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A Final Fantasy Retrospective/Rant by Kazekawa - Part 2 of 4

Greetings my fellow g1 members. It's that time again for another look at the Final Fantasy series.

Part 1 - http://screwattack.com/node/8966

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Final Fantasy 5 (PlayStation 1)

*General Game Play / Experiences:

The game that brought the class changing system back to the series and for many gamers outside of Japan, it was the first time you could change classes in FF. The game was traditional in the FF sense and greatly followed the awesome improvements that Final Fantasy 4 made. Speaking of the classes, the PlayStation version had 22 classes to master and the GameBoy Advanced version had 26 classes! The really sweet thing about FF5 was that you could mix classes like have a knight that could use black magic. This system was the base that FF11 Online would use years later.

The game revolved around Bartz and his now famously named chocobo... Boko. It seems that the 4 elemental crystals were used to seal a nasty wizard name Exdeath away and now the seal is being broken as each crystal is shattered into pieces. Now like FF4, this game features more than one "world". In Final Fantasy 5, there is a separated world that is similar in design to the first world. The whys and hows are revealed throughout the game to explain the back story as to why there are two worlds and what the characters must do to restore peace to the land.

You end up traveling across both worlds which have quite a few unique areas including some kind of desert pyramid. Moogles were introduced in this game for the first time which would live on throughout the series. There were many cool and hidden things in the game like teaching Bartz how to play the piano by trying every single piano in the game which also ended up unlocking a bard song.

The battle system used the active time battle system that had been created in Final Fantasy 4 but unlike the former game, FF5 added a gauge that let the player know when it was his/her turn to attack. This system became an industry standard and was used in the FF4 remake on the DS as well as games like Chrono Trigger.

The game featured some very fun and unique ways to travel to make the journey easier and many of these methods have not been seen since. You of course had a trusty chocobo for a time but then you obtained a ship, then a dragon, then an airship that later was modified to become a boat, a submarine, a black chocobo... I think that's it but jeez right?

The ending was original and hasn't been done in a similar manner since FF5. Depending on who survives the battle determines the ending the player receives. This is done in many other games but as mentioned, this was only done in this game for the FF series.

*Gripes:

Now I personally didn't care for this game as much as the others in the series because I didn't feel that Exdeath was a very believable villain, at least not until the 2nd half of the game and even then he is "iffy". I hear about this evil wizard who was... born from a tree filled with evil spirits and he made a half assed attempt to attack the opposite world of his origin. He gets out and goes back to his home world and eventually reveals his plans as time goes on.

So I keep playing and now it turns out that the two worlds were once a single planet but had been separated due to an evil power called the void. Exdeath eventually combines the two planets and attempts to do some last minute bad guy stuff to justify how awesome he is (again, I personally thought he failed as a villain). He becomes the big bad guy in the end and woo hoo, all is saved. I didn't really enjoy the conclusion to the game but in Exdeaths defense, he accomplished quite a bit compared to other would be FF villains.

*Side Note:

The game actually spawned a sequel movie called "Legend of the Crystals" which ended up having the minor character Mid show up in ghost form. The original game is slightly mentioned but for the most part nothing is recognizable from the game. It was an ok anime film but I really wish it could have been tied in with the game more. A prequel actually would have been better.

Yea, I have a sealed copy I bought while working at a library. As much as I don't really care for the game in general, it is still part of the FF series and so I still give it props for everything this particular game helped to do for the series.

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Final Fantasy 6 (Super Nintendo)

*General Game Play / Experiences:

Oh god. Do I really need to even talk about this game? I suppose I should try... but can I really condense 500 pages into a few paragraphs? This is one of if not the best Final Fantasy game ever created. The sound track was amazing, the story was amazing, the characters were amazing and yes, the game play was amazing.

The job class system is once again removed from the series but in its place you are given 14 completely different characters (the largest cast in the series with their own unique skills and abilities. From using tools like the over powered auto-crossbow to Sabin's Blitz martial art moves all the way down to Strago's blue magic ability. The game allowed you to customize your main party to reflect your style of game play. The party size was lowered from FF4's 5 person party to 4 person parties.

Gone is the ability to simply learn magic by leveling up or switching classes. Now ANY character can learn magic by equipping "magicite" which not only taught characters magic that was unique to the magicite, but it also acted as a summon crystal calling forth a badass esper. With magic not being a factor for what character you chose, you could now simply pick the guys or girls you thought were the most hard core.

Moving beyond the great characters and abilities let us now look at the story. You have an evil empire that is literally draining summoned monsters of all of their magic. They then take this liquid magic and inject it into their soldiers to give them the ability to use magic. Beyond the injections they also create a number of machines including the Magitek armor. The game was set in a steam powered era and magic had gone missing from the world thousands of years prior.

We are introduced to Terra who is the product of a summon monster and a human female having done the naughty. She is naturally able to use magic and thus is controlled by the Empire to do their bidding. She escapes the Empire with the help of Locke and the story goes on from there. The story is quite epic with a ton of side quests and things to do and find not to mention 2 secret characters.

Final Fantasy 6 is also the game that featured who I consider to be the greatest villain of all time whether it be a book, movie or game... Kefka. Kefka was an imperial general who was the first to get an injection of magic. It caused his brain to snap and he becomes... for lack of a better word... "crazy".

How crazy could this clown looking guy be for me to decide he was the best villain of all time? Well, let us look at a few of his deeds in the game. He poisons a castle full of enemy troops as well as his own, he kills General Leo, he uses Terra in a test by having her burn hundreds of troops to death, he eventually kills the Emperor of the Empire, he becomes the literal and tangible representation of "god" and thus decided to rearrange the continents while making the sky on fire and the water become blood, as god he kills a town's parents but leaves the children alive so that they can die slowly and alone, he kills many summoned monsters turning them into magicite in a single swoop and he creates a massive tower of debris and flesh to live in. Did I list enough?

The airship in FF6 was truly special as it acted as a flying base. You could go inside of it and change characters who moved around inside, there were also shops inside the ship. The game used mode 7 graphics to produce a 3D look while flying which was amazing at the time. Final Fantasy 6 also introduced us to something that would become world renowned in FF7, limit breaks. They were actually attacks you could do while desperately low on health but they were the origin of limit breaks to come.

*Gripes:

There are a few glitches in the game as well as some unexplained plot elements or characters. Some people spend forever trying to fight a "certain sneezy" monster in the coliseum over and over only to fail. One of my biggest gripes about this game is the internet. Yes, the innocent internet full of idiots and liars. I was one of those people who saw a "list of extra" characters that were supposedly in the game like Megaman or Simon Belmont. I remember one character unlocked by standing still by an ocean for a few minutes and I think it was Megaman X that was supposed to be washed ashore. Yea, it never happened and I curse my lack of thinking skills as a child.

The PlayStation release of the game though is a legit reason to complain. It added some cool videos and a bestiary but stuff like Sabin's Blitz moves became laggy. He'd start the animation and then appear seconds later next to the enemy. I still played it anyway but I really wish they had fixed such problems before release.

I'd be happy to talk about this game with anybody as I could literally talk about it for hours.

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Final Fantasy 7 (PlayStation 1)

*General Game Play and Experiences:

What can be said about one of the most successful games of the series that hasn't already been said? When you take a series that was more or less classic fantasy and then throw in: guns, motorcycles, amusement parks, evil corporations and ridiculously large swords, you get one of the best gaming experiences... ever.

1997 saw the release of FF7 in Japan and within 3 days it sold more than 2.3 million copies setting several records at the time. By December 2005 it has sold 10 million copies worldwide. I remember when there were articles for the game prior to its release and thought it'd be cool but I had no idea what I was expecting when it was released.

On release day I decided to visit a buddy of mine who had a PlayStation (I didn't as I had opted for the N64) and saw that he had already picked up the game. I ended up going home 9 hours later and in quite a bit of trouble for having been missing all day. It was less than a week later that I got my PlayStation and the remainder of the summer became a blank but the one thing I can remember about it was the fact that I never left my room and the only game I played was Final Fantasy 7.

The intro of the game showed off some impressive graphics for the time and followed with an awesome scene of ass kicking accompanied by music I had not heard in many video games up to that point let alone Final Fantasy. The game completely redefined what an RPG was and so there is no doubt as to why it is on the top of most people's game lists.

The 3D graphics were cool but were very blocky which looked awkward but at the time nobody really cared. The summon spells became ridiculous cut scenes compared to former FF games which made every cast enjoyable. Well, it was enjoyable at least until you had to spam Knights of the Round on the Emerald weapons 50 times.

The series remained without job classes and following the concept of magicite, the new "materia" system was created. It was a bit more limited and carried some negative effects compared to the old system but there was a larger selection of materia to choose from than magicite. The characters in the game were all equally epic but I felt that besides their limit breaks... they are all just about the same where as FF6 had greater diversity. The party number was reduced to the lowest at the time forcing you to have only 3 members though they could be changed.

So there is this guy Sephiroth that provides us with one of the coolest moments in video game history as he strides carelessly through fire. It actually takes a movie and some prequel games to actually figure out why he goes entirelly batshit but he is one of the fanboys top villains in video game history. I personally think he epically fails on many levels as he never succeeds in his plans and besides impaling a few loved ones and murdering the very enemy the main characters seek to defeat, I can't think of what makes him so cool except his actual look. He is slick, his voice rocks and he is an all around badass but his constant whining about his mother and then the fact that he runs away leaving you to fight Jenova makes him lose some street cred.

*Gripes:

There are many items that remain in that do nothing which led to countless rumors such as the ability to bring Aeris back to life. The Japanese version of the game did not have the Ruby or Emerald weapons which was sad for them until they got an international version. The fanboyism of the game is at the highest levels and is at times overly ridiculous.

Barrett is your typical African-American guy with an attitude but unlike his other 1980s counter parts, he sports a gun for a hand. Some characters NOBODY wants to use like Cait Sith, Yuffie or Red XIII as they are all mediocre and Vincent's limit break make him uncontrollable which is a huge disadvantage in many boss fights.

The computer version of the game did not work for about 80% of the people who tried to play it. I personally cannot get it to work even today on my awesome rig of a computer. I also had to buy the PlayStation copy at least twice due to discs getting easily scratched until they released the greatest hits version which used different discs.

*Side Note / Bonuses:

Final Fantasy 7 has gone far beyond a single game. There have been numerous cell phone games, novels, 2 prequel games (one of which is a cell phone game), a few spin off games, massive amounts of merchandise and a sequel movie which also did extremely well in the market. While in Japan I was able to watch all of Advent Children on a massive tv screen on the side of a building in down town Tokyo, good times. The series also continued the "potion" soft drink.

I plan to make a blog specifically about the drink so you will have to wait for it and all of the awesome pictures, cans and bonuses that came with them. Yea, I'm a point whore.

FF7 is a legacy that will live on for many years to come and if you cross your fingers tightly enough, they just may remake the game for the PS3.

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Final Fantasy 8 (PlayStation 1)

*General Game Play / Experiences:

Finally a game I can talk casually about as I have the complete opposite opinion that many others have in regards to this game but we shall save this for later.

The game keeps the format of 3 characters in your party from FF7 and stars the character Squall who wields a "gunblade" while studying at a university. The mechanics of the series were greatly altered in this installment and the magic system from the previous games was scrapped. In it's place was a "draw" system forcing the player to siphon magical spells out of monsters and bosses.

Another radical change to the series was the junction system. You basically attached a summon monster (or guardian force) to a character and then unlocked stat slots with the summon to improve your own character. Attaching 99 full cure or life 2 to a summon creature that has an hp junction slot would in turn give you 9999 life.

The monsters of the game "level up" as you do so that no matter where you go on the map, the monsters would always prevent a challenge to your party. The game also introduced "Triple Triad" which was a playable card game. Characters could unlock the ability to turn monsters into cards or they could battle for cards.

The graphics improved drastically from FF7's 3D box look and the music toned back down from the previous games former feel. There is still an absence of job classes at this point but a fairly balanced group of characters similar to FF6 make up for it. The summon spells in the game also got crazier in FF8 as you could now button mash to increase damage.

The story switches between two groups of characters for awhile but eventually focuses on the main party as the story advances. The plot is often confusing at times and leaves you with a feel of... what exactly am I supposed to be doing right now? There is one really cool thing about FF8 and that is the fact that you have to fight summoned monsters to obtain them. This is similar to previous Final Fantasy games but they had much more to say this time around.

Despite a few strange systems that were added to the game, the battle animations are extremely well done and the overall style is fun to watch. I personally love seeing Zell hit a limit break and just go to town Tifa style. Some characters are less used but in the end you can choose the party that suits you the best. I never really cared about any of the characters so I just went with whatever was the strongest at the time.

*Gripes:

Finally, *cracks knuckles* now we can get down to business for my reasons as to why this is one of the worst games in the FF series.

So you wake up at the hospital... yea a hospital and eventually find yourself at a different town and low and behold, there is a car rental service. I rent a car and drive it for a bit but uh oh, I didn't buy extra gas so now the car stops and I am stuck near a forest. Why the hell is there a car in Final Fantasy? Why the crap do I need to buy gas for it?

The drawing system is ridiculously retarded. You spend countless hours sitting there as the monster hits you so that you can give the max number of draws from a monster and as mentioned above, you then use said drawn magic to increase your stats. Yea, just after the first disc I found a golden caterpillar which had like full cure or something and I sat there drawing from it and after junctioning I had 9999 life... WTF.

There is a stupid system of upgrading your weapons so you need to find parts for them. Whatever happened to simply buying the new sword conveniently waiting for you at the next town?

At one point in the game missiles are being aimed at your school and you attempt to stop it. Yea, rocket powered missiles are being shot at you, nice right?

How do you make money in the game? Surely you just kill crap and sell the stuff you do not need right? NO. You have to take these stupid tests to increase your rank in the group that you belong to and receive periodic paychecks.

The main villain of the game changes 2 or 3 times and you are eventually sent back thousands of years in the past. You walk in the final castle and BOOM! You lose all of your abilities except fight. You then have to fight bosses in a specific order to obtain them back, but wait, a paycheck comes to you casually BACK IN TIME. How the hell does that work and at that point of the game where do you plan to spend this money?

There are some cool moments in the game and it is not all bad, but it is one of two Final Fantasy games that I only played and beat once and never plan to go back to again. The other game was Final Fantasy 2 (the real one) which also sucked.

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That is it for part 2 of my Final Fantasy retrospective/rant and I would like to remind everyone that all of this is solely my opinion and is not exactly fact. I left a lot of things out of the retrospective but if you really wanted details, this would become part 2 of 20 so be thankful I kept it like this =p.

To anybody who actually read it all, I offer 1/10th of my body fat to you.

Average: 4.6 (16 votes)

xD

Kefka FTW! Bwa ha ha

FFV

I personally dunno why everyone hates on FF V, i think its one of the better ones (better then 2 3 8 and 10-2 anyways) imho. Maybe I'm just a fan of character classes > fixed character classes.

Oh I agree

FF5 is much better than the real 2, real 3, 8, 10 and 10-2 but I still didn't really connect with the game. None of the characters really caught my interest and I didn't care for the main boss at all. It's an ok FF but its doesn't make the top 5 list.

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FF VII and FF VIII

Hell yeah i loved those two games!

good job dude

ah... the infamous car and

ah... the infamous car and money system from FFVIII... I had a feeling you were gonna speak on those. I honestly don't know what they were thinking when they implemented them in the game.

And yes, FFVIII was not "that bad" , but i think it failed due to all of the hype surrounding it, and all of the success FFV7 achieved. It just left you with the feeling of, "Is this all that they were able to come up with?" .

I remember after playing the game I was really disappointed, and i never touched it since '99 .

Great job once again. It was a great read

Same here buddy

Thank god they made FF9 which restored my faith in the series. I'm looking forward to talking about that next week.

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FF8

In Final Fantasy 8 you dont wake up in a hospital, its the school nurses office. Because your character got beat up in a sissy Gun Sword fight with some Bully. How BAD ASS is that? Also the gun sword was the dumbest weapon in Final Fantasy History.. Well next to the guy who throws volleyballs at enemies. Yeah that game sucked.

Lawl

More or less yea, lol. It was the nurse office, you are right but when I first saw it and all the tech I just sighed to myself.

Final Fantasy 7 found a way to bring guns and tech into the series without making people turn away. FF8 went way to far and threw away the traditional game play which is why is caused bad reactions.

Yes, the volley ball guy (WaKKA) for the lose.

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FF7, FF8 & FF9

FF7 brought futuristic Sci-Fi elements to the Final Fantasy series (although futuristic elements such as robots and hi-tek buildings existed in past games but they were very few) and FF8 brought a modern present time technology feeling to the series.

FF9 brought back the wonderful epic fantasy feeling and by my account, it is the best FF game of them all story wise, music wise, gameplay wise and graphic wise. (yeah, graphic wise as well... although it was on the PS1 I like the graphics better than newer games, believe it or not)
I'm looking forward to your next review which will include FF9.:)

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Agreed

I completely agree with you. FF9 was one of if not the best FF game. I personally replay it more than most of the FF games. I love the style and coloring in particular. Exploring the game and finding the occasional (!) items also made it fun to spend extra time searching.

As for the Moogle Post below, yes they were also in FF7 as well as other FF games. We were just discussing their origin which ended up with me listing a few games they were present in. I am glad the FF community here is so strong.

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FF9 characters

Another thing that I might neglected mentioning about FF9 is that the characters there are the most diverse and interesting in all the series in my opinion.
Steiner is my favourite FF character and I also like Vivi a lot.
But hey, I will wait for your next review.
I will probably have more things to say in the comments about FF9.

Yeah, there are more than a few g1s here that are fans of FF and it is always nice to meet another FF fan.:)

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Oh dude,

Do you remember the love letter? That was goddamn hilarious!

Or when Steiner and Beatrix are fighting back to back against endless swarms of baddies?

Or the ending sequence?

Ahh, goddamn it. It's making me all gushy again. I'll have to replay it soon.

FF9, easily my favourite FF and definitely the best characters of the whole series. Especially after the horrible FF8 cast.

I sure remember all those great moments from FF9

I sure remember all those great moments from FF9.:)
I just finished the game for the 2nd time a few months ago and I realized how much I missed the game.

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Paychecks?

In FFVIII you got paychecks? Were they high? Anyway, this was a cool read! I need to play Final Fantasy V again. I got so close to the end last time, but I had to level up like mad and got sick of it. Yeah, Exdeath is retarded.

Oh and I loved how you dislike Sephiroth. I don't think he's a good bad-guy either. Whines almost as much as Titus.

I've never played...

any of the 3D Final Fantasies, so I can't really judge this to the fullest extent, but from what I can see it is very informative and well written. I can't believe the mods missed this for a top post!

Nice job

Good job as ever mate. I would have to say that i feel a little more credit should be given to 8 althogh prob not the best FF you have to admire the bravery somewhat of SE for attempting something different. Didn't quite work out hence FF9 which i look forward to your opinions on. I hope that soon i can get my Opinions to all the FF games on here so you can have a look. Keep it up mate.

Appreciated

Thanks everyone for your comments. Yea I was really happy how this version came out but when you are talking about FF6 and FF7 it is fairly easy =D.

FF8 does earn some props and as for the paychecks question they were enough high to be silly.

Look forward to the next edition in a week.

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my thoughts...

FFV:
When I first played the game on PSX, I had a blast! That was until my older brother got his hands on it and would play it so often that I never really got a turn, and eventually got bored of looking at it. I plan on playing it again someday, maybe on the GBA on my Gameboy Player. That might be fun...

FFVI:
I was not and am still not into this game NEARLY as much as everyone else. I've been playing the game since I was a kid (have never completed it) and struggle to really get into it. I love the music, graphics, gameplay, story...well...yeah it's okay I guess. The atmosphere is what gets me. I'm not big on FANTASY settings. It's just hard for me to enjoy them, I'm unsure of why. Every FF before this didn't feel as flooded with the fantasy driven atmosphere as this one felt to me. I do plan on playing one day though.

FFVII:
It's okay, not the best, a bit over rated, but a good game.

FFVIII:
I HATE this game, it makes me want to kill myself! Okay, not literally, but I thought the Nerd's quote would work good here. The music and presentation of the game are amazing, and the graphics are decent. The gameplay and story were boring as hell to me though.

Another AWESOME blog, I cannot WAIT until the next part. Keep'em coming!

- Drew

Well that would explain it

"I'm not big on FANTASY settings. It's just hard for me to enjoy them, I'm unsure of why."

Well then yes, you would have a hard time playing a game called Final FANTASY then =p.

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Agreed.

I first got into the series because my father and two older brothers were playing the original NES game. After FF4 (known as FF2 back then) I was able to get more into the games.

I don't like the fantasy or sci-fi genre, but if the game is good enough and has a good enough story I can really get into it.

Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy X are probably my favorite FF games.

- Drew

I keep hearing about g1s whose parents played video games

I keep hearing more and more about g1s whose parents played video games in the past.
My folks hadn't played video games in the past (and don't play them today).
I guess it makes me feel quite old.:)
I'm 29.

Btw, I like Fantasy more than Sci-Fi, that's why I enjoyed games like FF9 and the earlier FF games more than, say, FF7 and FF8.

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Weren't moogles

Weren't moogles first introduced in Final Fantasy 2?

Ouch.

Actually it was Final Fantasy 3, my bad on the wording. They appeared in 5, 6, 9 and so on as well but FF 3 was the origin of them though their first appearance was seen in FF6 outside Japan. I will correct this after the blog is taken off the top blog list.

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Oh

Oh i got those 2 mixed up. BTW i think you should have mentioned in FF5 that Galuf was the first FF character to die in the line of duty.

Indeed

Though many other characters in your party died in 2. Every 4th member that joined and including key people like Cid died. FF5 was a shocker though having somebody that had been with you for most of the game to suddenly die.

When I am able to, I'll add it in.

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Moogles made somewhat of an appearance in FF7 as well

Moogles made somewhat of an appearance in FF7 as well.
There is a moogle riding on the Chocobo when you summon it and You can play a game called "Mog House" in the gold saucer.
Grant you it's true that the Moogles theirselves didn't made an actual interactive appearance in the game.

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Cait Sith's Robot Steed

Doesn't count? Seriously, was he not totally out of place in the whole 'serious atmosphere' they had going in the game? Conservationism/Terrorism, Amoral Conglomerates/Mutated Psychopaths, Reincarnation (for everybody except Sephiroth I suppose.)

And then a giant robotic Mog, being ridden by a cat with a megaphone. A cat which may or may not also be a robot and both of which are somehow controlled over vast distances by a badguy turned good who obviously manages to work his job and quest with your party, sun-up to sun-down.

Goddamn you Cait Sith.

The most perfect description I have ever heard

You summed it up perfectly. I never use Cait Sith simply out of principle. Reeve is a nice guy and all but that stupid cat and doll messed up the atmosphere 6 ways from Sunday. Oh no Aeris is dead! Cait Sith pats Cloud on the back. "There there buddy it's all good..." *shudder*

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Is that what Cait Sith tell Cloud after the famous scene?

Is that what Cait Sith tell Cloud after the famous Sephiroth killing Aeris scene if He is in your party?
I don't remember if he was in my party when I got to this part and I played the game 3 times.

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No no

Extreme sarcasm. You simply cannot take a large mog doll with a robot cat on top seriously no matter what he says.

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FFVIII

Personally I liked FF8. It's definitely flawed especially the draw system which I didn't grasp totally but still made it through the game I just had to use summons a lot more.
The summon animations in the game was fairly insane, after a while I would change the channel on my tv so I didn't have to sit through another animation.
Some of the characters like Zell, Selphie and Irvine were weak to me, cliche and with little personality or growth. The story was also a bit messy and had some parts where I thought "that's weak.". Overall though I'd give it a 7 or 8, the card game in it was superb and I spent many hours on it.

Nice blog

This is a very well written blog. Gratz.

A few comments (discussion points):

I really like the money system in 8. It was a very good take on the "gold pops out of wolf's tummy" system of previous games, which has always been somewhat unrealistic. Also, you can spend the money on items and then transmute them to magic with GF's (so you don't have to draw as much) :S I also never got bored farming draws either hehe. The characters were rather shallow, though. Square probably did do too good a job imitating the shonen mangas (they are the game's plot inspiration from what I understand) in that regard.

I have played through over half of 5 three times, never to finish. I have never been engaged enough by anything going on in it to keep me playing. At least 8 was able to keep me interested with all its wonderful images (The art direction is quite good, set a standard for later games)

Good blog!

FFT?

Great blog but... before you go on ah... where's Final Fantasy Tactics?

FFT's a Final Fantasy game too... or... well... it might be more closely related to Tactics Ogre than Final Fantasy, but it still has the FF stamp in it's title.

Or are you just going to leave that for last and do all the spinoffs like the Chocobo games, Mystic Quest, and Vagrant Story (The second in the Ivalice series I believe.)

Yes surfing pik

As stated in part 1 of my reviews, part 4 will include the spin off titles.

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Great blog. I personally

Great blog. I personally loved FF5 and FF8, but it was a good read.

Uawaaa ha ha ha!

You missed the most obvious reason why Kefka is the most bad ass villian of all time; his flippin' laugh was awesome!

Correct

You are absolutely right, he had the best laugh of any character in the series and somehow I completely forgot to mention it. I think I had thought of it while typing but had planned to link a sound clip and it had forgotten about it while making my revisions.

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How amusing... is that all you can muster?
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"Your lines sound like something from a self help booklet!"

And don't forget the part at the end of the game when all the characters that you play in the game gather and speak to Kefka and he just tell them that their lines sound like something from a self help booklet.:)

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FFVI

FFVI is in my top three favorite games of all time. The music is what really made it for me. And Kefka of course. I think he's crazier than the Joker. They should battle... maybe square and DC will do a crazy fighting game. heh.

Where to begin..

First off, FF12 is the best selling game, thereby making IT most successful

I, i just can't do it anymore...what do you have against renting a car, that game is massive. I mean, if you cant see through FF7 and it's bullshit then i just feel sorry for you.

Storywise and gameplay wise FF8 was the best game. Did the tutorial make you cry? Did you not know how to get Diabolos lamp? Was Giant Cactuar too much pwn for you to handle? Or, could you simple not figure out the card game.

lol, the same kind of people that try to use summons on Ultimecia, but most of you can't make it through her castle anyway.

PWN TO OWN.

As stated before, FF8 and FF12 are not the best selling games

That is simply your opinion on the topic that it is a good game. Just because others do not share your opinion does not mean people were incapable of completing the game.

I happened to have all the hidden summons unlocked, I did beat all of the bosses in Ultimecia's castle. Final Fantasy 7 was not the best FF, but it was and is the most popular of all the Final Fantasy games.

Let's look at some numbers.

Final Fantasy VII (9.8 million, includes Final Fantasy VII International)

Final Fantasy VIII (6 million)

Final Fantasy XII (5.2 million approximately)

Final Fantasy X (6.6 million

So yes my friend, Final Fantasy 7 sold more copies than 8 and 12. Not only did it sell more copies but it also has 2 Prequel games, 1 Spin off title, 1 full legnth feature film and has sold more merchandise than any other the other series.

Learn to have facts to support your claims.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games#PlayStatio...

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How amusing... is that all you can muster?
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Cool.

Great blog.
My only complaint was that there was no mention of Gilgamesh and Ultros.

Now I personally didn't care

Now I personally didn't care for this game as much as the others in the series because I didn't feel that Exdeath was a very believable villain, at least not until the 2nd half of the game and even then he is "iffy". I hear about this evil wizard who was... born from a tree filled adtech ile reklam 2.0 dönemi başlıyor ve Trkycmhrytllbtpydrklcktr r10.net seo yarışması with evil spirits and he made a half assed attempt to attack the opposite world of his origin. He gets out and goes back to his home world and eventually reveals his plans as time goes on.

Great Overview

I'm glad someone is paying homage to one of the greatest RPG series of all time. I definitely agree with most of the things you say, Kazekawa. The biggest problem with the masses of people who have played Final Fantasy games is that many of them started with number VII. FF VII is a great game, but so many I have talked to think it is the "best ever" or "only one worth playing" or something to that extent. Many of those same people (probably gramers) only played FF VII and maybe FF VIII and then went back to the latest gramer game.

The problem is that new fans to the series, for the most part, ignore FFs 1-6, which I believe contain the best games and the true essence of the whole series (even the mediocre FF II). Thanks to multiple re-releases and updated versions, this is beginning to change as younger gamers get to play the classic FFs on newer systems. It's fine if a hardcore FF fan thinks number VII is the best, but only if he/she has also played 1-6, 8, 9, 10, and 12, or at least most of the FF games. Yeah, and number VI is incredible. It's hands down one of the top three FFs of all time. All three of the Super Nintendo released FF games were top notch, and of course numbers 1 and 3 were excellent with the class systems, too.

And Spoony Bard, I'm glad you brought up FF IX as being one of the best. After the horrendous FF VIII, IX was incredible and went back to the classic roots of the series. Steiner whooped up the competition, and with the great story, combat system, and side quests, FF IX was and still is a true masterpiece.

Maybe Kazekawa should also do a Dragon Quest series overview. Though largely overlooked in the United States and in Europe, in Japan it is the most popular RPG series of all time. I rank it right up there with Final Fantasy.

Alright boys, let's get in there and destroy General Havoc once and for all!

My thoughts

Good comment, General Chaos.

Well, believe it or not the first FF game I've played wasn't one of the numbered series at all... it was Mystic Quest.:)
And I got this game purely by accident.
I've asked my uncle who lives in the States (I live in Israel) to bring me back home the game Disney's Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse and he brought me Final Fantasy Mystic Quest.
Although A piece of cake of a game, very short and not considered a "real" FF game I actually enjoyed the game and the awesome soundtrack contributed a lot to this fact.
The first numbered FF game I played was FF4 (or should I say FF2 easy-type) on the SNES.
I was completely immersed by the plot, characters and soundtrack.

I think one of the reasons FF7 is getting so much credit and is considered the most popular FF of them all is because it had the most noticeable changes in the transition from its predecessor in the history of FF.
It is the first 3d FF title and it is the first Sci-Fi oriented FF title.
This is why it garners much attention even till today, 11 years after it has been released.

Regarding Dragon Quest, I have never really played any of the games, perhaps because I don't like the cartoonish DBZ style of the graphics but I really hadn't gave the games a chance so I can't give my opinion on the series.

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