Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Final Fantasy IV (Spoilers)

Warning: The following review contains spoilers. Reader's discretion is advised. 


Kon'nichiwa, ToriJ no bideogēmu no rebyū e yōkoso. We continue Thanksgaming Month with another fan favorite, Final Fantasy IV! Final Fantasy IV was originally released to the Super Nintendo in July 1991, and localized to the states four months later renumbered Final Fantasy II since we couldn't get our hands on FFII and FFIII at the time.

The game stars Cecil, a Dark Knight who works for the Kingdom of Baron, but lately the King of Baron has been acting strangely, and when Cecil is tricked into killing a summoner in Mist Town and raining fire upon the city, he's said enough is enough and turn traitor! 

  Fuck the King!

At the beginning it's just Cecil and Kain traveling together before you get separated and meet new allies. You can't name each character when you meet them, but there is a guy you can talk to where you can change your names at any time. I would have preferred being able to name them at meeting and then using him in case you changed your mind later, but I digress.

You start off at level ten, making you immensely more powerful than the enemies you fight at the start so just have fun killing things, until you find out that you killed someone's mother. I DIDN'T KNOW! Cecil's regular attack does a lot of damage, but Dark was just next to useless so I seldom ever used it. Kain is a badass through and through and you're going to miss him when he's gone.

  YAY! She doesn't hate me anymore.

There is a lot of party switching in this game. After you're separated with Kin, Rydia joins your party. Then later you meet up with other characters that stick around for a while, before leaving and being switched out for others. This game actually does away with the four members max policy and you can have up to five members this time. Awesome!

Putting certain characters in the back and front rows is the most tedious thing in this game. Instead of just being able to select an individual, all of the characters in your party switch row at once. You have to mess around in the Order menu just to get them in the rows you want before proceeding. Luckily, once you get to a certain point the game just sets new party members in the proper row they should be in and you can go from there.

  It's dangerous to go alone.

Something I find strange is the way speech is presented in the game. Usually each character would have their own speech box, not share one like FFIV does in the picture above. The first two Final Fantasy games didn't do things this way, so why does FFIV feel the need to? It just comes across as sloppy.

There are a lot of caves at the beginning, and all of them look alike except for a few minor differences. I can forgive this since it's mostly due to technology limitations, and they get better over time. Monsters you find in these dungeons are challenging to the point I find the bosses to be easier than some of the regular enemies. 

  What is this watery substance that fall down my cheeks?

Final Fantasy IV's story is well executed, and it really makes you feel for the characters. Whether it be Cecil trying to escape his dark past, Kain's jealously of Cecil, Rosa love for Cecil, Rydia overcoming her fear, Tellah's wanting vengeance, Edward's losing his beloved, it just knows all the right heartstrings to pull and when to pull them.

You don't get to know Anna at all, but you do get to know Tellah and you feel his pain at losing his only daughter. The same feel of tragedy comes later when Porom and Palom, two characters that you actually DO get to know beforehand, and travel with you, sacrifice themselves to save the rest of the group. You don't see it coming, it's tragic, and it compels you to keep going on your journey. For a franchise that has lately been criticized for being afraid to kill off characters, there certainly was a time where they weren't afraid to axe people like they were Game of Thrones. But it wasn't all tragedy. There were a lot of funny bits, too. Who can forget this timeless classic?

  Wait, I wish to negotiate!

The game knew how to balance out the serious parts with some light-hearted humor so it didn't descend into the mellow drama that a lot of stories today do. Final Fantasy IV also tells different parts of the story through gameplay, like the picture above. However, it's kind of annoying that we have no control over the characters during these segments. Like in the opening act where Cecil was fighting monsters on his own. I was just waiting, and waiting for the game to finally allow me to play it.

In closing, it's easy to see why Final Fantasy IV is considered a classic, and loved by so many. It's a fairly challenging game with a good story, well-written characters, and various twist and turns to keep you on the edge of your seat. If any of these things interest you, then I suggest you pick up a copy for yourself.

Get it.

2 comments:

  1. Nice pick for your review! :D Like many people who grew up in the NES/SNES era, this is one of the earlier RPGs I was introduced to, and it is still, all these years later, one of my favorites. The boss music alone is a contender for my favorite in the series and I was super hyped when it showed up for the Culex fight in Super Mario RPG.

    I also loved how the game brought complexity to most boss fights that was, some FFIII fights excepted, missing from the series prior to it, such as the splitting mechanic during the Calcabrina fight and Barbariccia's tornado. It provided a level of strategy to the series that was desperately needed. I hear this element in particular was greatly expanded upon in the DS remake, which only makes me sadder I still haven't picked it up.

    Probably the thing I appreciate the most about the title, though, and also find among the most interesting, is how the developers really managed to pull together the best the series had to offer for the title. Instead of using the 'blank slate' characters from the second and third games, they elected for the defined classes the original offered; instead of light plot and null personalities, they drew on the stronger story, shifting roster, and character identities present in the second title; and instead of the fairly simple world and transport methods of the first two games, they opted for multiple 'maps', vehicles (though they left out the sub ; -;), and rewarding player exploration like in the third game. Best of all, the developers didn't just combine these older elements for their game, but they also gave it defining traits of its own, such as things you mentioned like in-combat cutscenes and a good combination of humor and gravity in the story, but also elements like the ATB system that provided to backbone of the series' combat for the next 5 games. All in all, its a combination of pure gold with solid, defined characters filling combat roles that fit them as they explore and progress through a believable world and interesting story. While I may like other games in the series more for certain elements, FFIV is what I've always felt was kind of the 'ultimate' Final Fantasy for these reasons, and, as I said before, I'm super happy to see you picked it to review. :)

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    1. Belated response, I know. Thanks for the comment, Rez. Final Fantasy IV was a no brainier for Thanksgaming Month.

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