Dark Wave and other removed commands (FF2us)

[Spooniest]

In the original domestic release of Final Fantasy IV (Final Fantasy 2), many of the characters' special skills were removed from the game, along with lots of consumables and such. Censorship, too, but that's not the focus of this thread.

Why was this stuff cut out? I'm not fond of the opinion that they didn't think people would get it, but if it is true, then the question must be asked: why not?

[VeloZer0]

It was part of a general toning down of the game. Not only did they make it simpler, they made it easier. I don't know if it was due to gut-instinct about the American market or actual testing and market research but my gut-instinct tells me it is the former.

[Spooniest]

Is it possible it wasn't localization related? I mean, it might have just seemed right at the time. They even released another version in Japan after the fact (EasyType) that actually is radically different from 4 or the American 2.

[Roogle]

Well, I liked the fact that the status effect recovery items were removed because there were far too many of them for how little the party is inflicted with status effects. That, coupled with the limited inventory space, might have been a reason.

[Jowy]

Still, I think Yang having a proper five commands instead of three opens a whole other level of gameplay. That applies to any character with missing abilities, really. Darkwave helps for early level grinding a hell of a lot more than Fight and Item. Give the protagonist a little bit of variety.

[Roogle]

The changes to the character commands bothered me a lot. There's a big difference between only having Attack and Item or having Attack, Darkness Wave, and Item. I generally approve of the item changes though.

[Evastio]

None of the command removals seemed all that bad to me, except maybe Dark Wave (mostly since Dark Knight Cecil uses it in the Paladin battle and it just came out of nowhere in FFII US. I didn't really use it since I don't like losing health to do damage).

I didn't mind the simplification of items. It cleaned up the screen a lot more and it always seemed like overkill to me, having one item for every status ailment, especially in later FFs where there were loads of status ailments.

[Christmas]

I was shocked when my doppelganger could use dark wave and I can't. I was rolling on the floor having a fit crying not fair back in those days. :(

[*Peter*]

It was part of a general toning down of the game. Not only did they make it simpler, they made it easier. I don't know if it was due to gut-instinct about the American market or actual testing and market research but my gut-instinct tells me it is the former.
Some of the changes in the original American translation appear to have actually in some sense made the game harder;
most notably the removal of several of the characters' attacks.
For example, the removal of Dark Wave means that Cecil cannot conveniently attack all enemies at once, and Rosa also lost her Pray command, which was a nice and simple way to keep the characters' HP up, and Yang lost his Brace and Focus commands, which means that he can no longer protect himself from physical attacks or build up his attack power.
But I guess a better term for these changes is that they "simplified" the game.

[Sorceress Claire]

It was part of a general toning down of the game. Not only did they make it simpler, they made it easier. I don't know if it was due to gut-instinct about the American market or actual testing and market research but my gut-instinct tells me it is the former.
Some of the changes in the original American translation appear to have actually in some sense made the game harder;
most notably the removal of several of the characters' attacks.
For example, the removal of Dark Wave means that Cecil cannot conveniently attack all enemies at once, and Rosa also lost her Pray command, which was a nice and simple way to keep the characters' HP up, and Yang lost his Brace and Focus commands, which means that he can no longer protect himself from physical attacks or build up his attack power.
But I guess a better term for these changes is that they "simplified" the game.

At the same time though the enemies are weaker in easy type aren't they? To be honest I've never played Easy Type. The first time I ever played this game was the PSX Chronicles version in February 2004 when I was 15.75 years old. However, since 2015 I've been playing the Uncensored, Rebalanced Woosley Edition Patch.