To Change or not to Change: introducing fresh ideas into Final Fantasy

by Joseph Fernandez

Some say that Final Fantasy 7 marked the end of the series as they knew it. Some say that FF7 (and now FF8) aren't real FF games. The pundits complain about how Square supposedly changed so much that the 32 bit FFs lost their identity as parts of the series. To this I ask two questions. One, how much has actually changed, and two, have they changed ENOUGH?

To me, the name Final Fantasy means an RPG game of the highest quality. Final Fantasy has always been about pushing the limits of whatever gaming hardware it's played on. Final Fantasy is about story and characters that keep your interest well after you finish the game. To many people Final Fantasy means the ultimate game. In my opinion, this distinction does not completely hold true for the 32 bit FFs, not because of what has changed, but because of what hasn't.

If you look at it closely, not much really has changed since the days of the SNES. The story and characters still remain top notch, but the gameplay continues to be lacking. Before you say that console RPGs are supposed to excel in story over "gameplay", my question is "why does it?" Square has pushed the envelope in graphics and story for the latest game in the series. Yet the game remains as linear as a movie, and the battles lack any sort of challenge whatsoever. Now before you say that linearity is necessary for a coherent storyline, think about the good old "choose your own adventure" books. There you started at the beginning and read until you came to a choice. When you made the choice, the story branched and told a slightly different story leading up to multiple unique endings. There's no reason why a FF game can't be at least this complex. If you think about it, it's not "non-linear", it's multiple LINEAR paths that branch out. If it's structured in this manner, the story will not seem incoherent, but will seem as if it's a linear story...just that you have some control over how it progresses. These days it seems like an RPG has to be either totally linear, or totally non-linear. Using a branching method, we'll finally see the middle ground.

The fact remains that Final Fantasy 1 on the lowly NES was the hardest game in the series (other than FF5, which won't be in the US until the anthology is released). Difficulty of gameplay has really never been part of the FF series. Square designed FF games for watching (and reading) rather than playing. What's worse, the more advanced the hardware is, the easier the games have gotten. I don't see any reason now why Square can't combine a cinematic storyline with challenging, strategic gameplay. At least make the battles more strategic than they are now. They don't have to be real time (which of course would be blasphemy to FF fans). Just increase the difficulty of the regular (non-boss) monsters, making the player have to do something other than pressing "x" over and over. Add more strategic choices to the combat scenario, and make every command, summon, spell, item, etc.. useful is some way and none that are unbalanced. Speaking of summons, they're becoming rediculously powerful. For Final Fantasy to truly be the ultimate game, the gameplay difficulty must be increased.

Don't get me wrong, I love the FF games. I just think that it's time that Square breaks some of the rules. It IS possible to make a game that combines the cinematics in the current FF games with some non-linearity as well as beefed up gameplay. Then and only then will a Final Fantasy live up to the billing as the ultimate game.