Since it is FFII's main claim to fame in this era, what were your thoughts about the story and cast of characters?
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Since it is FFII's main claim to fame in this era, what were your thoughts about the story and cast of characters?
Honestly, I like both the story and the cast, just, uh, not much else. ._.
If you think on this with only the original Final Fantasy to compare it to, Final Fantasy II seems like Square just dumped the entire bucket-load of "Epic" sauce into the mix. The story might seem pretty tame and generic now. Evil empire, yada yada. But I feel they went all out in trying to make this quest as awesome as they could. And with such a small development team, it's amazing how much they were able to accomplish.
After the happy-go-lucky first game where everyone lives and people seem to have only minor inconveniences (Elfheim and Melmond did the worst, I'll admit), this game went dark! Some of your party dies, villages get bombed. Infiltration, betrayal, and tricks. Later games used these more, but this used them really effectively for its time.
This game really impressed me, and it still does today. I love FF II!
While FFII may not be the best story in the series as far as how well it flows or the length and size (again, think back to the time), I love the risks it took. People to this day consider it one of the darkest FF games in the series, and there's a good argument for it. 3 Three of your party members die in front of you along with at least 3 NPC's (which one joins the SoR team), two of the villains die and come back as monsters, Entire cities and kingdoms are wiped off the map, and you feel like you can never catch up to the Empire for a good chunk of the game, which is brilliant.
The characters are also awesome. There's a reason why many of them spawns spiritual descendants throughout the series. Then there are concepts like chocobos, Cid, Mysidia, Dragoons, Dark Knights, pretty villains, betrayal...you know, the stuff in a ton of other FF games that are almost integral to the series itself (mostly Cid, chocobos, and pretty villains).
Call it dated. Call it a Star Wars ripoff (btw FFXII is almost like a more expanded version of this game, so...). Just keep in mind the time it released and recognize its merits in that regard. For 1988, this game has a good plot and characters.
It was pretty good. Was it the first RPG to start out with an enemy that defeats you no matter what? I always wondered where that trend came from.