To Make a Fan: Let's Play Final Fantasy

[RagingKrikkit]

(Edit: 6 Mar 2015: When this was originally posted, I was operating under the username "YakYak", and I'm not going to ask everybody in this thread to edit their three-year-old posts as well.)

Let me begin with a simple statement:

I am not a Final Fantasy fan.

That is not to say that I have not played Final Fantasy. Indeed I have played several, and have even beaten one or two. But I lack the knowledge of and experience with this series to truly call myself a fan of it. I am here today to begin a process by which I will see if this is something worth changing.

As such, I have decided that I will play the Final Fantasy series in its entirety, and since you only get one virgin playthrough of a game, I have decided to make the most of this occasion, and not simply play through the Final Fantasy series, but also record my misadventures as a series of let’s plays. This is going to be a long and most likely moderatley-to-ridiculously crazy ride, and I hope to see you all at the end of the trip.

That said, let me dive in right over my head, and begin with the first Final Fantasy game, appropriately entitled Final Fantasy.



In 1987, a Japanese video game company by the name of Square found itself on the verge of bankruptcy. Doubting that their company would live to see the next fiscal year, the board and the developers came to a decision. They would make one last game before they faded into history. One final masterpiece that, when Square had died and its employees dispersed, they could look back in pride on that last year together, and remember the glory of their last year together.

Finally, on December 17, 1987, Square released their swan song game on the Nintendo Entertainment System (Known in Japan as the Famicom). They called it Final Fantasy.

Then, something nobody had foreseen happened: Square stopped going bankrupt. In their bid to create the most unique and memorable game on the console, they also created one of the best-selling. Released only to Japan, it sold 400,000 copies out of the original 400,000 copy shipment, and Square skyrocketed to the center of the JRPG market.



Fast forward to 1990, when Final Fantasy hit the shelves of America, and took the American gaming market by storm. Lauded for its gameplay and story, Final Fantasy went on to sell another six figures worth of copies to America, and cementing a fandom that would grow and flourish over the next 23 years.



A MSX2 port came out in 1989, and a Famicom bundle with Final Fantasy II was released in 1994,but the next release of real note was a remake released on the WonderSwan Color in 2000. This was the biggest technological leap of the series, coming packed with bug fixes and graphics redrawn to resemble the style of the newer Final Fantasy games.



A year later, Sony got their hands on the series with a release for the Playstation. Featuring the WonderSwan graphics and full-motion video sequences, this port also carried a new easy mode, which reduced the price of items in the game and lowered the amount of experience required for characters to level up.



Then, we have Final Fantasy I&II: Dawn of Souls, a port released for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. It used the same graphics as the WonderSwan and Playstation, but also only carried the easy mode from the Playstation. On the other hand, it also included a new translation and four bonus dungeons, each with a boss from one of the later Final Fantasy games. For simplicity’s sake, this is the copy I will be playing.

So, now that I have done my research and rambled through the history of one of the most famous video games in history, it’s time for me to get to the actual diving in over my head part of diving in over my head.

RagingKrikkit presents:

The to-be longest running LP series on GitP

Let’s Play: The Final Fantasy Saga

Book One: Final Fantasy

Table of Contents:

Spoiler

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Chapter 1: Enter the Heroes
Chaper 2: My First Boss
Chapter 3: The Pirates of Pravoka
Chapter 4: I'm on a-*shot*
Chapter 5: Dungeon Prep
Chapter 6: Dungeon Crawlin' Foolery
Chapter 7: Plot Twisted
Chapter 8: In Which I Want to Blow Something Up, and Blow Something Else Up Instead
Chapter 9: Not As Bad As Marsh Cave, But Close
Chapter 10: Mini Big Bad (Link appears to be glitchy for NO DAMN REASON)

Chapter 1: Enter the Heroes

Spoiler

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Can you spell “iconic”? Every gamer (and a good portion of non-gamers) on earth know those words. For good reason, I’m told.



Let’s see.



First off, we get to pick the team and name them. Let’s take a look…













So, six classes to fill four slots, with the ability to pick multiples of a class. I hear running four white mages is a popular challenge, but let’s go with something manageable for now.



Alright, with this I’ve got a decent mix of offense, defense and white magic, but I’m a bit short on black magic. I guess we’ll see if I can manage. Now for names. Hmm, let me hit the auto-select a bit.



Right.



So the Thief is a girl.



Or not. (Interestingly enough, most sprites can pass as either male or female.)



Well, would you look at that? Hello, first instance of the traditional Final Fantasy Star Wars reference!



Oh, and look! There’s the other!

But enough fooling around.



Oh, wait, I’m fooling around again.

Oh, well, why not?



And with that, we are brought to the opening cutscene.

(Music)























In the original translation, this read “orb”, but was changed to crystal here to better fit in with the feel of later Final Fantasy games.







The screen fades to white, and when we see again…



Here we are, unceremoniously dumped on the docks of Corneria Cornelia. (Best guess for why this was changed? To eliminate confusion with the planet in the Star Fox series.)



So, let’s take a look at these miserable loosers.









Well, I’ve seen worse cases of level 1 characters. Frankly, we’re doing better than characters in the NES release were at this point, seeing as they spawned with not only no weapons, but not even clothes on their backs.



Anyway, let’s head into town.



Cornelia. Not the biggest RPG town I’ve ever seen, but it’s got quite a leg up on Pallet Town.



Unfortunately, she doesn’t feel like elaborating on that statement.



Hey, don’t rush me. I’m checking out the town.



Oookay. However that works.





Why do I get the feeling we’re going to deal with this later?



Hey, a fountain!





Geez, jerk fountain.



Maybe one of the bonus dungeons is hidden inside one of these.



But enough wandering around aimlessly. Shopping time!



Weapons…



Armor…



White magic…



And black magic.













Alright, that’s all we need to start our adventure! Hey, Mr. Guardsman!





One could argue that this is railroading, but oh well.



































Nothing like a good old-fashioned save the princess quest to get us started, is there?

[ThePhantom]

Well, this should be fun. I look forward to seeing how you do.

[Illven]

But I don't want to play Final Fantasy if you stop updating


And you should have started with a Fighter, Thief, Black mage, and Red mage.

[Hunter Noventa]

A good start, a couple tips though.

You might want to make your screenshots a little bigger, they're pretty hard to read. And you might want to consider either transcribing text of using a script if there is one, rather than screenshotting every dialogue box in the game.

[Eldonauran]

I eagerly await every step of this journey....

[fizzmaister]

This is quite the undertaking. I wish you luck. Having never finished a numbered FF game and only reaching half-way on 5, I look forward to seeing the story unfold right along with you.

[Deme]

This is...An impressive undertaking. I'll be following along, come success or failure.

[smuchmuch]

The whole saga ? I'll dmit I've played on,e FF game, the 9 (which i did admitedly enjoy quite a bit) but from what I gathered of the games, unless you can afford to playing 7/7, 24h/24h Im pretty sure that might take years. (But hey it's going to be cool to watch)
Good luck.

[tyckspoon]

The whole saga ? I'll dmit I've played on,e FF game, the 9 (which i did admitedly enjoy quite a bit) but from what I gathered of the games, unless you can afford to playing 7/7, 24h/24h Im pretty sure that might take years. (But hey it's going to be cool to watch)
Good luck.

You can try speed-running the games a bit, or at least just focusing on playing through the main story; I know you can save tens of hours of playtime on the PlayStation-era games by mostly ignoring things like the Golden Saucer, Triple Triad, and Chocobo Hot & Cold.

[Perkinz]

You can try speed-running the games a bit, or at least just focusing on playing through the main story; I know you can save tens of hours of playtime on the PlayStation-era games by mostly ignoring things like the Golden Saucer, Triple Triad, and Chocobo Hot & Cold.

But... but... that was nearly the best part of that game! Maybe even more than the main game!

Joking aside, I've played most of the series, and while I can say most of them were worthwhile at the time... some of them have not aged well, shall we say. The stories are still good, but the mechanics aren't what they used to be.

[ZeroNumerous]

..., Triple Triad, ...

Why would you start up the game and then choose to not play FF8?

[Deme]

Chocobo Hot and Cold was great fun, but yeah. Avoiding some of the more time-consuming minigames and side-quests will be the best way to preserve sanity.

[Shpadoinkle]

Why would you start up the game and then choose to not play FF8?

Triple Triad pretty much IS the main game. It's the best way to get cards to refine for spells and items, and leveling up your characters actually makes them WEAKER compared to the way monsters level up.

[Gnoman]

Not like that matters. FF8 is so mind-numbingly easy, even without putting much effort into Junctioning (the difference between mastering the Junction system and simply being able to use it is that, with the latter, the bosses actually get a turn. Sometimes.) that it's worth doing that just to have some kind of challenge.

[Eldariel]

Best of luck, sir YakYak. I love LPs on GitP but it's painfully rare for them to be finished. You'll understand that I'm skeptical about this monumental uptaking but I'd be more than happy if you proved me wrong! I'm going to follow this keenly.

RE@FF8: Yeah, Triple Triad is probably the best minigame in Final Fantasy history and the only one that's actually more enjoyable than the game itself. I'd love to play FF6 with Triple Triad!

[ZeroNumerous]

RE@FF8: Yeah, Triple Triad is probably the best minigame in Final Fantasy history and the only one that's actually more enjoyable than the game itself. I'd love to play FF6 with Triple Triad!

You know what I'd like? FF Triple Triad Anthology.

A Dissidia-like mix of all kinds of random Final Fantasy characters and cards, with none of the non-sense that passes for a modern Final Fantasy story.

[Eldariel]

You know what I'd like? FF Triple Triad Anthology.

A Dissidia-like mix of all kinds of random Final Fantasy characters and cards, with none of the non-sense that passes for a modern Final Fantasy story.

This is brilliant. Then make it a mixed world where you can play vs. all the different characters from the different games and a bunch of different places with different rules from the different games.

Hell, while at it, might go all Yugioh and say the world was made of cardgames! It's at least as plausible a creation story as half the Final Fantasy crystal/whatever ones.

[RagingKrikkit]

...And you should have started with a Fighter, Thief, Black mage, and Red mage.

That's actually their suggested starting team, so I wanted to do something that was at least slightly out of the norm.

...You might want to make your screenshots a little bigger, they're pretty hard to read...

May I ask what screen resolution you're using? I'm at 1280x720, and it shows up fine. I suppose I could experiment with making the shots larger, but those would probably take a little manual work. Hang on, and I'll put up a test post before too long.

The whole saga ?... Im pretty sure that might take years.

Let me clarify: I plan on doing the entire numbered series, with the possible-to-probable exception of XI and XIV, depending on how into this I get, and how much I can get over my general dislike of MMOs. Thus I will be playing I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, X-2, XII, XIII, XIII-2, XV, and XVI if it is out by the time I get there. Also, if demand is high enough and I get intetrested in a world, I may do a side game, such as Dissidia, Crisis Core, or Tactics.

Anyway, on with the show!

Chapter 2: My First Boss

Spoiler

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(Battle Theme: NES GBA)



Goblins! Get ‘em!











It’s even easier than in D&D!



(Victory Fanfare: NES GBA)

Yay, we’re not dead yet!



Goblin Guards. This will either be laughably easy, or you will all laugh at my first TPK.



Eh, we’ll be fine.



See? No problem.



Ooh! Level ups!



O_O

Roy: HP +29, +Str, +Int

Elan: HP +2, MP +3, +Str, +Int

Haley: HP +23, +Str, +Agl, +Sta, +Lck

Durkon: HP +26, MP +14, +Int

Well, Elan got kinda screwed there.





The in-game bestiary provides us with some possibly interesting information on our foes. I might or might not keep posting the data from here.



A few more one-sided battles bring us to level 3!

Roy: HP +4, +Agl, +Sta

Elan: HP +2, MP +15, +Agl

Haley: HP +2, +Agl, +Sta, +Lck

Durkon: HP +3, MP +17, +Sta

Well, that’s not nearly as exciting as the last one…



On the other hand, we’re rather beat up, so let’s head back into town.



A quick stop at the in will bring us back up to full HP and MP…



And a trip to the general store provides us with emergency potions.



That done, we make our way north and—hey look, a cave!



Lang ago ye could enter, but the way’s been shut syne the land began tae decay.



As the man said, this is Earthgift Shrine, and it is one of the GBA’s bonus dungeons. We may or may not make our way back here.



My little pon-*shot*



No, seriously. In the NES version, this thing was called “Madpony” to save space.



Well, this looks like the kind of place that an insane knight would take a kidnapped princess to.



This… is not a pretty sight (and a very short dungeon).



Who’s there!?

You know, because villains have this need to monologue when there is nobody else nearby. Well, I guess the princess is right there, but she doesn’t exactly look conscious.

Hmph. The king’s lapdogs. Do you have any idea who you’re messing with? You really think you have what it takes to cross swords with ME? Very well…



This line. This line became so famous when it first popped up in the NES version, that in all ports and translations ever since, it has remained, right down to the double exclamation marks. It’s not even a mistranslation; the Japanese text reads “You impertinent fools! I, Garland, will kick you around!”



(Boss Battle: GBA)



Magic is handled slightly differently in this than in the original version. The NES Final Fantasy allowed characters to use a certain number of spells of each level (limits increasing with level ups), and required a night at the inn to replenish slots. The GBA remake, however, uses the less ripped off of D&D system that later games used: Magic Points.



For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about: Each spell has its own Magic Point cost, and that cost is paid out of a characters pool of MP. If you don’t have enough points, you can’t cast the spell.



Those of you who do know what I’m talking about can skip that last paragraph.



For a master swordsman, he doesn’t do a lot of damage.



Four turns. I think he just beat out Queen Gohma for quickest first boss kill.

LEVEL UP!

Roy: HP +27, +Str, +Lck

Elan: HP +2, MP +3, +Str, +Sta, +Lck

Haley: HP +26, +Str, +Int, +Lck

Durkon: HP +3, MP +5, +Str, +Lck



Yay, cutscene time!



I am Sarah, princess of Cornelia.



That’s the first time anyone’s ever defeated Garland.

Everyone in Cornelia must either suck at sword fighting, be too stupid to gang up on him, or both.

You must allow me to show you my gratitude. Please, accompany me to castle Cornelia.

And one fade to black later…



…we’re back at the castle.

There can be no doubt that you are the Warriors of Light from Lukahn’s prophecy! You should hear the prophecy in its entirety. Ahem. If I may…



If they cannot gather the shards of light, the darkness will consume all. The four crystals will never shine again.



Restoring light to the crystals is our only hope of ridding our world of the monsters that plague it! I will have the bridge to the north rebuilt, as I promised. I pray that you succeed in restoring light to the four crystals—and to the world.

Sweet. Let’s see what the princess has for us.



When he abducted me, Garland took this lute as well. I want you to have it. It may aid you in your journey.



: Ooh! Ooh! Can I have it?

Meanwhile:

















Before we hit the bridge, though, let’s do some grinding!









Elan is hereby moved to the back of the party until further notice.



That done, it’s time to get moving!



Wait, why is everything going white? It’s a trap! AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!



No, it’s just giant floating text. Phew.







The time for their journey had come.





Hello, title screen.

That’s all for today, folks! Join us again next time for more of our thrilling quest to restore light to the world!

[fizzmaister]

There went the tutorial dungeon, and since you re-reached the title screen, it's safe to say that the story has finally begun.

[erikun]

Well then, now you have two options!

One is to head east, to the city of Pravoka. The other is to detour north just a bit, and visit the witch up there. It might be a nice informative sidetrip, although be careful you don't wear yourself out. (Both routes have very tough enemies to fight.)

Also, you might want to put Elan ahead of Durkon. 116 HP sounds like a lot in comparison to 63 HP, but we're talking about Elan's 16 DEF against Durkon's 1 DEF. And that 5 points of evasion probably won't matter that much at this point.

[tyckspoon]

Despite his cruddy luck with HP levelups, Elan's ability to wear heavier armor means he's at least as tough as Haley to physical attacks, and since being a magic class lets him get a lot more Int levelups he'll tank magic more efficiently too (although it should be a good while before you actually hit anything with meaningful magic.. all the way up until the first Elemental Fiend, IIRC.) I'd just leave him in that slot for a while.. you can switch him over to spot 3 if you want, but definitely leave Durkon in last.

[Illven]

I guess Mook chivalry also extends to the good guys?

[CarpeGuitarrem]

So that's why it's called "Final Fantasy".

[OrcusMcP]

I never got around to playing the really early FFs myself, so this will be a real treat for me! Good luck! Looking forward to when you get to IV, VI and IX. Yes that's along way off, shut up!

[Hunter Noventa]

May I ask what screen resolution you're using? I'm at 1280x720, and it shows up fine. I suppose I could experiment with making the shots larger, but those would probably take a little manual work. Hang on, and I'll put up a test post before too long.

Ah I'm using 1920x1080, that might have something to do with it. But yeah, for me your screenshots are slightly bigger than a pair of postage stamps.

[Eldariel]

Request: This is going to be long. The updates are going to be spread out throughout the thread. Could you please link the posts containing the episodes of the Let's Play itself in the OP?

In case you don't know how: To get a single post display, click the post number in the top right of each post. You can use that address as a single post link (or use the link but use "showthread.php" instead of "showpost.php" to have it show the whole page just scrolled to the post in question).

An example:
[url]http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=15638003&postcount=26[/url] links this post thusly: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...3&postcount=26
[url]http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=15638003&postcount=26[/url] links this post thusly:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showt...3&postcount=26

[Balain]

I played 7 when it came out. then Tactics.Then I think I skipped to the ones on ps 2.

I Have had the same idea. Although not blogging about my play throughs. I have downloaded 1 - 9 ish((which ever one ended on the playstation one, on to my vita. 5 only works on the ps3, as well as tactics ). I bought the ones for ps3 (13? and 13 part 2?)

1 - 4 are mostly remakes they did for Playstation One, PSP, etc. Although 4 and 5 maybe ports of the originals (4 seems to have some expansions or something Still playing 3 right now). 7 - 9 (maybe 10) are the originals from ps one

I had some for the ps2, I am not sure what I will do yet for those. I no longer have a ps2 and gave my copies to someone. Not sure if I can burrow them again and try on an emulator?

There also seems to be some numbering differences between Japanese version and US versions. Maybe I am wrong about that. Anyways mine are all english versions.

[ryzouken]

"Congratulations! For having beaten the first boss of the game, you receive the following: 1 Fat Lute, 1 Bridge. Now get the heck out of my castle!"

King Cornelia is kind of a wanker.


In the olden days, it used to be you had to talk to Princess Sara to obtain your fat lute. IIRC, this made it a missable key item. Missable. Key Item. Yeah, I'm sure that never came back to bite anyone in the arse.

I think you should totally put the Bestiary information up when available, provided it isn't too onerous a chore. While I've played through 1 a time or two on a system or three, I didn't pay much attention to the Bestiary so it'd be nice to read up on it whilst I follow along with this epical lets play.

15-ish games spanning over 25 years of 40+ hour JRPGs. You have your work cut out for you. If you manage to complete this massive undertaking, I recommend you put it on your resume as a sample of your dedication to a task. Cause if you manage an average of 40 hours on these games, you'll still have put in at least 600 hours, not counting time spent typing up posts and screencapping.

[Mewtarthio]

There also seems to be some numbering differences between Japanese version and US versions. Maybe I am wrong about that. Anyways mine are all english versions.

The states didn't initially get II, III, or V. IV and VI were numbered II and III, respectively. Most rereleases correct that (except the Nintendo Virtual Console version).

Incidentally, the PSN version of FF IV is the Complete collection, which includes the sequel and a new interlude.

[huttj509]

The states didn't initially get II, III, or V. IV and VI were numbered II and III, respectively. Most rereleases correct that (except the Nintendo Virtual Console version).

Incidentally, the PSN version of FF IV is the Complete collection, which includes the sequel and a new interlude.

This also tends to have in person discussions of opinions of those games start to sound like a Abbot and Costello sketch.

"Things went downhill after 3"
"3 6 or 3 3?"
"3 is 3"
"depends on if you're counting 1 2 3 or 1 4 6"
"third base"
"sixth base?"