A repost of the review I wrote for the first Final Fantasy game. I was sixteen or so when I wrote this, so about six years ago.
Princess Sara of Cornelia has been kidnapped by the evil knight, Garland, and the kingdom has no idea how to save her. Until, that is, four strange warriors are seen walking around the town. They are quickly identified as the four Light Warriors of legend, and brought to the King, where they are asked to rescue the princess in exchange for the completion of a bridge to the next continent. It seems that this is enough, and the warriors agree. When they have rescued Sara and the bridge is completed, the four warriors continue on their journey.
Final Fantasy is nowhere near as plot driven as the later games in the series. Much of it is merely exploring, with no real driving force behind your characters until near the end.
Speaking of characters, I'm not sure if the beings in Final Fantasy can be described as such. You have four warriors, and must choose which class they are. There are only six classes to choose from; Warrior, Monk, Red Mage, White Mage, Black Mage and Thief. None of them ever speak (think Ryu from Breath of Fire), and none are ever addressed by name, although you are able to give them names.
Warriors fight with swords, and wear heavy armour. They are fairly strong with good attack and defence. Monks equip very little armour or weapons, making them fairly cheap, and their unarmed attack is high. Thieves, unfortunately, can't steal, but they are quick. Their speed is really their only redeeming factor, as the rest of their stats remain pretty low.
Red mages use white and black magic, although not the higher forms. They are also more limited than White or Black mages, as they have the same amount of magic points, but have more spells to choose from. Red Mages can equip light swords and armour, giving them decently average stats.
White and Black mages use white and black magic, respectively. White magic limits itself to healing, and a few holy spells to damage the undead, while black magic is the attack magic Final Fantasy have players come to know and love. Both Black and White mages have low attack and defence.
Final Fantasy is very simple, gameplay-wise, and is pretty much what you'd expect from a traditional Final Fantasy. There is a world map, and various towns which can be visited. Most towns contain weapon, armour and item shops, as well as Black and White magic shops. For each level of spell, there are four White magic spells, and four Black magic spells. Each character can learn three of each level of spell.
For example, the level one White magic spells are Cure, Dia, Protect and Blink, while the level one Black magic spells are Fire, Sleep, Thunder and Shape. The White mage can learn any three White magic spells, while a Black mage can learn any three Black Magic spells. The Red mage must choose three spells out of the options of Cure, Protect, Blink, Fire, Sleep and Thunder. Higher level spells are more expensive than lower level spells.
There's nothing really noteworthy about the weapons and armour systems; as a general rule, each town has slightly more expensive and better quality weapons and amour, which can be equipped depending on your characters class.
Battles are turn based, although your character and the enemies don't move in any specific order. Final Fantasy characters move in their own sweet, variable, time, which can mess up any attempt at strategizing.
There are very few sub-quests or mini-games to be found here. There is a puzzle, which is accessible once your party gets ahold of a ship. If you hold the X button, and hit Circle around fifty times, a new screen will appear with a basic sliding puzzle game. If you beat the best time (which is defaulted at around two minutes), you win several items, and 10,000 gil. Just to put that into perspective, one of the best weapons in the game costs 50,000 gil, and this mini-game is accessible very early on. Defeating it within two minutes is ridiculously easy – my record is 26 seconds – so unlike in many other games, earning money is never really an issue.
Another sub-quest involves Bahamut and results in a class upgrade for your characters – Warrior to Knight, Thief to Ninja, Red Mage to Red Wizard, and so on. This changes your characters look slightly, and enables them to use more varieties of spells, although they are still limited to three per level.
The graphics consist of sprites, on 2D, plainly coloured backgrounds. They have been improved from the SNES, but are nowhere near the quality of the PS2 or even the Playstation in its prime. Still, they're simple and clean, and if not impressive, at least free from the dreadful Final Fantasy VII arms.
One nice touch is the inclusion of collection lists. These detail how many items you've found in each location in a handy blank out of blank format. This allows you to check what percentage of treasures you've found, and exactly where you've missed something. There's a similar list for the bestiary. Filling both of these in unlocks several pieces of original artwork. Somewhat annoyingly, the fact that you get the airship so early on means that many field monsters will be missed in a normal play-through, so you'll need to go out of your way to get most of the normal monsters.
Also annoyingly, the only way to save permanently is when resting; in other words, whenever you wish to save, you must either rest at an Inn, or use up a sleeping bag, tent or cottage item. You can quick save at any time, even in dungeons. Quick saves will disappear when the machine is turned off, although you can use the traditional Final Fantasy soft reset (R1+L1+Select+Start) if you need to. A handy use for this is to avoid any and all battles – you simply save every few steps, and reset when you run into anything.
Gamers shouldn't go into this expecting anything like the depth of plot of the later Final Fantasies, which is unfortunate, considering it's what the series is known for. Still, the game is fun and simple, and fairly short. I completed it in around twenty hours on my first play-through, and I didn't miss a single item. The game has two modes, normal and easy. The main difference is the enemies hit points, and the cost of weapons, armour, spells and items.
In summary, it's a fun, simple game, and a must for any Final Fantasy fan. It's not a great introduction to the series, but, considering it's said to have saved Squaresoft from going under, they must have done something right. You might, however, wish to bear in mind that that was almost twenty years ago.
Warning: The following contains major spoilers.
Princess Sara of Cornelia has been kidnapped by the evil knight, Garland, and the kingdom has no idea how to save her. Until, that is, four strange warriors are seen walking around the town. They are quickly identified as the four Light Warriors of legend, and brought to the King, where they are asked to rescue the princess in exchange for the completion of a bridge to the next continent. It seems that this is enough, and the warriors agree. When they have rescued Sara and the bridge is completed, the four warriors continue on their journey.
Final Fantasy is nowhere near as plot driven as the later games in the series. Much of it is merely exploring, with no real driving force behind your characters until near the end.
Speaking of characters, I'm not sure if the beings in Final Fantasy can be described as such. You have four warriors, and must choose which class they are. There are only six classes to choose from; Warrior, Monk, Red Mage, White Mage, Black Mage and Thief. None of them ever speak (think Ryu from Breath of Fire), and none are ever addressed by name, although you are able to give them names.
Warriors fight with swords, and wear heavy armour. They are fairly strong with good attack and defence. Monks equip very little armour or weapons, making them fairly cheap, and their unarmed attack is high. Thieves, unfortunately, can't steal, but they are quick. Their speed is really their only redeeming factor, as the rest of their stats remain pretty low.
Red mages use white and black magic, although not the higher forms. They are also more limited than White or Black mages, as they have the same amount of magic points, but have more spells to choose from. Red Mages can equip light swords and armour, giving them decently average stats.
White and Black mages use white and black magic, respectively. White magic limits itself to healing, and a few holy spells to damage the undead, while black magic is the attack magic Final Fantasy have players come to know and love. Both Black and White mages have low attack and defence.
Final Fantasy is very simple, gameplay-wise, and is pretty much what you'd expect from a traditional Final Fantasy. There is a world map, and various towns which can be visited. Most towns contain weapon, armour and item shops, as well as Black and White magic shops. For each level of spell, there are four White magic spells, and four Black magic spells. Each character can learn three of each level of spell.
For example, the level one White magic spells are Cure, Dia, Protect and Blink, while the level one Black magic spells are Fire, Sleep, Thunder and Shape. The White mage can learn any three White magic spells, while a Black mage can learn any three Black Magic spells. The Red mage must choose three spells out of the options of Cure, Protect, Blink, Fire, Sleep and Thunder. Higher level spells are more expensive than lower level spells.
There's nothing really noteworthy about the weapons and armour systems; as a general rule, each town has slightly more expensive and better quality weapons and amour, which can be equipped depending on your characters class.
Battles are turn based, although your character and the enemies don't move in any specific order. Final Fantasy characters move in their own sweet, variable, time, which can mess up any attempt at strategizing.
There are very few sub-quests or mini-games to be found here. There is a puzzle, which is accessible once your party gets ahold of a ship. If you hold the X button, and hit Circle around fifty times, a new screen will appear with a basic sliding puzzle game. If you beat the best time (which is defaulted at around two minutes), you win several items, and 10,000 gil. Just to put that into perspective, one of the best weapons in the game costs 50,000 gil, and this mini-game is accessible very early on. Defeating it within two minutes is ridiculously easy – my record is 26 seconds – so unlike in many other games, earning money is never really an issue.
Another sub-quest involves Bahamut and results in a class upgrade for your characters – Warrior to Knight, Thief to Ninja, Red Mage to Red Wizard, and so on. This changes your characters look slightly, and enables them to use more varieties of spells, although they are still limited to three per level.
The graphics consist of sprites, on 2D, plainly coloured backgrounds. They have been improved from the SNES, but are nowhere near the quality of the PS2 or even the Playstation in its prime. Still, they're simple and clean, and if not impressive, at least free from the dreadful Final Fantasy VII arms.
One nice touch is the inclusion of collection lists. These detail how many items you've found in each location in a handy blank out of blank format. This allows you to check what percentage of treasures you've found, and exactly where you've missed something. There's a similar list for the bestiary. Filling both of these in unlocks several pieces of original artwork. Somewhat annoyingly, the fact that you get the airship so early on means that many field monsters will be missed in a normal play-through, so you'll need to go out of your way to get most of the normal monsters.
Also annoyingly, the only way to save permanently is when resting; in other words, whenever you wish to save, you must either rest at an Inn, or use up a sleeping bag, tent or cottage item. You can quick save at any time, even in dungeons. Quick saves will disappear when the machine is turned off, although you can use the traditional Final Fantasy soft reset (R1+L1+Select+Start) if you need to. A handy use for this is to avoid any and all battles – you simply save every few steps, and reset when you run into anything.
Gamers shouldn't go into this expecting anything like the depth of plot of the later Final Fantasies, which is unfortunate, considering it's what the series is known for. Still, the game is fun and simple, and fairly short. I completed it in around twenty hours on my first play-through, and I didn't miss a single item. The game has two modes, normal and easy. The main difference is the enemies hit points, and the cost of weapons, armour, spells and items.
In summary, it's a fun, simple game, and a must for any Final Fantasy fan. It's not a great introduction to the series, but, considering it's said to have saved Squaresoft from going under, they must have done something right. You might, however, wish to bear in mind that that was almost twenty years ago.
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