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Final Fantasy Record Keeper Review
Square-Enix has long been fascinated with the mobile market. If it were announced tomorrow that Final Fantasy XVI is going to be a mobile title the response from many fans would likely be weary acceptance . Square has struggled in the mobile market with ports of its older Final Fantasy titles being its best offerings. Original titles like Crystal Defenders, Airborne Brigade and All The Bravest range from mediocre to a cynical cash grab with the Final Fantasy name crudely stapled to it. Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more. Final Fantasy Record Keeper is the latest attempt at capitalising on our nostalgia for the series we all know and love, released – for free, no less – on iOS and Android last week. Since I beat Type-0 HD I’ve been mildly addicted to it, so I’m going to dive right in and tell you what I think of it.
There seemed to be a myth on our beloved Eyes on Final Fantasy that Record Keeper was going to be an educational title to help kids type. Let’s put that to bed. It’s not. The plot, if you can call it that, is that there’s a gallery with images of Final Fantasy moments, and you can go into the images and live those moments. Sounds lovely, right? Well, naturally it’s all gone a bit tits up and some evil force is possessing all of the records. You, the titular Record Keeper, have to go jump into the paintings, rough house some baddies and restore the paintings, unlocking more in the process.
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Dr. Mog, "Legitimate Pharmaceutical Supplier" and Tyro, local tweaker.
The gameplay consists of battles and improving yourself for said battles. That is it. I can’t fault the battle system. They’re like a streamlined Final Fantasy battle system and a lot more fast paced. Each character can equip two abilities depending on their class – there is no explanation of what each character’s class is and so it’s a matter of trial and error as to what they can equip, which is helpful – and they also have a Soul Break, which is of course a limit break. It works well. Enemies from Final Fantasy games have been accurately recreated. The Mist Dragon turns into Mist and will pummel you if you attack it like this. Whelk from FFVI has his special lightning shell. They even give you that same garbled warning about the Guard Scorpion from FFVII and its tail.
There is an “auto” button that means your characters will just attack, attack, attack. No abilities, no soul breaks, just attack. You can easily clear out whole dungeons with the Auto button and literally find yourself not having to lift a finger. Where you will find the real challenge is in the bosses of Record Keeper. There is such a disparity between the difficulty of random enemies and the bosses that it feels like you’ve missed a step up in difficulty somewhere, as if the game has suddenly jumped from Easy to Hard with no Normal in between. The bosses are a definite challenge, particularly as you are facing them after completing a dungeon marathon with no chances to rest (unless you expend precious Mithril or Gems, but more on those in a second) in between.
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When you have enemies called Slag Worms the jokes just write themselves.
Why bother with all this fighting? What’s my reward? Well, it isn’t for the story. You’ll get a few lines describing the events of that Final Fantasy with an accompanying blurry screenshot, which does little to stir the emotions. No, the whole point of the game is loot, loot, and more loot. Weapons, armour, gil and orbs are on hand. Abilities can be crafted from orbs, and there’s a surprisingly impressive selection of physical attacks, black magic, white magic and summons available for you to make. Both abilities and equipment can be upgraded using other equipment and orbs respectively, meaning you’ll feel a real sense of progression. In some cases you’ll even unlock characters, though at the moment only FFIV, VII and X characters have any representation alongside generic Final Fantasy job classes. Oh, and you’ll also acquire 1 Mithril for each level you complete,
And so at last we touch on the point of this exercise. It’s a free game, yes, but if you want to pay for things you certainly have that option. It’s not mandatory. I can’t stress that enough. It’s not like Theatrhythm Mobile where you only had two songs, or All The Bravest where its raison d'être was to see how many microtransactions its players could be made to pay. You only get a limited number of actions, or Stamina, before you have to wait for it to recharge. If your stamina runs out and you don’t wait to wait, fork over one of your hard earned pieces of Mithril. Or alternatively, 100 Gems! Ah, Gems. Why is it always Gems in these games? 100 Gems will set you back 79p/99c. Want to buy 9,500 Gems? Hope you have £64.99 and $84.99 handy. Want to heal in between battles? 1 Mithril or 100 Gems. Died in a battle and want to retry that battle without taking on the entire dungeon again? Same price pal.
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I'd like to have an Evil Dream about Lilith if you know what I mean. And if you do, let me know because I sure as heck don't.
I said I was addicted, and boy did they do a damn fine job in getting you hooked. The real lure is the relic draw. Pay 5 Mithril or 300 gems – you’ll note the 1 = 100 Mithril to Gems ratio has suddenly changed here – and you’ll get a shot at a rare and powerful piece of equipment! Boy do they ever beat you over the head with it. Want Cloud’s Buster Sword? Sephiroth’s Masamune? For a limited time only, spin the wheel and take your chances! Of course, more often than not you’ll end up with a really good Harp or six really good Gloves. Which is nice and all but like a gambler you feel if you try just one more time you’ll get what you want, which is of course rather dangerous to your wallet.
Also on offer is a different daily dungeon, offering wild and crazy rewards if you deign to log in and play that day. Gargantuan quests and events also appear. There’s an event running until Saturday where you must climb the Shinra tower, clearing out each floor and fighting all your favourite bosses and then some. The characters of Tifa and Sephiroth joining your party are the lofty prizes on offer. A new event launched today with Dark Knight and Paladin Cecil being given to those who can climb Mount Ordeals. It starts off fun and interesting, and the bosses all do mimic the behaviour of their console counterparts but it soon feels like a grind.
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White/Power? I didn't realise I'd be fighting against the Ku Klux Flan.
So despite my addiction, what stops me falling in love with Record Keeper is just how creatively bankrupt it is. It’s a trend in Final Fantasy games – Dissidia, Theatrhythm, the previously mentioned mobile abominations – where Square are just rehashing the same old characters going through the motions. No new stories are being told, there’s no character development, no emotion whatsoever. The music is just ripped from the Final Fantasy games and while they’re all great songs, they’re nothing we haven’t been listening to for a decade or two.
Only five games have levels at the time of writing, and only three of those have a large number of them: IV, V and VI. Is it a coincidence that those are the SNES games whose art don’t need to be changed to fit Record Keeper’s pixel style? Of course it isn’t. At first I was really impressed that they had recreated elements of FFVII in pixel art, but it transpires it’s just the assets for All The Bravest being re-used. That perhaps is the most disheartening thing about it. It’s like if you were eating out but sent your meal back as unsatisfactory and all they did was move items around the plate and tell you it was brand new.
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"ATTACK WHEN ITS TAIL IS UP! ...if you're a dumbass, that is! ...what do you mean 'unhelpful instructions'?"
Square-Enix might argue that these tribute acts are what the fans want, and perhaps the success of the likes of Dissidia and Theatrhythm might indicate that. Final Fantasy Record Keeper is aimed at long time Final Fantasy fans – god help any newcomers who try to make sense of what is going on. That they’re trying to squeeze more money out of their core fanbase, the ones who have shown the most loyalty, by serving up content from games we’ve already likely bought on numerous systems is what saddens me about it. Square knows full well what their fans want when it comes to nostalgia. It’s just that a HD remake of something like FFVII takes a lot more courage and effort.
Like my Type-0 HD review, you might read my criticisms and think of the whole review as a negative one. It’s not intended to be. Final Fantasy Record Keeper is a free game and I’ve spent a lot of time playing it. I’m going to recommend to you right now to download it if you haven’t already, it is absolutely worth having a look at if you’re a Final Fantasy fan. But then I simply can’t help but be frustrated when I play something decent with potential to be great, but corners have been cut to reduce time and costs. I’m addicted to your game, Square-Enix, but I’m not buying your Gems. Don't show anyone my account purchases please Square!
The version reviewed and screenshots were the iOS version of Final Fantasy Record Keeper played on an iPhone 5C. You can pick it up on the App Store and Google Play for iOS and Android.
