Final Fantasy Thread

[MasterEn]

You are right! I had especially Scenes in Cities in Mind, as here:

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/262710528773350976/3EBB2BAC7ACBCD79A07C9FE5B4819C4CDCA45683/

But i would say, there is not AS much Geometry going on, that have more real 3D.
It could be the overall Texture Quality, that has to take a bit of a cut.

yeah, some parts are in 3d, but it's usually in small areas like you said. buildings and hallways. it's probably like the same situation with the psx games. the backgrounds were actual 3d models and just had pictures taken of them and used as a backdrop; while the gameplay area is a small 3d space overlaid on top of a picture.
a lot of a game's size is located in the graphics. and ffx has full motion videos too, so the actual game might be a lot smaller.

 

[Lena CE]

Sometimes I forget just how little some folks understand game development

 

[MasterEn]

Sometimes I forget just how little some folks understand game development

it's easy for most people to not understand the difficulties of how something is made. most of us only ever interact with the finished product. and a lot of people don't care how it's made, they just want the thing.
it would take years to port something like ffx to an entirely different system, most likely you would have to build from scratch with a developer kit to do it.
and then, you still have the question of: why do this?
i don't expect this ffx port to ever happen. but it is a bit interesting to think about it.

 

[moonbits]

Sometimes I forget just how little some folks understand game development

It's often quite annoying to me, as a software developer.

 

[starseeker300]

Its a damn shame they keep remastering them in 2d format without improving the story , ff1 is like barebones in terms of story you don't even get to say anything as the heroes all you do is act surprised lol , garland is nonexistent as a villain.

The game is pretty difficult basing my judgment on the origins copy I would say the 2d games seem more difficult than the 3d ones (I only played 7 and 8 from the 3d games) its way less forgiving in ff1 the pacing is also slow as heck I beaten the game at level 35 or 36 to think this is final fantasy started so simple and how far it came...


Same goes for ff2 it got a pretty good intro showcasing the emperor and the heroes one thing I found outrageous was maria being the slowest in the game she starts with highest agility and somehow lacked behind in the intro....In terms of gameplay ff2 is unique by having no level system instead you get this "the more you use the better you become" sort of system now its not bad but quite flawed I didn't use any exploits of hitting the team members to gain health I see it as pretty lame tbh , the fact that you need to mass use spells to get them going is genuinely annoying and spells like esuna can come in handy late game but because I found myself not getting hit by negative spells that much it remained lvl 1...

So you get the sort of gameplay that if you decide to change your weapon or any of the members weapons at a certain point in the game their performance would go down unless its maria who I see as a spellcaster for the most part this system forces you to stick to few spells and weapons that you have leveled up pretty well during the game.

And the story? As I said the intro gives off promising vibes into this being an amazing adventure to stop evil well the game starts off in you getting chased by imperial soldiers and supposedly killed in the process that's quite a way to start the beginning of the game sounded pretty promising but as time went on the story just slowly disintegrated there is no major character development for any of the members save for gordon who was like the only interesting character in this whole mess and gareth the original Dragoon in my case the bunching bag of the team as foes just targeted him the most his death was the only meaningful one too each other character death felt rushed (Joseph literally dies one dungeon later after getting to know him LOL)

Speaking of dungeons the design is torture I can only imagine square at the time making dungeons and deciding that it would be good to add trap doors that punish the player for exploring you know this clip of tom from & jerry where tom is creating some sort of chemical and has an evil grin the whole time? That's how it looked like when square were making the dungeons for ff2 its a game that has a pretty grim setting for a world and the potential to be top tier in terms of story but goes underused and just falls flat I mean the emperor is supposed to be this very strong being well he dies pretty easily both times he doesn't get enough screen time either.

Square shouldn't keep remastering these 2 games and keeping the core story untouched they seriously should remake ff2 and make the story good

I heard that at some rerelease of ff2 (there is so many that it feels like square just sits in the meeting room one guy says "we are releasing ff2 for the billionth time" and the room goes wild) the level up of items system is more dynamic and allows for pretty fast leveling of weapons and spells early on but become slower as time goes on.

yeah ff2 is pretty love it or hate it. i personally love it for the darker story compared to the other nes/snes final fantasy's as well as its unique progression system. 1 is simple yeah, but it has pretty good replay value in just going thru the game with different party setups. If you want an expansion on ff1's story then maybe give stranger of paradise a shot

 

[MasterEn]

It's often quite annoying to me, as a software developer.

apologies for that. most normal people don't care about the hard work that goes into everything. since i've been learning about the behind the scenes stories and going-ons for a lot of games and some movies, i'm far more chilled and relaxed about waiting for developers to make something. i'd rather have a high quality product that took time to make than a rushed one that ends up disappointing.
i think the story of sonic 06 needs to be more widespread than it is. that might help a bit.

 

[moonbits]

oh don't worry about it, you don't have to apologize everyone is free to express themselves. Just as someone who works with code/engines/tools/SDKs on a daily basis, reading gamers take on why "games are unoptimized" or "why cant they do this" is just.. *sigh*

 

[MasterEn]

oh don't worry about it, you don't have to apologize everyone is free to express themselves. Just as someone who works with code/engines/tools/SDKs on a daily basis, reading gamers take on why "games are unoptimized" or "why cant they do this" is just.. *sigh*

yeah, but i was like that too once, when i was young. i didn't know how games were made, it just seemed like magic. i try to remind people to be patient, but it doesn't work most of the time.
ironicly, if they played rpgs, they might have more patience. i have a fairly high level of that stuff from playing those kinds of games.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

it's a repurposed disney fighting game, according to what i've read about its development. it's one on one, stages are based off of various locations from the series, one stage per installment. characters can freely move around the environments during battle. they have levels and stats, along with moves and spells learned through level ups and move sets can be altered to suit your tastes. many characters play quite differently. warrior of light is your standard average one; no weaknesses or strengths. i main him primarily. exdeath can't run. he walks slowly no matter what. he can teleport and deal damage with it if you collide with it. he also gets a block ability that can block all attacks with perfect timing. there's even a hybrid real time turn base mode. your character can move on their own and you pick commands from a menu like in the main games.
the thief is bugged in the original version, i think, and he is underpowered pretty much in all of them. his ninja promotion makes him better. a little bit better, but it is a positive.
ff8 levels up enemies while you level up your characters. that's why it maintained a decent difficulty for you.
the gba versions have removed the stat losses, so you can keep whatever you gain with out losing it.
ultima was bugged in the original and i don't know if they fixed it. ever. it's supposed to check all spell levels and weapon levels of the character who possesses the ultima spell; and then it adds that info in to the damage calculation formula. so, one weapon type is level 10, 14 spells at levels 2-7; yeah, the ultima spell is going to suck

Yeah it sounds good to me will probably give it a try as soon as possible.

And yeah ff8 does have this good dynamic of enemies levelling up with you although I think they retain their HP but only damage gets improved.

And yeah the thief is pretty meh even the warrior surpassed him in agility gain which was the thing I picked him for

yeah ff2 is pretty love it or hate it. i personally love it for the darker story compared to the other nes/snes final fantasy's as well as its unique progression system. 1 is simple yeah, but it has pretty good replay value in just going thru the game with different party setups. If you want an expansion on ff1's story then maybe give stranger of paradise a shot

FF2 indeed has a very grim and dark setting the intro makes that pretty clear and throughout the game people keep dying and such but sadly the game doesn't use it well.....that's why I want a remake of ff2 the dark setting would be used very well here.....

In terms of repeatability I guess yeah? In my playthrough I didn't use a monk or a red mage although I doubt red mage is worth giving a try in terms of looks he is the coolest (sorry black mage) but since he is a mix of both and white and black I guess his usefulness goes down further as the game progresses im basing this off my experience with the red mage in ff5 who seems like a very decent pick in the mid game but completely falls of late game.

And man there is so many final fantasy games to try I think they would keep me occupied for a year or two on their own lol

 

[MasterEn]

Yeah it sounds good to me will probably give it a try as soon as possible.

And yeah ff8 does have this good dynamic of enemies levelling up with you although I think they retain their HP but only damage gets improved.

And yeah the thief is pretty meh even the warrior surpassed him in agility gain which was the thing I picked him for





FF2 indeed has a very grim and dark setting the intro makes that pretty clear and throughout the game people keep dying and such but sadly the game doesn't use it well.....that's why I want a remake of ff2 the dark setting would be used very well here.....

In terms of repeatability I guess yeah? In my playthrough I didn't use a monk or a red mage although I doubt red mage is worth giving a try in terms of looks he is the coolest (sorry black mage) but since he is a mix of both and white and black I guess his usefulness goes down further as the game progresses im basing this off my experience with the red mage in ff5 who seems like a very decent pick in the mid game but completely falls of late game.

And man there is so many final fantasy games to try I think they would keep me occupied for a year or two on their own lol

there's also lots of mods for dissidia duodecium, the prequel/expansion pack game.
for the original ff1 on nes, the red mage gets a lot of good equipment, and nearly all spells except for level 8 ones. they nerffed the red mage in 3, and have been keeping them down for all of the subsequent games. the red mage does learn duoblecast for mastering the job, which is helpful for other magic classes.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

there's also lots of mods for dissidia duodecium, the prequel/expansion pack game.
for the original ff1 on nes, the red mage gets a lot of good equipment, and nearly all spells except for level 8 ones. they nerffed the red mage in 3, and have been keeping them down for all of the subsequent games. the red mage does learn duoblecast for mastering the job, which is helpful for other magic classes.

Ff3 is the only 2d game I didn't play yet I kinda want to try its 2d version before trying the 3d remake square just doesn't seem very fond of this game they re-release all 2d games on the ps1 save for ff3 idk why it just feels like they don't like it as much as other 2d games , since the red mage is quite versatile I think its alright if he got nerfed if I remember right from ff5 he had decent strength so he was able to deal physical damage as well although not capable of taking damage at all he still looks cool as heck tho.

And speaking of mods I like to experience the base game as it is then look into mods if its worth it now enough speaking about dissdia please ? it already looked cool anyway and this makes me want to play it more I been taking a break from final fantasy from September 2024 to 12/1/2025 all I been playing is final fantasy so I guess its time to take a break before going into FF tactics and FF9 if 8 was an amazing experience then 9 has to be even better.

 

[MasterEn]

the mods for dissidia are primarily just costumes. like kain can look like goku, link as the warrior of light, things like that.
3 is, not well liked. you'll see lots of people pick on 2 for the mechanics, 7 for being incomplete and rushed, and 13 for the story and half of the characters.
3 brings back the job system with about 22 jobs in it. the remake just adds freelancer for the starting job. which uses the base character designs that you see in official artwork.
the implementation of the job system is strange. the original has a renewable limit for each character, so switching form one job to another cost class points. i don't recall the in-game name but it's basically class money. the remake lowers your stats temporary for a few battles. the penalty is reduced if you swap between similar jobs, warrior and knight, white mage and black mage.
now, that wouldn't be too bad of an idea. switch classes, test it out, and by the time that you decide on whether you want to use it or not, you'll have some points built back up to do so.
you will, for about half of the game, be forced to switch classes for both story progression and boss battles. you'll be mini for one and you'll need a full party of dragoons for another. someone will always need to be a mage to cover the spells, and you'll need time to outfit everyone for battle with the right gear.
also, two classes in the original are so broken and overpowered, that all other classes become obsolete upon unlocking them. fortunately that's at the end of the game. there's a bit of balancing in the remake.

 

[Tonberry]

Its a damn shame they keep remastering them in 2d format without improving the story , ff1 is like barebones in terms of story you don't even get to say anything as the heroes all you do is act surprised lol , garland is nonexistent as a villain.

This game is literally exactly what you're requesting.
I think it's awful, but if you want to play a weird take on FF1 with actual "characters" and lots of focus on Garland (I really can't say more without spoiling the whole thing), this is the one:

Side note, I'm starting a Final Fantasy 1 playthrough! Will be my first time on a pixel remaster release and I'm excited to shoot for the platinum! Anyone want a party member named after them? Gimme a name and what class ya want if so :D

Enjoy! I think the Pixel Remaster is the best version of FF1 (would've been PSP if it had the old-school magic system!)

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

Yeah seen that one heard you play as the man himself garland and you get to visit cornelia or whatever the heck first town was called.

 

[Tonberry]

Yeah seen that one heard you play as the man himself garland and you get to visit cornelia or whatever the heck first town was called.

If you like Team Ninja action games like Nioh it's probably worth a shot, especially if you'd like some more meat to your FF1.
I'm not into those kinds of action games myself very much, but the job system is pretty cool.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

If you like Team Ninja action games like Nioh it's probably worth a shot, especially if you'd like some more meat to your FF1.
I'm not into those kinds of action games myself very much, but the job system is pretty cool.

No I never played team ninja but im always down to trying new games and new game genres

 

[starseeker300]

In terms of repeatability I guess yeah? In my playthrough I didn't use a monk or a red mage although I doubt red mage is worth giving a try in terms of looks he is the coolest (sorry black mage) but since he is a mix of both and white and black I guess his usefulness goes down further as the game progresses im basing this off my experience with the red mage in ff5 who seems like a very decent pick in the mid game but completely falls of late game.

Red Mage is Really Good, please jsut trust me, it gets a lot of good equipment options plus most of the black and white magic, including Thundaga, Blizzaga, Firaga, Curaga, and Life(Raise/Revive). Its physical attack while not as good as knight or monk is still serviceable unlike thief. its just a really good jack of all trades overall.

Ff3 is the only 2d game I didn't play yet I kinda want to try its 2d version before trying the 3d remake square just doesn't seem very fond of this game they re-release all 2d games on the ps1 save for ff3 idk why it just feels like they don't like it as much as other 2d games , since the red mage is quite versatile I think its alright if he got nerfed if I remember right from ff5 he had decent strength so he was able to deal physical damage as well although not capable of taking damage at all he still looks cool as heck tho.

having played the 3d remake of ff3 only, I can say ff3 is the worst final fantasy ive played, the job system sucks, half the jobs are worthless and the other half get outclassed by the last 2 jobs you get except for maybe black belt if you have the right equipment. also yeah the mini dungeon is genuine pain to go thru, there is annoying stuff like that all throughout the game

 

[Strategist's icon Strategist Strategist]

I agree that Red Mage is decently OP, so is the redhead Fighter. I still think Black Mage vs Red Mage is an interesting debate. The only class I think is unusable is the Thief. Too bad in the early game and the Ninja isn't that much better than the Red Wizard.

 

[MasterEn]

I agree that Red Mage is decently OP, so is the redhead Fighter. I still think Black Mage vs Red Mage is an interesting debate. The only class I think is unusable is the Thief. Too bad in the early game and the Ninja isn't that much better than the Red Wizard.

black mage vs red mage is really only up for debate in ff1. that's when they are the closest in viability, the red mage gets all spells up to level 7 once promoted. only level 8 magic is restricted. they get a wide variety of armors and shields, lots of good swords. very balanced, more strength and defense than a mage, more magic than the warrior/knight, thief/ninja and monk/master; and the inverse hold true as well.
black mages specialize in magic. shooting lightning with unlimited power!! very low physical stats and hp. three shield, one only available when upgraded. full access to all black magic, including teleport for a slightly accelerated escape from a dungeon.
but this only matters if you pick 2 melee classes like warrior and monk. thief is useless. it would ultimately depend on whether you lean more towards magic or melee combat.
also, the ninja should never be compared to the red wizard. the ninja is a second rate bootleg of a red mage in comparison to the red wizard.

 

[temper137c]

yeah, some parts are in 3d, but it's usually in small areas like you said. buildings and hallways. it's probably like the same situation with the psx games. the backgrounds were actual 3d models and just had pictures taken of them and used as a backdrop; while the gameplay area is a small 3d space overlaid on top of a picture.
a lot of a game's size is located in the graphics. and ffx has full motion videos too, so the actual game might be a lot smaller.

So would it be possible to reduce the cut scenes down to say a text scroll so that the information is still there but unneeded in regards to the actual gameplay?

Post automatically merged: Feb 5, 2025

I Don't think you could. if i remember right, Rockstar was going to put GTA3 on the Dreamcast anyhow, and had part of the code done. and since it got Leaked, Fan coders and such have worked on it. but Already had part of the Code to work From.

Most likely it Would not be possible.
if it Could be done. it would have to be Reverse engineered from the ground up.
which without a Large team activity working on it full time, might take Years, or Decades.
View attachment 21235

Sad to here but still glad it was said...?

 

[MasterEn]

So would it be possible to reduce the cut scenes down to say a text scroll so that the information is still there but unneeded in regards to the actual gameplay?

yeah. you could just cut out the voice acting. skies of arcadia only uses small, quick snippets of voice acting, mainly for battle techniques. the script could still belong though. i have a copy of the game script i found on gamefaqs. it's about 750 kb in total. not all of it is necessary. if you know what you need and don't need, you could trim it down. most of the scenes could be replicated with in game graphics and careful direction on how to execute them.

 

[Zarathusta]

This game is literally exactly what you're requesting.
I think it's awful, but if you want to play a weird take on FF1 with actual "characters" and lots of focus on Garland (I really can't say more without spoiling the whole thing), this is the one:

View attachment 21652


Enjoy! I think the Pixel Remaster is the best version of FF1 (would've been PSP if it had the old-school magic system!)

I actually really liked it. Especially the dlc with the fight with dissidia Warrior of light and the ff2 emperor.

 

[Sumea]

oh don't worry about it, you don't have to apologize everyone is free to express themselves. Just as someone who works with code/engines/tools/SDKs on a daily basis, reading gamers take on why "games are unoptimized" or "why cant they do this" is just.. *sigh*

This generation without a doubt is unoptimized though. Sometimes you have to be user without years of Unreal engine and nothing else under their belt to notice that visually similar games run with worse FPS with worse native resolutions. Latest example for me is Marvel Rivals that does not significantly look better than say, Overwatch that released years ago. The portal effect halves the performance of the game while Valve developers optimized their's on source engine a decade ago better, as did splitgate where having numerous portals are not hinderance to the gameplay performance, that works at 60fps on last gen hardware.

Of course I do not understand optimization but user can look at the past numbers and current numbers and come to more than less correct conclusion that something ain't right. Mainly unreal 5 has been a disaster that I hope developers would upgrade to 4 from.
"But modern raytraci-" Nobody cares. Deep down all the fake stuff we were doing already looked better and performed the hell and beyond better. Ray-Tracing even with the decade of marketing claims from Nvidia is still: Unoptimized in itself. Well, as optimized as it can be which is great for movie studios, useless to gamers.

Like most amazing things in mostly size optimization is the 119kb FPS .kkrieger that said "In real world these techniques at least partially could be used to reduce texture sizes for fuller games" yet here we are with 100-150gb games for 500gb SSD consoles.

Do most gamers know what they mean or are coping about their 10 year old GPU when they say "unoptimized"? Maybe, likely so. But this generation of gaming aside slop and flop tastic has made more and more gamers get visceral text book examples of what unoptimized is.


The "Why they can't just do this" part I get. I am just a user but I know in computer science, programming etc. Things are not that simple. Seen at clueless gamers say wild stuff for sure.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

Heard a statement once that said final fantasy only got good at its 4th installment having played the first 2 games I can see a bit of a point into this statement but to really see if its true I have to get ff3 the original version or any non 3d version that isn't well pixel remaster anyone know where to get it? Since its the first iteration ever of job system which was pretty decent in ff5 when I first saw the job system I thought you will pick a job and work and such the word "job" must have been replaced with class its way more fitting.

 

[JackNoir413]

Am I the only Final Fantasy II apologist?

You can defend the attempt at a plot and maybe the "level up each stat" idea.
But the execution is so bad the game sucks so much its worse than ff1 it makes you want to cry.

Post automatically merged: Feb 5, 2025

Heard a statement once that said final fantasy only got good at its 4th installment having played the first 2 games I can see a bit of a point into this statement but to really see if its true I have to get ff3 the original version or any non 3d version that isn't well pixel remaster anyone know where to get it? Since its the first iteration ever of job system which was pretty decent in ff5 when I first saw the job system I thought you will pick a job and work and such the word "job" must have been replaced with class its way more fitting.

Hate for the original trilogy is so forced. ff1 is fine and ff3 is pretty dope especially after getting the black belt job.
But its true that ff4 was the point where it started to be plot-driven instead of being a game about grinding and seeing your stats go up.