{"id":24309,"date":"2022-12-18T16:53:19","date_gmt":"2022-12-18T16:53:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/12\/18\/happy-35th-anniversary-to-final-fantasy-my-all-time-favourite-gaming-series\/"},"modified":"2022-12-18T16:53:19","modified_gmt":"2022-12-18T16:53:19","slug":"happy-35th-anniversary-to-final-fantasy-my-all-time-favourite-gaming-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/12\/18\/happy-35th-anniversary-to-final-fantasy-my-all-time-favourite-gaming-series\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy 35th anniversary to Final Fantasy, my all-time favourite gaming series"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

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My introduction to\u00a0Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>is a bit funny.<\/p>\n

When I was 10, my best friend got a new game for the GBA: Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories<\/em>. He hadn\u2019t actually played the original Kingdom Hearts\u00a0<\/em>on the PS2; instead, he picked up this handheld sequel because his brother\u2019s friend had erroneously told them it featured Inuyasha, the main character of his favourite anime.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Kingdom<\/a><\/p>\n

I wonder if that kid thought that Riku, Kingdom Hearts\u2019 silver-haired hero, was Inuyasha.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

No, I\u2019m not kidding \u2014 I guess kids really do say the darndest things.<\/p>\n

Thankfully, we ended up falling in love with Chain of Memories<\/em><\/a>, and one character quickly caught our eye: Cloud. His perfectly coiffed hair, badass bandaged sword, enigmatic black wing and face-covering scarf\u2026 he was the epitome of cool (everything I most certainly wasn\u2019t). Imagine our surprise, then, when we found out he actually had his own game, Final Fantasy VII<\/em>! My friend\u2019s mum quickly bought it for him, and he devoured<\/em> it. I didn\u2019t get to see him too often since he lived far away, so I was anxious to hang out again and hear what he thought in person.<\/p>\n

Eventually, he loaned the game to me, gushing praise, and my mind was blown as soon as booted up my PS1 and I began the thrilling opening bombing mission. I\u2019d never experienced anything like it, and it would eventually, quite literally, change my life<\/a>. But another reason that I love FFVII\u00a0<\/em>is that it introduced me to the broader\u00a0Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>series, which has since become my all-time favourite in gaming. So today, December 18th \u2014 exactly 35 years after the original Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>debuted on the Famicom (NES) in Japan \u2014 I want to celebrate that. Here\u2019s to the legendary RPG series from the little Square team, led by the big-dreaming Hironobu Sakaguchi<\/a>, that dared to shake up the game.<\/p>\n

A new adventure, every time<\/h2>\n

After VII<\/em>, I wanted to play as many of the other Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>games as I could. That wasn\u2019t exactly easy, given the gaming industry\u2019s spotty-at-best track record when it comes to preservation<\/a>. To its credit, though, Square Enix did release ports of FFI<\/em>,\u00a0II<\/em>,\u00a0IV<\/em>,\u00a0V\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0VI <\/em>on the GBA, and that\u2019s where I was able to first play all of those titles. And my god, did I fall in love. (I\u2019ve since finished every numbered single-player entry in the series.)<\/p>\n

As someone who was painfully introverted growing up and often cities or even countries removed from many of the friends and family I did hold dear, I regularly found myself drawn to games. After all, they are, in many ways, the perfect form of escapism. They whisk you away to worlds you could never have imagined and let you inhabit them in ways that no other art form can. Final Fantasy<\/em>, for me, has been my biggest provider of such experiences.<\/p>\n

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\u305d\u3057\u3066\u2026\u3000\u305f\u3093\u304d\u3085\u3046\u306e\u305f\u3073\u306f\u306f\u3058\u307e\u3063\u305f<\/p>\n

\uff26\uff26\uff13\uff15\u5468\u5e74\u304a\u3081\u3067\u3068\u3055\u3093#FF14<\/a> #\u30b9\u30af\u30a6\u30a7\u30a2\u958b\u767a\u5ba4<\/a> #sakaGUCCI<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/6r8qXJxr4c<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 \u5742\u53e3\u535a\u4fe1 (@auuo) December 16, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Unlike most series,\u00a0Final Fantasy<\/em> takes an anthology approach, so every numbered entry is its own standalone experience. As such, it feels consistently fresh. The original five games are different spins on traditional medieval fantasy featuring mix-ups like interdimensional travel (V<\/em>\u2018s Rift) and even moon landings (IV<\/em>). From there, it gets even more interesting:\u00a0VI\u00a0<\/em>is all about steampunk,\u00a0VII\u00a0<\/em>has a refreshing cyberpunk flavour,\u00a0VIII <\/em>sports a distinct \u201canime schoolboy\u201d vibe and X\u00a0<\/em>is more Southeast Asia-inspired.\u00a0Discovering where each new\u00a0FF\u00a0<\/em>takes place, and all of the ways in which each world feels unique, has proven to be delightful highlight of the series.<\/p>\n

Of course, it\u2019s the individual stories that help further distinguish these settings, and Final Fantasy <\/em>has always done that magnificently. VI\u00a0<\/em>used the familiar backdrop of an evil empire to tell a heartwrenching tale about people struggling to find meaning in a dark, often depressing, world. Feeling more timely than ever in 2022, VII\u00a0<\/em>explored themes of life and identity and how a ruthlessly greedy megacorporation\u2019s planet-killing business threatens to upend it all. While paying homage to the medieval FF<\/em>s of old,\u00a0IX\u00a0<\/em>also focused on the importance of love and friendship, especially in the face of mortality. X<\/em>\u2018s world of Spira, meanwhile, warned about the potential dangers of organized religion. Taking cues from Final Fantasy Tactics<\/em>, Final Fantasy XII\u00a0<\/em>was rife with political intrigue. Then there\u2019s XIV, <\/em>which has become a massive and beloved series in its own right thanks to an engrossing, sprawling and ever-evolving MMO story. Hell, XV<\/em>, at its core, was literally a charming road trip between four bros. Pretty much every Final Fantasy<\/em> game, even the weaker ones, has brought something new to the table, and I love them all for that.<\/p>\n

Literal game-changers<\/h2>\n
\"Final<\/a><\/p>\n

The Pixel Remaster of Final Fantasy IV.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

That ethos has also extended to the gameplay. Indeed, what I most admire about Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>is its unwillingness to follow the same playbook. Over the past 35 years, the franchise has experimented with so many different kinds of gameplay, and many of them have been resounding successes.<\/p>\n

The most impactful of these has been the Active Time Battle system, originally designed by legendary developer Hiroyuki Ito for IV <\/em>in 1991. In a feat of utter brilliance, Ito took classic turn-based RPG combat and injected speed and energy into it. Essentially, party members and enemies alike would have to wait for a bar to fill up before they could attack, adding a level of urgency and real-time action to the fray. Later games would add further layers to combat in their own compelling ways, like V<\/em>\u2018s remarkably deep Job system<\/a> allowing for rich party configurations, the\u00a0intricate and highly customizable\u00a0Materia of VII<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0X<\/em>\u2018s open-ended and addictive Sphere Grid character progression method<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0XII<\/em>\u2018s more MMO-inspired Gambit system<\/a> to oh-so precisely fine-tune companions\u2019 AI behaviour.<\/p>\n

At the same time, we\u2019d still occasionally get returns to traditional turn-based mechanics, like X<\/em>, which cleverly used this format to encourage strategy by making you decide when to swap in teammates and attack based on a bar that displayed who\u2019s up next. And that doesn\u2019t even take all of the spin-offs and other offshoots into consideration. Final Fantasy VII<\/em> Remake<\/em><\/a>, for example, is a masterful blend of ATB and real-time combat, delivering utterly thrilling battles that feel fast, fluid and strategic. Or take\u00a0Strangers of Paradise<\/em>, a smart, brutal Nioh<\/em>-esque spin on Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>that also doubles as a fascinating villainous origin-prequel story<\/a>\u00a0to the original\u00a0Final Fantasy<\/em>. The fact that Square Enix is finding ways to breathe new life into decades-old tropes and systems never ceases to impress me.<\/p>\n

People to root for<\/h2>\n
\"Final<\/a><\/p>\n

The famous opera scene in the Pixel Remaster version of Final Fantasy VI.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Would any of this matter, though, if you didn\u2019t care about the characters themselves? Thankfully, Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>has truly succeeded in crafting well-realized, nuanced and memorable figures for many years now. In fact, it wouldn\u2019t be an understatement to say that so many of this series\u2019 casts rank among my favourites in any medium. That all boils down to the unique interactive elements of games that you make you truly engrossed in your characters\u2019 plights since you actually get to live through them yourself. Over the course of dozens of hours of well-written narratives, you come to truly relate to them.<\/p>\n

Maybe that was in\u00a0VI<\/em>, where Celes\u2019 struggles with allegiance led to a profoundly moving opera performance or\u00a0<\/strong>devastating struggles with depression. Perhaps you\u2019re like me and most closely identified with VII<\/em> \u2014 specifically, Cloud\u2019s deep-rooted issues of self-worth and longing for acceptance, and also found inspiration from Zack\u2019s story in Crisis Core<\/em><\/a>. Many have also gravitated towards Vivi\u2019s arc in IX<\/em>, a surprisingly existential quest that serves as that game\u2019s emotional centre. Others, meanwhile, might resonate with X<\/em>\u2018s Yuna, a strong-willed young woman burdened with an unfair responsibility that she nonetheless compassionately shoulders.<\/p>\n

In many of my loneliest and darkest moments, I found so much solace in these characters; I connected with them in ways that most other games couldn\u2019t speak to me. In a sense, the series grew over time in terms of maturity and complexity, much in the way that Harry Potter<\/em>\u2018s coming-of-age story becoming darker over time made it click so much with my generation. For Final Fantasy<\/em>, that growth was no accident, either. Sakaguchi has been open about how his earlier creative failures led him to keep the stories of the earlier Final Fantasy\u00a0<\/em>titles relatively light, but the untimely death of his mother inspired him<\/a> to draw from his emotions to pen deeper, more impactful narratives in future projects. One of the biggest examples of this was the Lifestream in\u00a0VII<\/em>, a beautifully spiritual exploration of the afterlife and what binds us all together. Both Sakaguchi and Final Fantasy <\/em>as a whole have gone on their own personal journeys, and through them, so have I.<\/p>\n

World-class scores<\/h2>\n