FINAL FANTASY I

Final Fantasy I starts the incredible series by establishing several constants throughout the game. Some being airships, certain weapons, items, spells, and introduces a round-based battle sequence. Four warriors begin a quest to bring back light to the four mystical orbs that have long since lost their power. They will encounter many foes and obstacles to achieve their goal. Not much else to say about plot.

I have seven leters to say about this: C-L-A-S-S-I-C!! This is a great game seeing what system it's for. (NES) True that there is only one MIDI instrument and a precussion throughout the game, but that's standard of ALL NES games, right? Characters are not very dynamic because the characters you start with are the characters you end with. That is, of course, IF you beat the game.


FINAL FANTASY II

FINAL FANTASY III

I put these two games together because I haven't played through them. I wasn't thrilled with the beginning of FFII and I could even get to the title screen of FFIII!

FINAL FANTASY IV

Final Fantasy IV begins with Cecil, Commander of the mighty Red Wings, returning to the capitol city of Baron with a newly acquired crystal of wind. Questing his king's motives gets him ejected from Red Wings and sent on a mission to wipe out Mysidia. Feeling betrayed, he begins his own quest to protect the remaining crystals that hold the balance of nature in check. The friends he meets and the power he gains will aide him in his quest to seek the truth of what has happened to Baron's liege.

I for one did not like this game very much. For a start, the interface is really hard to control and has much room for improvement. I also don't like only being allowed a certain number of items in the inventory. (which was a FF constant until the next chapter) I also don't like the plot of 'saving the crystals' at all. I'm not even sure why, it's just not interesting.


FINAL FANTASY V

Final Fantasy V tells the tale of an evil power out to destroy the world. (so what else is new?) A wandering vagabond/adventurer starts out the quest by rescuing the princess Leene from goblins. Then an old man (who lost his memory except that his name is Galuf) and the princess plead with Butz to take them to the wind shrine where the crystal of the wind (surprise, surprise) is in danger of shattering. They arive too late. Eventually all the crystals shatter and the world Leene is from and the world Galuf is from (I'm not going to go into a lot of detail here) merge to become the way the world was thousands of years ago. Exdeath has accessed the Cleft of Dimension and has taped into the great power that hold the universe together. (Yet another unexpected plot twist)

This is a much better game than t's predecessor. It has limitless inventory as well as a "Key Items" list apart from the regular items unlike FFIV. One thing really stinks about it over everything else. The Job Classes of course! I hate those @#%$^& Job Classes! They take forever to master and they are required to do some things like cast magic and special attacks. Music is great, as are the graphics in battle, and the interface in the menu. Everything else is a little drab.


FINAL FANTASY VI

1000 Years after the War of the Magi magic simply ceased to exist in the world. Technology reigns as iron, steel, and coal are re-discovered. Eventually, magic is used only by special machines called Magi-Tek. A whisper of the word Esper is on all of the Empire's soldiers. Suddenly after 1000 years of laying silent, Espers reemerge and attack the Empire that has oppressed them. The future of the whole world rests apon 12 to 14 characters with their own unique skills and personalities. 'This evil empire must be stopped at all costs' they say. But when Kefka, the first of the Magi-Tek soldiers, gains the power of the three stone goddess statues (the source of ALL magic) the group must reunite to expel this new all-powerful evil villan.

WHAT A GAME!!! This is by far my favorite! I don't know why, but I like how many characters there are and that every character can use every magic spell that they have learned. It makes the battles go so much faster! THe plot is good too. This is the first FF game that I actually cried over. I mean, come on! It IS the end of the world as we know it. When I saw "On that day, the world was changed forever" I couldn't take it. I like the last bosses personality too. Manical, yet simplistic. (You know: hate, hate, hate...etc) With all the charaters with different backgrounds that have ALL been affected by the unfolding chain of events somehow, you're bound to have a good group no matter which four you choose. Personally, I like Gau the best. He can get REAL strong! He learns all of his rages (which is nest to impossible to do) and all the magic spells. He can also equip the Snow Muffler which is the best armor in the game. With a Merit Award and the Illumina sword, Paladin shield, Ribbon, and Genji Helmet, he is unstopable. I'd almost say that he alone can take on Kefka if he is like that.


FINAL FANTASY VII

The planet is withering away at the touch of the mighty ShinRa Inc. If action is not taken, the world and every living thing on it will die in suffering. Enter: AVALANCHE. An anti-ShinRa faction that will sacrifice everything and stop at nothing (except Gold Saucer :) to ensure that ShinRa will cease draining the planet of it's life force. Enter: Sephiroth. Born of the cells of an immortal being that the planet's previous inhabitants called "The terror from the sky," he will travel to what he thinks is the land the Ancients called the Promised Land to gather energy and become a god. Cloud, an ex-member of ShinRa Inc.'s army, has a personal grudge against Sephiroth for burning the town of Nibelheim and will see to it that Sephiroth does not achieve his goal. Along with AVALANCHE and a few other assorted characters (included a stuffed animal, Cait Sith), Cloud must stop Sephiroth, ShinRa, and Meteor from harming the planet any more than they have.

Good grief! What an addition to the FF series. It is very long and has incredible graphics. When I first played FFVI, it took me around 48 hours to beat it. FFVII took me almost 90 hours. There is so much more to do in this game. Raise and breed Chocobos, test your strength in the Gold Saucer's battle arena before facing the dreaded weapons, blow up stuff, sabotage, infiltrate, and just have fun. We are also introduced to a concept of materia. You can hold from 0 to 16 pieces of Materia that give you special abilities and the use of magic. There are also more items and status' to watch out for. Each character can only equip only one weapon class. Also there are no longer shields or helmets to equip. Only a weapon, an armor and one accessory that can give you various stat changes.

FINAL FANTASY VIII

Decades ago, a war divided two continents: Galbadia and Esthar. One enhanced itself magically, the other mechanically. Years later, a girl named Ellone was born with a unique gift, to send someone's consciousness into someone else's in the past. Esthar scientists studied this ability and eventually was able to copy it. Decades later in the future an evil Sorceress learns of this ability and uses it for her own purposes, Time Compression. Somewhere between those two times is another soceress named Edea who started an orphanage in hopes of training them to fight the sorceresses. The attention focuses to one particular group of these orphans (Squall, Seifer, Quistis, Selphie, Zell, and Irvine) and their interaction with this battle between the sorceresses and the rest of the world.

My honest opinion, this game is the worst Square has ever made. While the story is layed out well, the most basic plot is not much different from the first FF game. Shops have been downgraded. So have weapons and the overall equipment screens. Lack of Armor, weapons and accessories severly limits the number of items in the game. The Characters are much weaker too. When my characters are at level 100, they still barely do more than 1200 damage to a weak enemy. The main mode of attack is made up of GFs which give you abilities and ways to improve your stats my junctioning magic onto them. MP doesn't exist in this game. Magic is stored with each character like items. You can hold 100 types of a particular magic. They can be used to give you different styles of defense and attack. 100 Ultimas junctioned as elemental defense will block 100% of all elemental damage.
Anyway, this game is definitly not on my next-to-replay list. When I first played through this game, it was during a time when I was sick and felt very dizzy constantly so even thinking about the game doesn't exactly give me a good feeling.