Why people are so crazy over Final Fantasy?

Originally Posted by Fluent
I wish I could take LSD. I don't trust my mind enough for that, though.

Don't do drugs, kids.

one of the best CD's ever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dvbl2vOXbT4

I'm playing Final Fantasy XIII again and it feels really good. Way better than any other Final Fantasy game. It's dumb and linear and a total no-brainer, but it doesn't feel like a chore to play compared to other games in the series, which is the main reason why I enjoyed it.

Final Fantasy VIII is also very good but it's been a long time since i played it and I kinda forgot about it. Tried the rest of the games, they were boring, so I dunno why you guys are wasting your time on these no-brainer jrpgs…

Oh, I forgot that I played Mystic Quest when I was a kid. IIRC it was pretty hardcore, so I'm pretty sure why you guys aren't discussing it. 8)

Originally Posted by zwanzig_zwoelf
Oh, I forgot that I played Mystic Quest when I was a kid. IIRC it was pretty hardcore, so I'm pretty sure why you guys aren't discussing it. 8)

Only, what, 95 more posts to go? Keep at it!

Originally Posted by zwanzig_zwoelf
…Final Fantasy VIII is also very good but it's been a long time since i played it and I kinda forgot about it. Tried the rest of the games, they were boring, so I dunno why you guys are wasting your time on these no-brainer jrpgs…
…)

Probably because they, surprise, surprise, follow their own taste in stead of yours. Is that so hard to understand?

pibbur who finds it hard to understand why ZZ wastes his time wondering/worrying about why people like things he doesn't like, but he admittedly finds it a bit amusing.

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
2011 - The Last Story

Now that's a game I would rather forget having ever bought. There are good things in it for sure, but the frame rate… Single digit farmerates in real time combat is no fun. And in the later parts of the game, this is really common. Basically, The Last Story was an alright game that did not take into account the limitations of the hardware it was developed for, and it suffered greatly because of it.

Originally Posted by Aubrielle
Only, what, 95 more posts to go? Keep at it!

I don't understand your post. Maybe I need a fluent person to interpret your message from Aubriellean. But no offence taken, I'm A-OK with you.

I'm interested in finding a contact point with the series, and that's all. What do you guys think of Dirge of Cerberus? My friends tell me it's a very good game…

I hate everything Final Fantasy related for personal reasons.

Like, despise it all.

To be honest I played 6 or 7 FF games, but didn't finish any of them. Not because they were boring and bad, it's because of some hard encouters with enemies. And later I find out that in order to beat them I supposed to grind many hours. This and random encouters are biggest issues in FF series for me.

Always found FF an extremely overrated series… Perhaps I would feel differently had I played the older titles closer to when they were released. But playing some of the early FF fairly recently I found them to be repetitive grindy JRPGs that were a chore to play.

The only FF I have ever played to completion was FFX. (I had a PS2 so got it maybe a year after release). The decent combat system was really the best thing about it. And the summoning was cool. There were still far too many random encounters, but at least there was an item you could get at some point to turn them off. Minigames were terrible. Story was OK, albeit very melodramatic. However, I detested "Tidus" the main character. He is an insufferable, whiny, arrogant stupid kid and it's not good for an RPG to have such an unlikable main character.

Each FF title I played had some redeeming qualities, sure, especially if you consider each iteration in the context of what other RPGs were available at the time of release. However, I don't think they deserve anywhere near the level of praise they received. There are far better JRPGs that for whatever reason never received the attention they deserve in the West.

But on more JRPG centric forums there are diehard FF fans who will rabidly defend it. Yet it often seems they cannot really articulate why they love it…

Overall, it's a mediocre series that I think enjoys success mainly due to nostalgia… When the early titles came out there wasn't a whole lot else in the genre to choose from. Now it's popular because it's popular… I imagine large amounts of the sales are from people who buy the game thinking "Let's see what all the fuss is about".

Originally Posted by daveyd
Always found FF an extremely overrated series… Perhaps I would feel differently had I played the older titles closer to when they were released. But playing some of the early FF fairly recently I found them to be repetitive grindy JRPGs that were a chore to play.

A bit overrated, perhaps. But you have to admit that there are some really solid RPGs in there. Final Fantasy Tactics springs to mind. It's heavy on story, atmosphere, and player choice. It's also aged remarkably well, especially with the Lion War edition.

Final Fantasy XIV isn't too bad either.

I would say that if you don't play any other entry in the series, play Final Fantasy Tactics. I think every RPG fan deserves to play that one.

Dunno. Final Fantasy 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11 (mmo), are really good. True there wasn't much like them back in the day, but they were/are still great games, IMO. Played the port of 6 not too long ago and it was still awesome. Didn't find it "grindy" at all.

Originally Posted by daveyd
Overall, it's a mediocre series that I think enjoys success mainly due to nostalgia… When the early titles came out there wasn't a whole lot else in the genre to choose from. Now it's popular because it's popular… I imagine large amounts of the sales are from people who buy the game thinking "Let's see what all the fuss is about".

I find that to be highly unlikely. A series can only survive for so long on nostalgia or people buying copies out of curiosity. The games obviously appeal to a great many people. They just don't appeal to you.

I enjoyed the series back in the NES and SNES days, but I stopped buying out of nostalgia after FF9, and that was what…15 years ago?

Originally Posted by jwilliams
To be honest I played 6 or 7 FF games, but didn't finish any of them. Not because they were boring and bad, it's because of some hard encouters with enemies. And later I find out that in order to beat them I supposed to grind many hours. This and random encouters are biggest issues in FF series for me.

But your avatar….

pibbur who thinks he's funny. And may very well be wrong in assuming that the avatar stems from a certain JRPG series.

Originally Posted by JDR13
I find that to be highly unlikely. A series can only survive for so long on nostalgia or people buying copies out of curiosity. The games obviously appeal to a great many people. They just don't appeal to you.
…,

This.

You said it better than I could.

pibbur who admits that probably isn't particularly hard to do.

Originally Posted by JDR13
I find that to be highly unlikely. A series can only survive for so long on nostalgia or people buying copies out of curiosity. The games obviously appeal to a great many people. They just don't appeal to you.

Sonic….

To be honest, I find it hard to believe that there wasn't much to choose from.

NES kiddies could get Castlevania, Crystalis, Faxanadu, some Wizardry/Ultima ports, and a couple of other games.
SNES kiddies could get Lufia, Terranigma, Arcana, Eye of the Beholder (though SCD version is superior in every way…), some Ultima games, Paladin's Quest… am I missing something here?
PS1 kiddies could always get Megami Ibunroku Persona, Legend of Dragoon, Grandia, Wild Arms, Koudelka, Jade Cocoon, Kartia, Granstream Saga… heck, even these stupid re-releases of Lunar games are fairly good.

Basically this means that at least some part of Final Fantasy fans are these devoted customers of McDonalds who keep saying that there is/was nuffin like it because they never bothered to notice KFC on the other side of the road or never heard of it because they never get out of their safe spess. Am I right?

Originally Posted by zwanzig_zwoelf
Basically this means that at least some part of Final Fantasy fans are these devoted customers of McDonalds who keep saying that there is/was nuffin like it because they never bothered to notice KFC on the other side of the road or never heard of it because they never get out of their safe spess. Am I right?

No, you're not.
The Final Fantays series has always done certain things right, that's why they got so popular.
The first thing to consider is encounter rate. Many of its contemporaries during the SNES era in particular had very high encounter rates (Lufia & Breath of Fire are prime examples), while it's been more manageable in the FF series. This helped make the games more approachable and thus giving the games more mass appeal.
The FF games have always offered skilled players the chance to beat bosses at an earlier level than most casual players realize, more so than what most of the competitors did. Basically the FF games were deeper. But you don't have to really dig into its depth if you don't want to, you can just do a bit more grinding (and the FF series was generally not too bad in regards to grind) to get past any thing that gave you issues.
The stories were usually deeper than what the competitors had to offer. It's not until relatively late in the SNES lifecycle that we start seeing JRPGs with deeper stories. And a good chunk of them were still Square titles. Enix was the main competitor, but their stories were still generally simpler.
The soundtracks for the FF games are legendary. Nobuo Uematsu helped sell games. More so during the PS1 era, where Square was really pushing the inclusion of his music in their marketing.
The FF series was generally rather good at pushing the tech of its time. It still is actually. For the most part, Square was far above its competitors in the JRPG market in terms of technical prowess. Yes the block hands in FF7 look ugly, but the in combat graphics? For its time, that was really impressive. Combine strong tech with a distinct art style, and you've got graphics that sell games.

Originally Posted by Fnord
No, you're not.
The Final Fantays series has always done certain things right, that's why they got so popular.
The first thing to consider is encounter rate. Many of its contemporaries during the SNES era in particular had very high encounter rates (Lufia & Breath of Fire are prime examples), while it's been more manageable in the FF series. This helped make the games more approachable and thus giving the games more mass appeal.
The FF games have always offered skilled players the chance to beat bosses at an earlier level than most casual players realize, more so than what most of the competitors did. Basically the FF games were deeper. But you don't have to really dig into its depth if you don't want to, you can just do a bit more grinding (and the FF series was generally not too bad in regards to grind) to get past any thing that gave you issues.
The stories were usually deeper than what the competitors had to offer. It's not until relatively late in the SNES lifecycle that we start seeing JRPGs with deeper stories. And a good chunk of them were still Square titles. Enix was the main competitor, but their stories were still generally simpler.
The soundtracks for the FF games are legendary. Nobuo Uematsu helped sell games. More so during the PS1 era, where Square was really pushing the inclusion of his music in their marketing.
The FF series was generally rather good at pushing the tech of its time. It still is actually. For the most part, Square was far above its competitors in the JRPG market in terms of technical prowess. Yes the block hands in FF7 look ugly, but the in combat graphics? For its time, that was really impressive. Combine strong tech with a distinct art style, and you've got graphics that sell games.

In other words, it's Call of Duty of JRPGs.

Originally Posted by zwanzig_zwoelf
In other words, it's Call of Duty of JRPGs.

That was not what I said, nor what I would say.

Originally Posted by jwilliams
To be honest I played 6 or 7 FF games, but didn't finish any of them. Not because they were boring and bad, it's because of some hard encouters with enemies. And later I find out that in order to beat them I supposed to grind many hours. This and random encouters are biggest issues in FF series for me.

In FF7? The only bosses you have to grind to beat are the optional "Weapon" bosses. Those are there for folks who are *really* enjoying the game or who just haven't got the cash for a new game yet and want to keep playing something.

Though maybe you mean that snake thing in the swamps near the start of the game? You aren't supposed to beat that, you're supposed to avoid it. It can be beaten the first time you see it if you grind like mad but there's no reason to do so.