Unlike JK Rowling’s famous answer to the Chicken-Egg argument, some things do have a beginning (not circles as every millenial’s favorite author told us). For me, my discovery of Final Fantasy began when I was roughly 10 years old, way back in 2003 – the more astute of you can guess my age, smarties!
Now, even at that tender age, I had already acquired a taste for games of the JRPG genre. There were quite a few that I had played to that point, but the one that sticks out in my memory has to be Breath of Fire IV. In all honesty though, I sucked! No seriously, in the days without easy access to internet and with poor, undeveloped grey matter, how could a kid like me even hope to get through a game as large-scale as that?! But, honestly it was all it took to get the bug to bite and I became a ten-year-old junkie! But, I’m drifting, this is a story for another post…
My dad’s younger brother, though still much older than myself, noticed my enjoyment of BoF4 and being a gamer himself, offered to lend me his copy of a game quite similar. He said if I enjoyed BoF, than I would most certainly have a great time with this one. Then he handed me a copy of Final Fantasy VIII.
As with BoF, I can honestly admit that my initial playthrough was terrible. I think I missed perhaps 50% of the content the game had to offer! However I was enamored with the beauty of the game! The visuals were breath taking, the music was emotive, heart warming when it needed to be, and dynamic and action packed whenever the situation demanded it. Each character resonated with me and within an hour of play, I was no longer watching their story, I began to experience it alongside them. To this day, while I do not feel Final Fantasy VIII is among the strongest installments of the series, it still holds significant sentimental value to me, helping to shape the next decade and half of my gaming life.
Of course my experience with this game was near the advent of the PS2, so bigger and better games started emerging. The next game I picked up at a random flea market was Final Fantasy XII in 2006. Having replayed VIII several times over the intervening years (subsequent playthroughs were far better, I assure you!), I was more ready for the series.
I was not disappointed. At first, I made the newbie mistake of assuming that the two games shared more than a second cousin twice removed relationship and panicked about missing five goddamn games!!!! Once I picked it up though, not only were the games unrelated except for a couple of Easter eggs, but XII it’s own unique, but no less entertaining storyline and gameplay. Unfortunately, I didn’t find the characters as compelling, but I was no less entertained.
Next foray into the world of Final Fantasy (no, not that game) was Final Fantasy IV on the Nintendo DS an aunt got me for my birthday in 2008, they really did have my maturity levels down, didn’t they? Of course the graphics were laughable, even though I later found out that it was actually an enhanced 3D remake. In any event, here I had another compelling story mixed with, by far, the best gameplay mechanics I had experienced in the series so far! By this point, it goes without saying that I had truly become a hardcore fan of the series, and as such I endeavored to consume every piece of Final Fantasy I could get my grubby hands on!
Thankfully, I had made a new discovery; eBay! Doing some snooping around on the internet, I discovered the general consensus among the fandom was the best game in the series had to be Final Fantasy VII. Naturally, this piqued my interest. A couple of weeks later, my shiny, second hand copy arrived. Now, usually when something is so hyped up, there is always a little bit of skepticism involved. Sure, everyone gushed about it and it had a 9,7/10 rating on Neoseeker, but was the game actually that good? Turns out it was. Yes, Final Fantasy VII lived up to its reputation and had leftover change to buy chewing gum! Of course the graphics were horrifying to say the least, but the music, gameplay and story more than made up for it. Suffice to say that if a story can be told through a bunch of technicolor Lego blocks, well, it’s a pretty awesome story. There’s a reason fans have been calling for a full 3D remake since 1997!
In the ten years since I first played Final Fantasy VII, I’ve done quite a lot of gaming, both outside of the series and within, and the series still stays with me as one of the greatest franchises in gaming. Now with the much anticipated remake of said game, 2020 looks to be a year filled with awesome RPG gaming.
Check out the next post for more information regarding this. Thanks for reading through until the end of this mini essay and don’t hesitate to leave a comment below and share your own Final Fantasy journey.
Until next time
Momo
Mechatronic Burst Gaming 