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Author: Ben <benk@tilde.team>
Tue Oct 5 01:10:51 PM +0330 2021
Yes, so it is that time again for me to review a Final Fantasy game. These reviews are based on me playing through the series in numerical order with the Pixel Remaster editions that just came out this year on Steam. They are Windows games, but they run well on Proton, though there is a slight vysnc problem. (i.e. there isn't any.)
What I'm doing is playing the games to completion, and I am also "mastering" them, which means that I'm getting all the completion achievements on Steam, which is not so hard to do. It generally means you've discovered everything in the game, including all areas, monsters, and chests. Otherwise I generally try to do a thorough and unhurried playthrough, so I do take the time to talk to NPC's and stuff like that as well as pay attention to the dialog in the cutscenes. There may be some NPC's I missed here and there, but it's not significant.
Final Fantasy III (I'm going to finally give in and start abbreviating the names, so "FF3") is the last Final Fantasy game that was created for the NES, so it rounds out all the installments for that platform. To summarize my reviews so far, I wrote that FF1 is an essential classic and should not be neglected, and that FF2 is somehow a bad game and perhaps should be neglected.
So, what do we make of FF3? I'm just going to come right out and say that I love this game, especially after playing the Pixel Remaster. I had already played FF3 many years ago when its 3D remake came out for the NDS, which if I'm not mistaken was the first time it was released in the West. I thought it was a good game, but perhaps at the time I was not so into these games anymore by then, so maybe I didn't appreciate it as much. This new, 2D rendition of the game seems to me to be much more enjoyable than the 3D version, which was still nice.
Looking at this game in light of FF2, it seems Square knew that the course of the series was in need of correction. In many ways they took the game back to its roots by (apparently) reexamining FF1 and capitalizing on what made it a great game, as well as keeping some nice innovations from FF2 (chocobo forests, for example) and expanding on them.
What we see in FF3 is an improvement on every aspect of the game, like richer story elements and NPC interactions, bigger, better, and more varied places to explore, the introduction of the famous class system, and more. It clearly stands out as a classic in the series, and as you would expect from a Final Fantasy game, especially late in a console's life, it likely pushes all the boundaries of what hardware was capable of doing at the time. Of course, with the Pixel Remaster it's hard to get a real sense for this because these remakes go far beyond what the original NES was capable. So the resulting game is more like a 16-bit + special effects affair.
While I'm sure the NES originals are nice, ultimately I think the remake versions are better for the graphical improvements. They still have a "classic" feel thanks to the art style. If you have never played FF3 before, I strongly recommend playing it, and playing this particular version of it. I would say, that it's probably a neglected and underrated title in the series, not having been released much and living in the shadow of games like FF1 and FF4.
One thing that I noticed by playing the games fully and in order is the apparent continuity that exists between them. It's kind of nice to see the gradual evolution of the series and references made to previous games. This reverberation effect (every game is a new story, but reincarnates the stories of the past) lends the series a strong mythological ethos which was clearly intended for it. I think this is already taking shape by the third title, but it's the later SNES games that really capitalize on this. In FF3, one cool thing is that Gysahl is a town you can visit in the game. I don't think it appears again in the series, but its name remains for the famous "Gysahl greens" which chocobos love.
It's also worth pointing out (again) how much the series relies on real-world mythologies for content. This is probably obvious and well known to everyone, but there are in the series references to eastern mythologies that a general audience may not have that much familiarity with. Earlier I wrote about how there is obvious Iranian influence in the previous game, and this one is no exception. Notably, FF3 contains the monsters Simurgh and Ahriman, which are important figures in Iranian mythology, Ahriman essentially being the god of darkness, and Simurgh is a legendary bird. Simurgh in Iranian mythology became a really big deal, but originally it was simply the Avestan word for a hawk or falcon, so I found its presentation in FF3 to be historically authentic. (Whether this was intentional or not, I don't know.)
I noticed that there is still a tiny bit of the "Arabian Nights" vibe that was included in the previous games, but this seems to have been toned down quite a bit, especially from FF2. One of the first bosses in the game is the Djinn, but otherwise this is minor detail in the story. Even so, you do continue to have Semitic elements like inclusions of Noah, Bahamut, Ifrit, and a few other things I guess. (Note: "Arabian Nights" is not exclusively Arab, but comes out of a cultural millieau in the Middle East that relied heavily on Iranian and Turkish folklore as well as Arabic, so it's all more or less related.)
As for the game itself, it's just got a very enjoyable and interesting story all the way though. I actually (unbelievalby) ended up playing it twice because after beating it in approximately sixteen hours, I was unable to complete all the achievements because I had missed monsters in the game's two one-time dungeons, the second of which is like two thirds or more through the game, so I started over with a new party and put another ten hours into the game. Honestly, I didn't mind.
Even though it's noticeably shorter than FF2, it feels longer and bigger somehow, because I think it's packed with a better quantity and quality of content. One thing that was nice about the second playthrough, is that I could play more efficiently and take the opportunity to experiment with the classes. Also, you appreciate certain story elements more; for example, there is a brilliant piece of foreshadowing at the point where you fly over the world engulfed in flood, and one of the few things on the map is the peak of the tower where the game ends. The first time you see it you don't know what it is, and you are never told, but I just thought this was really clever.
When it comes to strategy, there's probably just a few things that you could employ in order to enjoy the game more or play it more effectively. The main rule of FF3 is that you should change the job of at least one character multiple times throughout the game. I was initially resistant to this, as I think many players instictively are, but it's less scary when you have the foresight into what's coming up next in the game. Naturally, you'd want to level your characters' jobs as high as you can go gain an advantage in combat, but eventually you learn that job level is not necessarily as consequential as other factors like equipment and base level, and jobs level VERY quickly. (Sometimes with every encounter.) Also, there's nothing stopping you from switching back to a character's main job when a temporary job ceases to be useful.
How to know when to change jobs is hinted at VERY strongly in the game. At certain points NPC's literally just tell you what job(s) to have in your party for an upcoming area or boss. At other times, the game just drops heavy hints that you could only miss if you don't think about changing jobs ever. For example, at one point in the game you are about to break into a manor entirely made of gold, so do you think it would make sense to have a thief in your party? If you didn't think of it, the game gives you equipment (weapons and armor) specific to the thief class prior to entering this dungeon. If you still didn't take the hint, said dungeon is one of only maybe two that features locked doors, which the thief character can unlock. Hmm...
Therefore, get used to changing your job. It makes the game a bit more fun and interesting, even if it is not required. In my first playthrough I avoided doing this unless I had to. Certain bosses that are otherwise hard to beat can be beaten in just a few turns by the class you are warned you must have in your party. To open locked doors in dungeons, I simply bought keys in Gysahl, which are not even expensive, and I think ten was more than enough. So I did things like skipped having a thief, and basically leveled up a monk as high as I could to get massive physical damage. This strategy made some sections of the game too easy, and some too hard; I had to abandon the monk (later blackbelt) for the final boss fight (defense is too low), and later in the game it was slightly annoying to have to cater to the monk's very low defense.
Near the end of the game, one strategy that was convenient with having a high-level blackbelt in the party was that you could pair him up with a max-defense viking, who will draw attacks and take basically no damage while the blackbelt is free to spam kick or attack. At a certain point you'll just be auto-battling tough mobs and defeating them in a couple turns while everyone levels up.
In my second playthough, this strategy did not work out so well when my blackbelt was under-leveled and had spent more time as a thief. This character then seemed to be an ideal candidate to become a dark knight and eventually a ninja, which to me started to look like the intended progression. Even in my first-playthrough I was forced to give up my blackbelt for a ninja in the final dungeon. I also then noticed that the dark knight, like the blackbelt, has a physical attack ability that targets all enemies, so they can fill a similar role. The game tells you when to use the dark knight at a certain point by giving yout its equipment and alluding to a related side-quest of sorts. (Visiting Falgabard, which is optional.) The reason I failed to use dark knight in my first playthrough is that I thought it could replace my main warrior/knight, but it could not. It works as a secondary fighter like a thief or monk would.
On one occasion I also switched out my black mage temporarily for the dragoon sub-plot, but my ultimate feeling is that while black mages are not always necessary or useful throughout the game, they are generally useful, and going into the final dungeon with high-level black magic lets you kick ass with flare. I found white magic to be always necessary, which a single white mage and later devout can cover. Red mages are considered useful, but hardly cared for them. Having one at the very beginning of the game is apparently needed to use certain weapons.
A note about the summoner classes: I was compelled in my first playthough to change my black mage for a summoner (evoker) after seeing that a part of the game's content is focused on this character. It's somewhat useful mid-to-late game, but ultimately I think it's a useless class. I wanted to like it, but really all its good for is enjoying the summon animations. In late game you have multiple optional dungeons which are part of a quest to get the final summons. You can skip this part of the game entirely, but as such you'll miss out on a significant bit of content.
The other "special" classes like the bard and geomancer are apparently completely useless.
One thing that's good to keep in myind during a playthough is that buying items is often a waste of money. Not that money is normally tight in the game, but you feel dumb buying something only to find it on the ground or in a chest in the next dungeon or even on the same map.
As a rule, clear towns of items and chests before buying anything. If you are frugal, play the following dungeon and return to shops afterwards or during if necessary. You can also cheat and look at a guide to see what you get in the next dungeon, but you don't really have to do that. Try not to sell equipment, since it may still come in handy to have an extra something.
For the most part, magic cannot be found, and you should buy all magic. For summoners, later summons are gained through optional quests, but can still be bought later.
As I mentioned earlier, equipment is a very consequential aspect of the game and is a main driver for how you play. Sometimes your party's class make-up should just be based on having to equip your best equipment at any point in the game.
If you are playing the Steam version and plan to get all the achievements like I did, you can play the game normally without worrying excessively about this, except that you must know which dungeons in the game are one-time dungeons and cannot be revisited. Missing items or monsters there will force you to start the game over again as I was forced to do.
What you can do, is either keep multiple saves and after passing a point of no return start a new save and avoid overwriting the old, or when you know you're in one-time dungeon (there's only two in this game and you can probably guess what they are) just make sure you are thorough and get everything before moving on.
The latter strategy I think is better because I'm not sure how many of the achievements are locked to a single playthrough or can be achieved across multiple. I know from experience that the bestiary can be completely through any combination of playthroughs, but I have a suspicion that the other difficult achievements like finding every item/chest or visiting every area must be done in a single playthough.
As long as you ace the one-time dungeons, you can beat the game however you like, and then clean up on the achievements post-game.
I found the guides on rpgsite.net extremely useful for this because they are written mostly for this purpose. Rather than being complete walkthroughs, they generally just warn you of what to expect from the next part of the game, particularly what is missable. These will help you master your first and possibly only playthrough rather than your second. (Unless you want to play them all two times, which is not necessarily a bad idea.) They were written specifically for the Pixel Remaster series, making them especially useful. Link:
Of course, I probably would have disliked playing FF1 or FF2 a second time, so I'm glad I didn't miss anything when I played them the first time. FF3 is one I didn't mind playing twice.
When playing through the game, I happened to read a forum post saying the onion knight class (the one you start the game with) is actually the best class at they very end of your character's growth. This might only be of interest to min-maxers who want to get their base level to 99 and HP to 9999 or some such nonsense. One post I came across said to use onion knight for base levels 90+. You would probably never want to do this unless you are that kind of person and/or obsessed with this game.
I beat the game with a base level of close to 60, if I remember right. This was much like FF1, and so I wouldn't see the point in leveling to 99, however there is an interesting note that I wanted to explain here:
In the final dungeon/tower, there are a series of floors where different colored dragons appear. They are tough enemies, and when they are defeated they appear to drop onion knight equipment. This is not an achievement on Steam, but I felt that probably if you wanted to truly "beat" the game, you should gather/farm this equipment and then use it to form an end-party of onion knights to defeat the final boss with.
I am considering doing it myself, but since I can postpone it, I will now start playing Final Fantasy IV!