Is Final Fantasy Worth It?

[Chaos Isaac]

Depends on your taste, but i'd try 1 and 3 for some simple, fun, class based murderfests that save the world, and then six, seven, eight, nine and 12 for more murder fests but with more story and character.

For the Tactics offspring, i'd with with Tactics Advanced, as the Lion one for the PSP was kinda... pretty... bad. And A2 sucked.

Now, I haven't played five or six, and I played a bit of four and I have no idea how people enjoy it so much. But, I don't hear much of five and six always seemed interesting asides from the villain.

 

[Dr. Octogonopus]

In an ideal universe I'd consider getting into Final Fantasy, but they're on game 15 or something? Really? Because there's no way in hell I'd buy the 15th game in a series without buying the others, and I'm not going to buy those 14 other games just so I can play the new one. I never heard this name mentioned when people complain about a lack of new IPs, but I think the way it's being dragged on is alienating a lot of people like me.

Besides a few skippable sequels/tie-ins you do not need to have any prior knowledge of the series to play any ff game. All games have a separate universe, story, characters and gameplay.

Think James Bond. You dont have to watch every movie or read every book to enjoy Skyfall.

 

[Signa]

Having just played GBA FFV, I think it's worth it if you can tolerate the combat system. JRPGs have a certain flavor that a lot of people do not have patience for. That said, 1-6 all are 2D games, and that makes the lackluster gameplay less painful because there's no loading times or overdone cutscenes to deal with. JRPGs are always about the adventure and story more than the character building (Stat grinding, not character arcs) and action-filled combat.

My advice to you OP is to try Chrono Trigger instead. It goes light on the random battles (almost all battles you can see the enemies before you engage) and has one of the best JRPG stories I've played. If you like the feel of the genre from that game, play any FF to your hearts content.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

You have a point and far be it for comparing two genres of entertainment but again being "shallow" isn't a bad thing. Nolan's Joker is completely Shallow his motivation is simply his character is crazy, that's it, yet he's compelling and interesting. You don't always need a complex villain just a big enough threat that you can't ignore because - for arguments sake - let's say Kefka was a bad/not that good of a villain because he was shallow, would you rather he be Ultimecia? She had the dumbest convoluted reasons to destroy the existence and the way she went about it made absolutely no sense or worse that blue haired git from X who had a similar role to Kefka.

PS. For an example of a Good Shallow villain is that bug thing at the end of Chrono Trigger, it is by no means a character but it has the most interesting premise and concept, it's not actively trying to destroy everything it's just in order to live it does kinda like Galactus in some respect. A Big enough threat that even a villain will unite with the good guys to kill off.

Oh, GAWD, bringing up Nolan's Joker. Ya wanna know WHY Nolan's Joker is so interesting? Because he basically comes off as a slam to people who artificially try to add depth to characters with sloppy, token reasons. The reason the Joker WORKS is because he has has none of those. I actually still maintain to this day that the Joker wasn't human, but instead some sort of force that manifested itself when Batman was created. He has no human traits, he's just a ball of pure Id who lives only for destruction.

Kefka was merely lucky. And furthermore, there's a REASON he's not regarded as highly over in Japan. A LOT of what people claim is great about Kefka is due to Ted Woolsey's liberal translations. Kefka was actually written as REALLY annoying and stupid in the original text. So...yeah, Kefka was still really just an annoying comedy relief villain even after he took up the reins. Oh dear.

 

[Captain Sunshine]

I'm pretty sure 13 was supposed to be about family- pretty much every character had some sort of familial connection touched on in the game, and they hit all sorts of different relationships (parents and children, spouses and in-laws, siblings, non-traditional families without blood relations...) It wasn't really executed on very well, but I'm pretty sure that was the idea.

All that fal'Cie l'Cie le-see lalilulelo stuff made it seem like Fate was a really important theme for it as well, and making your own destiny. That said, didn't play it past the first few hours where they wouldn't stop talking about it, so that might be like saying FF7's theme is accepting your inner cross-dresser.

 

[remnant_phoenix]

I guess what I'm wondering is a few things: 1. Is Final Fantasy a series worth getting into? 2. When would you say the series began to go downhill? 3. If you didn't notice, none of the PSX titles had III. So what would be the best way to experience these games?

With that last one please try to keep in mind, the only systems I have are a SNES, N64, Gamecube, PS2, Gameboy Advance, and a Nintendo DS.

Thanks.

1, 4, and 6 are definitely worth playing. Most fans and non-fans of the series generally agree that those are high-quality old-school JRPGs. For 1, go with the PS1 version. The original NES FF1 was grind-tastic by modern standards. For 4 and 6, the PS1 versions are fine, but there are some annoying load times. I'd go with the GBA ports if you can find them; if not, the PS1 versions are recommended.

I would recommend 7 without reservation. Whether you enjoy it or not, it was a hallmark title for the JRPG genre, for better or for worse. And, whether or not you like 7 is a strong indicator of whether or not you should go forward. 7 is when the series fully embraced the more linear, scripted storytelling, and just putting more emphasis on the storytelling in general (more dialogue, more cutscenes, less challenging gameplay, etc), although it doesn't go as far as 8 (even MORE dialogue/cutscenes than 7), or 10 (more cutscenes/dialogue and extremely linear).

9 is kind of an oddball. It has the story focus of eight, but the gameplay is more like the old-school challenge level. Also, it's a throwback to the old high-fantasy (knights, dragons, castles, etc.) style of the older games as well.

Whether or not you'll enjoy 7-10 is highly dependent on your personal taste, but here's some general rules:

If you like cyberpunk anime with weird, sometimes confusing, plot twists, you'll probably like 7.

If you like shojo manga/anime, you might like 8.

If you like old-school fantasy JRPGs but also don't mind the more dialogue/cutscenes-heavy storytelling approach of newer JRPGs, you'll probably like 9. Also, it's arguably the best-looking PS1 game ever.

If you don't mind extreme linearity and sub-par voice acting, 10 is, in my opinion, possibly the best in terms of battle system and story.

12 incorporates some Western RPGs concepts and is more historical-fiction than fantasy, especially in the beginning, and it plays like an offline MMO. People tend to like it or hate it.

13 sucks. Avoid it.

My personal recommendations are 1, 4, 6, 7, and 10.

EDIT: As for when the series went downhill, I'm gonna say after 10.

Some old-school fans say that 7 was the point where it started to go downhill. As I said above, 7 was where the series began to focus more on linear, epic storytelling with a strong anime influence. A lot of people don't like this, but a lot of others do. This is why 7-10 are very popular, but also very divisive. However, 10 was the last main game that Hironobu Sakaguchi (the original creator of Final Fantasy) had anything to do with, and it shows. 12 was decent, but that's because the guy who made Final Fantasy Tactics was in charge of it for a while; while decent, it lacked the magic that made earlier games what they were. 13 is soulless and vapid and really starts to show that the people who made Final Fantasy what it was (like Sakaguchi) are long-gone.

Despite this, I actually have high hopes for 15. Tetsuya Nomura (the guy behind Kingdom Hearts and had a strong hand in FF7) is the leader of that game's development, and he is one of the few talented people that Final Fantasy has left.

 

[BlackJimmy]

Final Fantasy's III & IV have updated rereleases for DS, so get those versions.
V & VI have GBA updates so get them.
I & II have PSP updates so I'd reccomend trying to get one on the cheap. If that's not an option, get the Dawn of Souls rerelease.

I wouldn't say it's going downhill. It's never really gotten a terrible game in the main franchise, with it's worst being merely enjoyable.

VII, VIII and IX are my personal favs.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

All the FFs are worth playing at least once so I'd give as many a go as humanly possible. The older ones are a lot more grindy required than the newer ones but the series has no true decline just some things got worse for core fans of a certain gen. As for myself problems I had where the character stat progressions of 10, 12, 13 and some of the characters in FF 12 and 13 such as Vaan, Penelope and Hope.

That and FF 12 and 13 have dog shit battle systems.

All FF are really easy and I mean really fucking easy to break balance wise and become quite OP. For example, in FF VIII you can have all your character invincible, reduce the bosses defence capabilities real low and spam limit breaks. Whoever came up with the spells for that game gave not 1 fuck about balance.


No FF is anywhere near as good as people make them out to be as FF fans all have their pet faves that are "better than VII" or are one of those fans that like FF VII and over hype it a bit much. That said FF are also not as bad as others make them out to be so take the hype of each game and the hate and its true value is probably smack in the middle.

 

[renegade7]

Hey everyone I have a question for all of you.

There's a retro gaming store down the street from where I live and I go there almost all the time. They have a great selection of PSX games and have Final Fantasy I-VI in anthology collections (the first two in a set together, IV with Chrono Trigger, and V and VI together). I have never really played FF before (played the first a bit on an emulator) but have played Chrono Trigger on SNES (a lot of people have compared the two) and immensely enjoyed that. From the bit of the first FF I've played, it was a lot of fun.

However, my understanding is the series has begun to go downhill. I did some research but no one can really agree on when this began. I've heard since XI it's been going downhill but have also read that VIII is when the series began to suck.

I guess what I'm wondering is a few things: 1. Is Final Fantasy a series worth getting into? 2. When would you say the series began to go downhill? 3. If you didn't notice, none of the PSX titles had III. So what would be the best way to experience these games?

With that last one please try to keep in mind, the only systems I have are a SNES, N64, Gamecube, PS2, Gameboy Advance, and a Nintendo DS.

Thanks.

First, note that they are notated a little differently with the old games.

4 was originally released as 2 on the SNES in the States, and 6 was originally released as 3 on the SNES in the States. 2, 3 and 5 were not released in their original media in the US.

Here's my opinion.

4, 5, and 6 are absolute must-plays. The GBA versions are a little more polished but the difficulty is turned down a little, especially for 4. Better graphics (especially with 4) and cleaner translations mostly. The sound has also been changed a little to accommodate the GBA's slightly lower quality sound chip, and I've known that some people consider it a loss of quality (for some songs, they are a little worse, for others, there is significant improvement). Personally though, I prefer the GBA ones because bad translations seriously bug me.

3, the NES one (Not to be confused with 3 for SNES, which was actually 6 due to the non-synchronous localizations), is available for Nintendo DS. It's alright, if you like really old school RPGs, you'll like it, but it won't do much for you if that's not your thing.

7 and 8 aren't exactly my favorites, but they're still very solid games. 9 and 10 are must-plays. 11 is an MMO (it's decent), 12 is awful, 13 is kind of unremarkable, 14 is a joke of an MMO.

You'll be able to play all of these on the consoles you own.

 

[Sir Christopher McFarlane]

Final Fantasy is a problematic series. It's completely possible and common that your favourite and most hated games be in it.

I think that when it comes to RPGs from the SNES and PSX generations, the series tends to focus more on actual content, the story than it does on repetitive battling. The soundtracks are excellent. They were usually scored by Nobuo Uematsu then, but Final Fantasy Tactics has another composer and still sounds great. The graphics are usually better than contemporaries too.

If you want to avoid the entries with the biggest amount of busywork, try 4, 6, 7 and 9. They are very story-oriented and have straight-forward ability systems. Titles such as 8 and 10 have unnecessarily complicated ability systems that don't offer you enough benefits for time spent.
The classic period of the series is 4 through 9.

If you've played Dragon Quest and liked it, you likely will also like 3 & 5. They have characters that can change classes and gain completely new stats and abilities. I think 12 will also be your cup of tea. Although it restricted for the first few hours and it starts very scene-heavy, most of the game is focused on having a lot of sidequests, bosses and dungeons to brave and you can go for hours without having to even think about the story.

 

[Orekoya]

[...]the disjointed plot being pointlessly convoluted[...]

Odd. Opinions and different strokes and all that, but FF7 surely has the LEAST disjointed and convoluted plot of the whole series? Either that or I've misunderstood what you mean.

I'm not saying there aren't pacing issues, and it's not going to win any awards for cohesion, but it's the only one in the series where it feels like the writers had the whole story planned out from the beginning, as evidenced by the fact that almost all the plot developments are foreshadowed (again, not necessarily with consummate skill, but compare with something like FF6, where Kefka's plan isn't announced until he's about to carry it out, or the entire ending of VIII and IX).

In fact, it feels surprisingly like Chrono Trigger in that regard.

Uh, okay. Disregarding the mentioning of VIII or XI because I said 'prior entries', Final Fantasy 6's plot was pretty much a box of cliches(well, the same could be said about the rest of the prior entries too) but it was strung together quite well, mostly because there wasn't anything to mess up. That's why this clarification doesn't hold up.

I've put that badly. Villains springing a surprise is good storytelling. But the mechanism by which he achieves his plan isn't referenced, when it would be so easy to mention it repeatedly as background noise about the world's mythology. Which would make it a far stronger surprise.

Instead, it's almost as if they didn't know what exactly was going to happen until they got to that scene.

He's a prototype magi-knight that was driven insane from experiments. It was well established that these statues are the source of all magic in the world(thus the source of his mental perversion) which is why he made them his means to an end. Not exactly deep but it's cohesive.
On the flip side final fantasy 7's drive for set pieces left plot holes. Why did Hojo make Sephiroth clones? What was Sephiroth even doing for those years between the Nibelheim incident and the beginning of the game? Why would mako make those monsters in the Nibel Mountain reactor? What exactly was Shinra's business plan that entailed effectively destroying the planet they're on? How exactly is Holy the opposite of Meteor, why is that the only means in a technologically advanced society to remove said Meteor threat and if it is the only opposite why didn't it even work in destroying the meteor?

 

[Orekoya]

[...]the disjointed plot being pointlessly convoluted[...]

Odd. Opinions and different strokes and all that, but FF7 surely has the LEAST disjointed and convoluted plot of the whole series? Either that or I've misunderstood what you mean.

I'm not saying there aren't pacing issues, and it's not going to win any awards for cohesion, but it's the only one in the series where it feels like the writers had the whole story planned out from the beginning, as evidenced by the fact that almost all the plot developments are foreshadowed (again, not necessarily with consummate skill, but compare with something like FF6, where Kefka's plan isn't announced until he's about to carry it out, or the entire ending of VIII and IX).

In fact, it feels surprisingly like Chrono Trigger in that regard.

Uh, okay. Disregarding the mentioning of VIII or XI because I said 'prior entries', Final Fantasy 6's plot was pretty much a box of cliches(well, the same could be said about the rest of the prior entries too) but it was strung together quite well, mostly because there wasn't anything to mess up. That's why this clarification doesn't hold up.

I've put that badly. Villains springing a surprise is good storytelling. But the mechanism by which he achieves his plan isn't referenced, when it would be so easy to mention it repeatedly as background noise about the world's mythology. Which would make it a far stronger surprise.

Instead, it's almost as if they didn't know what exactly was going to happen until they got to that scene.

He's a prototype magi-knight that was driven insane from experiments. It was established that these statues are the source of all magic in the world(thus the source of his mental perversion) which is why he made them his means to an end. Not exactly deep but it's cohesive.

Spoiler: On the flip side final fantasy 7's drive for set pieces left plot holes.

Why did Hojo make Sephiroth clones? What was Sephiroth even doing for those years between the Nibelheim incident and the beginning of the game? Why would mako make those monsters in the Nibel Mountain reactor? What exactly was Shinra's business plan that entailed effectively destroying the planet they're on? How exactly is Holy the opposite of Meteor, why is that the only means in a technologically advanced society to remove said Meteor threat and if it is the only opposite why didn't it even work in destroying the meteor?

Side note, FF7's story felt nothing like Chrono Trigger. The only elements that they have in commmon is "This is gonna destroy our world, better stop it" and the hero myth.

 

[Tanis]

It's a good series, overall, but you have to also remember WHEN the games were released.

If you start comparing a game released 20+ years ago to a modern game in the genera...it's not going to go well.

While some JRPGs have aged INSANELY well (FF6, FFT, CT, etc)...
Some JRPGs have aged OKAY (FF4, FF5, FF8, etC)...
While even more have aged HORRIBLY (FF1, FF2, FF7, etc)...


I, back when FFX2 was released, played though all the FFs released at the point and it was a mixed bag.

Nostalgia, and cheats that gave you 10x (or more) EXP, helped me get thru several of the games that I thought were 'untouchable' when I first played them.
-I still can't get over how much I LOVED FF2 has a kid, and now I see it as a 'mediocre game with GREAT ideas that were POORLY utilized).

 

[Angelblaze]

What games are good and bad is entirely up to preference.


I personally love FFXI, the first mmo in the series.
Just so beautiful, the music is hypnotic, the class system is superb, I loved the 'menu' based combat - even though many people claimed to hate it. Black mage and Red mage will always be the best classes of any class to be classy, with the later being the buff spamming badass of the two.

If I had the money to, I'd go back and play it RIGHT NOW.

 

[SoManyCrimes]

He's a prototype magi-knight that was driven insane from experiments. It was established that these statues are the source of all magic in the world(thus the source of his mental perversion) which is why he made them his means to an end. Not exactly deep but it's cohesive.

Spoiler: On the flip side final fantasy 7's drive for set pieces left plot holes.

Why did Hojo make Sephiroth clones? What was Sephiroth even doing for those years between the Nibelheim incident and the beginning of the game? Why would mako make those monsters in the Nibel Mountain reactor? What exactly was Shinra's business plan that entailed effectively destroying the planet they're on? How exactly is Holy the opposite of Meteor, why is that the only means in a technologically advanced society to remove said Meteor threat and if it is the only opposite why didn't it even work in destroying the meteor?

Side note, FF7's story felt nothing like Chrono Trigger. The only elements that they have in commmon is "This is gonna destroy our world, better stop it" and the hero myth.

Was that established? I'm happy to defer there, but I remember all those plot points barely getting a line or two of dialogue. With stories taking over a day to experience, I'm not sure that qualifies.

But I think we're talking about different things. By "disjointed", I assumed that you meant "feels like a series of distinct episodes only loosely connected". And I think FFVII is the entry which suffers from that problem the least. If you just meant "internally consistent" then, sure. None of them make any sense. Although I still think FFVII offers the best compensation against that, because of its tighter structure and stronger, thematically relevant set pieces.

Spoiler: I do think some of those plot holes you mention are unfair

especially the one about Shinra's business plan. It's a heavy-handed game about environmentalism! It's not like there aren't plenty of real-world companies who seem to be willfully ignoring the problems of dwindling resources and environmental damage. I'd be happy to agree that the world isn't fleshed out enough to make Shinra seem plausible. The only real population centre is Midgar, and that's a shithole from top to bottom. I think the message would have been stronger if we'd been shown a lot of people living in luxury off the back of everyone else. But worlds feeling empty and constructed entirely for the benefit of the player characters is a problem with Final Fantasy all the way up to XII.

I'm afraid I'm not sure what you mean about the meteor. Why would you expect them to be able to destroy it in any other way? Their technology isn't that advanced, surely? Other than their fancy reactors and giant cannon what do they have? I was under the impression that (in keeping with the environmentalism theme), the party's plan with Holy was "well this may not work, but there aren't any other options, so there's nothing to lose by trying".

And I don't think you can complain that something wasn't established as working in a particular way AND that it didn't!

I'm not saying FFVII is a wonderful story. I just think it's the best twenty-hour plus video game story (that doesn't get its power from player insertion) that anyone's made up to this point. That's not much of a compliment.

And I only meant that FFVII and Chrono Trigger feel similar because of how plot information is threaded through them, rather than being kept from the player until it's basically redundant. I agree that the similarities stop there, but I think it's that technical expertise that makes them both hold up even now.

I'm happy to keep discussing this (it's always helpful for my job to hear why people did or didn't like particular stories), but we've drifted off-topic. I think the take away from this diversion for the OP is that it's not worth getting into Final Fantasy if you like your plots tight and cohesive.

 

[Orekoya]

He's a prototype magi-knight that was driven insane from experiments. It was established that these statues are the source of all magic in the world(thus the source of his mental perversion) which is why he made them his means to an end. Not exactly deep but it's cohesive.

Spoiler: On the flip side final fantasy 7's drive for set pieces left plot holes.

Why did Hojo make Sephiroth clones? What was Sephiroth even doing for those years between the Nibelheim incident and the beginning of the game? Why would mako make those monsters in the Nibel Mountain reactor? What exactly was Shinra's business plan that entailed effectively destroying the planet they're on? How exactly is Holy the opposite of Meteor, why is that the only means in a technologically advanced society to remove said Meteor threat and if it is the only opposite why didn't it even work in destroying the meteor?

Side note, FF7's story felt nothing like Chrono Trigger. The only elements that they have in commmon is "This is gonna destroy our world, better stop it" and the hero myth.

Was that established? I'm happy to defer there, but I remember all those plot points barely getting a line or two of dialogue. With stories taking over a day to experience, I'm not sure that qualifies.

But I think we're talking about different things. By "disjointed", I assumed that you meant "feels like a series of distinct episodes only loosely connected". And I think FFVII is the entry which suffers from that problem the least. If you just meant "internally consistent" then, sure. None of them make any sense. Although I still think FFVII offers the best compensation against that, because of its tighter structure and stronger, thematically relevant set pieces.

Spoiler: I do think some of those plot holes you mention are unfair

especially the one about Shinra's business plan. It's a heavy-handed game about environmentalism! It's not like there aren't plenty of real-world companies who seem to be willfully ignoring the problems of dwindling resources and environmental damage. I'd be happy to agree that the world isn't fleshed out enough to make Shinra seem plausible. The only real population centre is Midgar, and that's a shithole from top to bottom. I think the message would have been stronger if we'd been shown a lot of people living in luxury off the back of everyone else. But worlds feeling empty and constructed entirely for the benefit of the player characters is a problem with Final Fantasy all the way up to XII.

I'm afraid I'm not sure what you mean about the meteor. Why would you expect them to be able to destroy it in any other way? Their technology isn't that advanced, surely? Other than their fancy reactors and giant cannon what do they have? I was under the impression that (in keeping with the environmentalism theme), the party's plan with Holy was "well this may not work, but there aren't any other options, so there's nothing to lose by trying".

And I don't think you can complain that something wasn't established as working in a particular way AND that it didn't!

I'm not saying FFVII is a wonderful story. I just think it's the best twenty-hour plus video game story (that doesn't get its power from player insertion) that anyone's made up to this point. That's not much of a compliment.

And I only meant that FFVII and Chrono Trigger feel similar because of how plot information is threaded through them, rather than being kept from the player until it's basically redundant. I agree that the similarities stop there, but I think it's that technical expertise that makes them both hold up even now.

I'm happy to keep discussing this (it's always helpful for my job to hear why people did or didn't like particular stories), but we've drifted off-topic. I think the take away from this diversion for the OP is that it's not worth getting into Final Fantasy if you like your plots tight and cohesive.

See, this is why I can't have this discussion with fans. I've heard that same kind of noise from people who say Final Fantasy 6 is the best game ever with its deep rich storytelling.

Spoiler: 'I'm a god! I'm all-powerful! Uwee-hee-hee... I'll collect more espers! I'll extract their magic... And then... ... ... I'll revive the Warring Triad!' - Kefka

Just as FF7 is for environmentalism, FF6 is anti-war peace shouting. The war of the magi and the desire to avoid another war is pretty much the constant background noise. In the magitek factory you overhear Kefka flaunt his desire to revive the warring triad tauntingly when torturing the espers. So obviously since you hate this dick you gotta look into it. So then it's later established that it was the three gods of magic themselves that started the war hence why they're known as the warring triad. They sealed themselves in stone to end the war hence they're also known as the Statues too. And then oh my god why am I even defending this comparison they both sucked.

If you want to hear my personal biggest condemnation of final fantasy 7's story: its pacing makes it an absolute slog and kills my interest. By the time you get out of Midgar I've already stopped caring and in my multiple attempts to give the game another chance I can't even get past the first disc before I stop and tell myself 'no more'. Which is some credit I can give ff6, I'm at least able to finish that multiple times.

Also, I didn't say it wasn't established, it was. I was saying there was no justification for its establishment because it made no sense even within the internal logic which is why it's all the more aggravating that they copped out and had it not work at the last minute for the thematic flare. Therefore I will complain about it.

 

[Kakarot89]

Wow, I was seriously not expecting this many replies. I'm going to have a fun time going through and reading all of these. I did notice a theme though as I skimmed through these, a lot of people seem to want me to keep in mind when the games were released and that graphics have changed and other things. I would like to state that I am a serious retro gamer and find game play to be more important than a story or graphics. If a game has good game play AND a good story, then it only adds to the game. I just wanted to clear this up because I noticed it mentioned quite a few times within this thread.