The Final Fantasy series has been one of the most beloved and longest lasting series in gaming history. At this point in Square’s development, the series had already seen four installations in Japan, while only one had made it across the Pacific into North American hands. Since the Super Nintendo was gaining popularity in the States, Square decides to eschew Final Fantasy II and III, both Famicom titles, and go with its Super Famicom debut, Final Fantasy IV. So as not to confuse their American counterparts, it was renamed Final Fantasy II, even though it is not a true sequel of the previous Final Fantasy. The story in Final Fantasy II is significant because it is the one element that has been missing in a Final Fantasy until this point. The characters are meaningful and important because each has their own part to play throughout the game. Unlike previous Final Fantasies, you really feel for a character when they leave the group or are put in a dire predicament. Instead of being mission driven, like Final Fantasy was, Final Fantasy II combines the multitude of characters with a compelling plot to drive the action. Where Final Fantasy’s story became boring, Final Fantasy II’s turned out to be exciting. This is the biggest improvement in the series and would become one of the leading facets for future Final Fantasies. Along with the story, the characters are drastically different. Gone are the bland, nameless character shells from Final Fantasy as they are replaced by vibrant individuals with names, histories, and ties to other characters in the game. Each one has their own style and design, as well as an important role to play within the game. The game focuses primarily on Cecil, a dark knight that is employed by the king of Baron to lead the Red Wings, their daunting air force. In predictable fashion, Cecil has a change of heart and is quickly dashed from his rank and sent on routine errand with his dragoon buddy, Kain. The story enjoys multiple twists as Cecil meets several characters that will assist him throughout the game. There are 12 playable characters overall, providing a diverse selection of strategies in battle. Although you will not be able to choose your party at any time (the story chooses for you), the lineup is routinely shuffled so that any one group does not become stagnant. The gameplay is the other biggest change from Final Fantasy. While the action was set to a pure turn-based method in the previous game, Final Fantasy II brings about a system called active time battle. This system is based on the premise that each character will have a certain amount of time to achieve their action and then wait until their turn comes up again. This creates faster paced action because the enemies operate under the same principle. There are two options under which this battle system can take place, active and wait. If the active option is selected, the enemies will attack while you select which items or magic to use. If the wait option is chosen, the enemies will wait until an item or magic is selected before taking their turn. For faster paced battles, active should be selected, while less experienced users will find comfort in the wait option. The magic allocation system of Final Fantasy is replaced with the more straightforward MP system. In Final Fantasy, a magic user was allotted a set number of times a spell at a certain level could be used. The MP system has similar characteristics of the HP system in that each spell needs a certain amount of points to be cast. When the user has spent all their points, they cannot cast any more spells. The points are used for all spells and are not divided amongst different level spells like in the previous system. This creates a more strategic element in battle because stronger spells require more MP making the user think about utilizing the strongest magic possible whilst conserving MP. This system would become the standard for most future installments in the Final Fantasy series. The graphics are good for the Super Nintendo system. There are slight uses of 3D imaging, but the use is very limited. The backgrounds aren’t necessarily well detailed, but suffice for their purpose. The character design is unique for this series because each character has a specific look both during battle and on the world map. Another difference is having backgrounds during the battle scenes, which is a nice touch. Overall, the graphics look fine, but don’t give too much of an improvement over the previous version, which is somewhat disheartening since this game is on a newer system. The sound is excellent with credit given to genius composer Nobuo Uematsu. His soundtrack is more diverse in this game, with a different theme for almost every place, while expanding the limit of the simple technology. Although some of the music can get repetitive, that is acceptable seeing as how that happens in most RPGs. This game will give around 20-25 hours of gameplay for the typical user. There are several side quests, but none are exceeding long or tedious, especially given the substantial rewards of most of them. The replay value isn’t necessarily there, but you’ll feel satisfied after beating it the first time through, which negates any need to beat it again. Overall, this game is a classic in every sense of the word. While Final Fantasy laid the groundwork for the series, Final Fantasy II demonstrated many of the key factors that would become standards in the future Final Fantasies.
Other Helpful Reviews for Final Fantasy IV Easytype
INTRODUCTION "FFIV revolutionised the genre,beyond the point of recognition,and set some highly ambitious staples,that continues to be followed by the genre,years after they were set." In 1991,very few circles of w... Read Full Review
Since its release in the early 90s, I've played through FF IV countless times cause it's simply an amazing game, which set the standard for rpgs. FF iv introduced us to the active time battle system, raising the bar f... Read Full Review
