Final Fantasy and the PC

[Arcanz]

Ohoy there lads, so I was looking throught some old ps1 games and found my old FFIX (Final Fantasy 9 for the ignorant ones)and a sudden urge to play Final Fantasy stepped into my mind alongside Vivi the awesome character from FFIX.
But, seeing as my ps1 is currently dead, buried, dug up, lost, returned, smacked around a little and buried once more. I thought it might be easier to just get them for my pc instead of lurking in the dark corners of ebay to get a new one. In short, my questions are these:

Is the FF available to pc? If yes, then wich ones?
Are they worth playing on the pc? Any changes, graphics, gameplay and so on?
Where can I get them? If they exist..
And last, are there any collector's edition?

oh, and btw. Never played any other than IX and X to be honest. So are the other games different? I mean not in story but in gameplay. Because IX and X was pretty much the same, turn based and so on, if my memory ain't screwing with me.
As a sidenote, yay first post ever on the escapist ^^

 

[brenflood]

FF8 was released for the PC as well. but yeah, look for emulators.

 

[Slycne]

Welcome to the site.

Is the FF available to pc? If yes, then wich ones?

Baring emulators, VII and VIII were ported to the PC. XI is also available, but that's an MMO not a traditional rpg like the others.

Are they worth playing on the pc? Any changes, graphics, game play and so on?

I played VII on the PC and never noticed much of a difference one way or the other. The controls were passable on the PC, but if you were really suffering you could always use a PC game pad.

Where can I get them? If they exist..

Ebay or Amazon would be your best chance.

And last, are there any collector's edition?

Not that I am aware of, the collector's edition craze is actually a fairly recent occurrence. A few older games did have them, but it's become much more popular now.

oh, and btw. Never played any other than IX and X to be honest. So are the other games different? I mean not in story but in gameplay. Because IX and X was pretty much the same, turn based and so on, if my memory ain't screwing with me.

Not until recently with XI and XII have they done much with the combat system, they all play virtually the same - turn based combat with slight variations.

If I could offer a counter-idea. You might be better off/happier with picking up a PS2 on the cheap, allowing you to play all the PS1 and PS2 rpgs.

 

[megapenguinx]

I know there is a program somewhere that will let you play the non PC disk on your PC. But I'm not sure where or what it is.

 

[Squarewave]

FF 7/8/11 were on the PC.

However 7/8 were horrible coded and crashed a lot back then. Today not only does the crashing still happen but lots of XP compatibility problems cause even more crashing making them unplayable.

Your best bet is to use a PS1 emulator. Not only will you have less crashes (good chance at no crashes at all) but you can set the resolution to way higher then what the pc version could do, as well as filtering that can make the games look at lot better. It can takes some time tweaking to make them look right at higher res but it's way worth it.

 

[Nicholas Traill]

FFVII was terrible on the PC.. it was done on D3D which really doesn't do it justice at all.

+ the soundtrack is terrible. I would shoot for emulators if you want PS1 quality. There is a forum out there that will direct you on what you can get, and give advice on beefing up it's graphics - should you choose to buy a PC version.. FFVII, VIII, and IX (I think) were released on the PC.

VII and VIII are turn-based, like IX, and X before it. However, the magic and summoning systems are different.

VII - Uses Materia; materia being crystalised orbs created in the Planet's lifestream to grant the user of it powers such as Fire, Ice, Lightning, etc. Weapons have materia slots so if you equip Fire materia to your sword - you'll get the ability to cast fire. However - this doesn't make your sword a 'flametongue' or anything - you have to combine it with Elemental materia to give it that property. Summoning materia is avaliable as well, as well as Health Regeneration Materia such as Cure, Regen, Heal etc; and other materia that can give you different abilities. Characters have a Limit Bar, and for Limit Levels for Limit Breaks (Overdrives being their similar in FFX)

VIII - Uses Junctioning and Draw Points; basically your characters can 'draw' magic from enemies and specific points, and then 'junction' them to certain attribiutes to increase them, such as Strength, Stamina, Speed, Attack rate etc.

In order to this however - a character must have a GF junctioned (a summon monster basically | GF stands for Guardian Force) in order for certain upgradable attributes to have magic junctioned to them. You also need to have a GF equipped in order to use abilities such as using Magic, and being able to Draw magic and so on. Also - there is no 'mana' in FFVIII, it's based on HOW MANY of each magicks you have drawn, you can have 10 Thunders, 7 Blizzards, 12 Fires, and 15 Cures for example. The spells DO increase in strength (ie, Fire, Fira, Firaga | Blizzard, Blizzara, Blizzaga | Cure, Cura, Curaga and so on).

Hopefully this will be some help to you - these systems do seem a bit at first glance but when you actually play the game they become fairly simple.

But yeah, VII and VIII are turn based.

 

[Arcanz]

Thanks for the fast replies, I'll go check on the emulators. Only problem I have with emulators is that it's damn hard to find games for it, since it's all so "legal". Anyone who know wich sites that's good for these kinds of things? You know, the "legal" thingies

 

[Izerous]

Disclaimer:
The following does not apply to all countries. You should check with your local laws for what I'm about to mention.

Technically as long as you are using legitimate disks it is not illegal to use an emulator to run them. So if you have a legit FF9 disk you can technically shove it in your pc and run it with an emulator without legal issues. The legal issues are with the ROM's as that is where the copyright infringements occur.

 

[Squarewave]

The only legal issue with emulators+legit disks is the BIOS needed to run them. It's a legal gray area if you use the same bios version of the PS1 you own. You don't need to use roms or ISOs as a standard DvD/CDROM drive can read ps1 disks with no problems

 

[metagaia]

Thanks for the fast replies, I'll go check on the emulators. Only problem I have with emulators is that it's damn hard to find games for it, since it's all so "legal". Anyone who know wich sites that's good for these kinds of things? You know, the "legal" thingies

I am not an expert in this, but I think it depends where you are from to some degree. As long as the emulator isn't a carbon copy and merely reverse engineered, then it is certainly legal to own the emulator in the EU (developing the emulator is more of a grey area). I am not sure on the laws about this in the US though, and I suspect they might be a little harsher.