FF REtrospective

[PlagueOfLocust]

Whew, I was getting chills watching the FF-VI Retrospective. What a great game; it'll always be one of my favorite games of all time.

Personally I rate VI the best in the series, followed by IV and then VII (except I never played V, which I think I might like to do if I can find it.)

For the record, VI does not fail with its second half - if anything it excels there. The only thing that changes is the main story halts and all the back-stories of the characters come out. Just becase they're "side" stories doesn't make them less compelling. I'd argue that they're more compelling, that you feel like you're really learning about the world and the characters, and the game's self-contained history comes alive. Not to mention the sense of freedom to explore and find all the fantastic weapons/items/magicite. There's so much to do in the last half that when I played the game recently, I found something I'd never found before in all my innumerable times through the game. It was great.

FF - VII was cinematically breath-taking, though I could hardly make sense of the story. I also don't care for the pre-rendered backgrounds that came into the series with that game. For me, it made the game world feel less immersive, and sometimes it was hard to tell where you could and couldn't go (especially when you had to climb vertically). The combat was fun, though, and the characters were cool, but unfortunately I get a headache these days from the pixelated battle models. Actually stopped me from getting very far into a second run through the game. Still a classic, though.