- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
it's called Mystic Quest in Europe
Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Let's Play
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
OH MY GOD
IT TOOK LITERALLY ALL OF MY WILLPOWER NOT TO DRAW THE CONNECTION
AND YOU JUST MEMED IT OUT
you absolute criminal
- Location
- The Great Beyond
- Pronouns
- He/She/They
So what you're saying is that we need four teens with attitude to invade hell and put her down again?
So what you're saying is that we need four teens with attitude to invade hell and put her down again?
I mean, if it's true to the game, she'll be back herself sometime this week.
- Location
- Singapore
- Pronouns
- Singular They
Rather, Final Fantasy Adventure on the Gameboy.
Final Fantasy Legend on the Gameboy is the SaGa game.
(Which would be interesting to try after FFII, I admit.)
- Location
- East Coast
Again, the SaGa games are almost certainly Square realizing they had a brilliant innovative mind that's base setting was...
And, well you want to try and harness that, but you don't want it running your flagship series.
Last edited:
Mister Bad Guy
Mr Mercury to friends
- Location
- Bay Area
So going from zero to one and back to zero, then?
Final Fantasy II, Part 11
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The end is near.
The Jade Passage is a beautiful place, with crystal-studded walls, lush vegetation, and water-strewn rock floors. The purple crystals are a call-forward and a neat bit of environmental storytelling; Pandaemonium, as we're about to see, seems to be largely built out of purple crystal, so this is as if its influence was spreading to this place where Hell and Earth meet.
It does create a bit of an oddity compared to the NES version, though, as it's not clear why it's called the 'jade passage' when its primary features are running water and purple crystalline growths; meanwhile, on NES:
The crystals aren't there, the walls are normal rock, and it's clearly called the 'jade passage' because of its vivid green vegetation. So there was a bit of context loss in the transition to higher fidelity.
These Abyss Worms up above don't fuck around, btw. They hit for like a thousand damage a pop, which is enough to kill Leon in one hit. I spend a lot of MP casting Life on him in a futile attempt at keeping him alive and leveling up.
I finally figure out what's going on with the Malboro. My core party have high status effect resistance, so Malboro attacks only do damage. Meanwhile, when they hit Leon, he gets hit with Mini, Sleep, Silence, and Poison all at once. It's hilarious and also awful and kills Leon several times (Mini reduces his attack, Silence means he can't cast magic, Sleep means he can't take any action, and he takes over 200 damage per poison increment).
There's this cool floor that's divided by a giant waterfall. Except it can't be water, because for some reason the water causes me damage walking through it? I have no idea what that's about, but massive respect to this guy:
This Black Mage is doing the 'meditating under a waterfall' bit. I wasn't expecting an NPC there - and indeed he's not really an 'NPC,' in that he is a shopkeeper and as a result only has the default shopkeeper dialogue - but he sells the Death, Berserk, Haste, and Flare tomes. All of this makes me even more curious about him, if anything. Is he supposed to exist within the narrative of the game or just be there for gameplay purposes? If so, why one shop and why specifically one selling these specific tomes, instead of, say, an item shop to stock up on supplies?
Well, he's cool, anyway.
FFII also does something interesting. It was already there in FFI, but not nearly to the same extent in the endgame. Trapped chests were there for the first game, and trapped chests with especially powerful monsters containing especially powerful gear had already shown up. But FFII's endgame massively ramps up the extent to which it puts unique bosses (you know, the thing I've been complaining was missing for 90% of the game) in chests hiding especially powerful endgame equipment like Protect Rings (makes you immune to instant death) or Ribbons (makes you immune to most status effects) or the Genji set of armor (especially strong endgame armor of which there's only one set scattered across several chests).
This is King Behemoth, an even more powerful variant of Behemoth, guarding the Rune Axe, which I think might be the most powerful axe in the game?
This is a neat conceit, but the chests aren't in any way signaled as Special Unique Gear protected by boss monsters, they look the same as a random Hi-Potion chest. Powerful monsters protecting high-end gear will be used with much more elegance in later games, where they're signaled ahead of time or part of special sidequests.
…
Actually hold on to that thought.
Side quests.
It's striking me that Final Fantasy II doesn't have side quests. FFI had the class ascension which I believe was optional even if everybody would want to do it? But FFII straight up doesn't have any optional content whatsoever (I mean, beyond 'secret room you can miss' or not picking up some chests). Everything that happens, happens as part of the plot. It fits into this game's clear intent to be a grand epic (with a surprisingly dark tone) where everything fits into the arc of the story, but it's kind of interesting to see an RPG which is completely linear with no extra content, especially when FFI itself already had some degree of non-linearity (mainly skipping Marilith until later and deciding when to do the class upgrade). Which is interesting to put in light of how late you get the airship in this game - late enough that there is no choice what to do with it but a single clear destination, rather than the sense of freedom it incited in FFI.
Well, back to the Jade Passage.
But, as we go down into the passage, the vegetation fades away to be replaced by dark, yawning chasms:
And, at the end, we find our objective:
Daaang.
Pandaemonium isn't at all what I expected, either another iteration on the 'stone castle dungeon' like the Chaos Shrine, or some kind of nightmare spire or iron barbs and cages. In fact, it's quite beautiful - but in an eerie, otherworldly way. This is not a place built by human hands:
These guys are pretty annoying. They hit hard, have a lot of HP, and have very high physical defenses.
These Death Riders heal for as much damage as they deal, and they don't always die in one hit, so they can be dangerous in large groups.
There's something almost… uncannily organic to these crystal arches. Maybe because they're modeled after the way crystals do grow, in radial patterns, in a way that looks a little like something that's alive.
And it's not just gorgeous. It also sounds fantastic:
Listen to this. There are choirs! I wasn't expecting this even from the remasters. I know I haven't been talking much about the music in these two games - and I'm gonna be honest with you: that's because I spend the non-narrative portions of the games with the sound turned off either watching a YouTube video or listening to an audiobook. So I haven't been able to comment much on the remastered version of Nobuo Uematsu's iconic work. Also, I tend to write these LPs the day after playing through the relevant portion, which means I sometimes forget details - such as forgetting to mention that in the scene of the Lamia Queen impersonating Hilda...
View: https://youtu.be/WtjMJbzpABw?t=56
It plays Tchaikoswki's Swan Lake, of all things.
Pandaemonium is by the far the most dangerous area in the game. Many opponents deal as much as 2k damage when they hit Leon, which means he keeps being one-shot, which means he doesn't level up from the battle, which means he sucks the entire way through. Other characters have much higher Defense values and generally only take a little over 1k damage, but that's still enough to make bad things happen:
I legitimately don't remember the last time a member of the core party died. Wild.
This bit right there is where I finally resigned myself to stop using auto-battle set to Attack/Attack/Attack/Attack and actually take this dungeon seriously and strategize. Fortunately Firion is effectively invincible, hitting every turn for nearly as much damage as he takes. I didn't have any call as close as this one afterwards, but yeah, Pandaemonium doesn't fuck around.
Also, when I say 'take this dungeon seriously and strategize,' I mostly mean have Maria cast Omnitoad.
I had assumed that Toad had reduced success changes when cast on multiple targets. I had assumed wrong. Maria's spell can frogify all enemies in an encounter with trivial ease, with only Toad-immune enemies being any trouble.
Plus, it also has these aforementioned unique bosses protecting chests:
Okay, so we're bringing back Tiamat, but not just her - now that we're in Hell, we're actually throwing in some Christian demon lords! That's interesting. And these visual designs are clearly drawing on occult representations of these demons, with Astaroth as a winged humanoid and Beelzebub as fly-like.
That makes sense - these two are usually depicted as princes of hell - but it was a bit of a swerve to run into them in a JRPG. They're also both D&D characters going back to the early editions of the game, so it's possible that this is yet more D&D pilfering. It's an interesting addition either way. I suppose they, alongside Tiamat, must be high-ranking servants or generals of the Lord of Hell, guarding ancient artifacts.
Interesting that they did not take part in the attack on the world. Previously, the Emperor merely had some kind of deal with Hell and its rulers, so it made sense that they would restrict which monsters they would hand to him based on their terms, but now the Emperor has full control over Hell's armies and has unleashed them upon the world.
Hmmm.
So, remember when I theorized about the Imperial Shadow being either some splinter of the Emperor's soul, some conjured echo of it, or past Emperors bound into service? Well, now they're overworld encounters, according to the Bestiary and the wiki. I tried to find one to capture on a screenshot, but I got tired quickly. Which makes me wonder - did the Emperor take over Hell, then use his Imperial Shadows, either created by him or bound to his service, as generals to lead the world's invasion, because he couldn't trust the Princes of Hell who had once been loyal to the former ruler?
Maybe that is how far the Emperor's ego reaches: he cannot trust anyone but himself, for anything at all, and so when the need to delegate becomes inescapable in the scenario of a total world war, his solution is to make more of himself. A corps of generals, each one an echo of him, so that he need never rely on those who - like Leon, his trusted right-hand man - might hold designs of their own or loyalties separate.
Better to have Tiamat, Queen of Dragons, guard a piece of ancient armor in Pandaemonium, than risk entrusting her with a task she might have to show initiative and volition in performing.
It's a good thing the Toad strategy is working so well btw, because Pandaemonium is a maze:
All these arches don't just add depth to the visual setting, they also make it harder to figure out the best path forward from the map alone, and there are many optional chests and dead-end paths.
One of these chests has the funniest enemy in the game though:
ZOMBIE BORGHEN.
The literal joke enemy from the early game went to hell, and when the Emperor found him, said 'lmao,' and like, made him a zombie??? This is the funniest possible thing, made even funnier that despite being beefed up he is still trash who dies in two hits. This guy is just the game's punching bag and I love to see it.
This game finally has some cool, unique bosses with rad design who are protecting cool shit I want, and tragically it's all happening at the 11th hour when I have literally twenty minutes left to be using any of it. This is making me sad.
Also, as we get higher and higher up Pandemonium's floors, it becomes increasingly clear that we're not in Kansas anymore, as more and more space is taken up by a dark, starry void.
Note the contrast between the dark in the first image, which is just 'this is out-of-map' dark, and the dark in the center of the second image, which has crystalline stalactites reaching down to emphasize that this is a diegetic void.
And then.
It's time.
Holy fuck this is so hype.
This is some Final Destination shit. A translucent platform surrounded by strange crystals floating over an endless void filled with stars? A giant crystal throne on which sits the Emperor, clearly and unambiguously having taken over Hell as its lord and master? The heroes stepping forward for the final confrontation with an enemy that has transformed into something far more than human?
This is such a step up from FFI's Chaos. Who was fine! And it uses some of the same ideas! But this is so much cooler. This is a proper epic confrontation for the fate of the world. This is Final Fantasy, where going to Hell to fight the guy who kicked the Devil out of his throne and took over and it taking place on an impossible stage at the end of the universe is just what makes sense and what you expect.
This is The Aesthetic.
FFII has many flaws, but in that moment, taking a step forward to face the Emperor a second time, I forgive them. This is good. This is right.
I like that - however briefly - he gets philosophical here. It doesn't seem to relate to anything in the game's plot, but here we get a glimpse of the Emperor as someone whose worldview is partly based in a genuine existential misanthropy, a belief in the wrongness of the human condition, from which he has now absolved himself. 'The hand of man' was once his own - what false justice was rendered unto him? What forsaken love wounded him? We will never know. He will never tell us. In this moment, the Emperor has forsaken his humanity, and all he has for us are words of contempt and pride in no longer being human.
Cool design. Cool arena. Cool fight.
I spent some effort trying to give Leon the best equipment, rezzing him during battles so his HP could level, just in general trying to make sure he could bring some small contribution.
His contribution is being the Emperor's first target, taking a hit to the face, and dying instantly. I immediately give up on him.
This is actually not a total loss. This first turn gives me some genuinely valuable information: The Emperor can deal over 2k damage with his physical hits, and he heals from his attacks, meaning any attacks used before I can secure a one- or two-turn kill might be wasted. I adjust my strategy accordingly, spending several turns with Firion and Maria casting Berserk and Haste, and Guy alternating between layering Protect and casting Cure on people who get hurt by Emperor No Longer Bowie's attacks. He heals from them, but since he didn't take any damage in the first place, that's irrelevant.
We are, in a way, back to a sloppier, messier, less graceful version of the FFI Buff Dance I used against Chaos - which is in a way emblematic of FFII's combat gameplay as a whole. Even at it's best, it's still sloppy as hell.
Haste, ultimately, is what seals it. Berserk is nice and all, but Firion's base damage is garbage wielding the Blood Sword and Leon is already dead, so it only really matters for Guy, whom I need to cast healing spells. On the other hand, Haste increases the number of individual hits in Firion's attacks. And each hit drains 1/16th of the Emperor's total health.
I wasn't able to capture it on screen, but this means when Firion attacks, he hits Jareth for 9,999 damage. Then he takes another turn and gets an honorable mention for 6,000+ damage, deleting the Emperor's 15k HP and obtaining victory.
I wonder what is the fate of someone who is killed in Hell. Soul annihilation?
God, what a day this must have been for demons. Imagine: this dude you've been doing classic demon pact stuff with dies and shows up at your doorstep, kicks out your boss, takes over, declares that it's time to invade earth, and then these four teenagers show up and slaughter their way through your ultimate fortress, killing half of your highest elite troops and turning the other half into frogs, kill your generals, and murder the new Satan.
Where do you go from there? Four teenagers! Nobody's scared of you anymore! You're gonna need a rebranding. New management. Maybe they can call themselves something like 'Lord Freehugs' House of Peaceful Afterlife Resting Please Don't Hit Us."
There's a little bit to go through and my overall thoughts on the game, but since it's going to exceed the image load anyway I will post this for now and finish the rest later today.
The Jade Passage is a beautiful place, with crystal-studded walls, lush vegetation, and water-strewn rock floors. The purple crystals are a call-forward and a neat bit of environmental storytelling; Pandaemonium, as we're about to see, seems to be largely built out of purple crystal, so this is as if its influence was spreading to this place where Hell and Earth meet.
It does create a bit of an oddity compared to the NES version, though, as it's not clear why it's called the 'jade passage' when its primary features are running water and purple crystalline growths; meanwhile, on NES:
The crystals aren't there, the walls are normal rock, and it's clearly called the 'jade passage' because of its vivid green vegetation. So there was a bit of context loss in the transition to higher fidelity.
These Abyss Worms up above don't fuck around, btw. They hit for like a thousand damage a pop, which is enough to kill Leon in one hit. I spend a lot of MP casting Life on him in a futile attempt at keeping him alive and leveling up.
I finally figure out what's going on with the Malboro. My core party have high status effect resistance, so Malboro attacks only do damage. Meanwhile, when they hit Leon, he gets hit with Mini, Sleep, Silence, and Poison all at once. It's hilarious and also awful and kills Leon several times (Mini reduces his attack, Silence means he can't cast magic, Sleep means he can't take any action, and he takes over 200 damage per poison increment).
There's this cool floor that's divided by a giant waterfall. Except it can't be water, because for some reason the water causes me damage walking through it? I have no idea what that's about, but massive respect to this guy:
This Black Mage is doing the 'meditating under a waterfall' bit. I wasn't expecting an NPC there - and indeed he's not really an 'NPC,' in that he is a shopkeeper and as a result only has the default shopkeeper dialogue - but he sells the Death, Berserk, Haste, and Flare tomes. All of this makes me even more curious about him, if anything. Is he supposed to exist within the narrative of the game or just be there for gameplay purposes? If so, why one shop and why specifically one selling these specific tomes, instead of, say, an item shop to stock up on supplies?
Well, he's cool, anyway.
FFII also does something interesting. It was already there in FFI, but not nearly to the same extent in the endgame. Trapped chests were there for the first game, and trapped chests with especially powerful monsters containing especially powerful gear had already shown up. But FFII's endgame massively ramps up the extent to which it puts unique bosses (you know, the thing I've been complaining was missing for 90% of the game) in chests hiding especially powerful endgame equipment like Protect Rings (makes you immune to instant death) or Ribbons (makes you immune to most status effects) or the Genji set of armor (especially strong endgame armor of which there's only one set scattered across several chests).
This is King Behemoth, an even more powerful variant of Behemoth, guarding the Rune Axe, which I think might be the most powerful axe in the game?
This is a neat conceit, but the chests aren't in any way signaled as Special Unique Gear protected by boss monsters, they look the same as a random Hi-Potion chest. Powerful monsters protecting high-end gear will be used with much more elegance in later games, where they're signaled ahead of time or part of special sidequests.
…
Actually hold on to that thought.
Side quests.
It's striking me that Final Fantasy II doesn't have side quests. FFI had the class ascension which I believe was optional even if everybody would want to do it? But FFII straight up doesn't have any optional content whatsoever (I mean, beyond 'secret room you can miss' or not picking up some chests). Everything that happens, happens as part of the plot. It fits into this game's clear intent to be a grand epic (with a surprisingly dark tone) where everything fits into the arc of the story, but it's kind of interesting to see an RPG which is completely linear with no extra content, especially when FFI itself already had some degree of non-linearity (mainly skipping Marilith until later and deciding when to do the class upgrade). Which is interesting to put in light of how late you get the airship in this game - late enough that there is no choice what to do with it but a single clear destination, rather than the sense of freedom it incited in FFI.
Well, back to the Jade Passage.
But, as we go down into the passage, the vegetation fades away to be replaced by dark, yawning chasms:
And, at the end, we find our objective:
Daaang.
Pandaemonium isn't at all what I expected, either another iteration on the 'stone castle dungeon' like the Chaos Shrine, or some kind of nightmare spire or iron barbs and cages. In fact, it's quite beautiful - but in an eerie, otherworldly way. This is not a place built by human hands:
These guys are pretty annoying. They hit hard, have a lot of HP, and have very high physical defenses.
These Death Riders heal for as much damage as they deal, and they don't always die in one hit, so they can be dangerous in large groups.
There's something almost… uncannily organic to these crystal arches. Maybe because they're modeled after the way crystals do grow, in radial patterns, in a way that looks a little like something that's alive.
And it's not just gorgeous. It also sounds fantastic:
Listen to this. There are choirs! I wasn't expecting this even from the remasters. I know I haven't been talking much about the music in these two games - and I'm gonna be honest with you: that's because I spend the non-narrative portions of the games with the sound turned off either watching a YouTube video or listening to an audiobook. So I haven't been able to comment much on the remastered version of Nobuo Uematsu's iconic work. Also, I tend to write these LPs the day after playing through the relevant portion, which means I sometimes forget details - such as forgetting to mention that in the scene of the Lamia Queen impersonating Hilda...
View: https://youtu.be/WtjMJbzpABw?t=56
It plays Tchaikoswki's Swan Lake, of all things.
Pandaemonium is by the far the most dangerous area in the game. Many opponents deal as much as 2k damage when they hit Leon, which means he keeps being one-shot, which means he doesn't level up from the battle, which means he sucks the entire way through. Other characters have much higher Defense values and generally only take a little over 1k damage, but that's still enough to make bad things happen:
I legitimately don't remember the last time a member of the core party died. Wild.
This bit right there is where I finally resigned myself to stop using auto-battle set to Attack/Attack/Attack/Attack and actually take this dungeon seriously and strategize. Fortunately Firion is effectively invincible, hitting every turn for nearly as much damage as he takes. I didn't have any call as close as this one afterwards, but yeah, Pandaemonium doesn't fuck around.
Also, when I say 'take this dungeon seriously and strategize,' I mostly mean have Maria cast Omnitoad.
I had assumed that Toad had reduced success changes when cast on multiple targets. I had assumed wrong. Maria's spell can frogify all enemies in an encounter with trivial ease, with only Toad-immune enemies being any trouble.
Plus, it also has these aforementioned unique bosses protecting chests:
Okay, so we're bringing back Tiamat, but not just her - now that we're in Hell, we're actually throwing in some Christian demon lords! That's interesting. And these visual designs are clearly drawing on occult representations of these demons, with Astaroth as a winged humanoid and Beelzebub as fly-like.
That makes sense - these two are usually depicted as princes of hell - but it was a bit of a swerve to run into them in a JRPG. They're also both D&D characters going back to the early editions of the game, so it's possible that this is yet more D&D pilfering. It's an interesting addition either way. I suppose they, alongside Tiamat, must be high-ranking servants or generals of the Lord of Hell, guarding ancient artifacts.
Interesting that they did not take part in the attack on the world. Previously, the Emperor merely had some kind of deal with Hell and its rulers, so it made sense that they would restrict which monsters they would hand to him based on their terms, but now the Emperor has full control over Hell's armies and has unleashed them upon the world.
Hmmm.
So, remember when I theorized about the Imperial Shadow being either some splinter of the Emperor's soul, some conjured echo of it, or past Emperors bound into service? Well, now they're overworld encounters, according to the Bestiary and the wiki. I tried to find one to capture on a screenshot, but I got tired quickly. Which makes me wonder - did the Emperor take over Hell, then use his Imperial Shadows, either created by him or bound to his service, as generals to lead the world's invasion, because he couldn't trust the Princes of Hell who had once been loyal to the former ruler?
Maybe that is how far the Emperor's ego reaches: he cannot trust anyone but himself, for anything at all, and so when the need to delegate becomes inescapable in the scenario of a total world war, his solution is to make more of himself. A corps of generals, each one an echo of him, so that he need never rely on those who - like Leon, his trusted right-hand man - might hold designs of their own or loyalties separate.
Better to have Tiamat, Queen of Dragons, guard a piece of ancient armor in Pandaemonium, than risk entrusting her with a task she might have to show initiative and volition in performing.
It's a good thing the Toad strategy is working so well btw, because Pandaemonium is a maze:
All these arches don't just add depth to the visual setting, they also make it harder to figure out the best path forward from the map alone, and there are many optional chests and dead-end paths.
One of these chests has the funniest enemy in the game though:
ZOMBIE BORGHEN.
The literal joke enemy from the early game went to hell, and when the Emperor found him, said 'lmao,' and like, made him a zombie??? This is the funniest possible thing, made even funnier that despite being beefed up he is still trash who dies in two hits. This guy is just the game's punching bag and I love to see it.
This game finally has some cool, unique bosses with rad design who are protecting cool shit I want, and tragically it's all happening at the 11th hour when I have literally twenty minutes left to be using any of it. This is making me sad.
Also, as we get higher and higher up Pandemonium's floors, it becomes increasingly clear that we're not in Kansas anymore, as more and more space is taken up by a dark, starry void.
Note the contrast between the dark in the first image, which is just 'this is out-of-map' dark, and the dark in the center of the second image, which has crystalline stalactites reaching down to emphasize that this is a diegetic void.
And then.
It's time.
Holy fuck this is so hype.
This is some Final Destination shit. A translucent platform surrounded by strange crystals floating over an endless void filled with stars? A giant crystal throne on which sits the Emperor, clearly and unambiguously having taken over Hell as its lord and master? The heroes stepping forward for the final confrontation with an enemy that has transformed into something far more than human?
This is such a step up from FFI's Chaos. Who was fine! And it uses some of the same ideas! But this is so much cooler. This is a proper epic confrontation for the fate of the world. This is Final Fantasy, where going to Hell to fight the guy who kicked the Devil out of his throne and took over and it taking place on an impossible stage at the end of the universe is just what makes sense and what you expect.
This is The Aesthetic.
FFII has many flaws, but in that moment, taking a step forward to face the Emperor a second time, I forgive them. This is good. This is right.
I like that - however briefly - he gets philosophical here. It doesn't seem to relate to anything in the game's plot, but here we get a glimpse of the Emperor as someone whose worldview is partly based in a genuine existential misanthropy, a belief in the wrongness of the human condition, from which he has now absolved himself. 'The hand of man' was once his own - what false justice was rendered unto him? What forsaken love wounded him? We will never know. He will never tell us. In this moment, the Emperor has forsaken his humanity, and all he has for us are words of contempt and pride in no longer being human.
Cool design. Cool arena. Cool fight.
I spent some effort trying to give Leon the best equipment, rezzing him during battles so his HP could level, just in general trying to make sure he could bring some small contribution.
His contribution is being the Emperor's first target, taking a hit to the face, and dying instantly. I immediately give up on him.
This is actually not a total loss. This first turn gives me some genuinely valuable information: The Emperor can deal over 2k damage with his physical hits, and he heals from his attacks, meaning any attacks used before I can secure a one- or two-turn kill might be wasted. I adjust my strategy accordingly, spending several turns with Firion and Maria casting Berserk and Haste, and Guy alternating between layering Protect and casting Cure on people who get hurt by Emperor No Longer Bowie's attacks. He heals from them, but since he didn't take any damage in the first place, that's irrelevant.
We are, in a way, back to a sloppier, messier, less graceful version of the FFI Buff Dance I used against Chaos - which is in a way emblematic of FFII's combat gameplay as a whole. Even at it's best, it's still sloppy as hell.
Haste, ultimately, is what seals it. Berserk is nice and all, but Firion's base damage is garbage wielding the Blood Sword and Leon is already dead, so it only really matters for Guy, whom I need to cast healing spells. On the other hand, Haste increases the number of individual hits in Firion's attacks. And each hit drains 1/16th of the Emperor's total health.
I wasn't able to capture it on screen, but this means when Firion attacks, he hits Jareth for 9,999 damage. Then he takes another turn and gets an honorable mention for 6,000+ damage, deleting the Emperor's 15k HP and obtaining victory.
I wonder what is the fate of someone who is killed in Hell. Soul annihilation?
God, what a day this must have been for demons. Imagine: this dude you've been doing classic demon pact stuff with dies and shows up at your doorstep, kicks out your boss, takes over, declares that it's time to invade earth, and then these four teenagers show up and slaughter their way through your ultimate fortress, killing half of your highest elite troops and turning the other half into frogs, kill your generals, and murder the new Satan.
Where do you go from there? Four teenagers! Nobody's scared of you anymore! You're gonna need a rebranding. New management. Maybe they can call themselves something like 'Lord Freehugs' House of Peaceful Afterlife Resting Please Don't Hit Us."
There's a little bit to go through and my overall thoughts on the game, but since it's going to exceed the image load anyway I will post this for now and finish the rest later today.
Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
As you might expect, those unique sealed chest monsters are the ones that show up in games that do cameo boss dungeons covering the first six games, like IV: The After Years, which otherwise choose iconic bosses (e.g., the Four Fiends). They specifically used King Behemoth, Astaroth, Iron Giant, and Beelzebub for the II bosses.
Iron Giant being the exception, he's a rare random encounter rather than a chest monster.
Iron Giant being the exception, he's a rare random encounter rather than a chest monster.
Mister Bad Guy
Mr Mercury to friends
- Location
- Bay Area
The Emperor in the Pixel Remaster suffers a bit from the designers seemingly not interpreting his sprite right. Like, it's incredibly accurate to the original sprite; the issue is that in the original game, the sprite looked like this in battle.
Cool design. Cool arena. Cool fight.
It's clearly meant to be a case where the Emperor is some kind of huge entity and the rest of his body is veiled in shadow--taking advantage of the fact that the background of the fight is black. However, the game decides to use a background originally designed for the remakes, where the Emperor looked like this:
So instead you end up with a case where the Emperor is just... a floating upper torso.
- Location
- Spain
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I see, that makes sense. Amano's concept art makes it clear he's supposed to be a giant figure drapped in a cape:The Emperor in the Pixel Remaster suffers a bit from the designers seemingly not interpreting his sprite right. Like, it's incredibly accurate to the original sprite; the issue is that in the original game, the sprite looked like this in battle.
It's clearly meant to be a case where the Emperor is some kind of huge entity and the rest of his body is veiled in shadow--taking advantage of the fact that the background of the fight is black. However, the game decides to use a background originally designed for the remakes, where the Emperor looked like this:
So instead you end up with a case where the Emperor is just... a floating upper torso.
Granted, it's not as if 'floating torso' isn't a design that shows up sometimes in anime:
cB557
voOOP
While it's admittedly a bit incongruous with some of the party's physical feats at this point, I think you're taking damage because you're getting hit by a waterfall.
...And that's how I found out that the queen is dead.
Great job, 10/10.
Honestly, I think stuff like that may be the best part of those early games? The plot of FFI was pretty underdeveloped, and the plot of FFII, while competently executed, is pretty rote. But then occasionally the games would throw in some stuff like this mage or emperor's shadow or the nuclear warmachine that isn't at all explained or even remarked upon but invites speculation.
Certainly, your musings on those matters are my favorite part of this thread.
*Three teenagers show up and slaughter their way through your ultimate fortress. And also Leon is there.
I'm just going to assume that he still bears his mortal wound in hell (and that Firion really went on him).
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
at this point in the narrative we are on our way to murder hell
Soooo, you're saying there should have been more environmental hazards to reflect the hellish clime?
Huh, I thought they were going for a dante-esque devil frozen in ice kinda look. Just coincidental then?The Emperor in the Pixel Remaster suffers a bit from the designers seemingly not interpreting his sprite right. Like, it's incredibly accurate to the original sprite; the issue is that in the original game, the sprite looked like this in battle.
It's clearly meant to be a case where the Emperor is some kind of huge entity and the rest of his body is veiled in shadow--taking advantage of the fact that the background of the fight is black. However, the game decides to use a background originally designed for the remakes, where the Emperor looked like this:
So instead you end up with a case where the Emperor is just... a floating upper torso.
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Oh my god.
Turning on the Bullshit Generator and extrapolating lore and worldbuilding based on things that were almost definitely not given that much thought and put there for gameplay purposes is my favorite part of this.
I'm not sure what I'm gonna go when the rope runs out on that one. Like - I seriously doubt I'm gonna be bringing any great insight on Final Fantasy VII, one of the most famous, widely-analyzed, and sequel-spinoff-prequel heavy games of all time. What am I gonna have to say?
Problems for later though. The NES generation is ripe for it.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_uXUXQFypc
deadcrystal
Slaaneshi Cultist
- Location
- The Warp
Hey, when you enter the games with real plot and characters that just means instead of extrapolating from nothing, you can instead extrapolate from the stuff that was clearly intended to be something, but was either never finished or got cut. I remember a lot of stuff in FF8 that fits into that. Or the stuff they put in without thinking about the implications of.
Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Of which there is a lot in VII, considering it was NOT made with the spinoffs in mind and a lot of characterization/character related plot developmemts in them was based more in fan perception than in the text of the original. Taking the (poorly translated!) original as standalone ignoring that which comes after and you can interpret in some pretty different directions.
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
100% agree to this, the more impromptu speculation we get, the better.
I'm really looking forward to what comments will be inspired by FFIII, because it's (in my opinion) fairly solidly the best of the NES triad and, as I mentioned in the past, the DS remake changed a lot of stuff, so there's actually something to compare with when it comes to what sort of weird speculation the game inspires in a fresh player vs what sort of speculation it inspired in Squarenix execs when they tried to expand on it.
It's not just that you can take it in very different directions, it's that a lot of stuff was straight up retconned, to hell and back (just like the palamecian Emperor), for a very large number of reasons. But I think that discussion can wait until FFVII comes around; it's likely to keep the thread more friendly that way, in my opinion.
I'm sad we didn't get a comment on the only other creature (outside of the three chest guardians and the final Emperor) which doesn't get a palette swap version of itself in the game - namely, the Iron Giant. It'll become a series regular after this (the biggest contribution FFII gave to future titles was certainly the bestiary, since far more of the traditional recurring enemies appeared first here instead of FFI), but I think it's nice that FFI and FFII both have a rare, unique encounter in the last dungeon (even if Iron Giant isn't on the same level as Warmech, not even close), that doesn't otherwise shows up anywhere else in the game; it's a tradition that should have been brought forward, but wasn't all that much.
- Location
- Alberta
The FF2 endgame experience summed up in one sentence right there.
This idea just reminds me of what Darths and Droids did with Jango Fett. Though obviously that's a much less serious story.
Poor Leon. Wakes up one day planning to join the rebel army, ends up joining the guys they're trying to kill, has his plan to become the Emperor's successor after his death foiled by the dead Emperor himself, joins the good guys to get revenge, and ends up being beaten up by the Emperor again.
Well that's a boring way to write the Emperor's death cry.
(For the record, in the Japanese it's something along the lines of "UBOAAAAAA!" It's unique enough that it became something of a phenomenon in Japan.)
Final Fantasy II, Final
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It's over. The Emperor is dead. And, unlike in FFI, we don't immediately flash to an ending screen with a text scroll telling us what happens next! We have an actual epilogue!
It's structured pretty simply, but in a way that plays to the game's strengths. We're back in the Fynn throne room, and each member of the supporting cast takes turns reflecting on the events, thanking the heroes, and leaving.
So, Hilda and Gordon say that they will be working together to rebuild a unified kingdom from the ashes of the war:
Paul complains that we left him out of a job:
Leila hits on Firion/offers him a job before leaving to probably do a lot of crime:
Nelly, Josef's daughter, acts as a stand-in for her deceased father:
I can't believe this narrative endorses subservient power hierarchies rooted in bloodlines. This place needs some good old revolutionary spirit is what it does.
Josef's ghost briefly flickers behind Nelly, as if to thank us for our work.
Then there is this weird bit where Hilda, Nelly and Gordon are like "kthxbye" and just leave us alone in the throne room:
Which is mostly just a convenient device to have the group of four alone so the happy ending can be complicated with a bittersweet last note, which is only appropriate to the darker tone of the overall story:
I mean, that's fair.
Leon made himself the willing agent of a genocidal empire, the red helmsman of war at the command of its dreadnought. Whole cities have burned at his command. But also, he helped save the world (well, on paper). Can there be redemption for Leon? I think it's fair for this story to decide that this is outside the scope of its narrative. Perhaps nobody will put him on trial for his crimes, but it is up in the air whether he will be forgiven. And this wound is too much for him to stay with his friends (and his sister).
And then, there's this bit that's genuinely touching:
The ghosts of the four departed friends appear for a moment, without a word, as if to tell us that they have found peace and thank us for our deeds, and our three heroes head out into the world. What adventures await them? Who knows. The future is open-ended.
That's all, folks.
Conclusion
So that was Final Fantasy II.
That was certainly an interesting experience.
Final Fantasy II is wildly ambitious beyond its grasp, and that makes it both interesting and frustrating in equal measure. It's trying to portray a war epic, an apocalyptic story spanning two dimensions, an entire planet, and the fall and rise of nations. It's trying to do so with an extremely limited toolbox, if one far less limited than FFI's. Its combat system was a genuinely bold attempt at making completely customizable characters you could shape into whatever you wanted them to be, and in the end it all renders down to auto-attacking every fight because everything is a huge bother to train properly. It's a game that undermines itself at every turn even as it develops bold new franchise-defining ideas. Here we have the first appearance of Ultima, the ultimate destructive magic, which obtaining requires an entire plotline and the death of a major character. You're not gonna be using it because it starts at lv 1 and takes hours to grind to the same damage as your fists.
FFII is a game that isn't afraid to innovate, and a case study in how part and parcel of the innovation process is that sometimes, you get it wrong. Its ultimate failing, its greatest flaw, is that it is simply not fun to play. At the same time, I'm glad I played it; it genuinely feels like gaming history in the making, so many staples of the franchise appearing for the first time here, recurring names and plot devices. It's as if FFI was a blank canvas, and FFII the first layer of paint. And it activates my neurons. It makes me want to see what's there, in the finished painting - not just of the series, but in the negative space of FFII itself. What is a version of this game with a fully-realized world, characters and antagonists? What is it like to live in Palamecia, to be the Emperor, to be part of the rebellion? What does Kashuan look like, beyond the deserted tower that is the only thing we see of it?
I don't have answers to these questions - they don't exist, that I know of - but they intrigue me.
I want more Final Fantasy.
It's structured pretty simply, but in a way that plays to the game's strengths. We're back in the Fynn throne room, and each member of the supporting cast takes turns reflecting on the events, thanking the heroes, and leaving.
So, Hilda and Gordon say that they will be working together to rebuild a unified kingdom from the ashes of the war:
Paul complains that we left him out of a job:
Leila hits on Firion/offers him a job before leaving to probably do a lot of crime:
Nelly, Josef's daughter, acts as a stand-in for her deceased father:
I can't believe this narrative endorses subservient power hierarchies rooted in bloodlines. This place needs some good old revolutionary spirit is what it does.
Josef's ghost briefly flickers behind Nelly, as if to thank us for our work.
Then there is this weird bit where Hilda, Nelly and Gordon are like "kthxbye" and just leave us alone in the throne room:
Which is mostly just a convenient device to have the group of four alone so the happy ending can be complicated with a bittersweet last note, which is only appropriate to the darker tone of the overall story:
I mean, that's fair.
Leon made himself the willing agent of a genocidal empire, the red helmsman of war at the command of its dreadnought. Whole cities have burned at his command. But also, he helped save the world (well, on paper). Can there be redemption for Leon? I think it's fair for this story to decide that this is outside the scope of its narrative. Perhaps nobody will put him on trial for his crimes, but it is up in the air whether he will be forgiven. And this wound is too much for him to stay with his friends (and his sister).
And then, there's this bit that's genuinely touching:
The ghosts of the four departed friends appear for a moment, without a word, as if to tell us that they have found peace and thank us for our deeds, and our three heroes head out into the world. What adventures await them? Who knows. The future is open-ended.
That's all, folks.
Conclusion
So that was Final Fantasy II.
That was certainly an interesting experience.
Final Fantasy II is wildly ambitious beyond its grasp, and that makes it both interesting and frustrating in equal measure. It's trying to portray a war epic, an apocalyptic story spanning two dimensions, an entire planet, and the fall and rise of nations. It's trying to do so with an extremely limited toolbox, if one far less limited than FFI's. Its combat system was a genuinely bold attempt at making completely customizable characters you could shape into whatever you wanted them to be, and in the end it all renders down to auto-attacking every fight because everything is a huge bother to train properly. It's a game that undermines itself at every turn even as it develops bold new franchise-defining ideas. Here we have the first appearance of Ultima, the ultimate destructive magic, which obtaining requires an entire plotline and the death of a major character. You're not gonna be using it because it starts at lv 1 and takes hours to grind to the same damage as your fists.
FFII is a game that isn't afraid to innovate, and a case study in how part and parcel of the innovation process is that sometimes, you get it wrong. Its ultimate failing, its greatest flaw, is that it is simply not fun to play. At the same time, I'm glad I played it; it genuinely feels like gaming history in the making, so many staples of the franchise appearing for the first time here, recurring names and plot devices. It's as if FFI was a blank canvas, and FFII the first layer of paint. And it activates my neurons. It makes me want to see what's there, in the finished painting - not just of the series, but in the negative space of FFII itself. What is a version of this game with a fully-realized world, characters and antagonists? What is it like to live in Palamecia, to be the Emperor, to be part of the rebellion? What does Kashuan look like, beyond the deserted tower that is the only thing we see of it?
I don't have answers to these questions - they don't exist, that I know of - but they intrigue me.
I want more Final Fantasy.
- Location
- Great Khanate of Scotland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
"And believe me, I've pegged a lot of blokes."