This review is about FF1. I had actually started the psp version before I chose to play the gba version, but I dropped it since I found the game to be boring and overall just a slog. Nothing in the game really interested me and I was really annoyed by the encounter rate.

Still, after a while I decided to give the game another chance through a different version, and the game really grew on me. I still didnt really like the intro but after finally figuring out where I was supposed to go on the ship I got the appeal. The game is just really charming, from the varied playstyles you can get from the various party combinations, to the cool little sprites of enemies, to really just how simplistic it is in both its gameplay and its story and world, though I think what really won me over was the bonus dungeons this version introduced, or to be more precise, the bonus bosses in these dungeons.

The actual dungeons themselves were whatever. I actually did some of the bosses way earlier than I was supposed to and it was exhilerating clutching victory from them despite all the odds. Even the later bosses for when I was appropriately leveled still put up a good fight, though this lead me to realize the big problem with this version... its way too easy. The reason the bosses were challenging was because they were balanced around the changes to the stat scaling and spell use system. Aside from the beginning of the game, everything got steamrolled by my party since I didnt need to bother conserving spells or healing items since I had an abundance of mp to get me through the dungeons. Even the warmech/death machine, said to be the hardest encounter in the original versions of the game, fell to me with a couple of turns without ever posing a threat to my party.

I think I'll play the ps1 or nes versions of the game someday, to experience the challenge they offered, since while I still liked the game, it felt like it really shined when I actually needed to think about it beyond "press a to win". Either way, I'm glad it really wasn't the FINAL fantasy like the game's title says lol.

For GBA ports of Wonderswan ports of Playstation 1 remakes of NES games, this is a pretty good way to play the first two Final Fantasy games. I think it's a pretty good compromise between having the smaller-scale pixel art and assets for the world, text, and characters while also keeping the modernized features of the PS1 remakes with none of the loading times. There's also extra content that I don't remember was in the original remakes or not, but it's there! I think the pixel remasters have enough mods and options to make them the "premier" way to play the old FFs, and there is some part of me that maybe thinks I should have played the PSP remakes of these games instead of the GBA versions to get my classic FF fill, but overall I can't say what I played was a bad version of the game, or that I didn't get the "true" experience that way. And frankly, if you are the type of person that is gonna get on someones ass about playing the "true" version of a video game, why don't you go try to find the "true" way to not be a snob!

FF1 review (ngl this guy is from my pre-backloggd days where I didn't write as much aka the good ol' days, and I accidentally did log the wonderswan version instead of the GBA version but I don't give a FUCK)

FF2 Review (fun fact I mitigated most of the grinding in FF2 by grinding in the background while listening to class lectures, I do not professionally condone playing video games at school but hey I have an A in the class so shoutouts to the game boy fucking advance I guess)