This is part two of my incredible challenge to play (and possibly beat) every official game in the Final Fantasy series. Final Fantasy II was released within a year of it's predecessor, and it has developed a controversial legacy in the series, but has been bundled and remade almost as much as the first game. It was this Final Fantasy entry that introduced lasting elements that appear in the series like Chocobos birds, a character named Cid, as well other recurring themes like vehicles, airships, monster designs, and incoming and outgoing characters from your party.
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| Character designs by Yoshitaka Amano |
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| Character designs by Yoshitaka Amano |
Then there are the game mechanics. Much like the system in use today in the Elder Scrolls series, the characters develop by the use of their abilities At the end of battles, instead of getting experience points characters become better at the abilities they used in battle. Casting magic over and over makes a better magic character, fighting with a weapon makes that character better with that particular weapon. This interesting mechanic makes this title different from all the Final Fantasy games and also creates some interesting exploits, which I'll explain later.
Box Art
Final Fantasy II has been released and re-released many times. The cancelled North America release kept this game in Japan until it was finally released for US audiences in 2003. Like the game, the Japanese box features the concept art of Yoshitaka Amano. Again, his bold color choices and character design makes this box stand out from could have been the North American box art.
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| Famicom box art |
This is the mockup of the cancelled North American release of Final Fantasy II featured in a brochure. Note the subtitle added to the game: Dark Shadow over Palakia. Also mentioned is the 80+ page Hint Book that would have been included had this game actually been released. That would have been helpful.
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| Unreleased North American prototype box art from a Square promotional flyer for CES. |
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| Wonderswan Color Final Fantasy II bundle |
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| GBA version. |
The PSP and GBA versions of the game featured a side quest with the four characters that died during the original game. Finishing this extra side quest allows these characters to finally reach heaven in the afterlife. Interesting. I like the bold design on the US PSP version.
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| US PSP Remake box |
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| Japan PSP Remake Box |
During the making of this post I was amazed when I saw that Frank Cifaldi of Gamasutra had posted his incredible beta prototype of Final Fantasy II for sale on Ebay. Apparently he had bought the game over nine years ago and it is the only official complete prototype English translation of Final Fantasy II from CES 1991.
Long thought a myth, this is the real deal. For collectors of lost video games, betas, and prototypes, this could be the holy grail of cancelled NES titles. There are many reasons why it was cancelled: the emergence of the SNES very shortly, a Final Fantasy IV port to North America in the works, and the time it took to localize the game. By the time it could finally be released in the US, it was already four years old.
Complaints about the quality of the translation were an issue as well. It was stated by the guy in charge of localization, Kaoru Moriyama, that entire parts of the dialog were cut and chopped to form a semi-working English translation. It is my assumption that this original Square translation is probably way worse than the fan made translations that appeared when game emulation became possible. The technological limitations of the day made it very difficult to localize such a long and dialogue-driven rpg on an NES cartridge. But, according to Cifaldi, the entire game was playable.
This situation not only highlights what happens when a game is scheduled and cancelled, but the amount of time and effort that goes into game localization. This process can delay a game from ever reaching the US from Japan, often years after release. This was especially the case with some games that were either too difficult to localize, were deemed unmarketable, or the technological restraints rendered a US version impossible at the time. Looking back, Square probably made the right decision waiting for later release with Final Fantasy IV (named Final Fantasy II for English regions) which was launched very close to the SNES launch in the US.
Concept Art
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| Enemy designs by Yoshitaka Amano. |
Once again, concept art for the games was designed by Yoshitaka Amano. His unique style and color choices succeed in introducing memorable characters and monsters. Many of the monster designs found in Final Fantasy II have defined the art direction and monster designed for subsequent games in the series. The sprites used look very similar to sprites and 3D models found in later games. Those character designs have definitively decided the look for the entire series, and in was the artwork for this game in particular that shows that influence. In the same way that Akira Toriyama designed the look and feel of Dragon Quest, Amano deserves the credit for the look and feel of the entire Final Fantasy series. Some would disagree, but his influence is everywhere in this game and in the sequels.
Music
The music for Final Fantasy II was again composed by Nobuo Uematsu. The soundtrack for this game still resembles the previous soundtrack, but is more ambitious that the first. For an 8-bit game, the music deepens how the player becomes immersed in this fantasy world. In subtle ways the music sets a different tone for this game, possibly from the dark shifts the plot takes as the game progresses. In stark contrast to "World theme" found in the first Final Fantasy, the theme for the sequel is less energetic, wistful, and evokes a sense of undiscovered possibilities for the characters. Credit goes to Uematsu for again using so many different songs for every point in the game. The "town theme" itself is something that he may have borrowed from in later games (possibly VI), as it has a similar flavor that he established for his many town tunes. Some of the songs from Final Fantasy II were arranged for orchestra by the father and son duo Takayuki and Katsuhisa Hattori in the Symphonic Suite Final Fantasy concert by the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. The first song from that performance opens up with the awe inspiring and epic "World theme" that I mentioned earlier. Truly a fantastic arrangement. Take a listen:
I would have to say that I liked the music to the first game a little better- it was more memorable in my opinion, but I wouldn't consider the music for Final Fantasy II to be sub-par in any way considering it was programmed for an 8-bit console in 1988. Uematsu would write better music for the series down the road, but all of his familiar touches are definitely present in this soundtrack.
The official soundtrack to game notes three exclusions to the soundtrack included an "Airship" theme, a "Dungeon" theme (which would later be used in Final Fantasy VI as "The Magic House"), and a "Shop" theme that also excluded. It has been said that these tunes did not fit the darker emotions of the game and were therefore excluded by Uematsu. The "Airship" and "Dungeon" themes are particularly of interesting, both show the range at which Uematsu attempted to create a deeper soundtrack for this game, despite 8-bit constraints.
Also interesting to note is the song for the final level: "Castle Pandemonium" was remixed for re-use in Final Fantasy IX, as well as for Dissidia 012. It just goes to show how great that song was, despite being from such an early game in the series. That makes me wonder what other songs have been remixed and reused through out the series.
Development:
The game was produced very quickly after the success of final Fantasy, and trying to capitalize on the RPG craze that had swept computer gaming in Japan. By this time Square was convinced that RPGs could sell, and within a year the sequel was produced under the game design of Akitoshi Kawazu. He was the man responsible for the different game mechanics, and in a recent interview explains:
Kawazu admits he never expected the players to abuse his system to level up their characters. HE went on to use the same system in the popular SaGa series. Kawazu stayed with Square and worked on many games there, the latest being the Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles games, and he was Executive Producer for Final Fantasy XII.
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Results
As I played the game I found the start to be tedious. I encountered the same enemies over and over and while I could defeat them, they posed little challenge and therefore didn't help to increase my abilities. Was this how the game was designed? I began to look for enemies that would destroy my characters in the hopes that I wouldn't have to resort to other tactics to increase my status scores. In this game your abilities increase after using them, or by taking a serious beating. Ending a battle with low HP or MP is a good way to guarantee that they'll increase. I wanted to get beat up really bad so I could heal and be that much stronger.
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| Airship battles! |
The way to get around this is to beat up your own party members, almost to the point of dying. There is also a cancelling bug that allows you to select a spell, cancel it, and repeat as many times until infinity. This makes the computer believe that you've performed this ability countless time without actually doing it. Both go against the spirit and style of the game, but after playing for a while, there was no other way to really get my levels increased... unless I chose to grind through the game.
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| Easter Egg in FF2: Many NPCs in the first FF said this phrase endlessly. |
On the bright side, there are no equipment restrictions for your characters. I could make any of my characters fight, use magic, or both... so I wasn't limited with how I could play certain characters. The fourth party characters that would be added to the party throughout the game each had their own strengths which made things interesting... a mechanic that would come back in Final Fantasy IV.
I was frustrated by the lack of mobility in this game several times. Unlike other games in the series (including the first) the airship in this game is more of a one-way taxi for a certain part of the game, and final access to the airship is limited to the very end of the game. You do get a ship to cross the ocean, but the way the map is designed means that you will have to cross the entire world to get to where you need to. There is only one Chocobo forest. Lots and lots of walking.
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| At one point in the game you find the now famous Chocobo bird! |
Is it me or are there a serious lack of monsters in this game? It seems like I'm fighting the same ten enemies, with pallet swaps until infinity. Even the first game seemed to have a little more variety. These are just minor complaints I guess. Where are the memorable bosses? Not many in this game, most of the bosses are found in the final two dungeons. The random encounters are almost excessive. I guess they have to be, if you want to level up everything in the game. Which is impossible to a normal human, not cheating the system. Level design once again makes you crawl through mazes that give you the most chance of catching those random encounters. You always have to take the long way.
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| The recurring boss Behemoth makes his debut in FF2. Concept art for this boss was made for FF. |
Then there was the final dungeons. Many floors of twisting mazes, false doors, and boss encounters. Wow. The random encounters suck all of your resources for the final boss fights. It's really hard to conserve your health that long. We're talking three or four random encounters per level, and at ten or twelve levels that makes close to fifty encounters. Really hard! Did I pick a hard version?
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| Creepy zombie angel boss. |
It turns out I was really messing up my equipment, and my characters were taking waaaay too much damage. After some swaps, I was able to get damage under control and survive the ten levels to the end boss. After three rounds... he was dead. Almost anti climactic. Most of the boss fights have been really easy so far in the series with a few exceptions. The dragon bosses and Gigas giants were tougher than the end boss. Oh well.
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| Huge boss. |
The ending unites the four characters from the beginning of the game, but even after all is fine and resolved, Leon admits that because of his choices he cannot stay with the rest of his friends. They object, but in the end agree to allow him to leave on his way. This gives the ending a bittersweet conclusion, and in a way it works really well.
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| End Credits |
Overall I liked this game because it focused on a simple story that had some twists and turns, some NPC deaths (five?) and good music at times. The game would have been better with the traditional experienced based level progression, but I can't fault the designer for trying something different. Complete differences are what make each Final Fantasy game unique, and that has continued for every single game in the series. Still, the game was very challenging and I found myself getting killed off with cheap deaths over and over.
Final Fantasy II, while being the one of the strangest titles in the series, stands out as being one of the most influential games in the series by introducing many recurring themes, story ideas, and game design that would continue throughout the entire franchise. It improved on many aspects of the first game, and combined that with better plot elements to make the game feel more like a story the player could participate in.
Victory!
Worth the trouble? Eh... probably not. Good game? Yes. Definitely. Will I play it again? Not for a long time.
Statistics:
Total Party Deaths: 18. Saves: 55. Approximate Time: 25 hours. NPC deaths: 4. Inn Visits: 53 Ending Gold: 379787
Buy it Here: Final Fantasy II
yikes. typos.
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