Final Fantasy IV

I’ll get this out of the way quick: Final Fantasy IV is much better than the first three games. I think I’ve finally reached the “good” Final Fantasy games. Almost everything in this game is done better than what the first three games did, and I can see why people think this is one of the best games in the series. Yet it’s far from perfect.

I got about three-quarters into the game, and thought that this game is hitting all the right notes, without much to complain about. Any gripes I had were minor, and soon once again forgotten by everything the game did right. Unfortunately, it seems as though the developers still couldn’t figure out how to make an end-game enjoyable.

I’m going to get all of the things the game did well first, because they don’t really need explaining. I will point out that these are my thoughts only on Final Fantasy IV, and not Interlude or The After Years. While you will indeed find my thoughts on those games below, each section was typed after each game’s conclusion, and compiled later into one post. I did not want anything to change my opinion on the original, but still wanted all thoughts in one post. Also, just like in the past three games, I did not play the original version of the game, but on the PSP as part of Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection. I really don’t know what sort of differences there are, besides graphical updates, and difficulty adjustments.

While the graphics are great, it’s likely an understatement since I’ve been used to these graphics due to the Final Fantasy I and II remakes. Still very nice to come back to the sprites after Final Fantasy III DS, which really didn’t do it for me. The music, on the other hand, continues to show where the developers excel. I might have been listening to the remixed versions, but the three Final Fantasy games I’m comparing to were also remixes, so it’s a fair statement. I loved the music diversity, and how it fit almost all moments. If there’s any complaint, it’s that most of the final dungeon music was not epic enough, and that the spaceship music was too upbeat and cheerful for the scenes the player knew were coming.

The story, for me, is what sets this game apart from the prior three games. Characters have unique personalities, show emotion, and there’s an epic plot that never drags. Gone are the fetch-quests, the cheesy lines, and “four heroes” storyline. The only previous game that comes remotely close to the story is Final Fantasy II, but even with well personified characters, they can’t match those in Final Fantasy IV (and the fetch-quests really brought down that plot). Also, unlike the annoying character deaths in Final Fantasy II, characters dying and/or leaving in Final Fantasy IV are more sad or moving than frustrating. It didn’t matter if the characters returned, those dying/leaving fit into the story. I look forward to playing Interlude and The After Years, because I want to see what happens to all those characters, which is much more than I can say about the other Final Fantasy games.

The last good thing I want to say about the game, is that I enjoyed the hovercraft and Cid’s airship coming up out of the sand and ground, respectively. I don’t care that this is a reoccurring idea in each of the Final Fantasy games (and know it happens at least once more, in Final Fantasy X), I enjoy it.

If there’s a reoccurring idea that I did not enjoy (SPOILERS AHEAD FOR FINAL FANTASY III AND IV), it’s the last cutscene before the final boss. Okay, so Fusoya and Golbez fight Zemus and lose, which also knocks out the player’s party. Back on the Blue Planet, the rest of the characters and important NPCs know something is amiss, and start praying. One by one, their praying aids those on the Moon, reviving and healing them all, just in time to fight the final boss. I wonder how many people out there know that this scene was stolen from Final Fantasy III? Yes, that’s right, the exact same type of scene plays out in the previous game. The four heroes of light (okay fine- Luneth, Arc, Refia and Ingus in the DS version) are knocked out by the final boss. The important NPCs are gathered up by a recently-deceased sage, who all come to the rescue by praying, which revives the party just in time to stop the final boss. I cannot find anything online to show that either scene was added to their respective game (mainly looking at you Final Fantasy III, since you had character names/personalities added for the DS version). This is more disappointing since they were back-to-back games, and the better of the two stories “stole” the scene. END SPOILERS

Anyways, I have more complaints. But before continuing with other end-game frustrations, let me get three others out of the way, which while minor, I kept seeing the entire game. The first is that the “X” button is used to run. It sounds dumb, but it’s a bit frustrating when the same button is used to interact with people and objects. The problem is such: after opening a chest, the player must make sure to turn away from the chest before holding down the button to run, or else interacting with that chest again (or character, other object, etc.). Very frequently I would interact with something again because I pressed the button too quickly. The worst area was the spaceship, wasting a few seconds by interacting with the controls. All I could find in the menu to change this was setting the character to “always run”, which for some reason I don’t like. A small complaint, but one I wanted to point out due to being easily avoided (there are two other available face buttons on the PSP, Square Enix…).

Another minor complaint. When using some spells like Raise, the cursor always starts on the upper-most character on the screen. In previous Final Fantasy games that I played (Anniversary editions which came out before this one, I want to note), the cursor would automatically jump to a character that needs said spell cast on them. Honestly, why would I cast Raise on an alive character? Or use a Golden Needle on a stoned character? I had the settings on “Wait” so taking my time didn’t matter. But that fraction of a second might matter for a person playing on “Active”. Just my thoughts.

The last minor complaint is in regards to the cutscenes, with this version in particular with problems. This game has three types of cutscenes: in-game cutscenes, rudimentary polygonal cutscenes, and nice updated cutscenes. After watching the opening cutscene, with it’s pretty nice graphics, watching the bizarre old, polygonal cutscenes during the game was painful. Any immersion I had in the game was lost. They stuck out like nothing else in the game, and really make me question why they didn’t try any sort of in-game cutscenes instead.

As I mentioned before, my biggest complaints came apparent during the last quarter of the game, mostly in the final dungeon actually. The first is that unlike other dungeons, the player is well under-leveled to even try attempting to trek through; not including the hilarity I imagine would ensue if the player managed to reach the final boss. I grinded almost as much for the final dungeon in Final Fantasy IV as I did for Final Fantasy III. Let me repeat that. I grinded almost as much for the final dungeon in Final Fantasy IV…as I did in Final Fantasy III. That’s ridiculous, considering I used a guide for both games’ final dungeons (only place I used a guide in Final Fantasy IV besides in the Sealed Cave to see which monster doors to avoid), and the final dungeon(s) of Final Fantasy III are supposed to be much longer (that’s actually debatable). Granted, Final Fantasy III has way more grinding overall than Final Fantasy IV, but it at least gets my point across. If this is supposed to be one of the best Final Fantasy games in the series, and there was no mention of this grinding in any reviews, I’m nervous that this is a continued trend in the later games.

So something that is definitely a reoccurring theme in the Final Fantasy games: final dungeon enemies that become more feared than the bosses themselves. Final Fantasy IV is no exception. I fled from about 90% of the battles in the final dungeon, only less than Final Fantasy II (now those final dungeon enemies were insane). Except unlike the last two games, it wasn’t just due to difficult fights. It was thanks to about 60-70% of the battles being back attacks. Early in the game, back attacks were a bit frustrating. But when the majority of battles in the final dungeon are back attacks, I really had to question what the programmers were thinking.

It only gets better (plenty of sarcasm here). I, like many players I imagine, would flee these battles (along with most other battles in the final dungeon). The further in the dungeon, the longer it takes to flee from a battle. And of course each enemy gets at least one attack before the player can actually get away, three to four hits further in. And, as they should, the enemies get tougher further in as well. The combination of boss-like enemies, with three to four attacks, and the party in the incorrect formation, is a recipe for disaster. This forces the player to either use items or MP to heal after every single battle, fled from or not, and using MP just leads to more item usage later on (ethers, etc.). Major item conservation went on.

This is incredibly ironic, seeing as how the player can only carry 48 items. I got lucky that I brought a gysahl whistle into the final dungeon, or I would have had to make some tough decisions on what to throw away. I was not going to teleport out, just to store some items I may or may not need (turns out I wouldn’t have needed them anyways, but that doesn’t change how I felt at the time).

Honestly, even if I had teleported out, I only had so much money to spend. I give a big thanks to those who decided it was a good idea to have the player lose a ton of gil almost every time the player flees a battle. I can see it as a slight penalty I suppose, but it really doesn’t make sense. Is the money supposed to distract the enemies? Or is the player paying off the enemies, and the monsters have hidden monster-shops somewhere in which to use the gil? I mean, the developers tried to be somewhat realistic by only being able to carry so many items (that failed as well, seeing as how 48 different tiny items should weigh less than 99 identical swords…), yet there was no good reason behind this. It doesn’t matter that I had around 400k gil near the end of the dungeon and wasn’t going to use it, losing 16k each flee was just frustrating.

You know, maybe the monsters do need the gil. They clearly are buying chests from somewhere, to hide in. And that shopkeeper is an awful person. Monster chests are awful the whole game (first time in the series, thanks developers, another “great” idea- one I know does not go away in future games unfortunately), but none worse than in the final dungeon. This complaint is the sole reason I used a guide for the game. The first time I fought a Behemoth in a final dungeon monster chest, and got my ass kicked, I knew it was time for a guide. I was not about to continue losing time due to random enemies that cannot be escaped. Another idea that makes no sense- monster chests are unescapable, even if they’re the same as any other enemy.

Okay, end rant.

You get the point. I hated that final dungeon. I used a guide for the final dungeon of all four Final Fantasy games so far, which is disappointing. More disappointing is that the final dungeon in Final Fantasy IV seemed worse than any of the other three. Yes, worse than Final Fantasy II’s many dead-ends, or Final Fantasy III’s triple-final dungeon.

Yet Final Fantasy IV is still much better than the first three games, hands down. Barring the final dungeon frustrations, the rest of the game does everything else better. Current ratings are as follows:

1. Final Fantasy IV

2. Final Fantasy II

3. Final Fantasy

4. Final Fantasy III

Interlude

Well, that was…interesting. Completed in a little over two hours, the Interlude really was an interlude. I don’t have much good to say about Interlude, besides that it was neat to see the characters again, shortly after the original game. And I suppose it sets up The After Years. I do, however, have some complaints. This should not be a surprise at this point. But only three and this will be brief.

First, the amount of random battles almost seems higher than in the original Final Fantasy IV, and annoying or frustrating are both large understatements. Really, ALL random battles in Interlude are completely unnecessary and pointless. There is zero need to level up or fight random battles. The few bosses in the game need no leveling to beat (though I thought I might have to grind for one, but got lucky on my second attempt). And even if one did want to level up, they’d be grinding for hours, since all characters are way over-leveled for the areas they are stuck in. I understand that the random battles needed to be there, because it wouldn’t make sense for there to be zero enemies in these old areas that once had them. But the developers could have at least toned down the encounter rate.

Though I suppose the encounter rate didn’t matter in the Sealed Cave, considering the player is forced to fight at least a few monster doors. Yes Square Enix, that’s exactly the place the player wants to revisit. Of all the dungeons to choose from, the Sealed Cave was the worst choice (barring the lower floors of the final dungeon). Not much else needs to be said. Those monster doors are awful.

Finally, I have a qualm with the player’s inventory. The player controls different characters in different areas, possibly at different moments in time. Yet they all share the same inventory. This is really dumb, and does not make sense. It’s not like a character joins the party, then leaves, and might have part of the inventory items. That never happens, and therefore not a concern for the developers. I thought they wanted some realism with the “48 item inventory limit”, yet this negates any sense of realism. I hope The After Years is better in this sense.

The After Years

After about three and a half hours of playtime, I called it quits in The After Years. This is quite disappointing, because I really wanted to play this “game”. The overall plot of The After Years may or may not be as interesting as the original Final Fantasy IV, but after having become invested in all of these characters, I was curious to see how their lives have played/will play out.

To give one an idea of how far I got, I finished the first chapter, Ceodore’s Tale, in about two hours and forty-five minutes. I then got stuck on the next chapter, Rydia’s Tale, and accepted the fact that grinding would have been the only answer, and I was not in the mood to waste my time due to a poor gameplay decision (in my opinion). I could have skipped that chapter and played any of the other four chapters, but it didn’t feel right. I wanted to play through The After Years as the developers intended, to see the story revealed in the correct order. More on that shortly.

The pros of The After Years? The story seems interesting, the characters are given depth again, and the 48 item inventory limit appears to be gone. That’s all I could think of, which is really sad. I mean yeah, the fantastic music and great sprite graphics are still in place, but after so many years between the original and The After Years, I would hope something would grab my attention.

I have pushed myself through some tough times in my quest to play through every Final Fantasy game, whether it be Final Fantasy II’s final dungeon, Final Fantasy III’s areas of grinding or fear-inducing final dungeon, or even Final Fantasy IV’s need to grind in the final areas. But this area of The After Years pushed me too far. I quit playing because of the Sealed Cave. I’m not sure what went through the minds of the developers, but for some reason they honestly thought that forcing the player through the Sealed Cave again (for the third time- Final Fantasy IV, Interlude, and now at least once in The After Years, possibly more) would be either fun or a good idea. There are zero required monster doors to fight this time around, which obviously was the developer finally realizing the player’s frustration with this dungeon. It’s too bad they forgot to focus on who they were bringing into this dungeon.

First I need to explain that what is great about The After Years is that the story bounces back and forth between different characters, so the player gets to see the different perspectives of the situation as a whole. I liked this idea, and how the chapters are set up so that the focus is on one character, and what they are focusing on during these new events. Without giving away spoilers, Ceodore is trying to make his way back to his parents, and Rydia is trying to find out why the Eidelons have disappeared. However, thanks to a handful of other cutscenes given to the player (and through the events of Interlude), we as the player know of other plots going on at this time, and are curious to see how those are progressing. Occasionally characters’ paths cross, and timelines start to fall into place. The plots might not be all that creative, but it’s a well written game when played out in this fashion.

The one major problem with giving character’s their own stories is that it forces them to be split up, teaming up with maybe one other important character. Ceodore spends most of his chapter working with the mysterious Hooded Man. From what I played of Rydia’s chapter, she fights alongside Luca, the daughter of the dwarven king Giott. I’ll let you in on a secret: Luca is not a mage. So, if you look at this team, you’ll notice that there are no white mage-type abilities. Ceodore at least had Cure and Cura at his disposal, which I took advantage of and used often. The game forces the player to make a choice near the beginning of Rydia’s chapter: spend what little money the player has on items to heal, armor to better survive enemy hits and pray to get to a save point, weapons to kill enemies before they can do damage, or spend time grinding for money. I chose defense and items.

So now we get to where I quit. I rushed through the Sealed Cave, and fled from every random battle, seeing as how I was underpowered and also had no way to heal. This should have been the first sign of trouble, but I had been through worse in these games, so I pushed on. The second sign was enemies having two turns before I was able to flee. Yet I pushed on, all the way to the last save point. By now I was low on health, had no healing items left, and the two minor party members in my team besides Rydia and Luca were dead. These were two characters just randomly given to me to fight with, yet it was a slap in the face by the developers. They had 100 HP, did maybe 8 damage a hit, and had close to 0 defense. I didn’t bother once they died, since they didn’t help my team. The boss was a Demon Wall. Wow, what a surprise. Even Rydia makes an offhand comment like “I had a feeling this would happen”. It’s the developers laughing again at the player, for forcing them through one of the worse dungeons they’ve created over four Final Fantasy games. Anyways, I was demolished. It didn’t help that Rydia had no summons, thanks to the story at hand. Yet I already knew well before this point that I needed to grind. I can accept some grinding, but the amount needed to overcome this boss and potential future areas was well beyond what I was willing to put up with. So that was that.

I do have other frustrations I would like to point out. I mentioned that I like how the game jumps between characters to show what is going on, and I stand behind that. The one problem with this is that some of these scenes are from different points in time, and it can be very difficult to tell when this is taking place. This is especially true with Rydia, since not only does she have different scenes with her at different ages, but time passes differently in the Feymarch. I like the complexity behind what the developers were going for, but at some point it become too much for me to handle.

Speaking of time, I have a gripe with the moon phases changing automatically. Nowhere in the game is there a clock to show the player how long until the moon changes phases. So while a player such as me may put a strategy in place by using a certain amount of tents to force the moon into an advantageous phase, knowing that it could change into a disadvantageous phase in the middle of a dungeon is disheartening. The game pushes the player to grind while in the dungeons, but the player may be more apt to rush through to fight a boss on the moon phase they personally forced into place. I feel this could have simply been avoided by removing the system of the moon able to change phases automatically. Personally, I would rather they remove the moon phases idea completely. It seems neat until one realizes how hard it could make the later portions of the game.

Finally, the amount of character swapping during chapters is annoying. Over the course of Ceodore’s chapter, he had Biggs and Wedge, two soldiers, a white mage and black mage, and the Hooded Man with him in his party (and maybe others I cannot recall). It just felt unnecessary and annoying to have that many characters come and go in such a short period of time, especially since most will not be returning later.

If what I was facing in Rydia’s chapter was that frustrating, and I did not really have that much fun in Ceodore’s chapter, what makes me believe the other four and final chapter would be any better? It’s sad that I can personally say that The After Years is not a fun game. I think The After Years is a great example of how a great story does not make up for poor gameplay. I look forward to playing Final Fantasy V.

Final Fantasy III

I once thought that during my Final Fantasy series playthrough, that Final Fantasy II would be my roadblock. How wrong I was. Final Fantasy III (the real Final Fantasy III, not Final Fantasy VI) was so bad, that I put it down for almost a year before deciding to give it another shot. Yet here I am, less than a week after picking it back up and around twelve gameplay hours later, and it's done. To note: I finished the DS remake version, which has some differences (besides a graphical overhaul) from the Japanese-only original (but still supposedly harder than the more recent and almost identical iOS and PSP versions)

Writing about Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II was relatively easy, because I genuinely enjoyed both games. As you can guess from my twelve month "departure" from Final Fantasy III, I have mixed feelings about it. The game does some things rather well, and become staple features in later games (jobs/classes/etc.). Yet in other ways it takes a step backwards from its predecessors (my opinion based on the PSP Anniversary editions of FF & FFII). Get ready for another dry post based on facts and observations of my gameplay.

Let's just start with the graphics, and go from there. Being that I've so far only played remakes (and will likely only play ports up until Final Fantasy X or XII, Crisis Core withstanding), I can't really "compare" FFIII to FF & FFII. But I suppose I have to, because that's the point of all these posts. Honestly, FFIII was hard on the eyes when I first started. FF & FFII were beautiful, and I loved those updated sprite graphics. I really wish the developers would have done the same for FFIII. The polygonal graphics aren't too bad though I suppose, and actually looked decent when close up, though a bit jaggy. Graphics get a bit blurry when in motion though, unfortunately.

The other half to graphics, music, is still fantastic, to no surprise. If there's one thing that has stayed constant since the first game, is the quality of music. If I have any complaint in this area, it's that the dungeon soundtrack is basically the same for each, which can get a bit repetative. Just so my opinion is known, I think FF and FFII both have better soundtracks than FFIII (in the three versions I've played).

I'm going to head in a totally different direction now, because I really can't find a good way to segue to this point: FFIII treads new ground within party development, taking parts from both FF and FFII. I'll touch upon characters and plot in a moment, but let's dig into the stats. Gone is the total freedom to build a party however the player wants, from FFII. Returning from FF, are the individual classes with specific tailored abilities, magic, and equipable weapons and armor. Except, now the player can choose a party consisting of any of these jobs (as they come available), level them up to become more proficient, and change at will. A good overall change for the series, yet one of my two major gripes with this game.

During certain points in the game, the player is basically forced to take choose of two options to defeat a boss. Either switch one or more characters to a certain job which is effective against the boss, or grind their basic levels and job levels of the player's current party to be able to overcome the disparity. It in theory sounds like a neat game feature, to force the player to change up their party. It's like in Pokemon, coming across a gym which the current party is weak against. The problem is that, unlike in Pokemon, the player has no idea that this change is "required", and has to spend quite a bit of time grinding just to beat the boss, with whichever of the two options the player takes. Had the player switched a character or two to the job class well before the boss, knowing full-well they would need it (as Pokemon hints at before even arriving in the town), it would have taken far less grinding.

Having the option to choose jobs throughout the game, and change them up at will was a much-needed change from the original FF, where the party is stagnant and a poor party choice could make the game much harder. However, I don't understand why the developers decided to keep the same MP uses magic system from FF, while dropping the MP system from FFII. This was a big step backwards, and really did not fit with the first half of the game. The developer definitely promotes magic use throughout the game, but by using the FF system, the player does not have enough "uses" to effectively use magic in the first half of the game. This is seen early on, as the player must change their party to "mini" or "toad" form to pass through certain areas. Well, without the magic to use (eight uses- two for each character, to change into and then back), the player must buy items in order to change, which can be very costly.

The other big problem that I have with the jobs is the act of changing in itself. Every time a character changes jobs, they go through a downtime phase where their defense and attack stats are halved. The character must go through a couple battles before this phase is complete. This is especially frustrating if you want to change jobs mid-dungeon, where losing defense or attack stats can be deadly. You would logically think that this phase is basically the character becoming acclimated with their new abilities and weapons. No, the developers did not think this way. Instead, this phase is a "crystal sickness", being that the jobs are tied to the crystals themselves (more jobs unlock as crystals are saved). Good job Square, you made what should have been a short and logical explanation, something that makes no sense with no reasoning behind it. If you aren't going to have even a half-decent reason, why waste my time with this phase?

At least one nice feature about the job classes is that magic is a tangible item. Besides being able to use it as an item in battle (kind of neat), it can be un-learned from a character to put onto another character (or even sold). Even more user-friendly, all spells from one character can be switched all at once to another character (assuming they can use them). And thankfully there are only three spells per class (white versus black, summons not included), meaning a white/black mage doesn't have to choose three of four spells to use like in FF, and can use all of them (red mage and some others still have to choose, but that's the point of those classes). It's the small things that make these games better or worse than others, to me.

Such as something as small as a few seconds? Yes, my other gripe with the game is all about a few simple seconds. Except, it's not just a few seconds here and there, it's a few seconds before, during (many here, actually), and after every single battle. It's painful, honestly, having to wait while a battle loads, after the player chooses actions during battle, between animations during battle, and waiting for the "results" of the battle. The last part is a bit comical, seeing as how during FFII, the end-battle results scrolled way too fast, while this game is like giving results to a toddler. It's apparent in other parts of the game too, unfortunately. Bringing up the menu, loading between areas, zooming in to find hidden items, and especially cutscenes. For every five fights completed in FF or FFII, I could probably finish one in FFIII. Ironically, the one and only time I found this slowness to be of benefit was during the final battle, where I could use the second or two between each boss attack to think about how my strategy would need to change.

All this time really adds up, especially considering how much is spent grinding. Honestly, this game is hard. Yes, I understand that it's a JRPG, which typically means that if it's too hard the player can just grind for levels and make things easier. But when the player has to spend hours grinding for levels, it seems tough in comparison to other JRPGs. And grinding is a must in this game. I was not a fan of running fully through most dungeons multiple times, because the boss was much stronger than anything else in the dungeon in comparison, my party included. The overworld is a joke compared to FF and FFII, with no monsters I can recall to be afraid of. So the overworld is a no-go for grinding, needing to just jump from town-to-town and dungeon-to-dungeon.

Speaking of which, thanks to having weak overworld enemies, I had no idea where to go. In FF and FFII, very strong overworld enemies typically meant the wrong direction. FFIII had no direction, and the townspeople were of little help for the most part. I used a guide for most of the game, and have no regrets. It would have taken me hours to find some locations, hidden underwater or behind a mountain I was later able to "jump", only being told offhand that my airship could do so.

However, the developers did learn from their major dungeon mistakes from FFII. Gone are the monster closets, dead ends, and dungeons only traversable with knowledge of hidden walls (barely visable hidden walls still frustratingly exist, but now only for chests). I just wish "back-attacks" were gone. Happens much less often than in FF or FFII, but just as deadly because it leaves the party positions switched and the enemy gets a pre-emptive strike.

Yet even with these changes, the final dungeon was a doozy. Three dungeons in a row, with only one area to save at after the first. Oh, I guess I should have mentioned that saving anywhere in FF and FFII is gone, replaced with saving only on the overworld map. I shouldn't have relied too much on that luxury in those games, because it made FFIII that much harder. It also made me that much more cautious. As I traversed that final dungeon, I was more nervous than almost any game I've played. I was confident in my party, but nothing compares to fighting six end-game bosses in a row. It was nice that the game automatically restored HP and MP after each of these battles, although I was already set with the elixers and phoenix downs I didn't touch all game. I used one phoenix down in the final dungeon, and that was it besides the final boss, thanks to them not being purchasable in FFIII. And the only reason I used any during the final boss was because my Devout, who could cast Raise and Arise, was too busy casting Curaja every turn. Seriously, what an awful game design choice. "You can choose any combination of jobs for your party throughout the game!... Just remember that phoenix downs are limited, so you're probably going to need a healer in your party...but you still have a choice!" Back to my point, I'm very thankful that I beat all those bosses and the final boss, because that honestly would have been over an hour of lost time (even after having cleared out that dungeon of all chests, then going back and saving).

To wrap things up, I'm happy I finally finished this game, as much as a grind as it was. Not many people can claim having beat Final Fantasy III, compared to the rest of the series. And since I have, I believe I can rightfully give a valid opinion on which games are better than others, so far between the three I've finished (yes, being these versions and not the originals). Rankings so far, from best to worst:

1. Final Fantasy II
2. Final Fantasy
3. Final Fantasy III

Oh, and I enjoyed seeing Cid's airship rise up out of the sand, just like in the original Final Fantasy. I enjoy homages.

2013 Games Recap

Okay, let's get back to business. My last post may be boring, but it was necessary. 2012 never really got explored, and I had to at least make note of what happened. Having entered 2014, 2013 needs to be on the books - let's recap.

*As usual, a note must be made about my "rules", which unsurprisingly have not changed: all games listed were played during 2013 (though does not necessarily mean started during 2013); all games were played for at least one hour; games in bold are those finished; those without endings are still listed; finished does not mean 100%, but those that meet such requirements will be noted with a * (being met within the game parameters or having all Xbox 360 achievements); finally, any games finished in a year prior - therefore not my first playthrough - are noted with a ^.

Nintendo DS: Played 4 - Beaten 0
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow
Crosswords DS
Final Fantasy III
Picross DS^

Nintendo 3DS: Played 7 - Beaten 1
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy^
Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan
Heroes of Ruin
Pushmo
Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance]
Animal Crossing: New Leaf
Pokemon X

GameBoy Advance: Played 1 - Beaten 0
Castlevania: Circle of the Moon

Wii: Played 1 - Beaten 0
Rhythm Heaven Fever

PlayStation Portable: Played 3 - Beaten 1
Final Fantasy II
Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection
Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable

PC: Played 1 - Beaten 0
Stacking

Xbox 360: Played 22 - Beaten 11
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim^ (DLC)
Mass Effect^
Saints Row: The Third
Fez
Mass Effect 2
American McGee's Alice
Alice: Madness Returns
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Shadow Complex^
Left 4 Dead 2^
Batman: Arkham City
Terraria
Earth Defense Force 2017
Bioshock Infinite
Borderlands
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Grand Theft Auto V
The Walking Dead
Dust: An Elysian Tale
Tomb Raider
Trials HD
Spelunky

Total: Played 39 - Beaten 13

Well, my original theory that I may be finishing up more of my unfinished backlog before beginning new games turned out to be incorrect. On a good note, my ratio of played to beaten games is no worse than my 2011 year - about one game finished for every three played. Unfortunately, while not shown anywhere on my blog, my backlog bought ratio is probably along the lines of four games purchased for every one game finished, if that. The only good news is that looking at my list of "would like to own" games, there really aren't that many more games out there that I would like to own for playthrough purposes (games for collection purposes, while a very small list, is a different entity).

What I can take away from this list is that I preferred my Xbox 360 during 2013. This could possibly be due to not having to wear headphones anymore to play console games, thanks to having my own apartment again. I also see that my handheld systems are primarily used for RPGs, which is no surprise. Besides those, action and adventure games seem to be another genre I favored through the year. Overall, it's a pretty diverse list, which I'm happy to see.

I'd like to note a couple games and series on this list, as I'll likely post more in depth about them later. For example: I have two unfinished Castlevania games on this list (Dawn of Sorrow and Circle of the Moon). These are fantastic games, which I likely did not finish due to being pulled away for another great game. I will definitely be finishing both of these, and am still trying to find Portrait of Ruin and Order of Ecclesia for decent prices.

Grand Theft Auto V was a great game, and will likely see a post including it in the future. My plan is a very long post on the open-world genre of games, basically breaking down the pros and cons of different titles. These include but are not limited to: Grand Theft Auto V, Grand Theft Auto IV, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Saints Row: The Third, and Just Cause 2. These types of games are growing both in number and in vastness in-game, yet no one has perfected it. If I can get all my thoughts into a document, and arrange them into a worthy rant, this post will happen.

Most of the other unfinished games seen here are on my "to finish in 2014" list, most notably SMT: Persona 3 Portable. Letting this go unfinished into 2015 is not a good option at this point.

Finally I must touch upon the Final Fantasy series. I beat Final Fantasy (PSP anniversary version) in 2012. At the very beginning of 2013 (missed 2012 by a few days) I beat Final Fantasy II (PSP anniversary version). Yet Final Fantasy III (DS version) has been my brick wall, so much so that I broke my own rule and started Final Fantasy IV (Complete Collection version for PSP). I didn't get very far in IV before telling myself that I would not go any further, and that I really do want to beat them all in order. As it stands, FF III has held me back from progressing with this series. This is both good and bad. I know what lies past FF III, and it's almost nothing but good games, which is frustrating because of how bad I think FF III is. On the other hand, seeing all those excellent games in the future is that much more reason to push through this one. The problem isn't the difficulty. Yes, it's brutal, especially the final dungeon I keep reading about. But being a typical JRPG, grinding can solve that problem. My frustration is the tedium with the grinding, and a variety of other poor choices made by the developers, for both the original NES version and the upgraded DS port. I won't go into it just yet, but when I finish that game, I will have a lengthy and very opinionated post.

Those are my thoughts at the moment, and of my 2013 recap. For 2014, look to see more sequels if I post, as well as some older titles from what is now "last-gen" (Xbox 360, etc.).

2012 Game Recap

So a year has passed (almost exactly to the day), and I haven't posted on here even once (disregarding the few "Currently playing/reading" updates on the sidebar). I feel like I have let down my two readers. However, a new year means a new start, and I really would like to post more often. I'm still playing games which means I still need a way to share my thoughts and opinions.

And with it being a new year, that means a recap of last year is in order. But, first things first. As I browsed my posting history of "year recaps", I see that 2011's recap post (of 2010 games played and beaten) really ended up being a half-assed puzzle for my readers to figure out which games were being referenced. A neat idea at the time, but without a follow-up post with actual explanations, left a list of incoherent statements of things "I did". Especially after looking at my 2011 recap (of 2010 games), which was much more organized. So before I continue with 2013, read on for my list of 2012 games played and beaten. This time, the order listed is not alphabetical, but in order played (only within each system though).

*Note - my "rules" for the first year still stand as follows: all games listed were played during 2012 (though does not mean started during 2012); all games were played for at least one hour; games in bold are those finished; those without endings are still listed; finished does not mean 100%, but those that meet such requirements will be noted with a * (being met within the game parameters or having all Xbox 360 achievements); finally, any games finished in a year prior - therefore not my first playthrough - are noted with a ^.

Nintendo DS: Played 6 - Beaten 3
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded
Crosswords DS
Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City
Etrian Odyssey

Nintendo 3DS: Played 12 - Beaten 4
Heroes of Ruin
Super Mario 3D Land
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX^
Donkey Kong '94
Mario's Picross
AlphaBounce
Mario Kart 7
Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins
Art Academy: First Semester
The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords^
Pilotwings Resort

Wii: Played 2 - Beaten 0
Cave Story
Fluidity

PlayStation Portable: Played 5 - Beaten 3
Final Fantasy
Wizorb
Rock Band Unplugged
Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep
Xenogears

PC: Played 3 - Beaten 1
Terraria
The Binding of Isaac
Tribes: Ascend

Xbox 360: Played 12 - Beaten 8
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Fable III
Assassin's Creed II
Eternal Sonata
Left 4 Dead 2^
Mass Effect^
L.A. Noire
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Saints Row: The Third
Shadow Complex^
Dead Island

Total: Played 40 - Beaten 19

While that year has long passed and I cannot remember as much detail as before, it looks like I had favored my Xbox 360 and 3DS/DS, while almost forgetting my Wii. RPGs seemed to be a popular genre for me during 2012, as well as sequels. Something that grad school also played a part in, is this list does not have any Xbox Live Arcade games that I did not already have, thanks to not having internet for my Xbox 360 until the very end of 2012. As a whole I played less games that 2010, however 2012 lead to an increase to almost half of the games beaten versus less than a third in 2010. Adding to that fact, that the 19 beaten games in 2012 almost equals the same amount of beaten games (21) in 2010. It may be possible that I'm finally sitting down to finish games, rather than jumping around through my ever-growing backlog? I hope so, but time will tell.

EDIT - I just noticed not long after posting this that I don't have a 2011 games recap post, and had to go back to change everything to reference my 2010 recap. I do have a list of all games finished in 2011, so maybe I'll add it into this list at a later time.


Final note: as a reference to which descriptions fit which games from the original post (minus Terraria since I didn't actually beat it) see below, in order.

Mario's Picross
Pilotwings Resort
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Mario Kart 7
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded
Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City
Theatrhythm Final Fantasy
Dead Island
Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep
Shadow Complex
Fable III
Batman: Arkham Asylum
The Binding of Isaac
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Left 4 Dead 2
Assassin's Creed II
Final Fantasy

Final Fantasy II

I've done the impossible.  I've beaten Final Fantasy II.

Okay, so beating Final Fantasy II isn't impossible, but some people believe it to be.  The hatred some people have for this game can be astounding.  The problem is that many people have in their mind what a Final Fantasy game should be, and Final Fantasy II doesn't fit that picture.  This doesn't make the game inherently bad, but shows that some people strongly resist change.

I view it as a similar situation as Zelda II: The Adventure of Link.  It's the black sheep of the Zelda series, and receives quite a bit of flack.  There are ways a Zelda game "should" be, and The Adventure of Link, just like Final Fantasy II, doesn't have those traits.  Granted, in this case I believe that there are similar tones and general qualities that every Zelda game should have, and Zelda II falls outside those bounds.  I'm not saying it's a bad game, but I'm also not saying it's a good game, either.  It just doesn't feel like a Zelda game, and it is obvious why many people don't like it.

However, with the Final Fantasy series, I believe people should have an open mind.  I've only played a few games in the series (refer to my previous Final Fantasy post) and know a bit about the others, and can tell you that, unlike Zelda, each game is a bit different and has their own unique redeeming qualities.  There isn't a set standard that each game typically follows (Zelda captured by Ganon, ~8 dungeons, hearts for health, adventure game, etc.), besides being a fantasy game with RPG aspects of sorts, and the player controls a party.  Oh, and there may be "dungeons", some bosses, and a bad guy.  Really, that seems to be what all 13 games (substitute X-2 for XI) in the Final Fantasy series have in common.  And guess what?  Final Fantasy II still fits those characteristics.

I have a hypothesis of why the game receives its hate.  Being different wasn't the only problem.  It was that Square decided to go back to an older style of leveling up, instead of continuing with Final Fantasy II's system.  Japan received Final Fantasy III, with much in the same as Final Fantasy (or so I've heard, I'll find out soon enough), ditching the Final Fantasy II system entirely.  In the Americas, we didn't receive Final Fantasy II until later, instead receiving Final Fantasy IV after the original, therefore completely skipping the unique level-up system.  After we had played a couple Final Fantasy games, returning to a different level-up system seemed quite difficult, and for some people, pointless.  But this is just a thought, and I could be wrong.  Regardless, I want to take the time to point out both the good and the bad parts of Final Fantasy II, and bring up some comparisons to the original Final Fantasy.  Now let's have some fun.

Since I'm already on the topic of the level-up system, I might as well delve deeper into that.  To be quite honest, I really enjoyed it.  The system is very robust, and allows the player for any sort of customization they desire.  And I need to get this out of the way: leveling up by intentionally hitting characters may sound dumb, but a) it makes sense (keep reading), b) I can think of another RPG series that uses it without gaining flack (hello every Elder Scrolls game), and c) the player does not have to do this for very long.  I spent about an hour at the beginning of the game and another hour near the end for grinding in this manner, and that was enough.  I also need to mention that I was playing the PSP 20th Anniversary UMD version of the game, which is significantly different from the original.  This will repeatedly become a point of discussion.  In this case, it is important because the game is much easier than the original (as I've been told), including the leveling up process.  For example, this is the only version that has a "defend" option during battles (not even the somewhat recent Dawn of Souls GBA version has this option).  This is a very nice feature, for two reasons.  First, when low on health during battles, being able to defend to reduce damage is crucial.  The second goes back to leveling up, in that it can be nice for a character to "do nothing" for a couple turns, while another character can go to town with attacks and magic.  In this way, the character aiming to level up a stat doesn't need to worry about another character either wasting mp by casting a spell, or possibly attacking and killing the enemy, therefore ending the battle.  The longer the battle, the more likely it is to level up a stat, especially HP.

And let me tell you, Square went crazy with the stats.  Every stat is separate, and therefore has its own way of leveling up.  This includes everything from HP, defense, magical defense, agility, each magic spell, and everything in between.  Take more damage in battle, increase max HP and possibly stamina (the amount of HP that will increase each time it does).  Use plenty of MP during a battle, and increase max MP and possibly magic (the amount of MP that will increase each time it does) spirit (white magic power) or intelligence (black magic power).  Want to become more proficient with a certain weapon or magic spell?  Keep using it.  Thankfully, while the progression of some stats is "hidden" (agility is still a pain to level-up, as I never figured out how), all weapons and magic spells have progression bars, to see how long until it levels up.  Square was also kind enough to change this version from its original, so that stats will not decrease when focusing on another, opposite stat.  That must have been a pain, and probably would have been a deal-breaker for me.  I could see why that would turn people away, or even make some people hate the game.

But this system gave the player the freedom of choice, and for every character.  While Final Fantasy was neat that there were six classes to choose four from, and each had their particular use and proficiencies, it became a bit boring.  There was never any chance to do something different.  Spell selection was limited to choosing three spells out of every four available for each of the eight levels.  Characters could not equip weapons which they could not use.  Yet in Final Fantasy II, I could play the game however I wanted.  The game presents each character as what they "should" be, but the player can change them whenever they would like.  I could have created a team composed of four black mages, who are each well-versed in the use of swords.  Or four team-members with no magic spells, focusing entirely on bare-fisted combat (I wouldn't recommend it, since weapons, when leveled up, are much more powerful than even a level 16 bare-fisted character, or so I've read).  But Square didn't stop there.

Not only can each character choose what weapons or spells to use, but the player can choose how to equip the characters.  Each hand could hold something, besides the typical slots for a helmet, armor, and fingers.  I love the fact that I could actually choose what I wanted each character to hold.  I began the game with my characters holding a weapon in one hand and a shield in the other (besides Maria, my bow user, the only weapon requiring both hands).  Yet later I realized that if I were to sacrifice my shield and defense, I could double my attack by equipping two weapons, one in each hand.  Not only that, but after a couple hours, I noticed that Guy, who was using two weapons (two different weapons, Axes and Staves, to level up both classes), had a much higher HP than Firion.  It dawned on me that since Firion was still using a shield, he had lower HP, but a higher defense with the shield.  I enjoyed having the choice between what items I have equipped, and how it directly affected my stats over time.  In the original Final Fantasy, my characters would level-up according to how the game says they should, not to how I want.  But in the sequel my decisions directly affected the future of my characters.  I had fun as Firion became a bad ass double-wielding swordsman.  But I digress.  I have much more to talk about, so let's move on.

Since I'm talking about the characters, let's go in that direction.  Honestly, Final Fantasy II outdoes Final Fantasy in almost every way in this category.  Seriously, while the story in Final Fantasy is nice for how simple it was, Final Fantasy II blows it out of the water.  Gone is the party composed of four random individuals out to save the world.  This time the main party consists of a couple of friends who set out to overthrow the Emperor, who has gone about taking over and destroying towns, including their own, having almost killed them.  Each party character has a name, and they each speak, including the main character, Firion.  What's great is that it doesn't feel like one guy with a bunch of friends, but instead that all three characters - Firion, Maria and Guy - are one team, with no one character taking importance over another.  Guy's importance is lacking however, seeing as how he barely talks, and typically only with animals.  And when he does, his English is awful, almost caveman-like.  It reminds me of another Square RPG cave-dweller character at times...

Of course, not everything is perfect with this game, which trust me, I'll point out soon enough.  In this case, it's with the fourth party member.  Over the course of the game, the fourth party member slot is filled with five (I think?) different characters.  Personally, while this was neat and fit in story-wise, was a detriment to the overall gameplay experience.  I found it frustrating to have to level-up and start anew each time another character joined the party.  Worse, was losing a character unexpectedly (typical), and losing every item equipped on that character, forever.  Seriously Square, that's a poor design choice.  At least each character in the game has character, and a role in the story as the game progresses.

Square did a great job tying the world in with the story.  The graphics are fantastic on the PSP version, and really bring out the best in each town and area.  The graphics are similar to Final Fantasy for the PSP, but still different in some unique way.  But it was nice having diversity throughout the game, such as grassy, woodlands, deserts, snow, dusk, ports and other lands, with appropriate monsters to tie along.  This was not the case with the original.  The same can be said about the dungeons, with none looking the same, also not the case with the original.  Bringing everything together was the music, which was also fantastic.  The music in Final Fantasy was not bad by any means, but I got more enjoyment out of Final Fantasy II's.

And once again, Square went further than what the player would expect, and took the graphics and sounds to another level.  As with Final Fantasy (on the PSP), each weapon and shield has their own unique art, and can be seen when used by characters during battle.  Yet unlike the original, Final Fantasy II has unique sounds for every weapon.  Yes, that's right, every weapon makes a unique sound when used, and that's within each category.  A Fire Bow sounds different from a Dark Bow.  A Wing Sword sounds different from a Mythril Blade, which sound different from the Masamune.  It's a small detail, but really neat.  It makes every weapon feel truly unique, and not "just another sword with +4 attack over what is currently equipped".  My one qualm with the art though, is why in the world does the bow face backwards after being shot?  And this goes for both my team and the enemies when using one.  I've seen people "drop" bows after firing an arrow in the real world, but never backwards (which by the way is completely different and larger art, so the artists/programmers weren't just reusing assets).  Whatever, small detail.

I'm going to try another smooth transition, and move from the weapons to the actual battles (I'm trying here).  Pros: battles can be quick, and are fun.  Cons: a handful of things.  I appear to be ambushed more often than not, and it's frustrating.  To make matters worse, there are load times while I'm eagerly waiting to see if I'm ambushed in battle, or receiving an advance attack.  That's right, load times!  The original on the PSP did not have any load times at all, yet this game has load times quite often.  If it's long enough, it will actually say "loading..." in the bottom right-hand corner.  Not just while waiting for battles to start either.  It can also happen in battle after choosing actions for all four of my characters, waiting up to six or seven seconds for anything to happen.

Another complaint?  After the battle is finished, all upgrades flash across the screen automatically.  If the player is looking away, they'll have no idea if anything leveled up.  All I know is that the later Final Fantasy games corrected this, so that the player could see what went up without having to be paying close attention every time, after every insignificant battle (where HP can actually randomly increase in Final Fantasy II).

Let's take a break from big complaints for a second, and look at two spells I think are...interesting.  The first is Teleport.  Cast it to teleport out of a dungeon, pretty straightforward.  However, doing so will almost kill the caster.  WTF kind of logic is that Square?  Luckily I only used it twice.  The other is Osmose.  Unless the player is very lucky to receive one after a very rare random battle, there is only one of this spell in the game (as I found out later).  For good reason too, because I felt like an absolute badass at the end of the game, basically breaking the game with it.  It steals MP from enemies, and it works on all bosses.  And I learned all this on my own.  So I could spend 5 MP casting it, and receive over 150 MP back.  I only had 147 max MP by the end of the game, making the extra moot.  Using this was awesome on bosses, such as the Emperor's true form, because as far as I know, I was able to steal all of his MP, rendering him unable to cast any spells (I could be wrong).  Either way, I enjoyed breaking the game, and being able to retrieve MP whenever I was running low and needed to heal my party, without using items such as Ethers or Elixers.  But let's go back to complaints.

So how about those dungeons?  Those monster closets were just awesome.  I mean, what a brilliant idea Square.  I imagine the conversation between programmers went like this:
A: How can we lengthen the dungeons?
B: What if we add a ton of small rooms to each, with nothing in most of them, and a couple battles to escape.
A: We're idiots and want the players to hate us, so let's do it.
B: Right on!

I'm pretty sure that's exactly how the conversation went.  But really, besides the monster closets, the random battles weren't even random enough.  Out in the field, random battles didn't come too often, which was nice.  In the dungeon, it was basically every 10-15 steps.  And if the player saves and resets the game (or turns it off and on again), they will run into a random battle in the exact same spot as the last time they tried the same path.  That's not very random.  One could argue that completely random battles would be too heavy on such an old game's programming, but I would counter with the fact that the battles themselves still have random enemies.  Granted, I give a HUGE thank you to Square for, just like in Final Fantasy on the PSP, allowing me to save anywhere, and start again from that exact spot.  I abused that feature to hell.  They must have known I was going to, since they added a reset feature to the game, which was not in the previous game on the PSP.  That saved quite a bit of time, instead of having to quite the entire game to the PSP menu, and start back up.

I'm getting off-track again.  Back to the dungeons.  I feel as though the original Final Fantasy did a much better job with programming appropriate enemies to the dungeons, than Final Fantasy II.  In the sequel, the battle difficulty swayed wildly.  Enemies that appeared could range from a joke to frighteningly difficult (I'm looking at you, Adamantoise).  I mean really, those tough enemies would have destroyed the puny ones before I had even gotten there.  To make matters worse, the later dungeons get to be really long.  I'll be honest, I used a guide for the last quarter of the game, for basically the last 2-3 dungeons (the last is basically two dungeons in one).  I used it to find the items right away, and have the correct path laid out, avoiding all unnecessary dead-ends or monster closets.  And even with a guide, these dungeons took a few hours each.  Those dungeons, the length, the monster closets, the awful enemies...were just not fun.  They looked cool and the music was great (Jade and Pandemonium were awesome), but besides those two factors (which do play in a bit), the dungeons in Final Fantasy were better.

Enough griping about the dungeons, let's leave them and walk around the world a bit.  What have I noticed?  The game is just one giant fetch-quest.  The story in Final Fantasy II is much better than Final Fantasy, but how they played it out, for over two-thirds of the game, was really boring and repetitive.  Talk to people in Altair.  Get item in dungeon.  Return to Altair.  Go to next town.  Go to dungeon.  Return to town.  Return to Altair.  Continue process.  This is literally how it went for 10-15 hours.  At least in Final Fantasy the party only returned to towns to heal up or find particular items in shops.  And that's another part that made this so painful in the sequel: each town sold the exact same items, besides spells if I was lucky.  So having to continually return to towns such as Altair and Fynn was very annoying and pointless.  I'd waste time checking to see if shops got anything new in stock, but they didn't until around hour 20.  Here's something that changed every time I came across a town: the cost to use the inn.  Unlike in the original, the cost to use an inn was based on need, not a set price.  This was frustrating at the beginning of the game, since the player is low on gil, and the inn cost is usually pretty steep.  There was no way around this.  Using items to heal cost more than the inn.  Using MP to heal just means a decrease in MP and a rise in HP, reversing the need  and keeping the cost of the inn the same.  I'm crossing my fingers that this feature is not passed on to many other Final Fantasy games.

Okay, just three more random things.  Two complaints and one positive change.  First, I'm still stumped on why Square decided that to access the map, the player needs to simultaneously press the O and Select buttons.  Unless I'm holding the PSP incorrectly, this takes two hands, which is cumbersome.  I don't understand why not just set it to the Select button, which is an unused button in the game?  It's not like I would accidentally press it, since my fingers or hand is nowhere near the Select button on the PSP.  Ever.

After I finished the game, Souls of Rebirth opened up.  My friend had told me that since I am planning on playing through both The Interlude and The After Years in Final Fantasy IV, that I should also "require" myself to play through Crisis Core.  If those two "sidequests" are part of Final Fantasy IV, then Crisis Core is just as important to Final Fantasy VII.  I may agree, but also felt that if that's true, I should also "require" myself to play through Souls of Rebirth, an add-on story to Final Fantasy II, explaining some other events and tying up some loose ends.  I really tried playing it, but unfortunately Square made a poor design choice and made it virtually impossible for me to beat it.  Spoilers ahead!  Okay, so Souls of Rebirth is the story of four characters who died in Final Fantasy II, three of them being former party members (by the way, what's with all the important deaths in the game, seven total?!).  This means that whatever stats and equipment they had on them when they died, now appear with them in this sidequest.  Great for people who leveled up these characters and were unfortunate to unwillingly leave them to die with great equipment.  Bad for people like me who knew they were going to die, via a guide, and unequipped them of everything.  So I'm screwed, and the sidequest is virtually impossible.  Anyways, I read what happens, and it's a pretty neat and touching story, about how four dead characters help defeat the last boss (it does make sense), and watch while the final scene plays out, as ghosts, and then happily finally pass on (their deaths were unfortunate, but all related to the main party).
End spoilers

I'll end on a positive change though, which of course refers to the end of the game.  Final Fantasy had an ending much too long for the message it needed to convey.  The developers were smart enough to shorten the ending in Final Fantasy II, so that the last cutscene (after the endgame scene, but before the credits) which wraps up the story with text was only 1/3 the amount of text (for a much more involved story), and took only roughly 1/6 the amount of time (no joke).  As a bonus, Square included moving scenes in the background, for added effect.

I really enjoyed Final Fantasy II.  Yes, there were still some major problems with the game, as apparent in this very long post.  But they weren't even about the level-up system, which is what most people rag on the game for.  I honestly enjoyed Final Fantasy II more than Final Fantasy.  I hope other people take the time to give this version of the game a chance, and maybe they'll form their own opinions, whether they be positive or negative.

2012 Game Completion Highlights

I completed puzzles to reveal pictures of iconic figures.
I took to the skies to collect...ballons.
I have singlehandedly brought down two dragons at the same time.
I had heated conversations as items favored certain racers.
I defeated Jafar for the 4th time.
I defeated Jafar for the 5th time.
I brought my team together one more time, to finally bring down our foe and reveal the mysteries of the undergound world.
I almost drowned multiple times from draining my ocean into a quarter of my world - just to see if it was possible.
I defeated my enemies to the wonderful sounds of history.
I put many heels into the heads of zombies.
I began to understand the reasons for war, and why one person controls the destinies of many.
I inadvertently sequence broke while infiltrating the complex once again.
I would have had to make much more difficult choices for my people as king, had I not spent the time becoming rich.
I easily defeated the asylum inmates, thanks to my superior strength and cunning.
I was killed by Mom much more often than I killed her.
I became conflicted in my role in the evolution of humanity.
I wanted to kill my AI teammates, thanks to them continually spooking the witches.
I killed the Pope.
I traveled through time to defeat Chaos.

Final Fantasy

Let's cut to the chase.  I haven't posted on here in five months.  I do enjoy blogging, but without much time to play games or to even collect my thoughts while playing a game, I don't get around to updating this site often.  A few months ago I had the idea I would update my blog each Sunday, when I knew I'd have some sort of free time to at least put down a paragraph or two.  Unfortunately, I didn't play many games, and really just let the idea get away.  However, I think I may have found the answer to keep this blog alive: forcing playing through an entire video game series.

Normally I'd spend a sentence or two building up to what my idea could be, but c'mon, only one or two people actually read this blog, and it's in this post's title.  So yeah, I've played through a few Final Fantasy games over the years, and have pretty much enjoyed them.  For those wondering, I have finished X and X-2, and played through in various amounts IV, IX and XII.  Now that I own a PSP, I have a good reason to be able to go back and play a few of the better Final Fantasy games that I have missed.  Once I started to look at which games in the series I would like to play, the idea came to me to play through all of them, starting at the beginning.  There are multiple reasons, though mostly come down to bragging rights.  I mean honestly, who has beaten II, III and VIII?  So here I sit, having just finished Final Fantasy on the PSP (the 20th Anniversary version) less than an hour ago.

Unlike most of my other posts, I'll try to keep this brief.  I really don't have much to say about the game, though would like to at least mention what I liked and disliked about my experience.  I hope to have a similar post for each game, gradually expanding in length as I can make comparisons against their predecessors.

To begin, the graphics are fantastic.  I am by no means a "graphics whore", but these updated sprites and other graphics were really what made this game playable for me.  It's one thing to enjoy 8-bit games (and trust me, I do), but the older Final Fantasy's are almost too blocky.  Battle animations are smooth, but can still be played out quickly.  I also give major props to RPG developers when the actual weapons the characters use noticeably change as equipment is changed - a nice touch.

The game was relatively simple, both the pace and the menu system, which I enjoyed.  I like RPG's with functional and easy to understand menus, and a bonus map is included in this version of the game (thank you Square-Enix, that was much appreciated).  With the inclusion of the world map, I rarely had to use the internet for guidance, and figured out most of the game on my own.  Without it would have been a different story.  Back to the battles- they started easy, and had a gradual increase in difficulty as the game progressed.

Which leads me to one of my two gripes with the game.  The game was almost too easy.  Each boss I ran into was a cakewalk, with no character falling below 100 HP.  I had heard this version was easier than the NES original, and was not surprised upon hearing so.  After the four main bosses, I decided to challenge myself by taking on the extra dungeons (from the Dawn of Souls GBA updated version) before fighting Chaos.  They were enjoyable at first, but also much too easy...until I beat the first two.  Then I hit the difficulty wall.  The third had pathetically easy random battles, but the second-half bosses were quite difficult.  I didn't even attempt the fourth dungeon.

Which leads me to my second gripe about the game.  Random battles.  Of course, with an old-school JRPG, random battles come aplenty.  This was known well beforehand, and was not a concern.  But it's when my party is over-leveled in some (okay, most) areas, that these battles become painful, because they honestly aren't worth the exp or gil, and therefore not worth my time.  And these extra dungeons are LONG.  The first is 5 floors.  Except to fight each boss, one must go through it four times.  The second, 10 floors (twice through).  The third, 25 floors (again, twice through).  And the fourth, an astounding 40 floors, and even though it's only once through, is a ton of wasted time on pointless random battles.  I started the new PSP dungeon, but got bored with my wasted time (and found out online that I was actually under-leveled) and loaded a save file to get out.

I finished the game in just under 25 hours.  That's quite a bit of time for the original Final Fantasy, although I could have attempted the last normal dungeon and Chaos around the 16 hour mark.  It's a good thing I spent some time leveling up in those extra dungeons though, because Chaos turned out to be a very hard final boss (and screw you Square-Enix, you do not let a final boss with 20,000 HP use Curaja when they've lost an estimated 15,000 HP to recover 9999 HP).  A good game overall, though definitely helped by the updated graphics.  Now I start Final Fantasy II.  If I can get through this, this new blog idea will have a long life.

Fable'd Series

I often become nostalgic about older games that I have once played, but lately while playing Fable III, I have been feeling nostalgic in the game itself, which is quite a strange feeling.  As much as I originally despised Fable III when I first started, the game has really gotten a hold on me, even though I'm still not particularly enthralled with it.  I mean, every time Lionhead Studios and Peter Molyneux (now left the development studio to form his own, 22 Cans) would announce a new Fable game, they would go on about new revolutionary features, such as raising a child to eventually become the playable character, or the ability to burn down entire villages (this one is rumored to have originally been in Fable II, but removed due to controversy), only to release a game with a fraction of the freedom.  This was especially brought to light around the release of Fable III, which came out within a close time period of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Kingdoms of Amulur: Reckoning, which both put the game to shame in terms of freedom.

To be honest, nostalgic may not even be the correct word that I'm looking for, but the deeper I get into the gameplay and story of the game, the more I think back upon similar elements from Fable and Fable II.  It's almost as if I myself am this character on a journey, thinking back upon the history of the world, and the inhabitants before me.  The further I explore the world, the more I fully appreciate what the developers were able to accomplish not only in the third game of the Fable series, but how they've successfully tied together all three games.  What I've learned over the course of my time with Fable III is that the game is less of a sequel, and more of an expanded universe of the series.

In Fable I, the title character plays as a "Hero", one of few who have magic powers and superior strength above others.  The story revolves around the loss of one's family and village, revenge, the discovery of family members still alive, the hunt for the bad guy, and good and evil choices throughout, including a final decision to kill one's own sister for power, or save her for nothing.  In Fable II, 500 years after the original, the player and their sister/brother are separated by the evil king (being a Hero himself, shooting both in fear of other Heroes challenging him, killing the player's sibling), who is then slain by the player (once again a Hero, a "descendant" of the previous Hero I believe) after building up strength.  The end-game also requires a difficult choice to be made: to be rich, to save thousands of people who perished under the king, or to revive the player's sister, dog, and loved ones who also perished through ways of the king.

Having briefly explained the plots of both Fable and Fable II, which are both much more in depth than that (not even going into DLC for both games, which provide hints for the sequels), we arrive at Fable III.  Finally, near the end of the third game, I feel like Lionhead Studios finally hit the sweet spot in plot exploration.  Usually, when a game makes changes for a sequel, they do so to be fresh and new, but for once, the changes feel like they were made because the game itself has changed from what has come before it.  Fable III is a perfect example of how an entire game evolves - or better yet, game world evolves - for better or worse.

While walking through the world of Albion, the setting for all three Fable games, I would naturally come across cities, towns, or villages, and would sometimes recognize the name of said place.  I knew the name from both Fable II and even Fable before that, however could not remember how it looked, having been actual years since I've played the others (I believe 3 years since Fable II, and 5 years since Fable).  Slowly, however, I would stop at a random spot, and finally understand exactly where I was, having recognized something of unimportance, such as a small bridge or hill.  I have been here before, would be my first thought.  And I found this thought to be strange, because rarely does one stand in the same spot in a video game, that has been in not one, but two games before it.  At that point, I would look around, and realize what changes have been made to this area.  I'm not speaking of purely cosmetic changes (though I did notice that extra details such as textures and plants have been added), but of the placement of buildings, and how things have evolved.  Except it doesn't feel like a forced evolution by the developers, but rather a natural evolution that has occurred within the actual game, due to political and natural causes.  Fable I consisted mainly of magic and swords, and I believe had crossbows.  Fable II felt the push of societal changes, with the inclusion of the newly discovered gun, larger and less fantastical buildings, and the downplay of magic due to the extermination of heroes during the 500 years between the games.  Fable III moves into the industrial age, with steam powered engines, factories, the evolution of the simple gun to the rifle and pistol, and even governance.

What makes this feel even more of a natural evolution is that Albion is returned to during each game, with most areas making a reappearance, albeit in its new form.  The stories from the previous games are continued, and are referenced to when needed.  The last Hero, from Fable II, gave birth to two children (which is actually in the Fable II DLC, which I recently found out about), myself and my brother, who has become an evil king and partial dictator.  My goal is to get as many Albion residents on my side before overthrowing my brother.  These people live in the towns and cities that are all too familiar with what heroes can do, and some have been directly affected during the time between the two games.  Just yesterday while playing, I found a man looking for money to rebuild a bridge to another area, to memorialize the people that had lived in the village on the other side.  It took a moment for me to recognize the hill I was standing upon, the ravine and path below me, and the high waterfall to my right, which I could dive off of in Fable II.  It then occurred to me that the man meant that the ones living on the other side had been killed off by my brother, the king.  I came back a while later after the bridge had been built, and found the area to be desolate, which once served and my childhood home after I had been shot and rescued, during Fable II.  Except it wasn't me, it was my character's mother; the people who had raised her, who were now gone.

I found a path through the village, which lead me to a beach, which luckily still had a few remaining survivors of the old hippie village.  Seeing an island in the distance, I decided to swim to it, as I immediately recognized it as a small island in the middle of a large lake from Fable II, which held some decent treasure in its cave.  However, as I kept swimming, I noticed a very large tower, and wondered what had happened to the island during the course of history.  The lake also seemed bigger than I had remembered, until it finally occurred to me that it wasn't a lake, but a sea.  That island - that tower - presented memories rushing back to me.  Stranded in the tower, in prison, for years, forced into manual labor to build the tower.  During which time many were murdered back in Albion, including my family.  But once again, this wasn't me, it was my mother's past.  I was looking at the same tower in the distance (which I believe is inaccessible in Fable III) in which my mother had to make the final choice, which now stood silent, just as a reminder to what happened.

This is how sequels should be presented.  There have been multiple times throughout the game in which things like this have happened, bringing back images of what has come before, and how the world has changed.  What was once a happy forest in Fable I (besides the killer bees and bandits) has now become a desolate swamp riddled with cannons.  A graveyard from Fable II is back, though now with even more gravestones lining the path.  Even a semi-immortal character from Fable II has returned, bringing with him a device deemed "The Wheel of Death".  Unfortunately, while I used it to hilariously kill others during my time (as my mother, I suppose...), it was reversed and used unsuccessfully on myself.  There are still many other areas I am hoping to see return, a feeling that I rarely feel while playing a game.  What Lionhead Studios and Molyneux have done is quite amazing, having created a world that has a long continuing story, an evolving world and society, difficult moral decisions, all wrapped up with decently compelling gameplay.

Before I finish, I would like to touch upon the choice of good or evil in the game.  Each game has them at the end.  In Fable I saved my sister (who, by the way, becomes the blind seer, a large character in both Fable II and III); in Fable II I saved my sister, dog, and family (though honestly, while bringing my sister back was really cool, I had already killed off my wives, so I really just wanted my dog back).  Now I'm at the end of Fable III, or at least running down the home stretch.  After playing a bunch of games with moral decisions (KOTOR, Mass Effect, Skyrim, Fable I and II, etc.), I really didn't think that the game could present that much of a challenge.  I try to be the good guy, but in video games I don't care about others and do what's good for me, as long as it's a good cause - money and power don't matter to me at the end of games.  But, hearing online about what difficult decisions are to be made, I had to see it for myself.  I'm not going to lie, these really are tough decisions.  Without spoiling anything (I do urge others to play each of the games, both II and III have excellent combat), on one hand, I can lie to everyone I've befriended in the game and break every promise I've made, to actually be the good guy in the end, or I can uphold those promises and be the good guy in the short run, to be the bad guy in the end.  I'm having a hard time breaking those promises, so I'm going to see if it's possible to be the good guy no matter what.  No matter what I do though, someone is going to have to take the fall for others.

From the creators of Super Meat Boy

It's been a whole half year since I updated this blog, but I finally feel it's about time to do so.  During this course of my hiatus, I've not only started, but fully completed The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.  And yet during that whole period, I could not think of one particular idea to write about regarding the game.  Rather than writer's block, it was more of having such an expansive game, that I found it difficult to relate to one subject, without rolling off onto a tangent about a connected subject.  Hopefully since I'm writing again, I'll be able to come up with some Skyrim posts, especially being that I need to relate it back to not only past Elder Scrolls games (namely Morrowind, the only other I've played), but also Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, the other similar Bethesda and/or open-world games.

But back on topic, I finally played a game that really motivated me to express my opinions, and what better way than returning to this blog?  What may come as a shock is that after the grandeur experience Skyrim provided, it was a PC indie game that provoked me.  While most indie games are typically "meh" at best, lately in the past year or so indie developers have been turning out some great games (though this could possibly be attributed to the phrase "indie developers" being thrown around loosely - I'm looking at you, EA).  One such group came out with a game called Super Meat Boy, which quickly dismissed the notion that all indie games are shallow.  This past fall, the same development team (don't quote me on who helped, exactly) brought out The Binding of Isaac, which supposedly had gameplay elements from The Legend of Zelda and the rogue genre.

Since I first heard about the game and saw images, I was skeptical of this touted combination of genres.  After hoping for some sort of sequel to Super Meat Boy, I felt as though the developers had already lost their touch (after just one game), and were returning to "typical indie status," as I'll call it (nothing against indie developers, I give them credit for doing what they love and sometimes creating unique games, but I've already stated my views on indie games).  I had lost track of the game until this week, when a sale had been going on for quite a few indie games, across many platforms.  I decided that for $2, I could do much worse.

After just two hours, I have come to a conclusion about my feelings for The Binding of Isaac: I don't know if I love the game, or hate it.  I wouldn't call the game revolutionary, but it does indeed present a unique combination of both the old-school Zelda dungeon crawler, and ideas from the rogue adventure genre.  It's the latter that really poses the problems for me, since typically, rogue games are pretty difficult.  Combined with the fact that these are the guys who gave us Super Meat Boy, then yes, it can be a difficult game.  The first night I played the game, I absolutely hated it, and actually regretted spending just two dollars.  Earlier tonight, however (after reading some comments on a website forum), I started to understand how the game operates, and began to really enjoy the game.

Let's start with the Zelda comparisons.  The game has the same map and dungeon gameplay, whereas when one enters a room, they must clear out the enemies, and can then proceed in one of four directions (up, down, east, or west), depending on which walls have doors.  The map is basically identical to the original Zelda game, appearing at the top of the screen, next to the two equipped items (though it should be noted, there is no item select screen), which are then next to the players health - hearts, to no surprise.  Defeating all the enemies in a room can present a key, money, bombs, or nothing at all.  This information is displayed between the map and equipped items.  Keys are used to open doors and treasure chests.  Bombs can damage enemies, blow up rocks, or create a doorway to a hidden room.  Finally, a certain room will contain a boss (though a key is not needed to open that room).  Yes, The Binding of Isaac really is that similar The Legend Zelda.  This is gameplay I crave.

Fortunately, the development team decided to take the game in a different direction and added rogue gameplay elements, which I'm still on the fence about.  True to the rogue genre, once you die, you're dead - game over.  I haven't beaten the game yet, but have heard that there are eight floors in the full game.  Each floor is basically a dungeon from the original Zelda.  Top that off with typically only starting with three hearts (there are multiple playable characters, unlockables), this game is pretty tough.  Oh, and did I mention that, being a rogue, the floors are always randomly generated?  Sometimes the first floor or two are a breeze (I've played the game through eight deaths so far), but sometimes there will be some aggrivating enemies.  On that note, I would like to say that using a keyboard is absolutely hellish.  I've started to get the hang of the controls, but man, an actual controller would have been great.  What's that?  This would have been a great portable title, for possibly, the 3DS?  Why, I agree, but too bad Nintendo shot down the idea, due to the game's biblical themes, and possibly controversial matter.  This actual became quite an issue - the reason I bring it up - and recommend reading about the developers thoughts on Nintendo's stance, and how they love Steam for the freedom it provides indie developers.  They actually have a good point.

Back on subject, along with random floors, the game also presents random bosses at the end of each floor.  This is very interesting, because it presents a challenge to player to not only be tactically ready for each potential boss' movesets (dying and extra playthroughs obviously help here), but also physically ready with items and such.  Items typically make or break a playthrough.  This isn't to say that without certain items, the game becomes impossible.  All enemies can be defeated with skill and the basic weapon, there is no doubt about that.  But on each floor, there are one or two special items that can either add to the players' stats, such as increased shot range, increased damage, full map reveal, etc, or provide a secondary weapon.  These items are completely random as well, and while they are all "helpful", there are a handful that provide great "power."

My furthest playthrough led me to my death on the 5th floor (dying is also humorous, showing who killed the player, and every item they had collected on that run), and I thank the items I received for how far I had proceeded.  Finding a syringe early on helped, as it boosted my movement and firing speed.  On the next floor, I found an item I cannot recall which provided me with an extra heart container.  The same floor present one of the most coveted and rare items in the game, chocolate milk, which provided a long shot range, faster firing speed, and more powerful projectiles.  Onwards, I found a special room, where I spent some money in order to make not one, but two consecutive deals with the devil.  I shortened my life from six containers to three, but in the process, gained more strength, a 1up mushroom (this mushroom shocked me, in a game where death is permanent), and three temporary life containers (these cannot be refilled, but were of great help).  Make two deals with the devil may not usually be a wise move, but in my case, I felt like a badass...right up until I lost those temporary hearts, and realized how fragile I had become.  There are 68 unique items in the game, and I have only seen around 8 of them so far.  I am hoping to soon come across the PhD, which grants the player invulnerability from any bad pill effects.  Yes, the game often has random pill drops, which as in rogue-likes, has no information about what's inside, and changes on every playthrough.

So here we come down to it.  The rogue.  Do you explore the whole floor, and kill every enemy?  Is the temptation of a really special item worth entering the next room, which may provide some unknown terror or horrible combination of enemies?  Or would it be better to skip the item, and enter the boss room hoping that it's one of the easier ones?  I recommend you overcome your resistance to "poor" controls as I did, and download it to choose for yourself.