Wow didnt know this thread existed ;p
Anyways, decided to play all of the FF games all over again (and this time record it for my YT Channel as Playthroughs).
I've finished with Final Fantasy 1 Dawn of Souls and currently playing FF2 Dawn of Souls.
Final Fantasy 1 Dawn of Souls Playthrough:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDA6D72D8B7C9BF2E
Final Fantasy 1 Dawn of Souls Bosses:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL71E49BC0EBBBEBB7
Havent finished uploading them all yet though.
You should post this in the
Final Fantasy Anniversary thread too where we're keeping track of our playthroughs of certain games in the series!
You totally should! I always like reading that kind of thing.
…you asked for it. ;P
I’ll borrow from one of my previous posts. I don't have a central favourite FF. I like to lump them into groups, though. I hate ranking them because by the time I organize them into numerical rankings or Tiers, I end up switching them around a million times.
Favourites with regards to battle system/ability system: FFX-2, FFV, FFX, FFXII
Final Fantasy V took Final Fantasy III’s introduction to the job system in these games and made it a million times better. The music’s great, and the dialogue/GBA localization is pretty funny. But the meat of the game, as you will notice when looking at Job Fiesta threads, is in the game’s job and ability learning systems. The system was now refined, and you got AP to level your jobs up. Once you learned a skill, you could assign it as a subskill while equipped with another skill to try to juggle the advantages of learning many skills that a job has to offer. It was a nice attempt at trying to allow classes to multiclass/multitask, and you could change your sprite appearance and retain some of your skills from another class if you wanted to. This was also the first appearance of the Blue Mage and Blue Magic was one of my favourite spell classes ever.
Final Fantasy X-2 took
Final Fantasy V's implementation of the job system and modified it to something even more special. While I liked FFV's job system very much, I absolutely loved ATB Kai and the evolutions FFX-2 made to it via the Dressphere system. The on-the-fly job switching system allowed for so much flexibility and different combinations/permutations (if you required it) of jobs between characters and across the party to modify the party dynamic and synergy... and you could add those job spheres to a garment grid sometimes separated by stat enhancers that took effect if you passed through them in order to switch jobs on the fly. Sure, you can play with three dark knights, but where's the fun in that? Making things too easy isn’t fun, and you aren’t taking advantage of the diversity of jobs you have to handle. People who say it’s merely a “dress up” game really needs to take a long, hard look at it—it’s basically Final Fantasy V with an all-female cast. Each dressphere is a job and each job gives a different appearance to each character, like how all the jobs in FF5 gave a new appearance to a character, just in sprite form. We got an interesting set of jobs in Gun Mage, Gunner, Songstress, Festival-Goer, Psychic, Lady Luck, etc. So basically, instead of just 3 people in battle, you’re getting up to 17 or so jobs with each character, resulting in 680 possible combinations without repetition, 969 combinations with repetition, 4913 permutations with repetition, and 4080 permutations with repetition. I really liked tinkering with this system and seeing what I got out of it. Beat Trema without the Cat Nip tactic by using jobs that aren't ideal for the situation was fun.
Just… I love Final Fantasy X-2. I’ll defend it to the end.
I like ADB and CTB. I don't care much for the Sphere Grid system in
FFX, but I really enjoyed CTB. It was fun, despite essentially boiling down to RPS matches sometimes. In a way, I felt it was a bit more tactical than other FFs, but in other ways, I felt it wasn't. The player has plenty of time to choose their next action, see the turn order, and decide what to do next. I also liked how Aeons were implemented; essentially becoming other party members. I did not play the international version of FFX, so I'm not sure if there were any changes to the battle system or Aeon growth system to improve either of them. To be honest, though, I don’t like using summons in post-FF7 games much, so on my second playthrough I didn’t use the Aeons unless the story told me to/you did the sidequests.
ADB was quite a treat because I really liked not having to go into a separate screen for a battle and chaining enemies for more XP, and I liked how well the gambits were implemented, especially in IZJS. IZJS is awesome in its own right; better than vanilla
FFXII and improves upon its shortcomings in terms of the license board (also L1 to speed up the game is really helpful).
Favourites with regards to narrative and/or overall presentation: Final Fantasy IX, Final Fantasy VI, Final Fantasy II.
As I've said before, I like
Final Fantasy IX because it feels like an idealized interpretation of what Final Fantasy is. The characters have their whimsical sides, but also their serious sides. All of them can be silly at times, but they all have their personal struggles to deal with. The character whom I felt exemplified this quality perfectly was Vivi. Even Steiner exemplifies this because he has to struggle between his loyalty for his monarch, his loyalty to the country, his loyalty to the princess, and his loyalty to himself. Plus his CLANKING is a lovely character quirk that I can’t get over. From the moment I started controlling him, I couldn’t help but to laugh at the constant clanking of his rusty armour. All of the characters had their certain motivations to continue the journey. I felt like the silly moments complemented the absolutely serious and dark moments of the game perfectly. I don't really like how Disc 4 goes (except for Memoria, because I thought that stuff was kind of cool), or how Disc 3 ends very much, but the rest of the game is absolutely wonderful. The score is quite excellent, and the town design is absolutely gorgeous. Dali, Lindblum, Treno, Alexandria and Black Mage Village are some of my favourite towns in gaming just because I like their designs so much, and the music used for these environments are wonderful and synch so well with the art design and NPC talk.
I guess you could say I like
FFII because I like Suikoden and other political narratives like that? Aside from the great music, I thought the narrative was pretty good. I think it can be improved in some areas (in terms of pacing), but I liked it. As long as you play the game without beating up your party members in an attempt to level up quickly, it becomes less of a chore to get through. I'd like to think it's one of the darker FF narratives, but gets overshadowed because of its battle/ability system. It handles character permadeath pretty well for the era in which it was released. And I think FFII benefitted the most from its re-releases and ports. (Also, everything is weak against Toad. Toad > Ultima, confirmed.)
Final Fantasy VI was a game I did not play until I was 15 or so. I remember when I was little, I rented it once, played it for a bit, and really disliked it. Took it back to the rental place and rented Illusion of Gaia instead. It wasn't until I was in high school that I bought my own copy and gave it a fair shot. I've liked it ever since because the game has so much depth to it in terms of late-game sidequests, recruitable characters, the spritework, the narrative, a good villain, and an amazing soundtrack.
Great Presentation (artwork, localization, cutscene direction, etc): FFX, FFXII, FFXIII, the PS1 FFs
Final Fantasy X stunned me because it was one of the first games I had ever played with full-fledged voicework. When I first played it, it was unlike anything I had ever seen before, so it blew me away. Ending constantly makes me tear up but I kind of think it's because of the Ending Theme that's playing during those scenes; that is good scene direction. The art direction in that game is beautiful, and you can see some shades of it in Type-0. The use of shades of blues and greens throughout the game (fitting in with the aquatic theme of the game) was so smart.
Stuff like this makes for some breathtaking scenery. FFX is one of the few games that my parents watched me play the whole way through, and one of the games that I felt held my brother’s attention for quite a long time. Its art direction and worldbuilding is absolutely engrossing, even for non-players.
Final Fantasy XII's localization is absolutely brilliant, and the cutscenes and script reading were very well-directed (like, the decision to use a lot of people with theatre experience was brilliant). The environments are quite pleasant to look at, sometimes looking like paintings (the colours employed, the shading, the lighting, sometimes it feels like you can see pencil work). I liked the quest structure and the characters (some of the character dynamics between Fran, Balthier, Basch and Ashe worked well to me). And I loved spending a ton of time fighting against Yiazmat and other enemies who have some interesting designs.
Final Fantasy XIII, despite my criticisms about parts of it, is one of the most gorgeous games I’ve played this generation. There are so many places in that game where I'd spend minutes just standing around in one place and rotate the camera around just to get a full look at some of the breathtaking scenery. Looking at the Sunleth Waterscape for the first time (that one area overlooking everything else after one of the cutscenes; I can’t find a pic but people who’ve played the game’ll know what I’m talking about), I just had to sit back in my chair and gasp. So pretty. Sulyya Springs, combined with its BGM, was also just as breathtaking to me. In a way, so was Oerba. SE managed to make the game's setpieces (towns included, like Nautilus—especially Nautilus, and I’m disappointed that you couldn’t revisit it afterwards) and its score so absolutely beautiful.
The PS1 FFs -- I love pre-rendered backgrounds. I’m not sure about how other people feel about them, but when I had posted some of it in this thread before (
1,
2,
3), people seemed to really dig them, particularly FF8’s. I've already expanded a little about how I felt about
FFIX's setpieces; a lot of them were so colourful and very nice to look at while running around on the map (I recall Conde Petie being one of my favourites along with Terra and Esto Gaza when I first played through the game when I was a kid).
Final Fantasy VII has some really nice setpieces, especially in Midgar (Midgar was probably my favourite environment in FFVII mostly because of its atmosphere; the series essentially went from castles to skyscrapers) and the City of the Ancients. The soundscape for each of those areas enhance them and make them more believable. I can hear "Underneath a Rotting Pizza" and see all the metal and debris strewn about in a slum. I can hear "Opressed People" and think of Wall Market. The music for the City of the Ancients in particular is one of my favourite BGMs in that game. It really is a well-put-together game. I played the PC version completely first so I didn’t get to see a lot of the grammar/spelling errors that a lot of people who played the PS1 version found. I thought the script was fun and quirky at times, and a lot of the characters ended up showing some of their quirk (Barret shooting people up while posing in the mirror in his sailor uniform; Red XIII playing football with some kids; etc), while balancing some of their serious sides.
And I miss h3ro’s old avatar. So much.
But I felt like
FFVIII's town design went all-out. Esthar was breathtaking (and its BGM Silence and Motion was great), the Lunatic Pandora was nice to look at, Deling City was wonderfully crafted, a lot of the dungeon designs were nice to look at, but I think I like Dollet the most. The sunset landscape makes it looks even more relaxing and prettier, even though
The Landing was its prominent BGM early on in the game. FFVIII's soundtrack is also quite great. Balamb Garden is also one of the coolest-looking schools ever because it exhibits such a wonderful colour palette with great lighting. Out of the three PS1 FFs, I have a very hard time deciding which out of FF8 and FF9’s prerendered backgrounds I like the most because they both offer something different to the table.
And I’m thinking about it now, but FFVI does some very cool stuff with Mode 7. I like the colour palette for most of the game. But I can’t help but to feel like I want to compare it with other late SNES games like Terranigma and Chrono Trigger and say that I like the colour palettes in those games a lot better. But with that said, what FFVI did with its sprites in using one sprite for both battle and field, incorporating so many animations for them is amazing. The soundtrack, as mentioned before, is awesome.
Favourites to play on a rainy day: Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, FFIV, FFVII
Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is one of my favourite FFs just because it's so easy to get through and you can finish it within a day. And the music kicks so much ass. I enjoyed my FFMQ playthrough from this year because I was able to share it with others.
I've played both
FFIV and
FFVII enough times to know them pretty well without looking at any resources or trying to remember where things are or what to do.
Best soundtracks: Er, all of them? Even X-2’s. I think it’s extremely unfortunate that one of the composers for FFX-2 eventually left VGM composition partially because people hated the X-2 soundtrack. I thought the vocal albums and the International + LM album were really good, as well. The jazzy and lighthearted take in FFX-2’s soundtrack was quite refreshing, and it was a fun soundtrack overall. We also got pieces like
Memories of Light and Waves,
Besaid,
Yuna’s Ballad, and
The Farplane Abyss, so you can’t say the soundtrack was all bad even if you didn’t like it.
I could take hours to explain this, and you know I can based on
other VGM threads. So I won’t. :lol But if I had to pick my favourite BGM from every FF, it’d be difficult. Like, I’m struggling right now. When I was a teenager, I made it a point to try to pick up as many FF soundtracks I could possibly find in shops/import because I liked the soundscapes so much.
This post does a good job of trying to pull up FF tunes I like but I wish I could fit more into that post! Haha.
The soundtracks are one of the biggest factors for me to enjoy a Final Fantasy game. Most of the time, the music is so lovingly crafted and composed in that it fits so well with its environment. They can communicate majesty, silliness, love, sorrow, confusion, intensity and comfort so well, and I really appreciate FF's music for that. A lot of the tunes seem to be easily recognizable (but that might have to do with the popularity of the series) because a few of my peers have used them for recitals (including myself for vocal and guitar recitals) and presentations, and people have recognized the pieces.
Indifferent towards (this does not mean I dislike them): FFIII, FFXIII/XIII-2, FFI remakes/ports; FF4 is starting to get to this point, actually.
As much as I appreciate
FFIII's multiple maps, the implementation of the job system, its soundscape and its towns, I don't really feel much towards FFIII. It's strange. I like it, but it generally feels like once you went to FF5 and later 10-2, it’s just difficult to go back to it, especially since there’s less jobs to work with. However, it’s one of the better-looking NES RPGs out there, and it forced you to experiment with different jobs to get through it rather than brute forcing your way through. I don’t like the DS remake of it because it’s kinda slow, you have odd enemy strength balancing decisions to work with, you have less enemies to fight against in a battle, don’t like how it looks much, etc. It’s just a whole “once you go to a further entry, you can’t really go back” thing. I don’t dislike the game at all.
I generally have an “it's ok/there are times when I get annoyed with it” relationship with
FFXIII, though. Perhaps it's because I've played it twice, thought it was ok but not great on my JP playthrough, and ended up figuring it was average on my ENG playthrough. Perhaps it's because I went out my way to get the game's platinum? After a while, playing the game felt like a bit of a chore, especially when you got to the portion of the postgame where killing turtles is essential to getting money and weapons.
But then there are parts of FFXIII that I really enjoyed battle-wise--all three being in postgame (Attacus, Vercingetorix and the Raktavija x 2 battles). Those were the most fun I had in FFXIII, and I wished the rest of the game had been like that. I could modify my optima setups and try different things with each boss to see if they would make the battle even more fun. When I got to the point where I decided not to use the Poison/Tri-Defender strategy on the final mission, I felt really good about it. Or even against Atticus--when I stopped using Defenders in that battle, the battle felt faster-paced, a bit unpredictable and even more intense. That is what I wanted from FFXIII. It is too bad that I had to wait until postgame or two of the main game’s bosses + one form of the final boss for that kind of experience, though. I have expanded on FFXIII's presentation and why I liked it already. I think it’s quite pretty. I’ve… already gone into how I feel about FFXIII-2 in multiple threads so not to drudge the old thing up yet again, I think we’re fine here.
Perhaps I don't feel much towards
FFI because FFI vanilla was my first FF game and I don't really care much for it. I did enjoy the AE/Origins of FFI, though, but not as much as other FF games (and I mostly prefer the older Fighter sprites from the NES version because of various reasons).
Dislike:
Vanilla FFI NES. Once you play a port/remake, you cannot go back. Origins is much better than the NES version.
Best remake:
FFIV DS for the Augment system and extra scenarios.
These are probably my favourite parts of FFIV DS. Rather than playing through FFIV for the billionth time using the same ability growth system and experience the exact same story again (I've played through FFIV on SNES and PSX
a lot, so I knew it pretty well), FFIV DS brought a lot of new things to the table. I don't really like the graphics much, but that game played really well. Upping the difficulty a little, introducing augments and including the extra story bits made the game worthwhile and increased the replayability factor.
But as much as I like FFIV DS, I also like FFIVA as well for offering a traditional experience in a new and improved skin. I like both of them, I guess.
…I can’t bring myself to ever play FFIV anymore right now, though. After this playthrough of the SNES version, I’m going to be done for a while. SE, don’t release more versions of FFIV for a while, kplzthx.
Best Spinoffs: Hikari no 4 Senshi: Final Fantasy Gaiden / Final Fantasy: The 4 Warriors of Light and Final Fantasy Mystic Quest (and Final Fantasy Tactics)
Hn4S... I really loved it. I didn't think I was going to like it because I was hearing how bad it was from a lot of places. I didn't think not being able to select targets in battle, or having a limited inventory would be great, but these things did not detract from the game to me. FF Gaiden felt a lot like a love letter to older games in the series to me. Akihiko Yoshida's artwork is very wonderful to look at in this game, and Naoshi Mizuta's score hits all the right marks. I wasn't going to import the soundtrack until I heard how great it was in-game.
Final Fantasy Tactics used to be here, but I kind of want to omit it because I feel like the Ivalice Alliance games could probably be its own IP now. FFT was not my first TRPG. I’d played it after I’d played Arc the Lad. I loved the skill/job system evolution allowing for lots of experience with new jobs, and cool extras like a cameo with some FF7 characters. The game is filled with political intrigue with a masterful bombastic Sakimoto soundtrack supporting it throughout battles and dialogue sequences.
Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is a parody game. I think a few of us came to that conclusion in the anniversary thread. The dialogue can be hilarious because characters cut each other off, people talk to trees, a huge golem decides to use an invisibility spell in an ice dungeon just because, a giant bird runs away from you half the time in a dungeon, a guy on a flying nimbus asks you for 10 GP for coffee, your allies just leave you when you finish a dungeon, the music is excellent, the pacing is alright, and you can skip enemies if you wanted to. Oh, and they decided to not playtest a few of the final bosses in the final dungeon so you can use so many exploits to get rid of them leading to hilarious results. I like FFMQ a lot as a result.
I have not played FFXI that much because I don't have the time or money to invest in an MMO at all (not even when it came out); but from what I’ve played of it, the story’s decent, and the soundscape for the game itself is damn good. My favourite vocal song in the entire series is
Distant Worlds, and Mizuta & co don’t get nearly as much credit as they should for the soundtracks for the entire game because the stuff is really damn good.
I have not played FFXIV much either. I’ve played the first version release with my friend’s character for a few hours and the experience was not good at all. I have even less time to consider playing an MMO now, so I don’t think I’m going to jump into this myself at all.
Well.
You did ask for a lengthy post.
