Fina Fantasy Appeal

What do you think makes Final Fantasy so cool?
the characters, the story, the graphics?

i think its the stories. they r sooo cool. romantic, funny etc etc.

There aren't too many games around that act more like films, even if most gameplayers prefer plotless shooting and fighting there are still plenty of people who don't and who don't have as much choice, there's still a market there with not too much competition.

I think the sidequests and customability play a part, if you want an easy game and to look at some pretty graphics you can breeze through them with no problem, if you want a long game you can go through the sidequests, and if you want a long, hard game you can train to kill the Weapons and extra bosses. You can pretty much play it how you like and take part in as many or as few of the extra things as you want to, without the game designers deciding how much of a certain thing you'll enjoy and making it all compulsary to finish the game.

Definitely the story and character development. The stories are consistently good (except for FF8, which I found somewhat lacking - and I haven't played FFX). Definitely NOT the gameplay. FF1-FF3j were all about gameplay, since the battle system was a new thing in video games (RPG's in particular). However, they never really changed or improved the system (it's still just "wait until my meter fills up, then attack the enemy" - there haven't been any real significant changes, except maybe limit breaks). If FF was known for its gameplay, they would have come up with something new long ago. But I'm perfectly happy with a great plot and repetititive game play.

Definetly the stories. They are so intricate and interesting (usually) it makes up for the gameplay. Dialouge and characters help to.