Squeenix Rate your Final Fantasy

[bonescraper]

Shit Tier
Final Fantasy franchise

 

[Abu Antar]

God Tier
FF12

Some people really like shitty, single player MMOs, I guess.

Other people like games with great art, exploration, boss fights, good story and writing. If I wanted to play a MMO, I'd play a MMO.

 

[Gozma]

I need to try 12 again at some point now that MMOs are dying and I don't feel like anything neighboring an MMO element is a shit needle under my fingernail

 

[Jasede]

This is a nostalgic rating, not a serious one. I can explain if you want but I am busy right now.


God Tier
4, 5, 6

Top Tier
3, 8, 9 (8 if you consider Rinoa = Ultimecia canon)

Mid Tier
1, 7, 12

Low Tier
2, 10

Shit Tier
8 (if you don't believe in Rinoa = Ultimecia -yeah, it's that big of a difference), 13

 

[Tehdagah]

FFIX is boring and I suspect that the reason why it's so praised by FF fans is simply because the game is a "return to the roots" thing. Similary, Resident Evil Revelations is praised among RE fans, despite being a shit game.

The game is like FFV, but filled with massive loadings and without any interesting gameplay mechanic.

 

[MicoSelva]

God Tier
Final Fantasy IV - my favourite, because it was a simple story with cool characters and I was in the right age to appreciate it when I played it

Top Tier
Final Fantasy VI - Kefka is an overrated villain, but the game is really good
Final Fantasy IX - my favourite of the PSX era

Mid Tier
Final Fantasy VII - finished it, but not a huge fan
Final Fantasy I - too grindy for my taste, but I can appreciate it for what it was back in the day

Low Tier
Final Fantasy VIII - didn't like it, gave up after a few hours

----------------
I haven't played any others, but from what I've seen in Spoony's reviews, I would probably file most of the FFs after IX under Shit Tier.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

God Tier
FFT

Top Tier
FF7
FF8
FF10
FF13
FF13-2

Mid Tier
FF1
FF3
FF5

Low Tier
FF4
FF6
FF9
FF10-2

Shit Tier
FF12

I like this series for its visual spectacles, plots, and combat.

Every time it tries to make exploration and free roaming a part of the experience, it falls flat for me. Linear is good when polished setpieces are your strong point.

The plots are good, but the writing tends to be a bit on the juvenile side.

 

[Night Goat]

Top Tier
3, 8, 9 (8 if you consider Rinoa = Ultimecia canon)

Shit Tier
8 (if you don't believe in Rinoa = Ultimecia -yeah, it's that big of a difference), 13

I prefer the Squall is dead canon.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Top Tier
3, 8, 9 (8 if you consider Rinoa = Ultimecia canon)

Shit Tier
8 (if you don't believe in Rinoa = Ultimecia -yeah, it's that big of a difference), 13

I prefer the Squall is dead canon.

tl;dr the Ultimate fedora turbo-dweeb story?

 

[Blackguard]

Only ever completed two FF games 7 and 10. Both were pretty decent I guess.

 

[Delterius]

Top Tier
3, 8, 9 (8 if you consider Rinoa = Ultimecia canon)

Shit Tier
8 (if you don't believe in Rinoa = Ultimecia -yeah, it's that big of a difference), 13

I prefer the Squall is dead canon.

tl;dr the Ultimate fedora turbo-dweeb story?

Its much more than that. By the machinations of fandumb and all cosmic rights to insanity, the story of Final Fantasy 8 had reached a level never seen again until the...

Spoiler

Indoctrination Theory itself.

Difference being one comes from a genuine belief that the story is really good. And the other from a genuine belief that the story couldn't possibly be so bad.

 

[throwaway]

I've only played 6 but I found it a flaming POS. Serious question 1. What exactly do you people like about it(/them)? 2. How exactly do you reconcile that taste with criticising any single non unplayable bugfest RPG?

 

[Jasede]

Trying too hard.

 

[Shaewaroz]

God Tier
FF VI
FF VII

Top Tier
FF XII
FFT

Mid Tier
FF IV
FF V
FF X
FF I

Low Tier
FF VIII
FF IX

Shit Tier
FF XIII

 

[Zetor]

Of the ones I played...

God:
none

Top:
FF6 (probably my favorite JRPG of all time)
FFT (pretty damn good srpg, even with all the broken stuff)

Mid:
FF8 (as shitty as the plot and the characters are, SOME of the design choices really resonate with me)
FF5 (Job system, though not as enjoyable as in FFT)

Low:
FF7 (I find it a lot less interesting than FF8, even with all its faults)
FF4 (only played the android version... didn't find it particularly good/memorable)
FF9 (something about the combat annoyed me. Also not a fan of the characters)

Shit:
FF12 (I stopped playing at around the third map. Everything about this game feels wrong somehow...)

 

[Jason Liang]

Triple Triad is God Tier by itself

 

[GarfunkeL]

Good ones would be VI, V and IV.

Mediocre ones would be the I-III and IX and Mystic Quest.

Rest is shit.

 

[Jaesun]

All this Final Fantasy VIII HATE surely will anger Volourn

 

[Abu Antar]

VIII had interesting ideas but the story and characters were FFVII rejects. Edea and some other stuff were meant to be in VII.

 

[Jason Liang]

I just heard Eyes on Me while passing by a store on my way home (I'm living in China).

FF8 broke many jRPG conventions, which some love and some hate. Its visionary production values influenced all the major RPGs and console games that came after it. Just began replaying the steam release last week and I was reminded how addictive the first disc was. I would bet among RPGs it has one of the highest percentage of completed playthroughs.

FF8 treated random combat and grinding like a nearly completely optional side game. The primary gameplay is roleplaying the story itself, and combat and triple triad are almost optional distractions.

Because FF8 was so meta and broke so many conventions, I think it can't be judged by conventional standards of what a RPG is. But it innovated the gaming industry, brought a really new gaming experience, and its blueprint is in the DNA of the current generation of major game production, especially console games. VII sold a lot of playstations, but VIII changed all of gaming.

Oh and Squall is dead makes a lot of sense!

 

[GarfunkeL]

I know I just flattered you in the Shadowrun thread for your sharp analysis but based on your delusion that FF8 was groundbreaking and changed gaming, I take it back, you're an idiot.

 

[Ninjerk]

It's like he's trying to escape notice by saying something insightful and then something asinine.

 

[Jason Liang]

Maybe it's a personal thing, and I was the right age when it came out. I remember playing it then, back then without internet walkthroughs to spoil the story and gameplay, and the game held up and threw gorgeous cut scenes and gameplay curveballs at me, from the train sequence to the wtf-is-going-on Laguna flashback scenes, all the way until the end. By influential, I don't mean gameplay-wise, but rather how it incorporated cinema and music and was marketed to appeal to a maturing gaming demographic. It was influential in its scale of production values, and not just on the approach of US game designers but of Japanese and Korean game designers.

The more I think about what I wrote, the more it's apparent that FF8 is not a RPG but a plot-driven adventure game (like Sierra) with mostly optional RPG and card game side games. My experience of FF8 was like a drug, or a novel that you can't put down, or an engrossing TV show- I couldn't stop playing until the end of the first disc, and I finished the whole game in less than a week- and for that week I didn't care about anything other than playing that game. And then the game ended and I was released. And maybe that's it's most enduring virtue- the game ends at just the right point.

Before FF8, certainly books and TV could enthrall, but what I mean is that FF8 showed that video games could do it in the same way that TV and books could, and not the way that addictive video games made themselves addictive (not in the "I played Pong/ Pac Man/ QBert/ Tetris/ Dragon Warrior/ Pokemon/ Minesweeper/ Diablo for 8 hours!" way). I wont deny that there were a few games like that before- Chrystalis and original Zelda come to mind. I should also mention Ocarina of Time; FF8 went into production in 1997; Ocarina of Time came out November 1998 and FF8 came out February 1999 (wiki'd). I think Ocarina of Time was equally successfully at being enthralling- but FF8 gave future game designers a blueprint of how ANY game, not just a Zelda game, could through production be made an enthralling experience.

And I think this is the right model to think about this game, because the traditional addictive video game needs challenge to get someone to keep playing. Even for Ocarina of Time, you are playing for the satisfaction, the "high", of beating a temple or boss or challenge, of advancing, or the bourgeois habit of feeling good because "I'm getting better." I loved playing Ocarina of Time, and like FF8, it ended at the right point; but I would never desire to play Ocarina of Time again unless there was a new "challenge" to it. That's very different from the desire to passively watch a movie again, or read a book again. Playing FF8 steam build again last week was like watching a movie or book again, for recalling the experience of being enthralled alone.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Yeah, FF4 and FF6 had that effect on me, as did CT. Which is why I replay them every few years. Same as with some Gold Box and Infinity Engine games and original UFO and JA2 and few others.

However, FF8 definitely did not have that effect on me. I admit that I gave both 7 and 8 and 9 an honest try. I really tried to like them. But I couldn't. Most of the characters were annoying, the plots were convoluted messes that tried to be high brow psychoanalysis but ended being as "smart" as the fucking Star Trek technobabble bullshit. The main protagonists in both 7 and 8 are insufferable retards and I wanted to kill them both. The constant loading between every battle grated my nerves very quickly, accustomed as I was to the very quick loading time on SNES and this wasn't helped that I was forced to watch the loathsome retards wave their arms in the air for 20 seconds AT THE END OF EVERY FUCKING BATTLE and we all know how many battles there are in a typical FF game. Nine tried to go back in time and had far more tolerable characters but it still retained so many stupid retardations from 7 and 8 and had the same fucking loading time issues and switch CD's for another stupid fucking continent that looks just as ugly as the SNES world map looked except I have to load it from another CD-ROM and wait minutes. Only so that I'm stuck in some asinine bullshit conversation for the next twenty minutes that again tries too fucking hard to be either funny or deep and usually fails at both. And 9 is just as fucking guilty of this as 7 and 8.

Of course, 10 and everything that came after took the cake by making everything EVEN MORE GODDAMN AWFUL but that doesn't justify the PSone shits. Which is why I cannot fathom when gamers in the thirties say that they were only disappointed with 13 and only partially or whatever fucking Stockholm Syndrome cognitive dissonance bullshit lies they tell themselves to justify spending 60 moneys on utter garbage - when they probably played the PS2 and PS and possibly even SNES or NES games.

Sure, some of the issues that became glaring flaws in later games were already present in 6, like each character was "unique" in their skills and capabilities and you couldn't switch their jobs like in 5 and you were limited in equipment choices than you were in 4 but the Esper-Magic system was a great equalizer and permitted limited character customization when combined with Relics. And you had those aggravating "stuck in a place until you randomly stumble on the one NPC you need to talk to, to get the plot moving again" moments but they weren't that frequent - and there were no cutscenes and the monologues were over fairly quickly. Not to mention that you could set text speed on maximum and keep A pressed and it would pretty much skip over all shit.

But nooo, my mysterious and troubled swordsman! That's what gets the juices flowing, with the unrequited love pining after his broody dark menace! The only good thing that came out of them is the torrent of Tifa porn that Japs have spewed out. 8 didn't even manage to produce nerd-sex symbol. That's how pathetic game it is.

No offence if you own a body pillow with one of the bitches from 8 on it.

 

[Jason Liang]

I've played through FF8 twice; the first time when it first came out, and the second time a few years ago when I read the Squall is Dead theory and wanted to see if it held water (it actually does).

The first playthrough I played it like a traditional rpg and I had mixed feelings about it; enthralled but I hated everything about the moronic junction system. My second playthrough resolved those feelings and made me really appreciate it. First I played it on PC so no load times, and second I used the no-encounter GF-ability so no stupid victory animations. And what the game ends up being is an adventure game, like Myst without the insanely difficult puzzles. Like taking what made Myst special and getting rid of the "gameplay" that made Myst frustrating. FF8 is just a simple adventure game with enthralling world building and a linear plot to progress through that has very light puzzles that anyone can finish without consulting a walkthrough.

Gold Box, IE and JA2 are enthralling game experiences, and landmark games, but surely you don't replay them in the exact same way each time? You give yourself a new challenge or try new content or try a new strategy or explore a new area. FF8 enthralls with its production, completely separate from gameplay. The story in FF8 is completely linear, railroaded, no C&C, even moreso than BG2. If FF8 lacked its production value, there would be no reason to replay it, just like a book poorly written would not be reread for pleasure even if it contained great ideas.

That's why I think FF8 should be compared to Ocarina of Time. Most would argue that Ocarina of Time is a better game. But are games today more like Ocarina of Time or more like FF8, for how they try to design the experience? For me its pretty clear that they are better at copying what worked in FF8. Most games today may try to imitate Ocarina's gameplay but they fail, but they imitate FF8's production value and cinematic style and succeed. That's what I meant by FF8 being influential and changed gaming. Bioshock and Last of Us and countless other games of this and the previous generation don't owe their gameplay to FF8, but they are following FF8's formula in terms of production and totality.

If traditional games and rpg's are cheap and exploitative because they pander to bourgeois values (creating player pleasure by rewarding them for accomplishing easy, simple and mindless tasks), perhaps FF8 and the games influenced by it can also be criticized for being fascistic in their totality (creating player pleasure by taking away choice and reducing the player to a passive spectator, in this way movies and books also fall easily into fascism, cinema especially guilty of using music to dictate the audience's emotional response). These games strip away a player's individuality, subjectivity and creativity. If you value those things in a game (and that's what is pleasurable about sandbox games) you probably wouldn't enjoy FF8 (like you said, you feel like you are being forced to endure the moronic characters. I guess at least BG2 gives you a larger choice of NPCs to party with, and your main character is a blank canvas. That's also probably why Imoen gets so much hate, when BG2 players feel like they are forced to take her for story purposes). Different pleasures. FF8 has a beautifully crafted world but it's not one that you can fill with your own characters. Fascism in a nutshell so it doesn't quite escape the bourgeois trap.

I just read this Edge article on FF8, it's got great insight into what works in FF8: http://www.edge-online.com/features/time-extend-final-fantasy-viii/