Final Fantasy IV One Of The Greatest Games

Gamespot's series of "The Greatest Games of All Time" rolls on with a look at Final Fantasy IV. Dubbed Final Fantasy II in the states, it was easily one of the best games to be released for the SNES. From the article: "The narrative in Final Fantasy II gripped you and shook you like a rag doll right from the beginning of the game. Your introduction to the protagonist, Cecil, took place on the deck of a military airship that had been ordered to extort a magic crystal from an innocent town (not a very heroic vocation). After his complicity in this war crime, the conscience-wracked Cecil was dismissed from the military and sent on an errand to a nearby town, along with his best friend Kain. Using generic archetypes for characters (like Final Fantasy's White, Black, and Red Mages, for instance) was standard operating procedure in RPGs at the time, but Final Fantasy II went off on a far more interesting tangent."

Rubicant: Was it flame?

[jurgenaut]

Rubicant: I will show you how!

I always liked Rubicant, he was cool. Edge was a dumbass for casting a fire based spell on the fire elemental Fiend.

I remember FF2 fondly. Always felt a bit sorry for Kain, that he had to be charmed time and time again. As for which was best of FF2 and FF3, why must that choice be made? They're both great games, let's leave it at that.

Re:Final Fantasy Series

[Anonymous Coward]

the fault of ff6 was that the story floundered in the 2nd half -- a problem which square would revisit in ff7.

as soon as you collect the airship in the world of ruin, the story 'stops' and you just run around picking up items, espers and characters (as needed) until you raid kefka's castle. the final battle and the epilogue make up for some of that, but those of us who want to see and experience a story are left high and dry.

furthermore, because of the nature of magic in ff6, the average player tends to make most of his (or her) characters pick up at least some magic.. which blurs the distinctness of each character.

nonlinear areas are great for exploration, but there still needs to be something that nudges you in the right direction at times. kefka's tower of oppression isn't quite enough.

Cecil=Real Hero

[ecumenical_40oz]

The thing that gets me about all these new (post FFVII) RPGs is how they feel the need to create teenage characters the player can supposably identify with. I'm sick of protaganists who wear "sk8er" pants, have gratuitously spiky hair, are constantly moody and speak with modern slang that will sound dated in 5 years. Cecily was a real RPG hero, no acne, no bitching, no hormones. He was a grown man, a professional knight with a steady girlfriend, not a surly teenager halfway through puberty. Please RPG-makers, give me characters that I can be proud to waste 30 hours of my life on.