Final Fantasy 6 - Final Thoughts
Let's drum up some game stats...
Final Fantasy 6 - Game Stats
Hours Played - 48 Hours.
Final Party Levels - *Since I have an easy way to see all their stats, I'm posting all of them!
- Terra - Level 45
- Locke - Level 47
- Cyan - Level 41
- Shadow - Level 45
- Edgar - Level 43
- Sabin - Level 42
- Celes - Level 46
- Strago - Level 46
- Relm - Level 46
- Setzer - Level 46
- Mog - Level 45
- Gau - Level 45
- Gogo - Level 35
- Umaro - Level 36
Now that...is a lot of characters. As far as the story goes, you don't even HAVE to get Mog, Gogo, or Umaro. They're just nice little bonuses. Although I didn't make much use of the last two...
Anyways, that's a surprisingly low level group if you ask me. Next up, the judgement zone! Usually, I'd just do two parts of gameplay and story, but I think I should start doing at LEAST 3 points with the 3rd point being characters. Why? Because I have a feeling that the series (especially for ones I haven't played) will start making me like characters over the story and such. Anyways...ON TO THE REVIEW!
I'll start things by going over the basic bit of story. The game opens with the basic idea of "giant evil empire group is trying to take over everybody else." That works for a bit, but it's also REALLY close to the idea of what Final Fantasy 2 had for a story. Of course, it starts to evolve past that and grows into something more.
It also jumped on the idea of magic and technology. It's the first of several to have a co-existing world of magic and technology (airships don't count...they're magic or something). It definitely gets more interesting after the world ends. At that point, you start dealing with trying to recollect everybody and get them aimed at saving the world. Many of them are kinda hard to find OR are reluctant to rejoin (namely Terra). It's kind of hard to go on story alone without getting it mixed in with the characters (which I'm doing next). Overall, it's a good story, but the game seems to want to focus more on characters. I am glad that they went away from crystals though. Magic Gods and a crazed clown man with a ridiculous look and attitude. It's good stuff. Again, I enjoyed the story, but this game is more about the characters when it comes down to it. So...let's start with them next!
First and foremost, FF4 really started the trend of making it more about the characters, but FF6 definitely steps it up a notch. Not everybody gets a lot of spotlight, but they all get a little something before it's all said and done. Minus some of the lesser involved characters, each person has their own story and background. You get to hear about most of them. All of them are fairly typical character builds, but they all do really touch down on a certain level. However, sometimes I just like a simple and straightforward fun character like Gau. He doesn't really care about any of the things going on. He's just hanging out with his friends as far as he cares. If I had to pick favorite characters from 6...I'd probably say the following in no particular order: Gau, Shadow, Setzer, and Edgar. Gau is definitely up there. I just wish I'd taken the time to get more of his Rages, but damn that would have extended my time. Of course, he also has very little to his story from what I can tell. If you can explore it, I missed/messed it up somehow. Regardless, it's a lovable bunch of characters and kinda hard to really hate any of them. It's also the largest group of characters in all the Final Fantasy titles at 14! Great characters and almost worth playing for them alone! Next up, the gameplay!
Now, as for game play, it's really not super different from previous titles. They use the ATB system with waiting and bars and such. The level system is pretty straight forward. The real kickers in this game are the magicite and special abilities.
Magicite is used throughout the game to learn magic. You don't get it until around 10-12 hours in, but once you do, it's basically awesome from there. Everybody can learn all the spells with the right amount of time and patience. The only problem I'd have with it is how long it can take to learn some. I understand why something like Meteor or Ultima needs to be learned at a 1x rate, but why the hell should Drain be that slow? 3/4ths of my characters didn't have Drain because it took too long to learn. It's not really a necessary spell, but it also shouldn't be a 1x rate spell. Outside of that and a few others, it was all alright. Kind of a bummer if you miss any magicite though...Because then you miss out on entire spells! None of them ever really become "unattainable", but it sucks to not have them all. Also the whole Odin to Raiden thing kinda just irks me. I want both! Not one or the other. I've said enough about Magic though. It's a good system overall, but now we need to talk about the special abilities.
Every character has a Special Ability. From Sabin's Blitz ability to Shadow's Throw and even Gau's Rages, all of the special abilities are unique and useful...almost. The special abilities would probably be my only real complaint about FF6. First off, the overall usefulness of some versus others. Edgar's Tools and Sabin's Blitzs easily make everybody else's ability suck. They are the most powerful with the least amount of cost. On the other end of the spectrum are the not quite as useful abilities. Now, saying they "aren't useful" is somewhat of a lie. Everybody's ability has a use at some point, but what I meant to say is that some of them lose that use as time goes by OR that they feel pointless to do. Terra's initial ability is magic, but that changes to Morph after the plot twist. Celes's Runic is a fantastic ability, but it can also screw you over if you aren't careful. Runic absorbs your magic if you don't time it right. Mog's Dance ability seemed to fail more often than succeed, and even when succeeding, it really didn't turn any battle tides for me. Three of the fourteen are some sort of Blue Mage thing. Strago's Lores, Relm's Sketch, and Gau's Rages are all just slightly differing forms of Blue Magic. They each act differently, but they do the same thing at the end of the day...monster powers. I think the biggest problem with abilities is they are unlimited. Nothing keeps you from just doing them constantly. Why attack normally with Sabin when his Blitzs are better? Why use magic when Tools are superior? (minus super spells) I have a feeling that the "unlimited" aspect of special abilities are the core reason that the next title instigated the Limit Break thing. (I'll explain in the first post of FF7...if you don't already know). Anyways, special abilities...cool but overpowered.
To sum up game play, it's fun and can be challenging. Somtimes TOO challenging, but I'm not going to get into it. Lots of new little things to keep it fresh, but it's still the same old gameplay. Now let's just wrap this up in a final paragraph of sorts.
Final Fantasy 6 is a great Final Fantasy. Is it the best? I don't know yet. Is it my favorite? No. Would I suggest you play it? Highly! The game plays really well, the graphics are good for their age, the story isn't too shabby, lots of great characters to learn about, and just a good experience all around. I'd definitely place a "play" sticker on a box that represented Final Fantasy 6. I know that I have more or less said that they are all worth playing so far, but they honestly are! (If you enjoy RPGs...if you don't, why are you reading this?) So...next up is the famous Final Fantasy 7. For the longest time, it was adored as "TEH BEST FINAL FANTASIES EVAAAR!" I'll admit it is a good game, but I wouldn't say "the best" really. However, maybe I'll change my mind in the NEXT EPISODE OF RECURRING FANTASY! TUNE IN TO FIND OUT!
~May the Crystals Guide Me~
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