have a lot of hope for XV, it's far from a sure thing. As VanOrd mentioned, Square Enix seems far too concerned about reaching a large audience and not as concerned about making something that people will love. They are what network television in the US is to the cable networks. Appealing to everyone ends up appealing to nobody. They need to return to their roots and make the game they want to play, not the game they think everyone else wants to play. They need to capture the storyline that touches their hearts, not what they think will resonate with the greatest number of people. Passion for your art will inspire passion in others. Sterility will come across as corporate and bland. So far, though, they are innovating the gameplay by melding Final Fantasy XIII with Nomura's Kingdom Hearts series, a blending I am personally very excited for. This will bring in fast-paced action although I'm hoping for character development along the lines of Final Fantasy X, the best development system in the series, in my opinion. The storyline, bringing Final Fantasy into a modern setting, is a fascinating twist on the series, seemingly inspired by The World Ends With You, one of the best RPG's to come out in the last decade. If it's anything like that game, Final Fantasy XV will be exactly the revival we need it to be.
Game on!
Friday, February 21, 2014
Greatest Moments So Far Part 1
Playing through a series of games that's been going as long as Final Fantasy, there are definitely going to be some memorable moments. I'm partway through Final Fantasy VI, my seventh game so far in this list, and have definitely had more than a few. Here are some of my top ones.
1. You have legs! (Final Fantasy)
5. Josef's Death (Final Fantasy II)
Game on!
_009.png) |
| How is this not a meme? |
We're... what? Three months in now? I ran into this easily excited NPC on probably my second or third day into this journey and this still hasn't gotten old. Whenever I'm feeling down, thinking of this line instantly brightens my day. There was a lot of terribly translated dialogue in both Final Fantasy 1 and 4 (the fan translated games have been quite high quality) but this still takes the cake as my favorite piece of dialogue thus far.
_013.png) |
| All it needs is a sun with a happy face |
2. Beating Final Fantasy (Final Fantasy)
You'll have to forgive the screenshot, I didn't realize how many of these I would need to take that early in my journey so I only have a few from the first game. This isn't just about beating Final Fantasy I, although that remains one of my proudest accomplishments in my 20+ years of gaming. The actual moment I'm referring to is when you reach Garland at the end of the game and you realize that this game actually has a storyline to it. Prior to this moment, you kind of just wander wherever you're told to go, killing baddies and grabbing crystals. Suddenly, you reach Garland, and in three pieces of dialogue, you learn that not only does everything you did have meaning behind it, but this is actually a pseudo-science fiction story! Seriously, mind = blown.
3. Fighting the Evil Wall (Final Fantasy IV)
There are a lot of great boss fights in Final Fantasy IV: Dark Cecil, Dr. Lugae, Asura. While there were several meaningful and emotional fights like Dark Cecil or the battle against Edge's parents, none were quite as surprising and hilarious as fighting against this evil wall. Just look at the thing? Sure, it's bad looking but you can't help but laugh a bit. You know that when you die against a boss twice and still find it funny that it's a good boss.
4. Galuf's Death (Final Fantasy V)
You'll have to forgive the screenshot, I didn't realize how many of these I would need to take that early in my journey so I only have a few from the first game. This isn't just about beating Final Fantasy I, although that remains one of my proudest accomplishments in my 20+ years of gaming. The actual moment I'm referring to is when you reach Garland at the end of the game and you realize that this game actually has a storyline to it. Prior to this moment, you kind of just wander wherever you're told to go, killing baddies and grabbing crystals. Suddenly, you reach Garland, and in three pieces of dialogue, you learn that not only does everything you did have meaning behind it, but this is actually a pseudo-science fiction story! Seriously, mind = blown.
082.png) |
| It's an EVIL... WALL! |
There are a lot of great boss fights in Final Fantasy IV: Dark Cecil, Dr. Lugae, Asura. While there were several meaningful and emotional fights like Dark Cecil or the battle against Edge's parents, none were quite as surprising and hilarious as fighting against this evil wall. Just look at the thing? Sure, it's bad looking but you can't help but laugh a bit. You know that when you die against a boss twice and still find it funny that it's a good boss.
+%5BEn+by+RPGe+v1.1%5D123.png) |
| At least he died like a true Jedi... |
Okay, so this is really just a self-ripoff of Tellah's death from Final Fantasy IV. Basically, Galuf gets super pissed about Exdeath doing... something... to his daughter so he goes crazy and lays down the hurt on the final boss, costing him his own life. While in the grand scheme of things, this was just a cheap ploy to add some emotional attachment and shock value to the otherwise dull storyline (a rather unsuccessful one too, since it makes literally no difference to the game. Cara just replaces Galuf with all his abilities and stats right after this), it was still a pretty awesome moment since you get to control Galuf in the fight. Unlike Tellah's rage moment, you actually get to command Galuf and despite his health reaching zero, you can keep owning Exdeath while the dialogue goes in the background. It's a fun moment of redemption after your characters have literally failed at everything they've attempted thus far.
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| Way to undermine a guy sacrificing his life to save his comrades... |
Final Fantasy II did a lot to differentiate itself from its predecessor right from the get go. However, this is the moment when you really know things will be different this time around. A playable character actually died, sacrificing himself to save you from a marauding boulder. I wouldn't recommend trying this in real life since a huge stone boulder big enough to crush four people likely wouldn't be impeded in the least by one person standing in front of it but hey, Josef wasn't just any person. He was the first casualty in all of Final Fantasy. And it hurt, too, since he was probably the best fourth you got throughout the whole game.
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| Join us... Join us... |
6. The Ghost Train (Final Fantasy VI)
If there is one thing that sticks with me after playing through all of the Final Fantasy games, it will be this. There is literally no part of this sequence that isn't mind-blowingly awesome. It's so mind-blowing that I have to make up adverbs to describe how candasciously awesome it is (yeah, that's right. 'Candasciously'. Look for it in the next edition of Oxford Dictionary, coming to a store near you, never). Basically, Sabin and Cyan stumble through the woods looking to join up with their friends at Narsche. If you look at a map, they are going in the opposite direction but hey, they can do what they want. After going onto an obviously haunted train, it starts moving and they see ghosts throughout the train as they try to find out how to stop the thing.
Stopping there would have simply been cliche. Instead, they decide to go all the way with this and have ghosts in the main view as well as the battle screen. Some of these ghosts will fight you but some will sell you items and some will even join your party!
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| Nothing wrong with a couple of bros hanging out with a couple of dead bros. Nope. |
Then, when the ghosts start going all Children of the Corn on you (or Evil Dead, take your pick), Sabin decides to look into the future, channel some Nathan Drake and just book it across the tops of the train cars. Seriously, the encounter rate in this area is ridiculously high and I loved it. Every second I got to use two ghosts fighting more ghosts on a haunted train was another golden moment in my life.
There are plenty more awesome moments that have come up. Going to the Moon in Final Fantasy IV, the timed castle run in Final Fantasy V, finding a House inside a chest in Final Fantasy... But those will have to wait for another time. Rest assured, I will post more of these in the future.
Game on!
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