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Final Fantasy VI
Flying Mullet's Review
- Flying Mullet
Flying Mullet's Review
Back in April (2004), Final Fantasy VI celebrated its tenth birthday. To commemorate the event I decided to sit down and play through my favorite Final Fantasy for the umpteenth time to see how it has held up to the test of time. Now that I've completed yet another adventure through the World of Balance and World of Ruin I'm reporting how that experience went.
| Story I still love the story. It's simple and yet it has enough content to keep you entertained. One of my problems with today's RPGs is that they try so hard to keep away from the classic RPG clichés that the story becomes hard to follow, never seems to flow quite right and always has a plot hole or two that internet denizens debate for endless hours on many message boards and forums. I have no problem with the standard RPG formula of taking a group of adventurers through hardships and mishaps just for a chance to pummel some being intent on world domination or destruction. That all being said the story of Final Fantasy VI is simple and fun, "fun" being the key word for me. If a story isn't fun then the game isn't worth my time. I don't play video games to learn of the socio-economic strife that the inhabitants of its world are facing or to have a life-changing experience behind the controller and in front of the television. Video games are like books. They should be fun and make you want to play, which Final Fantasy does. I can take up the game at any part of the story and happily play for a few hours. The other aspect of the story that I absolutely love is that it is so open-ended. I'm a side-quest junkie, and Final Fantasy VI has enough side-quests for me to get my fix. Sometimes I only retrieve half of the characters and other times all of them. But that's hat makes the game so great. Because the story revolves around so many characters it is easy to control the story and make it new and interesting every time through. |
10.0 |
| Characters Many people complain that no character in Final Fantasy VI has good character development or that only a select few do while the rest get shoved into the back row. I like the fact that there is no one central character in Final Fantasy VI. It makes the game better for a couple of reasons. First, I don't like being spoon-fed a character's entire personality. I like getting bits and pieces of a character's personality and story and then filling in the rest with my imagination. That allows me to better connect with the characters makes the game that much more personable and enjoyable. Second, it adds to the replay value. Because there are so many possible party combinations with so many characters every time playing through is new. Every time I play through I try to stick with one or two characters all the way through the game whenever I can and it always brings a new experience and lets my imagination explore how these characters would interact. |
10.0 |
| Gameplay Granted the gameplay is similar to most RPGs in that you select actions in battle, walk around a map and talk to people and check treasure chests, but I truly enjoyed the battle system of Final Fantasy VI because each character has their own ability for use in battle. While some are pretty standard, such as Locke stealing, I enjoyed some of the more creative abilities such as Sabin's Blitz technique, which used Street Fighter-esque controller movements to have Sabin dish out different attacks. Unfortunately to give each character their own ability some of them are sub-par. Waiting for Cyan's SwordTech bar to fill up to the higher levels while getting hammered by enemies isn't very worthwhile, especially when you can dish out a couple of regular attacks or spells in the same amount of time for equal damage. Overall the gameplay is nice and very tight. I never had any problems with the controls and the interface for the game is easy to learn. |
9.5 |
| Graphics Wow, these graphics are still awesome to this day. I personally love bright and cheery graphics. I have no love for today's games that try to be realistic by making their environments dark and boring with lots of gray and brown. Not only do the graphics still excel for a 2D game today but Final Fantasy VI did a great job of taking advantage of the 256 color palate used by the Super Nintendo. Everything in the game looks good and nothing is confusing. In the past, especially with older game systems, graphics had a tend to look confusing as developers tried to do too much with them or try and put objects in the game that are more complex than the system could handle. Not a problem with Final Fantasy VI. Having perfectly rendered graphics just makes this game that much more fun to play through. |
10.0 |
| Music I have heard very few video game soundtracks that can beat, let alone match, Final Fantasy's music. Nubuo Uematsu outdoes himself again with music that sets the mood of each scene in the game beautifully. Often in today's games the music seems out of place; almost as if an afterthought that must be included as gamers expect music. Another problem I notice is that music is often used to set the mood, even if it must force the user to feel that mood; Final Fantasy VI easily side-steps these disasters. The music of Final Fantasy VI blends so well with the story and graphics that you can't help but feel sucked into the game and the story. |
10.0 |
| Overall As you have probably guessed by now, I feel that this game has stood up to the test of time, if not throwing back a few punches of its own. Final Fantasy VI shows that many game developers today are riding on the latest technologies as a crutch to develop their games, hoping that pretty eye-candy and heart-pounding cut-scenes will win over the gamer despite the lack of any redeeming qualities in the game itself, were gameplay, graphics, sound and story all blend beautifully together. Final Fantasy VI has just the right blend of everything to keep the game fresh after a decade of service to gamers, and I look forward to another decade of service. |
9.95 |
- Flying Mullet