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Never played Final Fantasy

polg said:
I've lost my FF virginity...

bought dawn of souls... 5+ hours into it and really enjoying... and I can't believe that the gameplay is 18 yo... how much have they tweaked it for this rerelease?

FF1 stuff: http://www.ga-forum.com/showthread.php?t=66781

FF2 stuff: Some post Scott made that I can't find (thought it was linked to in the topic above).

OT: I love how both Ignatz Mouse and SonicMegaDrive both said they'd never change their avatars.. :)
 
I thought they really killed it in the GBA release. They just made it way to easy. FF1 was a tough game and you had to level up or pay the price. The GBA versions become a cake walk. Or the first one does after playing 1 on gba I didnt bother with 2.
 
2 wasn't as butchered as 1 was in the GBA one, but it was pretty hard to not become overpowered whether or not you wanted to in 2 (stuff levels up too fast).
 
Start with 10 since it's just as good as the PS1 games but won't look ugly by modern graphical standards. Then you can work your way back.
 
Well, he already started with 1..why not go onto 2 (or skip it), and then go from 4 onward (saving 3 for the DS release)? Watch the natural progression of the series.
 
Himuro said:
For the record FFVIII and IX still impress me. It's FFVII which is fugly.

They're nice looking sure, but I don't think anyone wants to argue that pixelated PS1 graphics > slightly jaggy but other-wise great PS2 graphics.

Red Scarlet said:
Well, he already started with 1..why not go onto 2 (or skip it), and then go from 4 onward? Watch the natural progression of the series.

Because 4/5 aren't really that good besides the Nostalgia facter.

/ducks.
 
um guys... don't need any more suggestions!

playing FFI... and might just go with re-releases... til they do X...XI...XII :p
 
Bebpo said:
They're nice looking sure, but I don't think anyone wants to argue that pixelated PS1 graphics > slightly jaggy but other-wise great PS2 graphics.



Because 4/5 aren't really that good besides the Nostalgia facter.

/ducks.

Your tag ought to be rescinded. If he's playing through 1 right now, surely he can tolerate 4 and 5. I'd think it would be really neat to be able to go through them in near chronological order and see what is retained and new between each one.
 
Red Scarlet said:
Your tag ought to be rescinded. If he's playing through 1 right now, surely he can tolerate 4 and 5. I'd think it would be really neat to be able to go through them in near chronological order and see what is retained and new between each one.
If I do that, I will eventually catchup. Considering that I - VI rereleases have been announced/have been released.

I can wait til PS3 and a FFVII re-release :p
 
How about playing FF? The original?

Most people don't think it's the "best" but it sure as hell DEFINES what an FF game is, and shows you where the series came from and how it's changed.

And FF Tactics sucks. It's a lame rip off of Tactics Ogre.
(Yes, Squeenix owns the irghts to all things Ogre Batle, and yes, they raped it for the recent FF Tactics games)
 
I always wanted to play them in order, but now my backlog of games is mostly Final Fantasy games! Hope you're more motivated than I am :)

I've played FF1 on NES, then I played FF3j, then I got Dawn of Souls, but I just can't get into FF2 :( Is the story really great? Will I miss anything by skipping it?
 
Himuro said:
I'd say IV is good by itself. I played it for the first time a couple of years ago and loved it. However I agree on V.

I played a few hours of I on NES and then got through half of IV on a rental when it first came out on SNES but never finished it. So then years later when it was re-released on the PS1 I gave it another shot after having played 5->8 (or 9 if it was out by then) and besides Kain inventing the coolest job class ever, I thought the story was pretty awful and the gameplay wasn't anything special. At least V had excellent gameplay even if the story was blah.

To me, FF didn't start having real character development and interesting scenarios until FFVI. Before that it was just "go to the x number of elemental dungeons and then go fight the final boss". I got like 70% through the FF1 GBA remake but I lost interest and haven't gotten around to finishing it the "slice slice slice --all enemies dead x 1000" gameplay got old pretty quickly and the only reason I even got that far was the music and nostalgia factor.. Never played 2/3.
 
3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

For it's time, 2 had a pretty cool story, very evil badguys that wind up killing like half (or more) in the world. It is very predictable now, and as an FF game it is pretty unique (Kawazu guy) and a really acquired taste. Usually FF2 is received by people in an extremely polar way.

I like it, but not a lot of people generally do.

So you played only through half of 4? Rescind.
 
Bebpo said:
I played a few hours of I on NES and then got through half of IV on a rental when it first came out on SNES but never finished it. So then years later when it was re-released on the PS1 I gave it another shot after having played 5->8 (or 9 if it was out by then) and besides Kain inventing the coolest job class ever, I thought the story was pretty awful and the gameplay wasn't anything special. At least V had excellent gameplay even if the story was blah.

To me, FF didn't start having real character development and interesting scenarios until FFVI. Before that it was just "go to the x number of elemental dungeons and then go fight the final boss". I got like 70% through the FF1 GBA remake but I lost interest and haven't gotten around to finishing it the "slice slice slice --all enemies dead x 1000" gameplay got old pretty quickly and the only reason I even got that far was the music and nostalgia factor.. Never played 2/3.

I don't see you saying you finished the PS1 version in that. 'Gave another shot' doesn't mean 'went all the way through'.

Cain didn't invent the Dragon Knight class, either, Richard was a Dragon Knight in FF2, and the Dragon Knight job was in FF3 (with the Jump command, to boot). RESCIND.

Yes, I went there with snooty-assness.
 
Red Scarlet said:
I don't see you saying you finished the PS1 version in that. 'Gave another shot' doesn't mean 'went all the way through'.

Cain didn't invent the Dragon Knight class, either, Richard was a Dragon Knight in FF2, and the Dragon Knight job was in FF3 (with the Jump command, to boot). RESCIND.

Well, I said I haven't played 2/3 so that explains that :P
 
Getting spells wasn't too bad (I never played cards except for the Siren card to convert) with the various ways to stock up. If all you ever did was draw while having a shitty 'Magic' stat, then it likely really sucked (especially if you decided to get 100 spells for every character instead of swapping them).
 
VIII is an average game, don't listen to the people who suggest it.

I'd go with VI, VII, or IX to start.

well I take that back, go with chrono trigger first, hah.
 
polg said:
I've lost my FF virginity...

bought dawn of souls... 5+ hours into it and really enjoying... and I can't believe that the gameplay is 18 yo... how much have they tweaked it for this rerelease?
You've made probably the wisest choice. I think FF II has been tweaked a lot more than FF I, though by all accounts it sounds like they made it easier on the whole. FF I was one tough game back in the day.

I would pretty much just play them mostly in order after that point, since each FF game brings something very different and unique to the table. Some you'll like, some you might not, but they're all different in many ways.
 
Himuro said:
You say FFVIII is average but you suggest IX! Does not compute!

VIII was unfinished...disc 3 and 4 were godawful, especially the "script" near the end. I still enjoyed VIII, but it was average. The best way to describe VIII imo, is that its a skeleton of a really good game.

IX had the magic of the snes games, the ending was amazing; it was just a great game all the way through.

Also the characters in IX were lovable and the world was much more realized...I hated the characters in VIII (not necessarily their designs, but their personalities). thats just my opinion though.
 
Start with 4, it's the easiest to get into, and the story's awesome
Then go to 6, The systems aren't that hard to learn, and they're fun
Then you should move on to 10, , the system's somewhat complicatred but not as much so as....
3 and 5, my two favorites, but their systems are complicated as they can get. Really fun though.
Now that you've played the best of them, you can play the remaining ones in any order.
 
SantaCruZer said:
FF7, FF8 and FF9 are all ace.
Remove VIII and IX and I'll agree. :)

VIII: Junction system was bullshit, and the
last boss was rediculously difficult and drawn out.

IX: Encounter rate was out of its fucking mind!

Now slap in some Tactics... That's the FF sex right there. It still bums me out that FFT Advance was slower than hell, story-wise. I lost interest about the 10 or 15 hour mark, and haven't gone back.
 
I'm no FF fanatic but it's plain as day what anyone should start with:

94689111041a_title.png


This is the one that turned many of us onto this series and RPG's in general (no disrespect to the great Phantasy Star 2).
 
FF8's final boss was hard? LMAO. You got to be kidding me. All you have to do is cast aura on Squall and use his final limit break. It takes 5 minutes top to defeat her.
 
Finished FFI last night... what a journey... loved it.
now... started FFII... cant get into it. Levelling up is... weird.
I might just wait for FFIV...
 
What version of 2 are you playing? You can level up quite a bit faster in the GBA version over the Famicom/WSC/PS1 version of 2 (imo too fast in the GBA one).
 
What're you having trouble with? Getting more HP/MP? Not sure what weapons/spells to buy?
Weapons and spells level up pretty quick for awhile in the GBA version.

To build up HP, lose HP. Like if you start the fight with 40HP max, if you lose 15 or more in a fight, that character should gain Stamina and/or gain HP. HP goes up by however much Stamina the character has.

MP works the same way, except it's the Magic stat value that your MP goes up by. There are some easy ways to gain both early on, but some people go a little overboard with their gains (4000HP/500MP at the start and other crazy stuff).
 
Final Fantasy 8 is what got me into the series. It's a good game. I had problems on the final boss the first time, but I learned the good ol 'cast-aura-on-squall-and-finish-it!' technique. Try Omega Weapon, thats ridiculously difficult....without Holy Wars :lol
 
I've only played the post-Nintendo ff games (VII-).

Tactics (as mentioned) is far and away the most enjoyable. Great story, character customization, and lots of ways to fight and succeed. Was also rather fond of the art and soundtrack. Good all around, but very different from the numbered ffs.

VII is my favorite still of VII-X2 - Couldn't stand the main character, but the story was alright, and I enjoyed the world quite a bit. There was also a good mix of the whimsical and the serious. Weapon/magic system was a good mix of flexibility and simplicity.

VIII I really hated. The main character was totally unlikeable and having to "draw" spells out of enemies was tedious to an extreme. The plot was surely generated by crazy people and made even less sense than usual. Skip.

IX I rented over a weekend, played tons, but didn't actually finish it. I liked the art-style, but found the game pretty bland.

X has some decent, if a bit overthought game systems, but the world is more-or-less a straight path from start to finish. I never really felt like I could just run about and find stuff, and none of the sidequests are available until the game is basically over. Still - not bad and probably my favorite numbered entry after VII.

X-2 was hurt a lot by re-use of all of the settings of X - it just didn't have the sense of discovery at all. This was hurt further by your ability to just teleport about the world at will - it made everything seem small (and X felt confined to me already). Havn't finished it, but story is pure candy and not very good. Lots of people really like the combat, but I found it too frantic so I'd just resort to attack attack attack rather than actually maximizing my skills. Character customization is lots of fun though.


EDIT: I suppose I shouldn't praise X too highly... I came away really disappointed all things considered. The (numbered) series has been a big cycle of hype/letdowns for me, really. Naturally, I'm getting hyped for XII, which looks to be doing lots of stuff right gameplay-wise.
 
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