The first Final Fantasy blew my mind. Maybe it’s because it’s the first Final Fantasy game I’ve ever played, maybe it’s because it’s the first RPG I’ve played on the NES that physically shows your characters fighting the enemy rather than using the classic 1st-person view, maybe it’s because of that stupid flying boat I’m now obsessed with. Who knows. But what I do know, is that Final Fantasy I is a fucking AWESOME game that has withstood the sands of time beautifully. Throughout this review, I will be comparing Final Fantasy with other NES RPGs I have played, which is just Dragon Warrior (1986/1989) and MOTHER (1989).
I played the game on my NES and had absolutely no issues with lack of save points, enemy/boss difficulty, and getting around to figure out what to do next. The manual for Final Fantasy 1 is insanely kind, going above and beyond what the already jampacked manuals for the time usually had. Again, the manual, not the guidebook, gives the player information for where to go until you discover the airship. That’s pretty much the end game, with help knowing the best weapons and places to go until that point. The manual of course also includes all the information for enemy, weapon, and armor stats, and a map of the whole area to boot. Final Fantasy gameplay wise is also just very, very player-friendly, with little need to ever grind if you focus on destroying every group you run into. In fact, I would argue you will quickly become OVERpowered if you focus on eliminating everyone you run into. With Dragon Warrior and MOTHER, I definitely had to put aside time just to level up between bosses, while Final Fantasy seemed to always lead me to be just the right level at just the right time, even when running away from a lot of the bigger groups.
Final Fantasy is a gorgeous game on the NES, even including cutscenes and a credit roll, something I don’t think I’ve ever seen on a 3rd-generation game (though I still have lots to check-out!). The music is really impressive too, with a very large variety that I can think back on fondly (though my wife eventually had me mute the TV because she couldn’t stand it lmao). I loved all the effort put into both the visuals and music in this game, and appreciated even the little things we might not think much about today, such as being able to change weapons and visibly see your change (I love the Coral Sword for being a bright hot pink hehe), the cute little dance after beating an enemy, large and varied groups of monsters to fight against, and the awesome and varied transportation you unlock throughout that only helps you move faster and faster! That’s what’s great about the original Final Fantasy, it really feels like a great video game conversion of DND. You pick who you want in your party, get to name them, create little stories in your head, and play them through a fairly open story that you can adjust to fit in a way you may prefer. My party had two fighters, a thief, and a red mage. I drew my own interpretations of them which you can see here!
My biggest complaint with Final Fantasy is that a bunch of the spells and magic are just plain broken in the game, so stuff like mages not being able to raise their intelligence and certain spells simply not working was a bit frustrating, but I heard they fixed that in later adaptations, so that’s good! Sadly, it did affect my playthrough, so I gotta dock some points towards the game for that as it was a bit annoying, and had me restart from my original team of fighter, thief, white mage, and black mage.
I feel there’s so much more I could say about Final Fantasy I, but I feel I’ve already rambled enough. It’s truly a wonderful experience and has so many fun visual elements that I felt were missing in Dragon Warrior and MOTHER. MOTHER came out after Final Fantasy I, and I’ve never played Dragon Quest/Warrior II though which is a NES/Famicom RPG with a party system that came out a year or so before Final Fantasy I, so that might be a more fair comparison, but oh well! This is the experience I have so my review is going to play off of that! If you’re looking for a 3rd-gen RPG to get started with, Final Fantasy I has to be the most player friendly I’ve ever played, and I can’t recommend it enough!
4.5/5
I played the game on my NES and had absolutely no issues with lack of save points, enemy/boss difficulty, and getting around to figure out what to do next. The manual for Final Fantasy 1 is insanely kind, going above and beyond what the already jampacked manuals for the time usually had. Again, the manual, not the guidebook, gives the player information for where to go until you discover the airship. That’s pretty much the end game, with help knowing the best weapons and places to go until that point. The manual of course also includes all the information for enemy, weapon, and armor stats, and a map of the whole area to boot. Final Fantasy gameplay wise is also just very, very player-friendly, with little need to ever grind if you focus on destroying every group you run into. In fact, I would argue you will quickly become OVERpowered if you focus on eliminating everyone you run into. With Dragon Warrior and MOTHER, I definitely had to put aside time just to level up between bosses, while Final Fantasy seemed to always lead me to be just the right level at just the right time, even when running away from a lot of the bigger groups.
Final Fantasy is a gorgeous game on the NES, even including cutscenes and a credit roll, something I don’t think I’ve ever seen on a 3rd-generation game (though I still have lots to check-out!). The music is really impressive too, with a very large variety that I can think back on fondly (though my wife eventually had me mute the TV because she couldn’t stand it lmao). I loved all the effort put into both the visuals and music in this game, and appreciated even the little things we might not think much about today, such as being able to change weapons and visibly see your change (I love the Coral Sword for being a bright hot pink hehe), the cute little dance after beating an enemy, large and varied groups of monsters to fight against, and the awesome and varied transportation you unlock throughout that only helps you move faster and faster! That’s what’s great about the original Final Fantasy, it really feels like a great video game conversion of DND. You pick who you want in your party, get to name them, create little stories in your head, and play them through a fairly open story that you can adjust to fit in a way you may prefer. My party had two fighters, a thief, and a red mage. I drew my own interpretations of them which you can see here!
My biggest complaint with Final Fantasy is that a bunch of the spells and magic are just plain broken in the game, so stuff like mages not being able to raise their intelligence and certain spells simply not working was a bit frustrating, but I heard they fixed that in later adaptations, so that’s good! Sadly, it did affect my playthrough, so I gotta dock some points towards the game for that as it was a bit annoying, and had me restart from my original team of fighter, thief, white mage, and black mage.
I feel there’s so much more I could say about Final Fantasy I, but I feel I’ve already rambled enough. It’s truly a wonderful experience and has so many fun visual elements that I felt were missing in Dragon Warrior and MOTHER. MOTHER came out after Final Fantasy I, and I’ve never played Dragon Quest/Warrior II though which is a NES/Famicom RPG with a party system that came out a year or so before Final Fantasy I, so that might be a more fair comparison, but oh well! This is the experience I have so my review is going to play off of that! If you’re looking for a 3rd-gen RPG to get started with, Final Fantasy I has to be the most player friendly I’ve ever played, and I can’t recommend it enough!
4.5/5
11 Comments
This was very much my game as a kid; it was the only one in our small NES library that nobody else in my family was into (except my little bro who was dutifully obsessed with everything that I liked). It's funny you mention the music because just yesterday I was praising the Black Mages' interpretation of Matoya's Cave. I still had the link in my paste history haha! Your thoughts on the vehicles are so spot on, too; even to this day there are very few examples of progression in games that feel as substantial and world-changing to me as going from foot to boat to canoe to airship; to me it's the gold standard in making me feel meaningfully powerful and having mastery over the world map.
Great review and I love your art! My wife is an artist too <3 Somehow I totally forgot about the thief's bright blue hair haha you make them such a cute emo kid I love it.
Great review and I love your art! My wife is an artist too <3 Somehow I totally forgot about the thief's bright blue hair haha you make them such a cute emo kid I love it.
@wzrdlovingwzrd @cowboyjosh I’m so glad to hear so many other positive stories of experiencing FFI - its honestly so special but can be a bit hard to explain!! Im so glad to see others relate ❤️
ff1 rules, awesome review! also def recommend checking out dq2 if you aren't planning to already, it's pretty rough but i think it's a cool ass experience to have at least once
also like WzrdLovingWzrd reiterated upon, the character choice and room for player expression is def what made the game for me as well. my best friend would always name her parties after our friend group, and for me playing ff1 as a teenager created my lifelong obsession with playing monks in RPGs (at first i mostly just loved them for not having to worry about weapons and armor, but then just grew to love them aesthetically as well lol)
also like WzrdLovingWzrd reiterated upon, the character choice and room for player expression is def what made the game for me as well. my best friend would always name her parties after our friend group, and for me playing ff1 as a teenager created my lifelong obsession with playing monks in RPGs (at first i mostly just loved them for not having to worry about weapons and armor, but then just grew to love them aesthetically as well lol)
Oh wow I never knew the manual contained so much information! I always thought my first playthrough was "tainted" in some way since I first played the pixel remaster version which includes things such as dungeon maps but apparently that is stuff I'm supposed to have from the manual anyway!
Reading through this makes me wonder what you'd think of Phantasy Star since I stumbled on this review while playing it, feels like a better Dragon Quest II so far and like one of the finer JRPGs of that age (it came out the same year as Dragon Quest II and Final Fantasy: 2 days after Final Fantasy in fact!) at least when playing through the Sega Ages version.
Love seeing your drawn interpretation of the characters! Reminds me of mid-2000s internet.
Love seeing your drawn interpretation of the characters! Reminds me of mid-2000s internet.
@frozenroy I’m really curious about starting Phantasy Star, it looks super up my alley - thanks for the recommendation!
So glad you had a blast I can’t wait for you to get to my fav games in the series
I'm actually really surprised at how high you rated this one. I've only played FF1 after already playing a half dozen of the later games, so this review is making me wish I could go in blind without the expectations set by the games that followed it lol
@handsomezack its a really really good NES rpg, with large emphasis on the NES part. I can understand that being a hard thing to get past when even just one console generation later (SNES) rpgs are SUCH a step up. Things like your character hitting no one when trying to attack an enemy that already got defeated for example is annoying but i guess i went in expecting that annoying stuff already with NES rpgs because of Mother. Going in blind definitely helps tho i agree!! Its why i decided to play them in chronological release order xD
Yeah Dalaamclouds you nailed it in your last comment; FWIW @handsomezack when I played this the only other RPG I had ever played was Dragon Warrior; by that standard it was incredible.
WzrdLovingWzrd
3 months ago