Any Final Fantasy fans here?

[NEOBuckeye]

Just curious. I'm working on Final Fantasy X right now. I've had it for two years, but just haven't had the freedom until now to sit down and play it all the way through to the end. I love RPGs with deep, intricate storylines, but they aren't so easy to just pick up and put down at will, you know?

[TroubleMan]

1. Yep, FFIII (VI) is one of my all time faves.

For some reason I hated FFVII. It was my least favorite out of all of them, but a whole bunch of FF fans will say it's their favorite.

I just hated Cloud in that one....however, I will admit it was a important game.

[NuttyFluffers]

3. Same here, FF6 is a fave here.

Used to love FF games, used to love square games. but now i find their games poor overblown hollow-shells of their previous glory. same with enix. and don't get me started on square-enix games... :puke: there is a god and he personally hates me...

wonder if anyone here played FF Tactics or FF Mystic Quest or some of the other more obscure FF games.

[Chovexani]

5. Tactics is obscure?

Um, yeah okay. Maybe we don't hang out in the same circles (and we probably don't...I'm one of the rare longtime fans from the NES games that loves every single entry in the series, even the red-headed stepchild with the broken level system called FF2).

Mystic Quest was one of the many reasons we didn't get FF5 until a few years ago. It's as much an FF game as the Gameboy ones (most of which were just re-named SaGa games to begin with).

[NuttyFluffers]

6. you'd be surprised the number of people who do not know.

sure you'll find rabid fans in tighter circles, but the broad range of gamers? they can all place ff7, but if you say FFT they'll look at you with confusion. it's rare to find strategy game lovers, believe you me. worked too long in game stores and hung around oodles of websites and arcades -- we are a rare gamer indeed. give me a good strat over fragging anyday.

in fact the amount of people i've come across who've heard of FFT, played it, and found that game too hard is astonishing. i have no idea why...? there's just a lot of people who don't like these type of games i guess. :shrug:

love mystic quest, such a delightful kiddy romp of an RPG. and some of the music on there was great. but then i love the occasional kiddy romp game. gotta love it for what it is, a well made children's RPG.

[Chovexani]

7. Weird.

I guess hanging out with nothing but hardcore nerds colors your experience. I was actually the last person in my circle to find out about FFT, and I first saw it in a promo video I got from Square. Luckily I got it right away before those poor bastards had to pay upwards of $100 for it on eBay (Greatest Hits kick ass, btw).

FWIW, I think the only thing hard about Tactics is trying to cut through all the Daravonese and understand the plot. :P I've played it about six times and I still don't really understand it beyond, Ramza's the dumbest guy in his family, Delita's a bastard, and the Church is Evil (which would become a recurring theme for Square, hehe). It's convoluted as hell, but so much fun. Well those chocobos you run into in random battles can be a bitch when your characters are all lvl 99...those meteors can flatten your little guys. Especially when you're a masochistic fangirl like me that likes to train Cloud up from level 1 for no other reason than pure love for the character.

I'm sorry, Mystic Quest was just fucking weak IMO. The music was terrible, the plot was non-existent and the characters were throwaways. That might be fine if you like to play video games with your brain turned off, but when I want to play video games with my brain turned off I go play racing and shooting games, not RPGs. It felt like a throwback to the multitudes of godawful shovelware adventure games on the PC only with less of a point. To add insult to injury it was released at what was probably the worst possible time. Despite the terrible translation, the censorship and the dumbing down of the game (Easy Type, anyone?), FF2US moved a crazy number of units for Square in the states. A mere fraction of what FF7 would eventually pull down years later, but it was still respectable and I know quite a few people who became Square fans due to that game (lots of people missed out on the original FF due to its weird release timing). They had a really great chance to increase their fanbase, people were clamoring at the bit for the next FF and they just totally blew it with Mystic Quest. The messed up thing is, they didn't even learn from this mistake...they did it again when Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 2) came out, another critically acclaimed game that was well-recieved by the fans. For god knows what reason, some genius decided to let Square USA develop Secret of Evermore instead of porting Seiken Densetsu 3, one of the best SNES games ever made.

Mystic Quest, much like Resident Evil: Code Veronica X, would have been just another in a long line of mediocre shovelware games for a popular console were it not for the high-profile brand name attached to it. And this is coming from a devout fan of the series. It feels like any number of bad SNES FF clones I've had the misfortune of playing over the years("Oh, you like Final Fantasy, you'll just love this game."). Just that it's made by Square, which makes it kinda sad.

[NuttyFluffers]

8. got my FFT for free, fun story to that...

someone wanted to sell it back to the store i worked for, heard the price, didn't like it and then just jammed out of the store. we tried to run after him and give his game back but he was gone. since the store didn't buy it, it was technically lost and found. we waited a few weeks i think and he never returned. after that i claimed it and it was mine. :D ended up buying a playstation just for that game, didn't have one before (big saturn fan). it was a decent game, terribly easy though. and the plot was laughably contorted to give the illusion of complexity. but meh, the fighting and class system was a pleasant diversion. i played this game, too, with my brain off, just like FFMQ.

too bad you didn't like the kiddie-game quality of FFMQ. yes, the american market was poorly dismissed in its appreciation of RPGs at that time, but that was to be expected. a lot of the japanese headquarters had little understanding of the american markets. sometimes i still think they have this problem. the music though is where i disagree, i find several scenes where the music was most remarkable and well crafted. no overly-elaborate, mock-classical, epic shlock. just some crisp thematic BGs in several 'dungeon zones.' yes, some of it was crap music in the cities, but cities often have crap music, comes with the territory.

you are the second person i met who finds Seiken Densetsu 3 to be one of the best, if not the best SNES game made. i will have to play it all the way through, then. what little i played of it didn't interest me. i was waaaay over Secret of Mana by the time i played it, no childhood illusions of fun on that game. Secret of Mana was fantastic fun for the first ... 2 maybe 3 summons you get. then it was a tedious bore to me, and even worse with friends. trying to play SD3 left me in a similar state rather fast, just wasn't into going through the same at the time. i felt no 'call' to play it, still don't really. i might give it another chance, but later though, when i have more time.

[Chovexani]

24. There is a fan-translated ROM of SD3 floating around

You REALLY owe it to yourself to play it. I think it's better than Secret of Mana, and it's one of the few games of that era that still holds up well after all these years.

[7th_Sephiroth]

9. the biggest problem with tactics is its level system

and upgrading weapons and armor (that and the battles last 30 min. so leveling up takes forever)

[NEOBuckeye]

14. You're talking about strategy; That's what makes it so fun!

Your enemies levels and abilities actually mirror those of your strongest character, so you can't just level up and expect to walk into battle like omnipotent gods every time, as in most traditional RPGs. It's better that way, because it actually challenges you to think about how you are going to fight an enemy by anticipating its' moves, and your own.

I liken games like FFT and Ogre Battle to a alternate style of Chess. Yes, they are time consuming. But think of their battles as good mental exercise.

[NuttyFluffers]

17. the biggest problem with FFT is how easily it is broken

true it mirrors your strongest character, so mindless leveling doesn't work like most RPGs. but it isn't a very well made 'AI difficulty' concept. it's cheesy difficulty, lazy programming, no real AI increase. besides being able to run down that jobs list faster than lightning (once you know what you are doing - not hard), there's those 'traps' that lower your level granting you a serious game-breaking loophole exposing the near-nonexistent AI (god, can my guest characters *have* a worse AI? i don't think so). also several of the jobs and their intermixing wasn't all that thought out (though that's to be expected -- too much was added to the customization. and there's not enough playtesting in the world to manage that while on schedule).

about walking into battle as an omnipotent god each time... you mean you can't do that? ;) depends on how you tweak. a sad thing because it kind of throws tactics out the window and becomes a min/max-a-thon. after plenty of D&D experience this was a simple exercise on how to break a game. and even without heavy tweaking you should be able to walk into any battle and own the situation if you've moderately kept up with the jobs and have had any serious strategy experience before.

though the artificial challenges are fun (try to play the game as all of one job type using just their skills -- with minor exceptions). that's an amusing diversion. also i must say the art design for the characters has been quite beautiful.

[7th_Sephiroth]

18. the availablilty of the items

compounded with the ability to loose members (and summoners will do that quickly) and having to retrain ppl when ramza is at level 30 and the others are at level 1 sucks

[NEOBuckeye]

13. Mystic Quest was intended to be "Final Fantasy on Training Wheels"

I think it actually had much more to do with the Japanese attitude towards American gamers at that point in time than any defined strategy aimed at winning us over, which also explains Final Fantasy II(IV) -- "Easy Type" because we apparently couldn't handle the real thing. I remember feeling insulted when I first read in one of the gaming mags that Square later released our version of FFIV in Japan as a "dummied down" version. Not that I couldn't have beat it with my eyes closed or anything. :eyes: Even the manual for FFIV de-emphasised fighting and wandering off path from the main story, much the way Mystic Quest later did.

We missed out on Final Fantasy V, the Romancing SaGa games, Secret of Mana 3 and Bahamut's Lagoon for much the same type of reasoning.

[Chovexani]

26. Have you ever played Bahamut Lagoon?

Aside from the obvious recycling of sprites from FF6, it is a very entertaining little game, and it's a shame it was never translated. It sort of reminds me of a more complex, proto-Pokemon.

There's a fan-translated ROM floating around out there.

[NEOBuckeye]

27. I haven't touched it yet.

I've been sitting on the rom and translation since it was released, but never got around to playing it, mostly because of school and other projects. I'm only just now finding the time to catch up on all that I've missed.

[NEOBuckeye]

12. They're not all bad, really if you look at each game as an "FF" of its own

Though I can understand how some of the older Final Fantasy fans might feel "betrayed" by Square with some of the more recent games that have gone off in a completely different direction from the NES and SNES FFs., I don't get why anyone would be upset with Enix over Dragon Quest. That's one series that has remained true to its roots in the face of evolving technology, almost to the point of ludicrosity. (See Dragon Quest VII). But even Enix has finally decided to change with the times in DQVIII by using large, cell-shaded graphics that actually resemble Akira Toriyama's work. I wouldn't call that an overblown hollow-shell of previous glory by any stretch of my imagination! :-)

[NuttyFluffers]

16. :) enix has always been more to me than Dragon's Quest

And i was never much of a fan of Akira Toriyama's work. I also don't like Dragon Ball. Yes, i'm the gamer equivalent of a heretic. Meh, don't care about gamerdom's orthodoxy though.

Enix used to have more creativity in game creation/publication and particularly solid plots and character dialogue in my past. The square-enix products i've come across are embarassing to their legacy, in my opinion. Maybe things will get better, but the trends don't read that way to me.

[NEOBuckeye]

11. I always felt that FFVII was rushed.

Particularly around the middle of Disc 2, after you pick up the Highwind. The story just seems to deteriorate from there. I know most RPGs usually become a lot less linear once you pick up the airship/flying machine, but when you get back to the story, it's usually just as strong as before. FFVII, however, never really got back on track, IMHO. I'll even go as far as to say that the story died when Aerith did. And what exactly was the point of Disk 3?

I no longer remember the source, but supposedly Sony, who had selected FFVII as the make-or-break game for the PSX and put together the multi-million-dollar ad campaign behind it, pressured Square to wrap up production earlier than they had planned. Not that it actually made a great deal of difference for the millions of people around the world who were easily drawn in by all the CG movie eye candy.

After reading all of the above, you might think that I don't particularly care much for FFVII. Actually I do, especially looking back now since I appreciate its' role in mainstreaming the RPG genre. Though it was, in my eyes, an imperfect work, FFVII's massive success around the world is the reason why we have so many RPGs available outside of Japan now.

If you were into RPGs before Final Fantasy VII and the "flood" that came afterwards, then you know what it was like waiting for companies like Square and Enix to release these kinds of games. It was a lot like watching water dripping s-l-o-w-l-y out of a faucet. The American public missed out on a TON of games -- including many of the early FFs -- that are now in re-development, or have only recently been released on GameBoy and the PlayStation. Final Fantasy III, for instance (the actual "III" not FFVI with Terra and Kefka), was probably the best NES/Famicom RPG ever that never made it to the U.S.

But back to FFVII, maybe Square will tie up some of the story's loose ends now in the new "Advent Children" movie and some of the other sequels to FFVII that have long been overdue? I'm happy to see that they have finally given in to the demands of the fans. :) It definitely makes sense to create more games using existing characters and storylines that have shown enduring popularity.

Anyone think maybe we'll see some sort of sequel to Final Fantasy VI as well?

[Chovexani]

36. FF7 was very rushed.

For instance, there were supposed to be multiple endings depending on whether or not you recruited Yuffie, Vincent or both. There was some kind of capacity issue involved that probably could have been worked out had Square had more time for development. IIRC the entire game is on each of the three CDs, which is why you can do that weird trick where if you pop in another disc during an FMV a different one will play. It's a damn shame that Sony rushed them so badly, but I can't entirely blame them. You can argue that FF7 won the 32-bit round of the console wars for Sony (Sega & Nintendo's combined stupidity nonwithstanding). Hell, I know the only reason I bought a Playstation is because I read Square was developing for it and the Nintendo console wouldn't have any FF games on it. I'm a Square whore like that. Kinda came full circle though, because I ended up getting a Gamecube and a GBA because Square and Nintendo kissed and made up. :)

I'll agree that FF7's story sort of stalled a bit after Aerith died, but I don't think it's entirely unusual. Most FF games tend to get slow in the middle and then pick up steam again in the run up to the end game. About the only one that didn't that I can remember is FFX, which was breakneck pretty much until the end (prolly 'cause it was shorter). It sort of reminded me of the World of Ruin in FF6 where everyone was just kind of sitting around waiting for the Big Bad to kill everyone. The chase after the Huge Materia was sort of boring; I wasn't really engaged again until the storming of Midgar and final confrontation with Hojo (which was bloody awesome if you ask me). The Weapons were a nice touch, but I thought they were underutilized in the story. I'm glad the concept was revisited somewhat in FFX-2, where it was expanded upon better.

I for one can't wait for Dirge of Cerberus (sp?). I've been in love with Vincent forever and I can't wait to learn more about him...hopefully it won't muck around too much with the fanfics I've written, hehe. I wrote my own elaborate backstory for him that I've sort of been using as fanon for my FF7 stories. I actually have a Cloud/Vincent yaoi story that's been sitting on the backburner for a few years that I need to hurry up and finish before Advent Children comes out, 'cause I just know it's gonna mess with everything I added to their backstories. :scared:

Oh man, I'm with you on how long it took for new RPGs to come out before FF7. It was torture. FFs 2 and 3 were the first games I ever imported. My first boyfriend was Eurasian and had a cousin in Japan who used to always send him stuff like tv shows, games, etc. For my birthday one year he gave me a Famicom and we played through FF2 and 3. I was such hot shit among my nerd herd because of it, hehe. :)

I'd actually like to see a full-blown remake or even a prequel of FF6 before I'd like to see a sequel. As good as it was I think the story pretty much broke down around the World of Ruin because the game turned so non-linear. Like I said before, everyone was just kind of sitting around waiting for Kefka to fry them, and I thought it was supremely ridiculous for Kefka to twiddle his thumbs until the heroes got there. The thing is, that's one of those areas where I have to repeat the MST3k mantra to repeat to myself it's just a game, I should really just relax. It's one of those meta things that comes with the territory of playing a game (just like, say, the notion of dragons and Tonberries more powerful than Sin roaming a 100-level dungeon underneath the most populous city in Spira without anyone stumbling in there and being eaten). At any rate, I'd love to see how the Empire came to power and how the Returners were formed. Not to mention where the Espers came from, etc. There's a lot of potential there.

[7th_Sephiroth]

43. squares major flaw is they will prematurely announce release dates

they announced final fantasy 7's release before the script was finalised

[PittPoliSci]

2. Crystal Chronicles

loved it.

[Chovexani]

4. I am the biggest Final Fantasy fangirl you will ever meet.

And that is not hyperbole, at all.

You ever need anything, let me know. :hi:

[7th_Sephiroth]

10. ok then, riddle me this

who's art has been the most prevalant through the final fnatasy series?

[NEOBuckeye]

15. No Brainer: Yoshitaka Amano

He's done character concept art for every Final Fantasy since the original, including the more recent FFVII, FFVIII and FFX, where Tetsuya Nomura was the primary character designer. The earlier SaGa games also featured Amano's work.

[7th_Sephiroth]

19. damn it the question was for chovexani

*kick*

[NEOBuckeye]

20. My bad. Being a long time FF fan, I couldn't resist.

:evilgrin:

[7th_Sephiroth]

21. the karma will return upon you

1 trillion fold

[NEOBuckeye]

22. Just hit me with Bahamut or something

[7th_Sephiroth]

23. no, maybe i'll w-summon/mime KOTR for eternity

lol

[Chovexani]

25. What Neo Buckeye said

But, I would add that Amano not only worked on Final Fantasy (though this was his most extensive work for Square), he also did work on Front Mission and Gun Hazard.

Sheesh ask me something hard next time. ;)

[7th_Sephiroth]

28. damn, ummmm

what was the text of the letter in ff9 that came with the excalibur 2?

[mourningdove92]

34. Well, what is the answer?

I played FF9, but don't have a clue what you are referring to.

BTW, I am also a big FF fan. I especially loved 7 & 8. 10 was pretty cool once I got everything figured out.

[Chovexani]

38. FF9 is the bane of my existence.

I'll admit I've never gotten Excalibur 2, but only because I've played through the game a grand total of twice, and the thought of keeping multiple saves, starting over again due to taking too long to accomplish certain things, etc. makes my teeth itch.

The only reason it isn't my least favorite FF is because FF2's levelling system is so goddamn broken. And, well, it's got Kuja and Beatrix. :)

You know what's funny? As bad as it was, it's still light years better than its RPG contemporaries. And that, my friend, is why I'm a Square whore. :)

On Edit: The thing is, it's not even worth pulling your hair out for a speed play to get the damn sword. It doesn't teach Steiner any skills he can't learn from Excalibur 1 and Ragnarok. :(

[7th_Sephiroth]

40. Spoilers

square has had a side story running since final fantasy 4 involving gilgamesh and his brother, the 4 armed thief in 9 is not gilgamesh, but his brother, the letter lays out part of the plot, gilgamesh and his brother are hunting for 4 legendary swords, he gets the final one in 8 (odin's sword) i think thier gonna make a gilgamesh based game soon

[ibegurpard]

29. My observations

I have found that as the graphics get better, the games seem to focus less on playing and free exploring and more on moving you from cutscene to cutscene. I had more fun playing Final Fantasy for the NES than I did with the latest PS2 version I played.

[Chovexani]

39. I think it's more an issue of linearity vs. non-linearity.

FFX-2 placed very heavy emphasis on playing and free exploring. It's the only RPG that I can think of, FF or not, where you started the game with the Uber-Vehicle and were literally able to go anywhere you wanted from the get-go. People seemed to hate it (I didn't). :shrug:

Personally? I'm an old-time fan and welcome the use of cutting edge graphics because I've always played FF games for the plot (even the original with the "Save the Princess" stuff, because I sure as hell wasn't playing it to get attacked every two steps and kill imps for 2 hours so I could afford equipment and magic spells that would just be obsolete when I got to the next town). I've been in arguments with older fans who complain that the stories have been neglected in favor of flashy graphics (which, wtf? because the writers are also CG artists. Whatever, fanboys). I'd argue the opposite--story and characterization are served by improved graphics. For instance, I dare anyone to tell me that Aerith's death could have had the emotional impact it did were that scene played out with 16-bit sprites. The sudden brutality of the act, the self-satisifed smirk Sephiroth gave Cloud as he pulled Masamune out of her, the smile that didn't leave her face even as she collapsed to the ground...I'm sorry, that was just a really powerful moment and it wouldn't have had that power if we couldn't see them in detail like that. I'm a jaded, cynical bitch but that scene reduces me to mush every time I see it, and I've played that game about 30 times. I have a similar reaction at the end of FFX, on the deck of the Airship when Tidus starts to fade away. That scene in particular illustrates the positive impact that good use of graphics and sound can have in a game. He begins to fade, and walks away, and Yuna runs to stop him and falls right through him. She cries and whispers, "I love you" (Hedy Burress is a shit actress but she nailed that line, I think), and Tidus tries to put his arms around her but he can't feel her because he's insubstantial. So he just kind of folds them around her. That just fucking kills me every time I see it.

Square's not even the worst offender in that category, anyway. You want games that consist of entirely "moving you from cutscene to cutscene", I direct you to Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Endless Fucking Dialogue and Xenosaga Crapisode 1: Pretension in a Box. Especially Xenosaga. I think women have gotten pregnant and given birth in the time some of those cutscenes take. And they're not even interesting.

I don't think it's necessarily graphics vs. free exploring, I think it's linearity vs. non-linearity and that's an argument as old as dirt in gaming fandom. I think FF6 was brilliant until the second half of the game, which was extremely non-linear and sidequesty and the main plot took a backseat to little character studies (which we didn't even get into deeply enough, because there were way too many characters in the game). Love it or hate it, one of the reasons the later GTA games work so well is because they manage to walk the line very well. Then again, I can't even remember why the hell Tommy Vercetti was in Vice City to begin with, so clearly plot isn't the thing attracting people (or at least me :P) to those games. I guess it boils down to what you're playing a game for. If I want exploration, I go play Metroid, one of the recent Castlevanias, or a Zelda or Mario game. If I want to mindlessly blow shit up, I play GTA3 or Vice City. If I want a good mindfuck, I play Eternal Darkness or Silent Hill. If I want exercise I play DDR. :P If I want to be sucked into a fantasy world with memorable characters and a plot better than most Hollywood movies, I go play FF.

Isn't it nice we have so much to choose from? :hi:

[Khephra]

30. I used to love FF games

Until they turned into movies that you watch more than you play.

[ibegurpard]

31. Exactly

That is what I was trying to say right above you but you put it much more succinctly.

[Khephra]

32. succinctly

is my middle name.

;-)

[Chovexani]

35. Oh dear god, not that canard.

And I liked you Kef. :P

I'm shocked it took someone this long to trot that tired line out. Come on, don't disappoint me people, now someone has to say "it's Final Fantasy not Final Sci-Fi!" to make my day complete. :P

[NuttyFluffers]

41. it's final fantasy not final sci-fi!

and now your day is complete.

and i think the 'canard' has a ring of truth to it, as painful as it may be for you.

[Khephra]

47. Sorry!

It's just the last few that I tried kept on showing movie after movie. By the time it was my turn to play, I couldn't, as the spiderwebs had crusted up my joystick.

:evilgrin:

[DireStrike]

33. Outing myself: FF8 is my favorite.

Followed by 7, then 10. I've only been able to play the oldies on emulators, and that takes away some of the magic.

I also find x-2 quite fun.


There, I've said it. I have no regrets!

Oh, and Tactics Advance BLOWS.

[Chovexani]

37. Hee!

Just to establish my street cred, I've played every last one of them the way the Gods intended (on consoles), when they originally came out, and I agree with you. Except I'd put 10 above 8. :)

Come sit by me, we'll have some fun. ;)

I haven't played Tactics Advance yet (my GBA library is downright pitiful, actually), but I feel obligated to because of the connection to FF12. What was crappy about it?

[DireStrike]

42. Bastardization of FFT.

The story starts off slow and starts to drag right away. Cliche and pointlessness abound. There's WAY too much time before you get to do any real playing.

The law system... well, you said you like challenges. It could provide challenges, theoretically. More often it's just annoying. Anyway, that's the only challenge you're likely to come across without deliberately handicapping yourself. The game is offensively easy.

I haven't played it in a long time... I don't feel totally qualified to write on it. Here's a review that pretty much sums up my stance: http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/gbadvance/review/R61940.html

Now, if you want a GOOD tactical turn based strategy GBA game, Fire Emblem is your ticket. Less customizeable, but it's just so much better in terms of story and feeling. It's quite difficult, also. Well polished, coherent, loveable. Similar to Shining Force, but darker (and it's ALL battles, no walking around.)

How does FF12 tie in with FFTA? I haven't been keeping up with it.

[NEOBuckeye]

44. Yasumi Matsuno

He produced and directed Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy Tactics. FFT takes place in the land of Ivalice, which is also the setting for Final Fantasy XII. Supposedly, Matsuno conceived of his vision for Final Fantasy XII eight years ago. He incorporated aspects of it into Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy Tactics. Now, having succeeded Hironobu Sakaguchi (FFI - FFX) as the producer of the Final Fantasy series, he has the chance to bring his entire vision to life in FFXII.

[DireStrike]

45. Ah, I see...

I'll have to play VS, and look into how heavily involved he was with FFTA.

It's certainly not a bad little world he has. I look forward to seeing his hand at work on FFXII.

[NEOBuckeye]

46. FFXII will be a new direction for the series in many ways.

I once suspected that Square was going to end the series somewhere around IX or X. Indeed, FFIX was the closer for the old-school style Final Fantasy games. But FFX actually marked a new direction for the series, such that it might be regarded as the new "Final Fantasy One" from which point the series will have advanced a decade or so down the road. There is even a similar trend running parallel to the first ten games. Final Fantasy XI has become the red-headed step-child like FFII was for the first ten.

But just how many more Final Fantasy games will Square make? Well, they have actually registered more than the current number of known sequels.

Hey, you know, this would make a great triva question for Chovexani! :evilgrin:

[Chovexani]

48. I hope they make them as long as I keep breathing!

Or, so help me, I'll have to find other games to write dirty gay fanfiction about. *g*

Who knows, though? One thing's for sure, I suspect we'll be seeing a lot more "sub-franchises" in the series. Hell, Final Fantasy 7 is turning into a cottage industry just by itself. Besides a movie (Advent Children) there's at least three spinoff games in the works: the cellphone-only prequel, Before Crisis, starring the Turks; Dirge of Cerberus, the Advent Children sequel starring Vincent (which, I swear to doG, I thought I hallucinated during one of my fanfic benders, because that is way too awesome a thought to be real); and the PSP action-RPG Crisis Core. I also would be very surprised if that rumored PS2 remake of FF7 from way back doesn't somehow rematerialize for another system (maybe the PSP, or PS3?). I mean, the original Final Fantasy has now been released for a grand total of four consoles that I can think of off the top of my head. FF12, being in Ivalice and helmed by Mitsuno is probably going to be very heavy with the politics, and is a rich enough setting to support a bunch of games made off it. I would say things like FFX-2 are going to be the rule from now on rather than a weird-ass anomaly.

FWIW, I don't think trademark registrations are really anything to go by. A few years ago every CT fanboy on the Internet creamed their jeans when Square registered "Chrono Break", and the rumors started flying that there was going to be some prequel/sequel to Chrono Trigger/Cross. We all see where that ended up. :P

Damnit, I really just want a sequel to Vagrant Story. Without spoiling the story for you (you really need to go play it! It's Greatest Hits even!), the ending was one of those rare open-ended affairs that was simultaneously satisfying and infuriating. It left me wanting more, big time. More gorgeous architeture, more deep gameplay, more Ashley Riot in chaps exchanging sultry homoerotic double-entendres with a sexually ambiguous villain that slinks around shirtless in tight leather pants. Does Chovexani have to choke a bitch? </Chappelle's Show>