The Light Heroes

I have decided to play through every main series Final Fantasy game.During the week, I play. On Fridays, I’ll write about my adventures.

Current Game: Final Fantasy (PS – FF Origins)

Well, here we go. The very long adventure begins with this, the first session with the game that started it all, Final Fantasy. This is actually my third play through of this game. I first played the original NES game many years ago. I remember it being a rather difficult but satisfying experience, albeit not one that I wanted to relive any time soon. It was brilliant, but also very rough around the edges.

Then, a few years ago, I played the GBA port. I really enjoyed that and I’d say it actually rekindled my love for the series. In fact, it was that play through that first made me think of doing this series play through.

Now, for my third outing, I’ve decided to play the PlayStation version released as part of Final Fantasy Origins. I don’t remember many technical details about the NES version, but so far I do notice a few differences from the GBA title. Some minor (I would say better) dialogue changes exist in this PS version. It also seems to be a lot more demanding in terms of enemy strength and item prices. Plus, the PS version opens with a great for its time but still kind of pointless opening cinema. I guess everyone probably thought it was amazing back then.

But enough of that for now. On to the adventure. One thing that always did, and still does bother me about this first game is that the protagonists are generic. You choose their class and you name them. They have no back story, no personality, and no tangible investment in the world other than it probably wouldn’t be cool to live some place evil reigns. All we’re told is that a prophecy foretold their coming. They show up with crystal shards clutched in their hands but fairly early on the game indicates that they know nothing of the mystery surrounding them.

So, what…did they just feel compelled to swing into action? I suppose it doesn’t matter. They are here and just when prophecy said they would be. My heroes are Warrior, Monk, Red Mage, and White Mage. The first stop is Corneria where a king’s daughter has gone missing. If the heroes rescue her from the traitor Garland, the king will believe they are truly the Light Warriors and restore the bridge to the north.

So we take a quick trip to some ruins where the evil Garland thinks he has taken over Corneria (and I’m guessing the world). Not sure about the logic there, but I suppose I can go with it. Garland is a total pushover of course and upon the turn of his daughter, the king holds to his end of the bargain. The bridge, which apparently leads to the rest of the known world, is fixed and our heroes come to the real beginning of their journey.

The long journey of the Light Heroes commences. Wait…where’s the bridge?

First stop, thanks to a tip from a dancer in Corneria is the cave of the witch Matoya. But she’s blind and keeps prattling on about some crystal eye so she’s no help. Fortunately she’s got some dancing brooms on loan from Mickey Mouse and they let me in on a little secret about how to pull up the map.

Anyway, I’m next led to the town of Provoka where some dirty rotten pirates have taken over the town by standing in one small corner in front of a building that has no entrances anyway. Pretty intimidating stuff, but somehow I managed to convince him (by beating up his entire crew) that he should totally knock it off with the whole standing/harassing thing, and he just straight up gives me his ship. Awesome, now my Heroes can take to the seas and fend off marine life that seems to have no problem jumping on deck and instigating lengthy battles as though being in water is just something they do while waiting for Shark Week to start.

Anyway, Dancing Girl mentioned something about a cursed Elven prince to the south, so it’s in the boat and south to the city of…Elfland? (Sigh.) Well, first of all, there are tons of things to buy in this town. It has good equipment and good 3 and 4 level spells. Everything is also ridiculously expensive. Plus, there’s a lot to consider when buying magic. After playing future titles in this series, it’s hard getting used to the magic system here. There are four possible spells in each magic level, but one character can only learn three of them. And magic points are weird with each spell only costing one, but each spell caster only getting a few points which are distributed across the different spell levels. It…makes no sense really. In any case, I don’t have enough money to buy even one, so I’m going to have to go hunting.

Before I do that I make a quick run up to the Elven castle. Turns out the prince has been napping for five years since some madman stormed the castle and cursed him. You’d think it would have been easier to just kill him, but I guess if the villagers still couldn’t figure anything out after five years his plan wasn’t too terrible.

And this is pretty much where I left off for the week. I know I want to get those spells from Elfland so I’m going to have to beat up some of the wildlife. Also, one of the elves mentioned that a witch named Matoya could brew potions, so if I remember correctly, she’s the one who helps me wake up the prince. But I still need to find her crystal eye. Another elf mentioned something about dwarves to the west, so I guess I’ll be checking them out too. Next week.