Now, you'll observe that the curve goes up for what makes a Final Fantasy game good almost in direct proportion to being able to turn off random encounters. Autosaving presents its own variable in--
Drops pointer. Bends over and splits pants open. Farts loudly. Falls over and knocks down the dry erase board and farts again. Gains 1,000 followers.
Drops pointer. Bends over and splits pants open. Farts loudly. Falls over and knocks down the dry erase board and farts again. Gains 1,000 followers.
The best of the Pixel Remasters thus far, only dragged down in my eyes by its final dungeon and boss gauntlet.
The pacing of Final Fantasy III was noticeably better than its other NES counterparts, aforementioned grindy final dungeon aside. The progression and job systems were neat, although I do feel the job system left a little to be desired, with some jobs being almost required to beat bosses and others being next to useless.
The story didn’t feel quite as focused as the second game, and in some ways it’s more generic, but it was expansive and featured more memorable characters. It definitely helps that said characters are recurring and don’t all drag down your party in combat until they die in the narrative.
A small thing that I adored about Final Fantasy III was the focus on the airships. The Invincible in particular acting as a mobile home base was just what the doctor ordered. I love that crap. The increased map size (or at least perceived size) combined with the different airships made it more of an adventure for me. In a similar vein, I liked the gimmicky dungeons with different minor mechanics like shrinking or turning into frogs. They didn’t overstay their welcome.
A real shame the original NES/Famicom version didn’t make it to the States, because it’s solid, and I think better than the first two games.
The pacing of Final Fantasy III was noticeably better than its other NES counterparts, aforementioned grindy final dungeon aside. The progression and job systems were neat, although I do feel the job system left a little to be desired, with some jobs being almost required to beat bosses and others being next to useless.
The story didn’t feel quite as focused as the second game, and in some ways it’s more generic, but it was expansive and featured more memorable characters. It definitely helps that said characters are recurring and don’t all drag down your party in combat until they die in the narrative.
A small thing that I adored about Final Fantasy III was the focus on the airships. The Invincible in particular acting as a mobile home base was just what the doctor ordered. I love that crap. The increased map size (or at least perceived size) combined with the different airships made it more of an adventure for me. In a similar vein, I liked the gimmicky dungeons with different minor mechanics like shrinking or turning into frogs. They didn’t overstay their welcome.
A real shame the original NES/Famicom version didn’t make it to the States, because it’s solid, and I think better than the first two games.
‘I can feel the light within you...strong, yet gentle...’
In the great Final Fantasy saga, the third opus holds a special place, as it is one of the only titles where it is difficult to suggest a particular version to anyone wishing to play it. The first two games have benefited from numerous re-releases and one can recommend Dawn of Souls (2004) or Final Fantasy 20th Anniversary Edition (2007) for the seminal opus, depending on individual aesthetic preferences. The later titles do not suffer from this situation either, because they have not yet aged enough or because they also have their fair share of more accessible versions – even if the community does not agree on the best one. Final Fantasy III does not enjoy the same level of accessibility. It wraps up the NES trilogy, and playing the original version may be too rough for the modern player: veterans can easily remember how difficult the final stretch was.
To the game's credit, it must be said that the perception of Final Fantasy III was largely influenced by the remakes of the first two Final Fantasy games, which dramatically lowered the original difficulty. Although some may not remember, their later dungeons were also very tough challenges, with a fiercely difficult boss rush. The solution was, as was customary at the time, to grind experience to push through those fiendish dungeons. The community more readily blames Final Fantasy III for this errancy, since the game never received a proper remake to update its gameplay philosophy to modern standards. The first international localisation of Final Fantasy III came with the 3D remake for Nintendo DS in 2006. In addition to the transition to 3D, the major change was that the Warriors of Light got a name and a personality – only vaguely explored. I won't go into the details of this instalment, as they deserve to be covered in another review, but suffice to say that the title hasn't changed its approach to farming. Enemies were less numerous, due to the technical limitations of the console, but the title was remarkably lengthy, for no real reason, going against the transformations that the genre was undergoing at the time.
The Pixel Remaster attempts to address all of those issues, while harking back to the original story and making the experience easier. Though the job system is generally unchanged, the negative consequences of switching from one job to another (Capacity Point, Job Adjustment Phase) have been completely removed. The experience gain has been increased and the overall difficulty reduced, albeit with some exceptions. In general, the game experience is smoother and farming is no longer necessary, but this comes with other problems, as the game has not been structurally fixed to accommodate such changes. Two examples help to illustrate this situation: the magic system is a simplistic version of DnD's, as it relies on a number of uses per spell level. Since grinding is not as important as in previous versions, players reach certain dungeons sooner. Assuming that the group includes a Black Mage, they are of little use at the beginning of the game, as their number of spells is too limited for them to reveal their true potential. Being a dead weight for a few hours, it breaks the team's synergy and a rational decision might be to favour a Summoner, but whose summons are only unlocked in the mid-game. This pacing issue in the gameplay progression is ever-present in the title.
A related and more critical concern is perhaps the gimmicky nature of some areas. Early on in the game, some dungeons require you to be transformed into a leprechaun or a frog. A White Mage can perform these transformations, but the number of spells, for the above-mentioned reasons, is far too limited, forcing the player to make too many back and forth trips. The pace suffers greatly and the progression seems excessively clumsy, almost absurd. In the second half of the game, the dungeons also contain creatures that split into two if they are not attacked by a Dark Knight. The game somewhat forces the player to change their job to another one, potentially being at level 1. This temporary regression can be crippling, as the character levels do not necessarily compensate for the job change. On many occasions, I have opted to stay with my original team, so as not to have to start a grinding session, just for one job. Perhaps the most aberrant instance of this situation is the final dungeon, where the latest jobs are unlocked. On paper they are very powerful, but struggle to compete with level 99 jobs. This leaves a clumsy impression, as the development team was unable to completely harmonise the new gameplay experience they were trying to create.
This observation can be extended to the production and the narration. The pixel art, while not so bad, leaves a somewhat unpleasant sensation. The wide 16:9 resolution doesn't tolerate the huge empty spaces and the random repetition of graphic assets, a trap that the remaster unfortunately falls into. The absence of certain sprites is cruelly felt, especially when the Mini spell is used: each character – including the hero who accompanies the party – has the same very disappointing appearance, that of the Warrior. Because the grind sequences have been shortened, the story in its first half also reads like a sped-up, parodic version of Final Fantasy I (1987), which hardly works. Final Fantasy III also borrows the emotional drama of Final Fantasy II (1988), but perhaps too insistently. The combination of these elements results in a game that lacks poetry and is too abruptly paced. The heroes are, until the second half, too disconnected from the rest of the world for any emotional weight to really sink in.
However, as soon as the player meets Doga and Unei, the title breathes more freely and regains a sense of gravitas, much welcomed. The Warriors of Light finally have a tangible objective to reach and it contributes to the organic quality of the progression, far from the awkward wanderings of the first part. The music adds to this successful atmosphere. Inspired by the rich baggage its iconic tracks now carry after their reinterpretation in Final Fantasy XIV (2013), the soundtrack sometimes takes on epic overtones, contrasting with the dreaminess of the NES version. 'Eternal Wind' combines an orchestra with modern instruments, while playing with rich syncopations and textures: this enhances the grandiosity of the adventure. Similarly, 'The Crystal Tower' has an electric edge with prominent drums, accompanying the tempo changes wonderfully. The other tracks are also coloured by the new instrumentation, although one may regret the sometimes mysterious tension created by the NES chiptune.
It is difficult to evaluate the Final Fantasy III Pixel Remaster, as it is the first proper localisation of the game outside of Japan, in its 2D version. Caught between the preservation concern of the original and the need to adapt the title to modern standards, the game settles for half-steps, sometimes unconvincing. When it comes to adapting sequences that worked very well in the original game, the remaster proves to be at ease, but it struggles with elements that required in-depth structural modifications. This is unfortunate, but to be expected, as Final Fantasy remains a monument of the JRPG, through the ages. This remaster should probably be suggested by default to new players, as there are not enough available options. However, a remake of 2D Final Fantasy games à la Live A Live (2022) is probably an ever-impossible dream.
In the great Final Fantasy saga, the third opus holds a special place, as it is one of the only titles where it is difficult to suggest a particular version to anyone wishing to play it. The first two games have benefited from numerous re-releases and one can recommend Dawn of Souls (2004) or Final Fantasy 20th Anniversary Edition (2007) for the seminal opus, depending on individual aesthetic preferences. The later titles do not suffer from this situation either, because they have not yet aged enough or because they also have their fair share of more accessible versions – even if the community does not agree on the best one. Final Fantasy III does not enjoy the same level of accessibility. It wraps up the NES trilogy, and playing the original version may be too rough for the modern player: veterans can easily remember how difficult the final stretch was.
To the game's credit, it must be said that the perception of Final Fantasy III was largely influenced by the remakes of the first two Final Fantasy games, which dramatically lowered the original difficulty. Although some may not remember, their later dungeons were also very tough challenges, with a fiercely difficult boss rush. The solution was, as was customary at the time, to grind experience to push through those fiendish dungeons. The community more readily blames Final Fantasy III for this errancy, since the game never received a proper remake to update its gameplay philosophy to modern standards. The first international localisation of Final Fantasy III came with the 3D remake for Nintendo DS in 2006. In addition to the transition to 3D, the major change was that the Warriors of Light got a name and a personality – only vaguely explored. I won't go into the details of this instalment, as they deserve to be covered in another review, but suffice to say that the title hasn't changed its approach to farming. Enemies were less numerous, due to the technical limitations of the console, but the title was remarkably lengthy, for no real reason, going against the transformations that the genre was undergoing at the time.
The Pixel Remaster attempts to address all of those issues, while harking back to the original story and making the experience easier. Though the job system is generally unchanged, the negative consequences of switching from one job to another (Capacity Point, Job Adjustment Phase) have been completely removed. The experience gain has been increased and the overall difficulty reduced, albeit with some exceptions. In general, the game experience is smoother and farming is no longer necessary, but this comes with other problems, as the game has not been structurally fixed to accommodate such changes. Two examples help to illustrate this situation: the magic system is a simplistic version of DnD's, as it relies on a number of uses per spell level. Since grinding is not as important as in previous versions, players reach certain dungeons sooner. Assuming that the group includes a Black Mage, they are of little use at the beginning of the game, as their number of spells is too limited for them to reveal their true potential. Being a dead weight for a few hours, it breaks the team's synergy and a rational decision might be to favour a Summoner, but whose summons are only unlocked in the mid-game. This pacing issue in the gameplay progression is ever-present in the title.
A related and more critical concern is perhaps the gimmicky nature of some areas. Early on in the game, some dungeons require you to be transformed into a leprechaun or a frog. A White Mage can perform these transformations, but the number of spells, for the above-mentioned reasons, is far too limited, forcing the player to make too many back and forth trips. The pace suffers greatly and the progression seems excessively clumsy, almost absurd. In the second half of the game, the dungeons also contain creatures that split into two if they are not attacked by a Dark Knight. The game somewhat forces the player to change their job to another one, potentially being at level 1. This temporary regression can be crippling, as the character levels do not necessarily compensate for the job change. On many occasions, I have opted to stay with my original team, so as not to have to start a grinding session, just for one job. Perhaps the most aberrant instance of this situation is the final dungeon, where the latest jobs are unlocked. On paper they are very powerful, but struggle to compete with level 99 jobs. This leaves a clumsy impression, as the development team was unable to completely harmonise the new gameplay experience they were trying to create.
This observation can be extended to the production and the narration. The pixel art, while not so bad, leaves a somewhat unpleasant sensation. The wide 16:9 resolution doesn't tolerate the huge empty spaces and the random repetition of graphic assets, a trap that the remaster unfortunately falls into. The absence of certain sprites is cruelly felt, especially when the Mini spell is used: each character – including the hero who accompanies the party – has the same very disappointing appearance, that of the Warrior. Because the grind sequences have been shortened, the story in its first half also reads like a sped-up, parodic version of Final Fantasy I (1987), which hardly works. Final Fantasy III also borrows the emotional drama of Final Fantasy II (1988), but perhaps too insistently. The combination of these elements results in a game that lacks poetry and is too abruptly paced. The heroes are, until the second half, too disconnected from the rest of the world for any emotional weight to really sink in.
However, as soon as the player meets Doga and Unei, the title breathes more freely and regains a sense of gravitas, much welcomed. The Warriors of Light finally have a tangible objective to reach and it contributes to the organic quality of the progression, far from the awkward wanderings of the first part. The music adds to this successful atmosphere. Inspired by the rich baggage its iconic tracks now carry after their reinterpretation in Final Fantasy XIV (2013), the soundtrack sometimes takes on epic overtones, contrasting with the dreaminess of the NES version. 'Eternal Wind' combines an orchestra with modern instruments, while playing with rich syncopations and textures: this enhances the grandiosity of the adventure. Similarly, 'The Crystal Tower' has an electric edge with prominent drums, accompanying the tempo changes wonderfully. The other tracks are also coloured by the new instrumentation, although one may regret the sometimes mysterious tension created by the NES chiptune.
It is difficult to evaluate the Final Fantasy III Pixel Remaster, as it is the first proper localisation of the game outside of Japan, in its 2D version. Caught between the preservation concern of the original and the need to adapt the title to modern standards, the game settles for half-steps, sometimes unconvincing. When it comes to adapting sequences that worked very well in the original game, the remaster proves to be at ease, but it struggles with elements that required in-depth structural modifications. This is unfortunate, but to be expected, as Final Fantasy remains a monument of the JRPG, through the ages. This remaster should probably be suggested by default to new players, as there are not enough available options. However, a remake of 2D Final Fantasy games à la Live A Live (2022) is probably an ever-impossible dream.
this is the most that i have felt like i am playing a prototype of real final fantasy, rather than a fully formed game. there's a lot to like about this! it has an astounding sense of scale that almost feels "next-gen" despite still being a famicom game. it's really cool to see the edge of the world or the gnome forest or the endless sea or the enormous saronia or the interior of the invincible. especially in the mid-game, there are lots of fun job combinations. the focus on hidden paths and items gives a nice sense of exploration.
but even though this game has lots of interesting pieces, they're all a little clunkily assembled. this goes for a dragon quest 3 style episodic town structure, but the episodes resolve themselves so quickly that it barely feels like anything happened. there are a few good ones like the town of cursed outlines or the floating forest in the desert or goldmember's mansion, but overall i could tell you more about the towns in ff1 than i could the towns of ff3. the lack of character in town episodes is especially noticeable in saronia, a huge city where npcs all say the same things.
there are lots of little annoyances in traversal that add up. it's fun to have a shrinking sequence where you're forced to use magic once or twice, but tedious to have to shrink or frogify just to get through a gate and reverse your status. hopping mountains with the invincible feels slow every time. and having to park one airship to go ride the other airship that can dive underwater is always a chore. despite the hidden paths in towns and dungeons, the dungeon layouts tend to be very boring. lots of simple hallways and symmetrical rooms that don't give much sense of exploration beyond noticing a hidden path. this really contributes to the final gauntlet feeling like a slog, just as much as the difficulty spike.
crystals handing out sets of jobs gives the game unique "mechanical chapters", where you'll use one set before moving on to the next set. the early jobs feel a little restrictive because it takes a while before you get the good spells, but mid-game jobs like geomancer, viking, bard, ranger, and thief have interesting unique abilities. i did like the boss fights that were built around short-term gimmick jobs like scholar and dragoon, but i wish those sequences had more than one design trick each. the late-game jobs settle into the good versions of the base jobs, which is fine but does feel like the game giving up on the potential of the job system before it really had a chance to blossom. but it is a fun consequence of the gendered job designs that the warriors of light come off as genderfluid. i think ff2's equipment system ultimately does a better job of making characters feel adaptable to different situations, even without unique commands.
all that said, i'm still mostly positive about this game. i got to see some nice sights and listen to some nice music and build some nice teams. they can't all be as revelatory as ff2.
but even though this game has lots of interesting pieces, they're all a little clunkily assembled. this goes for a dragon quest 3 style episodic town structure, but the episodes resolve themselves so quickly that it barely feels like anything happened. there are a few good ones like the town of cursed outlines or the floating forest in the desert or goldmember's mansion, but overall i could tell you more about the towns in ff1 than i could the towns of ff3. the lack of character in town episodes is especially noticeable in saronia, a huge city where npcs all say the same things.
there are lots of little annoyances in traversal that add up. it's fun to have a shrinking sequence where you're forced to use magic once or twice, but tedious to have to shrink or frogify just to get through a gate and reverse your status. hopping mountains with the invincible feels slow every time. and having to park one airship to go ride the other airship that can dive underwater is always a chore. despite the hidden paths in towns and dungeons, the dungeon layouts tend to be very boring. lots of simple hallways and symmetrical rooms that don't give much sense of exploration beyond noticing a hidden path. this really contributes to the final gauntlet feeling like a slog, just as much as the difficulty spike.
crystals handing out sets of jobs gives the game unique "mechanical chapters", where you'll use one set before moving on to the next set. the early jobs feel a little restrictive because it takes a while before you get the good spells, but mid-game jobs like geomancer, viking, bard, ranger, and thief have interesting unique abilities. i did like the boss fights that were built around short-term gimmick jobs like scholar and dragoon, but i wish those sequences had more than one design trick each. the late-game jobs settle into the good versions of the base jobs, which is fine but does feel like the game giving up on the potential of the job system before it really had a chance to blossom. but it is a fun consequence of the gendered job designs that the warriors of light come off as genderfluid. i think ff2's equipment system ultimately does a better job of making characters feel adaptable to different situations, even without unique commands.
all that said, i'm still mostly positive about this game. i got to see some nice sights and listen to some nice music and build some nice teams. they can't all be as revelatory as ff2.
First of the Final Fantasy games that I think is truly enjoyable to me through and through with no huge strings attached, taking the sense of scale that the previous games had while smoothing out a lot of the really rough patches and providing a far more grandiose experience. While I'm definitely a bit sad about how much of the weird, more ambitious ideas were stripped from this compared to what 2 was running around and doing, I wouldn't say this is totally devoid of its own unique charm and appeal either, and I think a big reason for this is how much of the game revolves around the idea of expansive exploration in an even more prominent way. While collecting the 4 crystals and defeating the lord of darkness or whatever is definitely an element of the story, it often feels like it plays 2nd fiddle to the party's desire to uncover new ways of exploring the world around them and just discovering new problems to help solve.
This becomes increasingly prominent as the game goes on, with so few of the objectives you accomplish feeling much as if you're directly contributing to your main quest of tracking down crystals, instead having many instances of just seeing a new problem and being the ones to take it down. Beyond anything else, I think the thing that this does the most is make the world feel less in service of the player's presence, with so many other things going on all over the place that you often just accidentally stumble upon, leading to a pretty wonderful assortment of plot points that act almost like a melting pot of different fantasy ideas. I love how these often result in happening to gain new ways of travelling too, whether it's getting that airship for a 2nd time and realising the awesome little mid-game twist it leads to, or learning that there's even more to find once this same airship gains the ability to dive underwater. Time and time again, the world around you gets recontextualised and opens things up in a lot of pretty cool ways. This leads to exploring the world around you to be really engaging with the way it'll so often change and expand as you unlock things, occasionally throwing entirely unexpected curveballs your way to reinforce this.
The narrative on the whole is quite nice as well thanks to this slightly slower, more aimless pacing at points lead to a certain opportunity to better take in the locations that you've directly helped out in their struggles. With that said, I also quite enjoy a lot about the endgame here as well, being this absolutely absurdly long, vaguely nightmarish gauntlet that figures out new and fun ways to keep stringing you along for as long as possible. While I totally understand the distaste some might have for this, it reminds me of a less extreme take on the Cave to Rhone from Dragon Quest 2, where it almost feels as if the evil nature of your current surroundings is doing literally everything in its power to halt your progress, trying as hard as possible to just whittle you down as you're making the gruelling trek up to take down this great evil that's plagued the land. Other than the fact that there 100% should have been a way to save the game at some point while going through this final set of 4 dungeons, it's just a great time all around to me, where just knowing to utilise the stockpile of resources you have at that point will drastically smooth out the process while also evoking this atmosphere of desperation as you see these resources slowly but surely dwindle. The whole nature of 2nd guessing whether you'll actually be able to make it not only does a lot to make this final stretch feel incredible tense and oppressive, but then also makes those moments of reprieve where you can then go and heal up for free all the more glorious.
I unfortunately can't really say I fully love the game either thanks to a few decisions that overall make things feel a bit weird, most of them to do with the combat in this game, which is pretty hit or miss. The way the job system is utilised is easily my biggest problem with this game, giving the player so many options each with their cool looking designs, but kinda going against the whole idea of versatility with them because of how many of these classes are either strict upgrades of previous ones, or just largely useless. By the end of the game there'll only be 5 or 6 of the jobs that feel at all useable, and even amongst them it all feels a bit uneven. The way the offensive magic is used especially feels unfortunate, with most lategame enemies having absolutely no weaknesses resulting in the dark mages being entirely kneecapped and dealing less damage than a regular knight but with the added problem of having a finite amount of these attacks because of MP being a thing. I also feel like the player isn't really encouraged to get especially creative with their party setups either for similar reasons, as it's not like in Dragon Quest 3 where you can mix and match different class attributes to make some weird and often entirely broken hybrid classes, but in this, changing the job just railroads you entirely into the characteristic of that new class you just chose.
While a lot of these jobs definitely feel unique, this lack of any major carry over from one to another as the game progresses makes it all feel a bit too disconnected and impersonal, all your party members feeling very indistinct without even much interesting and unique character progression from a purely mechanical standpoint. It's a shame too, because I really like the flavour added with some of the more unconventional classes, such as the geomancer casting magic for free but it's random and dependant on the terrain you're currently on, or the dragoon having an ability to jump out of the map for a turn, potentially dodging really devastating attacks if you think that one of those are coming. It's just unfortunate that the game doesn't seem to care much for you actually experimenting with these at all, both because of the aforementioned unbalanced nature of a lot of them, but also because there are a few too many instances of the game reaaaalllly wanting you to choose certain classes. On its own this would be annoying but acceptable to basically force a certain strategy, but FF3 makes it way worse by essentially shoving what the player needs to choose down their throat, blatantly telling you the solution and then cutting off most other possibilities in one way or another. For a game that so often doubles down on its more open, explorative nature, it simply feels like a very dissonant aspect of it all to make the dungeon traversal to often feel so restrictive in comparison.
Biggest reason why this isn't a dealbreaker is just because there's enough I love about the game that the experience as a whole is still very positive for the most part, but a more carefully considered system revolving around these jobs would've gone a very long way. Even so, despite stepping back in certain regards, Final Fantasy 3 not only continues representing the trend of this series going out of its way to constantly be trying something new, but also further refines the pre-existing elements from previous entries to make my favourite of the OG trilogy. It's certainly not always a game that works, but when it does, it's a fantastic ride and one that I'd happily play again when I'm looking for something pretty low stakes and comfy.
This becomes increasingly prominent as the game goes on, with so few of the objectives you accomplish feeling much as if you're directly contributing to your main quest of tracking down crystals, instead having many instances of just seeing a new problem and being the ones to take it down. Beyond anything else, I think the thing that this does the most is make the world feel less in service of the player's presence, with so many other things going on all over the place that you often just accidentally stumble upon, leading to a pretty wonderful assortment of plot points that act almost like a melting pot of different fantasy ideas. I love how these often result in happening to gain new ways of travelling too, whether it's getting that airship for a 2nd time and realising the awesome little mid-game twist it leads to, or learning that there's even more to find once this same airship gains the ability to dive underwater. Time and time again, the world around you gets recontextualised and opens things up in a lot of pretty cool ways. This leads to exploring the world around you to be really engaging with the way it'll so often change and expand as you unlock things, occasionally throwing entirely unexpected curveballs your way to reinforce this.
The narrative on the whole is quite nice as well thanks to this slightly slower, more aimless pacing at points lead to a certain opportunity to better take in the locations that you've directly helped out in their struggles. With that said, I also quite enjoy a lot about the endgame here as well, being this absolutely absurdly long, vaguely nightmarish gauntlet that figures out new and fun ways to keep stringing you along for as long as possible. While I totally understand the distaste some might have for this, it reminds me of a less extreme take on the Cave to Rhone from Dragon Quest 2, where it almost feels as if the evil nature of your current surroundings is doing literally everything in its power to halt your progress, trying as hard as possible to just whittle you down as you're making the gruelling trek up to take down this great evil that's plagued the land. Other than the fact that there 100% should have been a way to save the game at some point while going through this final set of 4 dungeons, it's just a great time all around to me, where just knowing to utilise the stockpile of resources you have at that point will drastically smooth out the process while also evoking this atmosphere of desperation as you see these resources slowly but surely dwindle. The whole nature of 2nd guessing whether you'll actually be able to make it not only does a lot to make this final stretch feel incredible tense and oppressive, but then also makes those moments of reprieve where you can then go and heal up for free all the more glorious.
I unfortunately can't really say I fully love the game either thanks to a few decisions that overall make things feel a bit weird, most of them to do with the combat in this game, which is pretty hit or miss. The way the job system is utilised is easily my biggest problem with this game, giving the player so many options each with their cool looking designs, but kinda going against the whole idea of versatility with them because of how many of these classes are either strict upgrades of previous ones, or just largely useless. By the end of the game there'll only be 5 or 6 of the jobs that feel at all useable, and even amongst them it all feels a bit uneven. The way the offensive magic is used especially feels unfortunate, with most lategame enemies having absolutely no weaknesses resulting in the dark mages being entirely kneecapped and dealing less damage than a regular knight but with the added problem of having a finite amount of these attacks because of MP being a thing. I also feel like the player isn't really encouraged to get especially creative with their party setups either for similar reasons, as it's not like in Dragon Quest 3 where you can mix and match different class attributes to make some weird and often entirely broken hybrid classes, but in this, changing the job just railroads you entirely into the characteristic of that new class you just chose.
While a lot of these jobs definitely feel unique, this lack of any major carry over from one to another as the game progresses makes it all feel a bit too disconnected and impersonal, all your party members feeling very indistinct without even much interesting and unique character progression from a purely mechanical standpoint. It's a shame too, because I really like the flavour added with some of the more unconventional classes, such as the geomancer casting magic for free but it's random and dependant on the terrain you're currently on, or the dragoon having an ability to jump out of the map for a turn, potentially dodging really devastating attacks if you think that one of those are coming. It's just unfortunate that the game doesn't seem to care much for you actually experimenting with these at all, both because of the aforementioned unbalanced nature of a lot of them, but also because there are a few too many instances of the game reaaaalllly wanting you to choose certain classes. On its own this would be annoying but acceptable to basically force a certain strategy, but FF3 makes it way worse by essentially shoving what the player needs to choose down their throat, blatantly telling you the solution and then cutting off most other possibilities in one way or another. For a game that so often doubles down on its more open, explorative nature, it simply feels like a very dissonant aspect of it all to make the dungeon traversal to often feel so restrictive in comparison.
Biggest reason why this isn't a dealbreaker is just because there's enough I love about the game that the experience as a whole is still very positive for the most part, but a more carefully considered system revolving around these jobs would've gone a very long way. Even so, despite stepping back in certain regards, Final Fantasy 3 not only continues representing the trend of this series going out of its way to constantly be trying something new, but also further refines the pre-existing elements from previous entries to make my favourite of the OG trilogy. It's certainly not always a game that works, but when it does, it's a fantastic ride and one that I'd happily play again when I'm looking for something pretty low stakes and comfy.
Mais curto do que eu esperava, com muito mais jobs do que eu esperava, a grande maioria tão inútil quanto eu imaginava. Mas é uma loucura o quanto esse jogo mais de 30 anos atrás já estava definindo de base pra todo o resto da franquia. Surreal. Uma história bem mais simples e monótona principalmente vindo do 2, mas ainda divertida e cheio de momentos muito memoráveis em particular os momentos que claramente inspiraram Minish Cap!
My team consisted of:
Macklemore: Warrior/Knight/Dragoon/Ninja
Eminem: Monk/Black Belt
PEE: Black Mage/Magus
Post Malone: White Mage/Devout
I failed to get 100% because i missed 4 enemies and 1 chocobo forest. I feel like such a fraud its unreal. I liked this version more than the DS one, truth be told. Comparible to 1 in overall quality, and comes out as a better game, but 1 leaves such a bigger impression on me. Theres nothing as insane as a fallen knight stuck in a time loop, and most everything cool in here had been done before in it. Most classes felt totally worthless and samey too, something im glad 5 fixes. I’m still mad about the missables, but ig ill get 100% when i replay it in 7 years
Macklemore: Warrior/Knight/Dragoon/Ninja
Eminem: Monk/Black Belt
PEE: Black Mage/Magus
Post Malone: White Mage/Devout
I failed to get 100% because i missed 4 enemies and 1 chocobo forest. I feel like such a fraud its unreal. I liked this version more than the DS one, truth be told. Comparible to 1 in overall quality, and comes out as a better game, but 1 leaves such a bigger impression on me. Theres nothing as insane as a fallen knight stuck in a time loop, and most everything cool in here had been done before in it. Most classes felt totally worthless and samey too, something im glad 5 fixes. I’m still mad about the missables, but ig ill get 100% when i replay it in 7 years
way better than i ever gave it credit for having not played past an hour and i think most people feel about the same.
i was of the persuasion that this was just an inferior ff5 going in, but i came to realize it's actually a superior ff1. if you liked ff1 i do think this is the closest in the series that harkens back to it in feel.
i was of the persuasion that this was just an inferior ff5 going in, but i came to realize it's actually a superior ff1. if you liked ff1 i do think this is the closest in the series that harkens back to it in feel.
A very competent rpg.
Great game! Easily the best of the pre-SNES Final Fantasy titles. This one took me a bit by surprise, I was expecting something good but this game is really solid and could potentially have reached classic status were it not for 4 and 6 being even better. This has a story on par with its predecessor but filters out a lot of the poorly aged or downright annoying mechanics. Instead this introduces the highly customizable Job system that we'll later see again in Final Fantasy V, and introduces other staples like summons and moogles. All in all a very important game in the franchise.
Of course most Final Fantasy titles features airships, but this one has a neat mechanic where you go underwater as well and can explore some locations. This also feels like the first one so far to really introduce side dungeons, completely optional content. Combat is also very fun and an improvement on both of its predecessors.
All in all if you're looking for a classic Final Fantasy experience I wouldn't skip this one. Onto the next one!
Platinum trophy #131
Platinum #7 of 2023
Of course most Final Fantasy titles features airships, but this one has a neat mechanic where you go underwater as well and can explore some locations. This also feels like the first one so far to really introduce side dungeons, completely optional content. Combat is also very fun and an improvement on both of its predecessors.
All in all if you're looking for a classic Final Fantasy experience I wouldn't skip this one. Onto the next one!
Platinum trophy #131
Platinum #7 of 2023
After the first couple of hours in this game I thought I knew what my review would be. “This is like FF1 except better in every way.”
Unfortunately, the game couldn’t quite hold up.
To be clear, it has pretty much all of the greatness of FF1. The soundtrack is probably my favourite so far. It also introduces the job system, which is amazing. Summon magic is super cool. And offensive magic is finally balanced in a way that allows it to compete with regular attacks!
I didn’t spend much time talking about the positives but that’s because they’re simple to explain/are already in my FF1 review, so keep in mind that I love this game while I tell you about the negatives of this game.
I might not have been a fan of the FF2 story, but I can’t deny that it was ambitious and mechanically well told, it just wasn’t a story I enjoyed. In that regard, FF3 is a step back. The storytelling is disorganized, even worse than in FF1 and there are fewer cute side stories than in the first game.
One way the game tries to copy FF2’s approach to storytelling is by having temporary party members, but it doesn’t want your core party to be only 3 people so you end up having this powerful warriors and mages by your side doing exactly nothing in combat which just doesn’t really work for me.
As much as I love the job system, there are some issues with how it’s implemented here. Unlocking new jobs is weirdly paced. The second set of jobs takes a while to unlock and then you unlock the third set of jobs almost instantly. This third set of jobs has 2 jobs, Dark Knight and Evoker, that can’t equip anything for a while which is pretty disappointing. There is no non-caster job in the fourth set of jobs, so your non-casters stay in the third set for pretty long, and then the fifth set of jobs has a non-caster job so overpowered it’s basically mandatory.
As cool as the swapping of things is, it might just be a bit too free. I didn’t have teleportation or any of the curing magics equipped to my casters, I just swapped them in whenever I needed them and then swapped them out again. There are some locked doors in the midgame which you need a thief to open, but there’s nothing stopping you from just swapping one of your non-casters to a thief, opening the door, and then swapping back, so a locked door isn’t a reward for having a thief, it just means you need to spend a minute in menus.
While the stronger offensive magic, addition of summon magic, and extensive job system mostly made combat better, there are also some issues. Status effects on enemies aren’t as obvious as in previous games, and the initiative order is much less clear and more volatile. I wasted many healing spells on party members that were either still dead because the healer acted before the raiser or already dead because the enemy acted before the healer.
My biggest issue with the game is how much the ending drags on. There are 4 dungeons in a row (one of which is technically optional, but you really need the loot from it) and the enemies (especially the bosses) in the late game have way too much health. Fights against minibosses shouldn’t take 20+ minutes in a game like this.
But all of these issues are fairly minor compared to how much this game improves on the already pretty decent FF1.
Unfortunately, the game couldn’t quite hold up.
To be clear, it has pretty much all of the greatness of FF1. The soundtrack is probably my favourite so far. It also introduces the job system, which is amazing. Summon magic is super cool. And offensive magic is finally balanced in a way that allows it to compete with regular attacks!
I didn’t spend much time talking about the positives but that’s because they’re simple to explain/are already in my FF1 review, so keep in mind that I love this game while I tell you about the negatives of this game.
I might not have been a fan of the FF2 story, but I can’t deny that it was ambitious and mechanically well told, it just wasn’t a story I enjoyed. In that regard, FF3 is a step back. The storytelling is disorganized, even worse than in FF1 and there are fewer cute side stories than in the first game.
One way the game tries to copy FF2’s approach to storytelling is by having temporary party members, but it doesn’t want your core party to be only 3 people so you end up having this powerful warriors and mages by your side doing exactly nothing in combat which just doesn’t really work for me.
As much as I love the job system, there are some issues with how it’s implemented here. Unlocking new jobs is weirdly paced. The second set of jobs takes a while to unlock and then you unlock the third set of jobs almost instantly. This third set of jobs has 2 jobs, Dark Knight and Evoker, that can’t equip anything for a while which is pretty disappointing. There is no non-caster job in the fourth set of jobs, so your non-casters stay in the third set for pretty long, and then the fifth set of jobs has a non-caster job so overpowered it’s basically mandatory.
As cool as the swapping of things is, it might just be a bit too free. I didn’t have teleportation or any of the curing magics equipped to my casters, I just swapped them in whenever I needed them and then swapped them out again. There are some locked doors in the midgame which you need a thief to open, but there’s nothing stopping you from just swapping one of your non-casters to a thief, opening the door, and then swapping back, so a locked door isn’t a reward for having a thief, it just means you need to spend a minute in menus.
While the stronger offensive magic, addition of summon magic, and extensive job system mostly made combat better, there are also some issues. Status effects on enemies aren’t as obvious as in previous games, and the initiative order is much less clear and more volatile. I wasted many healing spells on party members that were either still dead because the healer acted before the raiser or already dead because the enemy acted before the healer.
My biggest issue with the game is how much the ending drags on. There are 4 dungeons in a row (one of which is technically optional, but you really need the loot from it) and the enemies (especially the bosses) in the late game have way too much health. Fights against minibosses shouldn’t take 20+ minutes in a game like this.
But all of these issues are fairly minor compared to how much this game improves on the already pretty decent FF1.
Tbh, not my fave FF. I remember playing the DS version, though I was a lot younger, and it would've been one of the earlier ones that I played through fully. I did feel I had a positive time with it then, but wonder how it'd hold up now...
The introduction of jobs was really interesting, and this game has some cool ass bosses. Of the original trilogy from the pixel remasters, I think it's my least favorite, as the story is really pretty subdued. The best part of the game for me was the final dungeons which absolutely ripped, and constituted probably 1/5 of my entire playtime lol. Mayhaps too long? A lot of the backstory etc is loaded into that end game bit.
As with the other pixel remasters the sprite work, attack animations, and re-orchestrated soundtrack are wonderful.
Also now that I have XIV under my belt this game gave me a lot of wojack pointing energy. I'm glad to have played it again regardless, as I needed a refresh on the early entries of FF. I am really looking forward to playing the rest of the pixel remasters.
The introduction of jobs was really interesting, and this game has some cool ass bosses. Of the original trilogy from the pixel remasters, I think it's my least favorite, as the story is really pretty subdued. The best part of the game for me was the final dungeons which absolutely ripped, and constituted probably 1/5 of my entire playtime lol. Mayhaps too long? A lot of the backstory etc is loaded into that end game bit.
As with the other pixel remasters the sprite work, attack animations, and re-orchestrated soundtrack are wonderful.
Also now that I have XIV under my belt this game gave me a lot of wojack pointing energy. I'm glad to have played it again regardless, as I needed a refresh on the early entries of FF. I am really looking forward to playing the rest of the pixel remasters.
This review contains spoilers
With this experience completed, I now have played through the NES trilogy of Final Fantasy titles. Essentially, this is a better FFI, an evolution if you will, as it takes the jobs and leveling system from it, and makes them even better. While the story may not be as compelling as its predecessor, Final Fantasy II, or even have unique characters that it offers, I think FFIII is the most memorable of the trilogy. From better designed dungeons, awesome locations, and an even better OST, this is definitely the strongest of the Pixel Remasters that I’ve experienced so far (not including VI).
The overworld is amazing and the theme that goes along with it is a perfect combination that truly reinforced the theme of heroes going on a journey, and the various airships were really neat. The Invincible is awesome because it acts like a home base with the ability to rest and buy items/equipment/magic. The dungeon layouts and traversals were designed far better than I and II’s and the worst dungeon, the final one, is still better than a lot of the ones in those games. I am grateful for quick saves and the ability to turn off encounters, since the final dungeon has no way to save, so I ran back to The Invincible and rested before facing off against Cloud of Darkness. The event and set piece that was Saronia was awesome, too.
The job system returns from I, but grants a lot more freedom for your four party members and presents a lot of different setups for the adventure’s various encounters. There’s times the game makes it VERY obvious which jobs you should switch to, (like when they give you a bunch of Dragoon or Dark Knight equipment) and my final jobs for my party ended up being Dragoon, Sage, Ninja, and Magus. I love Dragoons, from it being my true first job in FFXIV (after reaching the minimum level for Lancer), and playing through The Legend of Dragoon recently, I was stoked to have access to this job. Though I did start off with Warrior, Monk, Black & White Mages and kept the Monk around for a while, I switched around the other three constantly as new ones were available. The times where you had to go “mini,” I was not too fond of, because in order to deal damage, you have to swap your whole party to mage jobs if you desire to move forward. Overall, a really solid system, but as the game goes on it makes most previous jobs irrelevant.
After giving us named characters in II and with a darker story, they definitely went back to the simplicity of I. There is some neat subplots from the NPCs that join your party and the whole deal with Master Noah and his disciples, but as a whole, it definitely was not as “grand” as II’s presentation. However, I really liked the idea of “light and dark working together” at the end emphasizing a balance between the two.
Also shoutout first Moogle appearance, love these guys.
The overworld is amazing and the theme that goes along with it is a perfect combination that truly reinforced the theme of heroes going on a journey, and the various airships were really neat. The Invincible is awesome because it acts like a home base with the ability to rest and buy items/equipment/magic. The dungeon layouts and traversals were designed far better than I and II’s and the worst dungeon, the final one, is still better than a lot of the ones in those games. I am grateful for quick saves and the ability to turn off encounters, since the final dungeon has no way to save, so I ran back to The Invincible and rested before facing off against Cloud of Darkness. The event and set piece that was Saronia was awesome, too.
The job system returns from I, but grants a lot more freedom for your four party members and presents a lot of different setups for the adventure’s various encounters. There’s times the game makes it VERY obvious which jobs you should switch to, (like when they give you a bunch of Dragoon or Dark Knight equipment) and my final jobs for my party ended up being Dragoon, Sage, Ninja, and Magus. I love Dragoons, from it being my true first job in FFXIV (after reaching the minimum level for Lancer), and playing through The Legend of Dragoon recently, I was stoked to have access to this job. Though I did start off with Warrior, Monk, Black & White Mages and kept the Monk around for a while, I switched around the other three constantly as new ones were available. The times where you had to go “mini,” I was not too fond of, because in order to deal damage, you have to swap your whole party to mage jobs if you desire to move forward. Overall, a really solid system, but as the game goes on it makes most previous jobs irrelevant.
After giving us named characters in II and with a darker story, they definitely went back to the simplicity of I. There is some neat subplots from the NPCs that join your party and the whole deal with Master Noah and his disciples, but as a whole, it definitely was not as “grand” as II’s presentation. However, I really liked the idea of “light and dark working together” at the end emphasizing a balance between the two.
Also shoutout first Moogle appearance, love these guys.
I don't think I'm saying anything people familiar with the series don't already know, but 3 is a return to 1 spiritually in many ways. Job system is back although this time it actually earns the right to be called a job system instead of just sketching a basic template for your character creation foundation. (I don't hold this against 1 as it's obviously a more loose beginning, just clarifying that this truly is one this time) DND spells per rest is back/mp is gone. Traditional leveling with all stats attached to each level up and generic experience is back. (alongside new job levels that, tbh, I still don't particularly understand) And, the more basic warriors of light setting out to defeat darkness/a vaguely defined evil is back over the more complicated war/politics driven FF2 storyline.
But while I gave 2 the edge over 1 for that teensy bit of character building you could control with its leveling system, the jobs here and swapping characters to and from is easily the best of the 3 thus far. And unlike say a lot of modern games with selectable classes or roles for characters, this is a game that embraces the player capability to switch jobs with particular enemies or dungeon gimmicks that ask you to reconsider your setup rather than just settling into 4 jobs and never touching the menu again. This has the side benefit of rendering a lot of what was extraneous dungeon loot in prior games more valuable than just another form of gil- having a few different types of sets of armor/weapons on hand makes swapping in and out of classes supported and the thorough dungeon explorer will find they frequently have this even if they haven't grinded the gil to buy it all naturally.
The only real drawbacks here I noted were a) that there really is seemingly a desire from the game to have you leave some jobs behind permanently as you go on, as earlier jobs may not be quite as potent as later ones even with higher job levels at the time you get the newer fancier models and b) specifically the thief job. The big draw of the thief, as far as i can tell, is its ability to lockpick enchanted locks. Well, you can swap to a thief in front of a locked door, unlock any of them even at job lvl 1 as a thief, then swap back without ever having to actually take a step or fight a battle in the job lol.
The basic story, while drawing from the same well as 1, does sketch in more detail in each place you go than its predecessor. It functions a more episodic fashion I'd say than 1, where learning about the various troubles in the latest town you've popped into is as much or more a focus in the script as the connecting tissue of pursuing the 4 crystals. (the counterpart to 1's four fiends hunt) But this isn't really the reason I prefer its narrative over 1- no the primary advantage it has here is that this is really the first ff where we see them start to really embrace the comedic expressiveness of moving their sprites all around. There are quite a few skits and bits scattered throughout the story and while the core narrative surrounding them isn't anything incredible, they're more amusing than anything in 1 or the rest of 3. (I'd still give the nod to 2's more focused narrative overall though if including all 3 in the comparison)
The episodic/more loose nature of your quest at times though, can lead to more moments of directionless wandering than either of the 2 prior games. This is a big world and you get access to a lot of it fairly early on. It's not a strict downside though as it can be fun to find entirely optional dungeons, particularly towards the end of the game where the series first summons can be had as rewards for completing them. I will say the constant airship juggling is a bit tedious though- even if i ignore the hilarity of airships that can't fly that high despite being picture well above the mountain ranges or the "jumping" upgrade you get later to traverse mountains but only in short bursts, having to swap airships (which entails traveling across the entire map to where you left the prior one) to pick between going underwater or mountain hopping feels incredibly inconvenient in a series thats otherwise felt like its had these sort of edges sanded off in the transition to pixel remaster.
The dungeon design, on the other hand, is all welcome news. The dead ends and trap rooms of ff1 and 2 are now entirely gone. The paths you can go on always go somewhere. And while this does lead to more linear feeling exploration than before, some of that has been made up for with the series' new fascination with obscured paths in certain tiles/between entrances. Loot is frequently hid off the main path now and feeling around every corner will be rewarded.
I dont really know how to critique music so i may just start making lists of my favorite tracks from each game as i go through them lol. I missed FF2's battle theme here (and agree that the pixel remaster version of it is not to my taste) but plenty of other tracks came through great. Eternal Wind, Dark Crystals, The Forbidden Land Eureka, The Crystal Tower, The Invinceable, and Doga and Unei's theme were all varying levels of hits to me.
Lastly, what i didnt miss from ff2 was the random encounter rate. FF3 thankfully pulls back on that quite a bit. These remasters in general are on the easier side, but FF3 does steadily ramp up its difficulty towards the end, even if more of that comes primarily from boss hp just skyrocketing relative to player damage than it probably should.
But while I gave 2 the edge over 1 for that teensy bit of character building you could control with its leveling system, the jobs here and swapping characters to and from is easily the best of the 3 thus far. And unlike say a lot of modern games with selectable classes or roles for characters, this is a game that embraces the player capability to switch jobs with particular enemies or dungeon gimmicks that ask you to reconsider your setup rather than just settling into 4 jobs and never touching the menu again. This has the side benefit of rendering a lot of what was extraneous dungeon loot in prior games more valuable than just another form of gil- having a few different types of sets of armor/weapons on hand makes swapping in and out of classes supported and the thorough dungeon explorer will find they frequently have this even if they haven't grinded the gil to buy it all naturally.
The only real drawbacks here I noted were a) that there really is seemingly a desire from the game to have you leave some jobs behind permanently as you go on, as earlier jobs may not be quite as potent as later ones even with higher job levels at the time you get the newer fancier models and b) specifically the thief job. The big draw of the thief, as far as i can tell, is its ability to lockpick enchanted locks. Well, you can swap to a thief in front of a locked door, unlock any of them even at job lvl 1 as a thief, then swap back without ever having to actually take a step or fight a battle in the job lol.
The basic story, while drawing from the same well as 1, does sketch in more detail in each place you go than its predecessor. It functions a more episodic fashion I'd say than 1, where learning about the various troubles in the latest town you've popped into is as much or more a focus in the script as the connecting tissue of pursuing the 4 crystals. (the counterpart to 1's four fiends hunt) But this isn't really the reason I prefer its narrative over 1- no the primary advantage it has here is that this is really the first ff where we see them start to really embrace the comedic expressiveness of moving their sprites all around. There are quite a few skits and bits scattered throughout the story and while the core narrative surrounding them isn't anything incredible, they're more amusing than anything in 1 or the rest of 3. (I'd still give the nod to 2's more focused narrative overall though if including all 3 in the comparison)
The episodic/more loose nature of your quest at times though, can lead to more moments of directionless wandering than either of the 2 prior games. This is a big world and you get access to a lot of it fairly early on. It's not a strict downside though as it can be fun to find entirely optional dungeons, particularly towards the end of the game where the series first summons can be had as rewards for completing them. I will say the constant airship juggling is a bit tedious though- even if i ignore the hilarity of airships that can't fly that high despite being picture well above the mountain ranges or the "jumping" upgrade you get later to traverse mountains but only in short bursts, having to swap airships (which entails traveling across the entire map to where you left the prior one) to pick between going underwater or mountain hopping feels incredibly inconvenient in a series thats otherwise felt like its had these sort of edges sanded off in the transition to pixel remaster.
The dungeon design, on the other hand, is all welcome news. The dead ends and trap rooms of ff1 and 2 are now entirely gone. The paths you can go on always go somewhere. And while this does lead to more linear feeling exploration than before, some of that has been made up for with the series' new fascination with obscured paths in certain tiles/between entrances. Loot is frequently hid off the main path now and feeling around every corner will be rewarded.
I dont really know how to critique music so i may just start making lists of my favorite tracks from each game as i go through them lol. I missed FF2's battle theme here (and agree that the pixel remaster version of it is not to my taste) but plenty of other tracks came through great. Eternal Wind, Dark Crystals, The Forbidden Land Eureka, The Crystal Tower, The Invinceable, and Doga and Unei's theme were all varying levels of hits to me.
Lastly, what i didnt miss from ff2 was the random encounter rate. FF3 thankfully pulls back on that quite a bit. These remasters in general are on the easier side, but FF3 does steadily ramp up its difficulty towards the end, even if more of that comes primarily from boss hp just skyrocketing relative to player damage than it probably should.
The best of the original 3 games by far. You get some crap dungeons like the two with splitting enemies and the Crystal Tower is a bit of slog (even with Pixel Remaster QOL changes), but it's still leagues above FF II, and feels meatier than FF I.
In my opinion this is clear cut and far away the best of the NES trilogy. It took the best aspects of Final Fantasy (the job system and leveling) and the best of Final Fantasy II (better characters and story), upgraded those strengths, and left out a lot of the things that hadn’t been working. Obviously it’s still not the Final Fantasy story telling and well ironed out gameplay that we eventually come to expect but you can see the formula coming together in this one. It’s a shame this wasn’t released in the west 30 years ago because it is easily one of the best NES games of all time. The only negative I have is the last dungeon is an absolute beast that goes on far too long and has 5 to many bosses. It’s a small negative in a game that is clearly beginning to find its stride as a franchise.
Out of the entire series, I feel Final Fantasy III being someone's first Final Fantasy game is pretty rare.
I first saw FF III from a old friend who had the DS version, and the first thing they ever showed me was that incredible CG opening. The only other CG opening I saw before was Kingdom Hearts 1, but oh my god this had so many more characters, such grand and lavish environments, cool ass magic and a dude who wields two swords what the hell is this game?? Oh and that music, even to this day I just adore the soundtrack. The town themes, Cid's theme, The Forbidden Land Eureka, Castle Hein, the final boss, and especially the overworld theme 'Eternal Wind'. I'd hear Eternal Wind in my head every time I would walk in my back woods, such an engaging, adventurous piece.
Back to that opening, it painted an exciting but also treacherous adventure, which reflects perfectly when I started playing it after borrowing it from my friend. For someone's first ever turn-based RPG that wasn't Pokémon, this game was hard and unforgiving. There's the fact that dying booted you to the title screen, and that alone was a shock to the system. If I lost in Pokémon I'd just lose a bit of money and could easily continue my journey. Here, no way! I die then it's over. It made the fear of failure borderline overwhelming. If I fuck up then I can lose so much. Not helped by the fact that I was, as the kids say, "bad". I didn't use items, I rarely used magic as they were limited by spell slots and they're much less convenient to recover then using a Pokémon center, I didn't know what any of my stats did, I hardly changed my jobs, and I almost never talked to any NPC who wasn't critical to progression. RPGs can be a challenge of numbers or strategy, but they're also often knowledge checks. And if you are insufficient in knowledge then ideally you should ask the townsfolk for helpful hints. This never occurred to my tiny mind.
So my (literal) dumbass got bodied by so many things. I didn't change all my party members jobs to spellcasters during the points where you had to be small which makes all physical attacks deal 1 damage, I didn't have a scholar who could identify the ever-changing weakness of Hein, and despite how many dragoon equipment they give you for free I never thought to use a dragoon against the infamous Garuda fight. This never dettered me from playing however. It was scary for sure, the next boss fight could kill me without a second thought, but it also engaged me to the game more. Every (accidental) success got me closer to exploring more of this vast world. If I was lucky, I might even find a crystal of light that'll give me brand new jobs for my party. Yeah I didn't change them often, but I usually changed them into either the coolest looking one or the same jobs they had during the game's cg opening. The overwhelming danger of this magical world made it more engaging.
But even as someone with a lot of tenacity as a kid, even I couldn't push through that. If you're familiar with this game, then you know what I'm talking about. A big reason why this should never be your first Final Fantasy game unless you really enjoy sadistic design. The Crystal Tower.
The final dungeon of this game. First some background, by this point you have access to a airship with a free inn. Incredibly valuable if you ever bite off more then you can chew, or just run into dumb luck. You also can only save on the overworld. Mid-dungeon save points weren't a thing till Final Fantasy IV. You probably know where this is going, but let's continue. First is the Great Maze. Not too difficult nor winding, but it does take a while to just run through. You wind up outside for your final chance to save the game before entering the Crystal Tower, but you'll notice that you don't have access to your airship. If you need to heal you'll have to walk through the maze all over again. Bearing in mind if you need to heal then you're probably out of most of your spell slots, so hope you don't run into too many encounters on the way back. I'm not going to walk-through the Eureka section since, while long and difficult, is at least situated at the Tower's entrance. Just know that it's"optional" but has the final tier of spells and the best shops and weapons so NO, do not skip it. Then you have the climb itself. Nothing you wouldn't expect from a last dungeon, longs floors, a lot of floors, encounters with tens of thousands of health that may nuke your party with magic whenever they feel like it, and chests that have the longest most roundabout hallways rivaled only by Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne. An hour later you reach the boss, who of course has Meteor, so hope your numbers are big enough. Beat them after a long fight... now for part two. Now you have to go through even more of this dungeon and fight four more bosses before facing the true final boss, plus the best head piece in the entire game is guarded by clones of the boss from the first part of the tower, AND once you're in part two of this place you can't leave meaning if you die you start aaaallll over again. Bearing in mind that some of these bosses are pretty absurd with their damage output, and in the DS remake that I was playing some of these guys have up to three turns of actions every round of combat. Final boss included.
You can see why young me couldn't do it. Here I am with a dinky wooden sword held together by shoe string and hope as I face against an unflinching sentinel crafted by the arms of a God that spares no thought in killing everything it sees. Someone tries to teach you a new fighting game without ever holding back, your learning by making sure next time less of your bones are broken. Thrown into the middle of the ocean with a compass and a raft board. Find your way home with that. Good luck, jackals (suppose to be "jackass" but that autocorrect is a lot more funny).
So eight years later I finally beat the game.
As much as I would like to tell you it literally took eight years of attempts, no I just put the game down and moved on to other games. At the time I just accepted I wouldn't see the credits, but I got well over 50 hours of enjoyment(?) out of it, so I wasn't too bummed. But then I grew older. Taller. Very marginally more intelligent. By that I meant I could read better and look things up on Google. I learned many things I wasn't aware of. I learned what stats actually did apart from damage. I used jobs like Viking and Monk more effectively for tanking and offense respectively. I was smarter with my magic usage. Items... still weren't used a ton but I now knew how valuable exilirs were. They're the only other way to recover spell slots, but are exceedingly rare so you have to use them only when it matters. And by that I mean only the final dungeon. Also I didn't start back from my old file, but rather I started a brand new game from scratch. Things were already a lot more smoother. Bosses that felt like a gamble if I could beat them as a kid were a lot more comfortable now. I knew where to go for progression so my runtime was a lot shorter. I did grind a lot, but this was still at a time where I didn't have a lot of games. And by the time I was grinding I was already at the Crystal Tower, but have yet to take a real crack at it again. Looking back, I think I didn't want my time with the game to end yet. Didn't want to have less of a reason to dress my guys in funny costumes, to listen to the scariest boss music I ever heard at the time, to admire these chunky-ass DS visuals, and to watch that beutiful CG opening again for the hundredth time. But I did it eventually. It was long, but not the worst. Bosses were still deadly, but I've learned how strong Ninjas were and the power of Black Belts. I also felt Sages were kind of overrated with their low MP, so I stuck with a Devout and Summoner for all my magic needs. It felt more surreal then satisfying watching the end credits. This'll sound ridiculous, but it felt similar to graduating High School. This constant in life was over, so what do I do now without it?
I could just play it again, you dramatic butt!
Joking aside, I honestly felt content in what I played. No feelings of "Thank god that's over", more "It's done." Simple as that. I enjoyed my time with it and now it's time to look for greener pastures. Like a decade later playing the Pixel Remaster of Final Fantasy III. Yeah finally talking about the game this is a review on, but "review" may not be best descriptor for whatever this thing I'm writing is. The best way to describe the Pixel Remaster version is that it's Final Fantasy III but for people who got shit to do. The big thing are autosaves. You die at boss, you can respawn in the room you died at. Also since this is a 2D game with lightning fast animations, battles just fly by. You also have a auto-battle feature to replay the parties previous actions but on fast-forward, allowing for some painless grinding if you feel ill-equipped. Or if you ever feel like saying "screw it" you can jack up the exp and money gains for less time in battles overall, or turn off encounters if they start getting in your skin. I don't feel you need these boosts on a first-time playthrough, but it's there if you want them. The autosaves also help ease the frustration of loosing a lot of progress because "Oh you didn't know your first-time fighting this boss that they have a meteor spell? That's a shame. Die." All around I saw the credits in 12 hours, with the caveat that I've beaten a version of Final Fantasy III before so I knew where to go at all times. If, like me, you have played the DS version then some things will throw you off due to it being based more on the original Famicom version. Namely dungeon layouts and when you obtain certain jobs. They caught me off-guard for sure, but I ain't going to complain getting access to Black Belt much earlier. Music is mostly fantastic, but I'm not the biggest fan of the remix battle themes. The electric guitar doesn't real fit FF III to me, the DS version of the boss theme gave the fights far more tension then the Pixel Remaster. Eternal Wind though, that remake is fuckin beautiful. No notes for that. The Pixel Remaster also has no penalty for swapping jobs. Yes, there's something like that in both Famicom and DS. The former required a currency from battles in order to change jobs, while the latter had your character debuffed for several battles as your character "adjusted" to their new job. I don't think I need to tell you that removing that is unequivocally a good thing even if you are the most hard-core FF III fan.
I am kind of one of those people who feels the autosaves removes a lot of tension from dungeons and boss battles alike, but if I take off my nostalgia goggles for a minute I do acknowledge that a lot of games have done FF III but better, at least in terms of combat and customization. Hell, you'll often hear Final Fantasy V as "It's like FF III but good". And after playing FF V for the first time recently (no I didn't write a review for it), I get the sentiment, though I also feel FF V has also been outdone by many other RPGs. That may imply I feel there's no reason to play either game, but that isn't the case. Even the oldest of games can provide something that nothing of modern times can. There's always a lot of value to be found in anything, or anyone's past. FF V certainly is a lot more manageable if you are coming in from a more modern mindset, but III has merits that have paved a lot for the Final Fantasy series to this day. It's the first game where Dragoons can jump in the air and slam back down with their spear, many iconic jobs like Ninja and Bard got their start here, summoning as a mechanic was new, Moogles exist, even dedicated optional bosses like Bahamut and Leviathan began here.
This is such an odd game to be introduced to Final Fantasy. The plot is simple, progression is just a simple but with a few steps that feel missing, combat is imbalanced with some jobs being relatively underpowered, the game forces you change jobs in several sections so you can't play however you want at times, and the final dungeon alone filters so many people out it's pretty sadistic. I can't say if I'd be singing a different tune for this game if I played it for the first time this year. I first played it in just the right circumstances at just the right age, being incredibly impressionable with a lot of free time and not a lot of other games. It's funny, I could've been playing so many other games at that time and I feel I wouldn't have nearly as much to share about them. Final Fantasy III is far from the perfect game or even one my favorites nowadays, but it was perfect for a young, imaginative kid that had so much more to learn.
I first saw FF III from a old friend who had the DS version, and the first thing they ever showed me was that incredible CG opening. The only other CG opening I saw before was Kingdom Hearts 1, but oh my god this had so many more characters, such grand and lavish environments, cool ass magic and a dude who wields two swords what the hell is this game?? Oh and that music, even to this day I just adore the soundtrack. The town themes, Cid's theme, The Forbidden Land Eureka, Castle Hein, the final boss, and especially the overworld theme 'Eternal Wind'. I'd hear Eternal Wind in my head every time I would walk in my back woods, such an engaging, adventurous piece.
Back to that opening, it painted an exciting but also treacherous adventure, which reflects perfectly when I started playing it after borrowing it from my friend. For someone's first ever turn-based RPG that wasn't Pokémon, this game was hard and unforgiving. There's the fact that dying booted you to the title screen, and that alone was a shock to the system. If I lost in Pokémon I'd just lose a bit of money and could easily continue my journey. Here, no way! I die then it's over. It made the fear of failure borderline overwhelming. If I fuck up then I can lose so much. Not helped by the fact that I was, as the kids say, "bad". I didn't use items, I rarely used magic as they were limited by spell slots and they're much less convenient to recover then using a Pokémon center, I didn't know what any of my stats did, I hardly changed my jobs, and I almost never talked to any NPC who wasn't critical to progression. RPGs can be a challenge of numbers or strategy, but they're also often knowledge checks. And if you are insufficient in knowledge then ideally you should ask the townsfolk for helpful hints. This never occurred to my tiny mind.
So my (literal) dumbass got bodied by so many things. I didn't change all my party members jobs to spellcasters during the points where you had to be small which makes all physical attacks deal 1 damage, I didn't have a scholar who could identify the ever-changing weakness of Hein, and despite how many dragoon equipment they give you for free I never thought to use a dragoon against the infamous Garuda fight. This never dettered me from playing however. It was scary for sure, the next boss fight could kill me without a second thought, but it also engaged me to the game more. Every (accidental) success got me closer to exploring more of this vast world. If I was lucky, I might even find a crystal of light that'll give me brand new jobs for my party. Yeah I didn't change them often, but I usually changed them into either the coolest looking one or the same jobs they had during the game's cg opening. The overwhelming danger of this magical world made it more engaging.
But even as someone with a lot of tenacity as a kid, even I couldn't push through that. If you're familiar with this game, then you know what I'm talking about. A big reason why this should never be your first Final Fantasy game unless you really enjoy sadistic design. The Crystal Tower.
The final dungeon of this game. First some background, by this point you have access to a airship with a free inn. Incredibly valuable if you ever bite off more then you can chew, or just run into dumb luck. You also can only save on the overworld. Mid-dungeon save points weren't a thing till Final Fantasy IV. You probably know where this is going, but let's continue. First is the Great Maze. Not too difficult nor winding, but it does take a while to just run through. You wind up outside for your final chance to save the game before entering the Crystal Tower, but you'll notice that you don't have access to your airship. If you need to heal you'll have to walk through the maze all over again. Bearing in mind if you need to heal then you're probably out of most of your spell slots, so hope you don't run into too many encounters on the way back. I'm not going to walk-through the Eureka section since, while long and difficult, is at least situated at the Tower's entrance. Just know that it's"optional" but has the final tier of spells and the best shops and weapons so NO, do not skip it. Then you have the climb itself. Nothing you wouldn't expect from a last dungeon, longs floors, a lot of floors, encounters with tens of thousands of health that may nuke your party with magic whenever they feel like it, and chests that have the longest most roundabout hallways rivaled only by Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne. An hour later you reach the boss, who of course has Meteor, so hope your numbers are big enough. Beat them after a long fight... now for part two. Now you have to go through even more of this dungeon and fight four more bosses before facing the true final boss, plus the best head piece in the entire game is guarded by clones of the boss from the first part of the tower, AND once you're in part two of this place you can't leave meaning if you die you start aaaallll over again. Bearing in mind that some of these bosses are pretty absurd with their damage output, and in the DS remake that I was playing some of these guys have up to three turns of actions every round of combat. Final boss included.
You can see why young me couldn't do it. Here I am with a dinky wooden sword held together by shoe string and hope as I face against an unflinching sentinel crafted by the arms of a God that spares no thought in killing everything it sees. Someone tries to teach you a new fighting game without ever holding back, your learning by making sure next time less of your bones are broken. Thrown into the middle of the ocean with a compass and a raft board. Find your way home with that. Good luck, jackals (suppose to be "jackass" but that autocorrect is a lot more funny).
So eight years later I finally beat the game.
As much as I would like to tell you it literally took eight years of attempts, no I just put the game down and moved on to other games. At the time I just accepted I wouldn't see the credits, but I got well over 50 hours of enjoyment(?) out of it, so I wasn't too bummed. But then I grew older. Taller. Very marginally more intelligent. By that I meant I could read better and look things up on Google. I learned many things I wasn't aware of. I learned what stats actually did apart from damage. I used jobs like Viking and Monk more effectively for tanking and offense respectively. I was smarter with my magic usage. Items... still weren't used a ton but I now knew how valuable exilirs were. They're the only other way to recover spell slots, but are exceedingly rare so you have to use them only when it matters. And by that I mean only the final dungeon. Also I didn't start back from my old file, but rather I started a brand new game from scratch. Things were already a lot more smoother. Bosses that felt like a gamble if I could beat them as a kid were a lot more comfortable now. I knew where to go for progression so my runtime was a lot shorter. I did grind a lot, but this was still at a time where I didn't have a lot of games. And by the time I was grinding I was already at the Crystal Tower, but have yet to take a real crack at it again. Looking back, I think I didn't want my time with the game to end yet. Didn't want to have less of a reason to dress my guys in funny costumes, to listen to the scariest boss music I ever heard at the time, to admire these chunky-ass DS visuals, and to watch that beutiful CG opening again for the hundredth time. But I did it eventually. It was long, but not the worst. Bosses were still deadly, but I've learned how strong Ninjas were and the power of Black Belts. I also felt Sages were kind of overrated with their low MP, so I stuck with a Devout and Summoner for all my magic needs. It felt more surreal then satisfying watching the end credits. This'll sound ridiculous, but it felt similar to graduating High School. This constant in life was over, so what do I do now without it?
I could just play it again, you dramatic butt!
Joking aside, I honestly felt content in what I played. No feelings of "Thank god that's over", more "It's done." Simple as that. I enjoyed my time with it and now it's time to look for greener pastures. Like a decade later playing the Pixel Remaster of Final Fantasy III. Yeah finally talking about the game this is a review on, but "review" may not be best descriptor for whatever this thing I'm writing is. The best way to describe the Pixel Remaster version is that it's Final Fantasy III but for people who got shit to do. The big thing are autosaves. You die at boss, you can respawn in the room you died at. Also since this is a 2D game with lightning fast animations, battles just fly by. You also have a auto-battle feature to replay the parties previous actions but on fast-forward, allowing for some painless grinding if you feel ill-equipped. Or if you ever feel like saying "screw it" you can jack up the exp and money gains for less time in battles overall, or turn off encounters if they start getting in your skin. I don't feel you need these boosts on a first-time playthrough, but it's there if you want them. The autosaves also help ease the frustration of loosing a lot of progress because "Oh you didn't know your first-time fighting this boss that they have a meteor spell? That's a shame. Die." All around I saw the credits in 12 hours, with the caveat that I've beaten a version of Final Fantasy III before so I knew where to go at all times. If, like me, you have played the DS version then some things will throw you off due to it being based more on the original Famicom version. Namely dungeon layouts and when you obtain certain jobs. They caught me off-guard for sure, but I ain't going to complain getting access to Black Belt much earlier. Music is mostly fantastic, but I'm not the biggest fan of the remix battle themes. The electric guitar doesn't real fit FF III to me, the DS version of the boss theme gave the fights far more tension then the Pixel Remaster. Eternal Wind though, that remake is fuckin beautiful. No notes for that. The Pixel Remaster also has no penalty for swapping jobs. Yes, there's something like that in both Famicom and DS. The former required a currency from battles in order to change jobs, while the latter had your character debuffed for several battles as your character "adjusted" to their new job. I don't think I need to tell you that removing that is unequivocally a good thing even if you are the most hard-core FF III fan.
I am kind of one of those people who feels the autosaves removes a lot of tension from dungeons and boss battles alike, but if I take off my nostalgia goggles for a minute I do acknowledge that a lot of games have done FF III but better, at least in terms of combat and customization. Hell, you'll often hear Final Fantasy V as "It's like FF III but good". And after playing FF V for the first time recently (no I didn't write a review for it), I get the sentiment, though I also feel FF V has also been outdone by many other RPGs. That may imply I feel there's no reason to play either game, but that isn't the case. Even the oldest of games can provide something that nothing of modern times can. There's always a lot of value to be found in anything, or anyone's past. FF V certainly is a lot more manageable if you are coming in from a more modern mindset, but III has merits that have paved a lot for the Final Fantasy series to this day. It's the first game where Dragoons can jump in the air and slam back down with their spear, many iconic jobs like Ninja and Bard got their start here, summoning as a mechanic was new, Moogles exist, even dedicated optional bosses like Bahamut and Leviathan began here.
This is such an odd game to be introduced to Final Fantasy. The plot is simple, progression is just a simple but with a few steps that feel missing, combat is imbalanced with some jobs being relatively underpowered, the game forces you change jobs in several sections so you can't play however you want at times, and the final dungeon alone filters so many people out it's pretty sadistic. I can't say if I'd be singing a different tune for this game if I played it for the first time this year. I first played it in just the right circumstances at just the right age, being incredibly impressionable with a lot of free time and not a lot of other games. It's funny, I could've been playing so many other games at that time and I feel I wouldn't have nearly as much to share about them. Final Fantasy III is far from the perfect game or even one my favorites nowadays, but it was perfect for a young, imaginative kid that had so much more to learn.
when people bring up final fantasy iii they usually bring up the job system as the main selling point, but what struck me the most playing thru this is how many cool memorable moments they're able to sprinkle in throughout the game's runtime... something about this title really captures some kind of adventurous spirit and feels like where final fantasy really starts to find its identity as a swashbuckling fantasy series.
seeing the map expand after leaving the floating continent on your airship, exploring underwater caves, taking the plunge into the dark world... this game really piqued my imagination in a way the previous two titles didn't and i think that's what puts it as the best famicom title in my mind rather than anything to do with the mechanics (which are also really solid!)
they shouldve probably given a heads up before that point of no return/subsequent final gauntlet though. jeez
seeing the map expand after leaving the floating continent on your airship, exploring underwater caves, taking the plunge into the dark world... this game really piqued my imagination in a way the previous two titles didn't and i think that's what puts it as the best famicom title in my mind rather than anything to do with the mechanics (which are also really solid!)
they shouldve probably given a heads up before that point of no return/subsequent final gauntlet though. jeez
It's incredible how good this game is.
Final Fantasy 3 doubles down on the goofy, tropey and whimsical adventuring of FF1 while expanding the scope to make it seem like a true sequel. In spirit and execution, FF3 is the actual sequel to FF1.
This game's biggest claim to fame is the job system. FF1's job system was something you picked at the very beginning of the game and stayed with you the whole adventure, with an upgrade towards the end. Final Fantasy 3 has jobs that are unlocked serially throughout the game, and you are allowed to change your character's jobs whenever you like. Anyone who has read my older reviews knows that I am a sucker for job systems, so I had no problem just eating this up. Surprisingly enough, the execution of the job system here was actually not bad for a first attempt. The game starts off by providing you with the jobs that were available in FF1, which immediately incentives you to pick the same party you would have picked in FF1, likely a Warrior/Monk/White Mage/Black Mage. From there, as more jobs are unlocked, you'll soon notice that the newer jobs are sidegrades or even upgrades to previously unlocked jobs. Meaning that you can, in essence, keep the same party composition for most of the game and succeed with no issues. This all culminates in the ultimate jobs which everyone in your party is likely going to be. While I certainly don't mind the linearity of the job progression like this, there is something to be said about the fact that most jobs are essentially a physical dps, a magic dps and a healer with varying degrees of proficiency.
I would call the lack of job variety a real negative if FF3 did not mitigate that through its encounter design. Something really awesome that this game does is that it sets up its fights with certain conditions that can only be accomplished with specific party comps. An early game example of this the giant rat boss fight. This fight comes at the end of a dungeon where you have to be mini, a status effect where your strength and defense stats are reduced to 1. The giant rat (which is actually normal sized) can absolutely maul your party while you do no damage to it if you are unprepared. The solution is to change your entire party to mages to use their spells on it to do damage and provide a constant source of healing. Another classic example is the Garuda boss fight; where you need to be a dragoon and jump out of the way before he wipes your party with a powerful spell. I know this puzzle like approach to bosses will frustrate some players, but I couldn't help but love it. Later Final Fantasy games would provide more flexibility in its challenges, allowing for more party comps as jobs become more multifaceted, but I can't help but love the simplicity of this design. It could be from the novelty of it all, but I wish we could get more games that approach its encounters in such a way.
Something else I want to bring mention is how amazing the sense of the scale is. You start the game in a continent that is roughly similar in size to the overworld in FF1. However, about a third of the way through, you realize that the starting continent is only a small piece of a much larger world. And then you come to the shocking realization that most of that world was actually flooded when the crystal's light faded. The mix of awe, dread, and melancholy that came over me, flying over this vast ocean that was once populated with life will always stick with me. The accompanying track, The Boundless Ocean, does such an amazing job of carrying those emotions forward to the surface. I was floored when I first came across it, I can't even imagine how some kid back in 1990 would have felt. The fact that this was the same game series that made FF1 only 3 years prior is mind boggling to me.
Beyond the grandiose things, FF3 has a lot of little fixes and changes compared to the last 2 games that make playing the game so much more enjoyable. First of all, the encounter rate is so much better. You can actually explore a lot of the world and a fair amount of the dungeons before being subjected to a fight. You actually do a lot of exploring on airships, meaning that this is the game with the least number of mandatory encounters when compared to FF1 and FF2. The actual encounter themselves are the best here too. FF1 random mods were too easily, FF2 mobs were so hard I just run away from everything; FF3 got it just right. Not too easy, but also not too hard. Dungeons are also much better, not the traps on traps on traps like FF2 and not the big empty rooms of FF1. All together, these optimizations make FF3 incredibly enjoyable to actually play moment to moment and a very rewarding game experience.
Last thing I want to mention, the music. My god. Words cannot even begin to describe. FF3 is generally among the lesser-known games in the franchise so my exposure to its music was minimal. Listening to all the tracks here for the first time was such an experience. It's goofy, lighthearted, melancholy, nostalgic, and exhilarating all in one. The beautiful mysticism of The Ancient's theme, the timelessness of Aria's theme, the quiet serenity of Amur, the hilarity of the 4 fake warriors of light, the previously mentioned Boundless Ocean. And the final theme, Everlasting World, a quiet, intimate, merciful piece that celebrates the beauty of life as it comes, in its little moments. Then to transition into bombastic, celebratory piece of resounding victory; to only to finish with the prelude, that iconic melody synonymous with Final Fantasy. Everlasting World is a goodbye to FF3, but with the hindsight of 30 years, it's also a goodbye to NES Final Fantasy. Starting with the next game, FF will transition into something more cinematic, character driven and dramatic. Beautiful in its own right, but very much different from the charm these 3 NES games have.
I think it's safe to say that Final Fantasy 3 is far and away my favorite NES Final Fantasy and a strong contender for top 5 FF. It's paced immaculately, designed confidently and plays like a dream. The music is transcendent, and the game experience is top notch. The game is fantastic and truly great. It's crime that it took this long for it to finally leave Japan, but oh so worth the wait. PLAY THIS GAME.
Final Fantasy 3 doubles down on the goofy, tropey and whimsical adventuring of FF1 while expanding the scope to make it seem like a true sequel. In spirit and execution, FF3 is the actual sequel to FF1.
This game's biggest claim to fame is the job system. FF1's job system was something you picked at the very beginning of the game and stayed with you the whole adventure, with an upgrade towards the end. Final Fantasy 3 has jobs that are unlocked serially throughout the game, and you are allowed to change your character's jobs whenever you like. Anyone who has read my older reviews knows that I am a sucker for job systems, so I had no problem just eating this up. Surprisingly enough, the execution of the job system here was actually not bad for a first attempt. The game starts off by providing you with the jobs that were available in FF1, which immediately incentives you to pick the same party you would have picked in FF1, likely a Warrior/Monk/White Mage/Black Mage. From there, as more jobs are unlocked, you'll soon notice that the newer jobs are sidegrades or even upgrades to previously unlocked jobs. Meaning that you can, in essence, keep the same party composition for most of the game and succeed with no issues. This all culminates in the ultimate jobs which everyone in your party is likely going to be. While I certainly don't mind the linearity of the job progression like this, there is something to be said about the fact that most jobs are essentially a physical dps, a magic dps and a healer with varying degrees of proficiency.
I would call the lack of job variety a real negative if FF3 did not mitigate that through its encounter design. Something really awesome that this game does is that it sets up its fights with certain conditions that can only be accomplished with specific party comps. An early game example of this the giant rat boss fight. This fight comes at the end of a dungeon where you have to be mini, a status effect where your strength and defense stats are reduced to 1. The giant rat (which is actually normal sized) can absolutely maul your party while you do no damage to it if you are unprepared. The solution is to change your entire party to mages to use their spells on it to do damage and provide a constant source of healing. Another classic example is the Garuda boss fight; where you need to be a dragoon and jump out of the way before he wipes your party with a powerful spell. I know this puzzle like approach to bosses will frustrate some players, but I couldn't help but love it. Later Final Fantasy games would provide more flexibility in its challenges, allowing for more party comps as jobs become more multifaceted, but I can't help but love the simplicity of this design. It could be from the novelty of it all, but I wish we could get more games that approach its encounters in such a way.
Something else I want to bring mention is how amazing the sense of the scale is. You start the game in a continent that is roughly similar in size to the overworld in FF1. However, about a third of the way through, you realize that the starting continent is only a small piece of a much larger world. And then you come to the shocking realization that most of that world was actually flooded when the crystal's light faded. The mix of awe, dread, and melancholy that came over me, flying over this vast ocean that was once populated with life will always stick with me. The accompanying track, The Boundless Ocean, does such an amazing job of carrying those emotions forward to the surface. I was floored when I first came across it, I can't even imagine how some kid back in 1990 would have felt. The fact that this was the same game series that made FF1 only 3 years prior is mind boggling to me.
Beyond the grandiose things, FF3 has a lot of little fixes and changes compared to the last 2 games that make playing the game so much more enjoyable. First of all, the encounter rate is so much better. You can actually explore a lot of the world and a fair amount of the dungeons before being subjected to a fight. You actually do a lot of exploring on airships, meaning that this is the game with the least number of mandatory encounters when compared to FF1 and FF2. The actual encounter themselves are the best here too. FF1 random mods were too easily, FF2 mobs were so hard I just run away from everything; FF3 got it just right. Not too easy, but also not too hard. Dungeons are also much better, not the traps on traps on traps like FF2 and not the big empty rooms of FF1. All together, these optimizations make FF3 incredibly enjoyable to actually play moment to moment and a very rewarding game experience.
Last thing I want to mention, the music. My god. Words cannot even begin to describe. FF3 is generally among the lesser-known games in the franchise so my exposure to its music was minimal. Listening to all the tracks here for the first time was such an experience. It's goofy, lighthearted, melancholy, nostalgic, and exhilarating all in one. The beautiful mysticism of The Ancient's theme, the timelessness of Aria's theme, the quiet serenity of Amur, the hilarity of the 4 fake warriors of light, the previously mentioned Boundless Ocean. And the final theme, Everlasting World, a quiet, intimate, merciful piece that celebrates the beauty of life as it comes, in its little moments. Then to transition into bombastic, celebratory piece of resounding victory; to only to finish with the prelude, that iconic melody synonymous with Final Fantasy. Everlasting World is a goodbye to FF3, but with the hindsight of 30 years, it's also a goodbye to NES Final Fantasy. Starting with the next game, FF will transition into something more cinematic, character driven and dramatic. Beautiful in its own right, but very much different from the charm these 3 NES games have.
I think it's safe to say that Final Fantasy 3 is far and away my favorite NES Final Fantasy and a strong contender for top 5 FF. It's paced immaculately, designed confidently and plays like a dream. The music is transcendent, and the game experience is top notch. The game is fantastic and truly great. It's crime that it took this long for it to finally leave Japan, but oh so worth the wait. PLAY THIS GAME.
People are kind of down on FF3 for not being as good as 5, but I dunno, I get what people who played the Japanese original as kids saw in it. I did try the DS remake back in the day but stopped around the Nepto Dragon dungeon, and I’m glad I gave it another shot in the pixel remaster. It’s got a lot of really cool ideas in it that end up being picked up and refined in later games, and despite its flaws I found myself having a really good time with it. It’s a shame that a lot of the jobs are extremely situational and obsoleted by later jobs, but I saw another review here saying that it was a refinement of the FF1 experience and in that context I think it’s pretty neat.
I think in terms of music and environmental design it’s a great sendoff to the NES era. Obviously I’m playing the pixel remaster rather than the original, but it’s pretty easy to see the scaffolding the prettier graphics were built upon. Leaving the floating continent and seeing the map expand is cool as fuck, and damn. I’m pretty sure the FF14 team made the Crystal Tower raids so important just to be like “hey the ff3 ost rules.” And you know what? They were right. There are SO many absolute bangers in this game. While FF1 and 2 had some great tracks I feel like FF3 is the one where Uematsu really hits his stride and there’s just so much good stuff! Eternal Wind! The Crystal Tower! Eureka! Okay my faves are kind of back loaded but I think the endgame needs to have great music and the final stretch is all killer no filler musically.
I mean the pacing of the Crystal Tower is pretty bad. But like. Quick Saves help. And I do love seeing all my old friends from Alliance Roulette.
Anyway in terms of story and tone it kind of reminds me of Dragon Quest 3 more than anything honestly. There’s an overarching plot that brings in some really neat ideas towards the end, but for the most part you’re kind of on a road trip dealing with local problems and moving on to the next town. The tone is really light and goofy for the most part, and that’s emphasized by the four Warriors of Light being textually kids. I feel like the DS version making them into more individual characters was probably a better decision, but this version lets me give myself psychic damage by looking at the color coded Onion Knights and going “hehehe I know what to name the red, blue, and lighter red ones” because again, I have The MMO Brainrot. It does feel a little like there is a bit of character to whoever you stick in the lead, even if it’s pretty shallow, and you do get fun flavor text for things like examining candles.
I dunno, there are tons of really cute moments in this game. The Cid is a cute little old man. Your characters start off getting booed off the stage when playing the piano, but after you pick up the bard job there’s a piano in the nearest town and you get everyone to do a big old dance number. The battle theme turns into a light woodwind number during the mini dungeons. The Dark Knight’s KO sprite is some empty armor which is sick as hell. It’s great.
The setting also has some pretty neat lore that is unfortunately pretty under-explored. Xande, Doga, and Unei have some weird philosophical shit going on, and I gotta admit I side with Xande there. I know it’s supposed to be some mono no aware shit and immortality sucks but it’s like getting socks for Christmas when your little siblings get a bike and some video games. Like yeah when you’re older you’re gonna love getting socks for Christmas but you’re fucking twelve now. Noah should’ve given him Speak With Animals or something instead of Mortality.
Also the idea of there being too much light that the Warriors of Darkness had to deal with? Cool as fuck. That was a great concept that only really came up at the end. I dunno, they made shit like FFIV: The After Years and Final Fantasy Origin: Stranger of Paradise, maybe they should’ve made a Final Fantasy III spinoff about the Wrath of Light or whatever. Maybe they could make the protagonist a grizzled thirty-something instead of a cute baby Onion Knight and call it something like. I don’t know. Shadow… bring—hey, wait a sec…
I think in terms of music and environmental design it’s a great sendoff to the NES era. Obviously I’m playing the pixel remaster rather than the original, but it’s pretty easy to see the scaffolding the prettier graphics were built upon. Leaving the floating continent and seeing the map expand is cool as fuck, and damn. I’m pretty sure the FF14 team made the Crystal Tower raids so important just to be like “hey the ff3 ost rules.” And you know what? They were right. There are SO many absolute bangers in this game. While FF1 and 2 had some great tracks I feel like FF3 is the one where Uematsu really hits his stride and there’s just so much good stuff! Eternal Wind! The Crystal Tower! Eureka! Okay my faves are kind of back loaded but I think the endgame needs to have great music and the final stretch is all killer no filler musically.
I mean the pacing of the Crystal Tower is pretty bad. But like. Quick Saves help. And I do love seeing all my old friends from Alliance Roulette.
Anyway in terms of story and tone it kind of reminds me of Dragon Quest 3 more than anything honestly. There’s an overarching plot that brings in some really neat ideas towards the end, but for the most part you’re kind of on a road trip dealing with local problems and moving on to the next town. The tone is really light and goofy for the most part, and that’s emphasized by the four Warriors of Light being textually kids. I feel like the DS version making them into more individual characters was probably a better decision, but this version lets me give myself psychic damage by looking at the color coded Onion Knights and going “hehehe I know what to name the red, blue, and lighter red ones” because again, I have The MMO Brainrot. It does feel a little like there is a bit of character to whoever you stick in the lead, even if it’s pretty shallow, and you do get fun flavor text for things like examining candles.
I dunno, there are tons of really cute moments in this game. The Cid is a cute little old man. Your characters start off getting booed off the stage when playing the piano, but after you pick up the bard job there’s a piano in the nearest town and you get everyone to do a big old dance number. The battle theme turns into a light woodwind number during the mini dungeons. The Dark Knight’s KO sprite is some empty armor which is sick as hell. It’s great.
The setting also has some pretty neat lore that is unfortunately pretty under-explored. Xande, Doga, and Unei have some weird philosophical shit going on, and I gotta admit I side with Xande there. I know it’s supposed to be some mono no aware shit and immortality sucks but it’s like getting socks for Christmas when your little siblings get a bike and some video games. Like yeah when you’re older you’re gonna love getting socks for Christmas but you’re fucking twelve now. Noah should’ve given him Speak With Animals or something instead of Mortality.
Also the idea of there being too much light that the Warriors of Darkness had to deal with? Cool as fuck. That was a great concept that only really came up at the end. I dunno, they made shit like FFIV: The After Years and Final Fantasy Origin: Stranger of Paradise, maybe they should’ve made a Final Fantasy III spinoff about the Wrath of Light or whatever. Maybe they could make the protagonist a grizzled thirty-something instead of a cute baby Onion Knight and call it something like. I don’t know. Shadow… bring—hey, wait a sec…
Haha shuriken go brrrrrr
Probably the best version of FF3, though that's admittedly not saying too much. :U
It is a nice, simple adventure. It won't blow your mind too much, and battles are... absurdly simple, but sometimes you just wanna play a comfy RPG, y'know?
That said - the dungeons are ENTIRELY too freaking long. Even ignoring how much of a slog it ends up being, it's kinda painful to use mages. Final Fantasy III uses an MP charge system, which means each "level" of magic has a certain amount of times you can use it before going to an inn or drinking an elixir - with the number of times scaling with how high your level is, natch. For the base jobs (which are the jobs you have for most of the game, mind) you get a ton of level 1 charges and... not nearly as many for the other levels. Level 1 spells can still be surprisingly useful for a surprisingly long time, but it's still kind of a pain - especially since the Pixel Remaster version of the first game added Ethers. It's mostly a pain in the ass during the midgame - the final set of jobs, while coming in way too late, have their MP distributed far more sensibly.
Otherwise it's generally pretty decent. The graphics are really good - it probably helps that Final Fantasy III doesn't have a 16-bit version to match itself against already, sure, but. The spell effects are REALLY good and I like them a lot. Music's also nice.
I think the final weird thing to me is forcing you to save on the world map still but then adding auto-saves (that're only really visible if you die, mind) and quick saves that... don't really go away, at all. like what the hell
Other than that, if you wanna waste an afternoon or two, there's far, far worse games to idly waste time with.
It is a nice, simple adventure. It won't blow your mind too much, and battles are... absurdly simple, but sometimes you just wanna play a comfy RPG, y'know?
That said - the dungeons are ENTIRELY too freaking long. Even ignoring how much of a slog it ends up being, it's kinda painful to use mages. Final Fantasy III uses an MP charge system, which means each "level" of magic has a certain amount of times you can use it before going to an inn or drinking an elixir - with the number of times scaling with how high your level is, natch. For the base jobs (which are the jobs you have for most of the game, mind) you get a ton of level 1 charges and... not nearly as many for the other levels. Level 1 spells can still be surprisingly useful for a surprisingly long time, but it's still kind of a pain - especially since the Pixel Remaster version of the first game added Ethers. It's mostly a pain in the ass during the midgame - the final set of jobs, while coming in way too late, have their MP distributed far more sensibly.
Otherwise it's generally pretty decent. The graphics are really good - it probably helps that Final Fantasy III doesn't have a 16-bit version to match itself against already, sure, but. The spell effects are REALLY good and I like them a lot. Music's also nice.
I think the final weird thing to me is forcing you to save on the world map still but then adding auto-saves (that're only really visible if you die, mind) and quick saves that... don't really go away, at all. like what the hell
Other than that, if you wanna waste an afternoon or two, there's far, far worse games to idly waste time with.
This game was the most fun of the original three for the first 90%. The job system, summons, and improved version of the FF1 storyline - as well as goofy sense of humour - allowed it to be a great improvement over the simplicity of the first game, and a breath of fresh air after the mess of the second. But then… the final dungeon absolutely eviscerated my goodwill. It’s basically 3 long (loooong) dungeons back to back, full of bosses that all feel like they came from the same hellscape that churned out FF1’s Chaos. The game went from a fun adventure to having the worst aspects of 1 and 2’s final dungeons put together and taking away any of my memories of the first 90% of the game.
Having said all that, I did genuinely enjoy most of this. It sucks that the first three so far are 3/3 for messing up at the last second and so I’m glad that I’m now onto the games that are where the series apparently starts go take off.
Having said all that, I did genuinely enjoy most of this. It sucks that the first three so far are 3/3 for messing up at the last second and so I’m glad that I’m now onto the games that are where the series apparently starts go take off.
It's crazy and a little frustrating to me that this gem remained unlocalized for this long, ignoring the heavily altered DS remake.
Final Fantasy III is an expertly guided, breezy and charming adventure that takes elements from both of its predecessors to further solidify the foundation that would characterize later games.
One very impressive feat is that despite being a relatively short experience, its scope and ambition are nothing to sneeze at. There are moments that shocked me with how boldly it expanded its world, and the themes about growing up and the hardships and uncertainty that come with the process of finding oneself are cleverly represented in the job system, requiring you to adopt different roles depending on the situation and sometimes straight up forcing you to do so.
The overworld theme, Eternal Wind, really sets the sort of melancholic and uncertain tone of the heroes' adventure, but the game isn't shy to have some fun with some goofy scenarios that would become a staple of the series in the future. The fake warriors of light specifically had me in tears with how immediately funny they were. Final Fantasy III is daunting in its scope but still whimsical and strange, and it's all the better for it.
Final Fantasy III is an expertly guided, breezy and charming adventure that takes elements from both of its predecessors to further solidify the foundation that would characterize later games.
One very impressive feat is that despite being a relatively short experience, its scope and ambition are nothing to sneeze at. There are moments that shocked me with how boldly it expanded its world, and the themes about growing up and the hardships and uncertainty that come with the process of finding oneself are cleverly represented in the job system, requiring you to adopt different roles depending on the situation and sometimes straight up forcing you to do so.
The overworld theme, Eternal Wind, really sets the sort of melancholic and uncertain tone of the heroes' adventure, but the game isn't shy to have some fun with some goofy scenarios that would become a staple of the series in the future. The fake warriors of light specifically had me in tears with how immediately funny they were. Final Fantasy III is daunting in its scope but still whimsical and strange, and it's all the better for it.
Acho que dos 3 Final Fantasy que foram lançados pro Nintendo original, esse é provavelmente o que eu menos gostei de jogar em si, mas é inegavelmente o melhor em questões de pura gameplay.
A história aqui é um downgrade do Final Fantasy II, os protagonistas voltaram a não ter personalidade e deixaram de ser personagens reais, mas em contraponto os personagens secundários são bem melhores utilizados na narrativa. E falando na história, ela é basicamente uma versão melhorada e mais desenvolvida do primeiro jogo, seguindo praticamente a mesma ideia envolvendo os cristais mas com algumas mudanças pra não ser uma cópia por inteiro.
O sistema de profissões é uma ideia muito boa mas muito mal utilizada já que tem profissões que são inúteis e outras que podem garantir a sua vitória sozinhas, mas independente disso ainda é um sistema divertido e um conceito que eu espero que seja melhor utilizado no FFV.
Em questões de gameplay, o combate é basicamente a mesma coisa que os seus antecessores, mas com o sistema de profissão agora algumas delas tem habilidades exclusivas que trazem uma variedade maior pro combate do jogo. Achei esse jogo bem menos experimental que o 2 em alguns quesitos (principalmente no sistema de level up), e aparentemente eles realmente tentaram ao máximo se divergir do segundo jogo pois tudo aqui é quase igual ao primeiro Final Fantasy mas com mudanças de qualidade de vida que melhoram e muito o combate e tornam ele bem mais polido. Gostei como aqui eles fizeram o mundo ser bem mais interessante de se explorar e com bem mais localizações diversas e coisas pra serem feitas, cada dungeon é bem diferente uma da outra e inclusive tem dungeons opcionais que você pode zerar o jogo sem nem saber da existência. Além disso as novas aeronaves cada uma com a sua própria função são uma adição muito boa pra navegação do jogo.
Em suma, gostei mais que o primeiro e menos que o segundo, é um jogo bom e sem muita coisa pra se falar. Obviamente eu não esperei muita profundidade nesses 3 primeiros jogos por terem sido feitos quando o gênero de rpg ainda estava se desenvolvendo, mas é triste ver como eles jogaram fora tudo que eles experimentaram no segundo jogo na hora de fazer esse. To ansioso pros próximos jogos já que aparentemente é do 4 pra frente que a franquia realmente começa a engatar em questões de história e desenvolvimento.
A história aqui é um downgrade do Final Fantasy II, os protagonistas voltaram a não ter personalidade e deixaram de ser personagens reais, mas em contraponto os personagens secundários são bem melhores utilizados na narrativa. E falando na história, ela é basicamente uma versão melhorada e mais desenvolvida do primeiro jogo, seguindo praticamente a mesma ideia envolvendo os cristais mas com algumas mudanças pra não ser uma cópia por inteiro.
O sistema de profissões é uma ideia muito boa mas muito mal utilizada já que tem profissões que são inúteis e outras que podem garantir a sua vitória sozinhas, mas independente disso ainda é um sistema divertido e um conceito que eu espero que seja melhor utilizado no FFV.
Em questões de gameplay, o combate é basicamente a mesma coisa que os seus antecessores, mas com o sistema de profissão agora algumas delas tem habilidades exclusivas que trazem uma variedade maior pro combate do jogo. Achei esse jogo bem menos experimental que o 2 em alguns quesitos (principalmente no sistema de level up), e aparentemente eles realmente tentaram ao máximo se divergir do segundo jogo pois tudo aqui é quase igual ao primeiro Final Fantasy mas com mudanças de qualidade de vida que melhoram e muito o combate e tornam ele bem mais polido. Gostei como aqui eles fizeram o mundo ser bem mais interessante de se explorar e com bem mais localizações diversas e coisas pra serem feitas, cada dungeon é bem diferente uma da outra e inclusive tem dungeons opcionais que você pode zerar o jogo sem nem saber da existência. Além disso as novas aeronaves cada uma com a sua própria função são uma adição muito boa pra navegação do jogo.
Em suma, gostei mais que o primeiro e menos que o segundo, é um jogo bom e sem muita coisa pra se falar. Obviamente eu não esperei muita profundidade nesses 3 primeiros jogos por terem sido feitos quando o gênero de rpg ainda estava se desenvolvendo, mas é triste ver como eles jogaram fora tudo que eles experimentaram no segundo jogo na hora de fazer esse. To ansioso pros próximos jogos já que aparentemente é do 4 pra frente que a franquia realmente começa a engatar em questões de história e desenvolvimento.
We really finaled their third fantasy bros
This was pretty good. Definitely the best out of the three original Final Fantasy games. It has a simple, but still pretty sweet story. Combat and job systems are great, and it's nowhere near as grindy as FF2. Random encounter rate is lower too, which is definitely nice. The world is way more fun compared to 1 and 2 as well, and you get a wonderful sense of adventure. Some things are still repetitive, but I would recommend it for sure.
Pros:
- A classic game with great influence on the series as a whole
- Lovingly recreated in the Pixel Remaster versions with great soundtrack and visuals (except for the font and weird screen tearing)
- A map and autosave function that will eliminate most of the frustration
- Shorter, more interesting dungeons and a managable encounter rate
- A new job system that is unique and implemented best here out of all the versions of FFIII
- Secret summons and side quests that make the world feel alive and reward players' curiosity
- An actual open world with many distinct ways of traversal
Cons:
- A convoluted, forgettable story with bland characters and easy solutions (which is a step back compared to the dramatic quality of FFII)
- Opague damage rolls and an apparently random turn order render strategic battles impossible
- An unbalanced job system that is rarely relevant to the game at large
- An incredibly high difficulty throughout the game, in particular towards the final dungeons. Be prepared to grind!
Magic Moment: When you realize how large the world map actually is. Oh, and the Fat Chocobo theme.
Verdict: The job system and manifold secrets make this one worth playing, even though this is probably the toughest and longest FF from the 8-Bit generation. Fans should take a look at this one, but one playthrough is enough.
- A classic game with great influence on the series as a whole
- Lovingly recreated in the Pixel Remaster versions with great soundtrack and visuals (except for the font and weird screen tearing)
- A map and autosave function that will eliminate most of the frustration
- Shorter, more interesting dungeons and a managable encounter rate
- A new job system that is unique and implemented best here out of all the versions of FFIII
- Secret summons and side quests that make the world feel alive and reward players' curiosity
- An actual open world with many distinct ways of traversal
Cons:
- A convoluted, forgettable story with bland characters and easy solutions (which is a step back compared to the dramatic quality of FFII)
- Opague damage rolls and an apparently random turn order render strategic battles impossible
- An unbalanced job system that is rarely relevant to the game at large
- An incredibly high difficulty throughout the game, in particular towards the final dungeons. Be prepared to grind!
Magic Moment: When you realize how large the world map actually is. Oh, and the Fat Chocobo theme.
Verdict: The job system and manifold secrets make this one worth playing, even though this is probably the toughest and longest FF from the 8-Bit generation. Fans should take a look at this one, but one playthrough is enough.
I love this game even though, some things in plot OUT OF ASS. I spoted in myself affinity to games, which do not have to be great, just gameplay/variety of classes and mechanics does the job for me. Yay! I love to spam, Baha/Fale/Holy and Ninja Auto-attack every turn xD
Mastered 100% achivs on steam - check missable guide if you don't want to lock yourself out of chest/secret items and monsters for compendium
Mastered 100% achivs on steam - check missable guide if you don't want to lock yourself out of chest/secret items and monsters for compendium
Being able to switch jobs whenever you want with no repercussions makes this the best version of FF3. If you're going to buy any of the Pixel Remasters, get this one.